Speaker 1: Dear Governor is a production of I Heart Media and
Speaker 1: three Months Media. If you are moved by Jarvis Masters
Speaker 1: and his thirty years struggle on San Quentin's death throw,
Speaker 1: and you'd like to support his cause, please consider signing
Speaker 1: a petition on his behalf. Visit Free Jarvis dot org
Speaker 1: slash podcast to sign your name to an open letter
Speaker 1: to California Governor Gavin Newsom, Dear Governor Newsom, Dear Mr
Speaker 1: Governor Newsom. This is an open letter to Governor Gavin Newsom.
Speaker 1: Dear Governor Newsom. As we wind down season two of
Speaker 1: Dear Governor, Jarvis Master's federal appeals process is just winding up.
Speaker 1: The law firm Kirkland and Ellis has assembled an ace
Speaker 1: team of attorneys that will guide Jarvis through the post
Speaker 1: appeals process with great expectations that he will after a
Speaker 1: lifetime in prison and celebrate freedom once and for all.
Speaker 1: We at Dear Governor will continue to follow Jarvis and
Speaker 1: his fight for freedom. If you're moved by Jarvis's personal story,
Speaker 1: we encourage you to keep him in your thoughts, to
Speaker 1: pay attention to his developments and engage support system is
Speaker 1: critical to a successful transition to the outside if and
Speaker 1: when that day becomes real. Later in the show, Jarvis
Speaker 1: answers some of your pressing questions and curiosities. But up
Speaker 1: next Jarvis's lead attorney, a man for whom Jarvis is
Speaker 1: trusting his life and future. My name is Mike Williams.
Speaker 1: I'm a partner at Kirkland and Ellis. I'm a partner
Speaker 1: in the litigation practice, so I'm one of the people
Speaker 1: who tends to go to court to try cases. Typically,
Speaker 1: I represent large corporations to in large corporations, that happens
Speaker 1: more than cases like jarvis Is that involved the death penalty.
Speaker 1: My largest client to date was the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico,
Speaker 1: So when they were sued by their bond holders and
Speaker 1: creditors and banks and on a line bond insurers during
Speaker 1: their financial crisis in twenties seventeen, I represented Puerto Rico
Speaker 1: and those proceedings and making sure that these creditors weren't
Speaker 1: allowed to seize property in Puerto Rico and so there
Speaker 1: could be this orderly bankruptcy practice. I represent a lot
Speaker 1: of companies in a broad array of different cases, but
Speaker 1: it's mostly commercial litigation with a few exceptions, and some
Speaker 1: of those exceptions are death penalty cases like Jarvis's. There
Speaker 1: was a case that I had handled. I stuck with
Speaker 1: this client for about seven years up and through the
Speaker 1: Virginia state and federal courts. His name was Ivon Telugus.
Speaker 1: He was one of the nine people on Virginia's death row.
Speaker 1: By the time Governor mccauliffe granted our petition for clemency.
Speaker 1: We've gone through federal proceedings, state proceedings, state proceedings because
Speaker 1: the State of Virginia was actually considering using the electric
Speaker 1: chair against him when they couldn't find access to the
Speaker 1: drugs that they needed for the lethal injections. So this
Speaker 1: was an example of a case where Van was also
Speaker 1: actually innocent. It's very very hard in federal courts to
Speaker 1: unwind a state court conviction and state abeous. That's where
Speaker 1: we are with Jarvis now, and I've got to say,
Speaker 1: the facts have to be really stark because of the
Speaker 1: deference that the federal courts tend to give to state courts.
Speaker 1: In Ivan's case, even though we stuck with him, it
Speaker 1: took really a courageous move by Governor mccauloff at the
Speaker 1: time to say this man's innocent. I'll at least commute
Speaker 1: his death sentence. So that was back in And what
Speaker 1: percentage I mean, you're a global firm, so what percentage
Speaker 1: of your cases are like this our pro bono? How
Speaker 1: do you decide which to take? I would assume there
Speaker 1: would be dozens and hundreds of people wanting your representation.
