Speaker 1: Danielle Moody here. You know, we like to feature exciting
Speaker 1: and interesting podcasts on woke f Daily, so we are
Speaker 1: proud to present an episode from In the Deep Stories
Speaker 1: That Shape Us, all about the importance of telling our
Speaker 1: stories to shape our communities and develop deeper self love.
Speaker 1: In this episode of In the Deep, you'll meet Leon Ford,
Speaker 1: who survived being shot multiple times by police and is
Speaker 1: now on the front lines of police reform in Pittsburgh.
Speaker 1: This is In the Deep Stories That Shape Us. Hey,
Speaker 1: my name is Kevis and I was really scared to
Speaker 1: get tested for HIV, but I knew I had to
Speaker 1: do it. So I found out my status and you
Speaker 1: know what, I'll also learn from a doctor that HIV
Speaker 1: is not a death sense, their medications available to treat
Speaker 1: HIV and options to prevent it. So my advice if
Speaker 1: you haven't done so, get tested, know your status. I'm
Speaker 1: glad I do, and press play on What's next. Learn
Speaker 1: more at HIV test now dot com. Learning to love
Speaker 1: ourselves and our messy and complicated truth is hard enough,
Speaker 1: but what happens when you have that feeling of otherness
Speaker 1: just hanging over your head where you don't feel understood
Speaker 1: even within your own tribe. How do you confidently grow
Speaker 1: into your own skin, or maybe even grow out of
Speaker 1: it when the road to acceptance and healing is so
Speaker 1: rough and bumping. Welcome back to in the deep stories
Speaker 1: that shape us. I'm your host, Zach Stafford. If you've
Speaker 1: been following us since day one, you're familiar with the
Speaker 1: stories of hardship. Our guests have shared those struggles of identity, discrimination,
Speaker 1: or health, and how these people have managed to move
Speaker 1: forward despite their circumstances. And if you're new, well check
Speaker 1: those stories out. You won't regret it. We're going to
Speaker 1: continue listening to these stories from black and LATINX people,
Speaker 1: hoping to gain clarity and get closer, even if just
Speaker 1: a little, to a road of healing and understanding. I
Speaker 1: think by now all of us have had some understanding
Speaker 1: that many black people living in America, especially black men,
Speaker 1: have that other type of talk with our family, the
Speaker 1: one that teaches you to keep your hands on the
Speaker 1: wheel or respond with yes sir no sir answers when
Speaker 1: interacting with police. And regardless of how much you prep
Speaker 1: in advance, no matter how many different scenarios you recreate
Speaker 1: in your head, can a person really be fully prepared
Speaker 1: for those human reactions, those feelings of anxiety, or that
Speaker 1: fight or fight feeling that can take over in times
Speaker 1: of danger. As a black man myself, I've had my
Speaker 1: own experiences with the police throughout my life. I've had
Speaker 1: the cops who follow you around town, hoping you miss
Speaker 1: one stop sign, do one thing they can deem suspicious.
Speaker 1: And as a journalist, I've dedicated most of my life
Speaker 1: to exploring how these cops misuse their power towards people
Speaker 1: that look like me all around this country, much of
Speaker 1: which has been inspired by my own personal experiences. But
Speaker 1: through all of these years and countless stories, I have
Speaker 1: yet to ever sit down and have the conversation you're
Speaker 1: about to hear today, a conversation with a man who
Speaker 1: was pulled over, was shot by the police five times,
Speaker 1: and became paralyzed at the age of nineteen, and today
Speaker 1: is working to not defund the police, but rather change
Speaker 1: them from within. Leon Ford's powerful story brings up so
Speaker 1: many questions for me personally and challenges me even more
Speaker 1: because even more than his body of work, Leon's journey
Speaker 1: begs the question can you truly heal and continue to
Speaker 1: help others? All while facing your inner panes and stigmas
Speaker 1: that have plagued you in your community for a long time,
Speaker 1: and even more powerful, can you take this healing and
Speaker 1: turn the people that have wronged you, those that have
Speaker 1: hurt you, into a sort of ally for change. So
Speaker 1: I am from the east side of Pittsburgh in a
Speaker 1: neighborhood called Garfield. It's like a small town, you know,
Speaker 1: we're all one degree of separation away. And so I
Speaker 1: was fortunate enough to build relationships with, you know, all
Speaker 1: of my different relatives all throughout Pittsburgh. I was a
Speaker 1: kid that always wanted to be outside. They used to
Speaker 1: call me professor because I was also I was also
Speaker 1: the kid that could have a full conversation with any adult.
