The Deen Show – The Life and Death of a Real Gangster from Bosnia Ismet Bajramovi elo

Ismet Cielo Baramovich was born in Sarajevo on

the 26th April 1966.

His nickname, Cielo, Ismet was sentenced to 11

years in jail. He was sent to the

infamous Zeneca prison. Out of the 11 years

he was sentenced to, Chalo served 6 and

he was released in 1991,

becoming the godfather of Sarajevo.

When he exited jail, he started to work

as a debt collector for of the underground

in

Sarajevo,

and you really didn't want to avoid payment

to him since the police were on his

side. And let's just say he was a

gifted torturer and a demolitionist.

There are stories of nightclub owners not wanting

to give him his share of the pie

and his men professionally disassembling the building.

What Bayramovich

told his men to destroy had to look

like a quarry after the action.

He rapidly rose through the ranks of the

mob to become the most powerful criminal in

Sarajevo at that time. The nineties in Yugoslavia

were a very dark decade,

marked by ethnic wars from 1991 to 2000

and one. Ismet joined the military and actually

helped the defenders,

especially in two decisive battles for Sarajevo.

The first one was on May second, 1992,

in the battle for the presidency of Bosnia

and Herzegovina.

They fought in Skenderia

against the special forces of the JNA from

Nis. The other battle was just 2 weeks

later on May 16, 1992,

the Battle of Pofalic.

Because of his heroic deeds in the two

decisive battles, Cello became a commandant for the

Sarajevo military police and his two friends became

deputies. Criminal groups were the first to enter

the military forces and defend against the siege

of Sarajevo.

They were not too keen to protect the

city from the attackers. They rather wanted to

protect their criminal territory.

And under the veil of war and the

military uniforms,

it was very easy to profit, especially as

a head of the military police.

At the beginning of 1993,

he was dismissed from the position of the

military police chief. Unfortunately for Cielo, he couldn't

profit for long because he was almost fatally

wounded.

In the fall of 1993,

he was shot by a Serbian sniper. The

shot barely missed his heart and he had

to be evacuated from the city and couldn't

return to the war until 1997.

He didn't sit with his arms crossed. He

tried acting in his downtime.

Chalo appeared in an episode of the PBS

program during that time. He also gave interviews

for Vanity Fair and The New York Times.

After the wars ended, a lot of nineties

mobsters were either dead, in the prosecution,

or made their way into politics.

Cello, on the other hand, continued his life

of crime. He was arrested multiple times for

a variety of charges, but was ultimately set

free a few weeks after the murder occurred

and Chalo as the leader was sentenced to

20 years in prison. But after almost 5

years behind bars,

his conviction was overturned and he was free

again. Death.

Remember the sniper wound to the heart? Well,

due to that injury and his unhealthy lifestyle,

his health began to rapidly decline.

Inhumane prisons in Bosnia at the time didn't

help either.

On 17th December 2008,

shocking news appeared in Yugoslavia. Izmet Cielo Bayramovic,

the godfather of Sarajevo,

former chief of the military police, T'asam a

criminal, and T'asam a hero, was found dead

in his apartment due to suicide.

He had shot himself in the temple of

the eye with a pistol, but unofficially, his

rapidly declining health was said to be the

motive. He always cared for himself and didn't

want to die as a sick old man.

He wanted to go on his own terms

with the ringleaders of organized crime and some

murders. Of course, no one wants to talk

about all this publicly.

And whether the stories circulating in Sarajevo are

true still stays unknown. Well I hooked up

with an individual that

I inspired to be like. When you watch

some of the other Goodfellas and you hear

about Al Capone, this individual

was the closest resemblance to those people, and

I wanted to be the top of that

lifestyle. And he took great care of me.

He took me into his home, his many

homes. He showed me around and said, pick

1. And I saw the lifestyle he had

that country. Basically,

it was his, and he was someone who

was who you didn't wanna cross.

And he was respected, and I took to

him,

and

we were very close.

Eddie returned to Chicago from Bosnia with a

new understanding

of the world.

In the same way, he demanded respect

and loyalty, this is something that I demanded.

And if I didn't get, then I took.

And I put fear in people

the same way he was doing.

Influenced by his father's work in the club

industry,

Eddie naturally began to seek out that path.

