In the boxing gym or in the courtroom, Derrick Graham is a compass, guiding young people toward better decisions.
Several months ago, Derrick Graham was standing in the stairwell of Newark's municipal court, telling a young man why Judge Victoria Pratt was coming down on him.
Jahvuntte Gordon, 18, of Newark had upset Pratt because he missed a job interview, and Graham was explaining to him that he had to be more responsible.
"This is an experience, so you won't have to come down here again,'' said Graham.
And before Gordon could agree, Graham drove home his point: "Handle your business.''
Last week, Graham was at it again. A court attendant, he was doing what Pratt says is necessary to save young people from the criminal justice system.
This time, Graham was in the lobby of the court building, asking Samad Foster how things turned out on a drug possession charge.
"He tells me how to go about life,'' said Foster, 20, of Newark. "If he can help you, he'll help you.''
Sometimes, it's in municipal court, where Graham has worked 16 years. But the sage advice often continues after he leaves the job and walks through the doors of Newark's Boylan Street Recreation Center. His shirt and tie come off. He's taping his hands, warming up on a heavy bag, then the swivel bag, dancing about in beat-up white boxing shoes.
Inside the rec center, there's a boxing gym - a court of its own kind - that Graham uses to tell the young fighters he trains to not make the same mistakes he made in life. This is the place that gave him purpose, a place where someone from the neighborhood would talk to him the way he talks to young people today.
"I tell them to use their common sense more than their desires, because their desires as a young man is to impress people who are not worth impressing,'' Graham said. "Without the proper guidance of a man in your life, it's easy to be trapped by the sinister powers that are out here.''
Graham, 46, has a pretty good idea of how young people who wind up in court think. He, too, was once a misguided 18-year-old growing up in Newark until the day he found himself handcuffed to a hospital bed in Bergen County.
He was a high school dropout, facing 10 years in prison on several charges, including possession of drugs and receipt of a stolen car, following a State Police chase on the New Jersey Turnpike.
His mother, he says, cried in court after seeing him in an orange jumpsuit, shackled from his wrists to his ankles.
"It ripped into her,'' Graham said. "I promised her I would never go back to jail unless I was protecting somebody.''
He kept his word, taking all kinds of jobs after the judge gave him a break by sentencing him to four years' probation. Graham worked in a warehouse and was a security officer twice. They were steady jobs until employers found out about his record.
In the midst of his craziness, an ex-boxer from the neighborhood pulled him aside to keep him out of trouble. Malik "Heavy Hooks" (how he is known in the city's West Ward) brought Graham to the same recreation center in which he now trains to stay in shape and coach fighters.
Malik said he taught Graham the basics of boxing. Others would show him the rest in a career that began with he and his brother, Eric, winning the New Jersey Golden Gloves titles in 1993.
Graham was 12-9-1 as a professional, but the record doesn't say that his opponents were world-class fighters who had more than 100 victories combined. His reputation for being a hard-nosed, scrappy fighter garnered invitations to spar with boxing greats such as Bernard Hopkins and Oscar De La Hoya.
Graham put the gloves down in 2000 - except for a brief comeback in 2006 - and wound up working in Newark's municipal court. It's the last place most people would think he'd be, considering how he started.
"Sometimes, when I'm sitting down, I think about where I could have been versus where I'm at,'' Graham said.
The boxer became a court recorder, court clerk and now, a court attendant, assisting the judge. Throughout the building, though, Graham is an ambassador of sorts who has a way of making a trip to municipal court less stressful.
"Derrick is our unofficial diplomat in the building,'' said court director James Simpson. "Derrick has the gift of meeting people where they're at and not be overbearing.''
It's the same at the gym, where kids and adults call him "Nas,'' an abbreviation for Nasir, his Muslim name, which means "helper toward greatness."
In the gym or in he courtroom, he's a compass, guiding young people toward better decisions. He did so again on Wednesday, with Antonio Rodriguez of Newark, in Pratt's courtroom.
It was the first time Rodriguez, 19, met him. He was impressed with what Graham had to say in a conversation that lasted maybe two minutes.
"He was encouraging me a lot,''said Rodriguez. "I just have to put my mind to it.''
With Graham on your side, anything is possible. Look at how he turned out.
Barry Carter: (973) 836-4925 or bcarter@starledger or nj.com/carter or follow him on Twitter @BarryCarterSL