Speaker 1: I remember just being at the table while my grandmother
Speaker 1: and aunts and uncles were playing spades. The games used
Speaker 1: to be rowdy, but there was like a lot of love. Whereas, like,
Speaker 1: you know, towards the corner, my cousins would be shooting
Speaker 1: dice and my grandmother would say, stay away from the
Speaker 1: dice game because you know, you just never know, like
Speaker 1: somebody's gonna fight or something, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: I played football growing up. I didn't love it as
Speaker 1: much as my son loves it. I have a nine
Speaker 1: year old son and he loves football. I mean, any
Speaker 1: chance that I, like skip football practice, I was definitely
Speaker 1: doing that. What were you doing when you skip football practice?
Speaker 1: Just hanging out with friends, right, and dirt bikes and
Speaker 1: just hanging out. Would you say, this time of your life,
Speaker 1: you're pretty happy with everyone and everything going on? Absolutely happy.
Speaker 1: I was spoiled. So when I was five or six
Speaker 1: years old, my dad he was indicted by the FBI
Speaker 1: for conspiracy to sell drugs and he actually served maybe
Speaker 1: fourteen years in federal prison. Yeah, so that was my
Speaker 1: first huge shift in my life. Where my dad was
Speaker 1: a very active father, you know, supported the little league
Speaker 1: football teams and things, and then you know he was
Speaker 1: snatched away. Something that really stands out in Leon's story,
Speaker 1: it's just this idea of manhood, a fatherhood, because on
Speaker 1: the one hand he has his father, his own personal superhero,
Speaker 1: but on the other he has the world's opinion of
Speaker 1: his character. It's almost like living in between two worlds.
Speaker 1: One where his father is very present, a great man, friend,
Speaker 1: a great leader even, and another where he's getting hurt, stabbed, shot,
Speaker 1: or even arrested. I can relate to that feeling because
Speaker 1: my dad was also hurt like Leon's. He was even
Speaker 1: indicted at one point two, and there's feelings of anxiety,
Speaker 1: that feeling of am I next are incredibly difficult to shake.
Speaker 1: So I felt like I lived in two worlds. In
Speaker 1: one world, I always was like a star student, and
Speaker 1: the teachers treated me really well because they knew that
Speaker 1: my parents were engaged. And then once my dad was indicted,
Speaker 1: they kind of looked at me like differently. Yeah, like
Speaker 1: I was a problem child, you know, like I had
Speaker 1: done something wrong, and my relationships with school changed because
Speaker 1: of that. I instantly felt my blockness, right, I felt
Speaker 1: my privilege kind of be stripped away, because I do
Speaker 1: feel like I was privileged. My father was very well respected,
Speaker 1: and there was like this deep reverence for him as
Speaker 1: a person because he's just a stand up guy. You know,
Speaker 1: he's a person who keeps his word. He took care
Speaker 1: of so many people, from you know, saving homes from foreclosure,
Speaker 1: to paying taxes, to supporting youth sports and just you know,
Speaker 1: being someone that people in the community felt they could
Speaker 1: lean on. But Dad has a huge heart. So one world,
Speaker 1: I'm revered even though my dad went to prison and
Speaker 1: people were like treating me well and trying to look
Speaker 1: out for me since my dad was gone. On the
Speaker 1: other side, you know, these predominantly white teachers were treated
Speaker 1: me like I was a criminal. So that was very confusing,
Speaker 1: and I was struggling with why. You know, five and
Speaker 1: six years old, I didn't have the language to say,
Speaker 1: maybe because I'm blocking and they think my dad's a criminal,
Speaker 1: and so they think I'm going to become a criminal,
Speaker 1: or you know, I don't know the reason, but I
Speaker 1: certainly felt it. I felt the shift. I still have
Speaker 1: the first letter that my dad wrote me when he
Speaker 1: went to prison. He basically said that I'm not to
Speaker 1: blame for him going to prison. My mom wasn't to blame.
