Speaker 1: That's what's up. Family. It's your girl to meek A D.
Speaker 2: Mallory and it's your boy my song in general, and we.
Speaker 1: Are your hosts of street politicians.
Speaker 2: The place where the streets and politics.
Speaker 1: Meet my song. How you doing, sir oh Man?
Speaker 3: I had a long weekend, but I'm blessed and holly favorite,
Speaker 3: you know, doing God's work as usual in yourself.
Speaker 4: I'm doing good, been with my granddaughter. It's been a
Speaker 4: good holiday weekend. That ends my attempt at a month
Speaker 4: long vacation. August is the month I tried two months
Speaker 4: throughout the years, you know, I try August and I
Speaker 4: try uh December, well, from Thanksgiving through Christmas or New
Speaker 4: Year's I try to slow down as much as possible.
Speaker 4: So and I'm blessed to be able to do that
Speaker 4: with all the other things that I do. But I
Speaker 4: until freedom work. It just doesn't really allow that. We
Speaker 4: talked about it last week. It's it's kind of hard
Speaker 4: to really really really cut everything off. But I do
Speaker 4: feel a little restored. I feel rested. I feel like
Speaker 4: I enjoyed myself and I took.
Speaker 1: Some much needed time.
Speaker 4: And so now this weekend I got a chance to
Speaker 4: spend with my granddaughter, who I love so very much.
Speaker 4: He's so sweet and so precious and so inquisitive and
Speaker 4: so aggressive, and you know, it feels good. So now
Speaker 4: it's time to get back to work.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was. I was with my grandson yesterday. Man.
Speaker 3: We took my my sons to see him. We had
Speaker 3: a little pool out in. So he is just he's
Speaker 3: something else. He is a handful and he loves his daddy,
Speaker 3: so he's a daddy's boy. So that was dope, man.
Speaker 3: But yeah, man, it's been it's been definitely been a
Speaker 3: long month. Unfortunately, you know, I don't really never have
Speaker 3: the opportunity to completely break away.
Speaker 2: From things I've been. I was a soccer dad all weekend.
Speaker 3: Both of my sons, like y'all know, they both play soccer,
Speaker 3: so they were in the tournament for the holiday tournament.
Speaker 2: And those tournaments started eight.
Speaker 3: Nine in the morning and an hour a way, so
Speaker 3: that means you got to get up at six six
Speaker 3: thirty to get ready to get there by eight thirty because.
Speaker 2: You got to be there in advance for the game.
Speaker 3: So and they don't finish till like two in the afternoon,
Speaker 3: and then they end up the scalding heat. You know,
Speaker 3: this is a hot weekend, so it's ninety degrees outside
Speaker 3: and they both got two and three games back to back,
Speaker 3: so it was a long weekend, but you know, you
Speaker 3: know it was.
Speaker 2: It was.
Speaker 3: It's always preasurable to watch your sons and watch your
Speaker 3: offspring engage.
Speaker 2: In sports and do things that they like, so you know,
Speaker 2: I can't complain.
Speaker 1: Well, that's good.
Speaker 4: You know, I feel like I did that and I
Speaker 4: know all about it. And it's funny because in the
Speaker 4: summer it's really really hot out there. My child played football,
Speaker 4: But in the like when it starts getting cooler, then
Speaker 4: it's freezing, and you still got to be out there.
Speaker 4: And it doesn't matter if you went out the night before,
Speaker 4: you still got to show up. You still got to
Speaker 4: have their stuff washed, prepared. It's no joke.
Speaker 1: You really have to be ready to have children.
Speaker 4: And I and I and you know, I think about
Speaker 4: so many people out here who we've heard stories recently.
Speaker 4: And I know there've always been people to kill their
Speaker 4: kids or to do horrible, horrific things to their children,
Speaker 4: but now that you know, but it's maybe because it's
Speaker 4: online more, I don't know what it is. And maybe
Speaker 4: it's pre cod I mean post COVID, the pandemic. But people, really,
Speaker 4: some people just don't need kids. They really don't because
Speaker 4: all that stuff that you're talking about. While to you
Speaker 4: it's not it comes natural. When I had to do it,
Speaker 4: I wouldn't say it came natural because I was much younger,
Speaker 4: but I still did it, and I had a lot
Speaker 4: of support from my family. My partner at the time
Speaker 4: was the coach, so we had a lot of support.
Speaker 4: But if there's somebody out there, a mother or a
Speaker 4: father who is trying to do most of it alone,
Speaker 4: it is no joke, no joke. And people mentally, they're
Speaker 4: not all able to handle the responsibility of working and
Speaker 4: trying to keep.
Speaker 1: Your kids in activities.
Speaker 4: God forbid, your child has some type of disability or
Speaker 4: some type of issue, and you're trying to keep up
Speaker 4: with the programs and this and that and the third
Speaker 4: and cook food and blah blah blah. It's enough to
Speaker 4: make people lose their minds. And you know, it's just
Speaker 4: very very what's the word that I'm looking for. I
Speaker 4: don't want to say dangerous, but it can be. It
Speaker 4: can be dangerous for people to try to raise children
Speaker 4: in this society where things are so expensive and sports
Speaker 4: for kids is like sports, like real professional sports. So
Speaker 4: it's a lot. I mean, bless y'all heart because they're
Speaker 4: still young. And you know, here comes a little girl.
Speaker 4: Just looking at my granddaughter as she is growing, she
Speaker 4: has been when I say she's aggressive. If she wants something,
Speaker 4: she's going to do everything you put it, tell a no,
Speaker 4: put it down. She'll go around the other way, she'll
Speaker 4: slide backwards, she's going to figure out how to get
Speaker 4: that cup of that thing.
Speaker 1: And when you tired, you like damn.
Speaker 4: So you know, And of course that doesn't mean I'm
Speaker 4: saying I see how or that it's an excuse for people,
Speaker 4: But I just know everybody doesn't need kids.
Speaker 2: I agree one hundred percent.
Speaker 3: That's why I always say that you can't force somebody
Speaker 3: to have a kid that's definitely not ready to have
Speaker 3: a kid, because you're doing more harm for.
Speaker 2: The kid in that individual than anything. So I'm all
Speaker 2: on board with that.
Speaker 4: No, really, So let's get into our topics because today
Speaker 4: we have a good guess and they're going to be
Speaker 4: coming on shortly, and so I want to make sure
Speaker 4: that we do talk about our topics, because we've also
Speaker 4: got some things that need to be you know, covered,
Speaker 4: and one of the things that is speaking of children
Speaker 4: and how everybody does need children and it takes a
Speaker 4: village to raise each child. This year, and I think
Speaker 4: this is the second year that the NYPD, the New
Speaker 4: York Police Department, did something around cease fires that I
Speaker 4: think is really really important, needs to probably go a
Speaker 4: step further. But we'll talk about why I say that
Speaker 4: in a moment. But they went to the homes of
Speaker 4: or and not all not all of it was home visits,
Speaker 4: but they found got in touch with communicated with whether
Speaker 4: it be home visits or you know, seeing them in
Speaker 4: the street. At least forty gang members or people that
Speaker 4: they have they have that they considered being gangs. Because
Speaker 4: I don't know these all of these folks, so maybe
Speaker 4: they they would say they're not in the gang at all,
Speaker 4: but they are people who have been identified as shooters
Speaker 4: or problematic or in problems or maybe you know, somebody
Speaker 4: in the community knows about some issues that they may
Speaker 4: have had or beefs that they're in. And they went
Speaker 4: to found these people and asked them to have a
Speaker 4: cease fire over labor Day weekend, and it seems that
Speaker 4: shootings were down.
Speaker 1: And hopefully this is a part of it.
Speaker 4: It's not one thing, and that's what I always say
Speaker 4: that it's not one thing. It's not just that they
Speaker 4: went to find these folks and that the NYPD. But
Speaker 4: then you also have the crisis management system under the
Speaker 4: you know, the the direct I don't even want to
Speaker 4: say supervision because you know, people don't really like when
Speaker 4: you use that terminology. There's a lot of leaders, but
Speaker 4: our brother at Mitchell as the czar for Anti violence
Speaker 4: in the City of New York, and you know, and
Speaker 4: the the whole crew that's been working alongside the Mayor's
Speaker 4: office to try to reduce violence. So you have that
Speaker 4: going on during Juve, which is the parade that happens
Speaker 4: every Labor Day in Brooklyn. And then of course you
Speaker 4: just have lots of community organizations doing work. So when
Speaker 4: you put all of that together, it's a real good
Speaker 4: gumbo that helps to address violence and going out actually.
Speaker 1: Communicating with people.
Speaker 4: First of all, there are people who might be super
Speaker 4: problematic that when they got either knock at the door
Speaker 4: or a conversation on the sidewalk.
Speaker 1: Or a text message or you know.
Speaker 4: Whatever that actually may have made them feel like, damn,
Speaker 4: somebody actually sees me.
Speaker 1: You never know to come to me.
Speaker 4: And put the kind of responsibility in my lap to
Speaker 4: help the city be safe so that children and families
Speaker 4: can be outside and enjoy the weekend without there being
Speaker 4: violent incidents that make people uncomfortable and unable to come outside.
Speaker 1: So I think it was a good initiative.
Speaker 2: It is a good initiative, but it also scares you.
Speaker 3: Right when you've been identified, you on the list as
Speaker 3: a shooter, and somebody that potentially out there shooting, It's like, yo,
Speaker 3: oh shit, they know my name, They not through my door,
Speaker 3: you know what I'm saying. I gotta calm down. I
Speaker 3: need to rethink this because I ain't trying to go
Speaker 3: to jail.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 3: If I'm on If I'm in the police station and
Speaker 3: my name came up and they knock on this door,
Speaker 3: it ain't really too much good things. It's either somebody's
Speaker 3: looking for me. I'm involved in some shit, or I've
Speaker 3: been at somebody that they probably are watching all the time.
Speaker 3: So it's it's basically a heads up that you got
Speaker 3: to straighten your shit up.
Speaker 4: Man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely one hundred percent.
Speaker 2: It is.
Speaker 4: It is definitely a sign that you better get your
Speaker 4: shit together, because it's like a branch with many leads,
Speaker 4: because one side is like, hey, we're coming to you
Speaker 4: with the responsibility hoping that you'll respect us as we
Speaker 4: are respecting you. We're all so acknowledging that you think
Speaker 4: you some kind of like whatever whatever, you think you
Speaker 4: are a boss or whatever in the community, which is
Speaker 4: some bullshit, but nonetheless that's what you think. So we
Speaker 4: also coming to you in that respect. But finally, we're
Speaker 4: on your ass, we're on your heels, and we know
Speaker 4: who you are. We know your name, we know where
Speaker 4: you're from, we know the shit that's going on, we
Speaker 4: know exactly about you and Ray Ray's situation, we know
Speaker 4: all these things that's going on, and so we're here.
Speaker 4: You know we're coming to you, and that is that's
Speaker 4: also another part of it. The further piece though that
Speaker 4: I said is kind of like missing, or maybe it's not. Well,
Speaker 4: it is missing because when I think about what's happening
Speaker 4: in the city of Newark with Mayor ros Baraka, and
Speaker 4: we were talking about this the other day, that they
Speaker 4: are actually they're employed, they are off the street and
Speaker 4: into jobs, they're into programs. There's money going into their
Speaker 4: pocket their family based upon on them doing work around
Speaker 4: violence prevention. So I feel like if you can find
Speaker 4: these forty to fifty people, then you should probably employed
Speaker 4: find them and make sure that they have money in
Speaker 4: their body exactly.
Speaker 3: Give them, give them incentives to do something different. I
Speaker 3: totally agree. I tell you all the time, crime and
Speaker 3: violence is incentivized in our community, right, so if we
Speaker 3: want something else, then we got to incentivize that as well.
Speaker 3: You can't make people think they're going we can get
Speaker 3: paid for doing negativity, and they can't be compensated and
Speaker 3: paid for doing something positive.
Speaker 2: You know, absolutely, it's not appealing.
Speaker 3: Nobody wants to be broke, so they're gonna figure out,
Speaker 3: all right, I can get some money doing this.
Speaker 2: I can get some money do it. That's what I'm
Speaker 2: gonna do. Now.
Speaker 3: If you show them, look you, if you take the
Speaker 3: time out to be a you know, a piece intervening
Speaker 3: a violence interrupted in these communities, if you utilize that
Speaker 3: same power that you have to do something good to
Speaker 3: save lives that put them in jeopardy, We're gonna pay
Speaker 3: you for that.
Speaker 1: I can give you some skills train them to get power.
Speaker 3: People want power, they want position. You know a lot
Speaker 3: of these people, that's what they want. They want to
Speaker 3: be known. So if they can be famous and not
Speaker 3: infamous and it can benefit them and they ain't gonna.
Speaker 2: Whisk their freedom or risk they life, why wouldn't they
Speaker 2: do it? Yeah?
Speaker 4: I think that's the that's the bigger part. And then
Speaker 4: it's like, it's so many things. Let's move on to
Speaker 4: the next topic because if we want to get the
Speaker 4: guests on and not hold her, and it brings up
Speaker 4: this next thing about this woman who was hit five brick. Now,
Speaker 4: big thing for me around this whole month two months
Speaker 4: a year, right, two months a year, eight.
Speaker 1: Weeks of fifty two weeks. It's fifty two weeks in
Speaker 1: a year. Yeah, fifty two.
Speaker 4: Weeks for eight I'm on thirty percent work, right, So
Speaker 4: I try my best, Like I literally go out of
Speaker 4: my way to be like, I'm not watching that, I'm
Speaker 4: not listening to it.
