Locked In with Ian Bick - Hittin Licks | Jay Williams

Episode Date: June 11, 2023

Growing up in poverty and trying to escape his deadbeat father, a teenage Jay Williams begins a life of crime which results in a 10 year prison stint. Listen to find out about the crime that lands Jay in prison, surviving a 10 year sentence and how he was able to turn it into becoming one of YouTube's biggest prison content creators. Connect with Jay Williams:https://www.youtube.com/@Jaywilliamsletslivelife Connect with Ian Bick: https://www.ianbick.com/Subscribe to our membership program on YouTube to get early access to interviews, see behind the scenes photos & more:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRvVklIft6DMelVW18M0oBw/joinPowered by Q29 Productions, LLC Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Real California, milk. Hey guys, it's Ian Bick, and we are back with another episode of Lockton with Ian Bick. On today's episode, I have a super exciting guest, Jay Williams, one of YouTube's biggest prison content stars with over 300,000 subscribers, is on the show today where we dive in to his whole entire story in this first exclusive interview setting. Thank you guys for tuning into the show. Sit back, relax, and enjoy my interview. with Jay Williams. If you want to get 50% off my Locked in merch, check out Ianbick.com and use code locked in subscriber at checkout to get 50% off my merch. We have shirts in white, black. They're

printed on next level apparel, really soft, really comfortable, great in the gym. Grab yours today. Also, we are now offering exclusive memberships on my YouTube channel. For $4.99 a month, you could get early access to interviews, behind the scenes, photos with guests, and interact with me on a personal level. Jay Williams, welcome to the show, The Man, the Myth, the Legend. Literally, I've gotten since we first started so many comments saying you have to interview Jay Williams, and I'm glad we could finally make this happen. Thanks for coming out today. How are you doing, man?

I'm good, man. It's a pleasure. Thank you for having me on, man. This is kind of, it's amazing, man. It's a marvel to look at you as well. You've come up fast. And it's a pleasure to be a part of the process. I'm good, though.

Thank you, man. I know you don't give everyone the time of day, so we really appreciate it, and it means a lot. I try to be fair, man. That's the thing I try to set myself apart. You'll go into sometimes you might see a podcast that's only got 500 subs, and you'll see me in there.

I don't ever want to be that guy that gets too big or that feels that I'm better than anybody else because I'm not. I'm literally the same way, because I'll do, like, when people hit me up, I'll do every podcast. Right. Because you could pick up a couple listeners. Who cares if they have one listener or two?

Right. Whatever. I mean, I look at it as you, I was in that position before, too, hungry to get onto those bigger pods and get those bigger guests. Right. So to give someone back that opportunity, I mean, granted, it doesn't always work out with scheduling, but I'm very receptive when people reach out to that. And I love to do it. You got to remember where you come from. You got to remember you were once that guy would.

500 subs and I'm sure there were guys that didn't give you the time of day. I don't ever want to be that guy. Yeah, because there's a lot of people in the world. There's a lot. There's more of those guys than anything and I'm not that guy. All right, so let's get into it. What's life like for a young Jay Williams? Where are you from? What's your family like? How'd you grow up? Born in Richmond, Virginia. We weren't in Richmond long. We took off to Charlotte. My dad had went to prison for murder prior to me being born and got out, met my mom, had me. Trouble started brewing again, stuff that kind of was left behind from the homicide. So they take off.

We had to Charlotte, North Carolina. We were poor. When I say poor, we were poor. We grew up in trailer parks. We are the definition of having left. You know, the type of kids at the schools come together to get our backpacks or winter jackets. They help with Thanksgiving. We're the kid that people come together to help with Christmas.

My father, he was a treatment. He worked trees. But he was also one of those guys that if he couldn't make a whole bunch of money at once, he wasn't going to do it. He was also a criminal. He dabbled in this. He dibled in that. I would see it. My mom, to this day, she is one of the hardest working women I've ever met.

This is a woman that at one point she was a blacksmith. I remember her having three jobs to support us. And I've got a brother and two sisters. My mom would, she would literally work, come in, take an hour nap, back to work, come in, took a two-hour nap, and back out the door. So there was a lot of time where we were unsupervised. My dad's out wherever. My mom's in between jobs or sleep on the couch,

which kind of leaves us to run a month. I grew up in a super abusive household. Like super, super abusive household. My father was a demon. And I don't mean in the physical form, I mean, just in the way that he treated us. He was an abused child. He was raised on an Indian reservation, Cherokee, North Carolina, Indian man. And he did not think that there was any such thing as abusing your child.

He thought that those are my kids. I'd do what I want to them. So a punch to the face at five years old was as normal as a hug from your dad. Violence was, violence ruled everything. So it kind of pushed me away from the house. I wanted to get away from the house as much as possible because my biggest fear was being at home. Like life for me was terrifying. My dad scared me and hurt me past what anybody should ever have to deal with.

To this day, I've never met a man that I feared as much as my father. And when I say he hurt me, he hurt me, like, as if I was his enemy. I'm this dirty little boy with blonde hair, and he would punch, hit, and then say things that just don't go away. No, is this the dad that also went to prison for murder? Yes. And he was out by the time you're five years old? He committed the murder prior to me being born. And got out, did his time?

He got out and met my mom. How much time did he do for a murder? It was a self-defense plea. He pulled up, there was a shootout that was taking place. When he pulled up to this bar, there was a big house next door to it, and there was this other group of guys, him and his brothers. My dad has multiple brothers. They were savages in the streets.

Like you see dudes drilling out of Chicago. My dad and his brothers were doing that shit back in the 70s. So he pulls up to this bar and there's a full-fledged gunfight taking place. His brother is laying on the ground With his uncle Roger is laying there with a missing leg He had already got hit with a 12 blast from a 12 gauge Took his leg all the way off Up until he died in 97 he had no leg

As soon as my dad steps out the truck He gets hit with the first shot Boom they hit him with a shotgun He falls up in the truck He grabs his shotgun Falls back down the ground The guy shoots him a second time Unloads the second round of buckshot into him

The man walked up stood over and went to go Reload the shotgun He pointed the shotgun of his chin and squeezed took his head on. Oh, wow. It's a self-defense plea. He went there knowing, you know what I mean? Like, he could hear the gunshots and all that from what I've been told.

This was pre-J before I was born. So he went there knowing that this was taking place. So there is some fault on his part going there with a weapon, knowing that there's a gun fire taking place. But he was also shot twice and killed the man that was getting ready to kill him. So he ended up, I think he didn't get, but he didn't do like two or three years on a self-defense plea. He did it here in Virginia, did a place called the Wall, Southampton, very common places, violent places. But all that was prior to me existing, prior to me being born. He got out and he would go on to, prior to meeting my mom, he would go on to have several children with the wife of the man that he killed.

Oh, wow. Talk about crazy op shit. He went on to have kids with the wife of the man that he killed. It's crazy. Kind of like, you know what I mean, just smeared in your face type thing. That didn't work out, and it would be shortly after that he met my mom. I'm surprised she was with him, though, too. There was just this weird entanglement of two different families that were both just known in the streets for doing their thing.

Said with the men and the women, you got women from this side, women from this side, men from this side. And they just kind of clashed in the streets behind the scenes like the men and the women, I guess, would do their things. and yeah, he ended up having children with that woman after he had killed her husband. Wow. And then he met my mom. So you're five years old, you're getting abused by him. Where's your mother in this?

Is she trying to stop him? Is she trying to remove you from the family? My mother, she did what she could. My mother, my dad used to drink, right? Tell your story real quick. Beat my mom real bad one time. We were living in this trailer park. And there was this big water tower up there.

I used to climb up this water tower, and I would sit. And it's way, you know what a water tower looks like, it's way up in the air. And I remember I used to climb up there and I'd sit on the side and I just let my feet kind of dangle when I look down at the trailer park. Look at the cars coming. I could see the interstate. At this point, my dad's drinking real heavy.

Whenever he would drink, he was all the man. He was always a violent man, 24 hours a day. He was just a violent man. But he gets into, like, really, really violent when he drinks. So he's beating my mom real bad one time. And I took off out the back trailer door and I run to this water tower. and I'm climbing and I'm climbing and I'm climbing and I'm looking at the top and I'm crying. I know that my mom's being beat back on the trailer and I slip halfway up and I fall.

And they were setting new trailers out there. So there was a big mound of sand that these dump trucks had dumped out. That's what I ended up landing in. Well, after I fell, I was unconscious for a while. My dad quit drinking. When he quit drinking, he stopped beating my mom. She had taken us, taking us, you know, me and my brother, sisters, and left several times. My dad would always find her.

And he had her convinced that he didn't care about going to prison, that he would kill her. And then after he killed her, he would kill us. So she was kind of left in a position of sit there and shut up. Mind your business. If you want it, come do something. So in a sense, she was as scared as we were. She had to sit by and watch her. her children go through it. But she was no longer her. The mental abuse for her got much worse,

but the physical abuse stopped. And when the physical abuse stopped for her, it began for us. You know, and I was one of those children that, like I said, I was scared to death of my dad. But with my brothers and sisters, they were much smaller than me. You're the oldest. Yes. They were much smaller than me. And I couldn't take him hitting them, even though he did. So when they would do something wrong that I knew was going to lead to violence or him hurting one of them, I would take the blame. I would step up and I'd say I did it. And instantly, I'd be trying to defend myself. He grabbed me, slam me off the walls, beat me, hit me with whatever he could and just leave me laying there crumpled up.