Speaker 1: It's it's that's one of the difficult parts is because
Speaker 1: we're a large law firm, we'd love to take on
Speaker 1: more cases, but just as a as a fact of life,
Speaker 1: so many of these cases are so difficult, and so
Speaker 1: many of the cases the record is so difficult. In
Speaker 1: many of these cases, the client is difficult to reach
Speaker 1: and differ pope to contact for lots of reasons. It
Speaker 1: also has to be a case where even though it's
Speaker 1: very rare for somebody who's on death row to have
Speaker 1: been served well by counsel before it reaches the federal courts,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of cases not this one, where
Speaker 1: we found that state council is actually almost an obstacle
Speaker 1: to get in relief. And just to give you an
Speaker 1: example there, very recently we had another death penalty case
Speaker 1: in Brazoria County, Texas, on behalf of a fellow who
Speaker 1: was intellectually disabled. And this is this is really the
Speaker 1: story of somebody's worst state corney because James Harris was
Speaker 1: intellectually disabled, had drug addiction issues, had a terrible day
Speaker 1: where he was locked out of the motel where he
Speaker 1: was living, and he just in a fit of rage,
Speaker 1: he committed acts of violence that he never would have
Speaker 1: committed under other circumstances. He had tried to plead innocent,
Speaker 1: plead guilty rather with the d A. The d A
Speaker 1: cut off PLEA negotiations and force him to take the
Speaker 1: case to try ill and he was sent to trial
Speaker 1: in Texas State court without anybody ever raising the defense
Speaker 1: of intellectual disability. An intellectual disability in our system, under
Speaker 1: our constitutional system, that's mitigation per se. You're not allowed
Speaker 1: to execute somebody under the Eighth Amendment if they're intellectually disabled.
Speaker 1: Nobody ever raised that defense, and so I used this
Speaker 1: as a case because it was another recent death penalty
Speaker 1: case that we handled. But we got a call from
Speaker 1: the American Bar Association where they said there's a case.
Speaker 1: It's going to a hearing in four months. And this
Speaker 1: is before the holidays, so you know, takes us over
Speaker 1: Thanksgiving takes us over Christmas. There are very few firms
Speaker 1: like Kirkland and Ellis that have the resources to do
Speaker 1: that anyway. And then it's an even smaller vent diagram
Speaker 1: when you talk about the firms that are willing to
Speaker 1: do it, that have the capabilities of doing it in
Speaker 1: terms of experience. So we were really lucky to get
Speaker 1: that case. Just a few months ago in March, we
Speaker 1: got a ruling that vacated recommended that we vacate James's
Speaker 1: death sense, So there was another win. But it still
Speaker 1: has to go up to the TECH to his Court
Speaker 1: of Criminal Appeals, which could reverse that. I think we've
Speaker 1: got a good factual record and the Texas Court of
Speaker 1: Criminal Appeals decides these cases at their own pace. But
Speaker 1: again that's an example of you know, you asked, how
Speaker 1: do these cases come to Kirkland? A lot of times
Speaker 1: it takes somebody like the A, B, A or somebody
Speaker 1: to say not just this is a good case, but
Speaker 1: also this is the sort of case where Kirkland should
Speaker 1: get involved. How did Jarvis come to your um? How
Speaker 1: did you learn about him? So we have We're fortunate Kirkland.
Speaker 1: We have a great partnership, we have great lawyers who
Speaker 1: are associates, not partners. And then we also have lawyers
Speaker 1: who are affiliated with Kirkland and Ellis. And one of
Speaker 1: those lawyers who is affiliated with Kirkland and Ellison of
Speaker 1: council position is Larry Marshall, who's one of the foremost
Speaker 1: professors on the planet in terms of innocence, sentencing, criminal law,
Speaker 1: criminal justice, I mean a whole host of issues. When
Speaker 1: I start talking about Larry's expertise, it's not to it's
Speaker 1: not even to try to exhaust it, because he's just
Speaker 1: that good of a law professor, and he's just the
Speaker 1: sort of smart person that you want to be lacoll
Speaker 1: if you're working at a law firm that reaches tony
Speaker 1: positions like this. And I understand that Larry got a
Speaker 1: call not from the A B A, but from Oprah Winfrey.
Speaker 1: And when Oprah asks for assistance from a law firm,
Speaker 1: the law firm pays attention. And so this is it's
Speaker 1: a sort of story that Larry would tell better than
Speaker 1: I would. But when you get a call that says,
Speaker 1: would you please hold for Oprah Winfrey and Brian Stephenson,
Speaker 1: you this this better be good. I better take a
Speaker 1: seat Jarvis Masters. I said this to several good friends
Speaker 1: of mine. If I lose with these guys her glean analysis,
Speaker 1: I've never had a chance of winning because this law
Speaker 1: firm is very, very good. And my conversations with Larry
Speaker 1: Marshall just gave me the confidence that he knew the
Speaker 1: case and he was going to find the best people
Speaker 1: to you know, represent me. And he's one of the
Speaker 1: few lawyers that in my life I totally trusted. So
Speaker 1: it was just a relief. I didn't ever, I didn't
Speaker 1: do anything but just trust in, you know, in my
Speaker 1: innocence to find the right people that represent me. And
Speaker 1: that's what happened. So why do you think they took
Speaker 1: on your case because they're a huge international team, global firm.