Speaker 1: I can't.
Speaker 4: There are so many leaders out here that jumping on
Speaker 4: many different issues. You always dealing with stuff and I
Speaker 4: don't know what's going on.
Speaker 1: I have no idea. So now we see I saw
Speaker 1: that on your page, a woman was hitting the.
Speaker 4: Face and I learned about it, like I don't know,
Speaker 4: I learned about it actually just kind of like over
Speaker 4: the weekend, I learned.
Speaker 1: About it, and so I don't know what happened.
Speaker 4: But the next thing I know, I saw on your
Speaker 4: page that people were saying that she did a skit
Speaker 4: in a thing and now this is.
Speaker 1: Fake or something.
Speaker 4: So I don't know if she was in the hospital
Speaker 4: with a fake Gallant helped me understand what pappened.
Speaker 3: The reality of the situation is a young lady was
Speaker 3: obviously walking through the neighborhood coming from somewhere. I don't
Speaker 3: know all the details of why she was in the neighborhood,
Speaker 3: and according to her, you know, a guy asked her
Speaker 3: for a number and she told him no, and based
Speaker 3: on that he made the gud ray.
Speaker 2: He picked up a brick, put it to a face,
Speaker 2: then hit her on the face with the break.
Speaker 3: What's most disturbing about the situation, it's not just the
Speaker 3: fact that this one guy hit her with a break,
Speaker 3: but there were multiple guys happened to be black guys.
Speaker 3: I think they might have been in Haitian, but they
Speaker 3: were black. Regardless of what they were around and they
Speaker 3: watched this happen, you know. And then after it happened,
Speaker 3: she goes on her video to show her face which
Speaker 3: is sticking out like this, and she's saying that, you know,
Speaker 3: a guy hit on the face and these black men
Speaker 3: sit around it do nothing.
Speaker 2: And you hear in the background one of the guy,
Speaker 2: who has you know, a.
Speaker 3: West Indian accent, saying, what we supposed to do, what
Speaker 3: we're supposed to do with what you want us to do?
Speaker 3: And that bothered me, you know, just the fact that
Speaker 3: it happened, and then hearing these men say, what did
Speaker 3: you want you to do? I would want you to
Speaker 3: try to stop somebody, a woman from being hit.
Speaker 2: In the face with a break, right.
Speaker 3: I would think that would be your innate nature. I
Speaker 3: would think that would be the common sense thing for
Speaker 3: you to do. I think that would be the more
Speaker 3: raw thing for.
Speaker 2: You to do.
Speaker 3: But his response in that situation, and just seeing some
Speaker 3: of the responses online was just it was just terrible.
Speaker 3: So then after, you know, I posted the video of
Speaker 3: her and then posted you know, the video of her.
Speaker 3: First the video was of her in the hospital explain,
Speaker 3: and then they showed the video of the guys actually
Speaker 3: saying this. So I post both of those videos just
Speaker 3: just you know, just expressing my concern and my dismay
Speaker 3: and disappointment. And the fact that men stood around and
Speaker 3: watched another man hit a woman in the face of
Speaker 3: the brick. He could have literally killed them, right, And
Speaker 3: the fact that people think that having any level of
Speaker 3: intervention in that is wrong or I don't know what's
Speaker 3: going on. I don't need to know what's going wrong
Speaker 3: on to know that a woman should be getting faced
Speaker 3: in the brick. I don't have to know all the details.
Speaker 3: She could have said the worst shit was, she could
Speaker 3: have stole money from you. But I want to protect
Speaker 3: both of y'all because I don't want you to kill
Speaker 3: her and do the rest your life in jail, and
Speaker 3: I don't want her to die. So me intervening is
Speaker 3: not purely just because I'm protecting somebody. I know, because
Speaker 3: it's the right thing to do. What happened is the
Speaker 3: right thing to do.
Speaker 2: Is like them.
Speaker 3: If I see a little kid running and I see
Speaker 3: somebody hitting him, the kid might have spit on you,
Speaker 3: might have stole something for you.
Speaker 2: If I see somebody about to swing a bat at
Speaker 2: a little kid.
Speaker 3: I'm an intervene. I'm gonna say, yo, don't hit the
Speaker 3: kid with a bat. Let me talk to you.
Speaker 2: I don't have to be It's not about being tough.
Speaker 3: It's about just having any level of courage, just anything
Speaker 3: in her something like how how do men sit around
Speaker 3: and watching women get violently beat with a brick and
Speaker 3: say that it's okay.
Speaker 2: So then after that, what starts to surface online is
Speaker 2: this video.
Speaker 3: Right, there's a video of her hitting a white man,
Speaker 3: saying something to him. I don't know exact word. She
Speaker 3: says something to him, she smacks him, she walks off,
Speaker 3: and then as she walks off, she twirks, Now, if
Speaker 3: anybody watched this video more three times, you can tell
Speaker 3: us a skit. It's not rocket science. The white man
Speaker 3: is standing there, she smacks him. He goes like this,
Speaker 3: She walks off, not even looking at him. She's not
Speaker 3: fearing that he's gonna retaliate, because if you smack somebody
Speaker 3: in the face in the street in an argument, you
Speaker 3: know there's retaliation coming. You know, she smacked him, didn't
Speaker 3: even look at the man. It was a light little tap.
Speaker 3: She walks off like he ain't even there. He knows
Speaker 3: that he doesn't look at her, he looks the other way.
Speaker 3: She goes about five steps and starts twirking. The video
Speaker 3: goes off right, So anybody who's paying attention to that, nos,
Speaker 3: it's not real.
Speaker 2: But the.
Speaker 3: People who want to discredit this woman's claim, the people
Speaker 3: who want to make it seem like it's justified that
Speaker 3: she was hit with a brick, found this video. They
Speaker 3: also found a video of her saying that how she
Speaker 3: I think she made she's part of the LGBTQ. I
Speaker 3: don't know exactly what position she is, but she was
Speaker 3: saying that, you know, I'm black. Women control everything. They
Speaker 3: they provide and they and protect right, get you a
Speaker 3: black woman, because that's what I'm gonna do. You know,
Speaker 3: black men ain't the ones out here really protecting us
Speaker 3: this and that. And people were angry about that the
Speaker 3: comments she made. But I say to myself, this situation
Speaker 3: proves the comments she made it's not It wasn't based
Speaker 3: off some shit that she just didn't know. When when
Speaker 3: you watching your when you can when you can walk
Speaker 3: in the street and get hit in the face of
Speaker 3: the brick and a bunch of black men sit around
Speaker 3: and do nothing, to ask you what they were supposed
Speaker 3: to do. Then what her statement is one hundred percent truth,
Speaker 3: and I can't be mad at her for feeling the
Speaker 3: way that she felt.
Speaker 2: I can't even be mad at that statement.
Speaker 3: But even if you all mad at that statement, it
Speaker 3: does not justify a weak assed man hitting a woman
Speaker 3: in the face of the brick. So they try to
Speaker 3: use all of those things to justify and I debunked
Speaker 3: those things and came up with the fact that everybody
Speaker 3: knows that that was a skit that came up right.
Speaker 3: And then what happened after that. One of the guys
Speaker 3: a quote unquote allegedly I don't know if he actually
Speaker 3: was there when he went online saying that he was
Speaker 3: there and that he's seeing what happen. And the lady
Speaker 3: was looking for trouble, and she she she said some
Speaker 3: things to the God that was rude, and she did
Speaker 3: him the hit with a brick, so you know, she
Speaker 3: got what she was looking for. And if he could
Speaker 3: do it again, he still wouldn't protect And I thought
Speaker 3: that was just the worst shit in the world.
Speaker 2: To me.
Speaker 3: I just didn't understand how a man can say because
Speaker 3: words came out of a woman's mouth that you didn't
Speaker 3: like that you was okay with her being hit in
Speaker 3: the face with a brick.
Speaker 2: I just don't understand it.
Speaker 3: The mind state that we have, you know, especially and
Speaker 3: people getting mad old you're trying to put it all
Speaker 3: is on own.
Speaker 2: No, I take it on me too.
Speaker 3: It ain't about I'm not saying y'all black man, No,
Speaker 3: it's me because if we do it something wrong as
Speaker 3: a society, if we're not calling out individuals that do
Speaker 3: shit like that, if we're not dealing with them on
Speaker 3: our own, if we not have some level of standing
Speaker 3: for manhood in our community, that certain shit is just
Speaker 3: not okay, and then it's our fault because we empower
Speaker 3: people like that when a man can walk like that,
Speaker 3: hit the face of the lady in the face of
Speaker 3: the break, and jump in his car and leave without
Speaker 3: anybody saying or doing anything to stop him or deter
Speaker 3: him or say, yeah, that shit ain't even right. Even
Speaker 3: if you was, even if you were scared to death,
Speaker 3: you not even saying, man, that's messed up. Man, come on,
Speaker 3: don't hit that lady like that. I don't want no problems,
Speaker 3: but come on, don't don't hit no lady with a break.
Speaker 3: The fact that you couldn't even muster that up is
Speaker 3: because you normalize it and you think it's okay.
Speaker 2: So if black men in our community think that, then
Speaker 2: we are all feeling and.
Speaker 3: We owe black women in apology because the fact that
Speaker 3: they don't feel safe. And I'm going through my comments
Speaker 3: with so many people say, oh, she deserves that. You
Speaker 3: see this video and the fact that people look for
Speaker 3: that stupid ass video to try to justify it. And
Speaker 3: it only took me ten seconds to realize it was scared.
Speaker 3: And but that's when you when you actually are intentional
Speaker 3: and you want to make sure that what you're saying
Speaker 3: is correct, when you want when you when you want
Speaker 3: to not discredit somebody, when you're not trying to look
Speaker 3: forward Q to justify a woman getting beat in the face.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: So it was, It's just a whole situation, and it
Speaker 3: really disappointed me. Man I felt sorry for the woman.
Speaker 3: You know, she was crying her face like she had
Speaker 3: a big, big swollen face. Some people try to say
Speaker 3: it's made up, it's just like your damn And you
Speaker 3: know it brought me to Meghan, you know, it made me.
Speaker 3: It reminded me of Megan, and that's that kind of
Speaker 3: hurt me. It's like, damn, we're going through this shit again.
Speaker 3: A woman was shot, one woman here with a break
Speaker 3: and we still we make them, you know, the people.
Speaker 3: That's the problem.
Speaker 2: We villainized. We villainized the victim. And that is crazy
Speaker 2: to me. It is so crazy to me that you
Speaker 2: know that. And the man said, yeah, he hit in
Speaker 2: the face with the brick, but she was looking for trouble.
Speaker 2: What is looking for trouble? Me? What exactly does that entail?
Speaker 2: You said some words. As a man, we not strong
Speaker 2: enough to hear a woman, a stranger that we don't know,
Speaker 2: say some words we don't like and walk away, go
Speaker 2: the other way, like whatever. Even if you yelled at her,
Speaker 2: even if you was mad and you cursed.
Speaker 3: I can deal with cursing more than I could deal
Speaker 3: with a man feeling that he is justified in hitting
Speaker 3: the woman in the face of the brick for words
Speaker 3: that she said come out of my mouth. So you know,
Speaker 3: it's I've been it's really been a tough day for
Speaker 3: me just ever since. I really because it was my DMS.
Speaker 3: You know, we were at our fabulous sisters son's wedding
Speaker 3: you know, so all those deals I didn't get. But
Speaker 3: you know, when I actually got a chance to look
Speaker 3: at it, it was like I couldn't believe that shit
Speaker 3: actually happened. I felt so bad. I'm like, damn, how
Speaker 3: how have we moved this far away from consciousness as man?
Speaker 3: How we moved this far away from our natural order?
Speaker 3: Our natural order is supposed to be provided and protect
Speaker 3: How do we how do we just negate to protect parts?
Speaker 2: You know? And it's it's it's it hurts.
Speaker 1: I don't have anything to say.
Speaker 3: It is what it is.
Speaker 1: I already know what it is.
Speaker 4: When once I see I didn't know all of these details,
Speaker 4: and once you stayed apart, once you said that she
Speaker 4: made statements about the men not protecting women and all
Speaker 4: of that.
Speaker 1: As soon as you said that, then I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: I see exactly what it is.
Speaker 4: So that's that's the reason why it's okay that she
Speaker 4: was hitting the face with a brick for a lot
Speaker 4: of people, because that that statement makes people feel for me.
Speaker 2: You didn't know about the statement when she got in
Speaker 2: the face with the brook.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but you know, it's just we don't have time.
Speaker 4: We don't have time now to unpack it more and
Speaker 4: get deeper into it. But we've done it many times
Speaker 4: on this show, and it just continues to show itself.
Speaker 4: And so hopefully there are some who see it and understand,
Speaker 4: and then there are some people who will never see it.
Speaker 1: They'll never understand. That's just it for me.
Speaker 4: This other conversation that we've been engaged in all weekend,
Speaker 4: and it's very similar in that, you know, the conversation
Speaker 4: around love and hip hop and Rika Menna calling Spice
Speaker 4: a monkey.
Speaker 1: You want to mention my you should have died.
Speaker 2: Monkey.
Speaker 4: You know, I've already made a million statements about how
Speaker 4: I feel.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 4: One of the questions that was asked of me directly,
Speaker 4: and it has been many other people. Shabaz asked me directly,
Speaker 4: but other people have asked me, do I draw the
Speaker 4: line at racism? And I wrote the whole thing about
Speaker 4: you know about that, And I want to make sure
Speaker 4: for the purpose of our conversation today.