So then the streets comes into play. We moved a lot. We didn't stay anywhere long. We'd either get evicted, put out, whatever the case may be. We moved a lot. plus with him being a criminal he was always paranoid so we just boom up in the middle of the night two o'clock in the morning grab whatever you can grab get the car we're leaving and we would just leave everything we had behind and we'd start over so then i get to a point to where i start meeting kids

in these neighborhoods and the last place i want to be is at home so i'm lashing out breaking into cars breaking into houses breaking into trailers vandalizing and i would just i didn't have to find the wrong crowd i was the wrong crowd i was the wrong crowd. Did you know what you were doing was wrong though? Absolutely. But you just were using it as your vice to kind of get away from... I can't. I can't say why I did it. I don't, I can't. There's no logical explanation to why a seven, eight year old kid would break in somebody's house. You know that's wrong. But I would. I would break in and steal things or just vandalize it. I mean, I remember we would live near a rock quarry and they had these, this shed where they kept this

dynamite in to blow up these rocks. And they had these quarter sticks and have. And they had these quarter sticks and half sticks and I remember taking them and blowing these bulldozers up with them and these giant like earth moving dump trucks lighting them and put them inside a gas tank and running and watching this heavy equipment blow up and I'm like eight years old and it was like the most beautiful thing to me and I didn't did I know what I was doing was wrong yeah but I really didn't care I only cared when the thought of getting caught came into it and I only cared them because I knew I'd have to deal with my dad. What about school? Was school an option? Could that have been a safe space for you? I went to school, but we were groomed. We were trained. You know what I mean? We were told,

if they asked how you got that bruise, you tell them this. And if you say anything different, I'll kill you. Don't forget, I will kill you. Yes, they'll lock me up. Yes, they'll put me in jail, but I will get out and I will kill you. And we believed him. We were questioned. School would see the bruises, the marks, what happened? Or we were planning. We were planning. We were plan, I fell off the trampoline, or I did this, or I did that. So in a sense, he created little liars as well. Like, he's teaching us to be manipulative, deceptive, all to protect him and what he's doing. So the school, they tried, but without any real, anybody saying, yeah, this is what's going on. There's nothing they can do but send the child home. And what's like your, like, as you

got older, did you ever reflect back on it? Like, when you got to your teenage years, in high, school and whatnot, were you reflecting back on these scenarios and what was happening? I don't think I ever really, I don't think I ever really reflected. I just progressed. I didn't slow down. It just went from one bad to another bad. You know what I mean? I would end up getting in trouble when I was 10 and it was shortly after that, I got jumped. I used to get jumped by these three kids in the school, right? There's three black kids. Cam Kour and Rico. It's crazy. I remember their names. I have a crazy memory. Siri, I have a sick memory, dude, but. I have a sick memory, But these three kids, Cam Coon Rico, used to jump me.

So I steal this knife from this yard sale one day, the big rambo knife, a buoy knife with the compass on the bottom and the serrated edge. And I take it to school. And every day after lunch, they would jump me in his bathroom. And I would fight these kids. I wasn't scared to fight, but I couldn't beat them. You know what I mean? I'm already bruised.

And they would just add to the pain I had going on. But I had so much anger in me that I couldn't back down, man. I couldn't see it happening. So I take this knife to school. And they go to jump me in the bathroom one day and I pulled the knife out. And I wasn't play pimping with the knife. I turned around and I commenced to try and slice these three kids up in this bathroom. Now there's other kids in the bathroom.

Now they're stirring it on. But when that big knife came out and I went to try to start cutting people, everybody runs out the bathroom. Now I'm the psycho kid, right? I wasn't a psycho kid when I was getting jumped. But now that I've brought a knife to school, I'm the psycho kid. So that's the first time they put me in handcuffs. You got arrested for that scenario. They took me out of the school in handcuffs.

So didn't the system kind of fail in a way that you're the one getting bullied and picked on and they're avoiding the bruises on you and not seeing how you're growing up and being treated? This is 1990s. So this is prior to the school shootings, prior to Columbine, prior to all that. At that point, you could bring a knife to school and it wasn't a big deal. Yeah. You know what I mean? Today you bring anything that even resembles a weapon.

It's a big deal. So they lock me up. They take me up out of the kids. Oh, he's crazy. He pulled a knife on us. And then they tried to flip it and make it seem like a race thing. I'm like, I'm 10 years old. Like, what are y'all talking about?

Y'all jump me daily now that I've brought something to school to even the odds. I'm the bad guy. But the terrible thing about locking somebody up at that age is is you remove the element of fear. My biggest fear was home. So you're telling me you're going to lock me up and you're going to put me in there where all I got to worry about is these other kids. And I don't have to worry about this 260-pound man playing Donkey Kong with my head

or punching me in my ribs or telling me how much of a disgusted human being I am and how much he hates me you're telling me I can go in here and I don't have to worry about being woken up in the middle of night being beat by him I'll sign up take me so you thrived off that and you pursued that

I had no cares I had no fear of being incarcerated because at that age where do you go this isn't this isn't Tom Saw you know Huckleberry Finn where you just run down the railroad tracks with a stick with your stuff on the back life don't work like that At 10 years old, 11 years old, where do you go? Now, are you getting like a long juvie stay for that?

No. You're in and out. It's in and out. You go in, you stay there a little bit, then your parents come get you. Do you end up finishing high school? No. My dad died when I was 17. Oh, wow.

What was that feeling like to have a figure that was as polarizing as him pass away? Are you happy or are you sad? Mad. You're mad. Mad. I'm mad. I'm mad that I didn't never get to. I didn't never get to whoop him.

I'm mad that I didn't never get to show him that I'm not that little blonde hair boy no more. You can't beat me no more. I'm mad that I didn't never get to stand toe to toe with him and tell him hit me now. That's how I felt at 17. Did you feel at peace at all, though, when he passed? No, no.

I felt like a chapter had been ripped out the fucking book. That's how I felt. I felt like this is unresolved, and it's not fair. Because our last altercation was that. It was me standing up to him And my mother getting in between us And separating us and me telling him I'm not a child no more

And you can't beat me I told him right there with my mom Standing there And the girl I used to be with I told him you can't, I'm not a child no more And you can't beat me no more And my mother's pushing me out the door And trying to keep us

She's doing everything she can To keep us from going at it And she pushes me out the door And shuts the door and locks it And it wouldn't be in the next day or two. My aunt called and said, your dad's dead.

He died in the hospital during open heart surgery. He had a blood clot that went from his heart. Well, I think it actually went from his leg to his brain during surgery. Wow. So our last interaction was a violent one. A lot of messed up things were said in those moments. And I really, I needed him to feel my pain. I needed him to feel my brother and sister's pain.

I needed him to feel the pain that he had inflicted on my mother mentally, emotionally, physically. I needed him to feel that. How did your mom feel about his passing? Free. Free. My mom, and I love my mom, and she hates that I talk about this stuff. But like I've told her, this is my story. She's like, I wish you wouldn't talk about this and put my business out there.

But it freed her. she was when it comes to being a victim she had been a victim much longer than all of us she had four kids with this man and she was more or less stuck with him till death to us part

whatever that may be so when he died she really got to know who she was she had been with him since she was 19 years old you know what I mean all these years he's in his 50s at this point she's free She can go be the beautiful woman that she is.

She can smile. She can leave the house. She can actually just be a normal person and not live in fear anymore. Was it hard? Of course. This is a man she'd been with, you know, 20 plus years. But to sum that up, him passing set her free. And you don't finish high school at this point.

No. What was like that decision to not finish high school? I was in the streets. So the streets was your full blown. I got locked up. and I was doing the school in the detention center, but I kept getting in the fights in the detention center. So then they would, when you get in a fight,

all they do is just put you in yourself for 24 hours. And then you come back out tomorrow. Then I would come out the next day, and I get into another fight and they put me in. So I didn't want to do the schooling in the detention center. If you don't do the schooling, you just sit in there while, you sit in your cell while everybody else is in class. And then at the end of the day,

when school is over it, then you come out your cell with everybody else. So I started bucking on the schooling in detention center. So the next thing you know, I failed ninth grade because I've been locked up. I can't finish the school year. Ninth grade rolls around again. I'm out in the streets selling this, selling that, committing crimes until 2, 3 o'clock in the morning.

So when other kids are asleep, getting prepared to go to school, I'm out running the streets. I'm out there in a hoodie. I'm breaking in cars. I'm at older kids' houses and older guys' houses. I'm doing everything that I shouldn't be. School is not a priority to me. At that age, at 16 years old, I'm an alcoholic.

At 16 years old, I am drinking. seven days a week. Are you doing drugs at all or just liquor? I smoked. I started smoking at a young young age. I mean, a young young age. I think the first time I smoked, I was seven. I'm about, I'd say smoking full time around the age of 10, 11. Did you ever get into hardcore drugs? I did some of the stuff, but I never really got into it. Like, I snorted powder. Um, you never had to an attic level. No, no, no, no, no. I sold Coke for long time. I sold crack for a long time. I sold pills. I would sell anything that I could turn a profit with. I did have my phased wig Coke where I think we went, I had so much of it. It was just so plentiful. It was like

a four or five month run of just every day, just snort and blow, snort and blow, snowing blow, selling powder. And then one day I just woke up and I was like, this is whack. Like I'm looking around and people crashed out on the couch and ashtrays overflowing and beer cans everywhere in the house. It's got fleas and it smells terrible in here. And I'm like, the same where it's that. I don't want to do this no more. So I just, I didn't lose anything behind it. You know what I mean? It's not like I became homeless or I did anything terrible to get it because I was selling it.

But it wasn't, like I've heard people talk about the withdrawals. No, I just woke up one day. It was like, I don't want to do Coke no more. This is kind of nasty. So you're one of those people that always needed to try something at least once just to like try it. Yeah, I try it. And then, but the only thing that ever really had a hold on me was alcohol. And what was it about alcohol that you liked?

Do you think it came from your dad at all? Or do you think it was just something that you developed on your own? It was the first thing that I, it was my first coping. It was the first thing that I ever came across that helped me kind of deal with what I had going on. It helped me let loose. I enjoyed the feeling of being intoxicated and just being able to laugh. But at the same time, I've got all this anger built up in me. I'm actually a nice guy, but you take somebody that's got a bunch of unresolved pain and anger,

and you give them a big bottle of Jack Daniels. And they drank that bottle, then the truth is going to start to come out and who that person is really inside, you're going to start to see. Yeah. And that's what would happen is I would drink and I would become violent. Just all the time you're drinking. Oh, I drink seven days a week. I quit drinking November 30th, 2021. I finally put it down.

My wife put her foot down. She said, you're going to choose. And at this point, when I come on from prison, I'm not in no crimes. I'm not doing anything stupid. But my drinking is become a problem. I'm drinking in the mornings. You know what I mean? As soon as I get up, I'm starting my day off with a 7-11 cup with two big twisted teas in it

because I don't think it smells like alcohol. So my wife kind of said, hey, you're going to get with this or get with that. Now, drinking that much, you were still able to function as like a criminal, like, able to commit robberies, do whatever you were doing. Yeah, drinking that much? Yeah, absolutely. That didn't throw you off your game at all? I didn't care if I got caught, Ian. What game?

