Locked In with Ian Bick - How I Escaped From a Tennessee Prison | Dane Gentry

Episode Date: November 13, 2024

Dane Gentry shares his story of escaping prison, evading law enforcement, and spending a total of 20 years across various Tennessee prisons. In this episode, Dane walks us through the events that led to his escape, his time on the run, and the experiences he faced while incarcerated. He discusses the realities of prison life, the lessons he learned, and the moments that shaped his journey.  #PrisonEscape #LifeOnTheRun #TrueCrimeStory #TennesseePrisons #PrisonLife #SurvivalStory #RedemptionJourney #LawEnforcement Connect with Dane Gentry: YT: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcCsbRfmj9-S4_C1A2V32Ng TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@danegentry68 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/29q53M22rRZrbePiOy2iZd FB: https://www.facebook.com/dane.gentry.58/?_rdr Thank you to our sponsors this week: Prize Picks: Visit https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/IANBICK and download the app today & use code IANBICK to get $50 instantly after you play your first $5 lineup! Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ Presented by Tyson 2.0 & Wooooo Energy: https://tyson20.com/ https://woooooenergy.com/ Buy Merch: https://www.ianbick.com/shop Use code lockedin at checkout to get 20% off your order Timestamps: 00:00:00 Introduction: Dane Gentry and Podcasting Journey 00:05:20 Life and Transformation in Prison 00:10:54 Life-Altering Accident and Surgeries 00:16:24 Overcoming a Troubled Past: A Journey to Change 00:21:35 Struggles & Law Evasion 00:26:41 Arrest and Transport Experiences 00:31:52 Prison Life Dynamics: Racial Tensions and Drug Influence 00:36:39 Daily Life in Modern Prisons 00:42:09 Prison Escape Adventure 00:47:54 Courtroom Drama: A Woman's Unexpected Revelation 00:52:13 Navigating Life After Extended Incarceration 00:57:33 Navigating Prison Life: A Survival Story 01:02:57 Life in Maximum vs. General Population Units 01:09:54 Struggling with Past Demons and Seeking Redemption 01:13:30 Arrest and Imprisonment: 111 Indictments 01:18:34 Turning Life Around: From Addiction to Entrepreneurship Powered by: Just Media House : https://www.justmediahouse.com/ Creative direction, design, assets, support by FWRD: https://www.fwrd.co Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Imagine a room that feels calmer, warmer, more inviting. That's the quiet beauty of Serena and Lily. Every piece is designed in-house, crafted by expert hands and made to live effortlessly with what you treasure most. Choose from over 150 fabrics and finishes, including bespoke sizing, and let their complementary design team guide you. Start your transformation at serena and lily.com. Discover thoughtful luxury at serena and lily.com. We're almost halfway through the year, and a lot of people are running on empty without fully realizing it. Grow therapy helps you find care that's covered by insurance before burnout becomes the baseline.

Whether it's your first time in therapy or your 50th, grow makes it easier to find a therapist who fits you, not the other way around. They connect you with thousands of independent licensed therapists across the U.S., offering both virtual and in-person sessions, nights and weekends. You can search by what matters like insurance, specialty, identity, or availability, and get started in as little as two days. And if something comes up, you can cancel up to 24 hours in advance at no cost. There are no subscriptions, no long-term commitments, you just pay per session. Grow helps you find therapy on your time. Whatever challenges you're

facing, Grow therapy is here to help. Grow accepts over 100 insurance plans, including Medicaid in some states. Sessions average about $21 with insurance, and some pay as little as $0, depending on their plan. Visit growtherapy.com slash book now to get started. That's growth therapy.com slash book now. Growtherapy.com slash book now.

Availability and coverage vary by state and insurance plan. Hey and welcome to Lockton. We are at an Airbnb in Nashville. Glad we can make this happen. Yeah, man. You're a fellow podcaster too. I am, man. Dane Gentry podcast, standing back up.

It's kind of the premise of people, Like us, man, who get out and get sober and we can do it. It's kind of that kind of idea. Kind of want to be that light for people. You get what I'm saying. But at the same time, man, I kind of want to throw in other stories too and have like some famous people and different things like that. So we'll see where it goes, man.

Until you're interviewing people and doing that kind of stuff. Right now it's just being like I had like Killer Bees, know who he is. Yeah, I had him on. I'm looking forward to having him on. He's great. He is a great guy. I'm going to tell you, man. That's a real genuine human being.

When I first started, man, I sent him a message, and he was like, anytime. And then I went to a show and met him and stuff like that. So he's a cool guy. People like that. Then Shannon Doa, you know country music? I think I've heard of it. The lead singer, he's going to come on, stuff like that.

So we'll see. Just right now, I know nobody know my name, so it's kind of hard. You know how it is. You send people a message to come on. You're kind of like, what I'm like. Well, we all start somewhere. That's where I started,

and you do stuff like this, because you have a fascinating story. So you use that to your advantage, get it out there. And people, I use my story to build a platform. Now you use yours. Yeah, here we go, man. You know what? I'll start from a dream.

That's the crazy part because, bro, I wouldn't have spoken in front of you, much less. Like, you know, I'd go speak in front of whoever now. But I think it was a matter of being okay with me. You know, when you're a 25-time, I don't know if I'm spoiling. You're a 25-time convicted felony, man. You kind of give up hoping yourself sometimes, you know what I mean? Yeah.

And you got to find it again. Absolutely. Did you grow up in Tennessee? I did. I was born in Nashville. I grew up in Franklin. Single mother, alcoholic, drug addict.

I had an older brother six years older than neither one of our dads in our life. Childhood was not ideal, bro. You know what I mean? A lot of hungry nights. Mom being gone.

See him mom beating. All the things the kids shouldn't see. And then all the violence. So, yeah. That's kind of my childhood, man. That's what I saw. I saw dysfunction. I mean, in reality of it, and that's all I saw.

I didn't see. The only good, like, as far as like a relationship or wherever it would go, would be my grandparents. Other than that, it was all chaos, man, just everywhere around me. Did you guys grow up, like, wanting for more, not struggling to put food on the table or clothes or anything like that? Yeah. At the age of 11, I had an accident.

I could hit by a truck walking home from school. And that seemed to also kind of wake my mom up a little bit. she went back and got education and went to school. Things got a little bit better. But for whatever reason, bro, I don't know what it was about that accident, but it did something to me to where

I just was I thought at the age of 11, basically I thought I was grown and I'm being serious. I would leave my house and not go home for a week at age of 11 and just be gone wherever and stuff like that. And so I just became so setting my own worrying about getting high

and girls that everything else didn't matter. But anything that I had as far as, like, good clothes, I had to hustle and get it myself, sure, without a doubt. You know, that's just reality of it, man. Everybody else in Franklin, that's a bad thing. You know, if you know anything about Franklin, it's very wealthy.

Right. So everybody else has money and you don't. But I don't ever remember it being like, oh, man, I'm poor. You know what I mean? But looking back at it now, yeah, man, we were poor. We were in bad shape. your friends of people that were in the same schools as you did they have money or are they in the same pretty good i had a lot of friends that did um there was a kid that we grew up with dan williams his dad

was a music producer i mean they had a bowling alley in their house you go from a two-bedroom trailer you know and that's all i ever lived in like my whole life was a trailer i never lived in a house brought it live in a house until i was 45 years old wow i lived in a trailer or I don't even think I lived in an apartment, really, maybe briefly, but, yeah, but I mean, you got to remember, though, prison. So I spent a lot of time in living there. Yeah. You grew up so very differently than even myself and a lot of people. Yeah, man, it was, I talk about it sometimes, and to me, even though I know it's not normal, I see, I look at, like, I look at your reaction.

Like, you've heard all kinds of shit by now for people, so it's probably not the big shocking to you. But, like, the average person, when you go to talk to him about that, the way they look at you is just like, It's almost a sense of I don't believe that. People wouldn't believe that there's people out there growing up that way, man, or living that way. You know, 14 years old, driving prostitutes around. You know what I mean? You know, I learned how to drive a car in the field.

And so now I'm the guy who's driving the prostitutes around at 14. So that was my life, man. So where did I expect my life to go? I didn't. I didn't have no dream. You know what I mean? My dream was, like I said, man, getting high because that's all I knew. Now, did you like that life back then?

Like, was that enough for you? Or did you know in your head, I don't want this lifestyle? I don't think Ian, I knew right then, but I think I found this out when I was in prison. This is, people will understand that someone. When I would look at the overall group in prison, I would look at them inside. I'm not like them, man.

Meaning that animalistic, just not going to change, just cold, mean, you know what I'm talking about. You've been there. and you know the type of people I'm talking about. And I would say, I want more. And even back then, tattoos and stuff wasn't a big thing.

And that's why I don't have a lot of tattoos because I said, I want to get out of here, man, and make something out of my life. It just took me a little while to do it. That's really fascinating about the tattoo thing. Yeah, that's why I didn't get them. That's the whole reason.

I've got four tattoos, brother, that I got in prison. That's it. Why did you end up getting those in prison? One of them's a patch for an organization, of course. And then one is my son's name and the other one. Actually, I only got three. And the other one, no, no, it's four.

was I was going to. I decided I'm going to get a sleeve, you know what I mean? I got two parts of them. They were jacked up, and I said, that's it. I'm not putting an issue on my body, and that was it. I was done with it. No cravings now to get one? A little bit.

A little bit now, you know, because, I mean, it kind of fits my story in a sense, you know, because that's another thing. In all honesty, people look at me with that when I don't have long sleeves on, they'll be like, this dude said he did 21 years in prison. He sure don't fit the bill, you know, as far as that goes. you know, maybe, but I'm old, man, I'm 48. It's the time to just quit that, and worry about that shit.