Speaker 1: But that they knew that I was innocent. That's that's
Speaker 1: the bottom line, and that that was the That was
Speaker 1: everything that I thought would would determine if they would
Speaker 1: take my case or not. Did they see my innocence
Speaker 1: right there? Did they research my innocence right there? And
Speaker 1: when they took on my case, I finally had someone
Speaker 1: who would really really believed in me, and I just felt,
Speaker 1: you know what, I have the best law firm that
Speaker 1: I can be fine in my life and in my situation,
Speaker 1: and from there, I just let it go. You know.
Speaker 1: I just give my faith to this law firm to
Speaker 1: do whatever they need to do to get me out
Speaker 1: of here. And what I would do is that he
Speaker 1: promised myself that I won't die in here. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I'll be able to leave here with a lot of
Speaker 1: my sanity in place. What does the team look like
Speaker 1: that you have put together to support Jarvis. We have
Speaker 1: a team that it's a cross offices. It's one of
Speaker 1: the things that I'm happiest about. Because Jarvis's cases bending
Speaker 1: in California, we're able to draw upon some of our
Speaker 1: best partners and associates in our Bay area offices. Leading
Speaker 1: the team with me is a lawyer named Erica Williams
Speaker 1: who was in the Obama White House Council's office. She
Speaker 1: was in senior positions in the Securities Exchange Commission. Death
Speaker 1: penalty cases aren't her expertise, but she was also leading
Speaker 1: the team with me on James Harris's case in Texas
Speaker 1: that I was just describing. So, Erica is a gifted
Speaker 1: lawyer who has an amazing courtroom presence. She's an amazing
Speaker 1: strategic sense. And she's one of those lawyers who when
Speaker 1: I call Eric and I say we've got a case,
Speaker 1: and Marie Marshall said that this is when we should
Speaker 1: take Erica is like one of the first people to say,
Speaker 1: of course, I'd get involved. So it's it's good to
Speaker 1: have her involved. But then also just a really talented
Speaker 1: team in our In our office in San Francisco, we
Speaker 1: have Ashley little Field and Austin Clark, who are two
Speaker 1: of our up and coming, really talented partners who are
Speaker 1: helping lead the team in the day to day efforts.
Speaker 1: They know California courts, they know California law, They've actually
Speaker 1: appeared in front of our judge before, so all of
Speaker 1: that is very helpful and leading a team a fairly
Speaker 1: large team of associate lawyers and also legal assistants, and
Speaker 1: all the resources that we have here at Kirkland. All told,
Speaker 1: our team is about i'd say about twenty lawyers, which
Speaker 1: is very large for a Kirkland case. You know, even
Speaker 1: our chemical company cases, you know, we we tend not
Speaker 1: to staff them that large. But here, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: an important case and there are lots of people who
Speaker 1: want to get behind it. Yeah. Yeah, I would imagine
Speaker 1: you took him on or you signed on Jarvis just
Speaker 1: prior to the outbreak of COVID. So how has that
Speaker 1: impacted your representation of him? You know, it's it's really
Speaker 1: made the challenges exponential. And I just talked about a
Speaker 1: case in Missoria County, Texas that was pre COVID, where
Speaker 1: we could, over the course of four months, take that
Speaker 1: team of twenty lawyers or what have you, and spread
Speaker 1: out over east southeast Texas and conduct an investigation here.
Speaker 1: Because so many of the witnesses are in an institutional setting,
Speaker 1: and because COVID had completely locked us out from those
Speaker 1: institutional settings, that's led to real challenges. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: and Jarvis's case, one of the things that I think
Speaker 1: is a real advantage for us is that I think
Speaker 1: the procedural problems, the constitutional deficiencies, and his state proceedings
Speaker 1: are pretty clear from the record below. You know, we
Speaker 1: we we can bring facts to the court, We can
Speaker 1: bring evidence to the court that would help the court
Speaker 1: decide these cases in our favor. We can show where
Speaker 1: the state court made errors even involving facts. But there
Speaker 1: are certain principles about not being able to use state
Speaker 1: procedural rules, you know, what can be admitted into evidence
Speaker 1: to create a constitutional violation, and that's what happened in
Speaker 1: Jarvis's case. So, while it's unfortunate we haven't been able
Speaker 1: to spend more time in sam Quentin and speak to
Speaker 1: people there, one of the benefits of Jarvis's cases is
Speaker 1: that it's pretty clear what these constitutional problems are just
Speaker 1: based on the face of the record that's there. Will
Speaker 1: you be hiring an investigator to go back and look
Speaker 1: at the facts of the original case, or is this
Speaker 1: more specifically about the constitutional issues that dealt with the case?
