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Speaker 1: Previously unsmoked. When you involved with things that are not legal,

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Speaker 1: what you say here stays there. But it didn't turn

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Speaker 1: out to be that way. Washington got statistics, but I

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Speaker 1: don't know that we had a profound effect on the problem.

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Speaker 1: My dad's initial lawyer told him that he would adjust

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Speaker 1: to daily life being incarcerated, being told where to go

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Speaker 1: at what time, and family members out in society. We

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Speaker 1: will probably never adjust to having a family member incarcerated.

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Speaker 1: I didn't have my praties in the right place. The

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Speaker 1: choices that I was making was causing them a lot

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Speaker 1: of despair. We need to ask prosecutors to use their

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Speaker 1: discretion to seek the best punishment instead of just belongest punishment.

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Speaker 1: He couldn't believe it had went legal, and I hadn't

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Speaker 1: voted for it. The phone call was very much like,

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Speaker 1: this is happening, and you didn't vote for it, So

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Speaker 1: locking them up. Robert flat Shorn walks into a nondescript

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Speaker 1: shop in a South Florida strip mall. Bobby tools in

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Speaker 1: the house. All right. From only a few steps away,

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Speaker 1: you can tell what's sold inside medical marijuana. It's a

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Speaker 1: dispensary from the true leave chain. Here in Miami buying

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Speaker 1: pot in a mall legally anyway, it is still a

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Speaker 1: little unusual. But in this case, so is the customer

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Speaker 1: doing good? Yeah? No, I brought my cruise so you

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Speaker 1: all be in movies. Miami Herald holder plat Shore and

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Speaker 1: got the nickname Bobby Tuna from the d e A.

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Speaker 1: They called his smuggling group the Black Tuna Gang. Back

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Speaker 1: in the seventies, they busted him for a multimillion dollar

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Speaker 1: pot operation that helped establish the same Colombian smuggling routes

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Speaker 1: that Randy later used. Bobby Tuna is one of more

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Speaker 1: than two hundred thousand Floridians approved by the state to

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Speaker 1: buy medical marijuana. Ten thousand new patients a month get

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Speaker 1: doctor's orders from marijuana and receive an ID card that

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Speaker 1: looks a little like a Florida driver's license. Are you doing,

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Speaker 1: my dear? All right? How is everybody? I gotta give

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Speaker 1: me in my card. You can imagine how nice this feels,

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Speaker 1: after thirty years in prison, be able to walk in,

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Speaker 1: show my card and get medicine. That day, Platform bought

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Speaker 1: a new vaporizer cartridge and some topical cream, both packed

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Speaker 1: with th HC the stuff and pot that gets you high.

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Speaker 1: He says, it helps him with his back pain, and

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Speaker 1: it's the sort of medical benefit platform frequently preaches about

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Speaker 1: other seniors on what he calls the Silver Tour, which

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Speaker 1: is sponsored by Two Weave. There are thousands of senior

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Speaker 1: communities and those people folk, they've got the need for

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Speaker 1: medical marijuana, and old body is talking to him. They're

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Speaker 1: in the dispensary. Plat shore And handed out tiny silver

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Speaker 1: pins in the shape of a pot leaf studded with rhinestones.

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Speaker 1: There's one for you and one for you. That's a

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Speaker 1: silver door pin. Are you guys a silver for I

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Speaker 1: am with the silver door, I'm the tuna. Thank you

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Speaker 1: for everything you've done for the movement. Man I appreciated,

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Speaker 1: and his legalization efforts unfold in Florida and across the country.

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Speaker 1: It's clear that plat sor And is helping blaze a

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Speaker 1: new trail. I love changing the law. After thirty years

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Speaker 1: in prison for other former longtime marijuana inmates searching for

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Speaker 1: their place in a vastly different world and in a

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Speaker 1: vastly different conversation about pot. I'm sort of half of

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Speaker 1: a celebrity, but it makes me feel good that everybody

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Speaker 1: appreciates what I do. And you know this is a

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Speaker 1: former revenge. I'm preventing other people from spending half their

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Speaker 1: life in jail like I did. Now, everybody says, but

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Speaker 1: aren't you upset because now it's legal and you did

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Speaker 1: all that time in jail. Hand afford to look back.

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Speaker 1: You look through the front window, knot out the back window.

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Speaker 1: From the Miami Herald and the Clatchy Studios. This is smoked.

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Speaker 1: I'm Amy Dristful, I'm Alex Harris, and this is part six.

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Speaker 1: Randy Lanier got the news he'd waited twenty seven years

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Speaker 1: for he was finally getting out of prison. Yeah, we

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Speaker 1: knew in the last thirty days before I got released

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Speaker 1: that I'd won my freenom, But every day you were

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Speaker 1: afraid they're gonna take it away somehow. When you get

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Speaker 1: short like that in the maximum security sometimes you run

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Speaker 1: into people that have a different mindset. So I tried

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Speaker 1: not to let the whole place know. By the time

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Speaker 1: the day came, it was like wildfire. The whole place. Now.

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Speaker 1: But why that's not clear unless you're Randy or his

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Speaker 1: lawyer or the government. Randy would only say this, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I have a sealed agreement concerning some issues along with

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Speaker 1: the government. Okay, so that doesn't stop some people from

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Speaker 1: speculating that it had something to do with the bicycle

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Speaker 1: club and the lawsuit. You may remember that's the California

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Speaker 1: card room. Randy and his smuggling ring funded the when

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Speaker 1: the government ceased, and then profited from to the tune

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Speaker 1: of thirty million dollars. They were dipping into the two

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Speaker 1: the government officials and Jane Fisher when I had improved it.