So you felt like you were at the... the point in your life where you had nothing to lose. I'd been like that since the first time I got locked up. Like I told you when I was a child, I got locked up. So they took away the fear of incarceration. Well, you know what they say? That makes one of the most dangerous human beings the person that has nothing to lose when he walks into a room.

Yeah. Those are the ones you got to watch out for. It's a true statement. I robbed and covered my face and wear gloves. Do none of that shit. What do you think that was? You wanted to get locked up? you wanted to die?

Like, what was that mentality of not being afraid? I don't know. I think when we go back to addictions, I think crime was my addiction. I think that's what it was. Some people, I don't know if it was the adrenaline rush or what it was, I started at such a young age that it's not like one day I'm just going to wake up

and be the captain of a softball team. You know what I mean? Like, this is all I know. It's all I knew. And then when you put the alcohol in it And then you mix the Xanax in it and you go into full-fledged blackout mode. And everywhere you go, you leave a shit storm. You know what I mean?

Everywhere you go, you're no longer welcome there anymore. It doesn't really matter. I go out and I knew a lot of times when I left the house. Like, there was times I'd be out on two, three bonds. They knew me by name in the jail. You know what I mean? I bond out that morning, be back that night. And the same guard that bonded me out, he hasn't even left his shift yet.

And I'm back. Like, damn, you broke a record this. time, you know, like, I didn't care, man. I think a lot of that goes back to to being young and getting locked up. It took away the fear. When you look back on it now, do you think there was another option, another path you could have taken, or do you think you were always destined and meant to go down that path? Like, there was no other option as that kid because of your circumstances. I think that everything that happened happened exactly the way it was supposed to happen, to put me exactly where I'm at right now. That's what I think. That's a beautiful thing. I do

When it comes to regrets, I regret hurting people. That is something I do regret. I regret anybody that I ever hurt in any way, whether it be mentally, physically, emotionally, that I regret. But I think everything that took place in my life had one piece of that puzzle not been placed the way that it was, we wouldn't be sitting here right now. Now, how does your teenage self that's committing crimes evolve up until like early adulthood, early 20s that eventually leads to you actually doing like. like your first bit of significant prison time? I don't know if you would even call it evolution. It's kind of just like water.

You just go with the flow. And that's what it was, man. I didn't, I never really, I'm not going to say I didn't set out to rob people because I 100% set out to rob people. But it didn't start off like that. It started off with, we got into it, what a dude one night, we were in Philly.

He was running his mouth. And we ended up messing his dude up pretty bad. and we ran his pockets and he had eight grand in his pockets I'm on the run I'm in Philadelphia I'm from Virginia I've got no job in Philly

I'm selling what little drugs I can here and there to get by but we just knocked this dude I ran his pocket now we're splitting eight grand three ways hey we might have something here you know what I mean just in a matter of a minute and a half

we just come up with $8,000 so that light that went off a light bulb goes off okay I'm out here nickel and diamond And when you can look around out here and clearly see who's got money and who don't. Like there's no point going over there and hitting the man that's pushing a shopping cart full of cans. When you've got this dude over there, we've been seeing all day go back to fourth-to-car windows selling drugs.

Just wait until nobody's looking and go rob him. And that's what we started to do. And at 19, I got caught in Philly. Me and two other guys, we got caught for robbery. And they booked us. Boom. I tried to run. I was too inebriated.

I come running out this alleyway and this female cop. I think I shocked her. I don't think, I mean, I think she was like kind of standing there waiting to see if she's seen anything. And that guy was called the Jump Out Squad. They just come through and he's like Jeep Charities with no doors. And they would just hop out on them and you got to get gone on. I mean, we're alleyways, fences, getting loose on them, right? But that night in particular, I'd never really messed with boat before, PCP.

But it's called getting wet. That night in particular, I had smoked some boat. and my homeboy has some lean so I drank some promethythine some tussohn X, popped a whole bunch of Xanx, some drinking all day, and his robbery pops off just out the blue. We're standing out there, this dude comes up. He's like, oh, I got that boat, and he pulls out to PCP, and one of my homeboys hits him. Boom, snatches, he grabs him to the alleyway. I know what to do, you know what I mean?

Even though I can barely stand up, I'm so messed up. Like, I'm white boy wasted. I'm trashed. But straight into the alleyway I go on top of the day. dude, freeze, jump out squad seasons. They're driving through Southwest. And we're off Elmwood Ave and they see us and they jump out. And I take off through the alleyway.

I've got stuff on me, gun on me, drugs on me, all this different stuff. So I hide behind his trash can and I get everything off of me because I know that I'm so wasted. There's no possible way I'm going to outrun the fattest cop out here. You know what I mean? The oldest cop, I'm caught. It's hard for me to even walk at this point. And how old are you at this point? 19.

19, okay. I come running out of this alleyway. And like I said, I think I scared. I think I startled the cop because they had at this point spread out, trying to, I guess, circle us in. And within this neighborhood, coming out to the alleyway, and I turn and I see the cop. She goes, oh, and she hits me in the nose.

She was on her walkie-talking. She hits me in the bridge of my nose. Brace my nose and drops me. They cuff me. They take me away. So they locked me up in Philly. I pleaded out to 11.5 to 23 on that. It's 11.5 to 23 months.

11.5 being the lowest, 23 being the most. do. I pled it out on that. I got out and it's right back to it. Like nothing didn't even happen. And it would be that cycle up until the age of 24 when I caught the robbery that sent me away. Do you think that the system fails in that sense, like that you were able to keep getting those chances with lower jail time? Like what if you had gotten a higher sentence that first time? Do you think that would have deterred you? or do you think if there was some other program or something for you, that could have helped? Or were you so stuck in your ways that you're going to continue to do that? No, I believe there's things that could have been done.

I think more digging should have been done. Whenever you flash back, you go back way before all that. You go back to me being a kid, me being, you know, pre-pubescent, 11, 12 years old. As an adult, you should stop and ask yourself, what is going on with the shop? This is not normal. You cannot tell me that his mom drives a Volvo and his dad drives a sob. Just from the outside looking in, you should be able to tell there's something wrong. That's when people need to really stop and take a look at the bigger picture.

What's wrong here? But there was none of that. There was nobody to intervene and say, hey, what is really going on here? Let's get your parents in here and talk to them. Like, there was none of that. It was just you go in, you come out. You go in, you come out. And the way the system is designed, it's a point system.

You go to court and it's you walk out. You just got a couple points. Oh, you get another conviction. You walk out. You just got a couple more points. It's like speeding tickets and DUIs. And then one day they take your license. Your license being your life.

One day you walk in, it's like, well, you got all these points. And with today's points, oh, you're now going to prison. And my points were so high. I caught a malicious wound and a robbery. When you were 24. When I was 24. And that day started off crazy, man. Yeah, take us through that day.

It had been a crazy series of months. But that day in general, I woke up. I'm at this chick's house. My homeboys messed with them on the sofa. I haven't showered on like two or three days. I remember I had these blue jeans that had the NBA patches all over them. You know what I mean? Like the big team patches all over the jeans.

And I had been in those for like three days. And pockets are empty. So I wake up that morning and I stayed with Zan. I'll pop a whole handful of Xanax. Boom. Right out the gate, I'll pop a bunch of bluefobiles. Go get some beer. Go get some liquor. It's typical Tuesday for me, right? Later that evening, I've already decided earlier that day. I'm going to rob people tonight. My pockets are empty. I'm going robber. I have a homeboy, Philly up. What are you doing? He's got two kids at this point. I've got a son also, but at this point, I'm not a dad. I'm just a dude in the streets that's got a kid.

You know what I mean? I was no father. I'm a father now. I hit my home well What are you doing? I'm at the crib with the girl, man, and the kids She's making something I said, I had a hollaback head you No, no, no, what's up, would you? I said, I'm gonna go hit legs

What about what you're talking about? I said, when we do what I do? You stay with the girl, I'm good. He's like, no, no, I'm on the way. So he comes and scoops, you know. He's got this younger dude, Dennis with him, right? And I'm like, who's a young boy on the back seat?

He's like, it's my homeboy. He's the young and don't worry about him. And I'm looking at him like, man, we don't need a third person. I don't know this dude. He's like, no, he's all right. He's going to watch out. So we go to the ABC store.

We get another bottle of liquor. I've already, at this point, drank a 24-pack. I've eaten the blue, 20 blue footballs I had earlier that day. I've got more footballs, more bars. I am just a walking, fumbling, tumbling mess at this point. We go to a liquor store. We get more liquor, riding around all this beer inside the truck. Now, we're in an excursion on 23s, all chromed out, money green.

We stand out. At this time, 23 Lexani's were the biggest rooms that we're out. So we're very noticeable. If you're going to rob people, you probably shouldn't do it in a big green excursion on 23s, right? So we go through and we do a couple robberies and then we go to this one neighborhood and I said, hey, park. I didn't want people to notice a truck. So we parked in this apartment complex and we walk over to where there's different people outside. It's late at night.

And we're walking down the street and there's one dude standing on the seam, standing off the side. He's kind of in the shadows. And we walk up on him and I push up on, dude, real strong. And come to realize I'm so kneebra, I don't even know I know the dude. And he's like, Jay, what are you doing? What are you in your homeboy? Come in. I'm running his pocket.

He's like, Jay, yeah, what are you doing? What are you doing, man? And I'm like, what? He's like, oh, it's me. And I like, I kind of come out of the haze and I realize I know this dude. I used to sell weed for his dad. I'm like, oh, my bad, man. I'm like, you can get the fuck in the house.

You probably shouldn't be out here this time or night. Like, what are you trying to get hurt? He's like, man, if you tripping, what are you doing? I said, whatever. He's like, you got a cigarette. So I said, yes, I gave you to him. I roll out. We're walking.

I see another dude coming down the street. And I tell the young boy, go over there, watch and make sure nobody out here comes in this direction. And as the dude's getting closer, we're walking, and it's complete darkness. There's a street light right there that has been shot out. But as we're getting closer, I call out a name. I just call out a random name to make the dude take I know him. And he says, that's not my name. And I said it again.