Speaker 1: And it's it's all the above corny because we are
Speaker 1: you know, we're compiling the facts and we've got people
Speaker 1: that you know, I don't want to talk too much
Speaker 1: about the investigation, but I will say it's both there's
Speaker 1: a factual challenge that I think is pretty important, and
Speaker 1: then there's also, fortunately in Jarvis's cases, there is also
Speaker 1: this black letter legal challenge units in James's case, just
Speaker 1: to give you a counterexample. In James's case, we had
Speaker 1: to go and we had to speak to his aunt
Speaker 1: to say, tell us when he was growing up, we
Speaker 1: had to go to his high school yearbooks and find
Speaker 1: people who were on his football team and match up
Speaker 1: the photos with the captions and say what can you
Speaker 1: tell us about James? And over the course of this investigation,
Speaker 1: we found out that James had a niece who is
Speaker 1: intellectually disabled and was actually a special Olympian, and nobody
Speaker 1: had ever said, wait, James, you have a niece who
Speaker 1: is a special Olympian who's intellectually disabled, who's close to
Speaker 1: you personally. Nobody had ever asked about this before. Of course,
Speaker 1: nobody raised your intellectual disability defense. With Jarvis, the set
Speaker 1: of witnesses is somewhat more cohesive, and it's also a
Speaker 1: little bit better explored because he had really good lawyers
Speaker 1: working for him before, you know, lawyers who were trying
Speaker 1: to do the right thing. Yeah, So there's the legal
Speaker 1: issues that are based on the actual record that they've created.
Speaker 1: Those legal issues are pretty stark. I mean, when you're
Speaker 1: not willing to listen to testimony because you're just saying,
Speaker 1: I'm tired of this, I'm gonna hang up the phone,
Speaker 1: I mean, that's probably an unfair caricature, but that's that's
Speaker 1: an example of a legal issue that we can raise
Speaker 1: on the existing record, but the factual investigation is also
Speaker 1: a piece of that. So where do you go from here?
Speaker 1: What is the best case scenario? What are kind of
Speaker 1: the next steps that we can anticipate, and how can
Speaker 1: our listeners support you or or support Jarvis in any way,
Speaker 1: shape or form. Well, so where we go from here?
Speaker 1: We filed our petition, our federal habeas petition, and I
Speaker 1: think that it lays out in I hope, in readable
Speaker 1: language for anybody who's not a lawyer. Doesn't you know,
Speaker 1: isn't you know? Isn't steeped in what you know Chambers
Speaker 1: versus you know what what the Chambers case means, what
Speaker 1: the Brady case means. But I hope that it says
Speaker 1: in in fairly straightforward terms what went wrong at Jarvis's
Speaker 1: earlier proceeding. I think it also makes a good case
Speaker 1: for actual innocence as well. So we've got we filed
Speaker 1: our petition. At this point, we're still waiting for the
Speaker 1: state to file its answer. I mean, that's that's how
Speaker 1: this proceeds. As we file our petition, the state files
Speaker 1: its answer, we file what's called the traverse, which is
Speaker 1: just basically an answer to the state's answer that's not
Speaker 1: usually as important. And then from there, one or both
Speaker 1: sides might see this case up either for an evidentiary
Speaker 1: hearing where we put on evidence, or the state might
Speaker 1: move for some rejudgment and say, even based on everything
Speaker 1: that they alleged, we think this is so clear a
Speaker 1: case that you should deny relief. So those are the
Speaker 1: next steps. And because because the state has been so
Speaker 1: slow and filing their answer, we've really got some questions
Speaker 1: about what they're going to say. They were supposed to
Speaker 1: file it in July thirty one, and we just received
Speaker 1: an email yesterday asking for another week. Now. I get
Speaker 1: the state has all kinds of resource issues too, but
Speaker 1: it also prompts the question, Corny, if you've got those
Speaker 1: sort of resource issues, why are you fighting this so hard?