Speaker 2: That we.
Speaker 4: State some things right, because I see so many narratives
Speaker 4: popping up on the Internet. First of all, I want
Speaker 4: to say that I have not said, nor do would
Speaker 4: I ever say, that Erika Menna is racist, because we
Speaker 4: know that the terminology.
Speaker 1: Racism or a person being racist.
Speaker 4: Means that they have some power to impact effect change
Speaker 4: the lives of people of color or black folks or
Speaker 4: other marginalized groups, and that they have the power to
Speaker 4: oppress a group of individuals. And I don't believe that
Speaker 4: the Latino community for the most part, While there are
Speaker 4: some people within the Latino community who consider themselves to
Speaker 4: be white adjacent, but they still are participating in white
Speaker 4: supremacy and peddling racist narratives and comments.
Speaker 1: But it does not mean that I would say that
Speaker 1: they are racist, So we have to be clear about that.
Speaker 4: I think that the comment that she made is a
Speaker 4: racial slur, and that is different from saying somebody is racist.
Speaker 4: I don't know her well enough to make that determination
Speaker 4: and to say that about her.
Speaker 1: By the way, Also.
Speaker 4: What I read in the statement that was put out
Speaker 4: by Love and Hip Hop is not that she was fired.
Speaker 4: It looks like a suspension because they say in the
Speaker 4: statement next season they could easily say that she is
Speaker 4: no longer with the Love and Hip Hop franchise. They
Speaker 4: could have said that. So I did not see it
Speaker 4: saying that she was fired or her contract has been terminated,
Speaker 4: and she would not be the only person on these
Speaker 4: reality shows who have faced in the past suspensions. Even Portia,
Speaker 4: who is our sister, was suspended for fighting on house Yes,
Speaker 4: she's on Housewives of Atlanta.
Speaker 1: So people do get suspended.
Speaker 4: There are they have periods where there's breaks or whatever
Speaker 4: as different issues are being worked through.
Speaker 1: So that's the other thing.
Speaker 4: The third thing, this is just my pieces, right, is
Speaker 4: that I have not said, nor would I have probably
Speaker 4: ever been advocating.
Speaker 1: For Rika Minna to be canceled.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: What I have been talking about is that there must
Speaker 1: be an.
Speaker 4: Understanding of the use of racial slurs and how those
Speaker 4: things should never be on the table.
Speaker 1: People say, well, her child shouldn't. That's fine.
Speaker 4: You can argue all day that the insults of saying
Speaker 4: something about a person's child, the insult of talking about
Speaker 4: people dirty, stink, funky, whatever you want to say, those
Speaker 4: are insults. They shouldn't be happening. It's out of line.
Speaker 1: It's all of that.
Speaker 4: But racial slurs absolutely go into a different area. If
Speaker 4: you are a child and you're in the school and
Speaker 4: you always playing around and moving around and doing whatever,
Speaker 4: and you constantly getting in trouble because you won't sit still.
Speaker 4: That's one thing, and that in and of itself might
Speaker 4: have you going to the principal's office.
Speaker 1: There may be issues, but if you get.
Speaker 4: Caught cheating on a test, that raises the level, and
Speaker 4: now there's such thing as suspension and or even being
Speaker 4: expelled from this school. So people need to stop acting
Speaker 4: like there are not levels to life. Can you can
Speaker 4: maybe take a piece of candy from the store and
Speaker 4: get in trouble for it, Maybe you go down to
Speaker 4: the courthouse because you get caught for stealing. But if
Speaker 4: you rob a bank, your ass is gonna probably get
Speaker 4: a felony conviction and serve lots of time. There's levels
Speaker 4: to everything in life. So you could say that the
Speaker 4: stealing of the candy in the store was wrong, and
Speaker 4: it might get you a little misdemeanor, or you might
Speaker 4: go downtown and the judge might say, slap on the wrist,
Speaker 4: don't ever do it again. But if you get caught
Speaker 4: doing a bank heist, there's a whole different set of
Speaker 4: consequences associated with that.
Speaker 2: Consequences increase immensely absolutely.
Speaker 4: And so therefore folks need to stop playing the we
Speaker 4: don't oh, you know, it's all the same.
Speaker 1: It is not all the same. And what is sad.
Speaker 1: What is sad to me is that the conversation around.
Speaker 4: First of all, what is very noticeable of black people
Speaker 4: who are speaking on this topic is the lack of
Speaker 4: knowledge that people have about our history.
Speaker 1: You can see it.
Speaker 4: You can see it in the responses from different people
Speaker 4: in different areas, Folks who are supposed to be, you know,
Speaker 4: people who are entertainers or people who have public profiles.
Speaker 4: You can hear literally their lack of understanding of our
Speaker 4: history just based upon the ignorance of what they are
Speaker 4: even saying. Right, Because and I'm going to finish this
Speaker 4: here because we have to go and come back and
Speaker 4: complete these conversations a little bit later.
Speaker 1: But I would say this.
Speaker 4: One of the things that I appreciate when we talk
Speaker 4: about going to that Palestinian wedding, right, Linda's son had
Speaker 4: an incredible, incredible wedding, and which we do too. So
Speaker 4: I'm not trying to say black folks don't we have history.
Speaker 4: We got culture, we got all of that. But it
Speaker 4: was a beautiful wedding. And I would actually drop this
Speaker 4: in as my thought of the day today, watching the
Speaker 4: family come together in the way in which they did
Speaker 4: for that Palestinian wedding. One of the things that I
Speaker 4: appreciate is that they passed down their culture and their
Speaker 4: history from generation to generation.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 4: I think about some of our brothers and sisters in
Speaker 4: the African community, Africans who are either here in the
Speaker 4: US now or when we went to Africa, and we know,
Speaker 4: we saw how you could go into any facility, you
Speaker 4: could be walking around the streets, and the Africans can
Speaker 4: tell you the story down to the children of their history,
Speaker 4: what has happened to them, what took place there in Africa.
Speaker 4: Same thing with the Haitian community. When I was in Haiti,
Speaker 4: I was talking to young kids ten and twelve years
Speaker 4: old while we were out on tours, just a part
Speaker 4: of their education.
Speaker 1: And I get it. I get it, my son, that
Speaker 1: a part of the.
Speaker 4: Effects of white supremacy and enslavement and all of that
Speaker 4: is that they cut us off of my history.
Speaker 1: And that's why they are.
Speaker 4: Trying to ban it in schools even still today, because
Speaker 4: they don't want us to know.
Speaker 1: Because if we understood our history, if we truly.
Speaker 4: Understood all that has happened to us where we are
Speaker 4: today is it doesn't mean we have to live and
Speaker 4: soak in it. But understanding it means that we will
Speaker 4: never be okay with somebody using a racial slur against us.
Speaker 4: Will never be okay with it, because I promise you
Speaker 4: you cannot sit on a show and get into an
Speaker 4: argument with a Jewish individual and then say, oh, you kite.
Speaker 4: You can't do that, because once you do whatever else
Speaker 4: y'all was dealing with, the level has now kicked up.
Speaker 1: And the difference between other communities and our community is that,
Speaker 1: for the most part, for the most part, they.
Speaker 4: Are going to have a group of individuals within their
Speaker 4: community that will organize.
Speaker 1: Against you.
Speaker 4: And the rest the others probably won't say much unless
Speaker 4: they think and injustice is truly being done.
Speaker 1: So we have we have been so disconnected from who
Speaker 1: we are.
Speaker 4: We've been so we've been taught to actually ignore that
Speaker 4: as a form of achievement and success, so much so
Speaker 4: that we lend ourselves to the negative and disrespectful narratives
Speaker 4: about us. And it is very, very, very dangerous. We
Speaker 4: come back, we can talk about I mean, you should
Speaker 4: definitely respond now, but we come back, we should talk
Speaker 4: about the whole love and hip hop brand, because that
Speaker 4: has been a big topic of conversation, and I have
Speaker 4: much to say about that well, based on.
Speaker 2: What you said.
Speaker 3: You know, I think you hit everything on the head.
Speaker 3: You know, I think I went online and I just
Speaker 3: wanted to make it clear that calling a black person
Speaker 3: a monkey is definitely a racial slurt.
Speaker 2: It's not okay. You know, it's historic.
Speaker 3: You know, there's things and it's even historic in our
Speaker 3: communities as of now, it doesn't even it doesn't even
Speaker 3: all the way go back to you know, slavery in
Speaker 3: white supremacy. It dates in our communities now. It's it's
Speaker 3: between blacks and Hispanics. Those are those are one of
Speaker 3: the main racial slurs used by Hispanics who who when
Speaker 3: they're angry with you, Latin I apologize. It is one
Speaker 3: of the main slurs that I personally encountered, those slurs,
Speaker 3: and and those are things that is known within our communities.
Speaker 3: You know, we know that we know blacks and Hispanics
Speaker 3: know Latinos. Blacks and Latinos know what the other words
Speaker 3: the words that you don't use, you know, like they say, oh,
Speaker 3: you let the people use nigga this, and I get it.
Speaker 3: But in our communities, since we grew up so comfortably.
Speaker 3: The fact that blacks utilize that as a determinent, then
Speaker 3: man utilize it in the thea you know, daily ebonics
Speaker 3: every day and they and the best friends are Latinos
Speaker 3: and naturally comes out we call each other, un my nigga,
Speaker 3: that's my nigga.
Speaker 2: We utilize that.
Speaker 3: Maybe it's not the right thing, but we have identified
Speaker 3: that this is a comfortable space for us in our communities.
Speaker 3: There are a lot of people who don't think is
Speaker 3: it and they and they have the right to believe that.
Speaker 3: But absolutely nowhere in our community is it okay for
Speaker 3: a Latino to call a black person a monkey. I've
Speaker 3: seen whole wars started, family wars started. My mother went
Speaker 3: down and with the lady's ass in the store and
Speaker 3: a bodega for calling me and my sister monkey.
Speaker 2: I didn't even know what the word monkey was in Spanish.
Speaker 2: I learned it because they called They said it to
Speaker 2: me a few times.
Speaker 3: I used to go there and they used to laugh
Speaker 3: at us, to say little monomono, and I was like,
Speaker 3: what the fuck does that mean?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 3: And somebody told me and I went to my mother
Speaker 3: that they called me a monkey, and then it became
Speaker 3: a little thing. Whenever it would be like a problem
Speaker 3: somebody had said, under they they're voice, they're screaming, so
Speaker 3: we know there's.
Speaker 4: An ast you understand, And I just want to insert
Speaker 4: in that what I hear you saying is that which
Speaker 4: you know Again, we can argue that, oh you don't
Speaker 4: want to do the the use of the word the worst.
Speaker 4: The use of the word nigga is problematic for xby
Speaker 4: Z reason. But the thing is the word nigga when
Speaker 4: saying it, because they try to say, well, fat Joe
Speaker 4: says it, and this and that and the third and
Speaker 4: you know whatever, and he's an artist and he's Latino,
Speaker 4: and that was a whole big topic.
Speaker 1: That term can be used, or has been used, and
Speaker 1: is often.
Speaker 4: Used while people are laughing and joking and talking and
Speaker 4: being together and like you said, in some ways endearment.
Speaker 1: Although I don't.
Speaker 4: Agree with that terminology because I try to stay away
Speaker 4: from using that term to talk about us as well.
Speaker 1: But people are laughing.
Speaker 4: Never ever, in the history of ever, when you, as
Speaker 4: a person said monkey in a good way, it's never
Speaker 4: been done.
Speaker 2: Is used in discourse.
Speaker 1: It's derogatory exactly.
Speaker 3: It's used during negative discourse to be derogatory. It's never
Speaker 3: a term of endearment, you know, So we understand that.
Speaker 3: So when people try to, you know, conflate the two things,
Speaker 3: it doesn't add up, you know. And furthermore, you know,
Speaker 3: the disappointment that I have in just our people, you know,
Speaker 3: I was, I was listening to Jess hilarious and her
Speaker 3: actually trying to justify it, and the statement that she
Speaker 3: made was, you know, I don't think a recommended is racist.
Speaker 3: Nobody says she was racist, but we said she used
Speaker 3: a racial slur. And she said, well, if she called
Speaker 3: Spice a monkey, maybe she looks like a monkey to her.
Speaker 3: And I thought that coming from another black woman, dark
Speaker 3: skinned black woman who I've known has heard things about
Speaker 3: her skin color and have probably been called types of names,
Speaker 3: I thought that was so crazy to me that you've
Speaker 3: embraced a level of racist connotation and you've taken on that,
Speaker 3: and you think we should all take on it because
Speaker 3: you've embraced it, that you've you've embraced the level of
Speaker 3: actually what it's called self hate, that you push it
Speaker 3: on to somebody else, and that shit is me And
Speaker 3: it's so hard for us because we can't even stay
Speaker 3: on cold. There will never be white people that come
Speaker 3: out and justify you calling them a name that's derogatory.
Speaker 3: Like you said, There'll never be Jewish people that come
Speaker 3: out and justify a slur that's used against them and anybody.
Speaker 2: They just not against anybody else. They'll mind the business.
Speaker 3: They might talk to you as a friend and say, yeah,
Speaker 3: I understand what you're saying, but you know that you
Speaker 3: probably shouldn't have used that terminology.
Speaker 2: And I love you.
Speaker 3: You know, we don't even have the wherewithal to understand
Speaker 3: that that's what we're on. Ever, commen, it could be
Speaker 3: a close friend. If she was my close friend, I'm
Speaker 3: an pull it to the side of sad.
