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Nicky Cruz was born in Puerto Rico, one of 18 children. Both his parents were spiritualists who made their living contacting spirits of the dead. They accused him of being evil, rejecting him when he was 15 years old and sending him to New York to live with his brother. There, he joined a gang called the Mau Maus, soon becoming its president. He then encountered David Wilkerson, a street evangelist, who introduced Cruz to Christianity.

Cruz changed his life and enrolled in a Bible college in La Puente, California. When he graduated, he took a job as director of Teen Challenge in Brooklyn, N.Y. He also leads what he calls "T.R.U.C.E. (To Reach Urban Children Everywhere) invasions" in an effort to reach out to inner-city youth.

His best known book is his autobiography, Run Baby Run, which details his metamorphosis from a gang leader to a Christian. His life was also the subject of David Wilkerson's book, The Cross and the Switchblade, which was made into a movie starring Lawrence Fishburne, Erik Estrada, and Pat Boone. Cruz has also written Code Blue: Urgent Care for the American Youth Emergency, a work that details the problems in America's inner cities and proposes a plan of action to solve these problems.

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