Locked In with Ian Bick - How I Survived New Jersey State Prison | Shawn Johnson

Episode Date: January 21, 2026

Shawn Johnson shares his story of growing up in poverty in New Jersey, getting pulled into street life, and eventually joining the Bloods. He breaks down how a murder charge led to a 60-year sentence in New Jersey State Prison, what it took to survive nearly two decades behind bars, and how prison life reshaped him mentally and emotionally. Shawn also opens up about the long road to freedom, the legal fight for clemency, and what it meant to finally walk out of prison after 19 years, when he was granted clemency by the governor in 2025. _____________________________________________ #PrisonStories #TrueCrime #NewJerseyPrison #SurvivingPrison #LifeBehindBars #RealStories #CrimeDocumentary #youtubepodcast _____________________________________________ Thank you to PRIZEPICKS for sponsoring this episode: Visit https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/IANBICK and use code IANBICK and get $50 in lineups when you play your first $5 lineup! _____________________________________________ Connect with Shawn Johnson: YouTube: Shawn Robert Johnson TikTok & Instagram: shawjohn1222 _____________________________________________ Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ Shop Locked In Merch: http://www.ianbick.com/shop _____________________________________________ Timestamps: 00:00 Shawn’s Case Overview & What Led to 19 Years in Prison 02:22 Growing Up in New Jersey: Childhood & Early Influences 09:05 Juvenile Charges, Family Struggles & Early Warning Signs 18:00 From Trouble to the Streets: Choices That Changed Everything 24:45 The Incident, Arrest & Facing Serious Charges 36:13 Trial, Sentencing & Life in County Jail 43:41 Arriving in Prison: Survival, Routine & Reality Shock 48:01 Daily Life in Prison: Politics, Social Dynamics & Rules 55:04 Avoiding Trouble, Growing Up & Mental Survival 01:00:01 Appeals, Legal Setbacks & Holding Onto Hope 01:08:05 Rehabilitation, Programs & Preparing for Release 01:15:15 COVID in Prison & a Major Legal Turning Point 01:20:32 Clemency Explained: Application, Review & Approval 01:25:11 Coming Home After 19 Years in Prison 01:28:18 Life Lessons, Advice & Final Reflections Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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My bell was $1 short of $10 million. What's that first night in your cell like after you lost trial? It could get violent at times. Clearly you're not serving 60 years anymore, but you exhausted all your appeals. So what happened? In this episode, Sean Johnson walks through his life from the beginning, growing up poor New Jersey, getting pulled into the streets, and joining the Bloods. He explains going to trial on a murder charge, being sentenced to 60 years in New Jersey State Prison, and what it took to survive 19 years behind bars.

Sean also shares how everything changed when he was granted clemency in 2025. This is an honest conversation about street life, the trial process, extreme sentencing, survival in prison, and getting a second chance. Sean, welcome to Lockett. Thanks so much for coming on the show today. Thank you. I appreciate you for even having me. Yeah, of course, a little snowy day in Connecticut here, but we made it work. We made it work. I'm here. I just got back from Nashville, and it's freezing over there just as cold as it was here.

Yeah, it definitely got cold. Like, the temperature dropped soon as we got here in Connecticut because of the snow, though. But it's nice. It's nice. I think after the Maxby interview, I got a ton of New Jersey people. Email me, DM me, hit me up on Facebook, too, saying, oh, we got to come on the show, tell you how New Jersey prison really is this and that. Yeah.

I think you were one of the guys that. Yeah, yeah, I definitely hit you up on Instagram, but me and Max B was in Trenton State at the same time. Oh, wow. We was in there at the same time. Did you guys know each other? Yes, we know each other. Like, the unit he was on was different from the unit.

I was on, so he didn't see each other day to day. But I met him, we met him. He met me, and we was there for a little bit of time. I was talking to someone else, and they were saying that he actually really did have the mic, like for the microphone for recording music and stuff in the prison. Yeah, he did. He did. He exactly what he was saying when he did an interview with how he was, he would just chill in his own way. That's crazy. Where do you grow up?

In New Jersey, Asbury Park, to be exact. What was that like growing up there? Well, you know, Asbury, that's the urban community. That's where we can sit in the hood. So growing up there, it's a lot of below middle class people that live there. And, you know, it's one square mile. It's a small town. It's a small town. So it's rough. You don't have too many things that you can do as far as outlets. Who raised you? Both of my parents, my mother, my father.

What they do for work? They did like periodic jobs here and there. My dad most likely did construction. My mom most likely did office work far as like secretary duty. How was your guy's financial upbringing? It was rough. It was rough. It was rough.

It's plenty of nights that we went to sleep without eating, me and my brothers. So it definitely was rough. It wasn't nothing that way. We was living. It was like below paycheck to paycheck a lot of times. How old was your brothers? My oldest brother is about a year or some change older than me. And my youngest brother is about a year or some change younger than me.

So I'm in the middle. Three of you guys. Was it hard being the middle child? You know, they always say the middle child get left out a lot in life. But I think it was just how it was just being left out. Who are you closer to your mother or your father? I would say equally I'm good with both of them equally. I think I probably had different conversations with my mother than I do with my father, but it's about the same.

What was the lesson they instilled in you as a kid? Don't give up, no matter what you might face in life at sometimes. And that's something I still hold to me until this day, no matter what experiences I go through. How would your best friend in, say, high school have described yourself? He would probably say that I'm laid back and just like reserved as much as possible. Like I'm very humble. So do you think anyone back then would have ever expected you would end up in prison? No.

Even when I first got arrested, a lot of people that read about it was like, yeah, they got that wrong. Was that the first time you ever got arrested? Yes, as an adult, yes. I had like little juvenile, like little charges here and there that I went to the youth house maybe a couple of times. But as far as adult, that was my first time. How old were you when those juvenile infractions happened? I would say 16 years old and 17 years old. And what were those about?

Just like little criminal mischief here and, you know, get picked up with like having a pocket knife with me here. And then after a while, they tally up. And then now I find myself in the youth detention center. Did a couple of months the first time I think six, I think I did six months overall. I did maybe two months there and four. months in a residential program, and then the second time I did about two months, and then I went down to Jamesburg, what is like technically the juvenile prison in New Jersey.

All over those small things. Small things. Wow. Small things. It sounds like there's kind of like a flaw in the system then for that. No, I believe it is because they want everybody to rehabilitate their cells, but they don't necessarily give you all the tools to rehabilitate yourself. It's like when I was arrested as a juvenile, it was kind of like.

playtime a lot of time. Like you go to where you had access to use the phone all day, every day. You're not locking in the cell. It's like a dormitory type setting. So you just just having fun with a lot of guys either from around your way or guys you link up with from different towns. And what were you thinking of career-wise when you were in high school? My two main things was basketball and business. Like as far as I can remember, those were my two aspirations. By the time I got to high school, I played basketball. a little bit, but things got rough so that let me, you know, venture into the streets. And businesses, like something I always was fascinated with a learning, just to be an

entrepreneur and do my own thing. What do you think was that defining moment that led you to the streets that you're just discussing? If I could think I would say my eighth grade year, the eighth grade year, like things was always rough leading up into there. But my eighth grade year, I remember I got a letter from this organization. called people to people. And basically what they did is they got young kids for whatever sport and you will go across seas during the summertime. And I remember that I got the registration.

I was excited about it. I'm online trying to reserve myself for it and they cost $300. So I'm about 12 years old, 13 years old. So I go to my parents and I'm like, you all I need $300. And they're like, nah, we haven't got it for you. So that kind of like killed my spirit because all I did up to that point us play basketball every day. And then from there, it's like, I can't even do something I love doing. So it had me very often to the streets from that point. How different do you think life would have been if they had just paid that $300? I think it would have been different in the sense of I definitely was focused. Like I said, I played basketball, whether a school team, whether it was AAU, one-on-one tournaments, basketball camps, going to the course after school. So I believe that

at that point of time, if I would have had the opportunity, it would have changed a lot of stuff in my life because it would have allowed me to see what the future could hold to me as far as pursuing playing basketball as a career and going to college, but it got taken away from me. Did you ever look at other kids or other families and say if I had just been born into that family,

my life would be so much different? Of course, I think a lot of us that come from the communities that we do think that at one point in other, just think that only if I had, a little bit more parental guidance. If I had a little bit more of, you know, structure or a little bit more money in my family that I could possibly do these other things. And how were your siblings doing? Were they going down the same path as you? In their own way. They had their own journey of what they was doing in their own way. So it was kind of like we was just trying to figure

figure life out for ourselves at a young age to have better than what we was having on a daily basis. Was college ever a consideration in your mind? It was in regards to playing basketball, whether if it would have been a scholarship that I would have got or just being able to go as a walk on by the time I got there, I definitely was going to go to college in regards to that. So did those juvenile issues cause you to not pursue the college aspect as well? Yeah, it kind of was because like once the thing is like once you think about like trying to just get into the streets to make money to better your lifestyle. You would just think that you only get in there to make money. But once you get involved in the streets, it's a lot more things that happen that you're unaware of at that point of time before you make that decision.

