Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Jason flam. Normally I interviewed the victims of
Speaker 1: wrongful convictions with the aim to inform and inspire action.
Speaker 1: Now we're launching a new series, Righteous Convictions, where I
Speaker 1: will speak with some of today's most prominent and active
Speaker 1: agents of change, people who see the wrong in the
Speaker 1: world and are driven to make it right. We will
Speaker 1: speak with this diverse group of thought leaders and change
Speaker 1: makers to hear the stories that forge their passion for
Speaker 1: all that they have done and planned to do. Our
Speaker 1: first guest found his calling after he had already been
Speaker 1: elected to Congress in the nineteen eighties, when many of
Speaker 1: our leaders acted hastily during the hysteria of the crack epidemic.
Speaker 1: Since those days, he spent much of his time trying
Speaker 1: to undo the unintended consequences of some of the worst
Speaker 1: criminal legislation ever enacted in modern times. I want to
Speaker 1: mention one story. Her name was Eugenia Jennings. She sold
Speaker 1: crack cocaine to buy clothing and food for her children.
Speaker 1: The mandatory minimum sentences a hundred to one, and they
Speaker 1: ended up sentencing to twenty two years in prison. I
Speaker 1: actually visited her in Freble Jail I will never, never
Speaker 1: forget Jason, looking down in her tear filled eyes, and
Speaker 1: she said to me, Senator, if you let me go
Speaker 1: into my babies, I'll never commit a crime again. It's
Speaker 1: kind of thing, you know, it sticks with you for
Speaker 1: a lifetime. Now, having been named Chair of the Senate
Speaker 1: Judiciary Committee, he hopes to be even more effective in
Speaker 1: his fight for reform and equal justice. Senator Dick Durbin
Speaker 1: right now on Righteous Convictions, Welcome to the very first
Speaker 1: episode of Righteous Convictions, a show where I get to
Speaker 1: interview people who are doing amazing work, making a real
Speaker 1: difference for no reason other than that it's the right
Speaker 1: thing to do. And I can think of no better
Speaker 1: person to be our guest on the first episode than
Speaker 1: Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois. UM, Dick, Welcome to Righteous Convictions. Jason,
Speaker 1: honored to be on your show. I can't think of
Speaker 1: an individual in the private sector as we call it,
Speaker 1: who has done more personally than you have to bring
Speaker 1: justice to America. And I just started to join you.
Speaker 1: Thank you for those kind words, and I'm so excited
Speaker 1: to talk to you because justice is on my mind
Speaker 1: and I know it's on your mind, and you have
Speaker 1: evolved in such a profound way over the years, and
Speaker 1: as it's been a real honored to work with you.
Speaker 1: But how did you first become so committed to reforming
Speaker 1: I'll call it our injustice system, Jason, let me tell you.
Speaker 1: As a member of the House of Representatives, I represented
Speaker 1: uh midwestern district in central Illinois. That's small town America.
Speaker 1: The biggest city with Springfield with a hundred thousand population
Speaker 1: and total population in the district around six hred thousands.
Speaker 1: So there are a lot of small towns in rural areas,
Speaker 1: generally conservative, and it leaned Democrat by a little, but
Speaker 1: not by a lot. And so I defeated a Republican
Speaker 1: incumbent of twenty two years. And I was very mindful
Speaker 1: of the fact that I represented people who looked at
Speaker 1: life from a Midwestern viewpoint, a conservative viewpoint. So on
Speaker 1: issues of law and ardor you know, I kind of
Speaker 1: thought to myself, I want to be fair about the
Speaker 1: administration of justice, but I shouldn't be afraid of prosecuting
Speaker 1: criminals and making certain they pay a price. That thinking
Speaker 1: led me to six, of course, when we had to
Speaker 1: deal with the issue of a brand new narcotic called
Speaker 1: crack cocaine. That was a moment that made such a
Speaker 1: difference in the history of justice in America. I try
Speaker 1: to describe it in terms that I remembered as a politician.
