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Speaker 1: I've never been in trouble in my life. I didn't

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Speaker 1: even have a parking ticket, you know what I mean.

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Speaker 1: I was brought up like cops are the good guys.

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Speaker 1: I didn't know what was going to happen, but I

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Speaker 1: do know that everything was stacked against me. Everything like

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Speaker 1: everything this isn't supposed to happen this way. I'm innocent.

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Speaker 1: I know I'm innocent. I know I had nothing to

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Speaker 1: do with this.

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Speaker 2: How is this possible?

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Speaker 3: I grew up trusting the systems. I've grew up believing

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Speaker 3: that every human being should do the right thing. And

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Speaker 3: that's why, even though I knew I was dealing with

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Speaker 3: corerough people, I wasn't going to break anyone to get

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Speaker 3: me out of prison because I wouldn't live with the

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Speaker 3: fact that I break my way out of my wife's death.

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Speaker 3: I'm not innocent, too proven guilty.

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Speaker 1: I'm guilty until I prove my innocence.

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Speaker 3: And that's absolutely what happened to me.

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Speaker 1: Our system. Since I've been out ten years, it has

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Speaker 1: come a little ways, but it's still broken.

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Speaker 3: I totally lost trusting humanity after what's happened to me.

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Speaker 2: This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with

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Speaker 2: Jason Flamm That's me. And today we have a very

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Speaker 2: special and unique episode of the show. Today we have

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Speaker 2: Tim Tyler with us. Tim, Welcome to Wronful Conviction. Oh,

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Speaker 2: thank you and Tim. One of the reasons why I

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Speaker 2: say it's unique is because Tim was actually convicted of

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Speaker 2: a crime that he was guilty of, which was an

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Speaker 2: LSD crime, non violent and sentenced to double life in prison.

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Speaker 2: No guns, no weapons, no violence, no no nothing. Actually,

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Speaker 2: and when I tell you, when you learn the story,

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Speaker 2: your head is going to explode. So stay tuned, uned,

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Speaker 2: get comfortable, because this is this is really madness. So Tim,

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Speaker 2: let's turn this to you. This case. I mean, you

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Speaker 2: were in prison for twenty six years, so this case

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Speaker 2: happened a long time.

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Speaker 1: Ago, Yes, in nineteen ninety two, August.

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Speaker 2: Third, nineteen ninety two, and you were on the road

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Speaker 2: with the Grateful Dead, right, Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I was a deadhead going to you know, like I

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Speaker 1: loved the Grateful Dead and the band, the families. It

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Speaker 1: was like a big family that went around and it

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Speaker 1: was a sense of freedom, it felt like. And I

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Speaker 1: was following them around and I was arrested. I mailed

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Speaker 1: some melisty to Florida and I was arrested and I

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Speaker 1: ended up doing like like you know, his twenty six

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Speaker 1: years in twenty seven days, right, And I'm lucky because

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Speaker 1: President Obama ended up giving me a clemency. So without that,

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Speaker 1: or without well support, I would still be in there,

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Speaker 1: and I wouldn't just be like another number, or I

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Speaker 1: couldn't get a message out.

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Speaker 2: And your case has so many horrible aspects to it,

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Speaker 2: and for me, it's very personal because listeners of the

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Speaker 2: show know that I'm the founding board member of the

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Speaker 2: Innocence Project, but I actually joined the Board of Families

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Speaker 2: Against Mandatory Minimums before I even knew about the Innocence Project.

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Speaker 2: So I've been with FAMS since almost since the beginning

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Speaker 2: of the organization. It's a wonderful organization, FAMM dot org.

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Speaker 2: It was founded by Julie Stewart. She was sort of

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Speaker 2: my mentor as I got started on this. You know,

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Speaker 2: lifetime in criminal justice reform, and you are a person

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Speaker 2: that we've spent a lot of time talking about. You

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Speaker 2: are a rallying cry, I think for people in this movement.

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Speaker 2: You're someone who all of us respect so much, and

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Speaker 2: you're someone who we're really proud to have played a

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Speaker 2: part in helping to win your freedom. But the lens

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Speaker 2: that the government went to to convict you of this

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Speaker 2: crime and sends you to life in prison, which again life,

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Speaker 2: And I've heard your sister talk about this on videos.

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Speaker 2: Is a video free Tim Tyler on the Internet. People

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Speaker 2: want to watch. It's so horrible because, as we say it,

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Speaker 2: fam Let, the punishment fit the crime, right, but your

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Speaker 2: punishment didn't match anything to do with the crime. Yours

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Speaker 2: was a non violent crime. How did this happen? Right?

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Speaker 2: How could this have gone so wrong? And we know

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Speaker 2: also that they ended up implicating your father, which is

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Speaker 2: so disgusting that it actually just and I think people

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Speaker 2: need to know that part of the story. I'm sure

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Speaker 2: it's tough to talk about it, but anyway, can you

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Speaker 2: take us back to this. So you're on the road

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Speaker 2: with the grateful Dead, you get approached by it turned

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Speaker 2: out to be a government and foremant right.

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Speaker 1: Actually, I had friends in Florida and Saint Pete, Florida

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Speaker 1: that I sold you know, I wanted to do LSD

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Speaker 1: and I sold some to my friends. Wanted to do it,

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Speaker 1: so I sold it to my friends. Well one of

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Speaker 1: them was arrested for I believe a sheet or announce

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Speaker 1: a weed, I'm not sure which. And he told me

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Speaker 1: he was arrested. He's like, I was arrested last night,

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Speaker 1: and he said he posted a bond and you know,

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Speaker 1: and I told him, well, your first defense in Florida

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Speaker 1: probably give you a probation. But he was recording me

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Speaker 1: at that time. And then he recorded me like twenty

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Speaker 1: six audio tapes after that, and like, I sold him

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Speaker 1: like a thousand hits of LSD, you know, And then

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Speaker 1: I sold them three more times another thousand, and all

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Speaker 1: of those were recorded where they could have arrested me.

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Speaker 1: And then I said, well, I was actually in Florida

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Speaker 1: when I did these sales in person to them, and

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Speaker 1: they could have arrested me, but they didn't arrest me.

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Speaker 1: I told them, I said, I'm leaving Saturday to go

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Speaker 1: on tour, you know, because there was no shows at

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Speaker 1: this particular time, and they could arrested me before I left,

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Speaker 1: but they didn't. They let me go. So I went

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Speaker 1: on to the shows, and actually I went to California

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Speaker 1: first and I bought like twelve five hundred hits of LSD.

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Speaker 1: Now it was like the price for that what I

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Speaker 1: paid was like four thousand dollars, So you're talking about

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Speaker 1: four thousand dollars of LSD total conspiracy. And I went

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Speaker 1: and I sent they wired me money, like eighteen hundred

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Speaker 1: dollars of their money, and I sent it all in

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Speaker 1: an envelope. But I had sent envelopes that never that

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Speaker 1: never arrived, and I took the loss myself before before this.

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Speaker 1: So this particular envelope, I sent nine thousand hits in

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Speaker 1: this envelope, and I put several different envelopes in it,

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Speaker 1: and one was for a friend of mine, one was

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Speaker 1: for somebody that somebody else that just was with a

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Speaker 1: blank person. One was for two thousand hits, which was

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Speaker 1: for my father. But my father was he didn't look

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Speaker 1: at it like he was doing anything. It was like

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Speaker 1: an envelope, you know. He never did all the steed,

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Speaker 1: so he was just getting some for a friend of his.

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Speaker 1: So but he knew it was coming, you know. But

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Speaker 1: I sent it all in one big envelope with more

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Speaker 1: with envelopes inside it, and I sent it to this

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Speaker 1: guy's business. Well when it was delivered, the dea or

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Speaker 1: whoever the officers delivered it. And at this guy's business,

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Speaker 1: and he knew me, says I was a kid, and

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Speaker 1: my father knew him since he was a kid, and

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Speaker 1: he basically cooperated right on the spot. So he called

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Speaker 1: my father and said, hey, come down here. So my

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Speaker 1: father did, and he basically threw the envelope in my

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Speaker 1: father's car, and then he convinced my father to walk

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Speaker 1: around with him at their business, trying to get him

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Speaker 1: to incriminate. I think that's the word himself. So my

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Speaker 1: father said something, Yeah, I'm just getting that. It's just

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Speaker 1: an envelope. I'm bringing to a friend. That's all my

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Speaker 1: father really said, and that's all he was really doing.

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Speaker 1: So they arrested him as soon as he said that.

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Speaker 1: They came and arrest him.

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Speaker 2: Right.

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Speaker 1: They were there hidden and they arrested my father and

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Speaker 1: I had a good friend of mine, they arrested him.

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Speaker 1: There was only five hundred hits was for him. He

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Speaker 1: ended up doing five years himself. This guy and my

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Speaker 1: father ended up being sentenced to ten years for this charge.

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Speaker 1: And he had about a year and have to go home.

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Speaker 1: And he died in prison of a heart attack at

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Speaker 1: the age of fifty three and April seventeen, two thousand

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Speaker 1: and one. So when I sent all this stuff. Then

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Speaker 1: I had warrants for sending that.

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Speaker 2: You know, now it's a federal crime because you sent

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Speaker 2: it through the mail.

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Speaker 1: Well, actually I sent it ups so it wasn't a

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Speaker 1: federal offense. But I was traveling the country and they

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Speaker 1: couldn't catch me, so I guess it was originally going

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Speaker 1: to be a state crime. And my father was arrested

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Speaker 1: and posted his bond as a state crime, but they

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Speaker 1: wouldn't release him because they decided to let the federal

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Speaker 1: take over my So eventually my father was able to

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Speaker 1: get a bond, and when I was arrested, I had

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Speaker 1: no bond, none, not a million, not ten million, whatever,

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Speaker 1: zero bond. And I also knew that once I was

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Speaker 1: arrested that I was I was going to go away

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Speaker 1: for a long time. This time, see, I had two

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Speaker 1: prior sales of LSD, and when I went to court,

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Speaker 1: they offered me eighteen months in prison or three years

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Speaker 1: for robation. So I took the three years for probation.

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Speaker 1: I pled guilty, took three years probation, and then they

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Speaker 1: took me to the other one and they actually wanted

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Speaker 1: to give me three years in prison, and I told

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Speaker 1: him I was never even in their town, which they

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Speaker 1: can verify, and I'd like to have a speedy trial

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Speaker 1: and go to trial. And then several months later I

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Speaker 1: told him I would be willing to plead guilty if

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Speaker 1: you ran at concurrent probation with the one in Penelos County.

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Speaker 1: Even though I was not the person that would drove

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Speaker 1: up there. They arrested. It was a friend of mine

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Speaker 1: that drove up there, and they arrested him and he

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Speaker 1: pled guilty in the whole nine yards. So after it

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Speaker 1: was like a week before we were going to go

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Speaker 1: to trial, they said, okay, you can plead guilty today.

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Speaker 1: Matter of fact, the judge was upset that I was

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Speaker 1: going to plead guilty. It was a female judge, and

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Speaker 1: she says, you could plead no contest and I will

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Speaker 1: give you adjudication of guilt withheld and give you three

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Speaker 1: years probation concurrent to your other three years probation. So

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Speaker 1: I pled no contest, okay. So then within six months

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Speaker 1: at that time, I ended up going to some shows again,

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Speaker 1: and I was really only had a couple of guys,

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Speaker 1: This guy UH named Jeff Rhodes that I sold to

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Speaker 1: on this charge that ended up setting me up, and

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Speaker 1: I had like one or two other guys that I

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Speaker 1: sold to.

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Speaker 2: That was it.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it was just my friends. It wasn't like

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Speaker 1: this big, big thing. I wasn't this big person that

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Speaker 1: they seem like to make me out to be.

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Speaker 2: But and I want to just jump in here for

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Speaker 2: a second, because you know, the the cynic out there

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Speaker 2: would be listening and go, Wow, this guy who's selling

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Speaker 2: LSD and it's against the law and this and that,

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Speaker 2: blah blah blah. We have people, all kinds of people

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Speaker 2: who listen to the show, and they all have their

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Speaker 2: own unique viewpoints on these two issues. But for those people,

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Speaker 2: I would ask them to consider the fact that it

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Speaker 2: was a total four thousand dollars involved, right, and we

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Speaker 2: spent as a country to keep you locked up for

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Speaker 2: twenty six years. We spent probably close to a million

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Speaker 2: and a half taxpayer dollars, not to mention the lost

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Speaker 2: income that we might have gotten from being out and

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Speaker 2: getting a job and working, paying taxes, you know, not

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Speaker 2: to mention your dad's ten years in prison. I mean,

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Speaker 2: the implications of this across the board, it's you know,

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Speaker 2: I guess when you edit all up, it's probably more

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Speaker 2: than a couple million bucks that we spent to lock

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Speaker 2: up a guy who probably needed to go to rehab,

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Speaker 2: which was you. You know, I mean, I don't I

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Speaker 2: can't go back and judge you from back then, but

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Speaker 2: you know, it sounds like you had to you know,

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Speaker 2: you had a drug issue, and at some point you

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Speaker 2: probably would have had to get some help for that.

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Speaker 2: But I think that's my personal feeling is that that's

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Speaker 2: how we should approach drugs. You should approach them as

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Speaker 2: a medical problem, not a criminal justice problem. And they

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Speaker 2: do that in certain parts of the world, like Portugal,

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Speaker 2: and they have no issues whatsoever right that all drugs

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Speaker 2: are legal there. Nobody cares. There's no there's no increase

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Speaker 2: in crime, there's no increase in overdoses, there's no Every

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Speaker 2: social scienceist that has studied it has found that when

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Speaker 2: they decriminalized it, which was in two thousand, all those

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Speaker 2: things actually were affected positively. The crime rate went down,

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Speaker 2: you know, drug use went down, overdoses went down, and

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Speaker 2: it went down not only for small countries. They compared

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Speaker 2: it to European countries and world countries like It's just

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Speaker 2: that all the evidence shows that this is the only

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Speaker 2: saying strategy is to treat drugs as a medical problem.

