Ben Affleck says he had a frightening encounter with a pair of older boys as a teenager â and claims one of them later went to prison for killing someone with a knife.
The actor shared the story while speaking with Kerry Washington on her podcast Wednesday. Washington asked Affleck whether he had ever been robbed while growing up in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Affleck recalled being about 14 and walking home from high school when he noticed two boys wearing what he described as âliteral hoodsâ on the other side of the street.
âI remember I was walking home from high school, I was 14 maybe, and I saw these two kids in like literal hoods on the other side of the street,â Affleck said.
Rather than run, Affleck said he tried to act as though nothing was happening. The approach didn’t stop the boys from confronting him.
According to Affleck, they grabbed him, held him at knifepoint and demanded his money.
The situation changed when Affleck realized he recognized the people confronting him. He said they were older boys he knew from playing baseball.
âI was scared. But then out of the corner of my eye, I realized who they were,â Affleck recalled. âI recognized them from playing baseball and they were like older boys that I knew.â
Affleck said the recognition appeared to change the encounter, with the boys acknowledging him before he believed he was effectively being let go.
âAnd so I guess I was like, I guess Iâm off the hook,â he said.
But according to Affleck, the encounter took on an even darker meaning years later.
He said the same person who robbed him eventually killed someone else with a knife and served 20 years in prison. Affleck did not provide further details about the killing or identify the person in the supplied account.
That means the story is based on Affleck’s recollection of the incident and his later account of what happened to the person involved.
For Affleck, what began as a terrifying walk home from high school ultimately became a story about how recognizing the people involved may have changed what happened to him that day.