Speaker 1: Along comes as a narcotic. It's so cheap, it's five
Speaker 1: bucks ahead, it's so addictive, it's destructive, particularly to mothers
Speaker 1: or carrying babies, and it's sweeping the country. And there
Speaker 1: was a human cry in Washington, do something and do
Speaker 1: it fast. This is going to result in more drug
Speaker 1: dependence than anything you've ever seen as an American. And
Speaker 1: right in the middle of that in Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: There was this one seminal event, This outstanding basketball player
Speaker 1: at University of Maryland, Lynn Bias, who was destined for
Speaker 1: the NBA, overdosed and died. His death had nothing to
Speaker 1: do with crack cocaine, but that was lost in translation.
Speaker 1: It created a political force, a momentum impetus. You would
Speaker 1: be amazed at how many of us voted in favor
Speaker 1: of the bill that was supposed to put an into
Speaker 1: crack cocaine. And the message of the bill was very clear,
Speaker 1: don't touch it. If you touch it and you're caught
Speaker 1: you're gonna end up with a criminal penalty the likes
Speaker 1: of what you've never seen. We're gonna hit you harder
Speaker 1: with this form of cocaine than anything else, a hundred
Speaker 1: to one hundred to one between crack and powder cocaine.
Speaker 1: And then the belief was this law is so powerful,
Speaker 1: we can stop this drug in its tracks. So we
Speaker 1: enacted the law and we were wrong. At the end
Speaker 1: of the day, we found out that not only were
Speaker 1: we filling our prisons, but sadly, the street price of
Speaker 1: the chemical was going down and the user numbers were
Speaker 1: going up. It was a total failure, and as we
Speaker 1: looked at it over a period of time, I reflected
Speaker 1: on it, and I came to the Senate a few
Speaker 1: years later and said, what can I do? And that's
Speaker 1: what started this whole effort to change the law. The
Speaker 1: mistake we made, and it was a hysterical time. And
Speaker 1: the media is complicted in this as well. Here's a
Speaker 1: drug that we now know, of course as pharmaceutically identical
Speaker 1: to cocaine. It just became the demon drug. And in
Speaker 1: this country there is a proclivity to always having some
Speaker 1: sort of demon drug. And then the media runs with it,
Speaker 1: and politicians react, and you have expressed to meet riv
Speaker 1: it lee your deep regret or even shame about it.
Speaker 1: But the differences, you've actually done something about it, and
Speaker 1: you're continuing. You in two thousand ten, right, you sponsored
Speaker 1: the first mandatory sentencing rollback, and I think it was
Speaker 1: forty years in America? Is that right? I think you're right.
Speaker 1: I think that members are right right, because politicians typically
Speaker 1: it's very easy and actually expedient to sponsor tough on
Speaker 1: crime legislation, and nobody up until then had had the
Speaker 1: courage to say, we're wrong, we're going to roll this back. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: the best deal that the Republicans would agree to at
Speaker 1: the time was eighteen to one, and that disparity is
Speaker 1: still in effect to this day. And of course it
Speaker 1: was also not made retroactive, which is crazy. Why do
Speaker 1: we do that? Why do we change laws and not
Speaker 1: make them retroactive? How does that make sense? That is
Speaker 1: hard to defend, but it's the nature of things to
Speaker 1: move slowly for fear that you're going to have a
Speaker 1: Willie Horton moment. Let me be very bluned about this.
Speaker 1: A release of someone who's going to go on a
Speaker 1: murderous rampage and make every politician who voted to release
Speaker 1: that person to pay a price in the next election.
Speaker 1: But in this situation, there were so many people affected
Speaker 1: by it. Just the numbers, I think, Jason tell the story.
Speaker 1: The federal prison population was forty six thousand, grew to
Speaker 1: two hundred thousand in two thousand nine. And this had
Speaker 1: a lot to do with mandatory minimums and the hundred
Speaker 1: to one ratio between crack and powder cocaine. So when
Speaker 1: I finally got into the Senate in a position of
Speaker 1: the Judiciary Committee where I thought I could do something,
Speaker 1: I introduced this Fair Sentencing Act, and I wanted to
Speaker 1: take the hundred to one to one to one for
Speaker 1: the reasons you mentioned. Cocaine is cocaine is cocaine, and
Speaker 1: for us to demonize one application of it, there was
Speaker 1: no scientific evidence for that, and we were ruining lives.