Speaker 1: It was his fault, the choices that he made. He
Speaker 1: broke down the importance of rules, how rules and laws
Speaker 1: are similar, how all laws and rules aren't right, but
Speaker 1: until we change them, we have to follow them right
Speaker 1: in a way, and he said, you know, wrote about
Speaker 1: how he wanted me to, you know, listen to my
Speaker 1: mom follow her rules, and he wanted me to become
Speaker 1: the best part of him, not the worst part. And
Speaker 1: you know, in reading this letter and being so close
Speaker 1: to my father, I thought about the possibilities of me
Speaker 1: being incarcerated one day, and that certainly frightened me. So
Speaker 1: even now I go to therapy and I'm a huge
Speaker 1: mental health advocate. There's certain things that I experienced from
Speaker 1: my father that made me who I am. But I
Speaker 1: won't necessarily do it to my son or say those
Speaker 1: things to my son, right, So I appreciate them, and
Speaker 1: I appreciate my father for him doing his best. Just
Speaker 1: because I've been exposed to a different way of engaging
Speaker 1: with trauma and healing doesn't negate the lessons that he
Speaker 1: learned throughout his life. And so I'm like moving forward,
Speaker 1: but I'm also acknowledging the past, and you know, I'm
Speaker 1: acknowledging the lessons from my father and my grandfather, even
Speaker 1: those lessons that society today may say are very harsh,
Speaker 1: which is complicated. You know, what you're saying takes me
Speaker 1: back to something my dad said to me. He said,
Speaker 1: I want you to be better than me, and what
Speaker 1: that requires of you is to be different than me
Speaker 1: and to deal with things different than me. So I'm
Speaker 1: still be me and treat you how I know how
Speaker 1: to treat you, but do not be me. Be different,
Speaker 1: because you will be better. So here's Leon existing, living
Speaker 1: his life, listening to his father's advice be different. But
Speaker 1: then on a regular Sunday morning, he gets a call
Speaker 1: from one of his cousins to hang out. Something tells
Speaker 1: him to stay, but he decides to go anyway. Leon
Speaker 1: and his cousins are really into fitness. They work out
Speaker 1: all the time. They're so close. They boxed together and
Speaker 1: even have a pact not to do drugs. But on
Speaker 1: this day, his cousin is hanging out with a girl
Speaker 1: and Leon gets a whiff of weed. His cousin has
Speaker 1: broken the pact. They all decide to go to their
Speaker 1: grandma's house, but Leon goes alone in his car. I
Speaker 1: got in my car and drove off. I drove to
Speaker 1: the corner to stop saying made a laugh. And so
Speaker 1: I was driving the correct way down on one way street.
Speaker 1: And then I saw a police cruiser coming toward me
Speaker 1: the wrong way with no lights on, just illegally driving
Speaker 1: down the street. And so when we passed each other,
Speaker 1: I had to like move over a little bit, and
Speaker 1: I locked eyes with those police officers and instantly knew
Speaker 1: that they were going to pull me over. I get
Speaker 1: asked this question often, like how did you know? It's
Speaker 1: just an instinct. It's just hard to explain to people
Speaker 1: who have never had that experience what that is like.
Speaker 1: And so I get to the next stop. Sound, made
Speaker 1: a left, drove about a block, made a right over
Speaker 1: a bridge. As I'm driving over the bridge, guys, so
Speaker 1: I see behind me police cruiser and they are speeding.
Speaker 1: Through investigations, we know that they were driving about ninety
Speaker 1: miles an hour trying to catch up to me. They
Speaker 1: call it fishing. That's the term that they use. Say
Speaker 1: they were definitely fishing. And so this police cruiser speeding
Speaker 1: behind me, I knew they were going to pull me over,
Speaker 1: and so you know, I began to prepare. I mean,
Speaker 1: I didn't have my seatbelt on, so I put my
Speaker 1: seatbelt on, you know those types of things, right, I want.
Speaker 1: They put their lights on and out immediately pulled over.