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Speaker 1: Charles Podesta is the former company bookkeeper. But then Randy

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Speaker 1: also had a sealed deal, but still he got tailed

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Speaker 1: into it, and that's one of the reasons I believe

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Speaker 1: that they finally let him go. On October, Randy walked

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Speaker 1: out of Coleman Prison in Central Florida. His family was waiting. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we got up very early in the morning and my mom,

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Speaker 1: my brother, and me went and did the drive and

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Speaker 1: we pulled up and parked in the same parking lot

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Speaker 1: we go for visiting and just kind of all look

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Speaker 1: at each other like, well, what are you supposed to

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Speaker 1: do now? You know? Do we go in? Do we

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Speaker 1: have to sign papers? Like what is this? And he

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Speaker 1: up getting walked out of the doors with his counselor,

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Speaker 1: and uh just had a wheelie card and wheeled out

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Speaker 1: his art supplies and his things. And we have to

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Speaker 1: go through a lot of checkpoints, pat downs and stuff

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Speaker 1: like that to get to the gates that gets you

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Speaker 1: into what you have to depart from. By the time

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Speaker 1: I left my unit with the director of psychology, it

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Speaker 1: was just him and I and then one guy, two guys,

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Speaker 1: and the next thing, I had a group, a whole

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Speaker 1: lot of people wanting to walk up, but it can

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Speaker 1: only go so far. So it was it's awesome have

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Speaker 1: your maris, his counselor said. Walking an inmate outside and

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Speaker 1: into the free world was mind blowing. I was so surprised,

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Speaker 1: to be honest, because it's a really weird thing. I

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Speaker 1: never experienced it. One minute, he's dressed in prison clothing

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Speaker 1: down in the receiving a discharge area. In the next minute,

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Speaker 1: just by virtue acrossing that last gate, now I'm looking

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Speaker 1: at him as a man for the first time. It

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Speaker 1: was a surreal thing to see somebody go from It

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Speaker 1: makes that as one minute to the next minute free.

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Speaker 1: And then you've seen him with his family, and I

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Speaker 1: was just very happy. Has Randy crossed the threshold. Maria's

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Speaker 1: wished him good luck and asked him to keep in touch,

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Speaker 1: and Randy has, and all of a sudden him was, hey,

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Speaker 1: every year sent me a holiday postcard. So he has

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Speaker 1: contacted me and called me or sent me a postcard.

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Speaker 1: You know, every hears some So for years Randy had

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Speaker 1: feared he would only leave prison in a coffin. That

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Speaker 1: October day, his thoughts were with some of the friends

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Speaker 1: he'd made, who still faced that prospect. Oh. I was

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Speaker 1: thinking positive, so much love, but I had mixed emotions

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Speaker 1: for the people that I was leaving behind. It's hard

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Speaker 1: to explain the river of emotions that was running through

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Speaker 1: me at the time, whether I was leaving some good,

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Speaker 1: solid people behind the wall. Randy and his family all

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Speaker 1: piled into his mother's white Toyota Corolla, Brandy in the

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Speaker 1: driver's seat. We took a selfie in the car before

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Speaker 1: we left Coleman never posted it or do anything with

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Speaker 1: it because I think we were all crying and yeah,

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Speaker 1: and then off to my grandmother's for breakfast. Yeah, did

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Speaker 1: your dad say anything? Just very tearful, big smiles, lots

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Speaker 1: of staring out the window. Um, I think it was

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Speaker 1: just a lot to take in a lot of thankfulness,

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Speaker 1: you know, constantly giving each other hugs and or just

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Speaker 1: grabbing someone's hands, just me like, you know, we can

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Speaker 1: do this without someone saying, uh, please separate three ft apart.

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Speaker 1: You're in this chair, you're in that chair. So freedom

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Speaker 1: is often forgot about how special it is until you

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Speaker 1: have it taken away, and then every little thing becomes special.

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Speaker 1: They drove to Randy's mother's house in Lakeland, Florida. Elsie

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Speaker 1: Lanier with seven and passed away last year, but not

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Speaker 1: before she got to see her son free again. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: We all phone conversations. I'm gonna make it until you

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Speaker 1: come home. If you did, that must have been quite

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Speaker 1: a moment. Yes, yes it was. Yeah. We probably the

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Speaker 1: biggest best homemade family breakfasts around, seaking eggs and shrimping grats. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: they're around the table with his family. The future suddenly

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Speaker 1: seemed very bright. God, I've been blessed like way over

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Speaker 1: the top. Before I gained my freedom, I used to

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Speaker 1: tell my son and do somebody's got to have a baby.

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Speaker 1: I'm trying to hold a little baby. So I come home.

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Speaker 1: My son has two within the year, frost out. In

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Speaker 1: Brandy Lanier's home on the edge of Denver, where her

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Speaker 1: father's art hangs on the walls and his racing memorabilia

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Speaker 1: fills her closets, there are plants in every corner. Definitely,

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Speaker 1: thank you. Yeah, we have over sixties strong now in

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Speaker 1: the house. So and that's not cannabis plants, that's just

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Speaker 1: the house plants. Yes, here in a spare bedroom, Brandy

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Speaker 1: and her housemates are growing pot legally inside a black

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Speaker 1: tent about the size of two refrigerators back to back.

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Speaker 1: So how much you have six plants per adult? Were

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Speaker 1: way under count as far as like illegal grow goes.

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Speaker 1: But we just have four plants and flower, and then

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Speaker 1: we cloned all four of them and we have their

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Speaker 1: four clones in veg in the closet. That's what they

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Speaker 1: really look like. Almost three dozen states, including Florida, now

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Speaker 1: have legal medical marijuana, and like Colorado, ten states in

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Speaker 1: the District of Columbia have legalized it recreationally for people

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Speaker 1: over twenty one. It is a busy day here in Springfield.

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Speaker 1: And even Illinois, the state where Randy was handed a

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Speaker 1: life sentence for pot smuggling, just legalized recreational weed supporters

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Speaker 1: say the bill will have a major positive social impact,

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Speaker 1: reversing pain caused by the War on drugs. Everyone is

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Speaker 1: navigating that new landscape in their own way. Some like

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Speaker 1: Bobby Tuna, have become public advocates for medical party. Everybody

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Speaker 1: in a senior community that they can talk about Alzheimer's

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Speaker 1: and marijuana, cancer and marijuana. But Brandy is part of

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Speaker 1: the new marijuana generation, not just legally in her house,

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Speaker 1: but professionally well. Two thousand and fourteen, between the legalization

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Speaker 1: and my dad came home, it was the light bulb

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Speaker 1: went off of Okay, this is the industry I'm going

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Speaker 1: to be in. So I kind of took my garden

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Speaker 1: knowledge and my house plant knowledge to the next level.

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Speaker 1: She works in cultivation, helping manage an indoor grow in

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Speaker 1: Colorado's booming industry. But I mean, for your family, though,

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Speaker 1: it's like crazy that you have this job. Probably I

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Speaker 1: actually have never even asked them what they think. They're

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Speaker 1: just very supportive and things that my brother and I

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Speaker 1: choose to do. So I think they're just happy to

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Speaker 1: see me succeed. But ultimately I think they're probably incredibly

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Speaker 1: happy that the option is there, not just for me.