Speaker 1: We were putting people away by the hundreds of thousands
Speaker 1: under this mistaken part of the law, and that's why
Speaker 1: we started pushing for the change. I ended up negotiating
Speaker 1: with none other than Jeff Sessions, Yes, the same man
Speaker 1: who became Donald Trump's Attorney general. He was opposed to
Speaker 1: any change of crack cocaine. And we had a negotiation
Speaker 1: session that took place in the Gymnasium locker room for
Speaker 1: the Senate, and it was a morning of the hearing,
Speaker 1: and I said, Jeff, you gotta give me a break
Speaker 1: on this thing. This hundred to one is terrible. Well,
Speaker 1: he says, the best I can do is to one. Oh,
Speaker 1: come on, Jeff, you know, bring it down to ten
Speaker 1: to one. No, I can't do that. How about fifteen? No,
Speaker 1: how about eighteen? Well, okay, and you wonder how laws
Speaker 1: are made. That number eighteen came out of that negotiation
Speaker 1: standing in front of our lockers. Later on in the day,
Speaker 1: we passed it ultimately in the Senate, ultimately in the House,
Speaker 1: ultimately signed by President Obama. But it brought down dramatically
Speaker 1: the penalties that were being applied, and it wasn't retroactive.
Speaker 1: You're right, Jason, it should have been. We got to
Speaker 1: that later. I'll never forget you telling me about having
Speaker 1: done a presentation in the Senate chamber, and I am
Speaker 1: I remembering correctly that you actually brought a death row
Speaker 1: cell into the chamber. Not in the chamber, but we
Speaker 1: had had an illustration on the issue of solitary confinement
Speaker 1: of exactly the size of a very limited cell that
Speaker 1: a person would be confined to for twenty three hours
Speaker 1: at a time, so that people can actually just feel
Speaker 1: the moment by standing inside and trying to visualize making
Speaker 1: that your life for twenty three hours a day. It
Speaker 1: really was a issue of solitary confinement. They all come together, Jason.
Speaker 1: I mean they're connected, one right to the other. The
Speaker 1: mandatory minimum sentences a hundred to one, the solitary confinement.
Speaker 1: We had a hearing. After hearing and I brought people
Speaker 1: end to tell the story, I want to mention one
Speaker 1: very quickly, and it's one that you had played such
Speaker 1: a key role as a private citizen in her name
Speaker 1: was Eugenia Jennings, and Eugenia Jennings was a poor woman
Speaker 1: who had had a horrible life experience. She had three
Speaker 1: little babies. She sold crack cocaine, caught for the third time,
Speaker 1: and they ended up sentencing her to twenty two years
Speaker 1: in prison. She was twenty three years old. She had
Speaker 1: sold the crack cocaine to buy clothing and food for
Speaker 1: her children. Didn't make a difference. It was three strikes
Speaker 1: and she was out and she had been imprisoned, and
Speaker 1: her brother had taken her three little kids to raise them,
Speaker 1: and came to testify before a committee. He told the
Speaker 1: story of Eugenia, and it was such a sad, heartbreaking
Speaker 1: story that I ended up doing my best and reaching
Speaker 1: out to my friend, my former colleague, Barack Obama, to
Speaker 1: be honest with you. In the early days of his administration,
Speaker 1: he had some hold overs in the Department of Justice
Speaker 1: who were not giving him good advice and certainly not
Speaker 1: reflecting his value use. It turned out that I asked
Speaker 1: for a commutation of Eugenia Jennings sentence, and he agreed.
Speaker 1: It was the first commutation he had given as president,
Speaker 1: and she was released in after having spent more than
Speaker 1: a decade in prison. Actually visited her in federal jail.