Speaker 1: I used to keep my driver's license and registration in
Speaker 1: a little zip block bag, so I got that for them,
Speaker 1: and the officer immediately like just came to the window
Speaker 1: and just snatched my license and he's you know where
Speaker 1: you going? Up talking I just going to my grandmother's
Speaker 1: house and eggs him that I do anything wrong, and
Speaker 1: he said, I ran to stop sign. He went back
Speaker 1: to the cruiser to run my name. Everything came back Claire.
Speaker 1: The car was registered to me. But then he decided
Speaker 1: to type in l Ford. So you can imagine on
Speaker 1: their system typing l Ford every name from Linda, Larry,
Speaker 1: any name or social to al that's going to pop up.
Speaker 1: And so he just basically decided to pick lamont Ford.
Speaker 1: I get frustrated a lot with this because the media,
Speaker 1: they would say, oh, they thought he was a gang member,
Speaker 1: or they thought he was a criminal, and he wasn't
Speaker 1: this criminal he was. He wasn't this game. He wasn't
Speaker 1: this bad person who they thought he was. The reality
Speaker 1: is that lamont Ford didn't even have an active warrant
Speaker 1: that I was shot. Yeah, and so like for the record,
Speaker 1: he didn't have an active war it. So even if
Speaker 1: it was even if I was lamont Ford, lamont Ford
Speaker 1: wouldn't have deserved what happened to me. The idea of
Speaker 1: justice in Leon's story is so complicated because even if
Speaker 1: you think, well, damn, he shouldn't have driven off and
Speaker 1: stayed and complied. This idea of being punished for having
Speaker 1: a human reaction feeling scared, feeling worried, feeling defenseless, isn't
Speaker 1: usually a means for such a drastic punishment. I've seen
Speaker 1: this time and time again in my own career, especially
Speaker 1: when I covered police in these incidents. At times, cops
Speaker 1: play the parts of both juror and prosecutor, tipping the
Speaker 1: scales to their favor and hopes of gaining a couple
Speaker 1: more informants for their needs. Going back to Leon for
Speaker 1: a second, think about it. He's nineteen. The police are
Speaker 1: confusing him for another person, lamont Ford. He's scared, and
Speaker 1: no matter how much he pleads, they are not taking
Speaker 1: no for an answer. It's his word against authorities. At
Speaker 1: that point, I was terrified. You know, nineteen years old,
Speaker 1: gave my driver's license, registration and car insurance. These officers
Speaker 1: now we're telling me, well, how about you get out
Speaker 1: of your car and come to our car. I look
Speaker 1: at this photo of lamart Ford. I never heard anything
Speaker 1: like that before, So I told Sam, I don't need
Speaker 1: to know what lamant for looks like as saying, we'll
Speaker 1: get your block ass out of the car before we
Speaker 1: pull you out. It was that moment where I kind
Speaker 1: of thought, well, I'm not getting out of this carca.
Speaker 1: I felt safe inside of the car, and one of
Speaker 1: the officers reached in through the window and unlocked the door.
Speaker 1: With the door two officers both grabbed me and tried
Speaker 1: to yank me out the car. So when I put
Speaker 1: the car and drive, the officer on the passenger side
Speaker 1: immediately jumped inside of the vehicle and within a half
Speaker 1: a second begin firing shots point blank range. And I
Speaker 1: was shot once in my neck, twice in my chest,
Speaker 1: once in my arm, and once in my hip. One
Speaker 1: of the bullets that went through my chest is the
Speaker 1: bullet that paralyzed me. Wow, you said that you felt
Speaker 1: safer in your car, you know, and I'm sure you
Speaker 1: grew up knowing that police were the s aggressive in
Speaker 1: your neighborhoods. What do you think was in you that
Speaker 1: day that said I better hit the gas to the pedal,
Speaker 1: Because you know that something When I talk to white people,
Speaker 1: especially and they look at these reports, they'll say, well,
Speaker 1: you shouldn't have driven off, you should have stayed, you
Speaker 1: should have just listened. But it sounds like everything in
Speaker 1: your body was saying, get out as fast as you can.