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Speaker 2: If you get behind the wheel and your high as

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Speaker 2: a kite and you hurt somebody, then I believed and

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Speaker 2: you have to be punished in some way, right Or

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Speaker 2: if you do anything to hurt somebody, and if you

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Speaker 2: act in a way that's irresponsible to anyone other than yourself,

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Speaker 2: then you know, we have to as a society look

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Speaker 2: at that. But for someone who is not harming anybody else,

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Speaker 2: not you know, selling it to little school children or

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Speaker 2: doing anything. You know, don't get me started, But anyway,

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Speaker 2: your experience is a is an extreme example of what's

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Speaker 2: wrong with our sentencing laws and with our approach to

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Speaker 2: drugs in general. And it is also an example of

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Speaker 2: something that's such a strange dichotomy because here you were

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Speaker 2: someone who is sort of a free spirit music lover.

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Speaker 2: I'm a music lover. I never liked the Grateful Dead personally,

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Speaker 2: I was a whole morning to the hard rock stuff,

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Speaker 2: but whatever, and then you end up being put in

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Speaker 2: going from this sort of hippie dippy lifestyle, flower power whatever,

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Speaker 2: into literally some of the most harsh conditions that any

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Speaker 2: human being can or ever would endure. And I want

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Speaker 2: to talk about that, because it's important for people to

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Speaker 2: understand what that's like and the concept of putting non

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Speaker 2: violent offenders like yourself into maximum security prisons, which is

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Speaker 2: so wrong on so many levels. But before we get

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Speaker 2: to that, tim so there's another problem with your case

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Speaker 2: that we find over and over again in wrongful conviction cases,

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Speaker 2: which is the lack of adequate counsel. And your attorney

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Speaker 2: actually sold you down the river in a very meaningful way.

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Speaker 2: And can you talk about that because did you have

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Speaker 2: a public defender?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, he was a public defender, but he was also

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Speaker 1: a private attorney that the government hired. It's kind of

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Speaker 1: a strange situation because my father hired a very good

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Speaker 1: attorney in Florida name Frank Osada. And as soon as

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Speaker 1: we played guilty, you know I was gonna plead guilty. Anyway,

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Speaker 1: I knew I was going to be in prison until

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Speaker 1: at least twenty twelve, which because I happened to believe

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Speaker 1: in some of the stuff that Jerry Garcia and Terrence

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Speaker 1: McKenna had spoke about that date, So I knew I

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Speaker 1: was going to be in prison until then at least. Anyways,

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Speaker 1: but I listened to my father in some levels. In

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Speaker 1: one level and his attorney and his attorney basically said

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Speaker 1: we should plead guilty, and my father was looking at

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Speaker 1: it through another another way too. I wanted I didn't

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Speaker 1: want to go to trial because I actually believed LSD

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Speaker 1: to be a sacrament, you know, which is something that

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Speaker 1: I'm sure there's a lot of argument to go on

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Speaker 1: both ways on that. But they did take Ayahaska to

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Speaker 1: the Supreme Court in two thousand and six and recognize

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Speaker 1: it as a sacrament to certain people, which is very similar.

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Speaker 2: So I just so that's now considered a religious ceremony.

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Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, it's considered religious ceremony. Ayahuasca. It's spelled a

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Speaker 1: ya h u a sca, and it's went to the

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Speaker 1: Supreme Court and it's legal in this country as a sacrament.

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Speaker 1: They use the same argument that the Native Americans use

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Speaker 1: for payote, and they took it and the guy that

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Speaker 1: owned Segum's Bottle company, Jeff Brawmnfman, I think I think

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Speaker 1: his name is, he took it to the Supreme Court

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Speaker 1: and he won. So it's regulated. But they're doing a

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Speaker 1: good job. They said, they don't want the same thing

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Speaker 1: that happened with LSD. They don't want it to happen

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Speaker 1: with Ayahuascas, so it's very controlled. You have to really

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Speaker 1: go through a ceremony and prepare yourself for it, you know.

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Speaker 1: But it's very similar, probably more potent in the experience

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Speaker 1: than LSD. And it's legal.

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Speaker 2: Right. What a strange psychotomy, right, I mean? And what

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Speaker 2: a weird society we are when you look at the

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Speaker 2: fact that alcohol causes you know, tens of thousands of

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Speaker 2: deaths every year, if not one hundreds of thousands. I

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Speaker 2: don't even know the numbers, but it's a lot, and

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00:18:07,240 --> 00:18:09,800
Speaker 2: it causes violence, and it causes people to misbehave in

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Speaker 2: all sorts of ways, all of which are negative for

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Speaker 2: society and their own families and their health and everything else.

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Speaker 2: And yet it's totally legal, right, And yet we have

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Speaker 2: other drugs like marijuana which are still which is you know,

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Speaker 2: obviously we're making a lot of progress, and this is

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Speaker 2: something I've been working on for a long time and

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Speaker 2: advocating for, but you know, there's still people serving life

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Speaker 2: in prison in America for marijuana like that. What in

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Speaker 2: the fuck is going on with that? I mean? People,

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Speaker 2: I say that to people and they're like, huh, No,

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Speaker 2: that doesn't make any sense. Yet we have more than

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Speaker 2: sixty percent of Americans now live in a community where

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Speaker 2: at least some form of medical or recreational marijuana is legal,

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Speaker 2: and yet we have people who are serving life in

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Speaker 2: prison and getting arrested every day. Tens of thousand of

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Speaker 2: people every week, every month get arrested for marijuana. It's

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Speaker 2: nuts and goes back to what you were talking about before. So,

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Speaker 2: so you came from a place of believing that what

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Speaker 2: you were doing really wasn't wrong because of the fact

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Speaker 2: that you looked at this and granted, you know, okay,

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Speaker 2: you know, people will have I'm sure very different opinions

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Speaker 2: on that, but I can understand where you're coming from.

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Speaker 2: But I want to fast forward a little bit to

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Speaker 2: the trial itself, because didn't your attorney give you literally

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Speaker 2: the worst advice that any attorney has ever given anybody,

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Speaker 2: which was the please guilty.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Actually he gave me worst advice than that. He

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Speaker 1: wanted me to cooperate, go against my father and they

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Speaker 1: would give me ten years, you know. So that was

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Speaker 1: his first conversation I ever had with him, and I'm like,

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Speaker 1: I called my father as soon as I was done

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Speaker 1: with that conversation. My father was had a bond and

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Speaker 1: he was home and I went and called him. I says, yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is what this attorney just told me. You know,

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Speaker 1: they offered me ten years to go against you. And

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Speaker 1: I'm like, of course, I'm just telling you. Of course

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Speaker 1: I'm not going to do nothing like that. And yeah,

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Speaker 1: he gave me bad advice. And I was his last

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Speaker 1: case that he was taken on as for the government.

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Speaker 1: He started private practice after my case.

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Speaker 2: So he's pretty conflicted.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's a sad story that the laws of

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Speaker 1: this country are made to hand somebody a life sentence

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Speaker 1: for this small amount. Well maybe it's a large amount.

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Speaker 1: It just all depends on the way you look at it.

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Speaker 2: Well, if you look at it in terms of monetary value,

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Speaker 2: it's a small amount. If you look at it in

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Speaker 2: terms of the sheer numbers, it's a large amount. But

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Speaker 2: you know, it's an amount that most people will never

358
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Speaker 2: ever see or come close to in their lifetimes. But

359
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Speaker 2: at the same time, you know, again I'm of the

360
00:20:46,160 --> 00:20:49,200
Speaker 2: opinion that drugs should be regulated, they should be taxed

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Speaker 2: just like alcohol, and they shouldn't be sold to minors,

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Speaker 2: and we should have safe spaces for people who are

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Speaker 2: heroinauts to to, you know, to do what they need

364
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Speaker 2: to do and not be in the streets. And you know,

365
00:21:01,560 --> 00:21:04,159
Speaker 2: it's been shown that these type of safe injection facilities

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Speaker 2: reduce the spread of AIDS and hepatitis drastically, clean needle exchanges.

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Speaker 2: Things like that, I don't do drugs. I wish, you know,

368
00:21:13,680 --> 00:21:16,080
Speaker 2: I could wave a magic wand and help every drug

369
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Speaker 2: addict off of drugs that you know that they could.

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Speaker 2: I believe we should have rehab facilities available to every

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Speaker 2: American who needs it and wants it like a hospital is,

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Speaker 2: and we would be a much better society if that

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Speaker 2: were the case. But instead we lock people like you

374
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Speaker 2: up for crazy amounts of time. But in your case,

375
00:21:36,440 --> 00:21:39,560
Speaker 2: your attorney told you that you could plead guilty. First

376
00:21:39,600 --> 00:21:40,919
Speaker 2: of all, the idea that he wanted you to testify

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00:21:40,920 --> 00:21:43,119
Speaker 2: against your father is something I really have to just

378
00:21:43,200 --> 00:21:45,280
Speaker 2: process for a little while. I guess he had to

379
00:21:45,320 --> 00:21:47,000
Speaker 2: offer you that option if it was an option that

380
00:21:47,080 --> 00:21:49,639
Speaker 2: was available to you. You know, he probably had a

381
00:21:49,760 --> 00:21:51,720
Speaker 2: legal duty to tell you about it. He didn't have

382
00:21:51,760 --> 00:21:53,720
Speaker 2: to advise you to do it. But I'm sure he

383
00:21:53,760 --> 00:21:57,600
Speaker 2: did have some sort of a responsibility to tell you

384
00:21:57,640 --> 00:22:00,320
Speaker 2: that that was on the table. You did the only

385
00:22:00,400 --> 00:22:02,840
Speaker 2: right thing that you could do, of course, and that's

386
00:22:03,000 --> 00:22:05,840
Speaker 2: the only honorable thing. And then but then he still

387
00:22:05,840 --> 00:22:07,760
Speaker 2: told you that if you pleaded guilty, you would get

388
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Speaker 2: what not.

389
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Speaker 1: Life twenty one to twenty seven years. I thought, so,

390
00:22:14,520 --> 00:22:17,320
Speaker 1: which is a long time, you know, when you're just

391
00:22:17,640 --> 00:22:20,760
Speaker 1: getting arrested and you're coming in. But I also I

392
00:22:20,800 --> 00:22:25,160
Speaker 1: just had to adapt to my environment and think about, Okay,

393
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Speaker 1: I'm going to be in prison for a long time,

394
00:22:26,720 --> 00:22:31,240
Speaker 1: so regardless, and I really thought about December twenty one,

395
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Speaker 1: twenty twelve. I had on the back of my mind.

396
00:22:35,240 --> 00:22:37,200
Speaker 1: I believed something was going to happen, and maybe I

397
00:22:37,200 --> 00:22:41,520
Speaker 1: would that date would change, you know, like Jerry mentioned,

398
00:22:41,720 --> 00:22:46,080
Speaker 1: or Terrence McKenna, an author, he mentioned, like a global

399
00:22:46,080 --> 00:22:48,639
Speaker 1: shift of consciousness on that date. So I figured, Okay,

400
00:22:49,080 --> 00:22:50,560
Speaker 1: I'm going to be in until then anyway. So it

401
00:22:50,600 --> 00:22:53,760
Speaker 1: doesn't matter if they say twenty years, two life sentences,

402
00:22:53,960 --> 00:22:56,280
Speaker 1: thirty years. It just didn't matter to me at the time.

403
00:22:56,320 --> 00:23:02,000
Speaker 1: I just accepted my fate, you know. Like I had

404
00:23:02,119 --> 00:23:05,280
Speaker 1: a couple of friends also, and I called them up

405
00:23:05,320 --> 00:23:07,760
Speaker 1: and I said, you're never going to hear from me again.

406
00:23:07,840 --> 00:23:10,760
Speaker 1: I'm if anybody ever comes to you ask you any

407
00:23:10,880 --> 00:23:13,960
Speaker 1: questions or anything, just tell them you'll cooperate against me.

408
00:23:14,440 --> 00:23:16,119
Speaker 1: That's what I told some of the people because I

409
00:23:16,160 --> 00:23:20,520
Speaker 1: know I was basically the taking it. I was going

410
00:23:20,560 --> 00:23:23,600
Speaker 1: to jail, you know, I was doing that as a

411
00:23:23,640 --> 00:23:24,120
Speaker 1: long time.

412
00:23:24,240 --> 00:23:25,840
Speaker 2: So you were trying to send a lifeline out to

413
00:23:25,880 --> 00:23:27,440
Speaker 2: some of your friends that might have gotten in trouble.

414
00:23:27,480 --> 00:23:29,399
Speaker 2: That's actually I've never heard that story before. That's a

415
00:23:29,520 --> 00:23:32,320
Speaker 2: very uh, it's extreme. I mean, thoughtful is not the

416
00:23:32,359 --> 00:23:33,919
Speaker 2: right word, is not a strong enough word for it,

417
00:23:33,960 --> 00:23:36,959
Speaker 2: but it's a it's a very grace graceful thing that

418
00:23:37,000 --> 00:23:42,120
Speaker 2: you did, and I tip my hat to you for that.

419
00:23:42,600 --> 00:23:45,639
Speaker 2: So your attorney told you if you pleaded guilty, this

420
00:23:45,680 --> 00:23:47,600
Speaker 2: is what you would get. You were operating under this

421
00:23:48,040 --> 00:23:50,840
Speaker 2: mistaken assumption that this prophecy was real and that you

422
00:23:50,880 --> 00:23:53,240
Speaker 2: would that some magical thing was going to happen on

423
00:23:54,000 --> 00:23:57,199
Speaker 2: that particular date in twenty twelve. Obviously that's not how

424
00:23:57,240 --> 00:24:00,000
Speaker 2: it worked out. So when you when you were sentenced,

425
00:24:01,960 --> 00:24:04,840
Speaker 2: I mean that moment, I guess it.

