Maywood ‘Players Ball’ Stirs Protest

Often sporting a lime-green plaid suit and clutching a diamond-studded chalice for sipping Moet, the self-proclaimed “king of the pimps,” Archbishop Don Magic Juan, “spiritual adviser” to rapper Snoop Dogg, is known to hobnob with celebrities and is accustomed to red-carpet treatment.

But his anticipated arrival triggered protests Saturday night at a banquet hall in Maywood, where the glittering “mack daddy” was to celebrate his birthday and preside over the 30th annual “Players Ball Convention,” where a trophy is given to “No. 1 International Pimp of the Year.”

Appalled that a party glamorizing the prostitution of women was to take place in their back yard — across the street from the Maywood Police Department, no less — a coalition of about 100 residents, former prostitutes, elected officials and clergy protested outside Mariella’s Banquet Hall.

The message was clear: Pimping’s not welcome in Maywood.

Juan, once known as Don Campbell, was a notorious pimp on the West Side. According to his memoir “From Pimp Stick to Pulpit — It’s Magic,” he hung up his pimp “game” in 1985, found Jesus and is a preacher who ministers “to the outcasts of society.”

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