Phillip Black

Homeless cat in the empire's hat

"I know them all. This one on the wheelchair, with everybody around her. She sells heroin. That guy who’s looking at you like that - he’s high on crack. Don't take a picture of him or you might not get home to your daughters alive."

I first met Phillip Black on a corner of cosmopolitan F Street in Washington, a few stops away from Ford’s Theatre, where Abraham Lincoln was shot, and almost within earshot of the White House.