Speaker 2: Baby.
Speaker 3: I know you probably was mad, but you can't cano
Speaker 3: black women, no monkey, not no dogskin black women that.
Speaker 2: We that ain't gonna work out. You just it just
Speaker 2: don't work out.
Speaker 4: Well, that did happen, and that did happen. That did
Speaker 4: That's what I'm saying that I'm talking about.
Speaker 2: I'm saying just hilarious. I'm not saying I don't know
Speaker 2: if just hilarious did. I know? We we we we
Speaker 2: under the exactly we're under the.
Speaker 3: Understanding that there were other people who came to her
Speaker 3: and in that in that fashion like, yo, I love
Speaker 3: you and everything, but you there's a history of that.
Speaker 2: You can't use that and whatever.
Speaker 3: Her response was actually led to where we are now.
Speaker 3: What I'm saying is the fact that we are allowing
Speaker 3: people to make us feel like racial slurs and disrespect
Speaker 3: to us. It's something that we should just take and
Speaker 3: just move on from, and we're embracing it. It's self
Speaker 3: hate to me, and it really I would say this,
Speaker 3: I don't know that.
Speaker 4: I guess when I hear you using the word embrace
Speaker 4: and I understand what you're saying, I don't I think
Speaker 4: that Jess would push back and say I'm not embracing anything.
Speaker 4: I'm just saying that it's not as serious as people
Speaker 4: are making it.
Speaker 3: And that if you confinduf as serious that a whole
Speaker 3: culture finds serious, that means you in some way not a.
Speaker 4: Whole See, that's the thing we have to be careful
Speaker 4: about absolute Because a whole culture doesn't.
Speaker 2: Find it means the majority of the culture.
Speaker 3: Right, Okay, major of the culture didn't do it, then
Speaker 3: we wouldn't be here in this situation.
Speaker 1: It was saying, and I don't. I don't disagree. Let
Speaker 1: me just finish my point so we can get into
Speaker 1: our guests.
Speaker 4: What I'm saying is, I don't think that Jess probably
Speaker 4: feels like she's embracing it.
Speaker 1: I think that what she's trying to.
Speaker 4: Say is that people like she she she doesn't believe
Speaker 4: that this young lady is racist, and therefore because of.
Speaker 1: That, we shouldn't be making it this big thing. It
Speaker 1: might just be a statement that she made that's on
Speaker 1: the fly. Here's what I want to say about that.
Speaker 4: That's our problem is that too much shit just happens
Speaker 4: on the fly with us. We're too okay with too
Speaker 4: much of the things that go on, and as a result,
Speaker 4: and as a result, we're being murdered, not just by
Speaker 4: the police, but by our own people within our communities,
Speaker 4: Domestic violences out of control.
Speaker 1: We some of us can't get opportunities, jobs, bank loans.
Speaker 4: We're being mistreated because when we start saying things like, well,
Speaker 4: I don't you know, I don't think that that's serious,
Speaker 4: and maybe this and that and the third I'm not
Speaker 4: just talking about Jesse, talking about all these people in general.
Speaker 4: Folks don't think we take ourselves seriously that's.
Speaker 2: What I'm saying.
Speaker 3: Normal we're normalizing and we are we are okay, and
Speaker 3: that ain't okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so let's pause there and bring our guests in.
Speaker 4: And we kept saying over and over again that we
Speaker 4: were going to invite the great Megan Kunniff to come
Speaker 4: and be a part of our show, and we and
Speaker 4: and every time new things happened, so we said, we
Speaker 4: gotta wait, we gotta wait, we gotta wait, because we
Speaker 4: wanted to really have a good, deep, expansive conversation with
Speaker 4: you about.
Speaker 1: All the things. And I think the main thing for
Speaker 1: us is that we're like, Okay, she's a journalist that we.
Speaker 4: Didn't know until now, but there must be more to
Speaker 4: her than just Tory Lanez and Meg the Stallion, and
Speaker 4: so absolutely we wanted to bring you on to talk
Speaker 4: about that today.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much.
Speaker 4: Meghan cunith is joining Street Politicians today and we are
Speaker 4: so appreciative of having you as our guests.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much.
Speaker 2: So how are you today, Megan?
Speaker 5: I'm doing good.
Speaker 6: It's you know, it's it's Tuesday after Labor Day weekend,
Speaker 6: and that seems to represent like a change, right, Like
Speaker 6: summer is going to be ending soon at kids are
Speaker 6: going back to school, like it's time to like focus
Speaker 6: and work. But I'm kind of at the point where
Speaker 6: I'm ending this big coverage that I did, and I'm like,
Speaker 6: I want to stop working so much, you know, I
Speaker 6: want to kind of kind.
Speaker 5: Of take it easy.
Speaker 2: I need to.
Speaker 5: I need to get out more and reclaim my summer.
Speaker 1: That's what happened. I saw you on a bike somewhere
Speaker 1: like yesterday. Yes, you were biking.
Speaker 5: Yes, got it.
Speaker 6: Got to get back into that during the pandemic. When
Speaker 6: the pandemic hit, I lost my job at the Daily Journal.
Speaker 6: They cut like half the staff, and I was doing
Speaker 6: the unemployment pandemic thing, and I went on a bunch
Speaker 6: of road trips to national parks.
Speaker 5: Got really into that, and you know, with that, you
Speaker 5: get in pretty good shape. And I was doing big hikes.
Speaker 6: I went to Yosemite and did Cloud's Rest with the
Speaker 6: idea to eventually do Half Dome, which is like the
Speaker 6: big hike in your And then I got a job
Speaker 6: at law dot Com and then I got to move
Speaker 6: to law and crime and it was like celebrity trial news,
Speaker 6: you know, get into the la coverage scene, and I'm
Speaker 6: like Okay, I've kind of lost track of my my
Speaker 6: hiking plans. I haven't even been able to play some
Speaker 6: trails like I wanted to.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm sure you are not hiking and enjoying life
Speaker 4: as you once were because what you have decided to
Speaker 4: dedicate yourself to it is cumbersome.
Speaker 1: It is tiring.
Speaker 4: It's twenty four hours a day because something can happen
Speaker 4: the middle of the night, early in the morning, and
Speaker 4: you know, people start relying on you for information, and so,
Speaker 4: you know, I just want to thank you so much
Speaker 4: for what you've been doing. I really truly think that
Speaker 4: you are a rock star in terms of how you've
Speaker 4: been juggling this this newfound celebrity.
Speaker 1: That you have. You may not want to accept that,
Speaker 1: but you do. So, my son, you go ahead and
Speaker 1: kick it off.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So I'm just interested to know how did you get
Speaker 3: into journalism, Like, way did it start me?
Speaker 6: You know, it's always been an interest of mine, and
Speaker 6: I credit my family. My dad was a criminal defense attorney.
Speaker 6: Well he was a small town attorney in Oregon, so
Speaker 6: he did criminal defense but also divorce, civil cases. He
Speaker 6: kind of a broad range of things, and he was
Speaker 6: really interested in politics, and journalism, and he died in
Speaker 6: two thousand and three. But during high school, I mean
Speaker 6: we would have conversations about political events, current events. He
Speaker 6: was really interested in the OJ Simpson trial, and he
Speaker 6: was skeptical of the police. He always had, I mean,
Speaker 6: he was a criminal defense attorney, so he was always
Speaker 6: giving us advice on you know, never let them search
Speaker 6: your car, that kind of thing.
Speaker 5: I mean, those are just things that we were kind.
Speaker 6: Of taught early on, Like he would he got a
Speaker 6: seat belt ticket once, and he fought it all the
Speaker 6: way that he could. I just remember a really intense,
Speaker 6: passionate dinner discussion about Dad getting this seat belt ticket,
Speaker 6: and of course he wasn't wearing a seat belt, but
Speaker 6: he was convinced that there was no way the cop
Speaker 6: could have actually seen that he wasn't wearing a seat
Speaker 6: belt because of the color of the seat in the
Speaker 6: car and the color of the seat belt. So he
Speaker 6: knew that this cop was just making this up and
Speaker 6: he was going to challenge it. I don't remember what
Speaker 6: happened with that, but it was, like, you know, four
Speaker 6: or five years old. Those are like my searing memories.
Speaker 4: Obviously, Tory Lanes his case is not the first case
Speaker 4: you covered, but it's when we encounter you and so
Speaker 4: can you talk about some of the other things that
Speaker 4: you've done?
Speaker 1: You said long crime at what is it?
Speaker 2: What was it?
Speaker 5: Low dot com?
Speaker 1: Law dot com? Yeah, talk about the other cases that
Speaker 1: you've covered.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean I started working at the high school
Speaker 6: paper and then always kind of knew I wanted to
Speaker 6: do journalism, So was at the college paper University of Oregon,
Speaker 6: Go Ducks, and then went up to Spokane, Washington and
Speaker 6: worked at the Spokesman Review and Boise, Idaho, covering the
Speaker 6: legislature for a year doing an internship with their Idaho
Speaker 6: legislature reporter. Then went up to Cordelaine, Idaho. And Spokane,
Speaker 6: Washington was when I started covering courts more because I
Speaker 6: was the night cops reporter and then I moved to
Speaker 6: the day side cops shift, and I kind of realized
Speaker 6: that the courthouse was where you found out more information
Speaker 6: about the people that you wrote about who got arrested,
Speaker 6: Like you could go to the courthouse and there would
Speaker 6: be you know, Appidavid's and stuff there explaining the cases.
Speaker 6: So I got into it through that and then moved
Speaker 6: to California in twenty thirteen to work at the Orange
Speaker 6: County Register. It was when they were doing this kind
Speaker 6: of pie in the sky expansion, like we're going to
Speaker 6: save newspapers, and they had a couple of guys by
Speaker 6: the paper and want to know, rekindle newspapers, and it
Speaker 6: kind of turned out to be kind of a scam involved,
Speaker 6: and they were doing stuff with the retirement fund and everything.
Speaker 5: There was a big lawsuit.
Speaker 6: But for a couple of years there was like this
Speaker 6: renaissance time at the Orange County Register where they were
Speaker 6: just hiring reporters to do really good work. And I
Speaker 6: was actually hired to cover, if you can believe it,
Speaker 6: the city of San Juan Capistrano. If you've heard of that,
Speaker 6: the swallows of San Juan Capistrano about as small town
Speaker 6: California as you can think. I mean, in a town America,
Speaker 6: San Juan wouldn't count as a small town because it's
Speaker 6: thirty five thousand people and it's in South Orange County.
Speaker 6: But they've got the city Council, the Planning Commission, and
Speaker 6: the Orange County Register had a weekly called Capistrano Valley News.
Speaker 6: So my job was to fill the Capistrano Valley News
Speaker 6: and It was my first experience in southern California.
Speaker 5: I kind of went into it having watched those episodes
Speaker 5: of Weeds.
Speaker 6: You guys remember that show, Yeah, and the politics with
Speaker 6: the city council on that, and then also parks and
Speaker 6: rec There was a very big parks and rec vibe
Speaker 6: to it, but it was very small town that the
Speaker 6: town had a lot of infighting about development and traffic.
Speaker 6: But for like a year and a half I covered
Speaker 6: that stuff. But they also had a big lawsuit over
Speaker 6: water rates. They had done pie in the sky water
Speaker 6: rates and were getting sued by some residents who, of
Speaker 6: course they'd just written off as gad flies, but actually
Speaker 6: the residents were like retired professionals who knew what they
Speaker 6: were talking about, and they ended up screwing up water
Speaker 6: rates for the entire state. In the middle of a
Speaker 6: out like the governor actually issued a statement about this
Speaker 6: appellate court ruling that had come against San Juan for
Speaker 6: their water rates, and it was kind of my first
Speaker 6: introduction to courts in southern California. So I went from
Speaker 6: the Register to the Daily Journal, and the La Daily
Speaker 6: Journal was really where I feel like I became like
Speaker 6: a legal affairs reporter covering all sorts of cases and
Speaker 6: getting to know all sorts of lawyers and judges, because
Speaker 6: the Daily Journal is like a clubby little newspaper for
Speaker 6: lawyers in the judiciary. It was it's been around since
Speaker 6: like the late over a century. It was like the
Speaker 6: Daily Court Journal, but it was bought by Charles Munger
Speaker 6: back in the eighties and he kind of wanted it
Speaker 6: to be like a gift for the legal community. So
Speaker 6: it's basically just profiles of judges, really in house news
Speaker 6: on litigation and stuff, but it's very civil based. They've
Speaker 6: got maybe when I was there, we maybe had ten
Speaker 6: reporters and one of them covers criminal justice and all
Speaker 6: the others the cious types of civil cases. So that's
Speaker 6: where I where I really got to know the system
Speaker 6: really well and felt like I was a court reporter,
Speaker 6: and I feel like I applied that stuff to the lane.
Speaker 6: Stuff like we didn't cover celebrity cases so much at
Speaker 6: the Daily Journal, but you just learned how the court
Speaker 6: system so it works so much. I wanted to get
Speaker 6: out of like the silo of Paywald legal affairs journalism
Speaker 6: like almlaw dot com. Where I went after that is
Speaker 6: very Paywald like lawyers, only they're writing for lawyers. They
Speaker 6: don't they're not writing for the mainstream at all.
Speaker 5: So I wanted to find a way to.
Speaker 6: Like marry the two, Like how can you take what
Speaker 6: you learned covering legal affairs journalism in the siloed Paywald
Speaker 6: area and move it to social media, and like law
Speaker 6: on Crime was a good way to kind of transition
Speaker 6: on that.
