Staff

 Taylor Code Maxie Jr is the Credible Messenger Coordinator and Case Manager for TFT's R.E.S.E.T Program. He is an author and poet whom is very passionate about youth advocacy and restorative justice. He has led hundreds of writing workshops in Los Angeles County classrooms, juvenile detention centers and probation camps, using poetry, music and rites of passage work to promote healing, education and restorative justice in the lives of incarcerated and highly at-risk youth and young adults. He has also shared his works in settings such as: Texas Medical Center (2020), YMCA Link Up Greater Houston (2018) Create Justice (2017),

Proctor Institute (2015), Survivors Speak Conference (2014), The VPC Gang Intervention and Prevention Conference (2014), San Carlos Apache Reservation (2013), and LMU Restorative Justice Conference (2012). His first publication Creations Of a Divine Entity (CODE) 2018 vividly illuminates Taylor’s redemptive healing evolution from traumatized child to incarcerated gang member to spoken-word poet, youth mentor, and restorative justice advocate. Through this work, he has created a

powerful road map for others to follow. Taylor is currently in the process of finishing his associate degree in Computer Science/Information Technology (Cybersecurity specialization), at Houston Community College. He also sits on the board of directors at Street Poets Inc., the organization that helped him to turn own life around.

Ernesto Perez is a Credible Messenger and Case Manager for TFT’s R.E.S.E.T Program. He is Director of Prison Ministry at Kingdom Muzic Inc. and a Campus Pastor at Get Wrapped Church. Ernesto is very passionate about breaking old mindsets and presenting the youth with a new way of not just living and thinking but perceiving life and what it has to offer. Coming out of more than 12 years of fighting with addiction and the identity the “street” life influences, he is very passionate about seeing young men and the youth do something impactful and positive with their life. Ernesto travels to prisons, churches, outreaches and youth gatherings all over the US sharing his story and victory over addiction and “hood life” mentality, empowering the youth and people of all ages to not conform to the negative patterns that society, culture and our environments may socially enforce on us.