Are you happy that you never ended up getting, like, fully tatted and everything like that? In a sense, man, because it would end up being some garbage, you know, and some shit you're going to have to fix, and because they're in there running that one needle. And, you know, and that was another thing was, if I was going to do it, I wanted to be all by one person. I didn't want, you know, 10 different people. And being able to stay around someone that long, it's hard to do, you know,

depending on where you're at. That's exactly why I didn't get tattoos in prison because I didn't want it to get messed up halfway through or not have the same person. See, I stayed in trouble a lot of time. So I was, I did nine years of solitary confinement. I mean, so that tells you, you know, I was an idiot. I didn't know how to act.

But at the same time, bro, that's where I educated myself. That's where I went in there for seventh grade education. I got kicked out of school in eighth grade. So over a girl. She was a rich girl. She got pregnant. they wanted to file restraint order on us not to see each other they did that but because we went to the same school one of us has to go so who you think it's going to be is it going to be the rich girl or is it going to be

the poor kid over here who don't want to go school anyway so they kicked me out was that after the bus accident yeah that happened at 11 I was walking home from school that happened in Franklin I had to stay over for an hour for something I probably not doing my homework or something but they didn't contact my parents, my mother. And so after that hour, there's no crossing guard, right? So where I cross at is where normally a crossing guard would be, but I was just a little bit over from it. And that's where I got hit.

And so instead of my mother suing the school board, she sued the guy, or sued the guy. And the lawyer told her not to sue the school board, we know why now because her brother was on the school board was part of the school board. And so could have got a lot of money for him, but I didn't get anything. Absolutely nothing, but a lot of pain and suffering and drug addiction. Wow. Let's take a quick pause to talk about prize picks, the best place to get real money sports action.

With over 10 million members and billions in awarded winnings, prize picks has made daily fantasy sports super accessible. You just pick more or less on player projections. and you're in the game. This season, I'm putting all that sports knowledge I picked up in prison to good use, choosing reliable players who've been delivering week after week. Right now, I'm looking at Patrick Mahomes for more passing touchdowns. Tyreek Hill for more receiving yards and Christian McCaffrey for more rushing yards. These guys have been putting up big numbers all season and have been paying me out the big bucks.

and buy big bucks, guys, I do not mean prison commissary items. I'm talking real money. One of the best parts, prize picks has an injury insurance policy, so if one of your players leaves in the first half, your lineup stays live. And with their flex play feature, even if one of your picks doesn't hit, you still have a shot at cash. Prize picks really lets you run your game all season long. If you're ready to get in on the action, download prize picks and use code Ian Bick, to get $50 instantly after you play your first $5 lineup.

That's code Ian Bick for an easy $50 bonus. Pull out your phone right now and download prize picks and use code Ian Bick to get $50 instantly after you play your first $5 lineup. That's code Ian Bick for an easy $50 bonus. Prize picks run your game. Now let's get back in today's episode. Do you think if you never got hit by that bus, your life would end up? differently. I really don't because even at that time I was already drinking and smoking pot like

an adult. Like my mom, anytime she was at work or whatever I was drinking and doing all that, probably not. I think the addict gene or whatever, you know, man, I'm not sold on it being a disease and I really don't want to get into that type of conversation, but I just think it's some kind of gene or something, you know, because my mom had it, my dad had it, all these people had it. I had it. It's just when I had the accident, it exploded my mind. I had the accident, it exploded to my left ear drum. So they kept having to do these surgeries on me and had to drill into this bone back here and they gave me vacated to the S when I was 15 and there we go. And so at the age of 17, I'm shooting the lot ofs with my mother, you know. That's a tough one to say.

And there's a lot of people don't know that. I just said that and that's okay. But that's really part of the story, you know, is that that's where it really went bad. So from the age of 17 to 18, I accumulated 21 years pretty much of time. 21 years of prison sentences? Pretty much, yeah. So walk us through that time period. It was like the first instance and what happened. What charge?

Yeah. The first charge I ever got, like for prison charge, it was a burglary. It was a burglary. I got caught with some stolen property. Now, I didn't actually do that, but I had stuff. So I basically I traded drugs for it. We already know of the deal. And so I took a 10-year,

probation on 11 charges the first time it was all burglary and theft it wasn't oh and then I got caught with two ounces of weed in jail after the fact they tried to fuck me on that excuse me on that but um so they give me what they did is they came and gave me 10 years probation all right intensive state probation so while I was in jail my mother moved to Houston Texas so the night I got out of jail tomorrow I'm supposed to go my probation officer, but I landed in Houston, Texas at 1135. Wasn't even going to try the probation. So I go down there, have a kid, and then come back, and that's when I go to prison in 98.

Now, weed and Tennessee in general is still, to this day, extremely, like, illegal. Yeah, it's still. They don't look at it in any type of... No, I think something about medical or something. Now, I think it's up to the officer's discretion, if it's under ounce, I think now. So back then it must have been even worse. Well, it was in jail. I mean, I had it in jail.

was the problem. I'd been in jail for 10 months. And then I had a guy that was coming in doing weekends, and he'd bring me two ounces of weed or a weekend. And, man, the situation, I'm glad I'm going to say this just because I'm going to clear something up about that. So this guy was bringing this in, all right? This is how the situation went. He was supposed to come in on a Friday. He didn't. He called a girl on a date, and he come in on a Tuesday, which is already weird to me, right? He comes in, he gives it to me. That night, everything's fine. The next morning they run in there. Now, they don't actually get me with it. But when they find it, they say, Mr. Gentry, what's this? Well, they take this dude that bring it in here out. All right,

and he goes up front. I don't ever see him again. Okay. So I'm thinking the whole time that this dude told on me. Now, this happened in January. I don't hear anything about it until March, and they indicted me. I got out of jail and they arrested me three days later on the indictment, right? But what I want to clear up is, is the whole time, I said that that dude told on me, right? And even after I got out of prison, I saw him at his 50th birthday party. And it was at a bar, right? And the only reason I didn't do anything to him was because I just got out.

And I was trying to get back into society. And people didn't want people to think I was crazy. And my brother was there. But I'm glad I didn't do it because he didn't. What happened was they caught him with some cigarettes that day. And they locked him up. And so from that point on, he had to do all of his weekends up front. So I never saw him.

So he's dead and passed on now, man. So everybody knows what I'm talking about, Danny Lenz's name, and he didn't, he didn't tell him. But it sure looked like that for a long time, man. So do you think that weed charge kind of like set a spiral, like that was one on top of the other? You had the burglaries or the robbery that you didn't actually rob anyone, but that set off a chain.

It did. Everything did. It seems like, it's just like now. If you're in sobriety, man, one little thing is going to set off that chain. It's that you get into that lifestyle. I'm in that circle and you're kind of hung in it. And before you know it, all right, like for an addict, if I go out here and do something today that works,

you best believe I'm going to do it again tomorrow. And I'm going to keep doing that until it doesn't work anymore. So what happens then at the end of that? You get all them charges, man. You're sitting there and you're a drug addict and you're doing more time than if someone killed someone, man, or child molester. That's the shit that they need to change, man. You know, now, I'm not going to say,

sit here and say that I wasn't in the wrong in doing 21 years because I was because like I said I went in there I'd done 11 years and seven months on 12 years since it 30% bro no good time on it this is Tennessee you get good time you know what I mean you get you can get up to 16 days a month and I did every day of it but that's because of what we'll get into about the escape for everybody yeah so I the problem is it's like the probation aspect like the 10 years and that That's what I see a lot of people that start off without charge like yours, and it just escalates into years and years and decades of prison. What they do is, is, okay, I'm going to say I took 10 years probation today, right?

All right. It's 10 years state probation, just regular probation. We're going along. Say I'm about two years into it. A fellow drug test, right? They lock my ass up, right? Well, then they come to me and say, what do you want to do? You want a service, you want to reinstate it.

And every idiot is going to say, I want to say, I want to. to reinstate it. Well, guess what, buddy? You just lost all that two years and you're starting fresh. My brother did this. It took my brother nine years to do three years probation. But it changed his life, man. You know, he walked out of jail and said, I'll never walk in there again, and he hasn't, man. That's been 25 years ago, close to 30 years ago now. So, you know, some people, man, man, I wish I'd have been one of them, you know, that one time, but most people don't because, like you said, it's that spire because then you start running. And so now you're on the run. What are you going to do on a run? It's only one way to make it. And so

they're going to try to get you with every charge they can. And then now, if you're on bond in Tennessee and you catch more charges, man, it's stacking. There is no concurrent sentences run together. But, you know, keep your ass out there. That's the main thing. So at that point, you had never gotten to high school because you dropped out in middle school. Did you have any aspirations, like college or even going to high school back to high school? No, I didn't. That's kind of my my TikTok deal. I'm going to throw it on there. I was just talking about that. I never had a dream, man. I didn't. I'm a kid who I do now, but I didn't. I never had a dream. I didn't find my dreams. It rose a few months ago, honestly, but I didn't, man. I didn't grow up one of being a firefighter. I didn't want to finish school. I didn't want to do any. I don't know what I wanted to do. It's like people ask me, what happened? I don't know, man. I messed up somewhere. That's all I know. I took a left and I don't know, man. My thinking, my everything was off just because, probably because, probably because I never had had anything in life. I didn't give a damn if I ever did.

That's the reality of it. I mean, now, shit, I don't know if they can get it. But, you know, there was times of my life, man. And there was a time I didn't care if I got out of prison. I did not care. It did not matter, man. It was just like, you know, after 10 years, you're sitting there and you're like, what does it matter, man?

