You, my friend, the first thing you said to me when I sat down was "oh my god"
"You look like somebody I arrested before." Dude I've known you for like two minutes. I don't even know your name
Can I have all my people who currently or previously have worked in law enforcement against that wall
all the other people, on that side
Apparently people are a lot braver than I am so, you know, or they're a lot more comfortable with their stories
Alright, my disagreers, come on in
I'm just more excited to be here and
To share stories, hear everybody else's story
For me more it's so, uh, in our situations that you're kind of conditioned like
You guys are the enemy, you know?
I don't know how you guys feel about us, or, you know, I've never had a deeper conversation with law enforcement
Probably from your point of view is is that it doesn't always seem like
The justice system is fair. I think that what you find though
It's if you truly
love this job, and this work that you strive to find that balance in fairness
I'm
Puzzled by what he's saying because I've never heard anything like this before
Because I mean if it's true what you're saying then how come police aren't policing police
Why are you standing idly by while your fellow officers are going around shooting and killing unarmed black people
Why is that happening?
I don't know. I probably did.
Sold drugs, that's why I did - I sold a shit ton of drugs and um,
I Didn't have family. I never - you know. I mean I grew up in foster homes. I didn't have any type of family, but I
Fucking knew that when I went to prison. I knew I didn't want to come back to this shit
You know what I'm saying, so while I was in prison I knew I needed to start there and build a foundation.
I've been out of trouble since 1989 you know so
I chose to commit my own crimes when I was younger.
I wanted the violence. I could have easily chose to do something else
But I was always there when things were gonna happen
I was talking about - thinking about between my professional life or my personal life.
I think that like you know, it's it's one of those things where like you look at for instance have I
Have I killed anybody, have I robbed anybody, have I - like all these major felonies now have I sped before? Yeah, absolutely
You know what I hear is uh?
You're telling me there's levels of legality. I mean I used to be
Sort of on that and to - like I grew up well, I went to private schools
I mean, I'm not somebody you know like which stereotype as somebody who gone to prison
You know and then I've gone to prison
And I just find out how fucked up the system is. I mean what about that guy who goes out?
Has dinner and has a drink. Ends up spending seven or eight years in prison because somebody started a fight with them.
But then I meet people in prison who've
Shot somebody in the back of the head execution style and only got ten years for it you know whereas for me
I spent 13 years in prison
because
Somebody was hurting my family, and I thought like okay, well we're gonna go get our stuff back from this person and
I get conspiracy to commit robbery conspiracy to, you know, use a gun which has added another 10 years
And it's nothing ever happened. You know nobody got hurt and like maybe it's cultural. Maybe it's you know I grew up
Where like you defend your family you know and yeah like was it a bad mistake sure
Can I ask a question though,
like, why your first thought wasn't like, "Let me call the cops to help solve this issue?"
Cause you know, like from my experience growing up
Cops don't help. They just come by, show up, make a great show of doing their jobs and then leave, but I'm just saying
There's no consistency in the system. It makes no sense, it depends on which county you go to which judge
You show up in front of. It's a political game.
It's - that's not justice.
What would you consider justice to be?
I mean, I would like to see that, you know, there would be some consistency if I go to LA County or San Diego or wherever that
The same crimes that carry the same time, there would be some, you know, consideration for, you know, situation. I don't think there is.
The criminal justice system truly does help to protect societies
If we did not have it that there would be chaos.
It may not be perfect right now, but we need the justice system, and we have to believe it
For some reason it just seems to me that if you're from a wealthier family, you're easy to get off the hook
When I was fighting my case I had a cellie who was
Fighting the same crime that I committed
For an attempted murder. He had came back said that the judge gave him one year with two strikes
I don't know how that went about but for me, I end up getting ten years with one strike
And his family was wealthy.
In that, did you have priors? Did he have priors?
I had no priors.
I just didn't understand. Why is it that, you know, if your family has more money?
It's easier to get off the hook.
A lot of times I saw that if you have a private attorney,
high-power attorney
I guess you have a better chance of getting off than having public defender
That could be a little hole in the criminal justice system, but that's how it is right now
And then I don't know how to address that issue
so I guess that's
It shouldn't be a game. It shouldn't be a game with people's lives, like how how can I get this?