So give us one of those scenarios. So it's like your thought might be, okay, I just want to sell drugs. But when you go sell drugs, now you got to worry about people that's, that's, you're going to worry about people that's, going to try to rob you. You got to worry about people that might end you, it might try to line you up and set you up at some point to take your spot, especially if you are making it good along the way. So it's like those things can lead to other situations where all you want to really do is just make money. Were your parents involved in your issues with, let's say, law enforcement and the juvenile detention problems growing up? And to the best of the

ability they was, like they showed up at court hearings and all that, to the best of the ability, they tried to be there as much as they possibly could. Do you feel like they were there not enough? No, I just think just, it wasn't the point of catching a juvenile charge and a parent in court. I think it was just more the family dynamic at home, the lack of structure that we had growing up because they was living their own life. So it's like, I think the home set. and is what played a bigger part than actually a parent's at juvenile court.

Do you think you're given too much freedom? Yeah, I think any kid that get too much freedom, you just go and go rogue and just start doing what you want to do, especially when you live in a crime-infested environment. So, like, in the beginning, of course, you don't want to get caught. But the more that you see how you can get away with it, and then you have nobody watching over you, of course you're going to be like, yeah, this right here is the way I can make money.

Yeah, it would be interesting to see if you took, say, like, a rich kid that grew up in the suburbs and grew to be successful if he grew up in an area just like you did, what that outcome would be, if it would be a similar outcome as yours. Yeah, I think it'll probably be different in some type of way. I think it will be different because the environment plays a major part of how we grow. Now, that does not take away from some people that come from these environments and they still succeed, right? But I don't know what their family structure is like. I don't know if they had other people that was doing things to help them get along that, no matter how small it was. But just having a lack of family structure or just any guidance, whether it's your parents,

your grandparents, that is not trying to keep you on a straight and narrow path. It would make it hard for you. Or some people still have those stumbles with, say, the law early on, but they're able to escape that life and then become successful before something significant happens. No, I agree. I agree. So do you end up graduating high school? Yes, I ended up graduating by the time I was in prison for the charge I went to prison for. All right. So tell us about what you actually got arrested for and what happened with that and how old you were.

So I actually got arrested. I remember the day October 24th, 2006, my initial charge was a murder charge. I was 19 years old at that time. It was two months before I turned 20. And I got arrested in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I was. there for maybe a week and then they extradited me back. I would say a couple of months into the process, I got indicted for the attempted murder charge that went along with the murder charge. So those was the actual charges. As far as the situation goes, you know, just growing up in the environment that you grew up

and you have your group of friends, you have other people, and it was just a lot of back and forth between other individuals that really didn't involve me too much, but loyal to my guys. So it led me into a situation, whereas me and a guy that ultimately died, we had a conflict type of situation. And, you know, shots went back and forth between us. And one of his friends got shot. And then a couple of days later, we ran into each other again, took a shot at me again, and it ended up me shooting him. So you got a shot about, what, five times?

And that's what caused him to die. So that's how I got the murder charge. And that's how I got the attempted murder was for the first time. Was the first time three days prior. Okay. And were you in a gang? Yes, part of the blus. Okay.

And was he in the same game? No. So it was a right? It was gang on gang. No, it wasn't even gang on gang. He was just, well, at that point in time, he just stayed regular in the sense that he didn't have any affiliations. Okay. So he was just regular and that's what I was a part of.

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Please drink responsibly. Camin Jack beverage company, Chicago, Illinois. Nice. So this wasn't, say, an innocent by, said dander. Okay. Now, after those shots went off the second time, did you, know you killed them in that moment or did you leave before you found out? No, I left before I found out and, you know, in my mind, I'm 19 years old at the time and regardless of the situation that happened,

you hear it a lot growing up is like, there's no such thing as self-defense. It's no such thing. Well, I found out later that that was a lot, but that was just my thought and I ended up leaving New Jersey and going to Pittsburgh. What do you mean by hearing there's no such thing as self-defense? Yeah, that's like one of the things that I heard growing up in my environment, my whole life, like, it was no such thing as self-defense. Wow. Right. And people will really say that, and then you hear so much you believe it. So in my mind, I'm like, okay, I'm 19.

I know he's hurt. I don't know if he's dead, but if he do die, even though I did defend myself, it's like your mind is just saying there's no such thing as self-defense. So I don't know how the outcome is going to be if I were to be arrested. Yeah, I mean, growing up, all I heard was about self-defense. You see that in movies and TV shows and stuff. That's interesting. Yeah. How many other people knew of the shooting at the time when you ran?

I would say a few. You're saying when it first happened? Well, the second time when the guy. Oh, the second time? Yeah, well, nobody knew about it. I just became a suspect because one of the guys that was his friend happened to be in the area and said that he seen me do it. How did you first find out you were a suspect?

This was, it happened on a Wednesday. I remember it was October 18, so I think about by that Friday, I was looking my, myself up on the internet at that time, and it popped up there like, yeah, you got a warrant for you. And it was for murder right away. Yes, it was for murder. It wasn't, the attempted murder wasn't even attached you at that time. It was just for the murder because he died. So now I'm looking at myself on the internet, and yeah, they're looking for me.

How did you feel finding out that he passed? away. It's an unfortunate situation. Even back then I looked at it as unfortunate. Like, we're kids growing up in an environment and it's like a dog-e-dog type of world environment. Like, you with your guys, I'm with my guys. And even at that, I still kind of looked at it from a standpoint of like, that's still somebody family, still somebody's son or whatever the case may be. And regardless of how much I felt that I was justified for defending myself, it's It's still kind of crazy for somebody to lose their life. Do you remember how old you were when you were first introduced to a gun?

I would say about 14. And was it the gang that introduced you to a gun? No, no, no, no. Just regularly just being out in the streets. Why do you feel like you needed one? Well, in the world that we lived in and that environment, it's like, if you know what you want to get into, into the streets, the more that you win there, you're going to want to protect yourself.

So you go on the run. how do you get caught? You see it in the news a couple days later? Yeah, I don't know the exact way of how I got caught, but for some reason he found out where I was at in Pittsburgh and the U.S. Marshals had ran in the house about 4 o'clock in the morning. Whose house was it? The girl I was dating at the time,

it was one of her family members' house. And did you have a kid yet at that time? I had three kids, yes. Already at 19? Yeah, I had three at 19. My son and two daughters at that time. Wow. It was two, two, and one.

Same mom? My son and my youngest daughter had the same mother and my middle daughter had a different mother. How old are? So you had the first kid at 17? Yes, around 16. 16, yeah, 16. Wow. Do you feel like you were even a father at that point in time?

No, because, like, the fatherhood is more than just hand the money over and doing that. Like, spending the quality time. So it's like being that I was in the streets, like I spent time with my kids, but not as much as I would say that a father should do. So it was just more of if their mother called me and say, your son or your daughter need this, here go to money, go do what you need to do to get it for them. And that was that. Was your side of the family involved in raising the kids? Yes. When I was in prison, they were.

They absolutely were. What about the mom's side? Oh, everybody was. When I went to prison, everybody was involved in help. and raising. So they came from good families? Yes. Okay. So they drag you out of the house, they arrest you. Where did they bring you? They took me to a federal building in Allegheny County. Was this a federal case? No, it was a state case. But being that I was in another state, they had contacted the U.S. Marshals to apprehend me. Okay. So you get there, what happens,

walk us through it. All right. So I remember it's about 4 o'clock in the morning. I'm asleep. Then They just run in there. And I tried to, I try to get out. I tried to get out. I ended up being under a bed. They grabbed me handcuffed me. It snowing outside. And then they take me to the federal building.