426
00:24:04,800 --> 00:24:06,800
Speaker 1: Didn't really hit me when I was sentenced when he

427
00:24:06,840 --> 00:24:10,679
Speaker 1: actually said, you know, I send you to life and

428
00:24:10,720 --> 00:24:13,119
Speaker 1: then another life. It didn't really hit me. My sister

429
00:24:13,160 --> 00:24:16,080
Speaker 1: was in the courtroom though, and the officers involved were

430
00:24:16,080 --> 00:24:18,600
Speaker 1: in the courtroom, and as I was walking out of

431
00:24:18,640 --> 00:24:22,680
Speaker 1: the courtroom, you know, I was it was. It didn't

432
00:24:22,760 --> 00:24:25,040
Speaker 1: hit me until I looked at my sister and the

433
00:24:25,080 --> 00:24:29,640
Speaker 1: two guys they were officers. They stood up and high

434
00:24:29,640 --> 00:24:31,560
Speaker 1: fived each other in the middle of the courtroom, and

435
00:24:31,600 --> 00:24:34,440
Speaker 1: my sister saw that, and I'm looking at my sister

436
00:24:34,480 --> 00:24:36,479
Speaker 1: and I basically start I broke down right then. I

437
00:24:36,520 --> 00:24:39,359
Speaker 1: was like, man, this is sad. I'm sad for my sister.

438
00:24:40,960 --> 00:24:43,120
Speaker 1: It's sad to see my sister here right now like that.

439
00:24:43,320 --> 00:24:47,040
Speaker 1: And I walked in, you know, with the marshals, into

440
00:24:47,040 --> 00:24:50,720
Speaker 1: the elevator, and I had some tears going because I've

441
00:24:50,720 --> 00:24:53,479
Speaker 1: seen my sister. It was more to do with her

442
00:24:53,560 --> 00:24:55,320
Speaker 1: than it was for myself.

443
00:24:55,600 --> 00:25:10,560
Speaker 2: You know, that's a crazy thing, but we've heard that

444
00:25:10,640 --> 00:25:13,359
Speaker 2: before on the show, with people at this moment of

445
00:25:14,080 --> 00:25:17,920
Speaker 2: utter despair still thinking more about the people they love

446
00:25:18,000 --> 00:25:20,280
Speaker 2: than about their own predicament, which is sort of a

447
00:25:20,680 --> 00:25:26,680
Speaker 2: really an interesting phenomenon psychological and emotional phenomena that happens.

448
00:25:26,320 --> 00:25:31,600
Speaker 2: But then, you know, then comes another terrible aspect of

449
00:25:31,640 --> 00:25:34,400
Speaker 2: your case, which is something that I know you talk

450
00:25:34,440 --> 00:25:36,639
Speaker 2: about in your speeches, and I know you want to

451
00:25:36,680 --> 00:25:40,359
Speaker 2: talk about today, and I want to talk about today,

452
00:25:40,359 --> 00:25:41,919
Speaker 2: which is the fact that you were sent to some

453
00:25:41,960 --> 00:25:45,880
Speaker 2: of the most dangerous prisons in America as a non

454
00:25:46,040 --> 00:25:49,800
Speaker 2: violent hippie. Right, you still look like a hippie. You

455
00:25:49,359 --> 00:25:51,280
Speaker 2: got you can't hear you can't see him on the radio,

456
00:25:51,320 --> 00:25:55,040
Speaker 2: but he's got long hair in a braid, and you know,

457
00:25:55,200 --> 00:25:57,760
Speaker 2: just sort of has the mannerisms of somebody who is

458
00:25:58,000 --> 00:26:01,840
Speaker 2: just a gentle musical sort of a soul, which I

459
00:26:01,880 --> 00:26:05,119
Speaker 2: recognized from my day job in the music business. So

460
00:26:06,160 --> 00:26:08,600
Speaker 2: how did you deal with this? I mean, what was

461
00:26:08,640 --> 00:26:10,720
Speaker 2: it like when you first went and how did you

462
00:26:10,800 --> 00:26:13,160
Speaker 2: manage to survive? I mean, these are places where people

463
00:26:13,200 --> 00:26:17,520
Speaker 2: are getting stabbed, people are getting beaten, people are getting killed, right,

464
00:26:17,800 --> 00:26:19,680
Speaker 2: and here you are not not I mean you're not

465
00:26:19,720 --> 00:26:22,360
Speaker 2: a small guy, but you're not a big bodybuilder type

466
00:26:22,400 --> 00:26:24,520
Speaker 2: of guy, tough guy whatever. You did grow up in

467
00:26:24,560 --> 00:26:27,480
Speaker 2: a violent you know, back with the background like.

468
00:26:28,080 --> 00:26:31,440
Speaker 1: It started off. I guess it just depends on who

469
00:26:31,520 --> 00:26:35,399
Speaker 1: you befriend when you first go into prison. You know,

470
00:26:36,240 --> 00:26:39,240
Speaker 1: I went. There was a guy from actually from Hell's

471
00:26:39,320 --> 00:26:43,879
Speaker 1: Kitchen in New York named Paulie Shartier. He passed away

472
00:26:43,920 --> 00:26:48,280
Speaker 1: since then, but he took me as a roommate right off,

473
00:26:48,560 --> 00:26:50,760
Speaker 1: you know, right off the bus basically, you know. And

474
00:26:50,800 --> 00:26:52,760
Speaker 1: I came in there with long hair. So he's like, look,

475
00:26:52,800 --> 00:26:55,959
Speaker 1: you gotta shut your you gotta cut your hair first.

476
00:26:56,080 --> 00:26:59,760
Speaker 1: And he schooled me. But he did more than school me.

477
00:26:59,800 --> 00:27:04,280
Speaker 1: He had without me realizing the amount of stuff that

478
00:27:04,359 --> 00:27:08,919
Speaker 1: he did for me, he had like power within the

479
00:27:08,960 --> 00:27:13,119
Speaker 1: prison system. Let's say, you know, if you're a serious

480
00:27:13,320 --> 00:27:16,760
Speaker 1: violent person or whatever, and you've done some serious violent acts,

481
00:27:17,600 --> 00:27:22,439
Speaker 1: then you gained some kind of power more more like

482
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:24,960
Speaker 1: people are afraid of you. I guess it boils down

483
00:27:25,000 --> 00:27:27,040
Speaker 1: to and he took me in as a roommate and

484
00:27:27,080 --> 00:27:30,480
Speaker 1: he schooled me. And he also had explained to other

485
00:27:30,520 --> 00:27:36,080
Speaker 1: people where I came from. You know, I'm this deadhead.

486
00:27:36,520 --> 00:27:39,240
Speaker 1: I'm you know. He's like, yeah, you're you know. He

487
00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:41,800
Speaker 1: used to he used to be funny to him in

488
00:27:41,840 --> 00:27:44,600
Speaker 1: a way as far as seeing me because I'm like

489
00:27:44,640 --> 00:27:47,439
Speaker 1: this non He's like, you don't belong in here in

490
00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:53,000
Speaker 1: this prison system. And he personally told people that other

491
00:27:53,040 --> 00:27:55,280
Speaker 1: people that had power like to look out for me,

492
00:27:55,400 --> 00:27:59,840
Speaker 1: you know, to like make sure that I don't get

493
00:27:59,880 --> 00:28:02,200
Speaker 1: in anything I wasn't. I didn't do drugs in there.

494
00:28:02,280 --> 00:28:06,840
Speaker 1: I didn't do I didn't borrow things from people and

495
00:28:06,880 --> 00:28:09,080
Speaker 1: not return them. There's a lot of things they say

496
00:28:09,320 --> 00:28:15,960
Speaker 1: when you get to prison, not to do gamble and.

497
00:28:17,359 --> 00:28:19,280
Speaker 2: Tim why do you think that he took such an

498
00:28:19,280 --> 00:28:21,639
Speaker 2: interest in your well being, because it sounds like he,

499
00:28:22,359 --> 00:28:24,160
Speaker 2: at least for a period of time, may have saved

500
00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:24,560
Speaker 2: your life.

501
00:28:24,600 --> 00:28:26,840
Speaker 1: Well, he wasn't the first person. I mean, he was

502
00:28:26,880 --> 00:28:30,880
Speaker 1: the first person, but he wasn't the last. An Italian

503
00:28:30,880 --> 00:28:34,960
Speaker 1: guy that's very well known from New York also, and

504
00:28:35,040 --> 00:28:38,840
Speaker 1: he's he's he took a liking to me too. And

505
00:28:38,880 --> 00:28:42,720
Speaker 1: I started playing tennis with him and three days a week.

506
00:28:42,560 --> 00:28:45,080
Speaker 2: And tennis at tennis in a maxim security prison.

507
00:28:45,200 --> 00:28:47,640
Speaker 1: They did in Atlanta. It took a few years, but

508
00:28:48,400 --> 00:28:51,200
Speaker 1: they had tennis in USP Atlanta when I when I

509
00:28:51,280 --> 00:28:55,280
Speaker 1: arrived there, you know, they actually had tennis courts in there.

510
00:28:55,960 --> 00:28:58,120
Speaker 1: No longer, they have no more tennis than any of

511
00:28:58,160 --> 00:29:03,040
Speaker 1: the prisons, but they had there and handball. And one

512
00:29:03,080 --> 00:29:05,640
Speaker 1: of the things I started doing was playing handball. And

513
00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:11,160
Speaker 1: these guys, you know, had a lot of power on

514
00:29:11,200 --> 00:29:14,040
Speaker 1: the street in the free world, so in prison they

515
00:29:14,680 --> 00:29:17,560
Speaker 1: some of them retained some of that power where nobody

516
00:29:17,600 --> 00:29:21,840
Speaker 1: would mess with them or maybe their friends. So they

517
00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:28,600
Speaker 1: by me playing at daily doing exercise with some people

518
00:29:28,640 --> 00:29:32,840
Speaker 1: that had it was that had a little power in

519
00:29:32,880 --> 00:29:35,640
Speaker 1: the free world, let's say, or even in prison, some

520
00:29:35,760 --> 00:29:39,239
Speaker 1: of the other people would think, well they better not

521
00:29:39,720 --> 00:29:45,160
Speaker 1: you know, approached me in negative ways based on only

522
00:29:45,200 --> 00:29:48,320
Speaker 1: because I befriended some people and not everybody is able

523
00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:51,440
Speaker 1: to befriend you know, some people like that. It's just

524
00:29:51,480 --> 00:29:55,000
Speaker 1: like they kind of like came to me. It's I

525
00:29:55,000 --> 00:29:57,920
Speaker 1: don't really know how it all happened. It was more

526
00:29:58,000 --> 00:30:02,280
Speaker 1: like they they saw somebody. They saw so many they

527
00:30:02,280 --> 00:30:05,959
Speaker 1: didn't feel like that was a real that was like

528
00:30:06,000 --> 00:30:10,160
Speaker 1: a I don't know, I like to say the word convict,

529
00:30:10,200 --> 00:30:15,840
Speaker 1: but in some levels like a criminal. They didn't look

530
00:30:15,840 --> 00:30:17,800
Speaker 1: at me as like a criminal, and they looked at

531
00:30:17,800 --> 00:30:20,760
Speaker 1: me like and I had a life sentence, So there

532
00:30:21,560 --> 00:30:24,840
Speaker 1: they had some compassion for me. I guess yeah, it.

533
00:30:24,840 --> 00:30:29,800
Speaker 2: Sounds like it. It upset their own sense of right

534
00:30:29,840 --> 00:30:33,240
Speaker 2: and wrong to an extent that they felt that they

535
00:30:33,320 --> 00:30:39,000
Speaker 2: could use that influenced power you know, they had in

536
00:30:39,040 --> 00:30:45,040
Speaker 2: that situation to be able to protect you. And that's

537
00:30:45,080 --> 00:30:47,400
Speaker 2: a sort of a little miracle, right, It's sort of

538
00:30:48,160 --> 00:30:50,920
Speaker 2: hope in a hopeless place, I suppose. But you were

539
00:30:50,960 --> 00:30:54,560
Speaker 2: transferred to I mean, you were in a dozen different

540
00:30:54,600 --> 00:30:57,720
Speaker 2: prisons over the time you were locked up, and so

541
00:30:58,360 --> 00:31:02,080
Speaker 2: you know, you couldn't have had a dozen different protectors,

542
00:31:02,200 --> 00:31:05,560
Speaker 2: right And even then, like for you, I know that

543
00:31:06,040 --> 00:31:10,000
Speaker 2: from having read about you at various times, you were

544
00:31:10,080 --> 00:31:13,760
Speaker 2: the winemaker or whatever in the prison, and that managed

545
00:31:13,800 --> 00:31:17,160
Speaker 2: to help you because making a prison hoots or whatever

546
00:31:18,480 --> 00:31:20,320
Speaker 2: to keep you in the good graces of some of

547
00:31:20,400 --> 00:31:22,760
Speaker 2: the other guys who might have you know, been predators

548
00:31:25,000 --> 00:31:28,400
Speaker 2: or tormentors of yours. And that that does lead to

549
00:31:28,440 --> 00:31:29,800
Speaker 2: a good point that I want to make, which is

550
00:31:29,800 --> 00:31:34,400
Speaker 2: that my friend Tony Poppa, who was in prison maxim

551
00:31:34,440 --> 00:31:36,920
Speaker 2: security prison New York for twelve years for a non

552
00:31:36,960 --> 00:31:40,800
Speaker 2: violent first defense, he talks a lot about how, you know,

553
00:31:40,800 --> 00:31:42,600
Speaker 2: there was so much there was so much drugs in

554
00:31:42,640 --> 00:31:44,960
Speaker 2: the prisons that he was in. There were so many

555
00:31:45,000 --> 00:31:48,040
Speaker 2: drugs and as he says, if you can't control the

556
00:31:48,440 --> 00:31:50,560
Speaker 2: flow of drugs in a maximum security prison, how can

557
00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:52,800
Speaker 2: you expect to control it in a free society. And

558
00:31:52,800 --> 00:31:54,840
Speaker 2: I think that really says a lot about the work

559
00:31:54,840 --> 00:31:57,880
Speaker 2: that we do, because just think about that, right, there's

560
00:31:58,160 --> 00:32:00,560
Speaker 2: I don't think there's I mean, for everything, everybody I've

561
00:32:00,560 --> 00:32:03,360
Speaker 2: spoken to, and as you know, hundreds of people by

562
00:32:03,360 --> 00:32:06,360
Speaker 2: now that I know who have served time in different

563
00:32:06,360 --> 00:32:08,320
Speaker 2: prisons around and nobody says that it was hard to

564
00:32:08,320 --> 00:32:13,720
Speaker 2: get access to drugs, which I find remarkable, but it's true.

