- Did you guys ever feel the need to protect yourself?
Going to school or walking home or?
- Um.
- Not really 'cause people are super nice to us at school.
- Oh, are they super nice?
I gotta go visit that area.
(upbeat music)
- Hi, how are you guys doing?
- Good. - What is your name?
- Helena.
- Helena?
Hi, I'm Jeff.
- Ethan. - Ethan.
How's it goin' bud?
- What's your name?
- Kyle. - Kyle.
- I'm Brett.
- Brett.
Brett and Kyle.
How do you guys know each other?
- We're sisters. - We're sisters.
- Who's older?
- I'm 11.
- And I'm nine.
- Do you have any kids?
- I got two kids.
- Do you have any sisters or brothers?
- I got a couple.
- Who do you love most in the world?
- I'd have to say that would be my wife.
- So, where do you work?
- I work at a warehouse.
- What do you do there?
- Drive a forklift.
I do that from, say, six, seven in the morning,
to about six, seven at night.
- We only go to school for six hours.
(laughing)
- You guys are lucky then.
- Hey, you guys ever get in trouble?
- Yes. - Yes, a lot of times.
- I'm the troublemaker. - You're the troublemaker?
- "Go to your room!" (laughing)
- A lot of times he picks a fight with me
and sometimes I pick a fight with him
so we're kind of both troublemakers.
- So both of you guys are in time out together?
Well at least you got company.
- Have you ever gotten in trouble?
- Uh yes, I have gotten in trouble.
- Like serious trouble?
- Been
kind of a longer stay, grounded,
where you can't leave this certain area,
say it's a square.
- Wait, oh.
I got it. (laughing)
- You've been to jail before.
- Yes, I've been to jail.
I wouldn't say I was a good boy.
I was kind of an acter-outer.
- That's what my sister does.
- Have you ever been arrested?
- Yeah, I've been arrested a couple times.
- What for?
- Possession of a gun.
- Why were you arrested for having a gun?
- Well, you have to go through a certain process
to be able to carry a gun, so I didn't
know about that process so I just went and got a gun.
That's a big no no.
- What did you get in trouble for?
- I got in trouble for growing marijuana.
- What's a marijuana?
- It's drug.
It's legalized now, like alcohol.
- Was you a drug dealer?
- Well, I've been called that.
So I guess yes.
- Why did you want a gun?
- Where I grew up, it's pretty rough.
I took it upon myself to prepare myself for war, kinda.
- Oh.
- Did you ever use your gun?
- No, I was lucky.
I didn't have to use it.
But I was ready to, though.
If I was walking somewhere with my daughter
and somebody had a problem with me,
you know, I would have to protect myself, so.
- Was jail boring?
- Jail was extremely boring.
It was watching a lot of TV is what you did.
- Just imagine, everything that you do,
you play sports, you go to school,
you're home with your family.
So just imagine all that time, by yourself,
in a confined area.
- What did the jail look like?
- Woo, well.
It kind of looked like this.
Only four walls.
- Jail is behind bars with policemen holding weapons.
Yay.
- What was in your cell?
- A bed.
You have a toilet next to the sink.
It's all together.
- Well you can have a phone.
- No, you can't have a phone.
They take all your phones.
They won't let you have inside anything.
- Was there anybody else in the--
- [Man] The cell?
- Yeah.
- Depending what type of individual you are.
If you're an angry person, they'll put you by yourself.
- Where would you go for the bathroom?
- Right there in front of everybody.
- That doesn't sound pleasant.
- No, it does not.
You have no clue. (laughing)
- What do you eat in jail?
- What do you eat in jail? - I always wondered that.
- You always wondered.
Not too many good things.
It's tough.
Like, you probably got some nasty stuff
in your cafeteria probably that you don't like eating,
like some meatloaf or somethin'.
- No, I like all the cafeteria food.
- Oh yeah?
What about you?
- I mostly like pancakes.
- Pancakes? - He's a picky eater.
- Was it like you could make friends in jail, or?
- I wouldn't wanna say friends, because you really
don't wanna trust nobody.
It's not like going to a Girl Scout hang out
camp out or somethin'.
- I had to make friends with people that could protect me.
It's a very strange different kind of relationship.
- At your school, do you have a group of girls
that you all hang together?
- Yeah.
- And then it's another group of girls that hang together.
- Mhm.
- The blacks and the Latinos,
we never see eye to eye.
We can never play jump rope together.
We could never, you know, never associate together.
- Are you guys like not allowed to interact or no?
(heavy exhale) - Not allowed?
Um.
- It's very competitive.
Everybody's trying to be better than another person.
- I have to get you before you get me.
- Oh.
- [Man] You understand?
- Yeah.
- It's not a place to go, you know.
- Yeah.
- Have you ever tried to escape from prison?
- No.
I knew I wasn't gonna escape.
- Maybe if you were smart enough you could.
- Smart enough?
Yeah.
Probably so. (laughing)
- Are you a felon?
- I am a felon.
Somethin' that I can't change.
I wish I wasn't.
- How is your life different?
- The biggest change in my life is that
many employers, they don't wanna hire people
that have been convicted of felonies.
- Could you work at, like...
- A restaurant?
- Maybe washing dishes.
- A bank?
(scoffing) - They'll laugh at me.
And tell me to get the heck out before
they call the police on me.
- Oh.
- I can't own a gun.
I can't vote.
- I can't vote.
- Oh.
- [Man] You lose that right, once you get a felony.
- Well, I don't really think that's fair.
- Nothing is fair.
- I mean honestly, it's just a mistake.
You went to jail for two years
and then for the rest of your life,
you'll never be able to vote again.
- Everybody should give everyone a second chance.
- I agree with that, and I wish I could
get a second chance in a lot of places,
but a lot of places don't allow that.
- Will you be a felon forever?
- Um, it's a process called expungement that I can get
one of my felonies reduced to like a misdemeanor.
But it costs a lot of money.
But it's possible.
I'm working on it.
- Are you still getting watched over by polices?
- No.
They figured I was doin' good enough and that
I was keepin' out of trouble, that they could
let me live my life without them watchin' over me.
- Do you regret of what you did?
- Everyday of my life, I do.
- Do you feel happy that you're out of prison
and you're free and you're with your family and?
- Very happy.
Very, very, very satisfied.
I figure, you have to go through the bad times
to get to the good times.
- Yeah.
- Do you think I'm a bad guy?
- No. - No.
- Even though I've been to prison?
- Yeah.
- Even though I have a felony? - Yeah.
- High five. (chuckling)
- You think I'm a bad guy because I went to jail?
- No. - No.
- No.
- No?
- Everybody has good in them.
- Your parents did a good job on you.
(laughing)
I'm sure they're very proud of ya.
- What about you little guy?
You think I'm a bad guy?
- Maybe if you were smart enough,
you could've escaped the prison.
- Kyle, you said that earlier.
(laughing)
- Yeah.
- Hey, it's Marina from Cut.
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(upbeat music)