And before he could say anything, I was on him. I reached out, and I'm not bragging. I'm just stating the facts. Dude, I do this at home. He was stupid. A racked the dude up. And I yoke him up. I tell him, run your pockets.

And my home boy is running his pockets. And he yells out for help. There's other people down the street. And when he does, my homeboy hits him. Blah! Dude hits hard. Shatters his eye socket. He gurgles.

and yell us for help again. He hits him a second time. Bam! Grakes his jaw, knocks out teeth. He goes limp. I drop him. When I drop him, he hits the curb. His head hits the side curve.

Messes him all up. We'd run his pockets. Take off. Get back in the truck. At this point, we had done quite a bit that night. So now he's went home, took his young boy, dropped him off.

I'm riding around with his chick. I get a call. Robbery Homicide. They had your number. We speak with such and such. This is him. Who is this? Detective such and such with robbery homicide.

Where are you at? I said, what's this about? You said, you know what this is. I said, no, I don't know what this is. What's going on? Why are you calling me? He said, your name has come up as a suspect. You were seen in the area

where somebody was hurt very bad tonight and might possibly die. This person's not doing good. So now you got me confused somebody else. The guy I tried to rob earlier that night put me at the scene of the crime. he'd gotten a cigarette from me. He knew I was out there.

He knew I was up to no good. I just tried to rob him. The guy that we did rob, ended up being one of his friends. So when the paramedics and the cops show up and everything, he tells them, no, no, no, no, such, such, such. So I tell the cops, I said, detectives, I said, no, no, not me. I'm at the beach.

He says, if you're at the beach, hey, I got the wrong guy, right, Mr. Williams? I said, yeah, you got the wrong guy, man. Mind you now, I'm inebriar. Oh, what are you sleeping on? the beach, you're a bum. I said, now I got her room. That's where I messed up. Oh, well, they called me from the hotel phone. As soon as your number pops up from the hotel at the beach, can't be you, right? Damn, I got to go. I hang up the phone. I look at the girl, so we got to go. She's like, where we're going? We're going back to Philly. She's like, well, what's going on? She don't

even know what I've been doing that night. It's not like when I get around the chicks, I brag about what I do. She has no clue what I've been doing this night, right? She just knows I got a pocket full of money. I got a bottle of liquor, some leftover beer. Cool, let's go. I call my home, Wesleyo. We got to bounce. What's up? He's sleep. I said, a robbery homicide just hit my phone, so they're going to be hitting your door pretty soon. At this point, I don't have a residence. Like I told you, I'm sleeping on people's couches, wherever. So you're not going to run up in my house. It don't exist. We bounce. Go to Philly. We're out in Philly. And mind you, I want you to this, I kind of lift this out. I had only been out 42 days.

from your previous arrest. I was released in Philly 42 days prior to this. And you got right back in. On a violation, on a probation violation, I had been in the House of Corrections, which is another institute in Philly. I'd only been out 42 days when I committed this crime. We take off to Philly.

We're out there a matter of days, maybe five days at the most, when Philadelphia, the police department, and the U.S. Marshals hit the house we ran. How'd they find that house? Did someone tip them off? Like, how does it just... Yeah, my homeboy got to argue with his baby mom on Mother's Day.

Oh, no, did she call? He called and told her. I don't message you like that. I got a new chick. Okay. This is where they're at. Yeah, girls are vicious. Like, you see it in prison, like when guys would have cell phones,

you do something. They find out you're cheating or talking to someone else. Call the office line, the counselor, hey, so-and-so has a cell phone, he's on FaceTime right now. They raid the room. Bam, they're going to the hole. And she said it. She said it right in front of me here one time.

She said, I would rather see you in prison than another female. And she hated me because, you know, I was, it's not like, I mean, was I good influence? No. Was I a bad influence? No, I've spoken to his mom's assistant. He's back in prison doing nine years. I'm out here. Yeah.

You know what I mean? Like, we were just, we were like all in water. When you put the two of us together, it did not. mixed well. But yes, she was bitter about another female. So she called, you know, her being the baby mama, these Robbie Homestead, has been by the house a dozen times now because they live together. Yeah. She's playing stupid. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Until he calls on Mother's Day saying, yeah, I got another girl. She's this, she's that. At that point right there, the whole script flip. She picked up the phone and he called. How long were you guys on the run for before this

happened? Six days. Oh, it was only six days between that. They take me back to the House of Corrections and I walked back into the cell that I was in about 48, 49 days prior. Those guys all greeted you. My old cellmate did. He asked me what I was going to do when I got out. He said, what are you going to do when you get out of here? He said, I'm going to do what I always do. I'm going to get a pistol and I'm going to get it popping.

I'm going to get right back out there and do what I do, man. And it's crazy because he was a black dude and he had the same last name, Williams. I come back onto that tier, mine a few weeks later into the same cell. And I walked back in. And he was looking at him because I went home from court. So I went to court one day and just never returned. So he didn't know what my outcome was. You know what I mean?

He just knows he went to court. He didn't come back. He must have got released from court. I come walking back into the cell one day. And I'm like, what's up, man? And he was getting ready. He was looking at football numbers from some robberies. And he was younger to me, but he used like, dude would kick knowledge.

He would tell me, stop, man. You end up like me. And I walked in the cell and he looked up at me. He was like, oh, stop playing, man. He was like, I thought you got to let loose. What, they just sent you to the other place? I was like, I did get a let loose. What are you doing?

I got robbery charges. So then they, aside from the flight I took today, that would be the only time I'd ever flown. They put you on the plan. I sat in there for, for, they have 90 days if you fight it to come and get you. They have to get governor's warrants. It's called the FOJ, future justice. If you waive your rights, they have 30 days.

30 day mark rolls around. I'm thinking I'm good. Ain't nobody showed up. They tell me, Williams, bag and bag. So I go down the booking. I know I'm standing there and I'm like, yeah, they changed me out of my clothes. And then I see a cop. I hear somebody go, what is a Chesterfield County?

That's the county I'm from. And I look up and I see a local cop. I don't know him, but I know that uniform is from the county I live in. And we're in Philadelphia and he ain't supposed to be here. And you're like, you're fucked. I know I'm fucked. I look out. There's a U.S. Marshal and there's a police officer.

And I'm like, Williams. And I come to the front of the bullpen. He's got my face card. He says, you're my guy step out so I step out like put the black box on me take me to the airport put me on a single engine Cessna you're on a commercial plane or a private plane I'm on a single engine Cessna I'm like on the plane that like Johnny Depp was driving in below a little plane with a little you know what do they borrow someone's plane or whatever it was a the US Marshall had a private the pilot's license okay

so they went to a local airport we need a plane where the police they gave them a plane they flew to Philadelphia got me and flew my ass back to Virginia That is wild They give you any snacks or anything No they gave me a set of handcuffs That they handcuffed my feet to the floorboard

Oh wow on the plane They don't even do that on Connaree No they said why what do you He's like well the plane goes down We know where to find you at And they said we don't want you You're facing a lot of time You know I mean

I've already been convicted of malicious woman And I've already been convicted of robbery I've got these convictions under my belt I'm looking at a lot of time. So what are you actually charged with in this one? What are the charges? Initially, it was malicious wound by mob because it was two or more.

Having that young in there, which ended up turning state evidence against us, he ended up testifying against us, made three people. So that's malicious wounding by mob. But once he turned against us, that took him out of the case, it cuts it down to two people.

So then it turns it into malicious wounding and robbery. How much time are you facing? 40 years. 40 years you're facing. They gave me, I fought it. They gave me 20 for the robbery with 10 suspended, 20 for malicious wound, and with 20 suspended. So out of 40, 30 was suspended 10 to serve.

So you had to serve 10 years? Yes. And you took a plea deal. No. You went to trial. Yeah, I was. I don't plead. You went to trial?

Yeah. Well, you pled early on in life you pled. Yeah, I don't plead. For me to plead, because here's the thing, for me to plea, I have to tell on him. If I, the moment I say I'm taking a plea deal, I just implicated him and everything. Because you had multiple people. Well, I had him there. So I have, I mean, as far as the streets go, there's only one thing I can do.

And it's keep my mouth closed. I didn't do it. Yeah. If I take a plea deal, they know 100% he was with me. But can that be used against him in court? They could say that his partner took. Yes, his co-defendant took a plea deal, Your Honor. The guy that was with him that night is saying he did it.

What did they offer you, though, out of curiosity? 27. 27 years? With how many suspended? That was my plea. They came in and said, prosecutor said, your record right now. Take this deal. It's a good deal 27 years. So it didn't come out. It would have been worse if you pled. Yeah. You got last time after trial. Absolutely. They came in. I fired

the lawyer. He came in. We had a lawyer visit. They called me, William's got a lawyer. So I go down the visitation room. I'm sitting down looking at my lawyer. I've been in jail a while now. Pick a old scruffy beard. I didn't get into a fight. So I'm in the hole. I'm in a red jump suit. And he's like, hey, got you a pretty good deal. I said, all right. I've paid this lawyer. eight grand what's the deal 27 years what did you say 27 years he's saying it's like he's saying days like he's saying months you said years he's like yeah 27 years that's their offer you're fired you're not my lawyer just the fact that you would even come in here and say that to me lets me know you don't have my best interest is a heart refund the rest of my money you're

fired how do you have the money for an attorney just from the robberies and i was dating a stripper at the time. You were dating a stripper. Yes. How was that? That was cool. She was actually, she wasn't like the stripper. She was like the door girl. She worked the door. She would go on a strip, but she made a lot of money up there. So I had money and she had money so the money combined took care of the lawyer. She definitely played a major part in it. Did you have any kids at all at this point? I did. You had already had a kid. I had a two-year-old. Wow. And that's why I said in the beginning, like, I had a kid, but I wasn't a dad. Now I'm a dad and I'm a damn good dad. I'm a great dad. So they come back with another plea, 17 years. I said, what part of not guilty aren't y'all

getting? Well, I'm not here to plea. I didn't do it. Not guilty. So I ended up taking into trial and you found guilty and sentenced to 10 years. But it was a 40-year sentence with the 30 suspended. How many years of probation? Indefinite. But I did so good. Like, they could have kept me on probation the rest of my life. Wait, they could keep, they can sentence to Padiday presents, in the red corner, the undisputed, undefeated weed whacker guys. Champion of hurling grass and pollen everywhere. And in the blue corner, the challenger, extra strength, Hannity! Eye drops and work all day to prevent the release of histamines that cause itchy allergy eyes.