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Speaker 1: But for the public. And finally things are changing and

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Speaker 1: you know, hopefully one day no one has to be

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Speaker 1: incarcerated for it again. Brandy remembers clearly the first time

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Speaker 1: her parents came to visit after her dad's release. They

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Speaker 1: came out in September for my dad's birthday, and uh,

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Speaker 1: we kind of toured around Denver like you do when

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Speaker 1: you first arrived here, and we stopped at a couple

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Speaker 1: of different dispensaries, and then we stopped to get coffee,

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Speaker 1: and my mom looked around and my dad was gone,

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Speaker 1: and so we went outside and we're, you know, looking

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Speaker 1: all over the street, and she said, we'll call him.

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Speaker 1: So I called him and he's directly across the street

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Speaker 1: at a big competitor. And he came out and I said,

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Speaker 1: you know, what are you What are you doing over

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Speaker 1: there in that store? You know, we don't shop there,

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Speaker 1: and and he was like, Oh, I'm gonna go in

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Speaker 1: every single one of these stories just because I can.

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Speaker 1: My wife was so much gratitude daily with the freedom

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Speaker 1: that I have, and walking into a dispense we made

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Speaker 1: me stop and think about how grateful I am to

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Speaker 1: experience the moment of what I'm experiencing. I told my

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Speaker 1: family to choose your passion that you're interested in, and

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Speaker 1: you'll love after work a day in your life. And

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Speaker 1: now she's involved in a legal aspect of it, and

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Speaker 1: I respect of all of which raises a question. No

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Speaker 1: one is suggesting it should be legal to buy tons

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Speaker 1: of pot from Colombian drug lords, sneak it into the

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Speaker 1: country and seek her compartments, stash it in warehouses, and

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Speaker 1: then truck it across the nation to sell to basically anyone,

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Speaker 1: but strip away the smuggling and international sourcing, and you

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Speaker 1: have an organization set up in some ways like the

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Speaker 1: legal marijuana companies today. Of course, now they grow it

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Speaker 1: in top of the line labs and shipped by armored

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Speaker 1: car The pot business is booming, and it was booming

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Speaker 1: in Randy's day too, just in the shadows. The more

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Speaker 1: you do something, you evolve. The process for buying a

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Speaker 1: pleasure boat, and then that became a sixty five photo

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Speaker 1: to an eighty photo to its foot budge, and just evolved.

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Speaker 1: And if you happen to hear Charles Podesta, Randy's bookkeeper,

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Speaker 1: talk about the needy gritty of the business, it might

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Speaker 1: be hard to tell which era he was discussing. And

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Speaker 1: we've been trying to figure out how much money you

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Speaker 1: guys made in from three to seven? What's your best?

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Speaker 1: Governs trying to figure that out too. Uh you know,

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Speaker 1: you know you have expenses, you know, and that's what

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Speaker 1: the government didn't want to hear. They heard a hundred

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Speaker 1: thousands of pounds he did a calculation of so much pounds.

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Speaker 1: That's your calculation was off because you never reached get that.

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Speaker 1: You don't net that. Like any business, you have losses,

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Speaker 1: you have waste, you have this, you have that uncollected death.

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Speaker 1: You know it netted low. Did I know? The government

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Speaker 1: thinks it was ten million dollars or year per person,

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Speaker 1: but it really wasn't that. How much exactly? I really

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Speaker 1: don't know. Uh, you know, I don't I don't have

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Speaker 1: that figure. In thirty years, what was once a crime

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Speaker 1: has now gone corporate and Randy's days and the pot

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Speaker 1: business are over at least for now. Have you ever

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Speaker 1: consider getting the business yourself? Um? When I first come out,

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Speaker 1: because I have runs that I know from the seventies

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Speaker 1: and eighties now have become big corporate people concerning the

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Speaker 1: cannabis industry. But um, right now. I'm happy with the

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Speaker 1: job I got that. What you've seen people who were

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Speaker 1: in the smuggle side now in the corporate tie. Yes,

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Speaker 1: I'm seeing people that were in my line of might

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Speaker 1: say work smuggling drugs in the cannabis industry and it's

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Speaker 1: getting huge. His daughter's role in the industry is something

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Speaker 1: he's proud of, but he'd be proud of her either way,

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Speaker 1: he said, and he knows his past probably influenced her.

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Speaker 1: I've never asked her why she's in the dispensary. I

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Speaker 1: know she knows the business very well, and she's been

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Speaker 1: around it all the life, oh with coming to visit me,

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Speaker 1: and she'd go to the appealed courthouses and set in

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Speaker 1: with my attorneys and stuff as she was going through college.

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Speaker 1: So she's been involved on the cannabis industry fighting for

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Speaker 1: my freedom since she was a young girl. But yeah,

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Speaker 1: it didn't have a positive light shed on it at

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Speaker 1: all through the nineties or in the two thousand's. And

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Speaker 1: it's very honorable that as a nation and as a people,

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Speaker 1: we can take research and learn from it and then

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Speaker 1: start formulating our own opinions and know how of this

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Speaker 1: flower because ultimately the end of the day, that's what

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Speaker 1: it is. It's just a flower. While Brandy said you

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Speaker 1: can't draw a direct line between her dad's past and

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Speaker 1: her career, it certainly shaped her politics on pot. She

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Speaker 1: supports groups that help nonviolent pot prisoners, like Freedom Grow,

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Speaker 1: which sends prisoners commissary money. If I can go to

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Speaker 1: a store and buy it, I don't see why anybody

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Speaker 1: should have to lose their freedom because of it. For now,

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Speaker 1: the federal government stands on marijuana remains unchanged. Weed is

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Speaker 1: classified as a Schedule one narcotic, meaning the government believes

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Speaker 1: it has high potential for abuse and no value as

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Speaker 1: a mid of snow product. It's in the same category

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Speaker 1: as heroin and ecstasy. Drugs such as cocaine, meth, and

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Speaker 1: oxyconton are classified as scheduled to narcotics, still highly addictive,

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Speaker 1: but potentially medically beneficial in the right circumstances. And as

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Speaker 1: the federal government continues to sit out the marijuana discussion,

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Speaker 1: the battle for legalization happens at the state level. Right

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Speaker 1: as Randy got out of prison the next month, Actually,

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Speaker 1: Florida voters had the chance to approve medical marijuana. They didn't,

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Speaker 1: but advocates tried again in and one thanks to the

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Speaker 1: deep pockets of one Floridian John Morgan. You know, the

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Speaker 1: first go round was more difficult because every time I

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Speaker 1: debated someone, I debated his sheriff in a green suit

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Speaker 1: with a gun. You know, I was kind of a

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Speaker 1: one man band out there, and I thought I would

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Speaker 1: have more help than I didn't get any help, but

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Speaker 1: so many people were coming up to me and thanking me.