Speaker 1: You know, if we've got a man who's got this
Speaker 1: even you don't know Jarvis, you've never met him, you
Speaker 1: don't know who he is, You've still got this claim
Speaker 1: of innocence in California, why are you pushing forward with
Speaker 1: the death penalty here? You know? And I don't want
Speaker 1: to sound flip, and I don't want to sound disrespectful,
Speaker 1: but like, why the blood bust, Like, what in the
Speaker 1: world would make you push so hard to make sure
Speaker 1: that Jarvis, with all of these procedural problems and with
Speaker 1: the showing of actual innocence, why are you fighting to
Speaker 1: keep him on death row? And I mean, it's a
Speaker 1: question that I hope gets answered at some point, but
Speaker 1: at this point, we just like to see what the
Speaker 1: response is by the State of California. Is there a
Speaker 1: time limit in which they have to answer you? At
Speaker 1: this point, they've extended the time limit, and you know,
Speaker 1: in federal courts, and with good reason, judges tend to
Speaker 1: be very lenient with extensions in cases like this. And typically,
Speaker 1: as somebody who's represented people who are on death row, ordinarily,
Speaker 1: when the state asked for an extension, we know we
Speaker 1: can't really oppose it. And for many of my other cases,
Speaker 1: execution was imminent. You know, when the state of recipent extension,
Speaker 1: it's like, well, great, that's another two weeks that we
Speaker 1: don't have to worry about somebody issuing a death war. Sure,
Speaker 1: but since the moratorium zon in California, that's not an issue.
Speaker 1: That's right, but the federal judge will well, ordinarily we
Speaker 1: just assume it's very difficult when the state can say
Speaker 1: I've got COVID, I've got a docket. You know, he's
Speaker 1: on death row. But you know, so it's it's very
Speaker 1: hard for us to to oppose an extension by the state.
Speaker 1: It breaks my heart because I mean, his his whole
Speaker 1: the whole state process for the habeas the filing and
Speaker 1: then the oral arguments that was decades before he got
Speaker 1: an answer, and he's just this is just not a
Speaker 1: speedy trial that he's guaranteed by the by the constitution.
Speaker 1: Huh no. And it's it's it's something that it's hard
Speaker 1: because I know every day that Jarvis is on death
Speaker 1: row is another day that an injustice is being committed.
Speaker 1: And yet at the same time, we don't want to
Speaker 1: say to a judge or to any decision maker, please
Speaker 1: hurry up and give us. We don't want a fast
Speaker 1: answer despite all the challenges of remaining on death row
Speaker 1: when you don't belong there. We really want the right answer,
Speaker 1: and so that's what we hope we can convey to
Speaker 1: the judge. Was there anything that that the listeners can
Speaker 1: do to support or follow We have a petition on
Speaker 1: free Jervis dot org that people can go and sign
Speaker 1: and it's basically just an open letter to Governor Newsom.
Speaker 1: But is there anything above and beyond that and that
Speaker 1: we can do as a podcast to help, you know,
Speaker 1: I I hope everybody keeps listening. And I hate to
Speaker 1: go on and on about stories like this, but I've
Speaker 1: had death row clients who had been executed. I had
Speaker 1: the first one just during COVID and this was a
Speaker 1: man who was on federal death row and even though
Speaker 1: he had a shocking procedural story, he was executed in
Speaker 1: June and the federal death Row in Terra Haut, Indiana.
Speaker 1: He died in obscurity. I mean, he was a person
Speaker 1: who had these really significant constitutional claims and I had
Speaker 1: only represented him before the Supreme Court of the United States,
Speaker 1: but he was very well represented by amazing habeas counsel
Speaker 1: during federal habeas proceedings, and the Supreme Court doesn't have
Speaker 1: to take a case. And so you know this, this,
Speaker 1: this client of mine was executed, and there were a
Speaker 1: couple of ap stories. You know, the federal government just
Speaker 1: executed somebody, and there was his picture and there was
Speaker 1: a video of his mother saying, please don't execute my
Speaker 1: son for a crime that he committed when he was nineteen,
Speaker 1: but he basically died in obscurity. So when I started
Speaker 1: by talking about how special a case Jarvis was, a
Speaker 1: big part of it is there's Jarvis, but there's also
Speaker 1: all these people who support Jarvis. And if there's going
Speaker 1: to be a change, whether it's in Jarvis's case or
Speaker 1: whether it's in the application of the death penalty, more generally,
Speaker 1: it's going to come from people who care. So I'd say,
Speaker 1: just by virtual the fact that Jarvis has supporters, people
Speaker 1: who would listen to a podcast and pay attention to
Speaker 1: this case, that puts Jarvis in an entirely different category
Speaker 1: from of anybody who's on death row, and almost certainly
Speaker 1: from anybody who's got these sort of injustices that have
Speaker 1: been committed in his proceedings. So I see the thing
Speaker 1: that you can really do. I know it's not above
Speaker 1: and beyond, but especially for now, it was just stay engaged.