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I was off in eight months. They let you off. So my probation officer, I used to just show up to pee for free. I would literally show up to my PO's office and be like, I was paranoid. I was afraid they would lock me back up. That's crazy that they could give lifetime probation. Indefinite. As long as they determine.

So they determine never to let me off, then never. So I come in, I would go see my PO and she was a cool chick. And I'd be like, do you need me to pee? She was like, what are you doing here? I'm like, I just want to make sure. world because at this point I've changed everything. Everything about to me's changed. Everything you just heard, don't don't get this confused as me bragging or saying that's who I am. This is not who I am. That's who I was. Yeah. So I would, after eight months, she's like,

you don't need to be here. She's like, you've started a construction company. You have custody of your son. You have a home. You have a driver's license. You've paid off all your court funds. You're good. So within eight months, I was off probation. So this all, this change of heart, change of mentality happens in prison. Where do you go for your 10-year prison sentence? Where are you sent to? I go to Greensville. Greensville Correctional Center is the largest prison in the state of Virginia.

Majority lifers also where they do the executions. So it's like a max security prison? Yes, DC sniper was executed there. I've watched a lot. When I say watched, my cell window faced where they would take the guys in to execute them. So you interacted with people that were on death row in the state prison? Yeah. What are those interactions like?

having like a last word with one of them? No, no, no. They would house them at another place called Sussex. They would bring them to where we were at 72 hours prior to their execution. Is that usual for that to happen? Yes, it's protocol. I feel like in the Fed system, they're housed at the actual prison. No, it's protocol.

They house them at usually at Sussex, and then they bring them from Sussex to Greensville, 72 hours prior to them being killed, to them being executed. They bring them to Greensville, they put them in a cell, and then within the next 72 hours, they're executed. Is that an eye opener for you being like, wow, if you continue down this path, you could be where they're sitting, where they're standing.

I think one of the biggest eye-opener's was making friends with guys that I know I'm never going to be able to sit and talk with like me and you are. I have friends that are in there right now that I know will never come home that I had conversations with that used to tell me,

you don't want this, Jay. It's saying what you want. Like I've had dudes that you legitimately can't come in and tell you have 10 years because they don't want to hear that. because they don't have a number. You know what I mean? They would say, well, what do you got?

You got 10 years? Don't say that again. Or can you get him out to sell? I can't. I know these guys here, he ain't got enough time. 10 years, guys here, you got 10 years. They'd be like, oh, man, you almost at the gate. And I'm looking down, I'm like, I almost set the gate.

I got a decade to do. But this is a man that's got 6, 7, 800, no number. That place being around guys that I met some good guys, man. Some guys that I built bonds with. that made mistakes, just like I made. But the differences, they went a little too far, and they'll never come home again. So it's like a wake-up call to you to see that.

But even then, it didn't do it, man. It took counseling, therapy, what I needed as a child. I got that. Inside prison. Two years prior to coming home, I went through a lot. In the eight years that I was at Greensville, fighting, stabbings, there was a lot. I got mixed up in all the wrong stuff.

I worked, worked maintenance. you know, had my prison routine, just like anybody else got real big, jacked up, swore white dude, no, just did my thing. Were you in like a gang or anything? No. You never. No, no. I got jumped as soon as I got there.

First day I got there, I got jumped about three bloods. And that right there made me not like gangs. And you had just asserted your dominance and? I just, I mean, I didn't, I'm not going to say I stayed to myself because nobody truly stays in himself. You can say that, but you know, I goes, you're going to find somebody to hang out with. I pretty much more or less aligned myself with the right guys. Like, dudes knew what I was.

would fight. Dudes, no, I'd push that metal if I had to. And I made sure that the dudes that were around me would fight and would push that metal if you had to. Therefore, I don't need a gang. You know what I mean? I'll take three of them all day over 30 of them. Yeah.

Because I know what these three dudes will do. And that's pretty much, that's pretty much how I moved it. Relax, cool, lay back, make my money, stay out the way. Were you making money in prison? I came home and almost seven grams on books. What was the hustle? Tattooing. You tattooed in prison?

Yeah. Okay, you got to break this down. That's not much to us. That's what I did. I was so curious about like the, how do you make the tattoo gun? There's several different ways. We get beard trimmers, CDU players. There's a lot of different things that require motor.

When I first came in, we still had tape decks. I remember running in the guys I knew from the streets. They come to my cell. And they'd be like, you got this on CD? And I'd be like, no, but I got it on tape. And they'd be like, how long have you been locked up, man? You got tapes? And I'd be like, yeah, I got the DMX on tape.

They'd be like, where did you get a tape player from? Commissary? And they're like, Jay, how long you've been locked up? but I mean, it's pretty basic. You take the motor out of either the tape deck or the CD player, you melt a toothbrush almost like an L, you mount it on the back. You take saran wrap, which comes with sandwiches, and saran wrap, you know, is great for so many different things.

Yeah. Especially as a bonding agent, a tightening agent. Like, you wrap it, you get that motor tight. They sold universal adapters on the commissary because you had CD players, beard trimmers, TVs, you had all these different things you could buy, and that adapter had to be adjusted. because it might run 12 volts on that, but you don't want to run 12 volts to your beard trimmer

so you could adjust the speed with these universal adapters. How do you know how to tattoo? I mean, I'm an artist. I can draw. Growing up. Oh, no, I had a cellmate in Philly that was like a human etchus sketch. Okay. That just wanted some tattoos one time, and I was like, I don't know how to tattoo.

And you just started doing it. Yes, and he was like, well, I don't care. And I was like, I'm going to fuck you up. Guaranteed, I'm about to fuck you up. Yeah. I don't know nothing about this. He's like, if you can draw, you can tattoo. I'm like, I don't, this doesn't have an eraser.

And I fucked him up. Is it all free tattooing, like free drawing? Like you don't put a sketch? A lot of people, they'll get pictures from here, pictures from there, but I can draw. So I would actually sketch stuff up. Some guys would have their people, maybe send them an image from the street. So they go to the library. But how do you like put the outline on them?

You draw the picture and then you go to the back of it and you take a pen and you trace over the back of it. Right? Like you draw it hard enough that you can see. When you flip it over, you can still see the. outline and you take a blue pen or a black pen and you trace over the back of it so you have an inked side of that paper right and then you take the clear deodorant like not the roll on but like the almost like the speed stick that's got alcohol in it and you rub it on the skin shave the area put on the skin and you take that piece of paper that's been inked stick it to the skin hold it 30 seconds

pull it away and it's now transferred the image from the paper to the skin that's wild now how much does a prison tattoo cost depends depends on who you're dealing with and what you're getting say I wanted my sleeve done. What's that kind of like? Depends on who you're getting it from. So if you're getting it from, if you're getting it from little shank maker who's, you know,

who's just terrible at what he does. He might do it for 50 bucks, but he's going to drag it out because he's got 10 sleeves to do it 50 bucks. But if we had a dude named Slim, Slim could draw anything. He could see it one time and the man could draw it. He'd been locked up, never going home.

It's same with my dude Spike. Shout out the Slim Man, Spike. Spike actually made parole. These guys were, I'm talking ink magazine worthy, with single needle tattoo guns, machines in prison, stuff that you would not believe some of the best portrait work you ever seen life-like drawings and art coming out of prison. But it all depends on the artist. You get you a dope fiend and he's just trying to get high. Oh, it does. You can pretty much tell him what you're going to give him for the tattoo.

And he's going to rush and bang it out and take the little bit of comments or you get him and go get high. But me, I kept for the longest time I tattooed for commissary, but then as I got towards the end and I could actually see the gate, there was no more commissary. I need the money sent to me. And then it got to a point where I would only deal with guys I knew because I, you know, in dealing with guys, you don't know, there's so much room for error. So I just have the people send the money to my books. And I stack that and stack that. And then I'd run the storebox. And then once the storebox got too big, I'd sell off half of it for half the price. Yeah. And I did that until kill them, accumulated. close to seven grand it's interesting you brought up like the close to home mentality because you see a lot of guys in prison where like when they get there say they have 10 years that first half is whatever they're going by prison rules this and that and then they pass a certain time whatever's in their mind some people it's the last six months a year whatever and they're like I'm focused on this I'm not involved in any of the bullshit like I'm going to work out I'm going to do this that I think that helps get a lot of guys

through to like the home stretch I know in my mind like it was like that last like three or four months okay, I'm not fucking with a cell phone. I'm not doing this. I'm not doing that. It's just focused on getting home. That's it. So it's just like a whole different mentality. Did you have like a nickname in prison at all? Jay. Or maybe they call me J or maintenance J or maintenance J. Maintenance J? Yeah, because I did I did maintenance. And the great thing with maintenance is I got had access to places in the prison nobody else had. Now how much are they paying you for a maintenance job? 35 cent an hour. And how much what would the paycheck be? Like 30 some bucks for the month, right? Yeah, but I mean it wasn't really about the paycheck. It was about. It was about

the freedom to move around to go to parts of the prison. This place has got over 3,000 inmates, and it's broken up into three clusters, and then three buildings in each cluster with four units to a building. You know what I mean? So I can get to other sides of the compound where other guys can't. I can get in areas in a prison where other guys can't. Were you able to turn that into a hustle to? Yes, I was around metal all day.

So shanks and I was in a shop with a grinder and lawnmower blades and rebar and angle iron and metal-cutting tools. So in a place where weapons are needed, if you're the guy that works over in the metal shop, you're kind of an important person. You know what I mean? Especially when you surround about a bunch of nutcases and everybody's just pokey, pokey, stabby, stabby, you know what I mean?

Now, is this the first time in your life you're actually passionate about, like, a job, though? Like, it seems like the way you talk about it, you took it seriously, like this maintenance job, you liked it, you enjoyed it. I did, but a lot of it goes to, and I have to give the man his props, Mr. Ken Liggin, he was my boss. He was an outside worker that came in to Greensville every day. He was one of the first, I'm not going to say normal people I had to interact with. My mom's husband that she met after my dad was normal. I'd come across many normal men, but never as being sober.