565
00:32:13,880 --> 00:32:16,480
Speaker 2: And yet we labor under this assumption that if we

566
00:32:16,600 --> 00:32:19,760
Speaker 2: devote enough resources to trying to stop the flow of

567
00:32:19,840 --> 00:32:23,280
Speaker 2: drugs or trying to you know, legislate our way out

568
00:32:23,280 --> 00:32:25,440
Speaker 2: of it or incarcerate our way out of it, that

569
00:32:25,520 --> 00:32:27,840
Speaker 2: somehow others going to reduce the amount of drugs and society.

570
00:32:28,080 --> 00:32:30,160
Speaker 2: It's never worked, it never will work, it never can work.

571
00:32:30,600 --> 00:32:33,640
Speaker 2: So and your your experience is just another example of that.

572
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:36,880
Speaker 2: But back to your experience. So, so you went from

573
00:32:36,920 --> 00:32:40,080
Speaker 2: prison to prison, you were placed in solitary confinement at

574
00:32:40,120 --> 00:32:42,240
Speaker 2: various times for either things that you did or did

575
00:32:42,280 --> 00:32:46,040
Speaker 2: not do right. And how did I mean? You were

576
00:32:46,080 --> 00:32:50,280
Speaker 2: deprived of basically all almost all the things that a

577
00:32:50,360 --> 00:32:53,040
Speaker 2: human being needs to survive, aside from the fact that.

578
00:32:53,080 --> 00:32:55,080
Speaker 2: I mean, were you you were vegetarian the whole time

579
00:32:55,120 --> 00:32:55,960
Speaker 2: you were in there too.

580
00:32:56,160 --> 00:32:59,240
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that's an early impossible to do. But yes,

581
00:33:01,480 --> 00:33:05,520
Speaker 1: I starved at times. Literally. That's something that I'd like

582
00:33:06,400 --> 00:33:09,160
Speaker 1: to bring awareness to, Like there is some other vegetarians

583
00:33:09,160 --> 00:33:12,080
Speaker 1: in there, vegans in there. There. There actually are a few,

584
00:33:12,200 --> 00:33:18,320
Speaker 1: like a lot of Rastafarians or vegans, and they have

585
00:33:19,320 --> 00:33:25,240
Speaker 1: very limited food choices in there. You know. Towards the

586
00:33:25,360 --> 00:33:27,600
Speaker 1: last couple of years I was in there, they started

587
00:33:28,200 --> 00:33:31,600
Speaker 1: letting people get like tofu and our bomzo beans and

588
00:33:31,600 --> 00:33:34,200
Speaker 1: stuff like that that are vegan. That are the vegetarians.

589
00:33:35,640 --> 00:33:38,240
Speaker 1: But for the most part, for the most of those years,

590
00:33:38,560 --> 00:33:41,959
Speaker 1: they serve like soy, just soy, you know, throw some

591
00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:46,520
Speaker 1: water and some soy and that would be food, you know.

592
00:33:46,600 --> 00:33:49,840
Speaker 1: But for me, I was fortunate where I would I

593
00:33:50,040 --> 00:33:53,800
Speaker 1: ate oatmeal and apples mostly every single day for lunch.

594
00:33:54,080 --> 00:33:56,200
Speaker 1: That was my lunch, you know. I would eat that

595
00:33:56,400 --> 00:33:58,480
Speaker 1: in my room because you can buy oatmeal in the

596
00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:03,240
Speaker 1: commissary and apples sometimes you can get them from the kitchen,

597
00:34:03,840 --> 00:34:05,560
Speaker 1: you know, or you can have somebody to bring them

598
00:34:05,920 --> 00:34:09,680
Speaker 1: to you, I guess. And I would just go out

599
00:34:09,719 --> 00:34:13,040
Speaker 1: and play handball for a lot of years, for like

600
00:34:13,200 --> 00:34:16,080
Speaker 1: the past twenty years, probably I would skip going to

601
00:34:16,160 --> 00:34:19,040
Speaker 1: the real lunch because there's mostly nothing there that I

602
00:34:19,080 --> 00:34:25,560
Speaker 1: would eat. But yeah, and then in a commissary, they

603
00:34:25,640 --> 00:34:28,960
Speaker 1: have a comma saries where inmates can buy food, but

604
00:34:29,120 --> 00:34:34,879
Speaker 1: there's nothing, definitely nothing organic in there. But there's very

605
00:34:34,920 --> 00:34:37,480
Speaker 1: little that's even healthy, you know, Like they might sell

606
00:34:38,000 --> 00:34:40,720
Speaker 1: bags of beans, but even those contain like canola oil

607
00:34:40,800 --> 00:34:43,880
Speaker 1: and other stuff that I don't that I know that's

608
00:34:44,040 --> 00:34:48,239
Speaker 1: unhealthy for you. So, like I said, it's very very

609
00:34:48,239 --> 00:34:50,960
Speaker 1: difficult to eat the way I did. But I I've

610
00:34:50,960 --> 00:34:55,239
Speaker 1: been a vegan for a long time, mostly for because

611
00:34:55,280 --> 00:34:57,919
Speaker 1: I karma, Like I don't like to promote death, even

612
00:34:57,920 --> 00:35:02,840
Speaker 1: of animals, you know, And so you know, that's just

613
00:35:02,920 --> 00:35:07,520
Speaker 1: my choice, and it was a hard choice. But luckily

614
00:35:07,560 --> 00:35:09,920
Speaker 1: I was given another chance. And when I come out

615
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:12,800
Speaker 1: to the free world here, I cannot believe they have

616
00:35:12,920 --> 00:35:16,640
Speaker 1: vegan restaurants now. Everywhere they have It's amazing. They have

617
00:35:16,760 --> 00:35:20,040
Speaker 1: vegan They have whole foods with vegan food, vegan salad bards,

618
00:35:20,320 --> 00:35:24,440
Speaker 1: I mean, organic food everywhere. It's unbelievable.

619
00:35:24,480 --> 00:35:26,279
Speaker 2: I'm telling you, I eat all that stuff now. I

620
00:35:26,280 --> 00:35:28,600
Speaker 2: eat the Beyond burgers. I eat that. They have these

621
00:35:28,640 --> 00:35:30,760
Speaker 2: things called fruffalo wings. That's my addiction.

622
00:35:30,880 --> 00:35:32,680
Speaker 1: Now is it a cauliflower?

623
00:35:33,080 --> 00:35:34,719
Speaker 2: I think it's made out of cauliflower. It's got a

624
00:35:34,760 --> 00:35:36,200
Speaker 2: bunch of differ stuff in it, but none of it's me.

625
00:35:36,480 --> 00:35:39,600
Speaker 2: And uh, you know, I'm gonna I'm gonna be opening

626
00:35:40,640 --> 00:35:44,719
Speaker 2: a vegan restaurant eventually, and I'm very excited about that too.

627
00:35:44,760 --> 00:35:47,520
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not I'm I'm almost there, but I'm

628
00:35:47,520 --> 00:35:49,520
Speaker 2: not quite there. I still slip once in a while

629
00:35:49,600 --> 00:35:52,120
Speaker 2: with a little bit of fish or something. But I'm

630
00:35:52,160 --> 00:35:53,680
Speaker 2: on the same page as you. I don't want to

631
00:35:53,719 --> 00:35:57,719
Speaker 2: hurt animals or or anything like that. So you know,

632
00:35:58,000 --> 00:35:59,520
Speaker 2: I'm getting there, you know. But I have a lot

633
00:35:59,520 --> 00:36:00,880
Speaker 2: of respect for people like you. The been able to

634
00:36:00,920 --> 00:36:02,319
Speaker 2: do it for so long, and the fact that you

635
00:36:02,360 --> 00:36:05,799
Speaker 2: were able to do it under those conditions is insane.

636
00:36:05,920 --> 00:36:09,560
Speaker 2: But I'm not perfect, but I'm I'm trying to minimize,

637
00:36:09,800 --> 00:36:12,640
Speaker 2: you know, my impact on the on the animals and

638
00:36:12,680 --> 00:36:15,000
Speaker 2: the oceans and the rest of it. So so I

639
00:36:15,000 --> 00:36:17,680
Speaker 2: look up to you for that. But how did I mean,

640
00:36:18,000 --> 00:36:19,760
Speaker 2: you know, going back to what I was saying before, Tim,

641
00:36:19,840 --> 00:36:23,840
Speaker 2: you know, the deprivation to someone like you who was

642
00:36:24,800 --> 00:36:27,960
Speaker 2: really yours addicted, more addicted to music than drugs, right,

643
00:36:28,040 --> 00:36:31,240
Speaker 2: I mean, and you weren't able to have that experience

644
00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:34,160
Speaker 2: in prison except on a very limited basis at certain times.

645
00:36:35,840 --> 00:36:40,880
Speaker 2: You obviously are someone who is a you know, a

646
00:36:41,040 --> 00:36:44,120
Speaker 2: kind and gentle and loving person, and here it is

647
00:36:44,600 --> 00:36:47,439
Speaker 2: everything is the opposite. Right. You're not able to have

648
00:36:47,760 --> 00:36:53,200
Speaker 2: appropriate forms of physical contact with with with and by

649
00:36:53,200 --> 00:36:57,440
Speaker 2: that I mean whether hugs or you know, romantic relationships.

650
00:36:58,920 --> 00:37:01,160
Speaker 2: You're not able to have any of the things that

651
00:37:01,360 --> 00:37:05,080
Speaker 2: sustained you and sustain you now on the outside, How

652
00:37:05,120 --> 00:37:09,600
Speaker 2: does a person like you go into an environment like

653
00:37:09,680 --> 00:37:13,280
Speaker 2: that and with with actually no prospects of ever getting

654
00:37:13,320 --> 00:37:18,720
Speaker 2: out and maintain sanity, hope, any of it? Like what

655
00:37:18,719 --> 00:37:21,920
Speaker 2: what you know? You're in this like the darkest hole

656
00:37:21,960 --> 00:37:25,080
Speaker 2: that even in solitary confinement, Like, how'd you do that? Well?

657
00:37:25,239 --> 00:37:27,799
Speaker 1: The first time I went in hole in South they

658
00:37:27,800 --> 00:37:30,840
Speaker 1: call it solitary confinement is known as the hole in prison.

659
00:37:31,239 --> 00:37:32,959
Speaker 1: You know, when you're in prison, they state it's the hole.

660
00:37:34,360 --> 00:37:35,960
Speaker 1: The first time I went in there, I was in

661
00:37:36,000 --> 00:37:39,280
Speaker 1: there for thirty seven days. I didn't do anything wrong,

662
00:37:39,520 --> 00:37:43,960
Speaker 1: but there's there's different reasons why you would go to

663
00:37:44,080 --> 00:37:47,200
Speaker 1: the hole. They call it special housing unit, it's called

664
00:37:47,200 --> 00:37:52,080
Speaker 1: a shoe. There's different reasons why. I like, at this

665
00:37:52,080 --> 00:37:55,600
Speaker 1: particular time, there was a guy that was in the

666
00:37:55,640 --> 00:37:58,760
Speaker 1: same living quarters that I lived at, and he actually

667
00:37:58,800 --> 00:38:01,759
Speaker 1: put a knife in not only our room, but like

668
00:38:01,840 --> 00:38:04,680
Speaker 1: four other people's rooms because he didn't like my roommate

669
00:38:05,080 --> 00:38:08,080
Speaker 1: and he didn't like you know, in the nineties, and

670
00:38:10,360 --> 00:38:13,200
Speaker 1: so they locked you. If they find something in your

671
00:38:13,280 --> 00:38:16,040
Speaker 1: room and nobody says it's theirs, my roommate would have

672
00:38:16,040 --> 00:38:17,480
Speaker 1: said it was his if it was his, And if

673
00:38:17,560 --> 00:38:20,319
Speaker 1: I have something that's wrong that I shouldn't have, I

674
00:38:20,320 --> 00:38:24,279
Speaker 1: will say it's mine too. So it wasn't either one

675
00:38:24,280 --> 00:38:26,479
Speaker 1: of ours. And so they took us to the hole.

676
00:38:26,880 --> 00:38:30,200
Speaker 1: I was there for thirty seven days and then they

677
00:38:30,480 --> 00:38:33,279
Speaker 1: let me out. And then another time I went for

678
00:38:33,440 --> 00:38:36,319
Speaker 1: over two months because somebody else was trying to leave

679
00:38:36,360 --> 00:38:39,400
Speaker 1: that prison. So he used my name to say that

680
00:38:39,440 --> 00:38:43,800
Speaker 1: I was like extorting him for to make wine or something.

681
00:38:43,840 --> 00:38:47,399
Speaker 1: You know. It was extorting. I don't. I would never

682
00:38:47,440 --> 00:38:50,040
Speaker 1: extort anybody for anything, you know, And I'm thinking, wow,

683
00:38:50,400 --> 00:38:52,440
Speaker 1: And they shipped the guy I was in the hole

684
00:38:52,480 --> 00:38:54,719
Speaker 1: for two months and two days. And it's just a

685
00:38:54,760 --> 00:38:59,439
Speaker 1: coincidence that it was around August ninth of nineteen ninety five.

686
00:38:59,480 --> 00:39:02,319
Speaker 1: This was right when Jerry Garcia died. I was in

687
00:39:02,360 --> 00:39:05,319
Speaker 1: a hole when he died. And they used to never

688
00:39:05,360 --> 00:39:09,239
Speaker 1: play music, you know, and you could maybe hear one

689
00:39:09,239 --> 00:39:12,120
Speaker 1: of their songs every so often on the music. But

690
00:39:12,160 --> 00:39:15,440
Speaker 1: when he died, they started playing all day for the

691
00:39:15,480 --> 00:39:17,560
Speaker 1: whole day. I was able to listen, you know, I'm

692
00:39:17,600 --> 00:39:21,319
Speaker 1: listening to music on the radio, you know. And that

693
00:39:21,440 --> 00:39:23,520
Speaker 1: started the Grateful Dead Hour, and they started to have

694
00:39:23,640 --> 00:39:25,799
Speaker 1: one hour a week, you know, where I can listen

695
00:39:25,800 --> 00:39:28,160
Speaker 1: to it. Where that helped me, really helped me. But

696
00:39:29,440 --> 00:39:31,200
Speaker 1: at times when I could not listen to it, I

697
00:39:31,200 --> 00:39:34,920
Speaker 1: actually used to use the telephone and call my sister

698
00:39:34,960 --> 00:39:36,640
Speaker 1: and she would play me the song called the Days

699
00:39:36,640 --> 00:39:39,840
Speaker 1: Between It's a Grateful Dead song over the phone, and

700
00:39:39,880 --> 00:39:42,480
Speaker 1: I would it would help me. It was like, oh,

701
00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:47,280
Speaker 1: it would help me, Like maybe someday, somehow somebody will

702
00:39:49,120 --> 00:39:51,200
Speaker 1: help me and I can go back to a show

703
00:39:51,239 --> 00:39:53,160
Speaker 1: where I can be able to listen to him on

704
00:39:53,200 --> 00:39:58,680
Speaker 1: my own, whatever the case may be. So I was,

705
00:39:58,719 --> 00:40:00,000
Speaker 1: like I said, I was in the hole for two

706
00:40:00,080 --> 00:40:03,239
Speaker 1: months in two days over somebody saying that I was

707
00:40:03,719 --> 00:40:05,479
Speaker 1: something to do it whine, But they shipped that guy.

