When he came home, he was determined to work at one of Manhattan’s elite gyms. There he became obsessed with fitness and got certified as a personal trainer. By the time he was a teenager, he’d lost both parents and ended up spending 10 years in prison for drug trafficking. It’s a path that Guadalupe, 42, traveled himself. His non-profit, A Second U Foundation, helps formerly incarcerated men and women get certified as personal trainers and build careers in the fitness industry. In New York City, Hector Guadalupe aims to help people like Ramsey succeed. By 2017, when he was released, he’d spent more than half his life behind bars. After she passed away when he was 15, he’d fallen in with the wrong crowd. His father had died before he was born and his mother had struggled to make ends meet. Ultimately, nearly half of federal inmates reoffend after being released.įor Ramsey, obstacles were nothing new. Yet, when he was finally released, his chances of success weren’t good.Ī 2018 study by the University of Michigan showed that more than one in four formerly incarcerated individuals can’t find work, and of those who do, 80% earn less than $15,000 in their first year out of prison. “The people that are home, taking care of their family, making a living – those are the people that I wanted to try to be like.”įor the next 12 years, he kept his goal in sight. And I’m like, ‘Damn, I’m here again.’ … I just made a decision that this was the last time.” he said. “I was in a cell by myself and I just had a self-talk. It came when he’d been incarcerated for the fourth time. Joel Ramsey remembers the moment he decided to change his life.
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