Speaker 2: So was this like your first high profile case that
Speaker 2: you covered?
Speaker 6: It was definitely the most high profile case that i'd covered.
Speaker 6: I'd gotten the first time I ever went on TV
Speaker 6: was actually Nancy Grace. I think she's still around, but
Speaker 6: does anyone remember her when she had the fill in show?
Speaker 5: Yeah? Really yeah, yeah, really.
Speaker 6: Conservative right, yes, like you know, going against you know,
Speaker 6: they're all guilty kind of thing. But there was a
Speaker 6: babysitter in Post Falls, Idaho who'd been arrested for murder
Speaker 6: involving a kid that she was babysitting. So I had
Speaker 6: written about that for The Swolkes In Review and went
Speaker 6: on TV for that. So I'd had a little bit
Speaker 6: of experience and doing some oxygen shows like what was
Speaker 6: the name of the show, A couple of murder cases
Speaker 6: they spotlighted when I was doing there, but Lane's was
Speaker 6: by far the most high profile case because before it
Speaker 6: was probably Michael Evan Naughty. Do you guys remember him,
Speaker 6: the lawyer first Stormy Daniels, who was really twenty eighteen.
Speaker 6: He sued Trump and there was actually serious talk of
Speaker 6: him being a presidential candidate for a couple of weeks,
Speaker 6: which is kind of crazy. But I covered all his
Speaker 6: financial fraud cases in California for a year and a
Speaker 6: half and that was the most high profile that I'd gotten.
Speaker 6: I'd got a lot of attention, and he was giving
Speaker 6: me a lot of flak online and he has this
Speaker 6: like dedicated group of like five Evannaughty cultists on Twitter,
Speaker 6: packing me and going. So it was I remember when
Speaker 6: I was telling somebody about all the flack that I
Speaker 6: was getting on from the Tory Lane stuff. So somebody
Speaker 6: was like, oh, it sounds exactly like Evannaughty, and I
Speaker 6: was like, well, no, it's actually way bigger, and they're like, no, it's.
Speaker 5: It's actually just like EVANAUGHTI.
Speaker 6: And it kind of is.
Speaker 4: But it was like, you know that a lot of
Speaker 4: people are really trolls, and they've made up several pages
Speaker 4: so they could go and talk from different pages and
Speaker 4: try to discredit you. So and we found that out.
Speaker 4: And my son likes to argue with people online who
Speaker 4: are who I look at it like. Sometimes I'll start
Speaker 4: like getting ready to make a comment too, and then
Speaker 4: I click it and the person has like two followers,
Speaker 4: and I'm like, okay, what.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and then.
Speaker 6: Exactly yeah, I did say in a in a live
Speaker 6: I did a while back. I was like, Okay, I
Speaker 6: need to start writing down these fake names that they're
Speaker 6: coming out with. There's one Maxwell Troy the other the
Speaker 6: other day. I was like, Okay, that's a good one,
Speaker 6: good old Maxwell Troy. When he's not passionately defending Tory
Speaker 6: Lanes in the comments on a YouTube channel, he's you know,
Speaker 6: running your local high school computer science club or something.
Speaker 4: Exactly right, he's like in the basement of a building.
Speaker 4: So let me see what was the how do you
Speaker 4: pick the cases?
Speaker 1: Now, maybe you didn't have.
Speaker 4: I get that in the previous spaces it was sort
Speaker 4: of a signed and or something that you were really
Speaker 4: interested in, and so you kind of jumped into it.
Speaker 1: How did you.
Speaker 4: Decide, like, Tory Lanes, this is the case. I'm going
Speaker 4: for it because you did basically most of this independent.
Speaker 6: Right, Yeah, yeah, well it was I was with on
Speaker 6: Crime when the trial started, and they're really into celebrity news.
Speaker 6: So I was there covering at that courthouse, covering Harvey Weinstein,
Speaker 6: the movie producers Rape Troll and Danny Masterson, the That
Speaker 6: seventies show actor Stephen Hyde. They were having two cases
Speaker 6: at the same time, so I was already there, and
Speaker 6: then I'd heard from the Law and Crime Network people
Speaker 6: that there was interest in the Tory Lanez case, so
Speaker 6: I was like, well, if I'm already here, I might
Speaker 6: as well cover it. And then I mean, at the
Speaker 6: time of I was a couple of months off from
Speaker 6: covering Cardi B's trial in Santa Anna. She was actually
Speaker 6: sued by somebody over the album art to Gangsta Bitch
Speaker 6: Music Vie, and she won, but she was in court
Speaker 6: for a few days and actually testified. So I was like, Okay,
Speaker 6: how many people in their life get to say that
Speaker 6: they saw testimony from the two women responsible for the
Speaker 6: wop song within like two months of each other, in
Speaker 6: two separate courthouses and two unrelated trials, Like I've got
Speaker 6: to at least be there for Megan testimony.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 5: But then when I stepped into.
Speaker 6: It, I just realized, I mean, it's such a more
Speaker 6: serious case to even bring it up in the same
Speaker 6: breath is that Cardi B lawsuit is? I mean, the
Speaker 6: Cardi B lawsuit was kind of silly, but you can't
Speaker 6: say that about the Tory Lanez case. Was a pretty
Speaker 6: serious case. And I just realized how much attention there
Speaker 6: was to it, and I'm like, wow, I think people
Speaker 6: wanted to want to cover this case. I should keep
Speaker 6: covering it.
Speaker 3: After you cover this case, right, I seen a lot
Speaker 3: of pushback you again, just a lot of pushback. And
Speaker 3: you I found out about you, you know, after Tamika
Speaker 3: had actually went to the court one time and she
Speaker 3: was telling me some of the things that she's seen
Speaker 3: inside the court.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm.
Speaker 3: And when I found you on Twitter, you were saying
Speaker 3: pretty much the same things that she had verbatim seen
Speaker 3: and other people that I knew were in the court.
Speaker 3: So I said, this person seems like they actually are
Speaker 3: non biased and just reporting the facts of the case.
Speaker 5: Right, Yeah, I mean I try to be.
Speaker 3: So what I want to know is what was that
Speaker 3: process like as you posted and you were getting responses back,
Speaker 3: was it was most of them positive or were you
Speaker 3: immediately getting the delays people that's like you're not you're biased.
Speaker 6: But for the most party, it was really positive, especially
Speaker 6: in the very beginning. I think it was the trial
Speaker 6: started on Monday, I think, and it was like Wednesday
Speaker 6: when I would look at my phone and be like, wow,
Speaker 6: this is like the most responses that I've ever gotten
Speaker 6: on Twitter, and it was just kind of getting blown up.
Speaker 6: But I remember I saw a message from some random person.
Speaker 6: It was a reply that just said thank you for this,
Speaker 6: this non bias and that this is we're spelled ds,
Speaker 6: and I was just like, I mean, it was just new,
Speaker 6: like like I don't usually get those kind of replies
Speaker 6: or it's usually like lawyers or something replying to my tweets.
Speaker 5: So I mean, I thought it was cool.
Speaker 6: I was like, this is awesome, like people are appreciating
Speaker 6: the coverage and just that what he said, like thank
Speaker 6: you for this, this is non bias. It's like what
Speaker 6: bigger compliment could you give a reporter who's trying to
Speaker 6: do that, you know, It's like, oh, I mean it
Speaker 6: was it was heartening and it was like inspiring to
Speaker 6: like keep going. So I did see once a tweet
Speaker 6: that said, it's unfortunate that a white lady with a
Speaker 6: bob is our only source of reliable information.
Speaker 5: And what was kind of like one of my friends
Speaker 5: was like, are they making front of your hair. I'm like, no,
Speaker 5: I think I need to embrace it. But it kind
Speaker 5: of underscored.
Speaker 6: It's like it's a really sensitive issue and the point
Speaker 6: that they made wasn't any thing to kind of diss me.
Speaker 6: It was just a comment on the state of journalism
Speaker 6: and black representation in journalism that I saw. It just
Speaker 6: kind of it just kind of struck me. I'm like,
Speaker 6: the issues in this are like so heavy for society.
Speaker 6: It's like way bigger than anything, Like a thieving lawyer
Speaker 6: defrauding his clients is serious, but just like the way
Speaker 6: media deals with violence against women and violence against black women,
Speaker 6: Like I just realized it was like all there. And
Speaker 6: then I remember I was using Instagram a little bit,
Speaker 6: but not so much. It was more of a personal page.
Speaker 6: But it's not like it was locked down, and I'd
Speaker 6: gotten a comment on like a photo like months and
Speaker 6: months back of bookcases behind there, and somebody would have
Speaker 6: had to scroll through a few pictures to see these books.
Speaker 6: But the comment was they added Megan the Stallion and
Speaker 6: they said, she has books about what they did to
Speaker 6: your people, but you can't. And it was some kind
Speaker 6: of insult to Megan or some kind of diss to
Speaker 6: Megan after that. But the first part where they're like,
Speaker 6: she has books about what they did to your people,
Speaker 6: and I'm like, they're talking about the two books that
Speaker 6: I had Uncle Tom's cabin and then we are not afraid,
Speaker 6: I mean slavery and the civil rights movement, And I
Speaker 6: just remember being like struck that like how personal it
Speaker 6: was for people that somebody would like take the time
Speaker 6: to do that and like look through the photos. And
Speaker 6: I didn't feel like attacked by it or anything. It
Speaker 6: was just like, I mean, I'm a journalist and you're
Speaker 6: kind of a public figure when you're doing that, so
Speaker 6: I mean, I shouldn't be bothered that somebody looked through
Speaker 6: like public photos that I had, but it just like
Speaker 6: underscored like how important this was for people and how
Speaker 6: like personal it was for people, Like other cases that
Speaker 6: I cover would not warrant that kind of response. And
Speaker 6: I also just remember being kind of proud that I
Speaker 6: had those books and being like this is a really
Speaker 6: sensitive issue. But if I just keep doing what I
Speaker 6: do and like, I don't have anything to worry about, Like,
Speaker 6: because you always hear those things about somebody getting a
Speaker 6: lot of attention, and then somebody goes back and finds
Speaker 6: some tweets from like ten years ago where they're saying
Speaker 6: awful stuff and they're only they're like, oh, well that
Speaker 6: was ten years ago.
Speaker 5: It's like, well, why were you ever saying that?
Speaker 6: You know, But I just knew that I didn't have
Speaker 6: anything like that, So I'm like, I should be good
Speaker 6: if I just keep doing what I'm doing. And but
Speaker 6: it was it was a little overwhelming to get all
Speaker 6: the responses all the time and be like do I
Speaker 6: respond or do I not? But fortunately the trial, fortunately
Speaker 6: the trial is just so busy that I could just
Speaker 6: focus on that and.
Speaker 1: Focus on that.
Speaker 4: Well, you know what, So I was going to bring
Speaker 4: this up, but you started. Actually you mentioned it first.
Speaker 4: In terms of the racial dynamics of you being a
Speaker 4: white woman covering this case and becoming a very important
Speaker 4: source of information, I think I have to say that, uh,
Speaker 4: what's his name? Dennis Byron also sort of became an
Speaker 4: important source, especially as a black man covering the case.
Speaker 4: And I see that the two of you now share
Speaker 4: conversations and online things, services and whatnot, which is good.
Speaker 4: I you know, I appreciate Dennis, although he and I
Speaker 4: don't always agree, which I'm sure that's just that's just
Speaker 4: a part of life. But when you mentioned this, DS
Speaker 4: very clear that for the most part, the person who
Speaker 4: said that is more than likely a younger person in general,
Speaker 4: and maybe maybe an African American because it has become
Speaker 4: a part of our lexicon, right, especially for younger people.
Speaker 1: Then when someone says the black.
Speaker 4: Woman with the bob, I mean the white woman with
Speaker 4: the bob, absolutely as a black woman. I can tell
Speaker 4: you that I have definitely noticed that Megan kuonif is
Speaker 4: the is the white woman with the bob? Right, like
Speaker 4: we just that's something, So that more than likely was
Speaker 4: a black woman who noticed it. And then the person
Speaker 4: who is saying they know the history, I can imagine
Speaker 4: that the quote was probably something like, she has books
Speaker 4: about your people's history, and you're allowing this black man
Speaker 4: to be crucified knowing that he didn't do the thing
Speaker 4: and this and that, so more than likely that was
Speaker 4: probably a black man. And I'm stereotype in here or
Speaker 4: type casting if you will. But it's just based upon
Speaker 4: what I know being online and also dealing with black
Speaker 4: people all my life.
Speaker 2: Yeah, question for you is, did you why.
Speaker 1: Were you reading those books?
Speaker 4: Do you have a relationship or are you involved in
Speaker 4: the black community, Like what tell me about your experience
Speaker 4: in terms of dealing with black folks and if not, much,
Speaker 4: did you learn a lot about us, about the way
Speaker 4: we communicate, about the things that really truly divide our
Speaker 4: community as you were covering this case.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean the truth is I don't have much experience.
Speaker 6: I mean, if you just look where I grew up
Speaker 6: in Cravallis, Oregon and then up in Spokane, Washington. I mean,
Speaker 6: I remember I was talking to Nick the other night,
Speaker 6: who does the YouTube channel NIEK at Night. I'm like, look,
Speaker 6: there were two black kids in my entire elementary school
Speaker 6: when I was growing up. And well, I mean people
Speaker 6: in Cravallis, Oregon are very liberal, like they're anti racism.