And then they say, well, you know, you got a warrant for your arrest for murder. And I'm just sitting there like, all right, like, okay. And then they just went to the formalities of, you know, all the stuff that they got to say, give you your Miranda rights and all that stuff. And then they just kept asking me about it. And I'm just sitting there like, I really. don't know what you're talking about. It came to a point that the female I was dating, you know, she was, I believe she was

pregnant at that time. And they arrested her for a harboring and a fugitive charge also with me. And I didn't want him to recharge with the murder. So I just told them about the self-defense of how, you know, the situation happened. Dude came at me. I shot back and that's how he ultimately died. Did you wait for your lawyer to get there or you told them? Nah, nah, I told them because I knew the truth that I stood on.

So I really wasn't worried about that. But my mind was just a whole, you know, no self-defense thing. But I'm like, it is what it is at this point. And also I wasn't going to allow her to be caught up and be in prison for potentially 20, 30 years for something that she had no part of. The big game is almost here. And there's no better way to cash in during America's biggest sporting event than with prize picks, where it always feels. good to be right. And since the big game is right around the corner, that also means it's your last chance to get into the football action before next season. So close the season outright with

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So why did they actually charge her with harboring a fugitive? Was she lying to them saying you weren't there? No, it wasn't about lying to them that she was with me when I got arrested and it was one of her family members' house that we was out. So to them they felt that she helped me get there. Wow, I didn't even realize they charged people with that unless they were lying to say the police. Yeah. Now, do you wish you didn't give that confession right away, looking back on it and how the legal process played out? I don't think I had anything to lose at that point because I felt that people was going to try to line me up anywhere when it came to it.

So I felt like, you know, at the end of the day, it might as well. it happened in self-defense I might as well to stick to I know what happened and hope that I could get acquitted at trial because going through the legal process over the I think I was in a county 20 months, 22 months. My lawyer actually sat down one day and we was having this self-defense conversation. I'm like, you know, it ain't no such thing as self-defense. So he's like, I don't know who told you that. But that's wrong. That's wrong. And we had the conversation. So we just felt that it was just the best strategy just to continue to go forward with it because it's what happened. But he just didn't want me to get on the stand and testify for it because they didn't want to elicit like a lot of other stuff that happened around it where I probably would have to plead the fifth.

So even with that confession, you still went to trial? Yes, still went to trial. Ah, so was the lawyer able to reverse a confession or it didn't really matter? It really didn't matter at that point. It really came down to, I believe, the trial. was a couple of witnesses that the state bought along. And these are some people that are supposed to be, you know, quote unquote, from the streets tied to the dude that died and they made statements.

So they're making statements and then try to renege on the statements. It kind of already put me in a bind because the jury, I believe, looked at it like, this is this guy, friend. They got to know what happened. So they believed the version that they gave to the police. Now, those guys that were in the street, why did they make statements? What was the benefit for them? Did they get off on other charges?

Because their friends are already dead. They had their own situations going on at the time. I don't understand it. I don't know why. Like, growing up, even with at that point of time, I thought we lived by a certain code in the streets, but it didn't happen and they said what they said. I know you didn't, but would there have been an opportunity to inform, on others that were a part of it?

Say guys that were shooting back at you? One of the guys, he was charged with his own charges and he was facing 20 years after he made a statement, he only got six. Wow. So I believe that was his incentive. So how does that make you feel looking at it? I'm saying it's tough.

It's tough because I feel like if you really felt some type of way, you could have probably wondered about it a whole different way, but it happened. couldn't change what happened. It happened. So it's like something I wouldn't do it did. What was the first plea deal they offered you? If they offered you any.

First plea deal, 50 years. 50 years right out the rip? 50 years, right at the rip. That was in my discovery. 50 years. Then it came to, I think, about a month and a half before I went to trial, and they offered me at 18-185.

So the outcome is technically the same with how things played out? Yes, give it take a few years. depending on how you look at it. And some stress. Yes, and some stress. But because of the factors of how I got home is completely different from, you know, the sentences that I got. True. So I think that's the difference underlying thing right there. Tell us about your time in county while you were awaiting trial. 22 months, they had me locked in on J-Pod, J-2, I believe it was. And basically, I only came out

an hour a day. It's kind of like a segregated unit that they keep you for high profile cases. And I come out maybe Monday through Friday for an hour. Other than that, I'm locked in the sale and then the weekends, you're not coming out. So it was basically 23 and 1, five days a week. And was your case at high profile that they have? Yeah. It was high profile to this, to the extent that even after I got arrested, I was reading in the newspaper because of the local. locations of what they happened. It was by a middle school. They, like, even announced it on the middle school and through the public school system that I was arrested because they made it bigger than it was. Like, I'm just just super big threat throughout the whole town. So that's why they kept me back there. Was Bond or bail even a thought at the time? $2 million. Oh, so if you had paid that, what, 10% you could have got out? Yeah, it was $2 million cash only. It was, like, they, they was not trying to let me out. When I first got arrested, I was, in Pittsburgh, my bail was $1 short of $10 million.

Wow. So they gave you bail in Pittsburgh before? Yes, they gave me bail in Pittsburgh. Like I said, it was $1 short of $10 million. Really making that. And then when I got extradited back over here, it was like $2 million. They should just say no bail instead of actually putting a dollar amount on it. No, I agree.

We did a bail hearing. And I think like the odds were stacked against me the whole way because we did a bail hearing. my lawyer said because of the evidence that had come out and that it could show self-defense, he went to opt for asking that my bail get reduced to $150,000. And I'm like, that's kind of crazy. You try to go from $2 million to $150,000. We ended up getting denied. But the judge basically said that he denied my bail for two reasons.

One is because I got locked up in Pittsburgh. And two, it's because either my family knew where I was at and they didn't tell the court system or two, me and my family wasn't that close. And I'm like, what does that have to do with a bail hearing? But that was his reason. He was pissed at you. Yeah, he was. I feel like sometimes judges do bring a motion into it.

They do. He was the assignment judge, but he opted to keep my case itself instead of passing off to somebody else for whatever reasons. I still do not know what to this thing. You mean like the magistrate type judge? Yeah, like the ones, like he's the one that he get in and say, okay, well, you want to take this case, you want to take this case. He actually kept my case himself.

Now, being in a lockdown facility like that, did that, do you feel like made you itch towards wanting to take a plea deal because it was such a miserable place? Or did you think in your mind you were in a hold strong to go to trial? No, I wanted to go to trial because I knew what happened. And I believe the facts, like once we started getting the discovery, a lot of people that made statements or a lot of the evidence, it linked towards everything that I was saying. Like in my attempt to murder case, the guy got shot once. They found a bullet projectiles in two different directions. I can't, with two different calibres of guns, that can't be me.

But just the physical pain of being in a facility like that, I mean, it's mentally draining too. It is. Did that make you want to say, hey, let me just take the plea deal to get out of here? No, but it was all or nothing. It's either I'm going to prove that everything happened in self-dealing. defense or if I lose, I know I'm going to end up in prison with a lot of time. How hard is it to fight your case from, say, a facility like that? It's hard because if you're on population, they allow you to go to a law library. Being that I was in the J2 pod, which is kind of like, it's like involuntary protective custody that the prosecutors put you in.

They don't allow you to go. When I was there, they didn't allow me to go to the law library. Isn't that your legal right to go to law? It's your legal right there. tell me fill out the phone, we have somebody go get the cases that you need, but I never knew anything about the law in the sense of how to look up cases. So it just didn't work out. Now, is your lawyer just mailing you in files, or do you only get to see everything through legal visits, or is it like now where there was some type of laptop or a computer you could

have in the cell? Back then in 2006, he had come in person. And we would just sit down and go over the stuff here, show me a statement that a person made. He had asked me my mom. opinion, did I know the person, did I not know the person? And then we just try to go through the statement in a way of how we can, you know, deflect or, you know, show that this person is lying in some type of way of what they're saying. And is he court appointed or did you pay for it? Yeah, he was a public defender. He was court appointed. How do you feel like he did? I feel like his attentions was right that he actually wanted to do right by me. And I think he He went about a lot of things in the right way to try to help the best way that he could.