Speaker 1: And the fact here is that you were right, you
Speaker 1: were in danger. You did get shot. But why do
Speaker 1: you think your body said try to get out? In
Speaker 1: that moment? I did not feel safe around these police
Speaker 1: officers and they weren't taking no for an answer, and
Speaker 1: I felt like they were going to harm me. And so,
Speaker 1: you know, I thought my best bet was to drive off.
Speaker 1: My parents told me, you know, don't drive with your
Speaker 1: hood on, don't have friends in the back seat, don't
Speaker 1: blast music. Right, So my parents gave me information. However,
Speaker 1: I didn't have the language to say, hey, I don't
Speaker 1: feel safe. I would like for a supervisor to come
Speaker 1: to the sea. Now. I don't know if that would
Speaker 1: have changed anything. However, I feel like it's a duty
Speaker 1: of mine to equip young people and people in community
Speaker 1: in general with the language to protect them, to potentially
Speaker 1: prevent them from experiencing what I experienced. And even with
Speaker 1: those words of caution in his head from his parents,
Speaker 1: Leon woke up in the ICU. He wakes up to
Speaker 1: a police officer in the room without his family. Confused.
Speaker 1: I remember there was a suction tube that I would
Speaker 1: use to get out of the saliva out of my
Speaker 1: mouth because of the tubes, and I was hooked up
Speaker 1: to all these you know, i VS and things, and
Speaker 1: I accidentally dropped the suction my mouth. You know, it
Speaker 1: was full of saliva and I'm like trying to spit
Speaker 1: it out, but I began to choke. And as I
Speaker 1: was choking, you know, I was banging the bed to
Speaker 1: get the police officers attention, and he turned the TV up. Wow.
Speaker 1: As I was choking in the machines are going off,
Speaker 1: and then you know, nurses ran into the room and they,
Speaker 1: you know, they got the saliva out of my mouth.
Speaker 1: They were so upset with this police officer, but they
Speaker 1: too felt powerless. But it was just like man, I
Speaker 1: had so much fear and anger that began to crystallize
Speaker 1: into hatred. I was shockled to the bed even though
Speaker 1: they knew I was paralyzed. I was arraigned from my
Speaker 1: hospital bed. Wow, because I was charged, and I couldn't
Speaker 1: see my family for almost two weeks and I didn't
Speaker 1: even know why. They actually had to hire an attorney
Speaker 1: to figure out a way to see me. I was devastated.
Speaker 1: When my family came to visit me, I was I
Speaker 1: was so happy man, and I would just remember their sadness.
Speaker 1: They're worried, and just like my dad when he was shot.
Speaker 1: You know, I was in the hospital bed saying I'm okay,
Speaker 1: I'm good, even though on the inside I wasn't. The mental, emotional,
Speaker 1: and even physical pain it was unbearable, you know. I
Speaker 1: remember hitting the button repeatedly to take morphing, to get
Speaker 1: them to come just knock me out. I just wanted
Speaker 1: to sleep, and so when I would wake up, I
Speaker 1: would be out for a while and it felt like
Speaker 1: a dream, and then I would soon be knocked out
Speaker 1: again by the morphine. I think most people would have
Speaker 1: grown resentful or maybe just given up on life after
Speaker 1: something so traumatizing, But Leon's journey never ended with this
Speaker 1: tragic day, and though he was left with conflicting emotions
Speaker 1: at times, he quickly realized that if he wanted to heal,
Speaker 1: truly heal, he'd have to open himself up to things
Speaker 1: he never even imagined, and with people he never thought
Speaker 1: would be willing to lend a hand. And this is
Speaker 1: something we will cover in Part two. Because Leon's journey
Speaker 1: is as complex and beautiful as it is powerful, and
Speaker 1: proves how healing yourself can sometimes come by lifting others
Speaker 1: up along the way. Hi, my name is Ramon and
Speaker 1: I was really scared to get tested for HIV, but
Speaker 1: I knew I had to do it. So I've found
Speaker 1: out my status and you know what, I also learned
Speaker 1: from a doctor that HIV is not a death sentence.
Speaker 1: There are medications available to treat HIV and options to
Speaker 1: prevent it. So my advice if you haven't done so,
Speaker 1: get tested, know your status, and press play on what's next.
Speaker 1: Learn more at HIV test now dot com