And in having talks with Ken, he kind of showed me like what it was to be a man. Remember him telling me a story they were playing cards at his house and he said his wife had her friends over and he had his friends over and this one chick shows up with this guy he didn't know and they're like smoking cigars and playing cards. She's just a typical dude. The dude looked like a state trooper. This is what my boss looked like. He said this guy goes on to brag while they're playing cards about how he's cheating on his wife that's sitting in his living room. And he said mid-card game, he tells him, put the cards down. Get up from my table and get out of my house.

You're not welcome in my house. We don't deal with your kind. And that was new to me. To hear somebody say that. Like, that's actually what a man should be. It was new to me. So I started taking, I took a liking to Ken, and I watched the way he moved, and he was just a different caliber of a man.

Was he like a father figure in a way? I don't know if I would say he was a father figure, but he was somebody to want to be like. That you looked up to. There was somebody I looked up to. He was a role model, and I hadn't. You had never had that before? I hadn't. I had one, and he killed himself.

So I didn't like, I never really had role models. Like, I wanted to be the bad guy. I mean. I never had a good guy that I strive to be. And he was a good man. Hobeck was tattooed up, but he had, you know, just his back. Nothing on his arms. And then he lifted his shirt and showed me one day in the maintenance shop. And I was like, oh, it was beautiful. It used to be a truck driver. He had this, like, truck with the grand king, the eagle and the flag. He was like, beautiful. And I was amazed that, like, a man like him would do something like that. But the job did give me, like, it gave me a structure. A lot of us are missing structure in life in general. I had to give up every day. I had to report for work every day. I had things I had to do. You had rules for the first time in your life. I did. But then they threw a wrench in the mix.

I don't know if it's divine intervention or what it is, but I'm about 18 months, two years shy of coming home. My points do not call for me to ever be at a level two. All my stuff is violent. There's no possible way I can go to a level two. Which is a low security person. Yes. They tell me one day to pack my stuff.

I'm transferring. I can put in front of transfer. What do you mean? I'm transferring. Y'all got the wrong guy. They transfer me to a TC camp, therapeutic community, behavioral modification. And it would be there that I met a lady named Patricia Collins,

who taught me about the whole change the way you think, commitment to change, all these different programs. And we would then dig into my background. She did something that should have been done a long time ago. She actually cracked the egg open. and looked inside. But you allowed her to? Not at first.

It does take two people to interact on that level. At first, at first I fought, I lashed out, and I kept doing it. And eventually I was like, this place, man, get me up off of here. So I'm sitting in the hole and she comes to my door. And she had told me in the beginning when I got there, she was like, you're not going to last year long. Because dudes would write each other up. It's called an awareness.

It's trying to make you aware of your criminal behavior and your sneakiness, right? I didn't understand that at the time But it's meant to try to make you aware of your just criminal thoughts Dudes kept writing me up And when I get rode up I'm taking it like I'm being snitched on like I'm still in the major like Who is it? And I find out and I lash out and I hit people and I hurt people But she comes to the cell one time

And I'm in the hole And she sits down outside my cell door I first try to talk to me and I'm in there Everything's just finished having the fight just finished And I'm still heated Still angry still bleeding a little I'm going to get to wave from my door.

I'm screaming to get away from my door and she sits down. She's a big, big woman. Dreads. She sits down outside my door and she kind of says, I'll wait for you to calm down.

Now I'm in the hole. I have no one to talk to. I'm lonely, still locked up, been locked up for eight years now. And she said, well, you talk to me. And I went and I sat down

at the door and I started talking to her. And she took me about the hole. She put me in a warehouse where I would drive a forklift and packaged chemicals all day. So it gets me out of the building. So I'm not, I would no longer like whatever their rules are, their politics,

I don't have to do that shit no more with these guys and they're telling because I'm not built for that. I'm not going to make it here if I have to be in population with these dudes telling each other. She tells me the agreement is I have to go do one group a week. That's it. These guys sit in chairs from 7 o'clock in the morning until 3.30 in the evening, listening to a council talk or each other talk. So she really starts to dig.

She would come get me and she'd take me in her office. I hadn't cried in so long that just during our first conversation, it was like like a well broke like a damn cut loose we were talking and she was asking me questions and then the tears just started porn she's like why are you crying and i was like i don't know and it was because for the first time in my life we were addressing and talking about things that had suppressed things i'd never dealt with mentally emotionally i'd never told another human being about i was now forced to face and then we we finally get to the root of it all i was lashing out i had all all this pain, all this shit I didn't understand that I never got a chance to understand.

Because life doesn't stop for anybody. You don't get to pause life while you're trying to figure this out. No, life continues to happen. And as a kid that's being abused, life continues to happen. You know what I mean? You don't get to hold on real quick. I need to understand why you did that to me. No, that's not how life works.

So we slowly started to break things down. And it made sense to me. And she broke through to me. And then at that moment, everything that I ever wanted in life changed, Ian. I made a promise to my son. He was two when I left 12 when I got out. I told him, if I get out of here, I'll never leave you again. Nothing will take me away from you.

And I kept that promise. The day I got out, I snuck up on him. I hugged him, and I looked him in his eyes. I said, I'm home. I'm never going to leave again. And that's played a big part of me becoming who I am today. my kids. A lot of us don't know what our purpose is.

We don't know what to wear in our 30s, 40s. Some men go to their whole life and they don't know what my purpose is. My purpose is to provide and protect. That's what I'm here for. My children needs me. My wife needs me. They need me. So I can't be out here doing things to jeopardize that.

Because what about them? My whole life I was selfish. It was all about me. Who cares that I got a kid? He'll be all right. If I get killed tonight, he'll be all right. It was selfish. Put others first. And that's what I do. I put them first. And since I started doing that, I started putting others in front of myself, the quality of my life has done nothing but

gotten better. I mean, it's awesome that you actually had that prison employee that was able to help you because I'm sure you've met a lot. They aren't all like that. No one helped me on that level. I had to help myself. No, there's a lot of people, if you act a certain way, they're going to be like, okay, fuck you, you don't want help, whatever. This woman clearly saw something in you and applied pressure and changed your life forever. You could have gotten out and went right back and got 20 or 30 years the next time. She did. And there's something else that a lot of guys got to do to really stop.

You have to get tired. You have to really, really get tired. I mean, just like learn to hate it. People don't do things they hate. I don't like tomatoes. I don't eat tomatoes. You don't like tomatoes? I don't know.

They're disgusting. Really? Yes. What about pizza? Love pizza. Love ketchup. Don't like tomatoes. All right.

So it's like a texture thing you want to like. There's a texture. It's just just, ketchup and tomatoes don't taste the same. So you'll eat pizza sauce. Absolutely. I'm just making sure. But tomato and pizza sauce don't taste the same.

We would have to stop the interview because you are in New York. You got to eat some pizza sauce. But tomato, eat a bite a tomato and then lick some pizza sauce. I know. It's not the same. It's totally different. Right. Like if you locked me in a room full of tomatoes, you come back in six days or now, I'd be starving

and there'd still be a room full of tomatoes. That's what they should have done is your punishment. That's, fuck. So how old are you when you get out? 34. You're 34. This is what year? 2014, July 10th.

2014. What struggles were you facing when you got home? The same struggles as anybody else's face. So jobs? Job. They gave me, they were giving me $62 a month in food stamps. So we said, we went and wipe that off the table. We don't need that.

You know, I mean, that's not even worth trying to find a ride to come get. I met my wife, strangely enough, about nine months before I got out. My brother was locked up at the time. You met her while you were in prison. Yes, and I would not entertain a relationship while I was incarcerated. I've got 10 years to do. Everybody knows about Jody. You know what I mean?

You're not going to be up in here kissing me all in the mouth when yesterday you was, no, no, no, no, no. And I don't want you to lie to me, so I just wouldn't do the relationships. But when you get under a year, you can actually see like a light at the end of the tunnel. I could see it. My brother's locked up at the time. His wife comes to my mom's house to drop off some money to put on his books, and there's a picture of me on the fridge. She just so happened to have the woman that's now my wife with her. They were best friends.

She asked, who is that? My mom tells her that's my son, Jay. Where is he? He's locked up. Where? He's been in prison about 10 years. When does he get out? She sees something.

You know what I mean? She told me, she said from the moment, I saw your picture. I knew that I was going to marry. Do you think that I was just like a soulmate destiny? Like she had never even talked to you, doesn't know your personality, and she just saw. And I ended up calling the house one day and she happened to be there with my brother's wife. And they were like, hold on, somebody wants to talk to you. And they put her on the phone.

And from there it was a rap. You guys just hit it off. I started calling to the point that I would fight behind the phone. That she'd be like, she'd be like, well, I know other people got to use the phone. There would be people behind me on the line on the phone. I'd be like, all right, I love you. All right, click and I'd hang the phone but I'd turn around and look and just

go ahead and wheel my back to the wall because you know what it is. Wheel my back to the wall and sit there and just wait. And dude's like, damn, that's crazy. All right. And go back to using the phone. So it became one of those things where she gave me reason as well.

Her and my son combined. She gave you hope. She gave me hope. Did she meet your son while you're in prison? No. She met him once. I got out, I went and stayed, I stayed with my sister for about a week, two weeks, and then I went to stay with her and her roommate. Her roommate was a pediatric trauma nurse. Who's watching your son

while you're in prison? His grandmother. Is the baby mom in the picture or no? She's got her own demons. She's battling and, you know, she got her own demons. His grandmother and his uncle Lonnie. So you're a mother? Huh? You're a mother? No. Oh, the other mother. Yeah, his, her mother's mother. Okay. So his grandmother and then one of his aunt's sons, Lonnie, were major, major players in his life. Like they were there. They raised him up.

Great guy, great kid. So I get out. I stay with my sister for a couple weeks. I immediately go to work. I start looking for a job. I find a job. I go to work the day after I get out. The following morning, I'm at work.

Working for a foreign company. I worked there. I get my license back. That was a big thing. The guy told me when I got my license. back he would give me a raise. I'm making 10.50 an hour. I can't do anything with 10.50 an hour. I get paid every two weeks. So I'm working during the day. I'm coming to work with my tattooing backpack. And then when I get off work, I'm headed to the projects. I'm headed to this house or that

house. You're tattooing. I'm tattooing. Wow. The same thing I learned to do in prison. People ask me what I wanted. They know I'm coming home after 10 years. Hey, what can we get you? Would you like some shoes or socks? Tattoo gun. Hey, Jay, what can I get you? I ain't seen you. Do you like some shoes and socks? Black and graying. Like I'm setting myself up. I'm already... You're in hustle mode. I know what I need. I don't...