You know, the night before I went home, people asked me about that. Did you sleep, slept like a baby? You know, it wasn't anything. Now, the next morning it was real. But that's sad to think that a human can get there. But what else you're going to do, wrong? You're going to sit in there and, you know, be all everyday begging and trying to figure out a way to go home because you're not going to go home.

So you have to accept it. So that weed charge happens. How much time do they give you for that? Six years. You had six for that. No, it run in. They really just done it for the. What they were trying to do is the DA was trying to wait on it to get to violate the 10 years

probation that I had just took, but they couldn't because the charges happened before I took the probation. but that's what they were trying to do. But it ended up being just another Class C family, man. Run in. I had to do 90 days in jail for it. And then you get out after those 90 days? I got out after those 90 days, and that's when I went to Texas.

Okay. Why do you go to Texas? Because I knew I couldn't do the probation. Oh, so you fleed? I'm fleeing immediately. Like, I get out. Actually, this is how it happened. I got out on Sunday.

Metro has a hole on me in Nashville. And the dude up front, I knew him my whole life. He's like, hey, man, you got a holds on you. I was like, no, he's like, I won't run it if you do. I said, I don't have no holds on me. He runs it, got a hold on me. He's like, damn. So I go to Nashville for two days, get out, a flight of Texas that night.

I walk off the airplane. I looked at my mother and said, I'm going to prison. And she's like, what are you talking about? And I said, I was violated my probation. And so I was out there from June of 96 to May of 98. Now, back then, there's not really cell phones or there is, but not everyone has them. No, back then. If you had a cell phone, it's like a back phone or something, maybe.

So how do you check in with, like, probation anyways? How do they, is it very loose? You would have to call in and go see them and they would come and see you. In all honesty, I don't know because I never did it. I never even had. I've had parole officers, but probation, I don't think I've ever even, I've talked to a probation officer before. I don't think I've ever had one like kind of my house room.

How long do you think it took them to figure out you were on the run? Probably six months or something probably. I mean, who knows? I can't remember. I used to know that. It seems, I want to say, and I may be wrong about this, but this is standing out my mind. It seems like I left in June.

I want to say the warrant come out in December, man. For some reason, I think that in my mind. I could be wrong, but I think that. Yeah. Wow. So, all right, so you make it to Texas. What are you doing in Texas? Nothing.

I immediately start getting high again. How do you have money after getting out of jail? I don't. I go down there with my mom and her old man. I'm living with them. But I got a job immediately as soon as I got down there. And I met a girl immediately. immediately.

Yeah. And baby's mama. That's, yeah, he's 26 now. He still don't talk to me, but this is what it is. But yeah, I started working, man. But then I started hustling, started getting high. Pills, I was eating pills as many as I could. And then I actually stopped doing pills, man.

I started drinking and become an alcoholic overnight. So whatever I do is to the extreme. It's like now dipping. You know, I dip two cans a day. that's extremely too much, but it's just that addict part of me, man, whatever I do, they do it too extreme. And there are those alcohol genes getting triggered again. Without a doubt.

And when you make it to Texas. Yeah. And so immediately, see what it was. I come off of methadone and let that part out when I was in jail. And that's rough, man, for anyone. I was 18 years old coming off of it. And it had been months. And I was still having a linger effects of not feeling good when I got to Texas.

So I got there that night. The next morning I was eating people. hills. Yeah. Then I went through the drinking stage there too. It was a bad time there. It's just bad. I was on drugs. I was on the run. You know what I mean? It was just bad.

Didn't like her. She's pregnant having a kid and it was just a mess, man. Were you afraid when you're in Texas? Like, were you worried about law enforcement or are you living scared or are you just out about your normal business? Out about my normal business. But what I did is

she she had a brother same age as me my hair used to be red when I had hair and he had red hair and blue eyes right but he was in the Air Force

and he was in Louisiana well something got sent to her mom's house about renewal driver license renewal time right and so then she has

this social security card and I got his driver license number so I memorized it and I go to the Texas Department of what a transportation and go in her and I said, hey, I lost my wallet where I didn't even a driver license.

You don't have that little fingerprint thing. I said, can I just put my thumb on that? And it'll tell you who I am. And they're like, no, hey, what the hell that is? That just takes a picture. And they just like, what's your driver license number? And I told them. And they said, stand right there and took my picture and gave me a Texas driver license.

So I'm on pills, and she's calling prescriptions in. All right. She's not on pills. All right. I'm saying she's calling me. This is the first time we're doing it. We get caught. But anyway.

coming with a big bright idea got a doctor's DEA number going to call into prescription so I tell her to do it and she does it and I said they're going to call back one time and they called back she answered just like a doctor's office everything's fine we leave they call back a third time

her mom answers the phone we don't know this and get to the drug store and I'm sitting in the truck with the kid and she's inside and I see a cop pull up and I was like yeah so I go in there and I'm like don't get them pills but she gets them and of course they arrest her. So instead of leaving, I couldn't do it, man.

You know what I mean? She ain't never been in no trouble. I just couldn't leave her like that. So I follow her down to a little substation. And she's telling me to leave. And I'm like, I got this driver license. I'm fine. You know what I'm fine?

And so they're talking to her mom, and they're like, and they say the name Jacob, and she's like, Jacob ain't there? That's my son. You have Dane, and she gets my son's birth ticket, reads off my whole name. So they've done running my name, and they know exactly doing everything,

but I don't know this. I still think I'm slick, right? and that cop, or she says, I got to go breastfeed the baby, and she goes into another room, and that cop says, hey man, you're all for proud of your son. I was like, yeah, you know, what father wouldn't be?

And he said, I don't know about Tennessee. And when he said, I was like, hmm, he said, we got laws here. He said, you can't beat your sister. And so he realized, you know, that Jacob doesn't put two and two together, and I was like, yeah, I'm a cop. And that was that.

But I could have got away, but, you know, I'd have left her like that. But I should have left her ass after what she did. But anyway. So do you think if you never met her, you would have been in Texas, like, under the radar or something was bound to happen? Something was bound to happen because of me. Because, listen, you know, I may seem like I can hold a conversation all that right now. Bro, let's put drugs in my body.

And this is not, you'd be like, who in it? I'm talking about instantly. I mean, it's like, it's not like, you know, a gradual, you know, like I would lose everything, go downhill change. It's instant. I become a completely different person, man. So it was just bound to happen. You know, you're going to keep, as long as you continue committing crime, you're eventually going to get caught.

I don't care who you are. I mean, look at the news today, you know. Even these people who think they're above the law, you're going to eventually get it, man. And it's even harder to get caught back then, and you are still getting caught. I mean, in today's world, you can't get away with anything. You're not getting away with it.

I wouldn't want to be a criminal today. I wouldn't a very good criminal in that way. I got a call all times. I never went to ever good at that. So, it's what it is. So they arrest you right then and they're at that? Yeah, they take me from, they have like a little substation.

It's Magnolia, Texas. It's right outside of Houston, Montgomery County. They took me to Conroe. And then took me to Harris County, which is Houston, and waited to be extradited. I don't know if you've ever been extradited, buddy. You ever been extradited? No, I've been sent to different states on the,

like, Con Air and buses, but that's not really extradited. But tell us about getting out. I should add. The second one is the one that's really a good one, but the first one, they picked me up on a Friday. I got back on a Sunday, but we'll get into the second one later

because it kind of fits into another part of the story I think we're going to get into. But that one, well, I was in there for two weeks on a van all across the United States, and that is, man, they picked me up in one jail and Tucson, Arizona. I don't want to run again.

It's another time from all this. And the U.S. Marshals arrest me out. and they picked me up in Tucson, Arizona, one of the band, take me all over California, Nevada, Oklahoma, everywhere, back to the same exact jail 10 days later. Could have just picked me up then, and then all the way back to Tennessee. And it is, man, we have some experiences, though.

We had some girls on her. This one girl, she was trying to kick the cage over, like to get to where they're at, because they were standing outside the van, and I guess she was going to, the van was running. Thank God she didn't, she probably killed us all. But I guess he's gonna try to take off in and drive, but the driver was a prick man and I don't smoke cigarettes but other people do and he wouldn't let him smoke, but he smoked and

But then like every now and you give him one where we were in Oklahoma and he was smoking a cigarette and he threw it out the window And the Oklahoma State Troopers saw his ass and pulled him over finding four hundred seventy dollars making him go out in the middle of the interstate and get that cigarette butt Right on all of us instant karma kind of deal man, you know, because there was a prick But you know they don't let you if people ask all the time where you sleep at You sleep in that van sitting straight up shackled and handcuffed. This is the most miserable experience you could ever imagine. Do you think they do that on purpose, like bringing you all to these different states just to like put you through.

A diesel therapy is what we call it. I mean, they do it, but they do it because of money. They're paid so much a mile for you. No matter if they pick you up in California and they take you or so I'm going to Nashville, well, they only went to Knoxville. So you're still in that van. You end up all the way back in California. you. And then in the end of it, guess who has to pay that? You do. That's all part of your fines

and all that stuff. Anything that you do, like, I didn't know this, or I probably wouldn't have done it, but like the governor's warrant, if you make them, that just means that, like, when I was in Arizona, if I was just saying that I'm not who they say I am, and so they have 180 days to get a governor's warrant, they got mine in 17 and to come and get me for Windson County. So it's just basically making them prove that I'm Dane Gentry, basically. Did you have any idea what you were facing when you got the Tennessee, like the amount of time, repercussions, anything? The first time or second time?

