SINCE THAT DAY: CHEETAH'S JOURNEY
Trustin Farmer had a basketball in his hand before he was even two years old. He loved the game, just like his father, Robert Farmer.
“I had a mini hoop in our house,” Trustin said from the sidelines of a concrete court at his grandfather’s house in Flint, Mich. “We set up some cones, and I was dribbling the ball and was shooting it and dunking on it and everything.”
However, four years after his father first introduced him to basketball, a bullet shattered their relationship. Trustin was a few feet away from Robert when the shot rang out. It hit his father, killing him.
Trustin’s older sister, Shanaree Farmer, saw it, too. She screamed in the phone to their mother, Shanika McBride: “Somebody just killed my f—ing daddy.”
That was the first time McBride heard her daughter cuss, she said.
“I got from Hill Road to Hemphill Road, King’s Lane Apartments, that’s where it happened. Right there at his house,” McBride said. “I beat the police there.”
Trustin changed after that day, as did his relationship with basketball.
“I suffer from PTSD,” Trustin said, now 10 years old. “I have flashbacks sometimes, and then I just go outside and start playing basketball.
“I work hard every day and get myself better until I can climb the board on the rankings list and make my dad proud.”
-
Special Thanks to Trustin Farmer, Shanika McBride and their whole family
Cinematographer/Storyteller - Michael Indriolo
Producer/Storyteller - Jiquanda Johnson