But I also think that probably could have did a little bit more in regards to investigating a lot of different stuff that probably could have helped us out. But I think he did the best that he could under the circumstances. Do you think a lot of that has to do with their caseload and what they have on their plate? Maybe. But I think it was an uphill battle the whole time just because the odds were stacked against me because of how the judge was acting from day one that I seen them. Tell us about going to trial from jail every day, going there, the process, how long the trial was, all of that. So my trial started, I would say, I believe, June 2nd or June 3rd in 2008.

I was already in the county about 20 months at this point of time. but they just come get me every morning once trial started we go we did our jury selection for the most part that took us a couple of hours but then once trial actually started it would just more so of just going there uh sit down i take notes throughout the whole trial i slide them to my lawyer and say okay this person said this what you think about this so when he came back and either for our cross if it was a state witness how we can try to prove that that person was lying or whatever the case may be. But it's just going back and forth and just weighing on my mind, like, what is about to

happen? Because it's like, by then, I'm 21. I'm 21 by then. So it was just thinking like, oh, man, like, am I about to really lose potentially the rest of my life to this case? Did you get to wear normal street clothes, like a suit and tie? Yes. We had street clothes I could wear.

So my mother, my father got me some street clothes, and I was able to go back and forth in that on a daily basis. How are your parents during the court proceedings and even your case in general, how did they feel? I know it was tough on them. I know it was tough. It was like kind of wake up everything normal. Then the next day, one of your kids is facing a murder trial.

So I think that right there is kind of tough. And then living in Asbury, it's a small town. So everybody kind of know everybody. And you might not always have the greatest rapport, but it's kind of like, okay, you don't want to have your son lose his life to the system. but then you're also probably looking at a family that you somewhat know and you trying to understand of how they're feeling because they lost the son. So I think it was just back and forth, but my mother and my grandmother,

they came to every court hearing that I had for trial. What about the mother of your kids? No, they did not come. So you didn't get to see your kids at all? No, I got to see them periodically when I was in a county, more so when I got down to prison. Now, what do you think was the turning point and the trouble? trial where, you know, it was going a certain way. And then at this moment, you knew you probably weren't going to win it or you probably thought you were going to win it.

A turning point was, I remember it was a detective they was asking questions to. And then they started leading the path down to the whole gang culture in Asbury Park. And they already tried to paint it as a gang-related case even though it wasn't. So I believe the turning point to me was the prosecutor purposely asked the detective, who, Who does the most damage in Asbury? And before he could even answer, my lawyer jumped up, he objected to it. The judge said, do not answer the question,

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I believe that was the turning point right there. Yeah, and those things happen all the time in trial. even though the judge says don't pay attention to what the jury, already heard it. They're humans. You already heard it. Because even in jury selection, it was one guy that came up there and said that he was part of a gang when he was younger. And he said, if I hear anything that's gang affiliated, I'm finding him guilty no matter what the evidence is.

So now you got a lot of them that heard that coupled with that. And let's be honest, the drawers that we get is not jewelry of repairs. So these are people that's coming from the outskirts. towns in the suburban town. So of course they're going to want to try to get somebody off the streets that they deem is not worthy to being out there based on the cases. Yeah, they want to get another gang, a high profile gang member off the street. And I'm sure in the news, all the articles are gang members. That's all it was.

Everything, every day, that's all it was. That's all it was. Even though it wasn't directly a gang-related case. It wasn't at all a gang-related case. So tell us about the day you were actually convicted what that was like when the jury's deliberating. All right. So when we rested on a case, they deliberated that whole day. Then we came back, I think the next day they deliberated, so it was going into the weekend.

So I felt like the more that they kind of didn't come back with a verdict that soon, that the odds were slowly increasing in my favor. And then they came and asked about the principles to murder, attempt to murder, and all that stuff. So I kind of felt that like, okay, maybe I got a shot. Monday it came that we was at the courthouse. They called me upstairs. They said they re-traverting.

My heart is pounding out my chest because I'm like, in this moment, either I'm about to walk free or I know I'm about to get sentenced to basically life in prison. And I'm looking at the drawers when they was sitting there when they came up. I think maybe like one of them, one or two of them actually looked at me. The rest of them wouldn't look at me. And the first charge they read, they came back guilty after that. It really didn't matter to me. I'm like, it doesn't even matter if I get found not guilty on the rest of them.

It's about to all be the same thing. Now, do you get sentenced that same day in the state? No. It's a different hearing. No, it's a different hearing. So I lost trial, I would say, June 21st in 2008. And then they scheduled me for my sentencing August 1st. And I had to go back for a whole other hearing for that.

What's that first night in your cell like after you lost trial? It's like, I'm about to lose my life to the system potentially. So my mindset was, okay, I'm here now. It's nothing I could do about it. They already found me guilty. What steps can I take to get back? And I started working on that process immediately. So I had, you know, lawyer reach out.

I attained an affidavit from one of the witnesses that actually testified against me in his own way. And I were just trying to learn as much as I could, even though I couldn't go to the law library. So I just based it on like phone calls to my parents or friends to try to learn as much as I can to help me get back on my direct appeal. Well, it was tough, though, just sleeping the first night to just thinking like what they're about to sentence me to? because I know it wasn't going to be five, 10 years. Tell us about sentencing there. When I walk in there that day, my lawyer asked me, did I want to speak?

I told them no. And one of the family members for the victim spoke, and she just talked about how, you know, the guy never got in trouble as a good kid, which we all know. He was in the streets. And it came to the judge, and he just started talking about how, you know, the case was high profile and he's one of the set an example and he's going to start setting an example with me

and how I'm probably the only person in his world that he know is born without a conscience and all these other stuff I'll probably catch another case. So he just started going down all this stuff and ended up sending me to 60 years. I get 40 years for the murder charge, 20 years for the attempted murder charge. They've run them consecutive. So now I get the whole 60. Plus I have the four gun charges. But once I lost, I really was even thinking about how much time I got. To me, it's like all the same thing. You get 50 years.

You get 60 years. It's all kind of the same thing. Yeah, I've heard from people where they got a sentence like that, and they, in their mind, they already sentenced to that after they lost. Sentencing is just a formality, and they don't care. They're indifferent to it. It really didn't matter at that point. If you were to say 70, it really didn't matter because it's like,

it's nothing I could do at that point. The only thing I could worry about was that point was making sure once I got to prison to do everything I could to put myself in position to be free. So was your mentality going into prison not the same mentality you had on the streets? Yes. Yes. I'm thinking it's hard, though, because you're angry. I'm angry for a period of time that I lost. I'm angry because some people lie, whereas even though, okay, if you're going to say something from a street, just tell the truth. Then I wouldn't be in a situation. So I'm angry to that extent. But slowly, once I go into prison, my main focus is just what do I need to do to be free?

Because I know I want my freedom back. By the time I lost trial, my kids was, what, four years old at that time, my son was four, my daughter was four, my youngest daughter was three. so I know I'm missing, I'm going to miss a good part of their life. And people don't realize when you get incarcerated, your family and your friends that's close with you is kind of incarcerated with you in their own way because they're tied to you.

So my mindset would just do whatever I need to do to get home. What were your options at that point? What did you have reason to have hope for? Outside of like family, kids and all that, I just wanted to just have my life back and not spend the rest of my life in prison. But you had the appeal, process.

Yes. Was that it? That's basically, at that point in time, that's basically all you have. You have the pill process, and it can varies. You'll get down there. And this is like the crazy thing I learned about the prison I went to, New Jersey State prison. In Trenton, when I got down there in 2008, a lot of people are so defeated already that

as soon as you walk in there and you get to know some people, the first thing they tell you is, you don't worry about one of your direct the pill. You're probably going to do at least 10 years before you get home. because it happened to so many of them. So they kind of like try to put that in your mind and in your spirit that don't get your hopes of thinking that you want to get a reversal in your first year or two down here. Yeah, they have the speedy trial act, but not the speedy appeal act. Yeah, that is true. That is true.

So tell us about day one going into New Jersey State prison. Day one. I remember when I left Kraft, which was the assessment center, I get to prison is probably. around the afternoon time like 11.30-ish. And when they bring you to Trenton State, like you're going through this garage. But when you go through the garage, it's like there's no lights in there.

It's just dark. And you can just feel like this place is, it's heavy. It's heavy with like a lot of heaviness. And I'm walking through there with the handcuffs on. You hear so much about this living in Jersey how Trenton State is back in the day of what happens in there. I'm just prepared like, okay, whatever happens is going to happen.

