A teenage father with ‘DEVAST8’ tattooed across his face is ‘waiting for the right job offer’ after his desperate plea for work went viral – and he has revealed he will be getting the jailhouse ink lasered off.
Mark Cropp, 19, from New Zealand, took to social media on Wednesday afternoon to beg someone to look past his criminal convictions and heavily-tattooed face and give him a chance at work.
Within hours he had been inundated with job offers and said he had ‘stopped counting when he reached 45’.
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Mark ‘Devast8’ Cropp (pictured) has revealed that he has turned down 45 job offers since his story went viral
The 19-year-old (pictured) had taken to social media in frustration that his face tattoos were preventing him from finding work
But he told Daily Mail Australia he still hadn’t ‘done a day’s work’.
‘I am just waiting for the right one to come about,’ he said.
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Some of the jobs required him to have his own car – he clarified – but he will need help getting to the work site.
‘Until I get my first paycheck and get a car I won’t be able to get myself around,’ he said.
The former criminal revealed he will be getting the artwork – designed by his brother after a night of drinking home brew in jail – removed as soon as possible.
‘A week before I got out I taped a picture of my face to the inside of an envelope so my partner could see it – she was devastated – but now she likes it and can’t see me without it,’ Cropp (pictured, right) said
Man with DEVAST8 tattoo speaks about trying to get a job
‘I am just working out a date to get it taken off – which sucks because it is going to hurt,’ he said.
‘And because, you know, this tattoo means something to me and my brother did it for me so it is hard to make the decision to get rid of it.
‘But I know it is the best thing for my future – and I want to be a person my family can look to for support.’
The artwork was designed to make him ‘look tough’ when he landed in jail following a long string of violent behaviour.
This image shows Cropp (pictured) before the face tattoo which made him go viral on social media
‘And because, you know, this tattoo means something to me and my brother did it for me so it is hard to make the decision to get rid of it,’ he said
Mark and girlfriend Taneia Ruki got together a year before he was sent to prison
It was meant to be a ‘little one along the jawline,’ but the pair got carried away after drinking home brew made from fermented apples, sugar and bread.
‘I went into jail with four tattoos and I came out with a full body suit,’ he said.
But the face tattoo was the biggest shock to his family.
‘A week before I got out I taped a picture of my face to the inside of an envelope so my partner could see it – she was devastated – but now she likes it and can’t see me without it.’
DEVAST8 happens to be the 19-year-old’s nickname.
Mark Cropp (pictured) told Daily Mail Australia he is still waiting for the right job to come along
Cropp (pictured) says the face tattoo was supposed to be small but he and his brother got carried away after drinking homebrew
‘I was going through a rough patch’: Teen with DEVAST8 jail tattoo
‘I would end up devastating everyone I met or got close to.
‘They would be disappointed with something I had done or said – I was always hearing “that’s devastating”,’ he said.
But he hopes the devastating chapters of his life are over – erased along with the ink on his face.
‘I have learnt from my mistake,’ he said.
‘I still don’t think people should be judged by the tattoos on their face – but I know it will keep happening unless I do something about it.’
Before his final desperate plea on Facebook the teenager said people had ‘laughed in (his) face’ when he had asked for work.
The tattoo was drawn with a homemade gun which used a needle made from the spring of a pen and powered by a cassette player.
Plastic knives and forks are burnt to a black plastic powder and mixed with toothpaste and water to create the ink.
The teenager has been out of jail for two weeks.
Mark has also been offered laser therapy to remove the tattoo and will have his first session on Tuesday (pictured right with partner)
The New Zealander (pictured) has been out of jail for two weeks and says he has learnt from his mistake
A woman who died and came back to life after 11 minutes has shared what she experienced during that time.
A woman named Charlotte Holmes said she spent 11 minutes in heaven after a near-death experience and shared the amazing things she saw in the afterlife.
In September 2019, Charlotte was at a routine check-up with her heart doctor when her blood pressure suddenly shot up to a dangerous 234/134. The doctors told her she might be having another stroke or a heart attack.
She was taken to the hospital while her husband, Danny, watched helplessly. He recalled the moment he thought he might lose her, saying, “Immediately, they called a code, and everyone rushed in. They started working on her, and I wondered if I would even be able to bring her home.”
As Charlotte’s condition got worse, she began to describe things she could see, like flowers. But when Danny looked around the room and realized there were no flowers, he realized something incredible. “That’s when I knew she was not in this world,” he said.
Charlotte’s heart had stopped, and for the next 11 minutes, she was clinically dead. But during that time, she said she was looking down at her lifeless body while watching doctors and nurses try to bring her back.
“I could smell the most beautiful flowers I’ve ever smelled, and then I heard music,” she remembered. “When I opened my eyes, I knew where I was. I knew I was in heaven.”
Charlotte, who lives in Wichita, Kansas, described being surrounded by incredible beauty in every direction. She watched everything sway in time with the music she could hear.
“I can’t explain what heaven looked like because it’s so much more amazing than we can imagine,” she said. Then, a group of angels led her deeper into the afterlife.
“There’s no fear, just pure joy when the angels are with you,” she continued. “I saw my mom, my dad, my sister, and other family members standing behind them.”
Write this in easy human language:
“I seen saints of old,” the mum explained. “They didn’t look old, they didn’t look sick, none of them wore glasses. They looked like they were in their 30s. Yet it says in the scriptures, ‘we will be known as we were known’.
“I knew them there in their new bodies. They looked wonderful.”
Charlotte then revealed that she saw a toddler, which left her quite confused.
She said: “I can remember thinking, ‘who is this?’ And I heard my heavenly father say to me, ‘It’s your child.’
“I lost that child. I was five-and-a-half months pregnant. I can remember them holding the baby up and saying, ‘Charlotte, it’s a boy’. Then he was gone. So when I seen this toddler, I said, ‘God, how is that possible?’
“He said, ‘They continue to grow in heaven – but there’s no time, it’s eternity’.”
Charlotte then claimed that she was taken to a place that was the complete opposite of the paradise she had just enjoyed.
“God took me to hell, and I looked down and the smell, and the rotten flesh – that’s what it smelled like…and screams,” she explained. “After seeing the beauty of heaven, the contrast to seeing hell is almost unbearable.”
Detailing why she was taken there, Charlotte said: “And he says, ‘I show you this to tell you, if some of them do not change their ways, this is where they shall reside.’ I heard my father say, ‘You have time to go back and share’.”
She then described how she felt herself being ‘drawn back into’ her body, while Danny noticed her eye twitched.
Charlotte – who went on to make a full recovery and was released from hospital after two weeks – said: “I felt the pain, where I hadn’t felt pain, I felt the sorrow.”
Following her near-death experience, she decided to share her incredible story with others.
“People need hope,” Charlotte said. “They want to know that there really is something out there, they want to know that everything’s okay. Heaven is more than you can imagine.
“I can look you square in the eye and tell you for sure, heaven is real.”
According to The Ozark County Times, Charlotte passed away on November 28, 2023, at the age of 72 after suffering a heart attack. She was survived by her husband of 52 years and their daughter Chrystal, as well as her grandchildren.
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