Speaker 1: I will never never forget, Jason, looking down in her
Speaker 1: tear filled eyes, and she said to me, Senator, if
Speaker 1: you let me go home to my babies, I'll never
Speaker 1: commit a crime again. It's kind of thing, you know,
Speaker 1: it sticks with you for a lifetime. I want to
Speaker 1: make sure that's a matter of record. You gave her
Speaker 1: a helping hand, and I'll never forget. Are you still
Speaker 1: in touch with her. She had cancer. When she was
Speaker 1: released from prison. She lived for two years, She got
Speaker 1: to see her girl graduated from high school, and she
Speaker 1: was able to live in her own apartment with her girls,
Speaker 1: which was her dream in life, for about two years
Speaker 1: before she passed away. Oh my god, what a tragic
Speaker 1: story all the way around. And it is also worth
Speaker 1: noting it's not talked about much, but the percentage of
Speaker 1: people that die within two years of being released from
Speaker 1: prison in America is extraordinarily high, and it's understandable when
Speaker 1: you look at the draconian conditions that we subject our
Speaker 1: fellow citizens too. How did it get this way, Dick?
Speaker 1: There was a time when there was a focus on
Speaker 1: giving people a pathway to a life when they were released.
Speaker 1: Now it feels like all we do is punish them
Speaker 1: and set them up for failure when they are released.
Speaker 1: How did that shift and what can we do about
Speaker 1: it now? If you look at the course of history,
Speaker 1: in particularly American history, you can see the emergence from
Speaker 1: time and time of reform movements when it comes to incarceration,
Speaker 1: and they're more enlightened and they're usually driven by the
Speaker 1: moral community, whether it's formal religion or people who want
Speaker 1: to raise the discrimination that is clear a part of incarceration. Uh,
Speaker 1: let's call it for what it is. Race and poverty
Speaker 1: have more to do with it than anything else, and
Speaker 1: they have from the beginning of our nation's history. Interestingly,
Speaker 1: at this moment, we're entering a relatively good phase compared
Speaker 1: to where we have been. You take a look at
Speaker 1: the situation where I end up moving the First Step Act.
Speaker 1: It ends up being trumpeted by Jared Kushner, whose father
Speaker 1: was incarcerated. Kushner convinces his father in law to sign
Speaker 1: the bill. The people supporting the bill include not only
Speaker 1: the obvious usual liberal suspects like myself, but the Koch brothers.
Speaker 1: Many conservatives are supporting it, some because they are libertarian
Speaker 1: in their views, others because they're tired of seeing all
Speaker 1: this money, taxpayer money, being spent on incarceration with no
Speaker 1: apparent evidence of success. So we are in a more
Speaker 1: enlightened period. We have a long way to go, a
Speaker 1: long long way to go, but we're at least starting
Speaker 1: to look things more honestly. One of them is addiction itself.
Speaker 1: We've started to view addiction as a disease that I
Speaker 1: think is helping us deal with drug crime and drug
Speaker 1: use in a much different context. I want to turn
Speaker 1: to the death penalty. I mean, I think Florida as
Speaker 1: a microcosm of the death penalty. There have been thirty
Speaker 1: one exonerations from death row in Florida, and they've been
Speaker 1: nine people executed. And then we know that there are
Speaker 1: innocent people who have been executed in Florida, people like
Speaker 1: Jesse to Pharaoh. So in the state of Florida, they
Speaker 1: continue with this machinery of that even though they're probably
Speaker 1: only getting it right about six at the time. I mean,
Speaker 1: what are we doing well? I can tell you this.
Speaker 1: I think two things that have been responsible for the
Speaker 1: most dramatic change in our conversation on criminal justice and
Speaker 1: particularly the death penalty, or videotapes and DNA. All of
Speaker 1: a sudden, we have tangible, real evidence of things that occurred.
Speaker 1: And it opens our eyes to the fact that for decades,
Speaker 1: for centuries, we were relying on testimonial evidence and other
Speaker 1: things which were unreliable and often wrong, and sadly, innocent
Speaker 1: people died as a result of the miscarriage of justice.