708
00:40:05,640 --> 00:40:07,600
Speaker 1: He wanted to get shipped, and they they did. They

709
00:40:07,600 --> 00:40:10,719
Speaker 1: shipped him. They let me back out, and then I

710
00:40:10,800 --> 00:40:13,120
Speaker 1: was there for seven years, and at the very end

711
00:40:15,160 --> 00:40:18,479
Speaker 1: they tried to say I was. They didn't know for sure,

712
00:40:18,520 --> 00:40:20,840
Speaker 1: but they were saying, just in case, they're going to

713
00:40:21,040 --> 00:40:24,520
Speaker 1: put me in the hole because they thought I was

714
00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:27,320
Speaker 1: friends with these guys that were trying to escape. I

715
00:40:27,360 --> 00:40:31,239
Speaker 1: would never try to leave because it's there's no sense

716
00:40:31,280 --> 00:40:33,920
Speaker 1: of trying to leave, because you're you can't stay away.

717
00:40:33,960 --> 00:40:38,239
Speaker 1: It's like it's weird. I wouldn't never try to try

718
00:40:38,239 --> 00:40:41,200
Speaker 1: to go anywhere. But I had a friend of mine

719
00:40:41,200 --> 00:40:43,319
Speaker 1: that was actually trying to leave, and he had some

720
00:40:43,320 --> 00:40:47,759
Speaker 1: friends and they all they were trying, and they locked

721
00:40:47,760 --> 00:40:49,239
Speaker 1: them all up. And then a month later they came

722
00:40:49,280 --> 00:40:50,800
Speaker 1: and said, well, we're locking you up just in case,

723
00:40:51,360 --> 00:40:53,080
Speaker 1: and they locked me up. And I was in over

724
00:40:53,320 --> 00:40:54,080
Speaker 1: five months.

725
00:40:54,239 --> 00:40:57,239
Speaker 2: Over five months because your friends were trying to escape.

726
00:40:57,040 --> 00:40:59,560
Speaker 1: Because I had one friend that was or whatever, they

727
00:40:59,600 --> 00:41:02,040
Speaker 1: just thought that just in case, they're locking me up,

728
00:41:02,440 --> 00:41:05,080
Speaker 1: just in case. So they locked you up. And back

729
00:41:05,120 --> 00:41:06,759
Speaker 1: then they can ship you if they had a good

730
00:41:06,840 --> 00:41:09,880
Speaker 1: enough reading. So they they just said, all right, you've

731
00:41:09,880 --> 00:41:11,840
Speaker 1: been here long enough, or sending you somewhere else. So

732
00:41:11,840 --> 00:41:15,120
Speaker 1: they sent me to USP Beaumont, which is another one

733
00:41:15,160 --> 00:41:18,200
Speaker 1: of the most serious prisons in the country. Still is

734
00:41:18,480 --> 00:41:24,560
Speaker 1: well now. It's really limited control in there, like there's

735
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:29,919
Speaker 1: fences everywhere inside there. You're never together with a whole

736
00:41:29,920 --> 00:41:33,520
Speaker 1: prison at one time, so it's very it's still violent

737
00:41:34,239 --> 00:41:36,440
Speaker 1: even with that. I have a friend of mine there

738
00:41:36,440 --> 00:41:42,640
Speaker 1: that actually named Ronald Adcocks that was arrested in nineteen

739
00:41:42,719 --> 00:41:49,000
Speaker 1: eighty and he had a release date in nineteen eighty

740
00:41:49,040 --> 00:41:53,719
Speaker 1: seven and a guy came to him and heard that

741
00:41:53,840 --> 00:41:57,920
Speaker 1: he was gay on the street and he got arrested

742
00:41:57,960 --> 00:42:01,320
Speaker 1: at seventeen years old in nineteen eight. Seventeen years old,

743
00:42:01,560 --> 00:42:03,640
Speaker 1: this guy came and slapped him and says, shay, if

744
00:42:03,680 --> 00:42:06,200
Speaker 1: you're going to be my girl. Basically in prison, so

745
00:42:06,239 --> 00:42:11,800
Speaker 1: he basically killed a guy. You know, I would have

746
00:42:11,840 --> 00:42:15,520
Speaker 1: thought he could have used self defense. But there's people

747
00:42:15,560 --> 00:42:19,520
Speaker 1: in prison that will go to court or trial against you.

748
00:42:19,560 --> 00:42:22,160
Speaker 1: There's some people that will like if somebody gets hurt,

749
00:42:22,600 --> 00:42:25,680
Speaker 1: there's somebody else in a whole other unit. That didn't

750
00:42:25,680 --> 00:42:27,600
Speaker 1: see anything, but they will be willing to testify that

751
00:42:27,680 --> 00:42:31,000
Speaker 1: they saw everything. And apparently he had enough people that

752
00:42:31,080 --> 00:42:33,120
Speaker 1: went against him and they gave him a life sentence,

753
00:42:33,719 --> 00:42:36,600
Speaker 1: and since then he ended up killing two more people.

754
00:42:37,360 --> 00:42:39,480
Speaker 1: There's different reasons why that would happen, but if somebody

755
00:42:39,800 --> 00:42:45,200
Speaker 1: tried you in that manner, you know, he did what

756
00:42:45,239 --> 00:42:48,160
Speaker 1: he did. And so he has three life sentences now

757
00:42:49,000 --> 00:42:52,120
Speaker 1: and he he's about six or four. You know, he

758
00:42:52,160 --> 00:42:55,520
Speaker 1: was a serious person and I ended up befriending him

759
00:42:56,280 --> 00:43:00,720
Speaker 1: in around two thousand and six and since then been friends.

760
00:43:01,000 --> 00:43:03,600
Speaker 1: You know, I've been We've been friends ever since then.

761
00:43:03,640 --> 00:43:07,439
Speaker 1: I actually still talk to him. He's he's I mean,

762
00:43:07,920 --> 00:43:10,400
Speaker 1: his story is interesting because he was arrested at seventeen

763
00:43:10,480 --> 00:43:13,239
Speaker 1: years old. He's never been to seeing a beach in

764
00:43:13,280 --> 00:43:16,040
Speaker 1: his life, and I'm like, there's anything I could do

765
00:43:16,080 --> 00:43:18,120
Speaker 1: ever to help him out. You know, I will and

766
00:43:18,200 --> 00:43:21,239
Speaker 1: I have been, you know, could do whatever I could

767
00:43:21,239 --> 00:43:22,560
Speaker 1: do for him.

768
00:43:22,640 --> 00:43:25,080
Speaker 2: And I want to talk about that too, Tim, because

769
00:43:25,800 --> 00:43:31,400
Speaker 2: before we get to it, though, your nightmare came to

770
00:43:31,440 --> 00:43:35,320
Speaker 2: a very dramatic end, and that's an important thing for

771
00:43:35,400 --> 00:43:40,279
Speaker 2: us to talk about. I have been for as long

772
00:43:40,320 --> 00:43:45,600
Speaker 2: as I've been in this movement an advocate for clemency

773
00:43:46,719 --> 00:43:51,799
Speaker 2: in cases like yours, in mandatory sense, in cases in

774
00:43:51,880 --> 00:43:56,040
Speaker 2: cases of actual innocence. Ironically, paradoxically, those are harder to

775
00:43:56,040 --> 00:44:03,320
Speaker 2: get clemency on, typically because governor and presidents will often

776
00:44:03,560 --> 00:44:08,320
Speaker 2: prefer to let the courts deal with those actual innocence claims.

777
00:44:08,400 --> 00:44:12,480
Speaker 2: It's sort of understandable, but it's easier for them to

778
00:44:13,040 --> 00:44:16,160
Speaker 2: look at a case like yours or so many other

779
00:44:16,280 --> 00:44:20,640
Speaker 2: mandatory sense in cases I've been involved with where it's

780
00:44:20,680 --> 00:44:27,080
Speaker 2: so obviously an affront to justice that someone is serving

781
00:44:27,160 --> 00:44:32,160
Speaker 2: a sentence that is so wildly mismatched with the crime

782
00:44:32,200 --> 00:44:35,520
Speaker 2: that they're convicted of, even if they are guilty. And

783
00:44:35,520 --> 00:44:37,560
Speaker 2: certainly there's a lot of people serving mandatory senses for

784
00:44:37,600 --> 00:44:42,120
Speaker 2: crimes they didn't do. But in cases where someone like

785
00:44:42,160 --> 00:44:45,279
Speaker 2: you actually pleads guilty, or even Lenny Singleton, who I

786
00:44:45,360 --> 00:44:48,239
Speaker 2: was so thrilled to walk out of prison and we

787
00:44:48,360 --> 00:44:53,560
Speaker 2: become friends since in several months ago in Virginia, you

788
00:44:53,560 --> 00:44:58,600
Speaker 2: know who is serving double life for stealing five hundred

789
00:44:58,600 --> 00:45:02,239
Speaker 2: dollars and a handful of dashing grab robberies in which

790
00:45:02,239 --> 00:45:04,600
Speaker 2: no weapon was used and no one was hurt. He's

791
00:45:04,640 --> 00:45:08,719
Speaker 2: another one who pleaded guilty and just judge was in

792
00:45:08,719 --> 00:45:11,600
Speaker 2: a bad mood that day, you know so. But in

793
00:45:11,680 --> 00:45:18,280
Speaker 2: your case, the system it took too long. Justice delayed,

794
00:45:18,360 --> 00:45:23,080
Speaker 2: but justice wasn't denied because ultimately there were a lot

795
00:45:23,120 --> 00:45:26,120
Speaker 2: of people who came to your You know, I guess

796
00:45:26,160 --> 00:45:28,160
Speaker 2: in a certain way, your prayers were answered, right because

797
00:45:28,160 --> 00:45:31,280
Speaker 2: you had a literally an army of people, four hundred

798
00:45:31,280 --> 00:45:37,120
Speaker 2: thousand of them signed petitions. I was one of them,

799
00:45:37,160 --> 00:45:40,040
Speaker 2: asking the president, Yeah, sure, asking him one of four

800
00:45:40,080 --> 00:45:42,400
Speaker 2: hundred thousand. It's good. It's a good army to be

801
00:45:42,440 --> 00:46:00,799
Speaker 2: a part of. So there was an army of people, advocates, lawyers,

802
00:46:01,160 --> 00:46:04,600
Speaker 2: families against mandatory minimums. Again, that's famm dot Org. I

803
00:46:04,719 --> 00:46:08,200
Speaker 2: hope people will go and visit the website who were

804
00:46:09,680 --> 00:46:14,120
Speaker 2: literally begging for your freedom, and those cries were heard

805
00:46:15,200 --> 00:46:20,120
Speaker 2: and you were granted clemency. But I want to hear

806
00:46:20,200 --> 00:46:24,399
Speaker 2: from your perspective what that moment was like and how

807
00:46:24,440 --> 00:46:28,520
Speaker 2: did you find out? Were you expecting it? How did

808
00:46:28,560 --> 00:46:30,080
Speaker 2: you Because this is the flip side, right, we know

809
00:46:30,120 --> 00:46:32,720
Speaker 2: what the misery was of that moment in the courtroom

810
00:46:32,760 --> 00:46:35,960
Speaker 2: where they were, you know, the high fiving and your sister,

811
00:46:36,080 --> 00:46:39,440
Speaker 2: and now this was really the opposite, right, So can

812
00:46:39,480 --> 00:46:41,440
Speaker 2: you explain that scenario.

813
00:46:42,520 --> 00:46:49,399
Speaker 1: Yeah, they were handing out clemencies every I don't think

814
00:46:49,400 --> 00:46:50,239
Speaker 1: there was a set time.

815
00:46:50,640 --> 00:46:53,240
Speaker 2: This is twenty sixteen, yes, President Obama.

816
00:46:53,400 --> 00:46:57,600
Speaker 1: President Obama was granting clemencies, you know, so I think

817
00:46:57,640 --> 00:47:00,160
Speaker 1: he started like forty five and then he and then

818
00:47:00,160 --> 00:47:01,719
Speaker 1: it got to be like one hundred I think at

819
00:47:01,760 --> 00:47:03,640
Speaker 1: one time, or one hundred and eleven I think. And

820
00:47:03,880 --> 00:47:06,160
Speaker 1: the time that they gave that, I was granted it.

