by Sean Gardiner, New York Newsday
NEW YORK - One son was named Loser, the other Winner.
One became a cop and eventually was promoted to detective — shield number 2762.
The other fell into the life of a small-time crook, racking up at least 31 arrests before being sent away for a two-year stretch in prison — inmate 00R2807.
But for the brothers Lane, it wasn’t a case of their unusual names sealing their fates.
“I went a totally separate route right from the start,” said Loser Lane, 41, a detective working in the South Bronx.
Loser, a star student and athlete, went on scholarship to an elite prep school and to Lafayette College in Pennsylvania. Then he joined the force.
Winner’s life has gone the other way. Now 44, Winner was released last month after two years in the Southport Correctional Facility outside Elmira for breaking into a car. He is living in Camp LaGuardia, a homeless shelter upstate, and trying to get his life on track.
Why did he commit so many crimes? “It’s just some situations I got in,” Winner said. “It wasn’t really for the need.” He declined to talk further about his trouble.
“Most of the crimes are minor crimes,” Loser said of Winner. “He’s just kooky ... some domestic-violence problems, but was never a heavy drinker, never into drugs ... He’s just not all there, I think.”
The brothers rarely see each other now. Winner will call Loser when he’s short on money, but they’re no longer close.
“I’m a cop,” said Loser, who’s known as Lou on the job. “And I have a way with me where I don’t tolerate a lot.”
It wasn’t always that way.
The Lane boys ran in the same circles while growing up in Harlem’s Wagner Projects. Their names never seemed to arouse even curiosity, much less ridicule, from the kids in the neighborhood.
It helped that Loser was the youngest of eight brothers and sisters. It also helped that he was a natural athlete, admired by the other kids for his talents.
The story of how Loser got his name is simple. On the day he was born, their father, Robert, asked his daughter Dinelda what to name the new baby.
“My dad comes home and asks my oldest sister what to name me and she said, ‘Well, we’ve got a Winner, why don’t we have a Loser?’ And there you go.”
Winner said he’s not sure how he got his name. In any case, by adolescence the lives of Winner and Loser started down routes as divergent as their names.
Around the time Loser entered prep school on a scholarship, Winner began his descent into the criminal-justice system.
He was first arrested at age 19, in September 1977, on a charge of recklessly causing physical injury. His first conviction came five years later, a burglary case. A steady stream of arrests followed.
In April 1999, he was arrested for breaking into a car — weeks after serving 135 days for another auto burglary. This time when he pleaded guilty, the judge gave Winner 1 1/2 to three years.
Loser joined the New York Police Department in 1984.
His friends had no problem calling him by his real name, his coaches, teachers and other adults “just couldn’t bring themselves to call me Loser.”
“It’s weird because people don’t like saying the name,” he said.
“They won’t believe it — you have to tell people seven, eight times, especially in the profession I’m in. You get, ‘Is it spelled the way you pronounce it? No, it can’t be.’ They throw a French twist on it, Losier.”
Winner has never had a nickname, Loser said. “When your name is Winner, that’s it. You don’t need a nickname.”