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Speaker 1: And now that it's all said and done, you know,

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Speaker 1: I think it's some of the best money I respect.

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Speaker 1: Morgan is a personal injury lawyer in Orlando, and his

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Speaker 1: perspectives on pot reformed, at least partly at home. My

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Speaker 1: brother was paralyzed. He was eighteen years old, and he's

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Speaker 1: of C six C seven quadriplegic, and he had really

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Speaker 1: bad pain and really bad spasms. And you know, at

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Speaker 1: one point in time, they had him on seven zan

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Speaker 1: x a day, seven zan X. I took a half

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Speaker 1: of zan x once and it took them two days

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Speaker 1: to wake me up. But he started spoke of the

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Speaker 1: marijuana and the spasms would dissipate immediately and the pain

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Speaker 1: would go away immediately. The worst thing that has ever

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Speaker 1: happened to my family's life with Kim's injury, and he's

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Speaker 1: one of the people that I loved the most in

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Speaker 1: the world. And all of a sudden you're seeing it

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Speaker 1: working in real life, in your real family, and it's like,

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Speaker 1: I don't need to see anything more than that it works.

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Speaker 1: Thanks in part to the millions Morgan spent on lobbying, advertisements,

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Speaker 1: and signature gathering, the Aridians voted to legalize medical marijuana

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Speaker 1: in but Morgan wasn't done. After spending a few million more,

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Speaker 1: Smokable medical marijuana was recently approved. This is News six

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Speaker 1: and nine the big story this morning. Smokable medical marijuana

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Speaker 1: is now legal in the Sunshine. At a press conference

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Speaker 1: this last January, Florida Republican Congressman Matt Gates acknowledged the

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Speaker 1: law is still evolving. During my time in the Florida Legislature,

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Speaker 1: I was the principal architect of our state's medical marijuana laws,

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Speaker 1: and I am here to confess that those laws need

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Speaker 1: to change. And I believe that when I die someday,

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Speaker 1: the first paragraph in my obituary, we'll talk about the

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Speaker 1: legalization of medical marijuana and Florida. More and more advocates

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Speaker 1: for legal weed. Like Morgan, Randy and Bobby Tuna have

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Speaker 1: another selling point on their side. It's becoming big business

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Speaker 1: when other businesses are going away with automation and AI

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Speaker 1: and technology. This is not this is a job creator.

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Speaker 1: This is a tax creator. And this is better. Listen,

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Speaker 1: what if five guys do when they drank, they start

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Speaker 1: a fight. What if five guys do when they smoked though,

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Speaker 1: they start a band. It's just a totally different deal.

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Speaker 1: You know, it is a matter of time where this

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Speaker 1: is no longer a states rights issue. This is the

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Speaker 1: massive across the country and we needed to start getting

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Speaker 1: some federal supports for the medical states and as at

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Speaker 1: least step one. Nikki Freed was elected Florida's Commissioner of

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Speaker 1: Agriculture in She's the only Democrat to hold statewide office

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Speaker 1: in Florida right now, and she's a former medical pot

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Speaker 1: lobbyist A generations go to get it right. As her

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Speaker 1: campaign rallies made clear, she's proud of her stance on

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Speaker 1: medical marijuana and it's certainly contributed to her victory. We

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Speaker 1: are going to be on the right side of history

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Speaker 1: on this issue. National estimates vary, but some industry analysts

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Speaker 1: predict that by twenty sales of legal weed could be

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Speaker 1: as much as eighty billion dollars a year. You're going

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Speaker 1: to continue to feel a lot of pressure from businesses

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Speaker 1: that want to be involved. As a Republicans, you go

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Speaker 1: more onto your conservative financial principles or your conservative social principles.

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Speaker 1: Conservative financial principles says is to be an open market,

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Speaker 1: but their social principles are guiding the way that they're

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Speaker 1: handling the industry. Certainly not everyone is thrilled with these

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Speaker 1: legalization efforts. If we make it totally legal, big marketing

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Speaker 1: is going to commit. And do you think if you

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Speaker 1: really bring big marketing and big money into selling marijuana

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Speaker 1: that that's gonna keep kids from using it? Dick Gregory

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Speaker 1: is a prosecutor from that South Florida task Force. I

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Speaker 1: don't know that we need to be locking everybody up

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Speaker 1: the way we were, but certainly in put monetary finds

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Speaker 1: on it to discourage it, and certainly we shouldn't be

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Speaker 1: uh promoting it marketing it the way we did with

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Speaker 1: cigarettes and an alcohol just as not a good idea,

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Speaker 1: and the walk back of harsher sentences for drug smugglers

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00:21:55,160 --> 00:21:57,800
Speaker 1: might not be the right call. Said Tom Rafanello, the

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Speaker 1: d A agent with that task force. Men. The mandatory

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00:22:00,920 --> 00:22:03,320
Speaker 1: has had a great effect if you met the criteria.

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Speaker 1: Rico investigations had a great effect, he says. Drug dealers

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00:22:07,080 --> 00:22:09,159
Speaker 1: saw the impact of the Fens being tough on crime

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Speaker 1: and went to prison for twenty or thirty years, and

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Speaker 1: nobody wants to do that. They worked Now. I still

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Speaker 1: think judges should have the latitude dependent on the seriousness

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Speaker 1: of the crime. You know, I still think there's a

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Speaker 1: place for minimum mandatories depending on what salient points you hit.