Speaker 6: I mean, if you go to Cravallis, there's Black Lives
Speaker 6: Matters signs in people's windows, that kind of thing. But
Speaker 6: it's it's that white liberalism that I'm sure has been discussed,
Speaker 6: you know, all over that you see that that doesn't
Speaker 6: mean that there isn't like racism there just from the
Speaker 6: fact that there just aren't many black people there growing up.
Speaker 6: So in my position as as a journalist, I've never
Speaker 6: really gotten like too involved in like activist movements, but
Speaker 6: especially when the Black Lives Matter protests started and the
Speaker 6: George Floyd murder protest started, because one perspective I think
Speaker 6: I can bring to that is somebody who can be like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 6: if you see the way the cops just treat you know, anyone,
Speaker 6: if you add racism into that, it gets it must
Speaker 6: just it's.
Speaker 5: Horrible, you know.
Speaker 6: I Mean, I have no doubt that they the cops
Speaker 6: are out of control in shootings and that they do
Speaker 6: target black people like just for and that something needs
Speaker 6: to be done about it. But as a reporter, I
Speaker 6: mean getting involved in the in the movement and that
Speaker 6: kind of thing, you're kind of not supposed.
Speaker 1: To do that.
Speaker 6: But as a journalist, I feel like I can bring
Speaker 6: light to the situations by covering civil rights movement or
Speaker 6: covering civil rights trials against cops, which I've done a lot,
Speaker 6: Like I've seen a lot of cops testify in court,
Speaker 6: and I feel like if I can just tell people
Speaker 6: what I see through that that'll help. But then when
Speaker 6: the George Floyd thing started, I was actually doing that
Speaker 6: the pandemic road trip to National Park. So I was
Speaker 6: actually up in Salt Lake City because I was going
Speaker 6: to go up to the Yellowstone and Grant Teton, and
Speaker 6: they were having protests up there, I mean Salt Lake City,
Speaker 6: and of course the cops just went crazy. Currently one
Speaker 6: person tipped over a cop car, so they just shut
Speaker 6: down the entire city, like put a whole perimeter around
Speaker 6: the downtown or something. And it was ridiculous because when
Speaker 6: you see the way the people were, I mean, people
Speaker 6: have every right to protest this, and when you see
Speaker 6: that video, it's like, yeah, I think people are going
Speaker 6: to be out in the streets like protesting this. Of
Speaker 6: course they were. They were protesting all over the country,
Speaker 6: and the cops line up in this big military row
Speaker 6: and they're just like bringing it. I mean, they're just
Speaker 6: they're they're totally they're just instigating shit and starting shit
Speaker 6: and I see it all the time and it pisses
Speaker 6: me off. So when you add race and just the
Speaker 6: institutional racism and the disadvantages that just are kind of
Speaker 6: caked into society.
Speaker 5: Through that.
Speaker 6: You add that with the police, it's like god, what,
Speaker 6: you know, the horror of that. But so I was
Speaker 6: trying to think of, like what can I do, like
Speaker 6: as just a white lady with a bob, you know, Like,
Speaker 6: I mean, there's not I mean, I live in South
Speaker 6: Orange County.
Speaker 5: You know, I work a lot. You know, I go out,
Speaker 5: I don't. I mean I remember I went to visit
Speaker 5: a friend in Washington, d C.
Speaker 6: And it was like it felt like a lot more
Speaker 6: diversity than I'm used to, which is just kind of
Speaker 6: a nice thing to do to just go out and
Speaker 6: see diversity.
Speaker 5: But one thing I wanted to do was read more books.
Speaker 6: And that's what I was reading about, Like what can
Speaker 6: white people do to try to like help things and
Speaker 6: make more of a difference other than just you know,
Speaker 6: protesting and being publicly against this stuff. And that's read
Speaker 6: more books about the black experience. So as somebody who
Speaker 6: I haven't been able to read that much this year
Speaker 6: because of all the work, all the work that I've
Speaker 6: been doing, but I have tried to read more black
Speaker 6: authors like Jesmine Ward Coulson, Whitehead, is a big one,
Speaker 6: and it's not like it's not like a chore to
Speaker 6: do this.
Speaker 5: I mean, Coulson Whitehead is like one of the bests
Speaker 5: out there today.
Speaker 6: So but I kind of make a point of trying
Speaker 6: to read books about stuff that I wouldn't normally know
Speaker 6: about or be exposed to, just and.
Speaker 5: I think that's important for everybody to do to kind
Speaker 5: of learn about that. But I mean, I don't know if.
Speaker 4: That's ah, I have the other question and then because
Speaker 4: I know you have to go in a few moments,
Speaker 4: so I just want to get back to that.
Speaker 1: And in my son you jump in about did you.
Speaker 4: Learn a lot about what divides our community, like you know,
Speaker 4: and some of the detentionions you know that came up
Speaker 4: around this case.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, definitely.
Speaker 6: It just seems like there's huge issues with just representation
Speaker 6: in media and how stuff is portrayed in like mainstream media,
Speaker 6: and then just.
Speaker 5: Not the problems with the criminal.
Speaker 6: Justice system kind of inherently distrusting the criminal justice system
Speaker 6: in the way it deals with black men, but then
Speaker 6: also having the problem of black women traditionally not being
Speaker 6: trusted and not being believed in public society. So it
Speaker 6: was like this this interesting mesh of those two issues
Speaker 6: and how skepticism was kind of born through both those things. No,
Speaker 6: I mean, I feel like I was talking to some
Speaker 6: people about, you know, what are some possible book possibilities
Speaker 6: for this that's not just focused on the Megan thee
Speaker 6: Stallion issue in the harassment, but just the whole issue
Speaker 6: of like online stand culture and celebrity obsession and how
Speaker 6: that is like coming into the criminal justice system, Like
Speaker 6: how do you deal with that? There's so many issues there,
Speaker 6: Like what I mean, are there are there other issues
Speaker 6: that I'm that I'm missing or do you think I
Speaker 6: do you think I No?
Speaker 4: I think I mean, my son, you can speak to it.
Speaker 4: I think you're right that that one of the biggest
Speaker 4: challenge here is that even people.
Speaker 1: Of good.
Speaker 4: Moral whatever, or people who were really good people who
Speaker 4: are who are fighters like for advocates for our community
Speaker 4: struggled with a black man going to prison and then
Speaker 4: a black woman also being mistreated and not believed, not trusted.
Speaker 4: So those things happened all at once, and it did
Speaker 4: absolutely create a lot of tension in our community.
Speaker 1: But you know, you know, so my son, you go ahead.
Speaker 3: So for me, it's this is a two prong question.
Speaker 3: I want you to give me what was the most
Speaker 3: surprising thing that you heard in the trial and based
Speaker 3: off what you might have read other than your own
Speaker 3: commentary and in your own, you know, reporting of the trial,
Speaker 3: what do you think was one of the biggest misconceptions
Speaker 3: on just the media that they put out that you
Speaker 3: found out why you were in the courtroom.
Speaker 1: Wasn't that you knew the media, the media or online
Speaker 1: because the media, not.
Speaker 3: The media, but the online the chatter if you if
Speaker 3: you were tuned into it, because there was so For me,
Speaker 3: there was just so many things that were just so
Speaker 3: conflicting based on what you were saying, based on what
Speaker 3: people that know were in the courthouse, evidence that were
Speaker 3: being presented, then.
Speaker 2: What was being put onto the you know, onto the websites.
Speaker 6: Yeah, probably probably the most surprising thing for me in
Speaker 6: the beginning was going in there and then realizing that
Speaker 6: it was actually like really big news that Tory's lawyer
Speaker 6: was admitting that Megan was shot. That I didn't realize
Speaker 6: and it was surprising to me that there was even
Speaker 6: a narrative saying that she wasn't even shot, because I mean,
Speaker 6: it stems from her saying that she stepped on glass
Speaker 6: in the very beginning. But to me, it just seems
Speaker 6: so understandable why she would why she would say that,
Speaker 6: and why she wasn't ready to just tell the cops that, oh, yeah,
Speaker 6: someone shot me and there's a gun in the car.
Speaker 6: I mean, just with everything we just talked about with
Speaker 6: the police, that all made sense to me. So I
Speaker 6: was surprised at the narrative on that, and then one
Speaker 6: thing that the focus on her relationship with Tory and
Speaker 6: just the fact that you know, she gone on Gail
Speaker 6: King and denied having an intimate relationship with him, but
Speaker 6: then it turns out that they had had, that they
Speaker 6: had been intimate. It was just like, why is this
Speaker 6: even I mean, I guess I can understand why it
Speaker 6: came up and the prosecutors were disclosing it to the
Speaker 6: defense after they talked to Megan after the Gail King interview,
Speaker 6: but it just seemed like, why is there even a
Speaker 6: focus on this? Like why? I mean, I just didn't
Speaker 6: understand how much of a role it actually played in
Speaker 6: the case. And it seems surprising to me and kind
Speaker 6: of shocking to me that they would have, like the
Speaker 6: prosecutors would have that as part of the case. But
Speaker 6: there's so much focus on the fact that she lied
Speaker 6: in that Gail King interview, you know, and if she
Speaker 6: lied about this, how could you believe anything that she said.
Speaker 6: It's like, why was she even being asked about that,
Speaker 6: you know? And I don't know, it just seemed it
Speaker 6: just seemed inappropriate. It doesn't really have anything to do
Speaker 6: with the fact that he shot her well, of course,
Speaker 6: but it does though, because it's the domestic violence. I mean,
Speaker 6: they weren't just two strangers who just happened to be
Speaker 6: in the same location. It was prosecuted by the domestic
Speaker 6: violence Family violence Unit, So I mean it was like
Speaker 6: she said, I mean, he's an abuser. It had the
Speaker 6: makings of that, and just the way Alex bought the
Speaker 6: prosecutor in the in the trial. In the closing argument,
Speaker 6: I remember he was alerting the going through the phone
Speaker 6: call that Tory made from jail to Kelsey where he's apologizing,
Speaker 6: but he's not saying exactly what he's apologizing before. But
Speaker 6: Bob was just saying what else could he possibly be
Speaker 6: talking about here? And he draws the jury's attention to
Speaker 6: when Tory is asking Kelsey what hospital Megan's at just
Speaker 6: the way he asks it in the and he's so persistent.
Speaker 6: He asked it a couple of times, but he said,
Speaker 6: you know, pay attention to the way he asked what
Speaker 6: hospital she's at, and he's just like, what hospitals she at?
Speaker 6: And he and Kelsey tells him, and then like maybe
Speaker 6: a minute or so later, he asks again, and Kelsey's like, oh,
Speaker 6: I just told you. And part of me is like
Speaker 6: wants to say, you know, any woman who's ever had
Speaker 6: to deal with some dumb ass man will recognize Kelsey's
Speaker 6: tone in that phone call. But it's like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 6: some dumb ass man. You just fired five rounds at
Speaker 6: them and they got back in the car with them
Speaker 6: and then had like it was just way more than
Speaker 6: like a traditional, you know, women dealing with dumb.
Speaker 5: Men kind of thing. It's just like I was just like, wow,
Speaker 5: this is like horribly abusive, Like yeah.
Speaker 1: It's funny.
Speaker 4: Well, I thought the same thing. I thought that first
Speaker 4: of all, I don't think she should have lied at
Speaker 4: all about on the interview with Gail King. I think
Speaker 4: that that definitely led to the narrative around her just
Speaker 4: being a liar and whatever, and it wasn't necessary to
Speaker 4: lie at all because we already assumed that that was
Speaker 4: the case. I mean, obviously, it's like, what else the
Speaker 4: hell would have created so much of a situation. However,
Speaker 4: I don't even understand why Gail asked that question. I
Speaker 4: don't you know, I don't understand it, and I'm not
Speaker 4: saying that. And perhaps it was because I don't know,
Speaker 4: maybe maybe Gail felt like it was a necessary that's.
Speaker 2: What it was inline to discredit everything that she said.
Speaker 3: That was one of the main things that she was
Speaker 3: mad because they were having sex, and this is why
Speaker 3: her and Kelsey quote unquote ansay, so that was something
Speaker 3: that they were trying to use to discredit her, and
Speaker 3: it pushed off into actual reporters asking the question, I
Speaker 3: don't think it really, Like, like Megan said, I don't
Speaker 3: see where the relevance of her having sex with him.
Speaker 2: Months or days before that, but the same day it
Speaker 2: did not getting shot. You know what I'm saying. I don't.
Speaker 2: I don't see that.
Speaker 1: But you got next question.
Speaker 3: What I want to say is there there's there's about
Speaker 3: three things that I want to know because based off evidence,
Speaker 3: you know, everybody hasn't seen the court transcripts. There's still
Speaker 3: people with you know, their narrative and this is what happened,
Speaker 3: and if that happened, why then this happened. There's this
Speaker 3: There are two things that that people keep saying that
Speaker 3: Kelsey's DNA is on the gun not toys, and there's
Speaker 3: GSL on both of their hands, so that's what they
Speaker 3: keep pointing to.
Speaker 2: Now, I don't know, I haven't read the court documents,
Speaker 2: so I was accurate those two statements are, you know?
