Helene Stapinski wrote a memoir about growing up in Jersey City in a family with a history of criminal behavior. She discusses her love-hate relationship with her hometown and criminal family. Despite being exposed to neighborhood crime and having family members engaged in illegal activities as a child, Stapinski was resilient and did not engage in criminal behavior herself. She attributes her avoidance of a criminal path to being young and having less responsibilities when her father drank, as well as learning from her family's experiences that she did not want to be involved in that lifestyle.

1. FIVE-FINGER
DISCOUNT: A
CROOKED FAMILY
HISTORY
AUTHOR: HELENE
STAPINSKI
BY: KAYLA WRIGHT

2. INFO ABOUT THE AUTHOR
• Born in 1965
• Baby Plays Around: A Love Affair, With Music
• Written for The New York Times, People, & New York magazine
• She now lives in Brooklyn

3. HELENE

4. BOOK SUMMARY
• Love-Hate relationship with her family & Jersey City
• Starts out when she is 5 years old
• Stories about growing up in Jersey City
• Criminal family
• Jersey City’s political corruption

5. HELENE AS A CHILD

6. HELENE’S LIFE
• Jersey City, New Jersey
• There has not been any evidence that shows that early
exposure to neighborhood crime will cause long term criminal
behavior in a person (Damm & Dustman, 2014).
• Helene’s grandfather “Beansie”
• The Majestic tavern

7. HELENE’S LIFE
• “Swag” from the cold storage company where her dad worked
• Free toothpaste & soap from the Colgate Factory
• Swag wasn’t the same thing as stealing.
• Jersey City had an unwritten rule that you could take as many
goods as you could carry from your job

8. HELENE’S LIFE
• Reporter- The Jersey Journal
• As a young adult, Helene was a risk-taker.
• Having an unpredictable childhood may have an impact on risk-
taking (Thomson & Hill, 2002)
• She gave up her job at the Jersey Journal to go all the way to Alaska
for a radio job. She was tired of Jersey City and needed something
new. After Helene had enough of Alaska, she returned home and
enrolled in a University for fine arts

9. WHY DIDN’T SHE TURN OUT BAD?
• Criminal behavior tends to run in families (Van de Rakt,
Nieuwbeerta, & Apel, 2009)
• She could have easily just become another unlawful Stapinski
• Helene was able to overcome the difficulties of her childhood,
which shows that she is resilient

10. RESILIENCE
• Having an alcoholic father increased her resilience
• The younger the child is, the more vulnerable they are to their
alcoholic parent
• The less parent responsibilities that the child has to take on,
the higher chance of resilience (Park & Scheep, 2015)
• She saw the life of her family and the impact of committing
crimes.
• She learned that she did not want any part of it.

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