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Speaker 1: But like it or not, everyone we spoke to seems

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Speaker 1: to agree there's a new perspective and that experiences like

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00:22:33,280 --> 00:22:36,080
Speaker 1: Randy's maybe far less common in the future. We're going

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00:22:36,119 --> 00:22:39,480
Speaker 1: to look like a what were we doing? Look at

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00:22:39,520 --> 00:22:44,359
Speaker 1: all the lives that were ruined. Forget smuggler, this little face.

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Speaker 1: You know, you don't get into mescu, you don't get

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00:22:46,760 --> 00:22:48,520
Speaker 1: in the law scu, you don't get the military gaming.

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Speaker 1: Just live ruined and I'll never get him back. These days,

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Speaker 1: freedom for Randy looks a lot like sitting on a

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00:23:07,440 --> 00:23:11,360
Speaker 1: beach near Fort Lauderdale, staring at the limitless horizon. It's

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00:23:11,359 --> 00:23:13,240
Speaker 1: where he spends a lot of his mornings as the

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00:23:13,280 --> 00:23:16,359
Speaker 1: sun rises over the waves. I would imagine the sunrises

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00:23:16,400 --> 00:23:18,440
Speaker 1: mean more to you than they used to. All the

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00:23:18,520 --> 00:23:22,200
Speaker 1: sunrises mean so much. I have look again just and

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Speaker 1: all of it. That I'm here and have the freedom

401
00:23:25,440 --> 00:23:28,480
Speaker 1: to see this, and so many people don't take the

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00:23:28,480 --> 00:23:31,600
Speaker 1: advantage of it, and I'm so blessed so when my

403
00:23:31,680 --> 00:23:36,280
Speaker 1: job allows me to watch the sunrise come up. When

404
00:23:36,320 --> 00:23:39,680
Speaker 1: Randy first got out of prison, he found a place

405
00:23:39,720 --> 00:23:42,400
Speaker 1: to stay and a job with Preston Hen, the old

406
00:23:42,480 --> 00:23:45,560
Speaker 1: racing buddy he drove with at Lament and two Randy

407
00:23:45,600 --> 00:23:48,600
Speaker 1: worked at Hen's swap Shop, a giant flea market, drive

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00:23:48,640 --> 00:23:51,639
Speaker 1: in movie theater and Fort Lauderdale tourist attraction. Yeah, we

409
00:23:51,760 --> 00:23:54,880
Speaker 1: go way back, and so he gave me an opportunity

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00:23:55,000 --> 00:23:58,000
Speaker 1: when I came out and ended up being a manager

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00:23:58,040 --> 00:24:01,000
Speaker 1: at swap shop, So that kind of worked out good.

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Speaker 1: He gave you an opportunity to cause you had race together. Yeah,

413
00:24:04,240 --> 00:24:06,960
Speaker 1: we race and with friends, and you know, we both

414
00:24:06,960 --> 00:24:09,119
Speaker 1: trust each other a lot, So he gave me an

415
00:24:09,160 --> 00:24:12,440
Speaker 1: opportunity there. But he started me out at minimum age

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00:24:12,600 --> 00:24:16,439
Speaker 1: selling tickets and eventually I was a manager. Now on

417
00:24:16,560 --> 00:24:19,480
Speaker 1: his voices of the Cannabis War radio show. Gene Fisher

418
00:24:19,520 --> 00:24:22,080
Speaker 1: remembered coming to visit soon after Randy got out of prison.

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00:24:22,560 --> 00:24:24,920
Speaker 1: He had co hosts on the broadcast and you may

420
00:24:24,960 --> 00:24:27,600
Speaker 1: hear them chime in. He gives me an address to

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00:24:27,640 --> 00:24:31,120
Speaker 1: see him in Pompano Beach. So I go up there

422
00:24:31,240 --> 00:24:33,879
Speaker 1: and it's right on the water. So I ran the

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00:24:33,880 --> 00:24:36,359
Speaker 1: front door bell and Randy comes and he lets me in.

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00:24:37,119 --> 00:24:39,960
Speaker 1: The guy who owns the house was an whole race

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00:24:40,000 --> 00:24:42,199
Speaker 1: car driver who knew Randy when he was before he

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00:24:42,240 --> 00:24:46,200
Speaker 1: went to prison, and he gave him a free cottage

427
00:24:46,440 --> 00:24:51,120
Speaker 1: to the bars right on the water. Randy goes twenty

428
00:24:51,200 --> 00:24:55,520
Speaker 1: feet and he's in the Atlantic Ocean swimming from doing

429
00:24:55,520 --> 00:24:58,040
Speaker 1: those sentences like we had all of a sudden, the

430
00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:00,840
Speaker 1: doors open and your father guest that you don't even

431
00:25:00,880 --> 00:25:04,520
Speaker 1: know what to say or do, almost jettish when we're

432
00:25:04,600 --> 00:25:08,440
Speaker 1: talking to each But there's one member of the company

433
00:25:08,520 --> 00:25:12,920
Speaker 1: who remains behind bars, Ben Kramer. After Jean Fisher and

434
00:25:13,000 --> 00:25:15,679
Speaker 1: Randy were released, Kramer filed his own suit over the

435
00:25:15,680 --> 00:25:20,119
Speaker 1: Bell Gardens Bicycle Club. It hasn't been resolved yet. Kramer

436
00:25:20,200 --> 00:25:22,760
Speaker 1: is still serving a life sentence. He was convicted for

437
00:25:22,760 --> 00:25:25,480
Speaker 1: the pot ring he led with Randy, plus the helicopter

438
00:25:25,640 --> 00:25:29,119
Speaker 1: escape attempt, and he pleaded no contest to manslaughter and

439
00:25:29,160 --> 00:25:32,200
Speaker 1: the death of power boat racing rival down Arnow. In

440
00:25:34,160 --> 00:25:37,520
Speaker 1: early in our reporting for this podcast, prison officials denied

441
00:25:37,520 --> 00:25:40,080
Speaker 1: our request to interview Kramer, but he sent us a

442
00:25:40,080 --> 00:25:43,760
Speaker 1: brief letter. He wrote, quote, I decided some things need

443
00:25:43,880 --> 00:25:47,120
Speaker 1: some light on them. No this I'm the last man

444
00:25:47,200 --> 00:25:50,199
Speaker 1: standing for a reason. Whatever Randy has to say is

445
00:25:51,040 --> 00:25:54,240
Speaker 1: he's a stool pigeon. In the letter, Kramer talked about

446
00:25:54,320 --> 00:25:56,600
Speaker 1: Randy's sealed deal, which he is trying to open up

447
00:25:56,640 --> 00:25:59,439
Speaker 1: through his lawsuit. Randy declined to talk much with us

448
00:25:59,480 --> 00:26:02,320
Speaker 1: about Cramer there, speaking only broadly about the release of

449
00:26:02,359 --> 00:26:06,000
Speaker 1: the company's partners. We all got out within two years

450
00:26:06,000 --> 00:26:10,040
Speaker 1: of each other, except for Creamer. Yes, my old coeffidants

451
00:26:10,080 --> 00:26:12,280
Speaker 1: still in. Do you ever talk to him? Are you

452
00:26:12,320 --> 00:26:14,280
Speaker 1: allowed to talk to him? We don't. We don't speak.