I'll get my own shoes. Don't worry about that. I'll wear these. I'm good. I mean, that's the other type of dangerous man and a man that knows what he wants and he's in pursuit and he's going to do whatever it takes to get there. So I got out, all my tattoo equipment's already lined up.

So if I can't find this job, I know with this gun right here what I'm capable of doing. Because I've done it for years. Eight plus years now, I've fed myself with this gun. And you're not counting on anyone else, just you. No, I got this. I ain't never had nobody. Why I start now? So I would work all day, and then I would get off, and I worked with a lot of different guys.

A lot of these guys were ex-cons, and they wanted to work, and they knew guys that want to work, and they knew girls that wanted work. So real quick, boom, I blast him, I blast him, I blast him. But I got three or four guys walking around at all times with fresh ink on them. People were asking, where, where, where? Now you've got a house party going. You've got all these people lined up. I bring a guy or two with me.

We got three guys in there slinging ink. You can make $1, $700, $800. in a matter of eight hours. Do you think that tattoo side hustle kept you away from having any inclinations to do crime again? It gave me a reason. It gave me something to do it. It also gave me the means to start my construction company. Because if you're only making $10.50 an hour and you didn't have that, you could be thinking,

man, I've got to go back to it and licks. It crossed my mind. It crossed my mind. There were several times. I'm like, I've worked myself to the point that I can't work anymore. There's no more money. Like, I've gotten all the hours, all the overtime I can do. and every penny's already accounted for.

And I'm tattooing. I'm tattooing. What else can I do? And the man told me to get my license back. He would give me a raise. I walk in. I throw my license on his desk, right? He didn't give you a raise.

No. Pretended, I got to take this phone call. Turned his back on me. Nobody on the phone. And that's when you realized it's you against the world. I walked out. Yeah. I walked out.

And a good friend of my, Helen, man. She owns a nonprofit in Powerton, Virginia, called Mesa Vista, deals with disavis. able children and horses. Put the children on the horse. It's a very therapeutic form and just emotion. And the child disabled children, you know, good friend of mine. I met her when I got out through my wife.

She told me that if I got my license, I could drive her car. She had this drop-top Mercedes. So I pulled up that day in this drop-top, right? And I was really excited because I got my license. This license cost me a lot of money. I had to pay our court funds. Like, I've grinded hard to get my license back. You can least give me a couple of dollars so I can, I've got custody of my son.

Like, I've done everything. I came, I got my son, I got a house, I have a car. I'm asking for two more dollars. I'm smoking your guys you got me working with. You know what I mean? I've only been doing this a matter of months, and I'm knocking the work out and half the time they are, I'm not asking for much.

He plays me. I walk out on the loading dock and I look at the guys that I work with, and I'm like, I tell him out. And they're like, where are you going? We're supposed to be going to work. We're supposed to be getting into work for me. It's first thing in the morning. I said, I'm quit.

I'm going to start my own construction company. They laughed at me. Half of those guys were going to be my employees. That's great, man. Do you continue to talk to someone on the mental health level, like pick up where you were in prison or no? No. No.

Do you mean do I go to counseling and stuff like that today? No, at that point in time, did you want to continue because you were in a good headspace and keep it going? No. I got what I needed. Collins gave me what I needed. I needed closure. Remember the beginning I told you it was like a chapter was ripped out the book?

You got that closure you needed. She told me. She said, I want you to write a letter. She said, and I want you to pour your heart into it. She said, and then I want you to go somewhere where there's nobody at. I don't want you to read that letter out loud as if he was sitting in front of you. And then when you're done, I want you to destroy it. I did that.

When it sat in the field, I wrote this letter. I tried to write it several times, and I struggled with it, but I finally finished it. And I went out, I sat. I know it was like at least three different times I started trying to read the letter and I'd just start crying. I was that little boy again. and I finally read it and then I destroyed the letter. I burned it and it was so such a beautiful moment. What do you say to all those people that are like, oh, you know, therapy is bullshit or therapy's not for men or that talk down about it, about speaking to someone?

That's stupidity. I don't care who you are. We all need some type of help at some point in time. If there's a problem and there's somebody out there that can potentially fix it and you think that that's stupid, She's take a look in the mirror. They're not paying these people all that money for nothing. They're not. You know, I could, I needed answers.

I couldn't get the answers myself because I didn't even know what the questions were. How do I answer something that I don't have a question to? I didn't know why I was doing what I was doing, what inclined me or pushed me or drove me to do what I did. I didn't know. But then I come to find out later on, I'm not going to blame my father. I can't. But it played a major role. It played a major part in me lashing out.

Yeah, I rebelled. I couldn't go home. So I turned to the streets. Were you able to rebuild a relationship with your mother, too, after prison? It's touchy, man. Me and my mom, I think that when I got sent away, I kind of died, if that makes sense. Like my mom said when they called her and they told her I had been arrested. Well, first one they called, robbery homicide called her.

She said her statement because they used it in court. When they called my mom and told her that I was a suspect and a robbery, possible homicide, she said doesn't surprise me and hung up the phone. So when I got arrested and I called her from the jail that night, I heard her sigh. It was a relief. She said that that night that when I got arrested, she hadn't slept that good in a long time because she knew that she didn't have to worry about

getting a call that I was dead in an alleyway or shot dead in a car and it was coming. It was coming. I had created so many enemies. I think I got locked up exactly when I was supposed to. But she said she was at, like she was able to actually sleep, a full night's sleep without being afraid

the phone was going to ring. That's powerful. That's powerful. Right. Her biggest fear was that phone ringing and waking her up and it was going to be me dead. So when they sentenced me to 10 years, I remember I heard my mom gasp in the courtroom.

Like, Like they just took her baby from her. And then as time progressed, it's a long time. You get used to the visits, the card, the call on the holidays, but you slowly start to lose touch with that person physically. So in the midst of me doing my time, my brother falls into his addiction, one of my sister falls into her addiction,

a whole new monster comes rolling along while I'm locked up. So now she doesn't have to deal with me anymore. Now she's got to deal with two of my siblings. going down their roads. Now I come out. I'm on the straight and narrow. I'm doing good in life. That's not her focus.

Her focus is on these two. So it's kind of everything that me and I don't see eye to eye with my siblings. I just don't. Too much has happened. And I think because of that is driven like a wedge

in between me and my mom, but I also think that a part of our relationship died when I went to prison. It's kind of like she kind of, to not worry, about me and to be able to deal with the time. My God, she just kind of had to let go. Yeah. And she was there. I can never say she wasn't. If I needed my mom for something,

she would answer that phone. Do you guys still talk now? No. I'm very outspoken in how I feel. I'm very honest in how I feel. She doesn't like social media stuff. She doesn't like that I speak about the childhood. She doesn't like that, you know, because even though this is my story, some of it's her story too. I mean, it's, this is a whole new world for people too, that getting out there and talking about it. I mean, I didn't even know this world existed for years. Like, I didn't talk. I was talking to my dad about it yesterday. It was like I didn't, I wasn't comfortable talking about prison or any of what happened in the past for years. Right. And now to put it out there for millions of people to see. It's needed. It's needed. But it also

takes a lot. Like, it's a big, it's a lot of pressure to do it. But it's also a big relief. Now it's normal. Like now I can go on TikTok and talk about a video of like peeing in prison or pooping at prison how to do that and it'll do millions of views and I'm comfortable with that whereas before I would never talk about that. So if we're feeling that way, just imagine like how our loved ones are feeling towards that. I get it. I get it. Like with my mom, I wasn't the only one that suffered trauma. She suffered it. It isn't just my story. It's her story too. She went through it as well. But we're very different in the aspect of I want to talk about it. I want to share it with others. I want to help others with it. She more or less wants to bury it, put it behind her,

forget that it ever happened. He's dead. He's gone. It happened. It's over. Leave it alone. And then you've got me over here, mic check one, two, one, two. So it puts us like, we're like this. Yeah. And I was always a mama's boy. I love my mother unconditionally. There's nothing I wouldn't do for her, even with us not speaking and us not being on speak of terms, if she was to call me and say she needed me right now, I would stop what I was doing. That's your mom. And I'm going. That's family.

But we're not. We don't talk. Well, hopefully one day you'll be able to repair that. Yeah, I hope so. Now, on the topic of social media, I think something I'm really curious about with you, with Chad, with JD, everything like that. So you start this construction business, which is a huge success on its own to go from zero to 100 and build that.

But you don't just stop there. You build this huge social media brand. How the hell do you get into YouTube? how do you go from this guy that gets out, rebuilds his life, he's a father, and then all of a sudden he's on YouTube and your life changes yet again, but this time in a positive way. I mean, I guess like I've always done it by any means necessary. I got on YouTube, to be honest, Ian, it was therapeutic. But who told you to get on, like you came up with it yourself? Nobody told me.

I just, it was therapeutic. I didn't know what a YouTube was when I got out. Remember when I went in, I had a chirp. That was the phone I had. I had a chirp. Yeah. Remember the chirps? Like the cricket wireless type of shit?

Yeah, the boost, whatever it was. I had a chirp phone when I got locked up. When I come out, there's iPhones, there's galaxies, it's a whole new world I come out to. I was a new world when I came out. And I remember I was watching. There was other channels I watched, and I talked to people. And I remember the counselor had me actually get up and speak in prison several times. And when I would do these hour-long groups and I would talk and

of these guys like guys were very receptive to it when i was done they were like oh that was dope man like next time they do a group you should talk like i'm messing with it so i didn't know that i was any good at talking until the same counselor made me get up and share my story with the guys right so that kind of planted the seed that i have this gift of gab that i can speak and i was just sitting and i was watching youtube one day i was messing with my phone january 20 of 2020 that's when you started yep And this is during this is right before COVID too. So you got in at a peak time. Yes.

The guys that I'm watching, no offense to any of them, I'm watching their content. I'm like, the shit sucks. The other prison creators. Yes, I'm like, the shit sucks. Same old shit. No. And I just flipped the phone around, hit record, looked at the microphone. So I'm my name is Jay Williams.

