The Two Sides Of The Blades Brothers

Toni Fort walked in on death.

The midnight image stays with her still: Body on the floor. Eyes open, staring but not seeing. Mouth agape, chest soaked dark red. A room full of panic and prayer.

A family's blood was spilling. Pro football stars Brian and Bennie Blades had it on their hands.

The 911 operator tried to help keep their cousin Charles Blades alive, asking that someone plug up the bullet hole under Charles' chin. Family friend Lorenzo Johnson tried, using his finger. Bennie, Brian and Lorenzo knelt, cradling Charles, talking to him and to God.

"The most awful thing I've ever seen," recalled Fort, Bennie's girlfriend. "I haven't been able to sleep, trying to erase the vision. If it's doing that to me, what can it be doing to Bennie and Brian? Pain? Grief? Turmoil? Our language can't begin to describe it."

Fort remembers hearing these words, over and over:

Hold on, cuz.

Please, Lord.

Why?

I'm sorry.

In the condominium below, a father and son were playing Tetris on the Nintendo, lost in the game's happy music. They stopped and stared at the ceiling on hearing a continuous, unmistakable sound that lasted more than five minutes.

It was Toni Fort.

Screaming.

This is a story about how a bullet smaller than a paper clip was big enough to change several lives and end another. It is a story about fast-lane living and how abruptly it can screech to a halt. It is a story about two famous brothers enjoying the All-American dream until a nightmare on the Fourth of July.

It has been more than a week since the shooting, more than a week since a tearful Brian dropped to his knees and begged forgiveness of Charles Blades' mother, whose son he apparently shot by accident. Brian and Gertrude Blades embraced for more than five minutes, without a word.

But the shooting wasn't the first hint of problems with the Blades brothers.

The picture that emerges from Miami Herald research is of two young millionaires living a carefree, sometimes reckless life. At one point, the two brothers - Brian, a star receiver for the Seahawks, and Bennie, a safety for the Detroit Lions - owned 11 cars, many bought for girlfriends, their relationships producing at least seven children by at least five women. Five of the children are Bennie's.

Their promiscuity has led to courtroom fights. Three women accused them of drunken violence in the late '80s - two of the claims coming against Brian within six weeks. Brian and Bennie have also been in court on driving-while-intoxicated charges; Brian's, in 1991, was later reduced to negligent driving.

Separate research by The Seattle Times shows that the brothers also have had significant money problems. They have been sued by banks and other creditors for failing to make payments on cars, homes and other items they have bought.

Brian's financial situation got so bad that in August 1990, a bank repossessed his Ford Bronco for unpaid bills. That same month, Brian, who was making $210,000 in the third year of a four-year deal, staged a 14-day walkout in training camp in a failed effort to get a new contract.

FINANCIAL WOES

The trouble started before the brothers entered the NFL. They got involved with an agent, Mel Levine, who got them under-the-table cash - reportedly $70,000 - at the University of Miami, where Brian and Bennie helped the Hurricanes win the national championship in their senior season of 1987.

Levine would later mismanage their funds. At one point he conceded that he had kept $160,000 of Bennie's money, which was supposed to go toward taxes, because Brian had owed him $200,000.

Brian's financial woes cleared up last year, when he signed a two-year, $3.7 million contract that paid $3 million in the first season.

But the brothers' lifestyles intersected tragically in Plantation, Fla., 11 days ago, when Bennie quarreled with an ex-girlfriend over child custody on one side of the street while his brother left a limousine to get a loaded gun on the other.

Brian isn't talking beyond a statement he read this past week, and Bennie has declined interviews since giving police a statement.

But family members say Charles Blades, six years older and always more big brother than cousin, tried to dissuade Brian from going downstairs armed. There was a struggle. And then a shot.

"It seems right that Charles died trying to keep peace in the family," his sister, Mary Simmons, said. "He kept Brian out of bigger trouble. He was always protecting us."

Henry Snell, Charles' best friend: "The Blades brothers liked to go, go, go, go, go. Those cats love to party. Charles made sure they stayed out of trouble. If they went overboard, he brought them back."

A GOOD SIDE AND . . .

Brian and Bennie have two sides.

One side:

Brian Blades' biggest fans include Seattle's littlest victims.

The television cameras are never there when Brian visits a downtown school for homeless children. Not when he hands over the $2,500 checks, not when he stages the annual Christmas party, not when he simply shows up unannounced at the school called First Place. He doesn't ask for publicity, just smiles.

"When he comes to the Christmas parties," First Place teacher Kelley Clevenger said, "Brian is the first one there to help set up, and he doesn't leave until the last wastebasket is emptied."

The brothers established the Blades Foundation to aid charities in their teams' cities and in South Florida. They pay for an annual college scholarship at Plantation High, where their brother Al plays football. English teacher Susie Austin of the Blades' alma mater, Piper High, won an NFL Teacher of the Month award based on their nominations.