453
00:26:14,320 --> 00:26:16,400
Speaker 1: I haven't spoken to him in quite a long time.

454
00:26:18,640 --> 00:26:21,240
Speaker 1: Randy spends as much time as he can near the ocean.

455
00:26:21,800 --> 00:26:24,399
Speaker 1: The beach he goes to most mornings now is a

456
00:26:24,440 --> 00:26:27,520
Speaker 1: short walk from his latest job as a behavioral health

457
00:26:27,600 --> 00:26:32,720
Speaker 1: technician and outpatient substance Abuse Center. I teach medication classes

458
00:26:32,840 --> 00:26:36,159
Speaker 1: five days a week on the beach sunrise meditation for

459
00:26:36,280 --> 00:26:39,000
Speaker 1: a group sessions saw it, so therefore I have time

460
00:26:39,040 --> 00:26:42,680
Speaker 1: to take the clients, the patients to the beach talk

461
00:26:42,760 --> 00:26:46,119
Speaker 1: to them. There's something about and seeing the sunrise, because

462
00:26:46,119 --> 00:26:51,000
Speaker 1: I've had lots of people tell me they experienced something

463
00:26:51,600 --> 00:26:55,440
Speaker 1: and emotionally I see it. It's just a wonderful time

464
00:26:55,480 --> 00:27:00,040
Speaker 1: to have a meditation session. Randy taught himself mind on

465
00:27:00,119 --> 00:27:02,640
Speaker 1: this in prison, and he says it remains he's preferred

466
00:27:02,680 --> 00:27:06,760
Speaker 1: mind altering practice. He doesn't use medical marijuana. I thought

467
00:27:06,760 --> 00:27:08,919
Speaker 1: about it, but I didn't put much consideration into it.

468
00:27:09,720 --> 00:27:12,320
Speaker 1: I really don't have no ailments that I kind of

469
00:27:12,720 --> 00:27:16,880
Speaker 1: use it for. But if symptoms came about that I

470
00:27:16,920 --> 00:27:21,800
Speaker 1: think it would benefit me rather than pharmaceutical peals. I

471
00:27:21,840 --> 00:27:26,520
Speaker 1: would go to the Avenue of the Natural Plant. Right

472
00:27:26,520 --> 00:27:29,080
Speaker 1: down the street from that treatment center. There are doctor's

473
00:27:29,119 --> 00:27:32,040
Speaker 1: offices that offer money back guarantees that if you visit

474
00:27:32,359 --> 00:27:37,960
Speaker 1: you'll get a Florida medical marijuana card. This CBS war Years.

475
00:27:38,359 --> 00:27:41,520
Speaker 1: A few months ago, a brand Culled Purely even opened

476
00:27:41,600 --> 00:27:45,480
Speaker 1: the area's first drive through medical marijuana dispensary. Yes, you're

477
00:27:45,480 --> 00:27:48,440
Speaker 1: looking at South Florida's first dispensary with like you said,

478
00:27:48,600 --> 00:27:51,320
Speaker 1: a drive through, very similar picking up your prescription at

479
00:27:51,359 --> 00:27:54,680
Speaker 1: a local farmer. Randy supports the cause of medical marijuana,

480
00:27:54,960 --> 00:27:57,560
Speaker 1: but mostly from the sidelines. He prefers to make a

481
00:27:57,560 --> 00:28:00,280
Speaker 1: difference in his own small way at the recovery enter.

482
00:28:00,680 --> 00:28:02,040
Speaker 1: I want to pay it for it a little bit

483
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:04,280
Speaker 1: because I know I can help people change their lives.

484
00:28:04,840 --> 00:28:07,760
Speaker 1: Through my struggles and what I've experienced in my life,

485
00:28:08,080 --> 00:28:12,080
Speaker 1: I have a hundred certainty that I can help people

486
00:28:12,400 --> 00:28:15,520
Speaker 1: change their lives. He has also stayed in touch with

487
00:28:15,560 --> 00:28:18,919
Speaker 1: his counselor from Coleman Have Your Maris, a man he

488
00:28:18,960 --> 00:28:22,320
Speaker 1: says helped him think differently about prisons, the physical ones

489
00:28:22,520 --> 00:28:24,840
Speaker 1: and the ones in your own mind. And he has

490
00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:27,760
Speaker 1: tried to get back into the prison to speak, but

491
00:28:27,840 --> 00:28:30,800
Speaker 1: it just seems like the bureaucracy of the prison sucks.

492
00:28:31,320 --> 00:28:33,720
Speaker 1: Maris said he's tried to help Randy set up speaking

493
00:28:33,760 --> 00:28:36,760
Speaker 1: engagements inside prison, but they's been turned down every time.

494
00:28:37,040 --> 00:28:39,280
Speaker 1: Sometimes they don't want inmates to come back who have

495
00:28:39,480 --> 00:28:43,080
Speaker 1: recently released, which I think would serve as a room motivation.

496
00:28:43,200 --> 00:28:46,840
Speaker 1: But the prison system is, you know, not a therapy

497
00:28:47,000 --> 00:28:51,160
Speaker 1: friendly or rehabilitation friendly place. The prison focuses its energy

498
00:28:51,280 --> 00:28:56,760
Speaker 1: on just keeping the inmates in. It's safe to say

499
00:28:56,920 --> 00:29:00,200
Speaker 1: Randy brings what might be called an uncommon background to

500
00:29:00,320 --> 00:29:02,920
Speaker 1: his work at the Substance Abuse Center, but it's a

501
00:29:03,000 --> 00:29:05,040
Speaker 1: chance for him to share the hard truths he came

502
00:29:05,080 --> 00:29:07,680
Speaker 1: to face in prison and to help others make better

503
00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:10,480
Speaker 1: choices in their own lives. Changing the way you think

504
00:29:10,720 --> 00:29:15,040
Speaker 1: you change your life. So through meditation and yoga, I

505
00:29:15,120 --> 00:29:18,120
Speaker 1: started changing the way I think. I started forgiving all

506
00:29:18,120 --> 00:29:20,880
Speaker 1: of the people in my life that I thought was

507
00:29:20,920 --> 00:29:23,680
Speaker 1: against me, and they really wasn't. I understand it now.