Speaker 1: You know, as a lawyer, I want to win this
Speaker 1: case in the courtroom, and so I would never say
Speaker 1: now is the time to start writing letters to the editors.
Speaker 1: That's not my lane, you know. My lane is let's
Speaker 1: put forward the best case that we can let's put
Speaker 1: forward a team that can win this case for Jarvis.
Speaker 1: I have to say, it's a real shot in the
Speaker 1: arm to know that there's somebody who cares and that
Speaker 1: we're going to do our best to win. And I'm
Speaker 1: confident that we're going to win. But to know that
Speaker 1: Jarvis has people who care about him, that makes all
Speaker 1: the difference in the world in a case like this,
Speaker 1: and that's to his lawyer. I can only imagine with
Speaker 1: me for Jarvis, well, David Cheff, who wrote The Buddhist
Speaker 1: on Death Row, the latest biography, and I have committed
Speaker 1: to host a freedom party when you succeed in getting
Speaker 1: him out. So I hope you will be a v
Speaker 1: I P. You will be a v I P at
Speaker 1: our party. Listen, I'll be bartender at your party. I
Speaker 1: don't need to be a v I P. And we've
Speaker 1: got a Kirkland team that's so large you can't have
Speaker 1: as all as as V I P. So you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's a hard it's a hard system to beat
Speaker 1: in the federal courts. But I think of the cases
Speaker 1: that I've seen and of the clients that I've seen,
Speaker 1: I mean, this is one that the federal courts really
Speaker 1: should make right. So I always get very nervous when
Speaker 1: I talk about pending cases, and especially pending cases like
Speaker 1: this where I don't even know what the state's going
Speaker 1: to say yet. But I will say, I mean, just
Speaker 1: knowing Jarvis and knowing the facts and knowing the law,
Speaker 1: there's a reason why Kirkland took this on, and there's
Speaker 1: a reason why people support Jarvis, and it's because this
Speaker 1: is the sort of case that should send a message
Speaker 1: to the system that things go wrong. Well Amen, Amen,
Speaker 1: good Corny, and thanks for everything you do. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know I keep saying this, but it really does
Speaker 1: make all the difference in the world. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: it's just terrible. I can say from from Christopher's case,
Speaker 1: which is the client I'm talking about, to you know,
Speaker 1: pour your heart and soul into pleadings and and and
Speaker 1: convincing yourself and then trying to convince the court and
Speaker 1: saying this shouldn't happen, and then the Supreme Court denies
Speaker 1: review and he's executed, and it's like, did this even
Speaker 1: make a difference at all? The effort? You know, I
Speaker 1: had a team on that one too, And did this
Speaker 1: make a difference? And here, it's like knowing that Jarvis
Speaker 1: has people who care, who are watching, and who are
Speaker 1: speaking to him. That really makes a difference, not just
Speaker 1: for Jarvis's case, but for all of this. Absolutely, thanks
Speaker 1: for everything you do. Point Thank you to Absolutely and U.
Speaker 1: I'll be waiting for your firetending skills. Thanks to take care.
Speaker 1: Okay by My name is Tyler from Atlanta, Georgia, and
Speaker 1: I wanted to ask Jarvis. After all the complicated legal
Speaker 1: battles and issues around people not believing that your innocence,
Speaker 1: what thought brings you peace? What do you think of
Speaker 1: you when you want to find peace with the world
Speaker 1: that seems so frustratingly cool and unjust meditation? I think
Speaker 1: the ability to sit down with both the good and
Speaker 1: bad does a lot to help me find that interfeace.
Speaker 1: I think there's always have to be something good about
Speaker 1: the worst things that are bad. And I definitely felt
Speaker 1: that when when COVID hit sand Quick, Where do I
Speaker 1: find my piece? You know? And my piece was to
Speaker 1: let it go through me? What does that mean? Let
Speaker 1: go through you? Knowing that I knew that this was
Speaker 1: something that I couldn't fight, This was something that they
Speaker 1: were not going to medicate me to keep me from
Speaker 1: catching it. I had assessed that San Quentin didn't know
Speaker 1: what to do. I didn't panic. I just said, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna let this, whatever it does, go through me,
Speaker 1: COVID go through me. I was not going to try
Speaker 1: to fight it, you know, I was just gonna let
Speaker 1: let my Buddhist practice give me an idea was the
Speaker 1: best way I can deal with this. That you have
Speaker 1: a place in your brain that you go, Like for
Speaker 1: me sometimes it's when I'm stressed out or whatever, Like
Speaker 1: I'll go to like the beach in my brain, you know,
Speaker 1: visit a peaceful place. Do you have any place you
Speaker 1: go or is it just a mantra? This is what
Speaker 1: I'm doing. I just noticed it's not long ago. Whenever
Speaker 1: I feel really bad about something, really depressed, and I
Speaker 1: don't think meditation is gonna who's going to address the issue.