Brian was the Seahawks' 1994 NFL Man of the Year nominee for his civic involvement. He also was a Byron "Whizzer" White Award nominee for public service.

"He signs autographs endlessly with the Boys and Girls Club," said Sandy Gregory, Seahawks' director of community relations. "Brian is in my office every day, which is unusual for a player. He answers all his fan mail, every single piece."

Bennie, too, is involved. He sponsors rewards for 30 students at Detroit's Barber Elementary based on academics. He helped collect toys for children of Haitian refugees. He sponsors "Bennie's Bustin' Bunch," bringing 20 needy kids to every Lions home game.

Brian buys 89 tickets (that's his uniform number) to each Seahawks game for underprivileged children. He raises funds for the United Negro College Fund. He buys Thanksgiving dinner for the families with Seattle Emergency Housing, a transitional shelter. He buys new sneakers for First Place's 50 or so students.

There's another side of the Blades brothers:

In June 1989, Karen Louis Slater of Fort Lauderdale sought a temporary-restraining order against Brian, alleging in a civil suit that he subjected her to "violence and abuse . . . physical, verbal and emotional." She claimed that Brian occasionally struck her with his fist and once, in "an inebriated condition," struck her in the face and kicked her. The suit was settled out of court.

That same year, Carolyn Chang of Hollywood, Fla., claimed in a civil suit that a drunken Brian beat her outside a lounge. That suit was settled out of court, too.

Henry Snell, Charles Blades' best friend, says the brothers "drink too much."

Brian was arrested for driving under the influence in Seattle in 1991, a charge reduced to negligent driving after he took an alcohol-awareness course. Bennie was arrested for drunken driving in Fort Lauderdale this year.

Because of their DUI arrests, the brothers often take limousines when they go drinking - as they did the night their cousin was shot.

The brothers have always spent wildly - even when they didn't have money.

Levine, the Blades' former agent, is in an El Paso prison for bank fraud. In his book, "Life In The Trash Lane" he chronicles the Blades' spending sprees.

"Where did the $70,000 go?" Levine writes, referring to the money he lent Brian and Bennie while they were at Miami. "He (Bennie) was always buying things for others, especially girlfriends. . . . I watched as he plunked down the money ($3,000) to purchase a stereo for a young girl he had with him. In the next year, he would purchase a $10,000 car for a girlfriend, an engagement ring for a fiancee he would never marry and a whole host of airline tickets on my American Express card shipping women cross-country on a moment's notice."

Levine estimates that, in one year, the brothers spent $400,000 on cars, buying 11 for themselves and girlfriends. Boca Raton car dealer Jim Gustolisi said Brian spent so freely that Levine called and asked Gustolisi not to sell Brian any more cars.

BEGAN WITH A FAMILY PICNIC

The holiday began with an early-evening picnic that has become something of a family tradition. Bennie bought seven big boxes of fireworks and invited friends and family to Plantation Central Park. About 150 people showed up for barbecued ribs and chicken, watermelon and salad.

"Bennie is like a big kid himself," said Fort, who recently began dating Bennie after breaking up with Gary Sheffield of the Marlins. "He gave kids sparklers and lit the rest of the stuff himself."

After the picnic, the brothers returned to their homes, across the street from each other, and showered for a guys' night out. The limo arrived after 10 p.m. Fort stayed at Bennie's house, caring for his 3-year-old daughter, Amber.

About a half-hour after the limo left, Amber's mother, Carol Jamerson, arrived at Bennie's house demanding custody of her child. She rang the doorbell and knocked incessantly, according to Fort, who said she never answered. Instead, she called Bennie on his cellular phone. Bennie ordered the limo back home. He called police from the back seat.

The police asked Jamerson to step off the lawn until Bennie arrived. They left before he got there. Bennie quarreled outside with Jamerson so loudly that neighbors heard them. That, according to family members, is when Brian went to his house and ran upstairs to get his Walther .380 PPK semiautomatic pistol and scare Jamerson.

What happened after Brian got his gun remains the crux of the police probe. According to family members, Charles followed Brian upstairs and tried to prevent him from going outside with the loaded weapon. The two apparently struggled over the gun. Two shots discharged - accidentally, according to Brian - and one of them traveled upward through Charles' chin.

Soon thereafter, Fort dashed across the street and upstairs, where she found chaos. Everyone in the room had Charles' blood on them, from holding him, she said. Bennie punched the wall so hard his hand immediately began to swell. A few minutes later, he turned to Fort and said, "I've broken my hand." He had surgery Wednesday.

As for Brian, Fort says, "I've never seen a man or woman as hysterical as Brian. He lost it. He was screaming until 6 a.m. `Why, why, why?' I thought his body would shut down. Seeing Charles' body on the floor, it was like something you see in the movies, except it was someone we knew and it was real."