508
00:29:24,760 --> 00:29:28,320
Speaker 1: All how you choose to perceive things, it might also

509
00:29:28,400 --> 00:29:31,600
Speaker 1: be a way to forget. There's something about Randy's case

510
00:29:31,600 --> 00:29:35,200
Speaker 1: that the jury didn't hear. It's about the barge. According

511
00:29:35,200 --> 00:29:38,080
Speaker 1: to an article but the St. Louis Post Dispatch. During

512
00:29:38,080 --> 00:29:40,040
Speaker 1: the trial, a witness told the judge in a closed

513
00:29:40,080 --> 00:29:42,640
Speaker 1: door session that the barge was scuttled after the company's

514
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:46,920
Speaker 1: final shipment. On board were twenty pounds of marijuana, and,

515
00:29:47,040 --> 00:29:50,360
Speaker 1: according to the witness, the bodies of two workers. As

516
00:29:50,400 --> 00:29:52,800
Speaker 1: part of a plea deal, the witness said, Randy told

517
00:29:52,880 --> 00:29:55,400
Speaker 1: him the men died in an accident and that they

518
00:29:55,440 --> 00:29:58,440
Speaker 1: had been overcome by gas built up in the secret compartments,

519
00:29:59,080 --> 00:30:00,800
Speaker 1: but the judge ruled the he couldn't hear a word

520
00:30:00,800 --> 00:30:04,600
Speaker 1: of it. No one was ever charged. The drugs started it, Yeah,

521
00:30:04,720 --> 00:30:07,240
Speaker 1: I was. We asked Randy about the barge all the

522
00:30:07,240 --> 00:30:10,680
Speaker 1: way up to my last load eighty six, and the

523
00:30:10,760 --> 00:30:12,719
Speaker 1: last load was the one you had to scuttle the barge.

524
00:30:13,720 --> 00:30:18,000
Speaker 1: That right, well, that I don't know. I after we

525
00:30:18,080 --> 00:30:21,920
Speaker 1: did quote documents on him that that's what they say.

526
00:30:23,360 --> 00:30:26,040
Speaker 1: It's hard to know. With Randy Lanier. In the hours

527
00:30:26,080 --> 00:30:29,280
Speaker 1: we talked with him, he veered from emotional, even tearful

528
00:30:29,600 --> 00:30:33,080
Speaker 1: to guard it and careful. Still, he's blunt in his

529
00:30:33,120 --> 00:30:35,920
Speaker 1: assessment of the damage he's caused in his own life

530
00:30:36,240 --> 00:30:38,720
Speaker 1: and those of his loved ones. I don't blame no

531
00:30:38,760 --> 00:30:42,920
Speaker 1: one but myself. I chose to make the decisions to

532
00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:45,760
Speaker 1: do what I did, and to set him blame anything

533
00:30:45,800 --> 00:30:49,480
Speaker 1: on anybody else would be false. But if prison can

534
00:30:49,480 --> 00:30:52,320
Speaker 1: tear a person down, and solitary can take away even

535
00:30:52,400 --> 00:30:55,880
Speaker 1: the concept of time, it's also clear he came out

536
00:30:55,960 --> 00:31:02,120
Speaker 1: the other side a different man and replacing the sensational

537
00:31:02,200 --> 00:31:07,959
Speaker 1: highs of the past is a focus on simpler THINGSD

538
00:31:08,480 --> 00:31:12,040
Speaker 1: like his family, so this is yesterday. Once he paused

539
00:31:12,080 --> 00:31:14,400
Speaker 1: our conversation to show off a video of his twin

540
00:31:14,440 --> 00:31:18,400
Speaker 1: grandsons and Batman and we went out slolling down a

541
00:31:18,480 --> 00:31:26,800
Speaker 1: hillside and accidentally into some spiky burst. He posted a

542
00:31:26,840 --> 00:31:30,320
Speaker 1: picture of those aspiring superheroes on Facebook with the caption

543
00:31:30,760 --> 00:31:33,600
Speaker 1: the world is as you see it. Well, I don't

544
00:31:33,640 --> 00:31:37,600
Speaker 1: feel badly about the position that I got myself, and

545
00:31:37,640 --> 00:31:41,080
Speaker 1: I feel sorrow for some of the people that are

546
00:31:41,160 --> 00:31:44,840
Speaker 1: short of lengthy sentences that do deserve a second chance,

547
00:31:46,200 --> 00:31:51,360
Speaker 1: because I can tell you everybody changes, everything changes for real.

548
00:31:58,160 --> 00:32:00,440
Speaker 1: Randy says there are still little things us that trip

549
00:32:00,520 --> 00:32:03,840
Speaker 1: him up about modern American life. I still get stuck

550
00:32:04,600 --> 00:32:08,560
Speaker 1: for thirty years. You get hand today commissary paper. You

551
00:32:08,560 --> 00:32:11,080
Speaker 1: don't get to go down to aisle shopping. You turn

552
00:32:11,160 --> 00:32:15,160
Speaker 1: it in and your stuff comes to a bin, and

553
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:18,160
Speaker 1: you put it in a laundry bag, commissary bag, and

554
00:32:18,200 --> 00:32:21,560
Speaker 1: you take it to your sale. So when I come

555
00:32:21,600 --> 00:32:24,360
Speaker 1: out one of my first stores, I went towards Walmart

556
00:32:24,560 --> 00:32:28,320
Speaker 1: to get some clothing, and the selection and the size

557
00:32:28,520 --> 00:32:32,920
Speaker 1: and I got stuck just buying flip flops, and I

558
00:32:32,960 --> 00:32:36,040
Speaker 1: can still get stuck out of store looking at the selection.