Speaker 1: And I think that's what the question was really asked
Speaker 1: of me. I create good conversations with people, you know,
Speaker 1: I really do. I create good conversations. I'll bring up
Speaker 1: something that would just put everybody involved in the conversation,
Speaker 1: whether it's a football game or something, and we're all
Speaker 1: talking about this you know, and it can go on
Speaker 1: for an hour or two hours, you know, and somewhere
Speaker 1: in between these conversations, I just looms that that thing
Speaker 1: about feeling really really you know, depressed, are set at them,
Speaker 1: you know or something. So that's where I really go to.
Speaker 1: I've noticed myself doing that a lot. Can you talk
Speaker 1: to the guys like through yourself? Is that how you
Speaker 1: communicate with them? Yeah, I'm sitting at my cell door
Speaker 1: and I will throw something out there and we talked
Speaker 1: about it, you know, and it maybe ten fifteen people
Speaker 1: involved in conversation, maybe even more, but we're talking over
Speaker 1: each other, but we can hear each other. We have
Speaker 1: that ability to do that. You know, sometimes when you
Speaker 1: hear the noise, you think everyone's making noisely everyone's really
Speaker 1: talking to each other, and they can not the noise
Speaker 1: and not even pay attention to them. You know, that
Speaker 1: someone else's noise, not my noise. After editude, I visioned it.
Speaker 1: I envisioned someone getting real frustrated. And what they do
Speaker 1: is they call a friend, someone of best friends, someone
Speaker 1: who they don't have to worry about using the correct
Speaker 1: speak each our words to get across what they feel
Speaker 1: most frustrated about m h. We do that here, I
Speaker 1: know I do that. There's people that I talked to
Speaker 1: like that. You know. I would say, hey man, let
Speaker 1: me bounce this off the wall and tell me what
Speaker 1: you think about this, you know, and I would get
Speaker 1: their advice. And most times I get the advice that
Speaker 1: I'm not looking for. But it's good to think about.
Speaker 1: There's certain guys that just weigh in when you do
Speaker 1: want them to. Yeah, but that would be my purpose
Speaker 1: to everyone jump into this. Please give my my mouth
Speaker 1: some stuff from going through. You jump in, man, you know,
Speaker 1: just just you know, yeah, hey man, more noise you
Speaker 1: make the better this is gonna feel, you know. I
Speaker 1: think it helps for everybody. I think everyone has someone
Speaker 1: they call when you know, when the workplace is not
Speaker 1: doing treating him well, or when you know there's spouse
Speaker 1: problems or whatever. You know, there's someone that we always called,
Speaker 1: you know, um, And that's the same way here. You know.
Speaker 1: I'm grateful that I can bounce things off of certain people.
Speaker 1: And I really really think Tyler Tyler for his call.
Speaker 1: I thought it was a good question. And often I
Speaker 1: get that question about how do I find some measure
Speaker 1: of peace and all this chaoffs, you know, and all
Speaker 1: this other stuff, and it's a constant practice and kind
Speaker 1: of made a really really great question. Hi. My name
Speaker 1: is Sophia. I grew up Catholic, and within my religious
Speaker 1: organization and affiliation, we have always been taught to be
Speaker 1: pro life. Presently, I have never made my own opinion
Speaker 1: on whether I'm against or for the death penalty. But
Speaker 1: I was really moved by something Jarvis had said, and
Speaker 1: he said, um, I have technology, the fact that I
Speaker 1: have her people, and I was really moved by that
Speaker 1: that he was, I guess, taking accountability for whatever he
Speaker 1: has done. I have been researching Jervis's case and I
Speaker 1: find it very shocking that Jarvis ended up on death row.
Speaker 1: I see that there's so many questions of jarvis case,
Speaker 1: especially fact that he might not have participated in the
Speaker 1: direct murder of a cop. How is it that we
Speaker 1: could can compare Jarvis's conviction to that of a serial killer?