821
00:47:09,280 --> 00:47:11,759
Speaker 1: So for me, I was every time they were to

822
00:47:12,719 --> 00:47:14,759
Speaker 1: have a group of clemencies, you know, you want to

823
00:47:14,800 --> 00:47:16,560
Speaker 1: be the first to see if your name's on or

824
00:47:16,840 --> 00:47:19,520
Speaker 1: you know, because we didn't know how they would tell

825
00:47:19,560 --> 00:47:21,840
Speaker 1: you if you was going to have one. So I

826
00:47:21,840 --> 00:47:23,799
Speaker 1: would go and see my note, my name's not on

827
00:47:23,840 --> 00:47:25,560
Speaker 1: that one. My name's not on it. So one day

828
00:47:25,600 --> 00:47:28,879
Speaker 1: I'm sitting in my room. I think I just came

829
00:47:28,920 --> 00:47:32,120
Speaker 1: in from recreation. I'm not sure, but it was that

830
00:47:33,640 --> 00:47:37,319
Speaker 1: it was like at one forty in the afternoon, and

831
00:47:37,719 --> 00:47:41,080
Speaker 1: normally when you're in prison, you can only move for

832
00:47:41,239 --> 00:47:44,680
Speaker 1: ten minute moves, like it's like on the hour. I

833
00:47:44,680 --> 00:47:46,719
Speaker 1: believe it is some places on the hour or some

834
00:47:46,800 --> 00:47:50,440
Speaker 1: and a half hour. So if it's not on the

835
00:47:50,520 --> 00:47:52,440
Speaker 1: right time, they're not going to open the door, and

836
00:47:52,480 --> 00:47:53,920
Speaker 1: you're not gonna go anywhere. You're gonna have to wait

837
00:47:54,000 --> 00:47:56,560
Speaker 1: until the next move, you know, and the next move

838
00:47:56,640 --> 00:47:59,000
Speaker 1: is either at two or two thirty. So they come

839
00:47:59,040 --> 00:48:03,080
Speaker 1: to my door, says you need to go out right

840
00:48:03,120 --> 00:48:07,000
Speaker 1: now and go to R and D. He didn't tell

841
00:48:07,040 --> 00:48:10,399
Speaker 1: me why or anything, so I s all right, I

842
00:48:10,440 --> 00:48:15,040
Speaker 1: walked out there. He opened a door, which is not normal.

843
00:48:16,239 --> 00:48:19,000
Speaker 1: So and then in the center of the prison there's

844
00:48:19,080 --> 00:48:22,960
Speaker 1: a it's called a hut where there's a guard standing

845
00:48:23,160 --> 00:48:26,759
Speaker 1: under there usually. So I walked and he doesn't ask

846
00:48:26,840 --> 00:48:29,040
Speaker 1: me where I'm going or nothing, so apparently he's in

847
00:48:29,120 --> 00:48:32,080
Speaker 1: on whatever this is too, so he didn't say nothing

848
00:48:32,080 --> 00:48:33,880
Speaker 1: to me. It's okay. I walk go to R and

849
00:48:33,920 --> 00:48:37,520
Speaker 1: D and they put me in this room and then

850
00:48:37,560 --> 00:48:39,239
Speaker 1: you know, they locked the door here in this room

851
00:48:39,239 --> 00:48:42,120
Speaker 1: in R and D. So I don't really.

852
00:48:41,960 --> 00:48:43,840
Speaker 2: Know exactly what's R and D.

853
00:48:44,360 --> 00:48:48,840
Speaker 1: R and D is receiving and oh receiving in disyard

854
00:48:48,920 --> 00:48:52,680
Speaker 1: my bat. So they called me in there. So I'm

855
00:48:52,719 --> 00:48:55,040
Speaker 1: sitting there for a few minutes, and then they called

856
00:48:55,120 --> 00:48:58,920
Speaker 1: two other guys that worked at this place, and they

857
00:48:58,920 --> 00:49:02,880
Speaker 1: have called unich or it's basically a factory in prison.

858
00:49:05,239 --> 00:49:10,440
Speaker 1: That's another whole story that's interesting because it's more like

859
00:49:11,080 --> 00:49:13,839
Speaker 1: the more people you lock up that are non violent offenders,

860
00:49:14,520 --> 00:49:17,000
Speaker 1: they can work in these prisons. Like let's say you

861
00:49:17,080 --> 00:49:21,000
Speaker 1: take a small time dealer and put them in prison. Well,

862
00:49:21,480 --> 00:49:24,600
Speaker 1: he doesn't have an income, so for him to get by,

863
00:49:24,719 --> 00:49:28,279
Speaker 1: he might go work for average sixty nine cents an

864
00:49:28,320 --> 00:49:32,200
Speaker 1: hour in a factory they call Unicorn. Anyways, so these

865
00:49:32,640 --> 00:49:36,759
Speaker 1: two guys were working in there and they came in

866
00:49:36,800 --> 00:49:38,680
Speaker 1: the same room as me, so all three of us,

867
00:49:38,680 --> 00:49:40,879
Speaker 1: and I said, hey, can I ask you guys a question?

868
00:49:40,960 --> 00:49:45,560
Speaker 1: Are you guys did you happen to put in clemency petitions?

869
00:49:46,320 --> 00:49:49,080
Speaker 1: And both of them said yes. I said, oh my god,

870
00:49:49,360 --> 00:49:52,200
Speaker 1: this might be a clemency. So they called one of

871
00:49:52,239 --> 00:49:54,600
Speaker 1: them first and they called him into this room. He

872
00:49:54,640 --> 00:49:57,040
Speaker 1: went to an office and he came back by us

873
00:49:57,080 --> 00:49:59,320
Speaker 1: and gave a thumbs up like he just got a clemency.

874
00:49:59,320 --> 00:50:02,760
Speaker 1: And I'm like, this cannot be happened, No way, I can't.

875
00:50:02,800 --> 00:50:06,480
Speaker 1: I cannot believe this. And they called me next, and

876
00:50:06,520 --> 00:50:10,120
Speaker 1: I went in there and it was. There was a

877
00:50:10,160 --> 00:50:14,400
Speaker 1: female a w there assistant warden, and she says, I

878
00:50:14,440 --> 00:50:17,200
Speaker 1: need to put you on his phone on a speakerphone.

879
00:50:17,480 --> 00:50:21,040
Speaker 1: So she puts so she hits it, and then Professor

880
00:50:21,040 --> 00:50:23,799
Speaker 1: Ogilvie at Catholic University gets on the phone. He says,

881
00:50:23,840 --> 00:50:27,759
Speaker 1: mister Tyler. He says, we have some good news from

882
00:50:27,800 --> 00:50:31,960
Speaker 1: you from the parton attorney. President Obama has granted you

883
00:50:32,000 --> 00:50:36,520
Speaker 1: a clemency. And I was I couldn't believe. I couldn't.

884
00:50:37,320 --> 00:50:40,920
Speaker 1: Almost just came back through me again right now. I couldn't.

885
00:50:41,520 --> 00:50:45,640
Speaker 1: I started, uh, like I want to tear up. I said,

886
00:50:45,640 --> 00:50:47,359
Speaker 1: I'm trying to hold it together right now. I said,

887
00:50:47,360 --> 00:50:48,960
Speaker 1: this is this is unreal.

888
00:50:49,680 --> 00:50:50,839
Speaker 2: And did you believe it?

889
00:50:51,160 --> 00:50:53,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I believe it because it's his voice

890
00:50:53,360 --> 00:50:55,880
Speaker 1: and he's talking to me. But I couldn't. I couldn't

891
00:50:55,880 --> 00:50:59,640
Speaker 1: really believe it. It was like a dream. And and

892
00:51:00,200 --> 00:51:02,840
Speaker 1: the woman which she was looking at me like she

893
00:51:02,880 --> 00:51:05,319
Speaker 1: wanted to hug me, you know, which is improper And

894
00:51:05,719 --> 00:51:09,120
Speaker 1: I didn't cross that line, but it was like it

895
00:51:09,160 --> 00:51:12,480
Speaker 1: was genuine a great feeling of energy that she was

896
00:51:12,560 --> 00:51:16,279
Speaker 1: sharing towards me at that time. And I just I

897
00:51:16,320 --> 00:51:18,120
Speaker 1: was like, wow, I'm trying to hold it together. Well,

898
00:51:18,320 --> 00:51:21,120
Speaker 1: he gave me, and then he went into the details

899
00:51:21,160 --> 00:51:23,640
Speaker 1: where I was given a two year date, which with

900
00:51:23,760 --> 00:51:25,560
Speaker 1: the enrollment in our adap.

901
00:51:27,800 --> 00:51:29,279
Speaker 2: To your date, does that mean a two year date,

902
00:51:29,320 --> 00:51:31,160
Speaker 2: a two year release date, you know you had to

903
00:51:31,160 --> 00:51:32,320
Speaker 2: serve another two years.

904
00:51:32,440 --> 00:51:34,319
Speaker 1: Yeah, he gave me. They gave me a clemency. It

905
00:51:34,400 --> 00:51:38,080
Speaker 1: was August thirtieth, twenty sixteen, and he gave me a

906
00:51:38,120 --> 00:51:42,440
Speaker 1: release date, so a two year date, which with the

907
00:51:42,520 --> 00:51:45,600
Speaker 1: enrollment in our APP which is a residential drug and

908
00:51:45,600 --> 00:51:52,080
Speaker 1: alcohol program. So I ended up going into that program.

909
00:51:53,719 --> 00:51:56,320
Speaker 1: But I lived all the way up until that time

910
00:51:56,640 --> 00:51:59,399
Speaker 1: without a release date. You know, I never I didn't

911
00:51:59,400 --> 00:52:03,239
Speaker 1: have a release d I was doing life. So a

912
00:52:03,280 --> 00:52:05,960
Speaker 1: lot of people coming into prison, they have release dates

913
00:52:06,000 --> 00:52:08,520
Speaker 1: like they're gonna go home someday. They know on this

914
00:52:08,640 --> 00:52:11,720
Speaker 1: date and this time, if they can not hurt somebody,

915
00:52:11,719 --> 00:52:15,239
Speaker 1: they're gonna go home, or if they can, you know,

916
00:52:15,440 --> 00:52:19,000
Speaker 1: stay out of mischief trouble, they'll go home. Well, I

917
00:52:19,120 --> 00:52:23,200
Speaker 1: never had that understanding or comprehension before. So he gave

918
00:52:23,239 --> 00:52:26,760
Speaker 1: me a two year date. I went back in my room.

919
00:52:28,239 --> 00:52:30,360
Speaker 1: I couldn't believe it. Actually, I went back in and

920
00:52:30,400 --> 00:52:32,959
Speaker 1: I tried to call my sister and she didn't answer

921
00:52:33,000 --> 00:52:36,480
Speaker 1: the phone. So I called my mother and I caught

922
00:52:36,520 --> 00:52:39,680
Speaker 1: my mom on the phone and I was like, Mom,

923
00:52:40,400 --> 00:52:42,760
Speaker 1: you ain't gonna believe this, but I just got a clemency.

924
00:52:44,400 --> 00:52:49,400
Speaker 1: And my mother was at first, She's like what. And

925
00:52:49,840 --> 00:52:52,799
Speaker 1: then all of a sudden, she I felt like all

926
00:52:52,880 --> 00:52:58,719
Speaker 1: this nervous, negative energy, negative depression that she's had for

927
00:52:58,760 --> 00:53:01,359
Speaker 1: all these years, I felt it like come on her,

928
00:53:01,400 --> 00:53:04,800
Speaker 1: and she realized, Oh my god, I'm going to come home.

929
00:53:05,040 --> 00:53:06,759
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm not going to die in prison. I'm

930
00:53:06,760 --> 00:53:12,080
Speaker 1: going to make it home. And it was just this

931
00:53:12,160 --> 00:53:15,759
Speaker 1: feeling that I can I can't even put it down

932
00:53:16,120 --> 00:53:22,200
Speaker 1: the way it really was. So I ended that conversation

933
00:53:22,239 --> 00:53:24,800
Speaker 1: with my mom and changed her whole life.

934
00:53:26,960 --> 00:53:29,200
Speaker 2: And look at what she went through, right, losing you

935
00:53:29,280 --> 00:53:34,880
Speaker 2: and your dad at the same time. As far I mean, yeah,

936
00:53:35,120 --> 00:53:35,600
Speaker 2: I'm just.

937
00:53:36,719 --> 00:53:39,200
Speaker 1: For many years my mother had says, I didn't raise

938
00:53:39,239 --> 00:53:42,680
Speaker 1: you to do all your life in prison. I didn't

939
00:53:42,760 --> 00:53:46,239
Speaker 1: raise you for that. I believed there's something more for

940
00:53:46,280 --> 00:53:48,680
Speaker 1: you to be doing here than serving all your life

941
00:53:48,719 --> 00:53:49,120
Speaker 1: in prison.

942
00:53:49,320 --> 00:53:56,960
Speaker 2: Well she was right, as it turns out, and.

943
00:53:54,040 --> 00:53:56,680
Speaker 1: So a few several hours later, I called my sister,

944
00:53:57,360 --> 00:53:59,600
Speaker 1: and when I called her, I know she already had

945
00:53:59,640 --> 00:54:04,160
Speaker 1: heard a new because at a certain time, whenever they

946
00:54:04,200 --> 00:54:09,319
Speaker 1: give out clemency to people, it goes all over the

947
00:54:09,320 --> 00:54:11,560
Speaker 1: internet of who's going to get it and all that.

948
00:54:11,760 --> 00:54:16,680
Speaker 1: So I couldn't catch her until like eight pm that

949
00:54:16,840 --> 00:54:19,680
Speaker 1: night on the East Coast time, which is five her time.

950
00:54:20,280 --> 00:54:22,440
Speaker 1: And when she answered her phone, I said, Carrie, I

951
00:54:22,440 --> 00:54:25,440
Speaker 1: got to clemency in this, But she didn't have that

952
00:54:25,600 --> 00:54:28,799
Speaker 1: genuine feeling of knowing it that I just told it

953
00:54:28,840 --> 00:54:31,080
Speaker 1: to her, so I knew, but she did have I

954
00:54:31,080 --> 00:54:34,600
Speaker 1: think it was NBC at her house or Las Vegas.

955
00:54:34,719 --> 00:54:39,000
Speaker 1: NBC was at her house actually recording when I called her,

956
00:54:39,400 --> 00:54:43,600
Speaker 1: So I told her the story about my mom that

957
00:54:43,680 --> 00:54:48,279
Speaker 1: I just revealed to you. And they actually played that

958
00:54:49,400 --> 00:54:52,160
Speaker 1: thing over the internet or over the NBC, that news

959
00:54:52,160 --> 00:54:54,080
Speaker 1: when I was telling a story about my mom. Because

960
00:54:54,560 --> 00:54:57,960
Speaker 1: when I called my sisters, she already knew, so they

961
00:54:58,040 --> 00:55:00,000
Speaker 1: recorded that all this. So that was interesting.