People just stay out my way. I'm going to stay out their way. Just leave me alone. Come my focus is to get back. But I was prepared for whatever happened. And I'm just walking through the halls, looking at the COs with their little bully sticks and all that. And you can just feel the tension in the atmosphere, literally while you're walking

through that building. And they put me on quarantine. What do you mean quarantine? Like the show? Or quarantine is basically, once you get there, they just want you to go. through the process of not being a population immediately. And then you sit there and you go to like a little classification thing and they teach you about how the prisoners, the do's and the don'ts and all that.

But the crazy thing is for me, when they put me in there, they have no room on the unit that's used for quarantine. So they end up putting me in the lockup unit. So I literally, I'm in lockup my first two weeks. What were the dues and the don't say explained to you? Oh, you know, the rules. you can't have cell phones, you can't have contraband, you can smoke at that time, different things like that, no flirtation with the COs, you know, be respectful, all the regular

normal stuff that they have. But I'm in, like I said, I was in lockup literally my first day, and then they forgot that I was there in lockup. So I actually spent two weeks back there before I actually got to get the population. And lockup is people that are pending charges, or what's that? Lockup for people that catch an institutional enforcement. fraction so they low longer. Yeah. So that's exactly what it is. So I'm in there from day one.

Were you by yourself or did you have a cellmate? By myself, but the way it was structured, you probably have like 34 cells on each tear. And there's about four tiers. So you could all talk because the cells, the doors are bars. So you can talk through people throughout there. So when you're in there, are you making friends with anyone? Are they explaining like kind of the inmate rules going into that prison, what you can expect? Yeah, well, the prison, I was that majority.

that's in lockup, it's not even from that prison. They're from, like, other prisons that's around, and you just come there for lockup. My first three days, I didn't talk to anybody. I would just sitting in the cell, and I would just, like, listening to everybody that was talking. And I was just trying to pick up on anybody familiar names or towns that might be somebody that I know

or somebody I know close to him. About day three, a guy that was next door to me, he actually, like, banged on the wall. He's like, yo, you're all right over there? I'm like, yeah, I'm good. You've been here like three days. You don't say nothing. So we kind of introduced ourselves and told him

I just came down. It's like the first day he did we could smoke cigarettes, gave me like a whole pack of buglers. Like that was a cigarette. And then from there, a couple people that he knew, he introduced me to them.

And I ended up talking to a couple of people that was there that knew some people that I knew. And that just started a process of me getting to know people that was actually in that population but was in lockup at that time. What type of inmates are house there? Majority of everybody,

what in lockup or the prison itself. In the prison itself? I actually thought when I first got down in Trenton that everybody was locked up for murder. It's not true, though. It's a good part of the population, but you got people that's there for murder, you have sex offenders that's there,

you have people that might have drug charges that I send this to 100 years or whatever. You got the carjackings. A lot of people are co-defendants that's down there with the person. So you have a mix of type of charge. And what's the average sentence? Is it life or is it a certain minimum? Average sentence, you're not probably going to be in that population if you have anything

less than 25 or 30 years. Wow. At a minimum. And age-wise, are you the youngest? Or were there other guys with that amount of time in there? When I got there, I was 21. I was one of the youngest in the entire building at that time. Like you, it was rare to have younger people. When I left, it was a lot more younger guys than older guys. But when I first got there. If it was, the population at that time was about 1900, I think it would maybe, maybe probably like, I'm in that that 100 class. It's like a hundred of us at like the same age range or lower out of the whole prison. Now, when you're in, say, the county or even when you got here, are the bloods holding you down? Like, are they sending you a care package putting money on your books, taking care of you?

That's the myth that it doesn't happen that way. But, you know, you have people that you come across that because of their affiliations, whatever the case may be, you know, y'all just jail how you jail within the prison. So you have some people that might reach out to you that's still on the streets. But from that point on, it's mainly just about the connections you make with people that's inside. So why do you think these young individuals, these young men are so, you know, infatuated by gangs today and present day, you know, knowing that they're not going to be taken care of or they're not truly family at the end of the day

when shit hits a fan. I think nowadays it's just more about, I want to say, I think some people might be for protection. For some people, it might be for the family part of it because, you know, you grow up with a lot of them guys,

you get attached to a lot of them guys that went through similar situations or circumstances. So it could be that aspect, but then I think probably now in 20206, for I'm saying, people just want to be somebody. They just want a reputation. So tell us about day one in general population.

Day one, I was sent to, after I got through the classification, I was sent to a unit. And a couple of people started coming up to me. We had a conversation. I actually had yard that night. So I really didn't do too much. I just went out to the yard and got some fresh air, played some basketball, and they tried to just keep my mind off of just like looking around the whole place. Like, you know, I'm really in this place that I didn't read about or heard about for so many years. So the first day was kind of easy outside of going to classification to see where I was going to be housed at.

What does it look like, the prison, the yard? It's an old prison. I think what they say is established 1865. So it's like an old prison. The cell is definitely, it's probably like half of this room that we're in, probably like half of it. One bed, got the toilet, the metal toilet. You got, depending on what unit you was on. So I was on a unit two right when I first got there.

It was four stories high, and it's 125 people on each tier. And it got like a double lock. So after the seal locked the door, it's like a breaker up top where they can, it can like close it and you're still locked. It even as unlocked. So they got to hit the breaker and unlock your door for you to be out. And then it just like people are just running around is living life as best they could in prison. So everyone has a single cell?

Everybody in the prison has a single cell. It kind of changed a little bit where you got two units, four left and four, right. They double locked, and there's only like 80 people in each, 80 people in each unit, and then a north compound. They got the west, the south, and the north. There's three compounds, and on the north, maybe two units, they started double bunking the first 12 cells.

And how often are you locked in your day in the cell? 23 hours Oh this is 23 hours Even those population It's 23 hours Depending on what your day is like If you go to the mess hall You get 30 minutes each time

You go to the mess hall For breakfast, lunch and dinner Before I left They implemented the kiosk system So if you want to go in a kiosch You get 20 minutes from the kios Shower They depending on the CEOs that work there

You might get 15, 20 minutes To shower If you don't go to yard That's about two and a half hours or if you got a job. So excluding all those things, it's about 23 hours. If you have jobs, if you go to rec, you can probably be out of your cell a good, maybe six hours a day.

And then depending on the type of seal that you got, they might be cool with you, unlock your door. You just be on a tier all day. And how big is it here? I would say at least about 100 yards or close to it. And is it wide or is it just narrow? No, it's narrow. Okay.

It's narrow. So did you ever watch Escape at Danamora? No, I heard about, I haven't seen it, though. So in there, it's kind of laid out, like, how you're describing with the three tiers, but there's, like, on the bottom tier, there's an area where there was tables to play cards and stuff, and then there was the two tiers, which were very narrow. Nah, you don't have no tables inside. All the tables outside in the yard.

And the yard is, like, it's big, but then it's broken off into, like, little quadrants, where they have a gate for each one. So you got four different ones. So you got the weight pile one. You got two other ones where you could just go play basketball. And, well, actually, three of them. And then they got, like, little pull-up bars and dip bars and all that stuff, too. Back then, could you cook in yourself?

Yes, if you had a stinger. You could cook it yourself. Oh, so it didn't have, like, a grill or... No, you don't get none of that. Like, even now you don't have that. Okay. You don't have that. Because I guess, like, the state prisons probably different in the fairs and all that, but, nah.

Oh, no, we didn't have that. And by no in New York prisons. Back then, there was options. They had like a grill or something to cook in. There was like a little stove. That's one of the reasons why those guys were able to escape prison. Yeah, well, depending on what unit you found on, they actually had a kitchen on a unit. So if you was cool with whoever worked in the pantry, you could just get them some food.

And they sit there and make something for you if you paid them or if they were just cool for to do it. But inside the cell, now you're just having a stinger with hot water trying to make it work. No, the commissary back then. What's that like? A commissary was, it's high. It really ain't good. So it's like you probably spend $150 mainly on junk food. That's probably that's one of the things I order majority of time junk food.

Oh, you're in pretty good shape for ordering junk food all those years. I worked out too. I worked out. Honey buns, cookies, chips and stuff like that. Because I also was blessed to have a lot of people that I came cool with over the years that worked in the kitchen. So they sent me trades. I'd be able to eat stuff that they make from the kitchen. So I really didn't need to order food, food on canteen.