The first time when you're getting extradited. The first time, man, I just knew that it was just going to be the 10 years probation was going to get put into effect, and I was going to get a 10-year sentence. That's what it was pretty much cut and dry. The probation officer already said, you know, I mean, you ran immediately. I just don't see us getting it reinstated, you know what I mean, or even trying. But she did try to talk a good game, like she was going to try to try to try to try to. to go in there and say something, but when we went in there, the judge said,

just pretty much I'm sentenced you to 10 years. And that's when it got real. I will say that. When I, the probation wasn't real, none of that real. But that day when I was standing in front of that judge, I'm trying to think I old it was. I think I was 21. I was standing in front of that judge and he said, I'm sentencing you to 10 years, Tennessee Department of Corrections.

He got real then. I won't say I was ever just scared, but I was definitely apprehensive. or nervous, a little sweaty palms, you know, the first night getting there and things like that. Classification was classification, but the first compound I hit was the roughest one in Tennessee. And so we got real, real fast. How old were you when you walked on that compound? 21. 21.

21, and you're a white 21-year-old. White 21-year-old. What is that like? Man, for me, shit, it was fine. I never had a problem, man. I never had a problem with anybody of any other. other race other than stupid shit that other people started and that I would get into, just to be honest about it.

I didn't have, man, the only problems I had were created by my own people without a doubt. You know what I mean? Now, there were problems created by other races, but again, it wasn't directly with me. Like, I've never had no one tried to take nothing away from me. I've never had no one, nothing, you know, whatever. but I guess it was because one of how I carried myself and two, I was kind of connected with players in the game. And so that could have had a lot to do with it too.

Now, were they looking at you as kind of like an attic, like strung out type of person? In prison? Yeah, when you first got there. No, because I wasn't. You know, I learned real quick about that. I learned that in jail. I saw people in jail alone what it was like to be strung out on drugs. And I said there was absolutely no way.

And then I wanted to go in there. I went in there, it's kind of crazy. I went in there with a crash-out mode, but also at the same time with the mode of, hey, man, I'm really going to try to get something out of this me and educate myself and things like that. And so I was just different, man. I just kind of went in there with kind of my nose to the ground,

but at the same time, you know, if you wanted that, you know, we'd go there. But I hear all this about these other states and especially Alabama and stuff, and I'm just in there going, man, you know, these white people down there, man, these white kids down there, having a hard, man. I mean, they're having it real hard, but it's coming here too.

I mean, it's probably 70-30 now, if that, maybe. And the meth craze kind of brought the white numbers up a little bit. You know what I mean? But it's probably 70-30. And it's run by gangs and all that now, but it wasn't always that way. How was it ran when you were there? How was it, like, segregated or divided? It wasn't segregated and divided.

It was just like, you know, you didn't see white people. and black people selling together. At this time, it's pretty much all it was. There was a few Spanish people here, there. Now there's more. And then you did. It would depend on where you were at, like the tension and things like that. Now, there was a lot of tension between blacks and whites.

It just wasn't my whites. You get me? There's some in there that are idiots. But most of the time in Tennessee, the problems come with the money, man. That's what it's all about. And so the last thing I ever wanted to do was being there strung out on drugs in prison, trying to hustle that. First of my, man, it don't do that make you weak, man.

It shows you how weak you are, and you see how they treat them. I mean, damn, for everybody to treat me like that. I don't care if I was strung out of it. I'm not going to treat me that way, so I'm not going to put myself in that position, man. It's just sickening. And so I've been to prison four times,

and I've only done drugs, one of those stays. That's it. That's incredible. A lot of people that have those addiction issues that put them in there, it's hard for them to recover from that. And they continue to do that. And I've seen, you know,

people get themselves in, serious situations in prison. Man, me too. And it happens a lot. And that's what's going on. All these people, man, you know, because my content now, send me these messages all the time and talking about what happened to their loved one. But you're not telling me the rest of the story, man.

And that's the honesty of it. If you want me to believe that your loved one is a drug addict on there, and these people have just done all that to him in there for no reason, I'm sorry. I do not believe that. I don't believe that. I know that there's evil in there. There's just something other,

but most of the time, people just don't go around doing it for no reason. Now, they may be trying to take advantage of them or whatever. That could be it. But I guarantee you it had something to do with drugs somewhere. What kind of charges are people in this maximum security prison in Tennessee back then? What kind of put you in it? Yeah, like what was the general? Like, I know what you were there for, but what were others there for?

Murders or assaults. In Tennessee, if you get an assault with a weapon, from that moment on, if you got caught with a knife, just a knife only you go to max. It really wasn't that hard, man. Tennessee would put you on max and keep you on it for a long time just because it's more money. You know, you get paid minimum, medium, maximum. You know that's how it works. I mean, most people do.

Do you know that? Do you know that? Yeah. See, that's why in a county jail, right? Think about the hole. I don't know about your county jail. Does your county jail put people in a hole a lot? So we don't have a county. I was in the federal system.

We didn't have a county jail. We have detention centers. Right. There are some county jails like out this way that have contracts with the feds. Right. But in Connecticut, there's no county jails. So you went to a detention center in Rhode Island. that housed Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut inmates.

Oh, okay. And ICE inmates. Yeah. Very different. See, here, like in county jail, you go in your minimum, medium, or max. If you go to the hole, you're max. They get more money from the government if you're max. See what I'm saying?

I think it's like $10 more a day or something. In Tennessee. I don't know if that's like that for the feds or whatever, but that's why all these jails are like here, jail in particular, Franklin, they'll put you in a hole if you give somebody a Jolly Rancher. if you say I don't want the peas on my tray and I give them somebody they'll put you in a hole for that

wow yeah so do you think guards are like planting stuff on people just to get them into those for the money aspect it's definitely happened without a doubt for sure there's a lot of cross-out that's the thing about tennessee there's a lot of cross-out moves in tennessee which means they're just pushing people to the back you know you'll take someone who is ahead over here and somebody else wants that position it takes a little bit of money and push them to the back and put them on PC and then their name is run forever yeah

I mean, in the feds, they give incentives to the guards for popping cell phones. Really? They get the $100 a phone or something. I don't know if they do that in Tennessee. Probably not because in Tennessee, man, they ain't got no guards. That's the problem. They're all locked down all the time. Even back then?

Even back then. It was a little bit different. There was times. But no, when I first started doing time compared to now, oh, man, it's night and day. Even in these county jails, I mean, it's just, if you're out there listening to any of this, the main thing you should be getting all this is to keep your ass out of there

because, bro, it's just, just not, man, I mean, when I went in, you could, you could freely move and go and, like, they called ball field. It'll be 12 hundred people out on the ball field. It's not that way anymore. Now it's top and bottom, and this unit you only go. So you only get an hour out of day and out of your cell. It'll keep you locked down all the time. And, you know, that's just not a way to do it on time, man. Yeah, what was a typical day like at that first prison where you're doing the 10-year sentence? All right. So in the morning, you get up, you know, about six. You'll hear the doors go around. and they'll pop.

That means you had a key to your door, right? And you had a little button you push and it would open it. And so from there it would be breakfast, and then you'd come back and it would be some kind of movement either for work, education, ball field, and all that stuff. So if you didn't have a job and it wasn't working, you could go to the ball field or to the rec room or arch and crafts or leather shop or whatever.

So that's pretty much it. And then chow. You lock down for count. They lock down at, again, at 11, 4, and then 9 at night is the final one. But that's there. And a lot of these prisons now, you sit there all day. Nothing.

You don't never leave the unit. If you do, it's just to go to the chow hall and back or for an hour out. Other than that, you're just locked down. This is all it is locked down. Now, back then it was like an older prison, So was it like the bars on the cells? No, mine have always been doors. There's one, it's closed now.

You hear about brushing mountain a lot in Tennessee. It had sales or it had the bars. But I've never been in one, had bars like that. I've been in a county jail had them, but never in prison. Now, because it was a 10-year, like, probation violation type thing,

did you have to serve the full 10 years, or do you get out early? No, they would put you in there. See, mine would have been 10 at 30%, which means at 30% you can go for parole. But then it's up to them. Being that you violated probation, they're going to put you off the first time, I'm sure, you know what I mean?

And they let you out. That's usually kind of how it is in Tennessee. You'll go up the first time they're going to put you off for something. Like, all right, when I first went in in the classification, they would have made some kind of recommendations, drug class or CBIP or something. And so when you go back up for pro, if you have all that stuff done, you know, odds are they don't have anything to put you off for.

they'll find something, but that drug class, you can't get in it unless the parole board mandates you. So you've got all these people coming in for classification who they're saying needs drug class, right? But they can't get it because they have to wait until they go for parole, let parole board put them off.

You see more time out of you before you can get in it. So it's jacked up. So what happens to you? Do you complete the full 10 years? Do you get to worry? No. Yeah, I completed it. So I go in and I was at that compound for about 60 days.

They sent me over to site too, which is minimum security, Lake County. I was over there for about the same amount of time. And they come to me and tell me I was going to an annex, which is the minimum security you can have, man. That's where you want to go. And I was like, cool. And so when I got there, they said, do you have a TV? and I said, yeah.

And he said, you can't have it. And I said, damn, why can't have my TV? And they said, because you're a technical violator, you're going home in 120 days. I said, shit, you have that TV. And so that's what they were saying is that I violated my, I didn't catch no new charges. I just violated it from absconding or whatever, right?

And so I'm going to do 120 days and go home. And here's where the fuckery comes in. After 60 days, man, I come in from work, and the counselor's like, I need to see you. I was like, oh, shit. I go in there and he says, hey man, we found out that you had them charges in Texas. I did.