And I just started talking. And I continued to do that. And then I started to share stories. Like I told you, I've got a great memory. I started sharing my stories. Get no feedback, no traction. I didn't do any lives. I didn't do any interviews.

I didn't interact with anybody. I just told my story. And short touring a thing back then. No, you had to really get it out the mud. Yeah. You had to grind to get it. There was no TikTok. There was none of that.

You had to like get it. So you fast forward 2021, January, 2021, I've got like 600 subs, hundreds of videos. I'm pumping them four or five days a week. And I'm doing it because, it's therapeutic. Those videos became my Patricia Collins.

It was your side hobby, your side of them. Those videos became my counseling. They became my therapist. Like you asked me what did I do? Do I do anything? YouTube became my new therapist. Being able to talk to people and interact with people in the comments section and tell this person this and this and this being able to help and give back.

YouTube gave me that option. I dropped the video. I'll never forget it. I dropped this video and I woke up and my phone I thought it was glitching because they had made a certain alert

when I got a message from YouTube all right I'm a nobody on YouTube so it doesn't make that alert very often I'm woken up by that alert and it's so much that it's like I'm thinking the phone is broke I mean it can't send one alert

without another jumping over top of it they're fumbling over top each other and I'm looking I have thousands of messages and I'm like What? And I open it up and it's like 5,000 subscribers. And I'm like, what? Refresh, 6,000 subscribers. What? Refresh. 7,000 subscribers. I'm like, This just went crazy. It was like the matrix. And it was one video that did that. I didn't believe it. I'm like, I didn't, I didn't know that there was a potential for money. I never got in with money on my mind. Like, I came into this pure, sincere with one goal. And that was just to share my life story.

But I think social media rewards that. Like when you go in real raw, like it's always out. Absolutely. We always say as creators like it's a video as you don't plan on going viral that go viral. And those are like the vulnerable, real raw. Like if you sit here as a prison creator and design things just to go viral, they're not going to go viral. Ever. That video, I'm not going to joke.

That video I was going to delete. I sat there with the phone in my hand and I felt so comfortable. It's called raped in a prison. shower. I felt so comfortable telling that, telling that story that there was publish and there was delete. And I remember sitting there with my finger and I was like, oh, fuck it. And I hit publish. And it changed your life. And from there, people think that if you go viral of one video, that's all it takes. No, you have to be consistent. You know what I mean? Just because you, or you'll just be a one hit wonder. You can make one video that was good and that that's all it is.

thought is. The people they show up, they fall in love with you. You know, I mean, it's not just a video. They fall in love over time with your character. You go to know these people, it becomes a community. I've got people that watch me that have been watched since day one. Well, that's the problem with like the dancing TikToks and stuff is because you can't build a sense of community with that. You have your one viral clip. Like you see a lot of social media people that they have one video, 10 million views or whatever, but that's it. It doesn't translate into follow. That's it. Yeah. No, you have to keep going on it. And I did. I didn't let the, fact that I gained a bunch of subscribers and none of that

changed anything. I didn't let it change up the format. I just went right back to recording. So you're like one of the original prison YouTubers then for that time period. There was some before me. Big shout out to lockdown 23 and one. Josh, deaf from over there, Joe from after prison show, Big Hurk, Big Lance. They were like, some before me. But as far as like in that that genre, when it came time for somebody to do something new, I was that guy.

and this was COVID when everybody was sitting at home. And you flipped the script on it. I did. There was like, at that point everybody's like, oh, the prison genre is, this is 20, 20. The prison genre's done. It's dying because that guy's channel's dying. So because that guy's channel is dying and the genre's dying, boom, kick the door. No, it's not.

There's always new fresh blood. Look at what we're doing here. It'll never die. It'll never die. There's too many stories to be told. There's too many different personalities. You know what I mean? Too much history.

How you can't kill it? This just began. Why do you think you've been so successful on YouTube? Because I've been honest. I've been honest. I tell people, consistency and honesty will go a very long way and your character. When I say character, don't get on here

and pretend to be somebody you're not. I mean the character, who you are, is going to play a major part like with you. You were able to come into the game because you're honest. You're consistent and your character. You're relatable. You're the people that, that guy could live next door to me.

I never would have known. That could have been my son. You know what I mean? People look at me and they're like, he reminds me this person. He reminds me this person. Or damn, I can't believe he said that. I'm relatable.

Because I'm not coming on here saying, talking about gang banging or shanked. I'm coming on. I'm probably one of the few prison creators that would come on and say I paid for protection. You're the only. And that's what makes me stand out. And that's, you know, that's great.

You know, everybody on here's a. killer. Everybody's a gangster. Everybody was stabbing. Everybody won every fight. I've been knocked out cold, Ian. Knocked out cold. I had to walk around with my eye looking like I got kicked by a donkey. I had to walk around looking like that. Yeah. You know what I mean? There was times I fought dudes and I was scared to death because I knew that if he knocked me out, he could beat my brains out on that floor in that cell. I'm a human, but I'm honest. Do you realize the power you hold? You with your fan base, like how popular and how, you know, like what you've been able to build, do you respect that and feel thankful for that?

Absolutely. Every day. Don't you ever think that you're bigger than the program. Never forget this. Without them, there is no you. Without them, there is no me. Without my community, my fan base, the people that stand behind me, the people that push play, the people that search me and that look at my videos, I do not exist on social media without

them. to them I give all things. That's what I like about social media and what like the prison genre could do because we build a sense of community. Like you see some creators don't even use their community wall or anything. People like to like they like to see the collabs.

They like to see photos being taken. They like to see like these types of interactions. And you're building it because like I'll have people say I was with you at 500 subscribers. And they're still rocking with you and you take the time to respond. Like you comment on my videos. I see you commenting all the time. Like there's not a lot of genuine people.

that do that. I would say besides like JD and now Chad that I met Chad, but it's tough to find that love and just building that sense of community. Now what about like the mental health struggles with social media? Have you experienced that at all being in this game for going on almost four years now? Absolutely. I've met guys, become friends with guys on social media, only to realize later on down the road that they have social, you know, they have mental issues. You usually don't see it when you meet somebody. You know what I mean? It's unexpected. One of you're like, what fuck was that? It's new?

You know what I mean? When did you start doing that? Like, I interact with quite a bit of people. I've talked people out of hurting themselves. I've talked people out of hurting them, hurting others. I've helped people with their addictions. Like, if you reach out to me, and it's hard. And I want people to understand this.

Never do I ignore your message. Never do I overlook your message. But when you have thousands upon thousands upon thousands of messages coming in every day, I am one person. I do not have a team of Js behind me. reading messages. I don't. You know what I mean? I have a whole entire life I have to. As the messages come, I do my best to respond to them, but I've been able to interact with others and kind of talk them off the ledge at times. Yeah. People that have been getting high their entire lives, I've helped

stop. You know what I mean? Just by being that person that's willing to take the time to talk to them, stop their day. How was your day doing? Why do you get high, just interacting with them? And like I tell people, You want to stop, stop. It's not that simple. It is that simple. Stop. If it's going to make you be sick, get sick today. Don't wait until tomorrow.

Tomorrow might not come. Stop. And I've got people that keep me updated, Jay, six months. Jay, a year. Jay, I'm at 18 months. And I tell them, congratulations. You did it. No, Jay, you did it.

No, you did it. That's awesome. And that is the beauty in this. If you come on here and you just make this all about a paycheck, you'll see your paycheck. but in due time people are going to see that that's all you are now what's next for you like what's like the next term goals where do you want to bring the platform to now i have so many dreams man i have so many dreams who could talk about some stuff i got my head after we're done with this

podcasting podcasting i want to get into podcasting and cover everything i think you could be a great host yeah i like i love the i love the mic i love the camera i love it um you're good on it you have that personality yeah podcasting man i doubt Definitely, I want to, there's nothing I want to be off limits with. I don't want to just, I'm never going to be, like right now I've got the animated series, we've got the second episode of the animated series about to come out. I'm always trying to think outside the box. I don't want to just be prison.

You know what I mean? I want it to be, I can be life, prison, genre, music. Like, I want to try to take all these different genres and push them into one box and podcast it. I like to sit down with a musician today, an ex-act. murderer tomorrow you know what I mean like yeah I don't want there to be any box I don't think you should ever put yourself inside of a box because then you're limited there's no ceilings around here well that's why I thought I was like I can't just go on social media and talk about my story forever you're going to run out you're going to run out which is how I got into the podcast game now

it's like it's unlimited there's so many stories and it's always going to because it's always going to be related to prison in some way shape or form but in the sense where like we want to interview crime victims. We want to interview, you know, brothers, parents, dads, mothers that had kids in prison or family in prison, law enforcement officers. Like, it's an endless world. Like, there's so many different directions to take it in. Now, if you could go back to your teenage self and sit across from him right now and have a conversation with him, what would you say to him? It's a good question. Get away from your friends. Get away from your friends. With what I know now, had I cut people off at the age of 19

I'd be a millionaire Keep a small circle Like of course stop the crime But get rid of the friends You fast forward in life And you're going to see this as you get older People start to disappear They create their own lives

And they go in that direction They die They go to prison They fall victim to addiction All these different things happen and with a lot of these people they'll drag you down get away from the people you're around

somebody told me something one time and it really stuck with me he said what were your friends doing Jay when you were out there robbing people I said what do you mean she's like they weren't trying to stop you I said no why he's like those weren't your friends he said your friend's not the guy

that stands by and watches you do that type of stuff a friend is the guy that tells you don't I never had anybody tell me not to Ian Yeah. So that tells you a lot of, as far as how many friends I got. So that's what I would definitely tell myself. Aside from stop, which I think should everybody be everybody's first basic answer, stop. Yeah.

But get away from these people, man. They don't care about you. They don't. Well said, Jay. This is my great man. It was great talking to you today. Thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for flying for the second time ever, not with the Marshalls escorting you.

No chains today. But yeah, man, looking forward to seeing you keep blowing up and having our audience view this. And I really appreciate the love and support you've been showing me, man. Hey, I keep doing what you're doing, Ian. You believe in you. And that's, you've already got half the battle one right there. Got the team on my back. You do, man.

And I'm always going to support whatever you got going on. If you ever need anything, you got my number. I'm going to tell you like, I tell everybody else. Call me. You got a friend in me. Thank you, bro.