Speaker 1: And the fact that the evidence that was presented was
Speaker 1: just playing wrong. Well, DNA is giving us something that
Speaker 1: is specific and objective, and it's doing dramatic things and
Speaker 1: changing our outlook. You know, I have this conversation center
Speaker 1: with with people who are protestantly, I say, what percentage
Speaker 1: of innocent people are you okay with executing? Because there's
Speaker 1: always going to be problems in the system even if
Speaker 1: everyone was doing their best, And unfortunately that's not the
Speaker 1: way it is. And it's interesting that the legislation that
Speaker 1: you're sponsoring, you being, of course from Illinois, Illinois having
Speaker 1: been sort of a hotbed for this right where the
Speaker 1: Northwestern law students in the law school found so many
Speaker 1: innocent people ball on death row, leading to a Republican governor,
Speaker 1: Governor Ryan actually commuting the sentences of everyone on death
Speaker 1: row in Illinois. Can you explain what you're working on
Speaker 1: now that will hopefully put an end to the death penalty.
Speaker 1: I want to say hats off to the Illinois Innocence
Speaker 1: Project as well as Northwestern and the work that they've
Speaker 1: done and so many others for really opening our eyes
Speaker 1: to the reality of what we face. You mentioned George Ryan.
Speaker 1: George Ryan, I've known for years, years and years as
Speaker 1: a kid involved in politics. I watched it. He was
Speaker 1: a conservative country club bay who one day is said publicly,
Speaker 1: I can't bear the responsibility of ordering the execution of
Speaker 1: a person. It's I'm going to put an end to it.
Speaker 1: There just won't be any death penalty in Illinois. Courageous
Speaker 1: of him, and he paid a price for it. Politically.
Speaker 1: A lot of people criticized him for it, but his
Speaker 1: sales caught the wind of public opinion and really started
Speaker 1: changing what we thought about the execution of prisoners. More
Speaker 1: and more present events over the last twenty years have
Speaker 1: said they were just not going to be engaged and
Speaker 1: the death only wouldn't happen on their watch until the
Speaker 1: former President Trump went on a killing spree in his
Speaker 1: last six months in office with Attorney General barr Uh
Speaker 1: And so I joined with Congressman Pressley, and we have
Speaker 1: a bill that would end federal deafenitalty once and for all.
Speaker 1: I think we ought to make it clear that is
Speaker 1: a policy and it's not going to change with the
Speaker 1: new president. What a difference an election makes. Support for
Speaker 1: the death penalty in America is at an all time
Speaker 1: love right, it's under fifty it is, and it's important
Speaker 1: to note the racial disparity, and I just want to
Speaker 1: read something quickly here. The color of a defendant and
Speaker 1: victim's skin plays a crucial and unacceptable role of deciety.
Speaker 1: Who receives the death penalty. In America, people of color
Speaker 1: have accounted for a disproportion forte percent of total execution
Speaker 1: since ninety six percent of those currently awaiting execution. It's
Speaker 1: even higher when you look at the US military, it's
Speaker 1: eighty six percent people of color, in Colorado eighty percent.
Speaker 1: The US government federal it's seven The seven percent of
Speaker 1: people on death row are people of color. So I
Speaker 1: think it's critically important that you're gonna put an end
Speaker 1: to this. We reached a point where we started looking
Speaker 1: I did at the death penalty and saying myself, even
Speaker 1: if you think that any given individual has committed such
Speaker 1: a horrendous crime, without a doubt committing that crime that
Speaker 1: they would merit execution, you have to ask yourself what
Speaker 1: you just cited. How do you explain the fact that
Speaker 1: it is the racial minority and the poor in America
Speaker 1: who overwhelmingly are the ones convicted. There's something wrong with
Speaker 1: the system of justice that ends up at that place.
Speaker 1: It was in that Supreme Court. Justice Harry Blackman said
Speaker 1: something which I had quoted so many times. He said,
Speaker 1: from this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with
Speaker 1: the machinery of death. And those words really summarized his
Speaker 1: frustration at what you just identified. Despite all of the
Speaker 1: procedural changes, it bottom line turned out that race and
Speaker 1: poverty were driving the death penalty in America and there
Speaker 1: was nothing he could do to change it. And he
Speaker 1: just said he's going to wash his hands of it.