962
00:55:00,120 --> 00:55:02,640
Speaker 2: And then and what was the reaction of the other

963
00:55:02,680 --> 00:55:05,800
Speaker 2: guys in prison, because word must have spread. Were they angry?

964
00:55:06,000 --> 00:55:08,480
Speaker 2: Were they bitter? Were they resentful? Well?

965
00:55:09,120 --> 00:55:10,960
Speaker 1: Actually happy? When I went back into the unit, and

966
00:55:11,000 --> 00:55:12,560
Speaker 1: I told a couple of guys and then they all

967
00:55:12,640 --> 00:55:18,399
Speaker 1: saw it later on the everybody gets these downloads from

968
00:55:18,520 --> 00:55:22,160
Speaker 1: the internet. We actually have internet in federal prison since

969
00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:25,560
Speaker 1: not the Internet but email, you know, you go to

970
00:55:25,600 --> 00:55:27,640
Speaker 1: core links dot com and you can email somebody that's

971
00:55:27,680 --> 00:55:33,760
Speaker 1: in federal prison. And there's actually can do clemency foundation.

972
00:55:33,840 --> 00:55:36,600
Speaker 1: I was mentioned in earlier where Amy and there's in

973
00:55:36,800 --> 00:55:40,080
Speaker 1: her East Coast affiliate is this guy named Elik King,

974
00:55:40,640 --> 00:55:44,439
Speaker 1: and he's in Atlanta, and he actually writes like over

975
00:55:44,480 --> 00:55:47,239
Speaker 1: four hundred people that are in prison daily and he

976
00:55:47,360 --> 00:55:51,080
Speaker 1: calls it lighting up our Blue there's a blue light

977
00:55:51,320 --> 00:55:53,759
Speaker 1: you know when we when you have a message, Like

978
00:55:53,840 --> 00:55:56,440
Speaker 1: you can walk by these computers in prison. There's like

979
00:55:56,520 --> 00:55:59,480
Speaker 1: five of them in your unit where you live usually

980
00:56:00,120 --> 00:56:02,120
Speaker 1: and if you go buy and you type in your number,

981
00:56:02,239 --> 00:56:04,400
Speaker 1: it'll show it'll be a blue light if you have

982
00:56:04,800 --> 00:56:08,959
Speaker 1: messages from the free world. So he would actually send

983
00:56:08,960 --> 00:56:11,439
Speaker 1: messages and he still does to over four hundred people

984
00:56:11,480 --> 00:56:15,040
Speaker 1: every single day, and I was one of them. And

985
00:56:15,160 --> 00:56:19,279
Speaker 1: so he would actually send us who who got the clemencies,

986
00:56:19,320 --> 00:56:21,480
Speaker 1: what they were charged for, their release dates, the whole

987
00:56:21,560 --> 00:56:26,279
Speaker 1: nine yards. So I saw my name there that day.

988
00:56:26,320 --> 00:56:28,560
Speaker 1: You know, that night, there's my name and everybody could

989
00:56:28,600 --> 00:56:30,520
Speaker 1: see that. But when I walked into the unit, I

990
00:56:30,520 --> 00:56:32,880
Speaker 1: couldn't help. I was like, oh my god, I just

991
00:56:33,560 --> 00:56:35,640
Speaker 1: I got out of clemency just now, and everybody was

992
00:56:35,840 --> 00:56:39,440
Speaker 1: so happy. Oh I'm so happy. Oh man. It wasn't

993
00:56:39,480 --> 00:56:42,319
Speaker 1: like they hate. They weren't hating on anybody. Anybody that

994
00:56:42,400 --> 00:56:43,720
Speaker 1: got They were so happy.

995
00:56:43,960 --> 00:56:44,200
Speaker 3: You know.

996
00:56:44,440 --> 00:56:46,839
Speaker 2: That's good to hear. And by the way, I'm glad

997
00:56:46,880 --> 00:56:49,600
Speaker 2: you mentioned that because I do get asked by people

998
00:56:49,680 --> 00:56:51,839
Speaker 2: and I encourage people to write to people who are

999
00:56:51,840 --> 00:56:54,239
Speaker 2: on the inside. And this sounds like a good time

1000
00:56:54,280 --> 00:56:57,440
Speaker 2: to talk about that. Because what's the name of the foundation.

1001
00:56:57,560 --> 00:56:58,840
Speaker 2: It's can Do Foundation.

1002
00:56:59,280 --> 00:57:02,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can do Clemency, or it could be just

1003
00:57:02,560 --> 00:57:06,320
Speaker 1: can do Foundations at c A N Capital c A

1004
00:57:06,560 --> 00:57:07,480
Speaker 1: N d O.

1005
00:57:08,239 --> 00:57:10,000
Speaker 2: You know, can do Foundations. I want to put in

1006
00:57:10,040 --> 00:57:11,560
Speaker 2: a plug for them because if you go to their site,

1007
00:57:11,600 --> 00:57:14,600
Speaker 2: they can give you some instructions as to how to uh,

1008
00:57:15,320 --> 00:57:17,880
Speaker 2: how to reach out and and you know, make somebody's

1009
00:57:17,960 --> 00:57:19,920
Speaker 2: day a little brighter on the inside. Because I know

1010
00:57:20,040 --> 00:57:23,560
Speaker 2: from the people that I'm in communication with, it does

1011
00:57:23,640 --> 00:57:26,280
Speaker 2: make a big difference to know that someone you know

1012
00:57:27,120 --> 00:57:29,760
Speaker 2: there are people out there that care about you and

1013
00:57:29,760 --> 00:57:32,440
Speaker 2: and are fighting for you, and I'm hearing it, of

1014
00:57:32,440 --> 00:57:43,400
Speaker 2: course from you now in such a powerful way. So okay,

1015
00:57:43,760 --> 00:57:47,640
Speaker 2: so it's and for anyone listening, please go to can

1016
00:57:47,760 --> 00:57:51,680
Speaker 2: do clemency dot com. It's c A N d O clemency,

1017
00:57:51,720 --> 00:57:54,120
Speaker 2: which is c L E M E n c hy

1018
00:57:54,720 --> 00:57:57,160
Speaker 2: dot com. So it can do clemency dot com and

1019
00:57:57,200 --> 00:58:00,400
Speaker 2: get involved and you know, correspond with some month and

1020
00:58:00,960 --> 00:58:03,440
Speaker 2: you'll be amazed how much of a difference you can

1021
00:58:03,480 --> 00:58:05,800
Speaker 2: really make with a very simple act like sending an email.

1022
00:58:06,160 --> 00:58:11,120
Speaker 2: Whereas Tim is so eloquently explaining right now. So so

1023
00:58:11,680 --> 00:58:16,600
Speaker 2: that's that's quite a dramatic turn of events. I you know,

1024
00:58:17,320 --> 00:58:21,560
Speaker 2: I hope that we're going to see many, many more clemencies,

1025
00:58:21,680 --> 00:58:25,480
Speaker 2: gubernatorial and presidential. We're going to I'm looking forward to

1026
00:58:25,480 --> 00:58:29,480
Speaker 2: working with can Do on some of these because I've

1027
00:58:29,480 --> 00:58:32,520
Speaker 2: been blabbing about this issue for so long that people

1028
00:58:32,520 --> 00:58:34,600
Speaker 2: that know me are tired of hearing me talk about it.

1029
00:58:34,880 --> 00:58:40,640
Speaker 2: I think clemencies are an absolute responsibility of people in power.

1030
00:58:40,680 --> 00:58:43,240
Speaker 2: That's why they're given those those powers so that they

1031
00:58:43,280 --> 00:58:50,000
Speaker 2: can right wrongs. Because the justice system, whoever created the clemency. Uh.

1032
00:58:50,240 --> 00:58:55,520
Speaker 2: You know, Protocol was obviously very aware that the criminal

1033
00:58:55,560 --> 00:58:59,320
Speaker 2: justice system is not, cannot be, and never will be perfect,

1034
00:58:59,640 --> 00:59:01,720
Speaker 2: and they're mistakes that are made, and the person who

1035
00:59:01,800 --> 00:59:04,320
Speaker 2: is holding the h highest executive office in the state

1036
00:59:04,440 --> 00:59:09,800
Speaker 2: or the country has an opportunity and responsibility to correct

1037
00:59:09,800 --> 00:59:13,120
Speaker 2: those injustices. And that's why they have that power. Unfortunately,

1038
00:59:13,600 --> 00:59:16,160
Speaker 2: it hasn't been used nearly as much as it should.

1039
00:59:17,080 --> 00:59:21,560
Speaker 2: President Obama certainly went farther than other presidents have in

1040
00:59:21,680 --> 00:59:25,240
Speaker 2: modern times, but not nearly far enough. In my view,

1041
00:59:25,360 --> 00:59:28,760
Speaker 2: I think there are just too many thousands and thousands

1042
00:59:28,760 --> 00:59:31,080
Speaker 2: of people in the federal system and of course hundreds

1043
00:59:31,120 --> 00:59:35,760
Speaker 2: of thousands of state systems that belong on the outside

1044
00:59:35,800 --> 00:59:38,960
Speaker 2: that deserve clemency, that can be productive members of society

1045
00:59:38,960 --> 00:59:41,840
Speaker 2: as you are now. And that's you know, with the

1046
00:59:41,880 --> 00:59:45,320
Speaker 2: limited time we have left, tim you know, I want

1047
00:59:45,360 --> 00:59:49,200
Speaker 2: to ask you about that because we were speaking earlier

1048
00:59:49,240 --> 00:59:51,880
Speaker 2: about some of the people you left behind, and if

1049
00:59:51,920 --> 00:59:55,760
Speaker 2: there were you know, you know, a couple two or three,

1050
00:59:57,040 --> 01:00:00,720
Speaker 2: you know, people that really stick in your heart that

1051
01:00:00,720 --> 01:00:03,440
Speaker 2: that you want to bring attention to their cases, this

1052
01:00:03,480 --> 01:00:04,920
Speaker 2: would be a good time to do it, because you

1053
01:00:04,960 --> 01:00:06,880
Speaker 2: never know who's listening. Someone might be listening. They can

1054
01:00:06,920 --> 01:00:07,520
Speaker 2: make a difference.

1055
01:00:08,320 --> 01:00:11,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's one person off the top of my head

1056
01:00:11,280 --> 01:00:13,440
Speaker 1: that I could think of. His name is Frank Merrold,

1057
01:00:14,520 --> 01:00:20,160
Speaker 1: and he, you know, he was in like a reverse thing,

1058
01:00:20,440 --> 01:00:24,440
Speaker 1: like the government was going to sell him some cocaine,

1059
01:00:24,480 --> 01:00:26,200
Speaker 1: which is it was going to be quite a bit

1060
01:00:26,240 --> 01:00:30,640
Speaker 1: of it, but he and he had access to money

1061
01:00:30,640 --> 01:00:33,320
Speaker 1: at the time, and he paid for it. And they

1062
01:00:34,360 --> 01:00:37,800
Speaker 1: he has no zero priors, and they gave him a

1063
01:00:37,800 --> 01:00:42,200
Speaker 1: life sentence. This is twenty some odd years ago. He's

1064
01:00:42,200 --> 01:00:44,480
Speaker 1: been down twenty some odd years. I just left him

1065
01:00:44,480 --> 01:00:46,160
Speaker 1: in jessep Georgia.

1066
01:00:46,240 --> 01:00:49,760
Speaker 2: So he was convicted of a hypothetical crime, right because.

1067
01:00:49,320 --> 01:00:52,280
Speaker 1: No drugs involved. I mean the government was actually selling

1068
01:00:52,360 --> 01:00:55,919
Speaker 1: reverse thing into him, trying to sell him cocaine, which

1069
01:00:56,000 --> 01:00:58,240
Speaker 1: was I think it was fifty kilos a lot.

1070
01:00:58,480 --> 01:01:00,680
Speaker 2: It was a lot, right, and it was intense his intention.

1071
01:01:00,760 --> 01:01:02,160
Speaker 2: He thought he was doing a real deal, but it

1072
01:01:02,200 --> 01:01:04,320
Speaker 2: wasn't even a real deal, right Obviously, then they.

1073
01:01:04,440 --> 01:01:09,240
Speaker 1: Fictitious drugs and well there's nothing produced. He had people

1074
01:01:09,240 --> 01:01:12,320
Speaker 1: that went to trial against him, but there's no evidence.

1075
01:01:12,360 --> 01:01:16,480
Speaker 1: There's no drugs anywhere. So and he's not. He's just

1076
01:01:16,520 --> 01:01:20,240
Speaker 1: somebody that I personally know. There's other ones inside prison

1077
01:01:20,240 --> 01:01:23,160
Speaker 1: that have similar stories. You know what they call it

1078
01:01:23,200 --> 01:01:26,440
Speaker 1: ghost drugs or stuff like that, where they didn't produce

1079
01:01:26,480 --> 01:01:30,600
Speaker 1: any drugs. There's no drugs actually involved. But that's the

1080
01:01:30,640 --> 01:01:35,919
Speaker 1: most Uh, that's probably the worst case I've I've ran

1081
01:01:35,960 --> 01:01:39,160
Speaker 1: across that I personally knew, you know, I've played the

1082
01:01:39,880 --> 01:01:42,520
Speaker 1: music with him in there a couple of times, and

1083
01:01:45,600 --> 01:01:47,960
Speaker 1: you know, that's somebody that I could bring awareness to.

1084
01:01:48,040 --> 01:01:51,000
Speaker 1: I had some other friends that were doing life for marijuana,

1085
01:01:51,120 --> 01:01:53,400
Speaker 1: like Billy Deco, but he ended up getting a clemency.

1086
01:01:53,560 --> 01:01:57,520
Speaker 1: Luckily I knew. I knew him for the hold for

1087
01:01:57,560 --> 01:02:00,640
Speaker 1: twenty five years probably in prison, and he got a

1088
01:02:00,640 --> 01:02:05,160
Speaker 1: clemency in two thouy I think fifteen before me, you know.

1089
01:02:05,200 --> 01:02:07,840
Speaker 1: But he was in there for marijuana, and he had life,

1090
01:02:08,920 --> 01:02:13,120
Speaker 1: and he was into like sprouting food like i'm, you know,

1091
01:02:13,160 --> 01:02:16,920
Speaker 1: into health like I was. He was into like sprouting

1092
01:02:17,360 --> 01:02:19,160
Speaker 1: beans and stuff. He even tried to do some of

1093
01:02:19,160 --> 01:02:21,200
Speaker 1: that in prison, which is nearly impot I actually did

1094
01:02:21,200 --> 01:02:23,280
Speaker 1: some prison like that, which is nearly impossible to do.