I caught a felony charge when I was in Texas, right? And he said, so you're not a technical violation anymore. He said, so sometime in the next coming week or two, we're going to send you back across the fence, which means backs to a compound somewhere. And I was like, all right, well, the more I thought about it, of course, I get pissed off and I come up with a great idea. Hey, man, Monday, if they let me go out to work,

I'm going to escape. And so I was talking to this other dude, and he's like, me too, man. I'm going to run off too. And so Monday came. Now here's the thing. So when I was a kid, this is happening in Wayne County, Tennessee. I went to a group home when I was a kid. There was a guy who was a sergeant at the prison.

His mom and dad was over that place, so he knew me. Now, on Sunday night, he called me into his office and said, you ain't going to do that stupid, are you? And I said, no, man, what are you talking about? He said, I'm going to try to keep you here. He said, just don't go out there at work. do nothing stupid. I was like, all right, well, the next day. What it is, they take you out and you do, you may be clearing brush on the side of the road. I mean, it just depends on what you're doing,

right, cutting grass. But then they'll take you to a church somewhere to eat lunch, right? Well, they take two crews of us. So there's only two guards there, and they ain't shit. All they got to the radio. That's it. They ain't got a gun or nothing. And they would be around front. And so we're going to go around back and we're going to take off. Now, here's the problem. We don't know where we're at. kind of you know what I'm saying but other than that I don't know all I can see is woods and I said that's the way I'm heading and so we pull up about five minutes every good there we take off and it's three of us his other dude just takes off running and I see him or whatever and so

we get into these woods we're running and then woods wasn't as long as this house as wide as this house and it was wide over cornfields and it was June so the corn is about chest high and I knew we wouldn't go have to have long because them inmates were going to go tell them you don't have to worry about the guards finding out the inmates are going to tell them. And they did. And so we heard the police radios and that kind of stuff probably about 10 minutes in.

And so me and the other dude that just took off running and get into it. And I tell him, you can go on somewhere, so he does. He goes his own way. Well, me and the other dude get in some power lines, right? And get that brush it over, with leaves over us. And we got some weed that we brought out with us. And so we're sitting there all day long.

This is June. So it's not going to get dark to nine. And we're watching the TV. The helicopter flew over one. and then it went. We heard dogs. They never got close to us. But then the TBI airplane flew over us all day long back before.

We sit there smoking weed watching it. And so it gets dark. And we say, what are we going to do? We're just going to walk. And so that's what we do. We take off walking. And the next morning, well, later on that night, when we took off walking, we heard some beating and banging.

But then we heard some police radios. Come to find out after we got caught. That was a dude. They caught that other dude that night, the first night. we find this house, man, and it looks like an Amish house, but I see the electric running to it, and I was like, it's not Amish, but there's nobody in there. There's only like a recliner in there and a bed, and that's it. And so we go in there, refrigerator, nothing in it but beer and vodka.

So it's like somebody's party house, right? And so we get the bright idea, well, let's just get drunk and pass out in this house. We don't know where we're at, and we just escaped in prison yesterday. So that's what we do. We wake up, and it's like 3 o'clock. in the morning and I'm starving. This is what I was talking about. And so we go and I was, I'm going to find a house, man.

I'm going to go in it. Just get some food. I'm not going to take anybody by stuff or anything like that. And so we find one and didn't think nobody was there, man. And so I knock on the door and the lady answers the door, but she's got on panties and cut off shirt. And that's it. But she doesn't scream, yell.

She just says, come on in. I told her I was hungry. So I had to go find the other dude. He took off running. And so I had to go find him to tell him to come on. And so we're in there, and she's talking a mile a minute. She won't shut up. And I'm trying to get in.

Is there anybody else in the house? I was really worried about kids. I didn't want kids coming here and see this. And she said, my old man's in there in the bed, and I'm thinking gun in my mind. And so I go in there. This dude's just sitting there on the edge of the bed in his little tidy-witie-wit-zone smoking a cigarette. He looks up at me, and I said, hey, man. cause her by no harm.

We just want something to eat. A very nervous voice, he says. Heat him up some at pizza, baby. Heat him up some at pizza. And so she does. They feed us, and then they keep talking about their brother-in-law coming over there. Now, we've been there an hour. This one has not put no clothes on nor as he told her to, all right?

And she keeps, I mean, by all accounts, farting with me and stuff, because she's like, I sure would hate to know they're going to arrest you and stuff like. I was like, well, they're going to. Anyway, and so when we go to it, the brother-in-law comes in, and he's like supposed to be some big guru out checking his plants or some shit. He comes in, and we don't stay long, but I was fine until I smoked some of the lettuce. And when I did that, man, I got extremely paranoid, and it went from okay to bad, quick.

I mean, I just did a turnaround. But anyway, we leave, and they gave us some money, different clothes, and some food, right? But I knew they was going to tell on this, man. And I didn't listen to my gut. And so I just keep going the same way. And later on that night, we see a prison van going down this little bit of you. And I was like, definitely they told.

So we have to climb up kind of like this little side of this road. It's like a bluff. Well, now we're up above everything. And you can hear everything. You know, there's a little house down here. So we're like here. And this truck pulls in there. This little kid comes out, and he's loud as hell, and he said,

police been here all day. Them dudes, and he's cussing. He said, them dudes that escape from prison, they're somewhere around here real close, and they got $100, that's food, dude in the trucks. They're doing better than we are. But the little kid starts firing a gun, man, and it's our way up at this hill, and we can hear it. So now we're trying to get back behind the best we can.

So we're stuck there all night. And the next day is when they finally got state troopers and all that. When they arrested us, they kept saying, where's the gun at? It kept hitting me all of my nuts. And I was like, man, I ain't got no gun. We had no gun. But what we figured out was they were just going to try to charge us with a bunch of stuff.

So we go to the jail. Now, we don't know what's happened. And they take me and they sit me in. I mean, it's like a desk. There's nothing else in there, but there's all kind of papers on it. And I look on it, and I see statements that people that wrote, right? and I see them two people because his name was Tracy and hers was Stacy or hers was Stacey and his was Tracy one or the two and I read them and so I'm I'm ahead of the game I already

know what's been said and so a dude come in and I said he said something I said man I want a lawyer I said but I didn't do nothing wrong I walked up knocking on the door and lady let me in and I watched I watched the expression on his face and I just walked away and that was the end of it but had I not seen all that or stuff or had this basically what happened is this woman's husband was sitting there feeling like a coward, as he should have. I mean, he should at least said, hey, you need to put some clothes on. You know what I mean?

And after the fact, and so he felt he wasn't going to go try it. And what he said that we did was basically kidnapping, robbery, and home invasion. Now, you're smart, young man, you know what that would have meant. That's over with. I'd have never got out of penitentiary.

But here's the thing. We don't know what's going on. November, they take us to court. walk in and there she is the woman and my heart drops I'm like oh my god and she like gets pretty close maybe from here to the camera and says

I said what are you doing she's I'm not here for that she said I didn't divorce him I'm married to another dude my old man's in here and I'm like cool you know so things started getting a little bit better so now we're all sitting in the courtroom and she keeps pointing the dude out like he's in jail and so they're going to read everybody's charges off

they read his charges off you already know what it is child molestation and I'm like I look at dude and he's like and you know we're fixing to be in the same holding cell with this dude and I said all right what we're going to do and he said you should you already know I said

you know think she can go back and say you know we did whatever and he's like no so they actually put us all in there together man he didn't make it back to court that day and they didn't charge us with it and that's one that they let us get away with but we monkey stomped him in there but the fact that the woman was pointing him out

and stuff and it was like his ex It's, it wasn't like one of these cases, like this had happened prior kind of deal. And this woman sitting there all proud of him and stuff. And I was like, man, it was the strangest thing. But that was the end of that. I never heard nothing else about it. But the woman definitely saved my life for sure. What a weird twist of fate right there that you guys end up.

She gets divorced. It's almost like the universe was doing that because of that guy who was a fat impetro, you know. Right. And that's what I was like, because dude is, his name's smoking Joe. He's still in there, man. He ain't never going to come home. But he ain't going to get a moment. much more time.

But that's what it was like. He said, no, it's meant to be. And I said, it's going to happen either. I mean, there was no answers buts about it.

They put us in there with him. But then I was looking at him other dudes in there, and I said to him, I said, so how long has this dude been in jail? And it's like a few months. I said, oh, so y'all just letting him walk around,

you know, everybody just won't drop your head, you know, whatever. Then they go to prison or, or they'll get out of jail and tell somebody what they was in there doing, and when they were doing nothing. You let him walk around,

probably get him in your commissary. The cops probably put a ton of pressure on the husband and wife. Yeah. Oh, I know they held strong. That woman held strong, man, because... You made a good impression. Yeah, I read it. Man, it was the craziest thing.

And she kept bending over, bro. I left that part out too, kind of. But, like, there was a box of clothes, and she kept... She had her ass, basically, to me. And she kept bending over, looking back at me saying, well, this fits you? Well, this fits you? And I was sitting her thing the whole time. I'm looking at dude.

And I really kind of felt sorry for him at the same time. Because here's a situation that the little did he ever think that somebody was going to rush in his house in the morning, which I didn't rush in and she let me in or whatever, but, um, and do that. But I just feel like I would have had a little different of a reaction. So why did,

what were the charges in Texas that you got paid up for? A forgery charge, man, because of a check that my son's mother's mother wrote us. And when all this happened, she said we forged it. I took it for the girl because there wasn't no sense of her doing anything. So they gave me four months. for it. So you could have gotten less time if you just stayed in there, went to the other side,

got transferred to Texas? Yeah, I could have just, but you didn't know what it was going to know what was going to go on, what was going to happen, man. Because you had a criminal record, Texas is strict. Texas is strict, but the good thing about them is, man, like I said, they gave me four months, or they gave me eight months and I did it in two months. That's what it was. They gave it to me, gave it to me in August, man. I don't want to say, no, that's not right. Whatever, they gave it to me. It was like two months, and I was done, and Tennessee was picking me up. Now, why did you guys stay on top of that hill or whatever? Why didn't you guys run?