How can I negotiate a win with this person's life?
At the end of the day man, it's all about money
And it's about numbers, and there's no
There's no money in rehabilitation, man. There's money in recidivism
And if I could give up my job today as a result of no other people going to jail, which means that they would
Actually stop committing crimes I would do it in a heartbeat
Oh, yeah, but there's not too many people like you
If we had a system full of guys like you
That'd be awesome, I think that that's that's but again
See what you just said is that's the perception that you have is that there are no, it's not-
It's a reality for us. For me when I was inside and the nonprofit that I worked for we had
You know, the programs in there, and this is a class that are is gonna help them
You know, actually do something with their lives every
evening while the guys are going to class like, they get harassed and they we come out of the class and
All the cops are lined up and like, get on the wall, strip-search, tear up textbooks, tear up their personal property, their homework
like yeah
That's how the system is, like on the way out of prison officers were telling me like, "I'll see you back on the next one,"
You know, like, that's fucking bullshit
Out of everybody in the circle, that he was the first one to actually voice
The fact that he made choices. It's in that moment that they claim dominion over themselves
So I appreciate that.
Thank you.
Don't know how they feel about that.
I don't think any one of us right here sat here and say like I didn't make my own choices
I understand I made my own choice. I got myself my own time. I thought yeah, I get the sense that you do too
I think the larger issue is that the system is broken and
that's what I have a problem with. I don't have a problem with taking ownership of my actions, it's
Society not taking ownership of its own creation.
And I hope you don't hear that
He was the one - he was the only person vocal in saying that
I will ask you this and I'll challenge you. Do you know who your representative is - have you ever contacted their office?
No.
Have you ever contacted your Congress member?
No.
Then I suggest that you should.
and here's the thing, cause you strike me as a very smart individual that has the ability to go in influence.
I agree with you as - I just think that
You need to take a walk in our shoes. You know, like - and I don't mean any disrespect by this, but
You sound like a law enforcement pamphlet
You know, like you sound like every perfect thing that they want you to say. It's kind of like when you work in a company
And the CEO says this is the policy, but when you're on the ground level
You know that there are certain things that just doesn't work in reality
I think you have, you know, great views
And I think you're - if we had, you know, law - like, just a team of law enforcement
That's exactly like you two, that have the same views, like, it would be great
You know, but I also think that there is reality
When you come out of prison,
Everything is just so stacked against you, like it seems that that's that commonality
So like when a friend - since when I talked about coming out of military
I had people that told me when and where to be, all these rules and regulations, and when I got out
You know, there was nobody there. Same thing happens in prison.
You have to break out of the prison mind mentality.
Here's the difference between
The mil- and I agree with you, there's a lot of similarities,
There are a lot of commonalities with prison in the military, however when you're in the military
You're told you're the men of this country, are the defenders of this country. You're men.
When you go to prison,
We were told that we're pieces of shit,
We were told that we're animals, you know, and when you've gone through a decade of that, it - it gets in your head,
Inside your mind. It's like, "who am I," like, "who am I to think that I can do these things?"
it just
Turns you into nothing, you know, and it makes you believe that you're nothing, that you can't do it
And that's something that you can't put into, you know, LAPD policy, you know, and that's what
the justice system does to you, like it breaks you.
But you know what, I can tell you this
Me looking at you,
I don't see any of the things that you talk about. I would hope for you, for actually all three of you,
that you know that you guys are able to escape those
Boundaries that have been created, because guess what, at the end of the day,
Like, you have one life to live and it's going to be predicated upon the decisions that you make now.
I honestly believe that
They have a structure in place
that
can help.
The people who are running it are the ones that need adjusting
I think it needs a lot of work. I think the resources are put in to a lot of the wrong
places and I'm not okay with
Saying "well
this is what we got so let's try to work with it," like, no I think that there should be moves
To try to improve the system, like I don't think we should ever be content.
You know, like I said unfortunately when the budget crisis happens, training is the first one that goes out the door
I think they need more training. If they're training to save the one life, I think it is worth it.
I also think communication,
to build a unity in a community. That way that it can
be trusted with one another and be able to work with one another with all the challenges that's going on in this chaotic world
do you have any information on your non profit organization?
I do actually. Let me give you - you can look us up.
Hey guys much appreciation
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