But majority of the food is fish pouches, clams, octopus, macro, and all that. I don't eat any of that. So my whole thing is I'd rather just eat what my guys send me from the kitchen. When the prison is a facility where you're locked down most of the day, are there politics at all with the other inmates, like clicks or crews? Or how does that work? Yeah, I think that's everywhere. I think you always going to have your different affiliations within the prison.

And even if you don't have affiliations, you're going to have people that link up based on town. It's really more diverse when it comes to. It's like not segregated based on race in the prison I was at. Like, you can be cool with whoever you want to be cool with. But most people would just stuck with people from the town that they were from. And that was like the thing that a lot of people did. It would be rare that you have people. that navigate outside of that,

but that was like the main focal point. Do like the OGs look after the young guys like yourself when you first get there? Depends on which one you're talking about, because at the end of the day, it's prison. You got some dudes that been down there for a while, you got some dude that try to use that as advantage, try to wheel you in for whatever reason

they want to have you railed in for. But you have quite a few that I actually try to do right by you. One of the first guys I met, I wanted to go to law library, and he told me to fill out a slip. And when I get there, I'm expecting like, all right, I appreciate you helping me. Yo, here's everything I need for my case. And he looked at me in my face and said, no, I haven't going to do that. I'm going to show you how to look everything up, and you're going to do it on your own,

but I'm not doing that for you. So that was a blessing in a way because it helped me learn a lot of stuff in the case. You get a lot of guys that would sit there and say, don't start your bid off, getting in trouble, because it's going to hurt you down the road. Some of them got locked up for a bid that might have only been 20 years, but then they turned it into 40 years. They might have turned it into life

based on the fact of their fractures keep and what kind of fraction it gets, stabbing and all that stuff. So now they got life in prison. Were you witnessing a lot of violence in that prison? It could get violent at times. For the most part, it's laid back, especially compared to like a lot of other prison

I've seen on TV or, hear about where it happens constantly. It could get to that point. But mostly everybody just wanted to just get home. What would be the cause of something happened? The funniest thing, I've seen people fight over the craziest things. I see people fight over trash bags. I see people fight over just talking to them the wrong way.

And it's probably, it's like people that's cool with each other. But, you know, prison is prison. You're still going to be able to drink. You're still going to be able to smoke. so you might get some dudes that's drunk, and then they start arguing and end up fighting on the tear. And it has nothing to do with anything serious. Or it could be as serious as a person can come down

and they're coming down for killing somebody or doing something to somebody family member that's down there or somebody that I know. And then once you get down there, you're a target. Did you have any altercations? Nah, I was telling. You went all that time without any altercations? Without one fight.

Wow. I think it's just a respect thing. I respect everybody in this world. I respect everybody's space. But I also felt like coming down there because of some things on the streets, like some people knew who I was. So it was kind of like a mutual respect thing throughout the whole time that wasn't really nothing like that. Did I get into maybe a confrontation where it could have escalated to that?

Maybe about once or twice. But as far as physically getting into altercation, I was just chilling. So do you think that time in the county really matured you? because a lot of the young guys that go into prison are the ones acting up and causing all the problems? Yes and no. I would say it could matured me because I was in like a lockup kind of. I was in 23 and 1.

So by the time I got a population, I could move around. I was kind of used to just like being by myself. So that was one. But also I said, no, I think it's a mindset thing. Because when you go into prison, you can either make the choice to tap into the wrong people or tap into the right people. And my focus was just getting home.

And along the way, I met a lot of good people. But my focus was just getting home. It wasn't about just sitting around talking about some war stories or some things that we did or getting into the politics of what dudes wanted to do because Allacre focus was on this prison. My mind was made up.

I'm going home. Were your kids coming to visit at that point when you first got there? Yes. I appreciated my parents for doing that. My parents definitely bought my kids. to see me throughout the years while I was in prison. So they made sure that I had that relationship with him. And it played a major part, especially the younger years

when it was like four to 10. So I still got to know them. They didn't understand at that time where I was at and why I was at until I was saying to my son was probably about like 11 and 12. And like he just came out one day like, yeah, you're a jam. He figured it out. Yeah, he figured it out.

He figured it out. And my daughters didn't want to believe him until we was all on the visit. And then they asked me, they're like, now he's lying. And I'm like, no, he's right. Do you feel like you were actually raising them on those visits? Or did you have to kind of defer to their mothers for that? I did a little bit of both. Like, I knew they was with their mothers physically.

But I tried to impart as much wisdom in them as I possibly could through the visits, through the phone calls. Because I wanted them to stay on a path and not feel that even by the time they got to a age level and hear whatever they heard about me that they feel that they had to follow in my path in some type of capacity. So my thing was keep them out of prison and keep them away from any affiliations or anything and hopefully that they have a good life. I just stay out of the streets and complete school. That's all I want to do. And the beautiful thing is even to this day that I'm home is like a lot of those things I still and to them I can see it. And they tell me about it.

They tell me about it. So I definitely appreciated those moments. What was the appeal process like? It's like a lot of letdowns. You are constantly hoping that every time you file a brief, that you have an opportunity to get some type of relief. My direct appeal, I got there 2008. My first appeal was denied in 2010, 2011.

2010, my direct appeal, I appealed their decision that he denied it again right there in 2011. And it's like you're putting case law into your brief and making points of why you should get some relief. And then the prosecutor's side will just find some way to use the same case law you use it. Amazon presents Jeff versus Taco Truck Salsa. Whether it's Verde. Roha or the orange one. For Jeff, trying any salsa is like playing Russian roulette with a flamethrower. Luckily, Jeff saved with Amazon and stocked up on antacids, ginger tea, and milk.

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Have a ball. Bring a date, your squad, or even your mom. Book direct at choiceotails.com. For their benefit, but then deny you on the other hand of it. And did you have a different lawyer for that appeal process? Yes. I had a different lawyer for the direct appeal, for my PCR process, and for my habeas corpus process, which when you get to the feds.

But every way along the way, I'm just filing it, hoping that I get relieved. but sometimes it is take long. After 2011, my next appeal process for my PCR happened in 2013, 2014. They denied that. I had an affidavit from one of the witnesses that said that he lied. But at this point, they're like, okay, yeah, he's lying in this affidavit, so we shouldn't give me no relief. But my standpoint is like, y'all know he lied that trial,

but y'all convicted me, but now y'all want to say he a liar. then my next second PCR was around 2018. I had something in there. Then I had the Haybears Corpus. They denied that my hay probably like 2019, 2020, right before the pandemic. And that was the last thing you could have applied for? That was the last part in the sense of things I bought up. But I did have another affidavit that I could file because under the rules you could file.

a newly discovered affidavits for your appeal process at any given time. So I still had that. And I still had the opportunity to apply for sentencing to get it because I was excessive sentence. So but I didn't file them yet. The pandemic happened, stop everything. So post-pandemic, I were just trying to be smart about it, get the right lawyer to do it the right way in hopes to get relief.

So all that time passes, do you still have hope that you're going to get out? eventually or? I always had hope. It might have wavered sometimes. Like sometimes I find myself sitting there like, is this really it? Am I really going to have to spend the rest of my life in prison? So, of course, that doubt is going to come into your mind sometimes.

But I never wavered on the fact that I don't care how it's going to happen. I'm going to get home one day. Now on a 60 or sentence, is there parole? My sentence was 60 with 85, so my parole eligibility was after several 51 years, so I would have been 70. That's insane. Yep. And you went in at 19.

When at 19, they told me at 70 years old is when I would be released. And when do you think your mentality truly changed of, like, you felt rehabilitated in regards to you weren't going to go back out. And if you were let out, you weren't going to go commit a new crime. At what mark? Seven years. Rather, seven or eight years, Mark. I remember I was just sitting there one day and just looking around in the cell and just knowing that I already been locked up for seven years.

Two in the county at this point, five years in prison. Now, I wasn't getting in trouble. I finished and complete the school when I was in there. I did that my first eight months. I actually got my diploma, my first eight months because they allowed me to do that. And I was just sitting there one day and just thinking like, I know I don't want this to be the rest of my life. but I definitely need to do other things that I know I'm capable of doing

and in hopes that that would be a changing factor of why I be free one day. So that was about seven years in and from that point on, I just stuck to everything that I was just trying to do to better myself, but to also better my guys around me

because you become family with them guys. You're all growing up together. You all got a bunch of time. And that was just my focus and I stuck to it all the way to the end. Would you see a lot of guys go home? No, no, no. First, I would say first five to seven years being in there, if one person got a reversal in the whole year, everybody was happy about that.