We worked for, for one of the largest

promoters in Chicago. Eddie worked for him and

I worked for him as well. Eddie was

one of the guys, one of the enforcers.

He used to run around. Basically just beat

up people. That was really Eddie's nature and

his essence.

Eddie was also a ladies' man. Eddie brought

a lot of the ladies. At any given

moment, he could have 7 to 8 women

that are running around the club looking for

him. While all of this was happening,

Eddie, who loved to fight,

found a new form of release

in Brazilian jiu jitsu. You know, there's 24

hours in a day, but it seemed like,

for 25 hours he was training. You know,

he was researching, training,

sparring, just, you know, was in love with

it. Jiu Jitsu, you know, change him, you

know. But jujitsu wasn't enough to keep Eddie

away from the cooler lifestyle. I know Eddie's

presence was very significant in the club. Everybody

knew Eddie. When he was dating one of

the hottest girls in the city, he decided

to get a, get a Harley, a chopper,

430, a nice new Mercedes. As the cool

became common,

Eddie began to have a new sense of

life.

We're about 6 months into,

owning this night club together. We were probably

drinking

6 nights a week because we're at the

bar all the time. So as training went

down, a lot of women went up. And

Eddie, I think, to this day may look

at God's way of kinda saying, yeah, you're

having fun but this isn't the way you're

supposed to be having fun. All the power

he possessed

still made him feel helpless.

As strong as he is and as intimidating

as he is as an individual,

it really didn't matter. There was no peace.

The glamorous life Eddie had been living felt

shallow and empty.

There was no peace of mind. Initially, when

we met, Eddie seemed pretty perfect.

The perfect lifestyle. All the women, all the

cars,

tough guy. He can do anything he wants

to do, runs around with his head up.

But as I got to know him, it

seemed it seemed flawed. There was things missing.

His physical being was great for his ego,

but it left him empty.

Feeling lost,

Eddie started searching for answers. Didn't take long

before Eddie was reminded of death. I was

in Brazil. I was maybe a week from

coming home and I was talking to my

brother on the phone. And then he asked

me a question in Islam like, did you

read this book? He wanted to make sure

in himself and inside his heart that that

was the truth. When my brother first started,

to learn Islam, he was so

enthusiastic.

It wasn't about forcing people to change.

Eddie's newly acquired knowledge allowed him to see

life

in a very different way. So he started

less and less going to the club. He'll

go to his parties but leave, like, be

there for an hour and leave.

Sometimes he wouldn't even show up and just

have, me and,

someone else run it. He kinda, like, wanted

to talk to people about Islam, but then

he was kinda being a hypocrite

because he was in the scene, and I

think it forced him more to get out

of it. Eddie had stopped drinking at this

point. Me and Eddie used to drink a

lot. Eddie used to drink maybe more than

me. At that point, Eddie had quit drinking

this over 2, 3 month time period. He

was praying 5 times a day. He was,

doing a lot of reading, a lot of

studying on Islam.

Giving up the old lifestyle proved to be

a real struggle for Eddie

but determined as he was,

he quickly adapted to the situation.

And that that first episode of that,

show

aired, I think that's when you saw the

full formation coming to to hope this guy's

changed. What's going on here? The Dean Show

combined with his passion for jujitsu

has made Eddie achieve goals he never thought

possible.

Eddie's purpose with the Dean Show was to

enlighten people

who might be in a similar condition

as he was in the past.

It is good for him to make up

for all those,

times that he missed doing what is right.

So, you know, and he probably realizes that

that's why he's working extra hard, you know.

Eddie continues his struggle to help people find

a way that has been lost to them.

For he himself

is an example

of redemption.

He is living proof

that if one puts his or her mind

to it, they can achieve anything.

If you want to do it and you

have a willpower, you can do it. And

if you if you have,

some support and some guidance, it is possible.

Being part of the biggest family of martial

arts, with over a few 100 students, in

the Dean Show, man, man, it's it's a

lot of work. He's he's a machine, you

know. If someone who knew Eddie,

in his youth, they would maybe predict that

he'd be dead or he'd be, in jail

or he'd be definitely

in in, on the, in the negative side

of life, you know, but to see someone

change, to see that their their whole,

their character changes, to see their, these these,

you know, countless changing positive changes in their

life,

It's a sign, of God.