559
00:32:38,400 --> 00:32:42,239
Speaker 1: But on weekends here at Homestead Miami Speedway, all of

560
00:32:42,240 --> 00:32:45,960
Speaker 1: that fades away. He leaves his Honda Accord in the

561
00:32:45,960 --> 00:32:48,800
Speaker 1: parking lot and climbs back into a race car for

562
00:32:48,880 --> 00:32:51,560
Speaker 1: this session when we pass, cause we want to make

563
00:32:51,560 --> 00:32:54,040
Speaker 1: sure a wheels a straight away and we want to

564
00:32:54,120 --> 00:33:00,400
Speaker 1: keep the all pms at about Randy, it's with the

565
00:33:00,440 --> 00:33:03,720
Speaker 1: one thing that always just stuck with him, so unwinding

566
00:33:03,720 --> 00:33:08,520
Speaker 1: the wheel and staught squeeze in the throattle. Maybe not

567
00:33:08,680 --> 00:33:12,840
Speaker 1: everything changes. I'm looking at the schedule and sometime this

568
00:33:12,960 --> 00:33:15,400
Speaker 1: year I'll hope to do one or two more races.

569
00:33:16,040 --> 00:33:20,840
Speaker 1: I'm not done racing. It's impossible to know how good

570
00:33:20,840 --> 00:33:23,840
Speaker 1: a driver Randy Lanier might have been. Randy Lanier, he

571
00:33:23,880 --> 00:33:26,120
Speaker 1: will start this race in the second row. The next

572
00:33:26,120 --> 00:33:29,160
Speaker 1: Andretti another fit of Paldi. I don't know. I'll tell

573
00:33:29,160 --> 00:33:31,600
Speaker 1: you this, Randy Lanier was a hell of a good

574
00:33:31,680 --> 00:33:34,080
Speaker 1: racing car driver, and he never want a race because

575
00:33:34,120 --> 00:33:36,480
Speaker 1: he was a smuggler, wanter race because he was a good,

576
00:33:36,520 --> 00:33:39,320
Speaker 1: good driver. Jim Buzby saw Blue Thunder win plenty in

577
00:33:39,360 --> 00:33:41,600
Speaker 1: the MPs series and won plenty of races in his

578
00:33:41,640 --> 00:33:44,880
Speaker 1: own right. I follow him. I mean, you know most

579
00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:47,760
Speaker 1: of his pictures on Facebook, our sunsets, and you know

580
00:33:47,840 --> 00:33:51,080
Speaker 1: whatever he's got going on in his life that he's salvaged.

581
00:33:51,800 --> 00:33:54,480
Speaker 1: No matter how good Randy was and no matter how

582
00:33:54,600 --> 00:33:58,560
Speaker 1: rich he got, I wouldn't trade what he's gone through

583
00:33:58,800 --> 00:34:02,840
Speaker 1: for any of it. If punishment was due, he got it.

584
00:34:02,960 --> 00:34:07,120
Speaker 1: So let's go on. Randy wasn't around long enough to

585
00:34:07,120 --> 00:34:08,720
Speaker 1: know if he could have stuck it out with the best,

586
00:34:09,360 --> 00:34:14,200
Speaker 1: or if he might eventually beaten the best. But it's

587
00:34:14,239 --> 00:34:18,280
Speaker 1: exactly that drive for greatness while risking destruction in everything

588
00:34:18,320 --> 00:34:22,040
Speaker 1: he did, begins to rus quickly when legend and reality

589
00:34:22,080 --> 00:34:25,719
Speaker 1: blur into one over last year's record, one of them,

590
00:34:25,800 --> 00:34:29,080
Speaker 1: Randy lightning on there and a wrong turn changes everything.

591
00:34:30,440 --> 00:34:33,640
Speaker 1: Randy there against the wall that made Randy's life such

592
00:34:33,680 --> 00:34:37,080
Speaker 1: a wild ride. I don't worry about rashion. I thank

593
00:34:37,080 --> 00:34:40,279
Speaker 1: If you worry about that, you may be hesitant on

594
00:34:40,719 --> 00:34:43,720
Speaker 1: keeping your foot down. All the rottle and the truth

595
00:34:44,440 --> 00:34:48,200
Speaker 1: so extraordinary. It was an adventure with a lot of

596
00:34:48,200 --> 00:34:53,399
Speaker 1: other inventures in a roll and into an adventure I'm

597
00:34:53,440 --> 00:34:57,239
Speaker 1: Amy Driscoll. I'm Alex Harris. This podcast is produced by

598
00:34:57,320 --> 00:35:00,600
Speaker 1: Karat Tabor and Davin Coburn and McClatchy Studio and The

599
00:35:00,640 --> 00:35:04,640
Speaker 1: Herald's Emily Michell and Matthias Ackner. This podcast was recorded

600
00:35:04,680 --> 00:35:07,440
Speaker 1: inside the w l r N studios at the Miami Herald,

601
00:35:07,760 --> 00:35:10,240
Speaker 1: and thanks to w l r n's Christine di Mattei,

602
00:35:10,440 --> 00:35:14,440
Speaker 1: who provided audio engineering assistance for lots more on this story,

603
00:35:14,640 --> 00:35:17,759
Speaker 1: including a video of Bobby Tuna inside a pot dispensary,

604
00:35:17,960 --> 00:35:22,560
Speaker 1: go to Miami Herald dot com slash smoked. Amenda Marquez

605
00:35:22,640 --> 00:35:26,040
Speaker 1: is President, publisher and executive editor of the Miami Herald

606
00:35:26,040 --> 00:35:29,480
Speaker 1: Media Company. Rick Hirsch is Managing editor of The Miami Herald,

607
00:35:29,840 --> 00:35:33,600
Speaker 1: and John Forsyth is mcclatchy's senior director of Video and Audio.

608
00:35:34,120 --> 00:35:37,319
Speaker 1: And thanks to jose Iglesias and David Neil at The

609
00:35:37,320 --> 00:35:39,759
Speaker 1: Miami Herald. Leave us a rating and a review on

610
00:35:39,800 --> 00:35:43,480
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts. To continue supporting this kind of work, consider

611
00:35:43,520 --> 00:35:46,920
Speaker 1: a digital subscription to The Miami Herald. Visit Miami Herald

612
00:35:47,000 --> 00:35:49,680
Speaker 1: dot com slash subscribe for more information