Now, mind you're 1900 people in the prison. So we just talk about one reversal. Everybody would be happy. I would say about mid-2015, 2016, as a law, changed a little bit, you will start seeing maybe now five reversals in the whole year. So that gives people a little bit more hope a lot of us that say, okay, now they kind of open it up a little bit more. New case laws is coming out.

Probably during the pandemic and after the pandemic, then you started seeing about five reversals in the week. So now it kind of boost your hope up a little bit and say, okay, you definitely got a shot at this point of time. But other than that, it's like, in the beginning, it's rare you'll see somebody go home. Now, where are you seeing guys that were in your shoes, but on the other end of it,

where they were leaving at that 70-year mark? Like, they're 70 years old. They got locked up at 19, and now they're going home. Yes. I've seen a few people that did about 40 years there and got released. What's their mentality like, like that day before they're about to get released?

One guy. He did about 30, 40 years. He got released. He went home and killed somebody the same night so you can come back to prison. Because he didn't know how to adapt. He didn't know how to adapt. That was one guy that happened to. It was a couple of other ones.

Like, you do 40 years, more than likely, a lot of your close family and friends than died, especially by the time you 60, 70. So some of them are just scared of going out there. Right before I actually left, maybe a month before. that one of my old heads he finally got granted parole and he did about 30 years and he's about 70 he's about 70 but he was still functioning he still was grinding to get to the next level now those individuals do you think they needed to be in there for that long period of time i don't think anybody needed to be in there for that period of time like we ain't talk about majority of like people that's like serial

killing everything, right? You might talk about people, maybe five of them get locked up. Whoever did it, don't know, but everybody didn't do it like 30 years. For what? And a lot of the crimes is not even murder charges. A lot of them are just selling drugs or robberies

where people get locked up for like a string of robberies or whatever it can be, but I think 30 years is a little bit excessive for something that, not saying that is right, not saying that it's right but it's like doing that amount of time it's crazy would you see a lot of wrongful convictions or is that minimal i don't know and the only reason i said i don't know because i really didn't open that door to brush shoulders with a lot of people like people i became cool with the long away i became cool with them the ones that i didn't i didn't if i didn't know people i was still

cordial to in a lot of aspects but i wasn't really trying to find out well like oh why are you here for why you're here for it. But it was a good amount of people that probably was wrongfully convicted in some type of capacity. Now, since there was a part of you that always had that mindset that you were going to get out one day, what were you preparing for? What were you going to do with your life? Preparing?

Well, as I was, like, getting older in there, and I would say pandemic really opened my eyes to a lot of different stuff. I always loved writing since I was a kid. And I told you to begin, I always wanted to do. do business basketball. So I said, okay, even though I'm in prison, let me see what I could do business-wise. So let me learn as much as I can learn. And with the writing, always love just writing stuff. I can probably make poetry up on a drop of a dime on the topic. And I remember during a pandemic I had wrote like a few poems. And I posted them on my social media, just various

topics. And the impact that people got from it, I'm like, okay, maybe I can make something others. So I just started doing it more and I'm going to say, okay, when I get home, I want to get into some public speaking engagements because I feel like my story and my testimony of what I've been through probably can help somebody in some capacity in their life. What was it like to age in there, you know, going through birthdays, holidays, all of that? Did you live off of the memories you had from before you got imprisoned? Or not because growing up in the environment of grew up with, it was like, okay, you probably celebrated a birthday, but it probably wasn't like all out.

It was like, you know, happy birthday, bro, and that's it. But in theirs, like, I really wasn't celebrating holidays. To me, it was just another day. For the 19 years I did, it was just another day. Every day was just another day. Like, a couple of my guys I knew it was my birthday, they had come, like, your happy birthday. Some people did I hear about it like, oh, why are you talking about it's your birthday?

I never really cared about that type of stuff. My focal would just, how can I get home? I worry about everything when I get on the other. side. Did you switch prisons throughout that? Nope. I was at the same prison the whole time. Wow. In one prison. So what was it like seeing the prison changing like guards and you know just the building getting older and new faces all of that? I mean I'm sure you went through a bunch of administrations too like wardens and all that. Yes. No it happened a lot whereas when I got that in 2008 I'm like oh man this prison crazy can't get any more messed up than this and then when other

administration come and get more messed up than what it was. I would say a lot of younger kids came in there, especially towards the end. They came in there like they just fit in prison already. Like they just been there. So then you have a lot of older guys that's following the younger kids and it's just like a whole bunch of chaos and nobody really accomplishing anything. A lot of COs that grew up in there the same amount of time I was in there, they started retiring.

So now you get in new CEOs. And I think like one of the main thing is like when I first get there, you're going through the metal detector, you get patted down. They pat you down. They say you keep it moving. Now it's like they come pat you down like, yo, how are you day? You feel it okay today? It's like they being polite.

So it's like a different way to approach it. Yeah. And what about the wardens and whatnot? How do those change and their missions and what their goals are over time? Well, the one that we had when I first got there, she really didn't do too much in regards of rehabilitation and programs. The last two, I think it probably switched about a couple of times. Might have been more.

I wasn't really paying attention to that. But the ones that I do know switch, I would say like the last two or three of them, actually started bringing back different programs and the prison for us to grow off of. And to try to just do something with ourselves. And they just bring out outside volunteers to come in and do different things that I help us in some type of capacity to rehabilitate ourselves. Do you find that wardens are political or it doesn't matter who the governor is?

No, I think they're political because I believe if the governor is democratic and you got a Republican administrator, they're going to be friction and vice versa. So, and that's the game that they play. And then you know the governor, he's the president of the state so he can implement what he really want to implement. So I think that goes a long way too. What was the pandemic like in there? Oh, man.

We was locked down for, we was locked down for about, what, nine months, the first nine months in 2020. Me, I was happening to be part of the first group that went on quarantine in there. Like, we didn't get masked at anything when a pandemic first happened. And probably while it was happening out here

from what, December, January on, we probably didn't get mass until like May. So that's like the first time it really got real for us in there. And we got tested every week. I was one of the first ones I went on quarantine. It was probably like 70 of us. And then they started quarantine in the whole units. And then through like the nine months process,

we wasn't coming out of a cell. It was just if you had a job on a tear, then you can come out and work and help pass out the trades and all that. But everybody else outside of a shower, you was locked in all day. So no rock. Nope. No yard. Nothing.

And how many showers do you get a week? You get a shower every day, depending if you want to shower every day. But certain days because of the pandemic, like, yeah, I got to wait to tomorrow for a shower. At least they were giving it to you every day. In the feds, when you're on lockdown, it's only three times a week. And could you get phone calls? Yeah, we were still able to use the phone. I would say Trenton is one of the only prisons in New Jersey to actually allow you.

The phone actually comes in the cell that you went. On like a push thing, like on a cart or what? No, no, no, the runners that work on the tier is the ones that bring it to you. They probably know everybody's phone slot. So by the time you work that job, you'll know who get the phone at what time and everybody have like a 30-minute hour slot depending on who use the phone on that particular side of the tear. But, yeah, the phones actually just come in the cell. It was like a regular handheld phone with a long cord that's probably like 90 feet,

and you just sit in the cell with it. While most you have to go on a tear for it. Could you still order a commissary? during this lock-down? Yes, they allowed to order a commissary. And what about meals? Was it like a bag lunch or a special, like normal food? No, it was normal food.

They allowed the kitchen workers to go to work. It was all of that was normal. It was just that you wasn't going to class, you wasn't going to school, maybe the first three or four months of it because it was like coming off the wintertime, you wasn't allowed to get visits. So then maybe summertime, they started visits around June, but it had to be outside visits. You couldn't hug or kiss your family members. You had to sit the whole six feet apart thing or however far it was. And that's just how it was for like maybe like that nine months to a year.