1095
01:02:24,440 --> 01:02:29,280
Speaker 2: Tim your story is a remarkable testament of the human spirit.

1096
01:02:30,400 --> 01:02:34,120
Speaker 2: The fact that you were able to, you know, to

1097
01:02:34,200 --> 01:02:38,400
Speaker 2: hang on as you did, and to you know, maintain

1098
01:02:39,120 --> 01:02:43,240
Speaker 2: hope and maintain your vegan and your just sort of

1099
01:02:43,400 --> 01:02:47,840
Speaker 2: gentle and kind spirit and throughout this over a quarter

1100
01:02:47,920 --> 01:02:54,680
Speaker 2: century nightmare. And so you know, I'm obviously thrilled that

1101
01:02:54,760 --> 01:02:57,000
Speaker 2: you're here. I hope people will hear your words and

1102
01:02:57,080 --> 01:03:00,000
Speaker 2: want to get involved if you do. The most direct

1103
01:03:00,120 --> 01:03:02,880
Speaker 2: way to do that is by going to FAMM dot org.

1104
01:03:02,920 --> 01:03:06,400
Speaker 2: That's Families Against Mandatory Minimum, So it's fa MM like

1105
01:03:06,720 --> 01:03:11,640
Speaker 2: Marymary dot org and learn and go ahead. So what's

1106
01:03:11,680 --> 01:03:11,920
Speaker 2: you say?

1107
01:03:12,640 --> 01:03:16,000
Speaker 1: I just wanted to say something about FAM because Julie Stewart,

1108
01:03:16,960 --> 01:03:21,480
Speaker 1: she had a brother. She started FAM twenty some odd

1109
01:03:21,560 --> 01:03:24,280
Speaker 1: years ago because she had a brother that was I

1110
01:03:24,320 --> 01:03:26,440
Speaker 1: think doing five years. It could have been more than

1111
01:03:26,440 --> 01:03:28,920
Speaker 1: that for marijuana and for.

1112
01:03:28,920 --> 01:03:31,479
Speaker 2: Growing it in his own home. Yep, right, it wasn't

1113
01:03:31,480 --> 01:03:32,320
Speaker 2: even a large quantity.

1114
01:03:32,400 --> 01:03:35,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And she and he had a mini mandatory.

1115
01:03:35,400 --> 01:03:40,520
Speaker 1: I think it's five years. And she heard of my

1116
01:03:40,640 --> 01:03:45,320
Speaker 1: case probably twenty twenty plus years ago also, and for

1117
01:03:45,480 --> 01:03:49,040
Speaker 1: all this time, whenever there's somewhere to talk about, she

1118
01:03:49,040 --> 01:03:51,640
Speaker 1: would talk about me. So you know, I feel like

1119
01:03:51,960 --> 01:03:54,360
Speaker 1: I'm indebted to her, and in some respects I went

1120
01:03:54,400 --> 01:03:57,840
Speaker 1: to visit her, and you know, I have a lot

1121
01:03:57,840 --> 01:04:02,800
Speaker 1: of thankful to go to her, you know, specifically because

1122
01:04:03,280 --> 01:04:06,520
Speaker 1: she introduced me to Catholic University that ended up doing

1123
01:04:06,520 --> 01:04:11,720
Speaker 1: my clemency petition, and she has introduced me to many

1124
01:04:11,720 --> 01:04:14,560
Speaker 1: people throughout the years. You know, that brought a light

1125
01:04:14,640 --> 01:04:18,640
Speaker 1: to my case. And I'm actually very lucky to be

1126
01:04:18,720 --> 01:04:23,200
Speaker 1: free right now. And that's a big tribute to her,

1127
01:04:23,360 --> 01:04:26,560
Speaker 1: you know, a big much of that is attributed to her,

1128
01:04:26,600 --> 01:04:32,880
Speaker 1: because without her and many other people, of course, and

1129
01:04:32,920 --> 01:04:35,040
Speaker 1: all the people that sign a petition at change dot org.

1130
01:04:35,560 --> 01:04:40,320
Speaker 1: Without all those people and her, and never mind President Obama,

1131
01:04:41,520 --> 01:04:43,480
Speaker 1: I wouldn't even be able to be here right now

1132
01:04:43,520 --> 01:04:46,040
Speaker 1: to speak to maybe help somebody else in the future.

1133
01:04:46,120 --> 01:04:47,800
Speaker 1: So I appreciate that.

1134
01:04:48,000 --> 01:04:51,160
Speaker 2: So Julia, I know you're listening, and I'm going to

1135
01:04:51,440 --> 01:04:54,640
Speaker 2: thank you from my bottom of my heart too for

1136
01:04:54,760 --> 01:04:58,240
Speaker 2: getting me involved in this fight and for mentoring me

1137
01:04:58,680 --> 01:05:02,080
Speaker 2: and so many other people, for really starting a movement

1138
01:05:02,200 --> 01:05:06,320
Speaker 2: that is gaining momentum every day and which we're not

1139
01:05:06,360 --> 01:05:11,440
Speaker 2: going to stop until you know, everyone who is in

1140
01:05:11,480 --> 01:05:14,360
Speaker 2: prison that shouldn't be is out and that's a huge,

1141
01:05:14,760 --> 01:05:17,480
Speaker 2: huge task. But there's a lot of really good people

1142
01:05:17,520 --> 01:05:20,880
Speaker 2: working on this now more than ever, and the momentum

1143
01:05:21,040 --> 01:05:25,920
Speaker 2: is there, so a change is definitely in the air. So, Tim,

1144
01:05:26,000 --> 01:05:28,440
Speaker 2: this is the part of the show that I like

1145
01:05:28,520 --> 01:05:32,400
Speaker 2: the best because as we get towards the end, I

1146
01:05:32,480 --> 01:05:35,280
Speaker 2: get the opportunity, since it's my show, to do what

1147
01:05:35,320 --> 01:05:37,280
Speaker 2: I want, and what I want to do at the

1148
01:05:37,400 --> 01:05:41,000
Speaker 2: end of each show is to stop talking and listen.

1149
01:05:41,640 --> 01:05:46,040
Speaker 2: And so before we before I turn the microphone over

1150
01:05:46,080 --> 01:05:49,000
Speaker 2: to you for final thoughts, I just want to thank

1151
01:05:49,040 --> 01:05:52,520
Speaker 2: you for coming in here, taking your time, doing all

1152
01:05:52,560 --> 01:05:57,040
Speaker 2: the advocacy work that you're doing, inspiring other people, including me,

1153
01:05:57,880 --> 01:06:02,200
Speaker 2: and sharing your story with us listeners. So, Tim, the

1154
01:06:02,240 --> 01:06:07,360
Speaker 2: mic is yours. Please feel free to talk about whatever's

1155
01:06:07,360 --> 01:06:09,280
Speaker 2: on your mind for the last few minutes that we have.

1156
01:06:09,960 --> 01:06:15,560
Speaker 1: Well, I'm sitting here in New York City, which in

1157
01:06:16,160 --> 01:06:21,360
Speaker 1: the free world, which is every single day, like I

1158
01:06:21,440 --> 01:06:26,040
Speaker 1: wake up, and I still have this comprehension where I

1159
01:06:26,080 --> 01:06:30,160
Speaker 1: can't even believe that I am free, you know, And

1160
01:06:30,480 --> 01:06:32,720
Speaker 1: I'm thankful every single day that I am free, that

1161
01:06:32,840 --> 01:06:38,800
Speaker 1: I'm able to have something organic to eat or something

1162
01:06:39,800 --> 01:06:44,040
Speaker 1: vegan to eat, that's you know, the life has changed,

1163
01:06:44,720 --> 01:06:48,320
Speaker 1: technology has changed. I do also feel at times that

1164
01:06:48,360 --> 01:06:52,080
Speaker 1: I just came out of a like I was thrown

1165
01:06:52,200 --> 01:06:55,000
Speaker 1: in the future somehow. You know, as soon as I

1166
01:06:55,040 --> 01:06:57,440
Speaker 1: walked like past that gate, you know, I had to

1167
01:06:57,480 --> 01:06:59,240
Speaker 1: go through all these gates and give your name and

1168
01:06:59,280 --> 01:07:00,959
Speaker 1: all this stuff. And as soon as I walked past

1169
01:07:00,960 --> 01:07:03,240
Speaker 1: that gate, I just broke down. I could not believe it.

1170
01:07:03,640 --> 01:07:06,640
Speaker 1: Like the sunshine, looking at the sun, it looked so

1171
01:07:06,760 --> 01:07:09,440
Speaker 1: different from walking when I walked through that gate, then

1172
01:07:09,480 --> 01:07:13,440
Speaker 1: it does inside them gates, the sun was like real again.

1173
01:07:14,120 --> 01:07:18,160
Speaker 1: And when I walked out of there, you know, we

1174
01:07:18,280 --> 01:07:20,919
Speaker 1: recorded walking out of there. And I have this friend

1175
01:07:20,920 --> 01:07:24,560
Speaker 1: of mine named Wes Brewer. Well, Wes Brewer decided to come.

1176
01:07:24,640 --> 01:07:27,120
Speaker 1: He's like a grateful dead fan or a fish fan

1177
01:07:27,320 --> 01:07:32,200
Speaker 1: or you know, similar fans jam band music fan, and

1178
01:07:32,280 --> 01:07:34,840
Speaker 1: he decided to come and take a bus with me.

1179
01:07:35,240 --> 01:07:39,120
Speaker 1: I was released from Jessup, Georgia, and I elected to

1180
01:07:39,160 --> 01:07:41,560
Speaker 1: take a bus ride all the way to Las Vegas

1181
01:07:41,640 --> 01:07:44,959
Speaker 1: because it gave me three days on of freedom before

1182
01:07:45,000 --> 01:07:47,960
Speaker 1: I had to go to the halfway house. And if

1183
01:07:47,960 --> 01:07:49,720
Speaker 1: you would have went on an airplane, then you would

1184
01:07:49,760 --> 01:07:51,960
Speaker 1: only have like eight hours of freedom. So I was like,

1185
01:07:52,000 --> 01:07:55,040
Speaker 1: I'll I'd rather see the country on a bus. And

1186
01:07:56,120 --> 01:08:00,280
Speaker 1: Wes decided to come, not only come, but to the

1187
01:08:00,400 --> 01:08:05,000
Speaker 1: video recorded me the whole way and interview me, you know,

1188
01:08:05,040 --> 01:08:07,240
Speaker 1: and asked me different, you know, coming right out of prison.

1189
01:08:07,960 --> 01:08:10,560
Speaker 1: So one of the things that he did do was

1190
01:08:11,920 --> 01:08:15,160
Speaker 1: he surprised me with a trip to the beach and

1191
01:08:15,480 --> 01:08:17,679
Speaker 1: recorded me. And as soon as I just touched the sand,

1192
01:08:17,680 --> 01:08:21,120
Speaker 1: I just broke down, like broke down, and he recorded

1193
01:08:21,160 --> 01:08:24,040
Speaker 1: all this and recorded me going into this water, and

1194
01:08:24,160 --> 01:08:26,760
Speaker 1: I mean I broke down, literally broke.

1195
01:08:26,560 --> 01:08:30,400
Speaker 2: Down and like baptized in freedom.

1196
01:08:30,600 --> 01:08:36,960
Speaker 1: It was unreal. I just it was just tears of joy, massive,

1197
01:08:37,120 --> 01:08:38,160
Speaker 1: massive tears of joy.

1198
01:08:38,240 --> 01:08:38,519
Speaker 2: Really.

1199
01:08:39,479 --> 01:08:43,680
Speaker 1: So yeah, I would like to thank everybody that has

1200
01:08:43,720 --> 01:08:45,760
Speaker 1: signed a petition for me or had supported me in

1201
01:08:45,840 --> 01:08:49,040
Speaker 1: any way anyway. And thinking my sister too, who has

1202
01:08:49,080 --> 01:08:55,519
Speaker 1: spent many years not giving up. I guess that's that'll

1203
01:08:55,520 --> 01:08:56,120
Speaker 1: probably do it.

1204
01:08:56,439 --> 01:09:00,240
Speaker 2: Well. Once again, thank you for coming everyone. Please go

1205
01:09:00,320 --> 01:09:06,800
Speaker 2: to FAMM dot org, go to kendoclemency dot com, and

1206
01:09:07,720 --> 01:09:10,680
Speaker 2: let's not stop until we get every Tim Tyler that

1207
01:09:10,720 --> 01:09:11,679
Speaker 2: there is out of prison.

1208
01:09:12,240 --> 01:09:17,000
Speaker 1: Thank you, Jason, don't forget to.

1209
01:09:16,920 --> 01:09:18,360
Speaker 2: Give us a fantastic review.

1210
01:09:18,360 --> 01:09:20,639
Speaker 1: Wherever you get your podcasts.

1211
01:09:20,080 --> 01:09:23,240
Speaker 2: It really helps. And I'm a proud donor to the

1212
01:09:23,280 --> 01:09:25,800
Speaker 2: Innocence Project and I really hope you'll join me in

1213
01:09:25,840 --> 01:09:29,719
Speaker 2: supporting this very important cause and helping to prevent future

1214
01:09:29,720 --> 01:09:33,400
Speaker 2: wrongful convictions. Go to Innocenceproject dot org to learn how

1215
01:09:33,439 --> 01:09:36,160
Speaker 2: to donate and get involved. I'd like to thank our

1216
01:09:36,160 --> 01:09:39,519
Speaker 2: production team, Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in

1217
01:09:39,560 --> 01:09:42,960
Speaker 2: the show is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.

1218
01:09:43,280 --> 01:09:46,040
Speaker 2: Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction

1219
01:09:46,439 --> 01:09:50,400
Speaker 2: and on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with

1220
01:09:50,520 --> 01:09:53,640
Speaker 2: Jason Flamm is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts

1221
01:09:53,680 --> 01:10:03,880
Speaker 2: and association with Signal Company Number one