Speaker 1: He no longer was going to act like he could
Speaker 1: make it work right. It wasn't going to work right,
Speaker 1: and as you mentioned, innocent people were going to die
Speaker 1: as a result of I agree with Justice Blackman at
Speaker 1: this point in my political career, a lifetime of politics,
Speaker 1: I will no longer tinker with the machinery of death.
Speaker 1: What can I say that is that you know, it's
Speaker 1: just sinking in it. It's so good to hear you
Speaker 1: say it. And I think we're going to see the
Speaker 1: end of the death penalty in America, hopefully in the
Speaker 1: next four years, not only federally, but in every state
Speaker 1: that there's so many innocent people that Richard Glossop and
Speaker 1: Julius Jones, among others in Oklahoma, Anthony Panovich and in Ohio.
Speaker 1: They're innocent people on death rows all over this country.
Speaker 1: It's something that should trouble everyone of good con I mean,
Speaker 1: it's exciting to see the public perceptions changing. You're helping
Speaker 1: to drive that. There's a real awakening. It feels like
Speaker 1: and I guess what I want to ask you, Dick,
Speaker 1: before we close. If you could waive a magic wand
Speaker 1: and change the justice system to a more just system,
Speaker 1: what would you do? It's an appropriate question. I will
Speaker 1: be officially named the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Speaker 1: I've been on that committee for twenty two years waiting
Speaker 1: for this moment. I have the thinnest possible majority in
Speaker 1: the composition of the Senate, and the chance, if I
Speaker 1: bring an issue to the floor for Kamala Harris to
Speaker 1: break the tie. But I am excited about the opportunity
Speaker 1: because this committee, which once I believe was the most
Speaker 1: prestigious and Capitol Hill, has an opportunity to reopen the
Speaker 1: national conversation on so many areas relative to justice and
Speaker 1: criminal justice. I have an exceptional group of Democratic senators
Speaker 1: on that committee who like myself are so anxious to
Speaker 1: finally spring into action and do things. Hold hearings, have
Speaker 1: a national dialogue, come up with good legislation, get it
Speaker 1: passed and signed by President Biden. I am more optimistic
Speaker 1: what we can achieve in the next few years than
Speaker 1: most because I know the potential that can occur here
Speaker 1: in the United States Senate. We have a variety of things,
Speaker 1: from Voting Rights Act, which really goes to the basics
Speaker 1: that we just learned were so critical in the peaceful
Speaker 1: passage of authority under our constitution. Issues involving immigration. It
Speaker 1: was twenty years ago that I introduced the Dream Act.
Speaker 1: It's still has to become the law of the land,
Speaker 1: and almost two million people are waiting for me to
Speaker 1: finally keep my promise and pass it. I could go
Speaker 1: through a long list, Jason, but I just want to
Speaker 1: tell you we are in a position now the likes
Speaker 1: of which we have not seen for years. I hope
Speaker 1: that we can capitalize on it and make good things
Speaker 1: happened for the future of America. Well, Dick, it gives
Speaker 1: me great confidence just knowing that you're going to be
Speaker 1: there to guide the ship. Any closing thoughts, just one
Speaker 1: thing I want to close with Jason Flam I'm honored
Speaker 1: to count as a friend. I know where your heart
Speaker 1: is on this issue, and it has made a difference
Speaker 1: in the lives of so many, so many people, and
Speaker 1: it's made a difference in my life to know that
Speaker 1: you're there when I need you. Wow. Okay, now let
Speaker 1: me just go float off on a happy cloud. Thank
Speaker 1: you for listening to Righteous Convictions. I'd like to thank
Speaker 1: our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Clyburne and Kevin Wardis.
Speaker 1: The music in this production was supplied by three time
Speaker 1: Oscar nominated composer Jay Ralph. Follow us on Instagram at
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction, on Twitter at wrong Conviction, and on Facebook
Speaker 1: at Wrongful Conviction podcast. Righteous Convictions is a production of
Speaker 1: a bilel for Good podcasts and association with Signal Company
Speaker 1: Number one h