Yo, what's good to the evil streets family, y'all already hip we back at it with another installment. Major love to everybody tuning in, all my subscribers and a special acknowledgment to every member holding down the channel. If y'all feeling the content make sure to hit that like and subscribe button. That's what keeps the channel moving forward, which lets me continue delivering these joints to y'all. Every single beat y'all hearing throughout these videos and shorts gets cooked up by yours truly. So if anybody's interested in any of the production y'all catching on this channel, shoot us an email at evil streets media at gmail.com. That goes for anybody looking to push their musical business ventures as well. Reach out and we can work something out together. We started dropping these episodes on Spotify's podcast platform as well. So anybody can just tune in on any device while y'all pushing through traffic or handling business in the streets. Link sitting right there in the description. I'm launching a Patreon as well, where I'll be releasing extended content with more in depth breakdowns. So stay tuned for that. Also anybody looking to just throw support to the channel in general, y'all can send a single dollar or a million dollars to our cash app, Evil Streets TV. Every cent that gets donated goes straight back into the channel. Make sure to drop a comment if you do so. I can acknowledge you on the next video. Aight, I've kept y'all waiting long enough. Let's dive into this gangster business. Enjoy the presentation.
Harvey Weasanton emerged from a small one-story dwelling on 11th Avenue right there in the Lake Marit section of East Oakland. Modest beginnings, but that block bred toughness. He started hitting the books early at Franklin Elementary, then transitioned over to Roosevelt Jr. High. That institution man, Roosevelt was pure bedlam. Crazy hallways, chaotic lunchrooms, no shortage of beatdowns getting distributed. That's where Harvey connected with the Momo family. Even though they represented two separate neighborhoods, they belonged to the same school district. So territorial lines got blurred and relationships got forged. Harvey was a large individual, even back in those days. Had them hands for real. Solid, broad and prepared to throw down. He wasn't just elevated, he was thick, and that frame came with fists. The cats from over on 23rd Avenue, they had no option but to acknowledge it. Information spread quick. Harvey would knock your head off before homeroom during recess and right after the bell rang, no pause. Once high school arrived, Harvey channeled that aggression to the gridiron and strapped on equipment. Football felt natural. He enjoyed hitting people legally. And by freshman year, he was already six foot five and weighing in over two hundred pounds easy. Coaches were loving him. The newspaper started documenting his moves. The city started recognizing him. They started calling him big harv. Some just referred to him as H. Either way, when he appeared, people moved accordingly.
After graduation, Harv started posted up heavy on 23rd with McMot. What began as hanging out transformed into operations. First some muscle work, then collections. Cats that owed currency knew the deal. Pay what you owe or catch them hands. Harv functioned like a repo man for narcotic debts. Only difference was he didn't take your vehicle, he took your soul. And if the situation called for it, yeah, he'd bust that hammer too. Harv wasn't in it for the attention. He was genuinely about that business. Eventually circumstances shifted. Harv separated from the momo's and headed back to 11th Avenue to establish his own operation. He had some currency stacked from his period running with Mick and started envisioning bigger. Heroin was declining and crack, that was the new phenomenon. Crack locations started emerging all throughout Oakland flipping stacks daily. Harv understood what time it was. A physician had even given testimony to Congress back in 79 stating UCLA was already recording crack in the Bay by 1974. But it didn't really start flooding the blocks until around 82 when freebasing transformed into cooking it up with baking soda and water.
At first his section wasn't really active like that. It was peaceful. Predominantly Asians maintaining the neighborhood with career town a couple blocks down on East 12th. But the geography was optimal, walking distance to downtown Laney College and Lake Merit. So Harv executed moves. He assembled a squad that was straight pressure. Grabbed shooters from his section and recruited enforcers from West Oakland's 24th Village to him. No vulnerable spots in this lineup. His inner circle, all them boys had aliases like credit cards, master charge, big visa and payroll. Then there was Merck Man, Killer Kev and Fat Dave. Fat Dave was a complete problem. Short, heavy, light complexioned with a demon tattooed across his back. The cat was off the chain. Kidnapper, robber, straight terror. He touched down in East Oakland like a ticking explosive, fresh out of West Oakland. Then there was the younger squad. Shawnee Boe, Critty Boe, Buck, Ant Lane, Black Ray Ray, Daddy Boe, Angelo and Davey D, Harv's blood nephew. Young wolves wild with it. Loyalty arrived with a payment and a purpose. Take what's yours or take what isn't. Didn't matter who you were or how tough you believed you were. If you were in the path, you were getting steamrolled.