You had ample time. You guys could have took it off, get out of there, get to a different state. Oh, because we didn't. That's the thing. All right, both of us, this is what I said to in the beginning. I said, you know, man, we could take and steal somebody's car and do all this. I just don't want to. I'm not trying to do all that.

I was going to try to make it back to Franklin on my feet. I wasn't trying to get no more time, basically, is what it was. And we were hung up. Like, that's what we were trying to do is make it, but we had to stay in the woods because everybody in this area knew without a doubt that we were somewhere more than likely. Now, had that dude not gone that day and done that, they would have never found us. We would have got away because they already stopped looking. Insane.

All right. So now you're back in this jail. You guys beat up the chomo. What happens? How much time do you guys get for the escape? Two years. That's it. Two years run consecutive.

So I turned my 10 into a 12 is all they did. And I did 11 years and seven months on that 12. You know, I don't even blame you for the escape. It's the case manager or who counselors' fault. Yeah, that's a huge mistake. Yeah, it happened on the state all the way around. That's the whole thing, you know, because it come down from the Rachel Jackson building.

You know, these counselors and stuff didn't do it. The people who do all your time in Nashville did. So it's the main people who sent that and said send him there. Yeah, they put out a silver platter, though, of, hey, give the guy a week to, at this. that's like saying you got a detainer on you and they put you out of camp it's almost like they wanted me to do it or something you know what i mean it's like i feel like that like i know they put me in situations when it comes to chomos and stuff though for sure in classification but

you don't never know what people are doing man i mean odds are if if i was in that situation and i was one of people and i went and told someone hey buddy you're not going home with 60 days we're going to just go and continue doing that 10 there's absolutely no way i'd let him go outside that fence no way. I mean, so, but again, there's a lot of stuff that gets overlooked, man. Do you ever look back on your life now and be like, I wish I just, you know, stayed, didn't try to escape,

because then I never would have got turned into the 10. You would have done the Texas. Everything would have been fun. Yeah. Like, you could have had another decade of your life. I could have, man. And then I could have got out and stayed out of trouble. It could have stayed off a dope.

I could do it in there, but I'd get out. I mean, I know we're not supposed to regret, But I always think about the what ifs. Like, what if this relationship worked out? What if anything from the past worked out? It makes you think, you know? Yeah. I think about it all the time.

You know, people ask me about shame and stuff like that. Yeah, man, I got a lot of guilt and stuff and a lot of what-ifs because I had several chances, bro. I had several chances like a lot of people did to do the right thing, man. Just quit getting high, man. I just wouldn't do it. You know, I just had to be a part of that crowd. and what I found out apparently was, you know, PTSD or whatever they say. I still don't have been buying into all that stuff.

But I finally dealt with stuff, man, and I realized getting hanging where it's at, you know, 21 years, man. And that's just prison time. That's not counting the programs or the county jails or all that stuff, man. And it's sad, man. And it's just that vicious cycle. My life as good as it is, I could leave here today and use. And tomorrow I'd already probably be close to having new charges or something. I mean, you know, I'd already be working on it.

It goes that fast, man. It's just like you have to learn. I had to learn how to be a normal person, man. Now they send you back to that maximum security prison you were in the first time. What are people looking at you as? Like, are you idolized because you escaped? Yeah, some people, because I was around a bunch of other people. A bunch of escapes happened kind of at the same time in Tennessee,

but they were the real deal escapes. Mine was I basically just walked off from working. detail but there's a group of guys who took over that prison that i'm at river bend in 98 and took over a whole unit and escaped five of them um stayed out about a week and another guys had escaped from south central so yeah because what they we were held in higher security than anybody you know we're the ones that they had to keep hands on at all times walking and all that and then man it kept us on max almost five years for it that's the you know that's the part that's the dead time day for day no good time and you're 23 and 1 in a cell you know that's a long time I did four years

three years and two years four years six months three years seven months and then right at two years a second time and just locked in a cell locked in a cell you got TV if you're fortunate enough to have one in a radio it depends on where you're at you know some places are different you know what you can have now it's getting to be where they don't want you to have anything at any of them really But now how can you hustle if you don't make if you don't have money from the outside if you're locked down? Um, you have to figure out a way, man. Now, as far as hustling lockdown, man, it's hard. That is very hard.

A lot of people will make wine, try to cook off whiskey or something like that. That's about the only thing. Or if you can get somebody to show you a little bit of love, maybe try to start your little commissary store or something like that. You know, that's it. But if you're on, man, if you're locked down and you ain't got nobody messing with you, that's some hard time, man. Because you only got 24 people in there. That's all it's in there. So if them 24 people, you know what I mean,

you ain't out around in the compound stuff, there's no hustle. And you're eating in your cell too, everything's strictly in yourself? Everything's strictly in yourself. So how do even gangs operate in these scenarios? They just don't. I mean, they're behind that door,

and they talk big, and they send stuff back out to the compound and all that kind of stuff. But now it's changed. They can keep you locked down on max like that now. They say, now they have what's called SMU, which is basically the same thing.

They keep you locked down and a max sale for a year and then after a year you're locked down with somebody else in front of the six months and so that's how they're getting away with it. But I know one guy in particular

who got put on max in 1994 and didn't get off until 2012. Wow. Yeah. Did you ever have altercations with your cellmate being locked down for so long? Oh yeah.

Yeah, I got a couple of salt offenders that were my cellmates but it was one of them was a case where I was doing whole time on the compound right and because the hole was full because of so many people were checking in and so if you got a whole time they would lock you down in your cell on your count on the compound which is where you'd want to be and so I'm in there mind of my own business man and they put this dude in there I didn't know him I never had seen this dude and the first thing he said was something about trying to get shipped away from northwest and I was just sitting thinking man who have they done putting a cell with me you know i'm in here like hansabang got a phone i'm living

good i'm doing my whole time and um he i'm like out of i got a blanket hanging over the beds you can't see me at all i'm like in a in congo so he's up on the top and he gets down in tennessee they have porcelain sinks on the wall and they have a little pipe under it well he takes that pipe out and he throws it and knocks the window out of our door like the little glass window and um i got up and i was like you know what's you doing me you know and everybody's coming over there And so the police come over there and I said, man, get this dude out of my cell, you know, whatever. And he's like, no, man, per the warden, he ain't going nowhere.

So I knew right then. I said, you, motherfucker. And I knew why they put him in there. And so I just told him, I was like, look, man, they're going to come replace that window. You're not going to knock that window out again. You're not going to blah, whatever. And so he's sitting there.

And all of a sudden he says, yeah, man, I ain't going to do that. What I am going to do is knock his sink off the wall. And that was it. That's all it took. And I big deal. He had a damn grapefruit on his head, bro, that come out right here from where his head hit the door how his head and there didn't bust i don't know but he ended up being a chomo but that's why they did that they put it in there they do that man they'll put

them in there with one they know you know i mean because i'm i'm gonna say this man some people can be whatever but the whites are the ones who primarily pretty much do stuff to the chomos man that's just kind of how it is in tennessee yeah i mean in the feds there will be blacks and Mexicans and other races among their own ranks that are chomos and they're accepted or they're never checked. The whites definitely hold their own people more accountable. Really? I didn't know it. There was a lot of black chomos that were, you know, they use religion as a cover, whatever. And they just, you know, they keep in their ranks and no one's checking them. It's not, it's just, it's so interesting, you know, especially among what I've noticed with the whites, the Jews in prison.

I was with a Jewish salmate and I'm Jewish too and he was a chomo. I didn't realize he was a chomo until after because he was so well respected because he had the rabbi on payroll to bring in contraband. So guys are using him. They're ignoring the fact that he's there for 15 to 20 years as a sex offender because he has those connections. So those were the only white people I got to see like get away with being a chomo. But it's very interesting of what goes on. in there and different races. But there would be a lot of black guys,

a lot of Spanish guys that were, you know, undercover chomos essentially along their ranks. And the white guys would be the ones to call them out on it. Is it, is it separated primarily by racing and the fed too? Is that how it is? I know in like Cali and the West Coast kind of it is in the penitentiaries, but on the East Coast it's by car.

So it's by state. They call like New York car, Connecticut car, a New England car, things like that. They ride like that. And then when you get into the Macs, the mediums and maximums, and you got your gangs, you got your heir in brotherhood, you got different, you know, things like that. Very political in the feds.

Yeah, see, the only time I've ever been around any of the politicking kind of stuff was in the county jail in Arizona. It just don't happen here. I could see a need for it maybe one day, but I don't see it happening. Tennessee's different. It's just different, man. I hear all these states and people talk about what goes on in them. and it's just not that way. Like I said, Tennessee has air conditioners and TVs and radios and beard trimmers.

I mean, you get a lot stuff, but they're slowly but surely taking it away, though, but yeah. Way better than Texas. Oh, yeah, Texas, I mean, you can't have nothing. No air conditioner, no TV. I think Louisiana's the same way. It's hot. Some states are like that. Alabama.

So is it tough, you know, when you're in the solitary for that long, constantly having different cellmates come in because it's like impeding on your home. When you're there the longest and they're different, they're coming in, they're moving differently. maybe other young people. Well, in Solitaire, you don't have no selling. Oh, you didn't have anyone. No, when you're on maximum security, you don't have a celly.