Speaker 6: And it's a good reminder to get to get the
Speaker 6: transcripts of everything, like the DNA expert and the GSR
Speaker 6: guy talking. I think that would help. But the DNA
Speaker 6: was inconclusive. They actually didn't take Kelsey's DNA. But when
Speaker 6: you look at the assessment of Tory's DNA, eighty percent
Speaker 6: of the DNA profile they got went was was the
Speaker 6: product of one male and they were able to exclude
Speaker 6: Tory as that male. So the next like the other
Speaker 6: mixture of DNA was too inconclusive to conclude if Tory
Speaker 6: was contributed or didn't contribute it to that DNA. So
Speaker 6: it would have been the same with Kelsey because Kelsey's
Speaker 6: not a man, so she wouldn't have been the contributor
Speaker 6: to the eighty percent. But then the other DNA samples
Speaker 6: are so small that it was like Tory being inconclusive.
Speaker 6: It would have just been inconclusive with Kelsey.
Speaker 2: They did have.
Speaker 6: Tory did have a defense expert who opined that he
Speaker 6: thought that the results showed that one of the profiles
Speaker 6: was more likely to be a female, but that was
Speaker 6: discredited by the other DNA expert, and it just didn't
Speaker 6: It just didn't have much weight in court. But I
Speaker 6: think to I think it would help to get the
Speaker 6: transcripts of the DNA expert testimony in the GSR, because
Speaker 6: Kelsey and Tory did both have GSR on their hands.
Speaker 6: But of course the story was that Kelsey was standing
Speaker 6: right next to him when when he shot her. So,
Speaker 6: I mean, and a lot of the stuff from the
Speaker 6: transcripts that I've seen, I just wonder. I was, like,
Speaker 6: have people actually read the stories, like the long crime
Speaker 6: stories on Sean Kelly's testimony and the tweets about that,
Speaker 6: because we were really clear James from the La Times too,
Speaker 6: that you know, Sean was originally said that he saw
Speaker 6: two women fighting and he thought the flashes originated with
Speaker 6: the girl. But then he said that basically Tory took
Speaker 6: over and was shooting.
Speaker 4: So but can I go back to this, So you
Speaker 4: said eighty percent of the DNA that was on the
Speaker 4: weapon was a male, but he was excluded from being
Speaker 4: the possible mail.
Speaker 6: Right, right, So it was always I mean I remember
Speaker 6: when I was watching the trial, I was like, well,
Speaker 6: it sounds like it was Kwan.
Speaker 5: I mean his his driver, right, yeah, but.
Speaker 4: The driver's gun that's in the car, Yeah, and then
Speaker 4: Tory gets access to it and this all happened.
Speaker 2: But the driver took the gun from Tory, and you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying, And.
Speaker 6: So everything that happened afterward, like his demeanor afterward, I
Speaker 6: mean that when they were pulled over on near Hollywood Boulevard,
Speaker 6: he had the gun at his feet. I mean that
Speaker 6: that kind of thing there was all there was kind
Speaker 6: of a just a totality of circumstances that led to it.
Speaker 6: Or But one thing I want to do is get
Speaker 6: the transcript for closing arguments because that would sum.
Speaker 4: It up right and that but the gs R piece
Speaker 4: is important because we know that GSR spreads, so whoever
Speaker 4: is closest to you can have it on their clothes,
Speaker 4: can have it on their hands, maybe even they go
Speaker 4: to be like stop or whatever, or you know, different
Speaker 4: things that can make GSR spread. So there are people
Speaker 4: who are saying that there's no evidence in this case
Speaker 4: because of those two that that particular area around.
Speaker 1: They just.
Speaker 6: They just don't know what evidence is. There's tons of evidence.
Speaker 6: I mean, the testimony is evidence, the calls he made,
Speaker 6: or evidence the the statements they made or evidence. I
Speaker 6: mean every there's there's a ton of evidence. And it's
Speaker 6: i mean the GSR and the DNA stuff I just
Speaker 6: think is the product of there's so much focus on that,
Speaker 6: but it's the product of like the CSI generation, people
Speaker 6: who just watched CSI and they think that's the only
Speaker 6: kind of evidence that there is because the totality of
Speaker 6: the circumstances was I mean, the jury came back pretty
Speaker 6: fast against him. And that's one thing, like all the
Speaker 6: talk in that documentary that just came out, I'm like,
Speaker 6: twelve jurors convicted this guy. Twelve people who live in
Speaker 6: La County, sat saw everything, they heard everything, they talked
Speaker 6: about everything, and deliberations. They asked to see Sean Kelly's
Speaker 6: for a readback of Sean Kelly's testimony. They asked for
Speaker 6: a read back of the GSR testimony. They were asking
Speaker 6: for a readback of Megan's testimony, but then they said
Speaker 6: they didn't need it anymore after they heard the GSR stuff,
Speaker 6: and then they went and convicted them. So that's the
Speaker 6: one thing I'm like, there's so much like these documentaries
Speaker 6: that come out that just rehash what everybody knows. It's like,
Speaker 6: the one thing that I want to do is find
Speaker 6: the jurors and talk to the jury support. But I'm
Speaker 6: sure you don't want to come.
Speaker 1: Forward pose themselves. Yeah yeah, but I would.
Speaker 5: I would give a man.
Speaker 2: So so listen.
Speaker 1: So we'll make sure we put that out there.
Speaker 4: If you're a juring you follow us, or you follow
Speaker 4: or listen to street politicians that Megan is willing to
Speaker 4: give you an amenity if you are are willing to
Speaker 4: talk to her. But I want to because I know
Speaker 4: you have to go. So let's just deal with Kelsey
Speaker 4: for one more minute. So Kelsey's the the first lawyer.
Speaker 4: The first lawyer says, after you know her text, I
Speaker 4: mean her email exchange with Tory is exposed.
Speaker 1: She says, if you.
Speaker 4: All are going to follow to try to use the
Speaker 4: Kelsey shot, Meg Narra, I can't be involved in that
Speaker 4: one because there's a lie being told that I somehow
Speaker 4: offered Kelsey money or I was involved in trying to
Speaker 4: get her paid, and that no, well she.
Speaker 6: She didn't make that connection in the email. Tory's new
Speaker 6: lawyers later tried to say that, oh, the reason she
Speaker 6: didn't want to do the Kelsey defense is because she
Speaker 6: had a conflict and didn't want her her her role
Speaker 6: to be brought out. But I think it's pretty clear
Speaker 6: in the email that she tells Toy she doesn't she's
Speaker 6: not comfortable advancing the Kelsey defense, primarily because she doesn't
Speaker 6: think it's a viable strategy. And I mean, Sean Holly
Speaker 6: is an experienced criminal defense attorney, much more experienced than
Speaker 6: George mcdesi and the guy that he went with, and
Speaker 6: I think she just saw the optics of it and
Speaker 6: knew it was a losing strategy to advance and basically
Speaker 6: told him that he should find another lawyer if he wanted.
Speaker 2: To do it.
Speaker 1: Yes, she said, you got to find another lawyer.
Speaker 4: I'm glad that you finished it, because I did see
Speaker 4: her saying you know that that's not true. And my
Speaker 4: thing with the Tory Lane's defenders and his supporters is
Speaker 4: that either you're saying that she did because their position
Speaker 4: is she just didn't want to do it because she
Speaker 4: was implicated in a possible bribe, but then that means
Speaker 4: it was something to bribe for, So either way it
Speaker 4: doesn't help.
Speaker 6: The U and I both know that that's not true.
Speaker 6: Was when she was telling him about the bribe money,
Speaker 6: that she's somehow offered bribe money to Kelsey, and she
Speaker 6: was saying that's not true. And that's one thing that
Speaker 6: people forget about in this whole Kelsey thing is the
Speaker 6: bribe because that documentary that just dared was so irresponsible
Speaker 6: on some of the stuff that they just aired on
Speaker 6: on stuff. But her pleading the fifth when they're like, oh,
Speaker 6: she must have something to hide it, it's like anyone
Speaker 6: who was in the situation that she would be would
Speaker 6: be pleading the fifth, wanting to plead the fifth and
Speaker 6: get some kind of immunity and testimony. But it's the
Speaker 6: bribery thing, guys. I mean, they're trying to pass it
Speaker 6: off like Kelsey pleaded the fifth because she's the actual
Speaker 6: and she went back and told the judge that I'm
Speaker 6: actually the one who shot Megan, and the judge was like, okay,
Speaker 6: well we're going to give you immunity. That's ridiculous that.
Speaker 6: I mean, we don't know exactly what happened and we're
Speaker 6: never going to be able to get the transcript for that.
Speaker 6: But that's there's no way that's what happened. And it
Speaker 6: has everything to do with the bribery thing, because I mean,
Speaker 6: I think I haven't watched that documentary, but Alex Bott
Speaker 6: says the prosecutor says in the documentary they think Kelsey
Speaker 6: took a bribe and they wanted to amend the charges
Speaker 6: against Tory during trial to add bribery charges. So it
Speaker 6: was all about the bribery things. So the idea that
Speaker 6: she pleaded the fifth it's it's all because of that.
Speaker 2: Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: The gotta be Yeah, he has a leak. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: my son might want to ask the last question.
Speaker 2: I just want to ask this letter.
Speaker 3: So based on so they read Kelsey's original statement right
Speaker 3: after they they questioned her in court, right.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, they played the entire eighty minute interview that
Speaker 6: she did with prosecutors. Was the next day her testimony
Speaker 6: was over two days, and she recanted she wouldn't identify
Speaker 6: Torri as the shooter. But then the judge ruled that
Speaker 6: there were so many questions in the defense portion about
Speaker 6: prosecutors pressuring her that to be fair, to make sure
Speaker 6: the jury saw the whole picture, they would hear the
Speaker 6: whole interview and just decide for themselves whether she was pressured.
Speaker 6: So that was that was pretty bad, and that wouldn't
Speaker 6: have come in if there hadn't been like bad lawyering
Speaker 6: like that. But that was I mean, that was when
Speaker 6: you really hear too, like you hear in a relaxed environment,
Speaker 6: and it sounds it sounds like she she's there. I mean,
Speaker 6: she's almost like in therapy the way she's like talking
Speaker 6: about the situation, and it's basically just up to people
Speaker 6: to decide. It's like, well, when was she telling the truth?
Speaker 6: Was she telling the truth in this interview or was
Speaker 6: she telling the truth on the witness stand when she
Speaker 6: recanted the way I canted, it was just like I
Speaker 6: think it was just kind of obvious for people, you know,
Speaker 6: the yeah, yeah, I think.
Speaker 3: Pretty much basically because that's what I got from everybody
Speaker 3: who actual it was there that was pretty much obvious
Speaker 3: why she was recanting the statement.
Speaker 2: Yeah. At one point I heard that they asked her
Speaker 2: was Tory playing for her lawyer?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think they did response to that, you know,
Speaker 6: I can't I can't remember exactly.
Speaker 5: I'd have to.
Speaker 2: I'd have to.
Speaker 5: I think they have.
Speaker 1: I think she said, I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean i'd have to.
Speaker 6: It's probably in my story. I haven't actually looked back
Speaker 6: and read thoroughly my line crime story on Kelsey's testimony,
Speaker 6: but it was pretty pretty detailed.
Speaker 2: So body, do you think that if Tory had testified
Speaker 2: it would have been different?
Speaker 5: I'm not I'm not sure.
Speaker 6: I think it could have. I think he might as
Speaker 6: well have it. It's like a hail Mary. I mean
Speaker 6: I I kind of approach everything. And you'll learn this
Speaker 6: old newsroom tradition is you vote your job, Like when
Speaker 6: you're if you're deciding who to vote for an election,
Speaker 6: and you're a journalist who works in a newsroom, you
Speaker 6: vote for the politician who's going to give you the
Speaker 6: best stories. So when people are like, oh, do you
Speaker 6: think Tory should have testified, I'm like, well, it would
Speaker 6: have been a hell of a good story if you testified,
Speaker 6: So of course I wanted him to testify. Whether it
Speaker 6: would have like helped his case or not, I'm not
Speaker 6: it he would have been It would have been tough,
Speaker 6: and he could he would have been killed up on,
Speaker 6: especially in cross them asking him about that phone call
Speaker 6: and everything, because the prosecutors would have been able to
Speaker 6: just like start playing that phone call for him and
Speaker 6: just being like, oh, so, what.
Speaker 5: Did you mean when you said this?
Speaker 6: Like, I mean, it would be he could have freaking
Speaker 6: killed and some other stuff too, I mean not just
Speaker 6: the rap lyrics, but other stuff that they could have
Speaker 6: asked him about like it.
Speaker 5: I don't. I don't think it probably would have been
Speaker 5: a good idea for him to testify.
Speaker 6: But it's also like, if you think you're going to
Speaker 6: get convicted, you know, might as well do a hail Mary,
Speaker 6: But I don't.
Speaker 5: I'm not sure if he thought he was going to
Speaker 5: be convicted, what do you think.
Speaker 3: His chances of getting this bail and actually win an appeal,
Speaker 3: just based off your experience and knowledge of law.
Speaker 6: Absolutely no chance for bail and five percent chance on appeal.
Speaker 5: I mean, I don't want to just say no.
Speaker 6: Chance on appeal because I haven't seen an opening brief
Speaker 6: and I don't know what his issues are. But the
Speaker 6: issues that were raised in the motion for new trial
Speaker 6: aren't really any kind of big appellate issues. The lawyers
Speaker 6: he has working for him don't really know what they're
Speaker 6: doing about California pellet law. I mean, this guy that
Speaker 6: he has that passes himself off as some kind of
Speaker 6: renown depellate lawyer has only been a lawyer.
Speaker 5: For like six years.