At first Harv didn't even have a designation for the crew. All he knew was 11th Avenue was headquarters and the block was loud. But it didn't stop there. They ran through East Oakland like a hurricane. No label, no logo, just straight terror and force. And every operation they executed was authorized by big Harv. Harv and his squad started conquering territory like it was a board game with no regulations. Their first target, Sobrante Park. They attempted to arrive heavy, deep and hostile, prepared to lay the hammer down. But the Sobrante boys weren't no pushovers. They stood firm and gave Harv's crew all the conflict they were searching for. A few bodies ended up laid out and harv and them had to pull back. It was a defeat, but it didn't slow them down. They regrouped and proceeded forward. Next destination the dirt road, 99th and Plymouth. A grimy stretch, one block of dusty, unpaved concrete recognized in the city as the Big Rock. This location had background. It was Oakland's first genuine crack gold mine and some serious names emerged from that soil. TB, AB, AF, Burley Moe, Fatcrag, Jaren, Reston Peace, Jed and Kiki. Soon as Harv caught information of how thick the currency was down there, he dispatched Fat Dave and a few others to press the situation. They arrived loud with them weapons barking. When the smoke settled, bodies were stretched and the dirt road had a new landlord.
From that moment on, Harv Squad was recognized across the city as Funktown USA. That designation hit different. Funk meant conflict, drama and Harv's team welcomed it with open arms. They weren't just a crew, they were a movement. They'd funk with anybody, anywhere, anytime. No invitations, just invasion. They started throwing up their set using their hands. Index and pinky fingers elevated, middle ones pressed down by the thumb, representing 11th Avenue to the fullest. Their slogan, Funkardye, and they meant it. Walnut Street was next. Right around the corner from the dirt road and Harv had plans for it. Killakev took leadership on that mission thanks to his connection, a dope fiend female named Gilda who had a residence on the block. Walnut was four blocks long extending from 98th to 102nd. The young cats over there had the block operating but no structure, just wild hustling with no genuine direction. So Funktown stepped in. When they arrived, they jumped out with full pressure. Fat Dave led the assault with a 357 long nose, what he called his Joker gun. He stepped straight to the first cat he saw, struck him with the steel and pulled the trigger in one motion. Barrel exploded in the kid's ear like a firecracker. Dave screamed, break yourself bitch. While the remainder of the crew was positioned with 12 gauge shotties controlling the crowd. They stripped everybody but naked, cleaned out their pockets, dope, jewelry, currency, and peeled off like nothing occurred. Just like that, Walnut was under new management.
From there, they started expanding. Funktown began swallowing blocks whole. 51st Avenue flipped and got renamed 5, 1 Funk. Then there was 82nd and olive. Deadybo, one of Harves Young Enforcers, transformed that spot into a full blown heroin empire. The expansion continued relentlessly through the mid-eighties. International Boulevard fell under Funktown control. Then Seminary, then 98th Avenue. They were moving like a takeover, a systematic dismantling of every independent operation in their path. Harv's name was ringing through Oakland like a bell nobody could silence. The money was flowing in torrents. Stacks upon stacks of currency piling up in houses across East Oakland. Harv was counting money in amounts he never dreamed about. Hundred thousand dollar days became routine. The crew was moving weight that would make regional traffickers jealous. Cocaine, heroin, crack, all of it flooded through their network. But with the money came the heat.
Federal agents started watching. Local narcotics started building cases. Informants were being cultivated on the inside of Funktown's operation. The indictment came down in 1989. Harv got caught up in the sweep along with most of his inner circle. Murder charges, drug trafficking, conspiracy, the charges stacked high. Harv ended up doing a fourteen year stretch in the federal system. Some of his youngstas got even worse. The crew that once owned the streets was now scattered across the prison system. Fat Dave got life. Killer Kev caught a murder beef that stuck. The empire they built in less than a decade crumbled in a matter of weeks. But the impact Funktown USA left on Oakland's streets was permanent. They changed the game, restructured how crews moved, and showed that organization and violence mixed together could control entire sections of a city. When Harv touched down from the pen in 2003, East Oakland had transformed. The crack epidemic had cooled. The streets had new kings. But the legend of Funktown never faded. Harv eventually settled into a quieter life, but his story lived on in the streets he once owned, a cautionary tale about power, ambition and the inevitable fall that follows when you climb too high. The legacy of Funktown Harv stands as a brutal reminder that in the game of organized crime, the money, the territory and the respect always come with a price that gets paid either in prison cells or in body bags. His rise was meteoric, his dominance was complete, but his downfall was equally swift. That's the nature of the streets, family. That's the cost of being king.