Speaker 1: How does it feel to be put on death row
Speaker 1: with other people that have committed probably even more hain
Speaker 1: his crimes and at the end of the day, they
Speaker 1: are being given the same punishment despite having a completely
Speaker 1: different crime. So that's my question. I think, Um, I
Speaker 1: think sometimes when you're forced live with people, you're forced
Speaker 1: to live with people. But you know, for me, I
Speaker 1: found it very interesting to just look at people, you
Speaker 1: know and see, wow, you know, there's Scott Peterson, there's this,
Speaker 1: and there's that, you know, and then I look for
Speaker 1: the differences than me. For me, you know, what is
Speaker 1: the difference between this person and this person and a
Speaker 1: lot of the stuff that they're on death row for
Speaker 1: you tend to see, you know, it's very Remember I
Speaker 1: wrote a story about the guy, me and this guy
Speaker 1: playing chess, you know, and he always would try to
Speaker 1: trap me and but not just win the game, just
Speaker 1: trapped me in a corner. Um. Now that you know,
Speaker 1: I meet people like you know, you know, these serial killers.
Speaker 1: I I'm so glad in all honesty that I'm not there.
Speaker 1: You know, that's where I walk away from. You know, Wow,
Speaker 1: I'm so glad I'm not there. You know, we're both
Speaker 1: on death road. But I don't know what is in
Speaker 1: his mind, you know, what's what's going on with him?
Speaker 1: You know. Me, I'm trying to write a book. Me,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to do this and it doesn't make me
Speaker 1: better or worse. I don't look at it that way.
Speaker 1: It's just, wow, my sanity is something that really really
Speaker 1: need to protect, you know, in many ways, I'm very
Speaker 1: very scared about, you know, this place turning to me crazy.
Speaker 1: And if anything scares me more than is being uh,
Speaker 1: it was in my mind. You know, I'm so scared
Speaker 1: to lose my mind. And after so many years, you
Speaker 1: can't to believe that, you know, it might just happen.
Speaker 1: What do you think kept seeing all this time? That
Speaker 1: is a question that that's like a corn I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't know what it is. I know it's people
Speaker 1: like you. Is the support I have on the outside,
Speaker 1: is constantly being a communication with friends. But you know,
Speaker 1: this book is still hard to cell, is still small.
Speaker 1: I can stand up and touch the ceiling, you know.
Speaker 1: I can put my arms out and touch both walls.
Speaker 1: And I see a bar that gets locked beyond the
Speaker 1: locked door that cannot be opened unless the world have
Speaker 1: the keys. So I think, how you know? But to
Speaker 1: your question, I don't know what it is. I used
Speaker 1: to say I'm crazy, because I'm not crazy. One thing
Speaker 1: I do know, and I think this goes really to
Speaker 1: the heart of her question is that a lot of
Speaker 1: people on death row, they're sick. And if there were
Speaker 1: more hospitals, if mental hospitals would still be, you know,
Speaker 1: as they used to be, you know, many of them,
Speaker 1: a lot of these guys would not be on death row,
Speaker 1: they would be at the hospitals, there would be mental hospitals. So,
Speaker 1: you know, sometimes I look at him and I just
Speaker 1: noticed it. You know, their minds a just shot out.
Speaker 1: But you know, I get along with mostly everybody. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm just socially that way. You know, I'm wired up
Speaker 1: that way. You know, I can get in the conversation
Speaker 1: with somebody I think is totally out of his mind.
Speaker 1: But I just stayed there for two hours and talk
Speaker 1: to him. And I know that some of these people
Speaker 1: and I know they're sit I know they're tormented. It's
Speaker 1: the fact. This episode was written and produced by Donni
Speaker 1: Fazzari and myself, Corny Cole. Our theme song sentenced is
Speaker 1: compliments of the band Stick Figure from their album Set
Speaker 1: in Stone. Stu Sternbach composed the original music. Nate Deft
Speaker 1: did the sound design. For more information on Jarvis and
Speaker 1: to find out how you can follow his case and
Speaker 1: support his cause, please visit free Jarvis dot org For
Speaker 1: more podcasts. For my heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows. In your mind, the first night that you're out,
Speaker 1: where you're stay, have you imagined that I'll probably stay
Speaker 1: outside outside? Yeah? Why? Because I haven't seen the dark
Speaker 1: outside these buildings for thirty forty years, maybe one time.
Speaker 1: So I want to stay outside in a tent. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I just want to be outside. Yeah, is
Speaker 1: that that simple? I just want to be outside where
Speaker 1: I am. I want to be outside. You have sixty
Speaker 1: seconds remaining? Wow, there something wrong with that? Not at all,
Speaker 1: not at all. I guess it's just something that that
Speaker 1: I take for granted on the outside, and the fact
Speaker 1: that that's the first place you'd want to be. I
Speaker 1: would imagine shelter, But you want anything but shelter, right.
Speaker 1: I don't want to be in no once. I don't
Speaker 1: want to be inside anything but outside. Yes, that's the fact.