So this was just later on. Yeah, this is later on. You go from max to close to medium like you step down, and that's where, and that's what it, but, you know, in most prisons today, man, you might as well be on max because they're going to say they don't have any staff. You know, we have a bad problem with one prison in particular, man, Trialdale.

And just they opened it up without any guards. couldn't even lock the doors. I mean, it was crazy, man. And they're trying to shut it down now. But a lot of stuff's going on there because people are locked down. It's the thing. People are locked down. You keep them in there.

If I'm telling you that you got me locked down with this dude, I mean, this dude ain't jiving, you should move. And the fact that you don't, that's on you. What happens? And they won't because, again, if you're locked down because they don't have any staff and say, get anything done, it's over with. And that's the problem. You can't get anything done, man.

Would you rather be locked? down or in Gen Pop, has you continued to do your time? Oh, Gen Pop, at a certain prison. Like, if I could have went Jen Pop to one of the minimum securities, like Morgan County, where you're not locked down all the time, there. It would depend on the prison, really, man, because even though Max locked down, there's probably more going on at some prisons than it is in general population.

Yeah. Because that's where everybody's at, you know. So after you get out of Max, what prison do you go to? Are you still in the same facility, just a different unit? Yeah, I went from, River Bend Unit 1 to Unit 5, which is close. And I was there for three or four months probably. Then I went to minimum security.

River Bend there too, which was Unit 6, which is where they keep all the workers at. Now here's the problem with that. It's also where all the police and chomos are at. And so all I did was I walked by and there was this guy, he's well known, he was some kind of priest or something. And he was sitting there and he had a young kid and he had a Bible. out and he was showing this young kid something.

All I did was walk by and just pointed at the Bible and said, tell me what it says about you, and that's all I said. And they locked me up and ship me next day. That's how protected they are at River Bend. Wow. And so from there, I go to the attorney center and things went horribly bad there too. I had a guy, you owed me money. Morphine used to be real big.

That was the thing, green money. And a guy owed me $100. But he'd been slow walking on me, but I was getting it, but he still owed me 50. And another dude come and asked me if he owed me money. I said, yeah. And he said, he just paid somebody else some money. So you already know it's going to be a problem. Me and Doug get into it.

He didn't like the outcome. And he went and told somebody he's going to get a knife. Now, I could have let someone else deal with that. That's just not me. I'm not that type of person. And so I went and found him after count cleared. I ended up having to chase him. but he had a knife also, which was my saving grace on that one,

and stabbed him 16 times. You stabbed him. Yeah, and so this is my second tree. Now I'm going back to Max, see, okay? He lived. Life flighted him out of, thank God, that he did, because the internal affairs told me he would give me a life sentence of a dude, died.

He wanted to, his name is Dickie Jordan. He's a punk. I think he's finally gone now. But anyway, he lives, and I go back to Max. Then I go, and now listen this. So I do almost five years on Max. for the escape. How long do you think I did for the stabbing?

Less. Three. Three. Yeah, a little less than three. Didn't charge you or anything. Nope. No street charges, no nothing. And so from that trip to Max,

wait a minute. Yeah, that's my second time. And then I get off. I can't really, I go back for assault again, but the second time was just a fight. And dude's head got busted. It just looked worse than what it was.

And so they maxed me out again. What did you use to stab him? what kind of shank. A piece of metal. We cut them out of like, you know, I'm sure in the feds the same way,

the cabinets. You know, you ever see somebody can cut a knife out of one in? Yeah, I've seen everything. And then the fence rods and the fence,

different things like that. That's what this was. Now, I stabbed it another one too, but the second one I used to, I do took two hair brushes, man. They were real thick hair brushes

and he melted them down together and made it real, and then made a point on it because they all started putting metal detectors in them. That was plastic. And it didn't break. It did not break.

But I didn't stab it. They were twice with that one. Wow. But that was not in this same. This was after I went back to prison after I finished all that sentence. So from an outsider's perspective, a civilian who's never been to prison, I understand it, but most people wouldn't, stabbing someone over $100 bucks. Yeah.

Can you explain the reason why you have to do that in prison? Because if I will let him take that, which was now $50 away from me, I'll let you take anything. I might as well been over this table. but I'm going to let you grease up. That's just how it is. You can't let nobody take a piece of bubble gum because it's weak. You show no weakness, man, which is also one of the hardest things it is to get out of you

when you get out of the penitentiary, because you still want to walk around and carry all that with you, man. At least me, I did. That's what drove me that. You're talking about that. You know, you're not going to do me that way. And I'm still that way today. I'm better.

I don't give me wrong. I'm like I act like I do in prison, you know what I mean? But I'm still that way. I just have that. You know, you're not going to do me that way, Did you want to become that person? No, I didn't, man, because that's never really not who I was. No, I grew up fighting and all that stuff.

You know, I was a boy, boy, whatever, and stuff like that. But I didn't want to be no evil person, man. And my mother told me, when I got out the first time, she hadn't saw me in 10 years. And she said, you've always had the most amazing, beautiful blue eyes, but I do not like what I see in them. That's what she's talking about, man, that coldness, man. Just that, yeah, no, I never wanted to be that way.

I never wanted to be, I never wanted to feel like harming someone was just another day, man. You know what I mean? And that's kind of where you have to be at or you're going to be the one that gets harmed, you know. How do you, you know, put that to the side in your life? Like when you eventually do get free after all those years, how do you try to put those memories to the sides? You do the best you can. I call them my demons, man. And I try to make better memories now.

See, my whole deal is I try to live in the real. be mirror other than when I'm telling my story or I'm trying to help somebody I don't try to sit around focus on it if you catch me doing that you'll see I'll do so I'll get up all of a sudden like for instance I'm like I'm gonna go for a ride whatever I'm gonna do something but I got them you know I got a lot of man because I make calls on things and things that that happened man that turned out to be the wrong thing but I could only go by what I was given at the time you know and these things you this is the things you carry with you in life man that they don't tell you about yeah you know how do you make amends yeah be a piece

You know, you have to make it with whatever your higher power is. Mine's God. I used to call my God. And that's what I do. In this case, I'm talking about, I've actually talked to the parents of this person. It was a bad deal, man. Bad information, put something bad on somebody of course as we know it can be. And it was even investigated properly, but still in the end, man, it come out how wrong it was, man.

You can't take that shit back. You can't take back anything that you do, man, to people, period. But when it's that, you know, or something serious and someone gets harmed or loses everything to happen or whatever it may be, man. You know, it's tough. But that's what drove me for a long time getting high. But then I realized, man, it's just like everything. It's just like every other stupid decision I've made, another wrong turn that I've made. The best thing I can do is a living amends, man.

That's changed my life and try to keep that for happening to someone else and then help others all I can. That's the best I can do. So that nearly like 12-year sentence you got after the escape, was that your last prison stuff? No, no, man. We're going back to 12 more. What happens there when you get out? I got out and, man, it was crazy.

I couldn't even go in a store. I mean, that's how freaked out I was and stuff. But eventually, man, I started drinking and going to bars and the girls and all that changed at all. But the first girl I met ended up being psychotic and tried to kill me three times. poisoned me once tried to run me with a car and tried to stab me with a knife but man she was good looking and good in bed but she was but she was through but so i started getting high man i mean

immediately and so what happens is i meet somebody and he's talking about some payroll checks and i don't know nothing about no payroll checks that's not my type of crime you know what i mean but he introduced me to it and showed me that each one of these little pieces of paper represents money and that's what we started doing. And ended up with a 12 at 45. How do you guys get caught from payroll trucks? And are you making any real money or do you get busted right off the bat? Yeah, no, I did it for you.

He made a lot of money, man. Oh, wow. It's a lot of money. Be honest about it. And they know about it. I can say it, $750,000. So it's what they say. You know, it's what they say.

So in my opinion, was it that much? No, but I mean, it was, you know, I lived well. I lived better during that time they ever had in my life. I'll say that. It was, man, I was doing 150 milligrams of methadone and probably four XNX bars a day. So I didn't even know where I was at most of the time. You know what I mean? I got charges and checks and stuff.

And I'm sitting there. I couldn't have a clue. But we got caught because a girl used my car and went to the bank and cast a check. And they followed her? Yeah, they alerted it. And they started that. And then she already know the rest of it. And she told on you.

Payroll trucks back then were a lot easier, right? I don't think you can really necessarily get away with that. No, you can't do it as easy now. They've got a lot more sophisticated. They've got that telecheck stuff. But you can still, don't get me wrong, you can still, if you got somebody that makes them and they're right, yeah, you can go to any of these little Mexican stores and the little hood market, we'll just say, you know, they're cash it. Did you struggle to find work?

Is that why you got into the payroll trip? Yeah, I did that time. See, I got out the first time in 2009. The economy was in the tank right then. And I went to every fast food restaurant, you name it, I went there. Kroger, Walmart. anywhere no one would hire me at that time i only had 12 felonies at that time or 11 excuse me but no one would hire me man and so but immediately i went right back into a life of hustling

and doing all that stuff um and so i got arrested i actually got arrested on one in williams and counting and then ended up being four and they wanted to give me drug court all right and my best friend, this is crazy, man, my best friend was in drug court, and he kept trying, he wanted me to take it. I was like, man, I'm not taking that shit. And I said, well, you know, Nashville's probably going to come out

with some stuff on me anyway. And so I go in and take the drug court and Metro showing one charge, I mean, one hold. And so I can't go and do the programming part of the drug court because I got a hold on me, they won't let me go outside of jail. And so I tell them, well, all you got to do is tell Nashville, you're going to release me. I promise you. They're going to come and get me.

