re: The wire **spoiler**

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Instead of attending school, Pearson worked as a drug dealer. At the age of 14, she was convicted of second-degree murder in the shooting death of a girl named Okia Toomer and sentenced to two eight-year terms, to be served consecutively, at the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women in Jessup, Maryland.[2] She was released after 6.5 years. Pearson said her life turned around at the age of 18 when Arnold Loney, a local drug dealer who looked out for her and sent her money in prison, was shot and killed.[1] He was the one who gave her the nickname Snoop because she reminded him of Charlie Brown's beagle Snoopy in the comic strip Peanuts.[1] While in prison, she earned her GED and was released in 2000.[1] She landed a local job fabricating car bumpers, but was fired after only two weeks when her employer learned she had a prison record. On March 10, 2011, Pearson was arrested along with 60 others for alleged drug offenses. The arrest was made during a predawn raid at her home in Baltimore following a five-month DEA operation.[3] Denying bail, Judge John Addison Howard reasoned: “Well, you can change your appearance, I’ve seen the episodes of The Wire in which you appear. You look very different than you do here today, and I’m not talking about the jumpsuit, I’m talking about your general appearance.”[4] After a month in jail, Pearson was offered bail of $50,000 on April 8, 2011.[5] In August, 2011, she pleaded guilty to the charges a day before her trial was to begin.[6] She was sentenced to a suspended seven-year prison term, with credit for time served, and given three years of supervised probation.[7]

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Pearson met Michael K. Williams, who played Omar Little on The Wire, in a Baltimore club. He invited her to come to the set one day. He introduced her to the writers and the producers, and after a subsequent audition, she was offered a role in the series

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