Speaker 6: So I think it'll be a big question of whether
Speaker 6: the appellate court, when they do issue they're ruling, whether
Speaker 6: the ruling is unpublished or published, because most of their
Speaker 6: rulings are unpublished, and that I mean, they're still public
Speaker 6: and you can see him on the website, but they
Speaker 6: don't argue or cite any kind of new case law
Speaker 6: or findings, so it's not considered any kind of thing
Speaker 6: that lawyers can cite in their rulings. So I think
Speaker 6: it's probably unlike unlikely it'll even be a published opinion,
Speaker 6: you know. But we'll just see what the issues are.
Speaker 6: But I think this case is pretty much over for
Speaker 6: a long time until the four well the fourteenth, the
Speaker 6: bail hearing, I mean, if that actually happens, but there's
Speaker 6: zero chance he's gonna get bail.
Speaker 4: Well, I thank you so much for you know, coming
Speaker 4: and this probably we could probably do three more hours
Speaker 4: of conversation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd be happy to.
Speaker 5: I'm kind of I gotta do this YouTube live thing now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'd be happy ahead. Please go ahead and do it.
Speaker 1: But tell folks before you go how they can subscribe.
Speaker 4: To your channels and your reporting, because now, in your independence,
Speaker 4: you have sort of been forced to organize yourself.
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, i am, I'm on.
Speaker 1: I'm a subscriber. I just became a subscriber.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much, Thank you so much the paid subscriptions.
Speaker 6: But uh, Legal Affairs and Trials dot com that's my
Speaker 6: sub stack, and I've got a mailing list that I
Speaker 6: cover trials, legal issues in Los Angeles, some celebrity news,
Speaker 6: but also some big high profile criminal cases, federal public
Speaker 6: corruption cases. There's a lot of public corruption in LA.
Speaker 6: I mean, if anyone sees the state of downtown Los Angeles,
Speaker 6: you can find some politicians to blame. Because the US
Speaker 6: Attorney's Office says that corruption is a way of life
Speaker 6: in LA politics, and they're trying to root it all out.
Speaker 6: So there's been some pretty significant prison sentences handed down
Speaker 6: to like a bel Air millionaire and that kind of
Speaker 6: thing recently, so I'm kind of trying to keep track
Speaker 6: of all that and YouTube too. I'm kind of trying
Speaker 6: to get into the YouTube. Megan qnif is my YouTube channel,
Speaker 6: but substack is the big thing. I'm trying to get
Speaker 6: into substack notes more to kind of replace Twitter. But
Speaker 6: you all can find me there.
Speaker 1: Yeahs terrible for me.
Speaker 4: I don't even go on and it's violence, yeah, because
Speaker 4: I'm sure your future is beyond your understanding in terms
Speaker 4: of where you're going.
Speaker 1: And I just want to say on behalf of not
Speaker 1: just black.
Speaker 4: Women, but black people, that I appreciate the fact that
Speaker 4: you are not just covering our stories but also trying
Speaker 4: to understand our history by reading the books and learning
Speaker 4: the things and being accessible to those of us who
Speaker 4: have reached out to you.
Speaker 1: It means a lot.
Speaker 4: And you know, it's hard to find trusted individuals to
Speaker 4: cover our stories, and we just hope, you know, you
Speaker 4: continue to do what you're doing and even get better
Speaker 4: and more. Whatever we can do to help increase your platform,
Speaker 4: we want to be able to we want.
Speaker 6: To do that absolutely, Thank you so much. And that's
Speaker 6: one of the best advice I got is to be
Speaker 6: an ally, like consider this monumental life experiences like a
Speaker 6: catalyst for the rest of my life to be an
Speaker 6: ally and keep working on that.
Speaker 2: So thank you.
Speaker 5: That means a lot.
Speaker 2: We're airline.
Speaker 3: Just keep giving them credible information, you know, because it's
Speaker 3: so hard to find that on this internet right now.
Speaker 3: So you know, it was a breath of fresh air,
Speaker 3: you know, just hearing you, just listening to you and
Speaker 3: just seeing that actually what you were saying at actually
Speaker 3: played out in real life. It wasn't like listening to
Speaker 3: a lot of these people that just was just throwing
Speaker 3: things at the wall trying to get something to stick.
Speaker 2: So we really the professionalism that you come with awesome.
Speaker 5: Well, thank you guys so much. It was awesome to
Speaker 5: thank you.
Speaker 1: Good interview. Lots of stuff left.
Speaker 2: Un Yes, I wanted to ask about Kwan that because
Speaker 2: I remember she posted that he walked into the courtroom
Speaker 2: the day, you know, of when it was the case
Speaker 2: was over, Like how did that go? It was a
Speaker 2: lot of things that I wanted to know, but she,
Speaker 2: for the most part, she gave us information man, a.
Speaker 4: Lot of things left uncovered, and I see where there
Speaker 4: are people who are either die hard Tory Lanez fans,
Speaker 4: and or they are just biased or not biased. They
Speaker 4: are traumatized from the history of black men and the
Speaker 4: system and all of that. I can see where they
Speaker 4: found places that they could stick and say, no, you know,
Speaker 4: this is not one hundred percent sure. But I can
Speaker 4: tell you that in almost every case that I've ever
Speaker 4: been involved with, it's never one hundred percent anything in
Speaker 4: court because it's time, it's later. It's not like court.
Speaker 4: It's happened in the same night of an incident, so
Speaker 4: the people have changed stories. Evidence doesn't always show up
Speaker 4: as it should. And to be quite honest, one of
Speaker 4: the things that I think I'm hearing from this whole
Speaker 4: scenario is that even the way the LAPD handled the
Speaker 4: situation is was shitty because of the fact that it
Speaker 4: was a black woman who was shot or and or
Speaker 4: who stepped on glass or whatever. Right, and and and
Speaker 4: let's and let's keep in mind that the fact that
Speaker 4: the glass thing was even out there, and they are
Speaker 4: not doctors, so they have no way of knowing that
Speaker 4: there would actually be bullet fragments found in her feet.
Speaker 1: Later, they didn't really, it wasn't that serious.
Speaker 4: And that's what they do with us as black people,
Speaker 4: and of course with black women, it's like, uh, you
Speaker 4: know whatever, we'll lose the bullet fragments at the hospital.
Speaker 4: Nobody cares. They don't care to get everybody's DNA. Kwan
Speaker 4: should have been he should have had to give a
Speaker 4: DNA sample. All of that should have happened, and that
Speaker 4: makes people feel like they can't trust the system.
Speaker 1: But to Megan's point, there are many.
Speaker 4: Different pieces surrounding the whole thing that shows you what
Speaker 4: took place. And Sean Kelly, while he says there's flashes
Speaker 4: that could be jury, it could be a whole lot
Speaker 4: of things. But the one thing that he was very
Speaker 4: clear about is a man standing over the door or
Speaker 4: over something, and that there were a number of.
Speaker 1: Shots that he saw.
Speaker 4: He kep He continuously said that he never changed that
Speaker 4: he said he saw flashes.
Speaker 1: He thought maybe, but he absolutely.
Speaker 4: We saw a man with the gun over the thing.
Speaker 4: And the number of shots that he said he heard
Speaker 4: were consistent with the ring bells. And so for people
Speaker 4: who keep trying to make the case that Kelsey was
Speaker 4: shooting first and then he might have grabbed a gun.
Speaker 4: The sound doesn't go pop hop or pop, and then
Speaker 4: there's a long time in between and then all of
Speaker 4: a sudden pop hoop or it again it is pop
Speaker 4: pop pop pop pop, and I think five. It's either
Speaker 4: four or five shots. And the man always said that
Speaker 4: he saw someone do that. So either what people are
Speaker 4: trying to say is that there was ten shots or
Speaker 4: seven or eight or three be didn't here or two
Speaker 4: we didn't here and then a space and then more
Speaker 4: or the bottom line is what it is that the
Speaker 4: man shot at the ground, more than likely trying to
Speaker 4: be stupid, just I'm a pop pop up at the
Speaker 4: ground to try to put fear in her and it
Speaker 4: ricocheted and fragments hit her foot.
Speaker 1: That's what happened, I mean allegedly, But for me, no,
Speaker 1: it's not allegedly. I mean based on convicted of something.
Speaker 4: People don't have to say allegedly because you've actually been
Speaker 4: convicted of it.
Speaker 2: Now for me, coming from where I come from, knowing
Speaker 2: that a man has an appeal, I don't.
Speaker 3: I don't know that to be true. That was the
Speaker 3: that was the that was the the testimony of the person.
Speaker 3: So allegedly it could be true, whatever it is. What
Speaker 3: I say is this, you know, this situation got out
Speaker 3: of hand and it went further than it should have,
Speaker 3: and I blame I think, I say all the time
Speaker 3: that Toy put itself in this situation. You know, when
Speaker 3: you look from the beginning and when you even when
Speaker 3: you talk about how you know the police did a
Speaker 3: bad job, I don't. I think the police did the
Speaker 3: job based on they seen three people together that look
Speaker 3: like four people together that look like they probably had
Speaker 3: a situation that nobody really wanted to give up any information,
Speaker 3: so they didn't.
Speaker 2: They didn't pry. It's hard.
Speaker 3: They didn't think there was a situation that merited them saying, look,
Speaker 3: we're trying to we gotta lock somebody up.
Speaker 2: We found somebody with a gun.
Speaker 3: Okay, cool, that's that's the furthest we're gonna take this situation.
Speaker 3: They didn't the rest of the dynamics wasn't something that
Speaker 3: they looked into. This gun was under this person's car,
Speaker 3: But when we're gonna arrest this person for the gun,
Speaker 3: They didn't think about all of the rest of the
Speaker 3: intangible situation. And I think that Torri's ego and the
Speaker 3: way that he you know, he carried on in on
Speaker 3: social media and in the media, caused a woman who
Speaker 3: was actually trying to protect him to feel like, you
Speaker 3: know what, I can't. I don't want to protect him
Speaker 3: no more because the level of defamation that he's doing
Speaker 3: to me, I don't feel protected. And I think, you know,
Speaker 3: although I don't think she should have been shot of anything,
Speaker 3: but I think I really don't think that she wanted,
Speaker 3: she had any initial you know, want to put the
Speaker 3: man in jail. I think they did have a friendship, relationship,
Speaker 3: whatever it was, and even though at that point it
Speaker 3: probably was over, I didn't I don't think immediately she
Speaker 3: wanted to go forward with putting that man in jail.
Speaker 3: And I think I think the things that he did
Speaker 3: after that night contributed to his own demise, you know,
Speaker 3: And and that's why we're here and based on that,
Speaker 3: you know, my, my, my.
Speaker 2: I don't get it, man, I just I just don't
Speaker 2: get why while we hate.
Speaker 1: Us, you know, you know, Malcolm X get it, I
Speaker 1: get it.
Speaker 2: I don't.
Speaker 3: I really don't, Minchael, who taught you to hate yourself?
Speaker 3: When when I look at all of these situations that
Speaker 3: we talked about today, you know, from the woman who's
Speaker 3: got hit with the brick, to Spice and Erika Manna
Speaker 3: to Tory Lanez and and and Megan's Desallian. It comes
Speaker 3: back to self hate, right. It comes back to people
Speaker 3: who are harmed, people who have been wrong shot, hit
Speaker 3: with bricks, disrespected, racial slurves, all three. The people who
Speaker 3: are actually had something done to them are actually being villainized, right.
Speaker 3: And it's sad to me that black women have to
Speaker 3: deal with this shit.
Speaker 2: It really is. Like I never used to.
Speaker 3: Say, like we always had conversation I used to debate
Speaker 3: y'all down, like, nah, you don't understand what black men
Speaker 3: go through telling you this, and now you don't understand.
Speaker 2: And I used to and I will argue you down.
Speaker 3: And over years I started to really see the level
Speaker 3: of bias and the level of disrespect that black women
Speaker 3: actually feel and actually experience on a daily basis. You
Speaker 3: know that the neglect, it's just it's mind boggling. The
Speaker 3: shit that I'm actually able to see now is just
Speaker 3: mind boggling to me. It's mind boggling to me that
Speaker 3: regardless of evidence that could be shown or anything, people
Speaker 3: will justify harm and disrespect that comes to black women.
Speaker 2: Man. So I don't I don't understand how how we
Speaker 2: got that far and self hate.
Speaker 3: I don't understand how, you know, a culture that was
Speaker 3: so unified at once, you know, a culture that was
Speaker 3: even after stay we were we were one of the
Speaker 3: main you know, the main fundamental values of our culture
Speaker 3: was to protect our children and our women. That's what
Speaker 3: it was built on. You know, the black women has
Speaker 3: always been a foundation of our culture. And I don't
Speaker 3: know how we moved so far away from that, man.
Speaker 3: And I really just don't get that.
Speaker 1: I mean, God bless us what some of us are
Speaker 1: going to continue to sound me along?
Speaker 2: So some of us gonna always stand up for black women.
Speaker 2: Y'all always got to ally for me.
Speaker 4: Just know we appreciate you black men, and we have
Speaker 4: been and will continue. We have been and will continue
Speaker 4: to stand up for black men as well. And you know,
Speaker 4: as time goes on, the more we educate people, they
Speaker 4: come along. We lose, some, win some, but we win many.
Speaker 2: Men.
Speaker 3: With that said, I'm not gonna always be right to
Speaker 3: me get malories. I can always be wrong, were both
Speaker 3: always and always I mean always be authentic.
Speaker 2: Peace.
Speaker 4: Listen, to Street Politicians on the Black Effect Network on iHeartRadio, and.
Speaker 3: Catch us every single Wednesday for the video version of
Speaker 3: Street Politicians on iwomen dot tv.
Speaker 2: That's how we owned