But my plan was, I was going to, Mattro was going to come and get me. I was going to go up there and bond out. And I was either going to roll out or whatever I was going to do. It didn't work out that way. I got up there and they had 111 indictments on me. And so I ended up having to stay in jail there six weeks. But I ended up with a 12, man, at 45% through this. And here's where it even gets crazy. So what I had to do is I had to finish a four in Williamson County. and then the rest of it would have been Davidson County. But I had to do it, the drug court. Well, on a Wednesday, my mother gets sick and goes into the hospital on Thursday.

Friday, my best friend mentions getting high. We'd been sober for a year. And so the next day, we're trying to get some pills. And I had never even saw heroin at this time. I was 35 years old. And long story short, couldn't get the pills. And he starts calling around and get some heroin. When he looks at me and he says,

Hey, bro, this may be God's way of saying we don't need to be doing this. And his phone rung. It's a girl, we can get it or she can get it. So we go and get it. And it's me, him, that girl, and his baby mama. And I do, like, man, like a quarter of what they do. And I'm wasted. And I'm like, you got to take me home.

I couldn't hold my head up. And so I go home and he comes in, but he's stalling around. And I said, what's up, man? You want me go with you? And he's like, no, because Brandi was like his ex-girlfriend. He's like, I'm going to try to get a piece or whatever. and so he leaves, but then he calls me,

we had a 9 o'clock curfing, you called me at 8.30 and say he's on his way home that I want anything from McDonald's. And I said, but I'm still throwing up, and I was like, nah. I said, well, just get it. I'll get it later.

And that was it. Nobody ever saw him again and talked to him again. They found him in his car next day at 1 o'clock, needle still in his arm. So what happens from that is, now remember my mom's in hospital too. Now, on that same day, they're putting her into an induced coma

because she's got some kind of infection. And so, but now drug court's trying to find somebody to blame for this. And so they keep trying to blame me. So he died on Saturday. My mom dies on Wednesday. Drug court put me in jail on Thursday and says, for my own safety. So Friday, they get the nurse to strip me down butt-niquet and look over my body with a magnifying glass looking for needle marks. I'm not going to find one.

And so they come in there Friday and they're like, well, you're not going to write. Ryan's funeral. I said, my mom's funeral tomorrow. They're like, we're not going that either. So I just get up and walk out and leave. Well, then they come back that evening and want me. And I said, uh, said drug court one of me. I said, tell drug courts suck my whatever and dude's like, I think they're going to give you a furlough. And I was like, I'll better go talk to them. And so I go up there and it give me a six hour furlough the next day to go to my mother's funeral. And so after the funeral, I went to Murfrews, Tennessee. How many discounts does USA Auto Insurance offer? Too many to say here.

Multi-vehicle discount, safe driver discount, new vehicle discount, storage discount, legacy. How many discounts will you stack up? Tap the banner or visit usa.com slash auto discounts. Restrictions apply. Looking to start 2026 with an unforgettable getaway. Fiji Airway's sale is on now. Fly non-stop round-trip to Fiji from just 748. Or enjoy a sunny Fiji stopover on your way to Australia with round-trip fair starting from 839.

As a one-world alliance member and American Airlines Advantage program partner, your miles go further, the South Pacific. Book now at Viji Airways.com or contact your local travel agent. Conditions apply. The next day, I was in New Orleans, Louisiana, and a day, two days after that, I was in Tucson, Arizona. Wow. Wow.

The way Arizona. I wanted to get as far away as I could. And the guy that I left with traveled and does a commercial vinyl hanging wallpaper. And so that's how I ended up out there. It was that way with that. But throughout all that experience, man, I was out there for like seven months. he tells on me and gets me arrested and I come back and through it all I ended up with less time it's kind of hard to explain but I got all of that time I got all the time I was on escape for

Metro give it all to me so it was like I was better off that I escaped the craziest thing ever because I ended up making parole on that sentence the first time because it looked like I'd already been put off for a year on it but I hadn't so it was a crazy experience man crazy deal. You love to escape. It was, that one man, you know, I just walked out. I just signed out. But even the woman was like, I can't believe I gave your ass off earlier. You ain't coming back. And I said, no, because I wouldn't he supposed to be in jail. I said, you know, because they're going to, they were going to violate me and overdue or whatever dying. But it's what it is. So you end up doing another 10 years? I end up doing pretty much all that one too.

That's for everything, the drugs, the money. All of it. I ended up. So I did the 12 that we talked about. Then that one, the first time I did, I did six years on it. Then after that, I've went in two smaller times on it. One was for 15 months, other one was for 17. I've been nice done. I'm completely done now with all of it. No charges, no warrants, no nothing.

That's crazy, man. That's the first time since I was 18 years old. Does it feel good to be free? It feels real good. It feels real good, man, because I'm living right, bro. That's why, you know, I could be off pro and all that, but if I was still strung out and all that, it wouldn't be worth nothing, you know, but that it's all finally, man, behind me.

I live that life, man. I live through it. And today I can help people, man. That's what it's all about, man. When did you get out of prison that last time? 2020. 2020. Yeah, the last time.

I was in there COVID. Yeah. And so, yeah. Why was that last time the last time for you? What in your mind triggered that you wanted to stay on the straight and arrow? Surrender, man. Surrender. I knew I finally was, for whatever reason,

drug acts we think we're really smart but we really make some dumb decisions and i was one of them who kept thinking i'm gonna be able to do something i'll be able to do a little bit here a little bit there i finally realized that no man getting high is just not in my life and if i don't do that and i stick with god i'll live a good life everything happened man i'm sitting here i'm looking at it and my brother's a millionaire and we come from the same exact life man he had the same exact life i did and things like that and then i saw it see that's another thing also other things along the way too all right i do the six years and i got out couldn't get a job same thing but i took a i answered an ad about appliance repair i never had worked on appliance in my life called the guy went and met him

and i told him i said man i never worked on an appliance but i'm pretty intelligent if you give me a chance i'll figure it out and he did and come to find out how to knack for it and so about four months later I started my own business about three months into it I had a contract with best buy to do all their installs and all that stuff and so I was seeing my capabilities I didn't know I had basically because I did all this myself just like no my podcast and my social media stuff ain't rid of but I've done it all myself without no help and that's saying a lot for somebody don't know who don't know you know what they're doing don't have education and stuff but yeah man it was good but I just went quick getting high same thing I lost it all bought brand new trucks had it all

lost it all started the business again lost it all again finished the pro started the business and things are going pretty good man you got to keep failing you know you I've failed and made so many mistakes and you learn and we're humans

we're gonna keep failing you know and you pick yourself back up and I think it's more powerful when you do it on your own it is man when you figure it out because like you were asking me questions about the gear this and that that's how I learned you ask you figure it out you know No one just hands it to you.

And that's the best way because I just feel like you find more satisfaction in it. I mean, yes, we all need help along the way. I know that. But it is, man, you know, that I did that. And then my brother said to me, he said something about it. And that's huge, man, because I do want to make him happy, man. I do want to make him proud of him because, man, he's done it, man. You know what I mean?

He's done. He's a good dad. He did it. Man, he started his own business. Like I said, and that's all he wants for me, too. you know i just had things in my life man that we can blame whatever but it was me i just kept many things to make excuses for in my life we'll just say that how's your relationship with your kids now non-existent um he uh we'll message every now and in he told me man you know he don't

hate me there's really no hard feelings or anything that he had a a pretty good life and um he's cool so we'll message on messenger he's in texas man i haven't laid eyes on him since he's five months old. I don't even know. I've never heard his voice. What about relationships and marriage? How has that been for you? That's tough, man.

I'm in and out of one right now that's been going on for a long time. But she was there through prison twice, three times, excuse me, three times, the last three. And a lot's been done. My part, you know, I'm a prick, man. I'm just going to be honest about it. When it comes to certain things I am, and I, I, I want to get that stuff out of me. And relationships are hard for me.

And this one's extremely hard. But she's worth it, man. And it's worth it just because she's always at my back, man. More than anybody ever in my life. No matter what I've done, she was there. What are some life lessons you've learned throughout your journey that you want others to take away from your story? Don't lie, man. That's one of the biggest things about life, man.

Don't lie. Don't lie. Keep your word. Do that. And remember, man. money is not worth it. Whatever you're doing today, and if you're breaking the law

and you're thinking that you're going to get away with it, man, first of all, you're not. You're going to get caught, and then you're going to up in there where nobody can get you out of it, man. So what's the best thing to do, man? Get up every day, go to work and do the next right thing, man. That's it.

If we'll all do the next right thing, and think about it, man, we'll be in a different world, man, but people are not going to do it because people have different excuses and they justify different things of why they do things and, you know, find your happiness, find your peace,

but don't find it in a bottle or some drugs because it's not there. Bro, I've spent millions of dollars on it. You know, I've got all the scars on my body, man. That's what that is. That's from a needle, man. That's what that scar is on my body. You know, because I want to stab a needle in my body

and get high. For what? There's nothing there, man. There's nothing there. There's only one way, the right way. that's peace man you listen you can have a million dollars in the bank if you don't have no peace in your head what do you got me i don't have anything if i can't lay down at night man and close my eyes without some kind of substance putting me to sleep i've got a problem absolutely well dan thank you

so much man thank you buddy i appreciate it man yeah i loved hearing your story today i'm glad we can make this work and uh we'll have all your information plugged in on the description in this episode yeah i appreciate it man yeah and wish you the best with your podcast if you ever need help reach out you got my number well do man thank you so much to end yeah