How is staffing? Was staffing very low during that period of time too? Yeah, because a lot of them didn't want to come in and catch it. And then the ones that they came in, they caught the virus, then they'd go out. They act like they got it longer than what they had it for. So now they're getting paid to be home for like a month. Or they brought it to you. Yeah. They don't want to. I bought it in. Now, clearly you're not serving 60 years anymore, but you exhausted all your appeals. So what happened? So, 2023, I believe, yes. We get an email one day. It's the summertime on the kiosk, the J-Pay. And we get an email that says, if, from the ACLU, they say, we're starting a clemency project. And if you fit these four criteria,

for extreme trial tax, you could potentially get some relief. So the four criteria was you had to go to trial, you got sentenced more than 15 years, your time that you got sentenced to was double what your plea offer was, and you had to have at least 20 years in, one third of your time in,

or your plea offering. So those are criteria. It wasn't into 2024 on June 10th, the governor Phil Murphy, he came and actually signed it into legislation in New Jersey. And I think he had meat mills and wallow, a couple of other people that I was there with him when they did it. And then they started a process. So you had the ACLU and you had the public defender's office working with Joseph Kouroro, who was the ex-head of public offenders office, working with Princeton and students,

like a whole bunch of stuff that's happening reaching out to us as in prison. and what they'll do is they take our application and they'll work with you. Some people, they will select to represent and some people you have to do a pro se. So when this happened, I actually was in lockup. This was 24. I was a lockup.

I got caught with a cell phone. So you got into some trouble. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was the trouble. I got caught with a phone. I had a phone in there. Had a little jelly phone. And when I'm in lockup,

they're talking about the clemency and people getting home. But at this point, nobody actually went home off of the clemency yet. So while I'm back there, when I used to be talking to my wife, she, and I'm telling her about the clemency, she was like researching everything that we would need for the clemency, reaching out the people. And shout out to a guy named Thomas and a guy named Jackie that helped. They was feeding her the information that actually helped prepare a lot of the stuff that

we was doing pro se, because the ACAU told me I was one of the people I couldn't represent. I'm like, okay, cool. So let's fast forward to 2025. I get out of lockup February, and we have the petition together. I get on a unit. She sends it in. We have little trouble with the jail getting it for about a month.

I finally get it. I notarize it. I submit it to the parole board in April, April 15th. One of my close guys, Zott, he was represented by the public offense. in his office and he was telling me about it. So I'm like, I might as well just take a shot to reach out to them to see if I can get a letter from them to a letter of support.

As one of the things you can add in there. And I'm like, if they're helping, their name got to mean something when it's going to the governor. It was a blessing that when I send it to them, they said they will pick up my case. So then it was no longer pro se. So they put it back together. And then they added their own support letter along with all the facts and stuff that they read. And then it came down to just a waiting period at that time. And it's nothing guaranteed.

It is about you filling out this petition and just praying that, you know, the governor and his team that he built, he built like an advisory board and he have a team that reviews your petition and then they recommend date what should happen with your petition. So it comes to about November and one morning they called me out to sell and I'm talking to a lieutenant. He called me, one that I knew and he was just making sure the numbers he had a piece of paper he like yo this your sbi number your state number so i was like yeah so he's like yo congratulations they granted your clemency so right there i'm like i seen maybe five people go home already within that year of 2025 so now i'm like it's a blessing that i'm about to be with them but my mindset was whether they

free me immediately or less than my time either way it's a win i know i'm not going to going to be here. And on November 12th, I sat down with the governor's team that he put together. And we had an interview for like an hour. They asked a bunch of questions based on the stuff you're submitting your clemency, your upbringing, your charge, your institutional charge, all charges that you may have got along the way. And they basically are just like, you know, we're going to put in our recommendation. And when a governor get it, he might. sign off on it. You know, they can't tell us anything,

even if they already know what's going on at this time. So I'm like, cool, I was just thankful knowing that something is about to happen. Then, the following week, they called me down and said, you have a meeting with the administrator. And when I get in that room,

we sit in there, he said, you got a meeting with the governor's team again. And when the video pop on, is actually not the governor's team, it's the governor itself, it's Phil Murphy. And he's sitting there,

and I'll never forget, he asked me, he said, he said, Sean, how are you doing this morning? I said, I'm blessed God. I woke me up this morning. He said, well, I'm about to make your day a whole lot better. I'm commuting your whole sentence.

So in that moment, I'm sitting there, I'm thankful, and I'm like, it's finally over after 19 years. And he goes on to tell me, he says, he personally wanted to tell me

that he's commuting my sentence. One is because the extreme trial text. I got sentenced too much when they offered me in 18-18-85. So they believe that if they offered me at 18-18-85, that they probably thought I was probably going to win that trial anyway. So that's why I was so low. So because of that, and I had served 19 years at this point,

I didn't exceed it what my plea offer was if I would have took it, along with everything I did along the way in prison to show that I rehabilitated myself. And from there, I signed my release picture, papers, maybe 10 minutes later after that. And I had to wait into December 4th. And that's when they finally let me free. Well, that's interesting. So they grant clemency, but then they go through other steps to find out how much that clemency is. Yes. All right. So the clemency, they can do it in any way. If some people that like me got granted clemency and we're free, is some people that got granted clemency so far

and they might have 20 years and 22 years and they say, you know what, based on the nature of your case, we're going to commute your 60 years, your 100 years to 25 years. So now you can't exceed that 25 years, but you're doing 25 years day for day, which is still a blessing because now you don't have to do that whole time.

So I was just one of the fortunate ones that was blessed to obtain immediate release. But after they had already said they were in a grant clemency When the Senate called you out So it took some time to figure out what that clemency actually was Yeah, no, I think they probably knew what it was the whole time Because once the governor team actually come see you That's just part of the process that they did here and there

They don't have to see you But they just come to see certain individuals that they want to see Just to talk with you to add more into, I guess your petition Because they sit down with the governor And tell them this is our recommendation We believe this guy or a woman should be granted clemency and go home right now or whatever they come up with. But I believe going into the room, they already knew what they wanted to do. It was just a matter of a conversation.

And after we got the conversation, maybe like I said, a week later, they actually come back and tell you what the decision was based on what the governor decided to do. And from there, it's just a point of them setting up a date because there's multiple people going home. It was me and one other guy that left that day. So once you know what's happening with you, they just have a set date because now you've got to do all the paperwork with the social worker, your exa photo, stuff for your ID to prepare for you getting out there, re-entry stuff that make sure that it's prepared

before you walk out the doors. Was there ever a part during your sentence where you thought to yourself, I wish I took that play deal, or are you glad you stuck to your guns and what you believed in? In hindsight, right now sitting in front of you, I can say I'm glad I stuck to it. But of course, of course.

It was, the plea was 18 and 85. So you technically do 15 years and three months off of 18.85, I think. By the time I got 15 years and three months in, I'm sitting here like, man, I could have been home if I would have took that plea. Then when year 18 hit, I'm like, I basically just maxed that whole thing out. I should have been home. But I just always have faith in just even growing spirit. in my relationship with God, I used to always pray. And it's like, okay, it's a reason why I'm here.

It's a reason why I went through this. And I can't change what I didn't take at that point in time. But I'm just praying that it worked out. How many discounts does USA auto insurance offer? Too many to say here. Multi-vehicle discount. Safe driver discount. New vehicle discount.

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D-pop, where taste recognizes taste. ultimately did is because now once they commute it, it's nothing that they can ever do. What they should do is if the prosecutor offers you a plea deal, it should be whatever that plea deal is, is the max you can get if you lose trial. And this is part of why they're doing extreme trial tax. Because their thing is, if just using me,

if they offered me 18 years, and then a month and a half later I go to trial, and you give me 60 years, which is an extra, extra 42 years. And your constitutional right to trial. It's my constitutional right. What different evidence did you have between the 18 years and me losing trial, except for your feelings getting hurt that I made y'all spend money that I wanted to go to trial?

Yeah. But you're, in a way, paying tax dollars for that trial that happened to begin with, too, you know? Exactly. The system's very flawed in that aspect. It is. It is. So, like, looking at it in hindsight, like, yeah, it's moments that I actually thought, like, I probably should have took the 18, but looking at it now, like I said, it's behind me now

where it's like it's over. There's nothing that they could ever say to do. It's closed and just move from here. What was it like to walk through that gate? Oh, man, that was one of the greatest feelings to know that I was walking down that hallway for the very last time, knowing that I did 19 years. And coming from where I came from, I did 19 years the right way. and I would just bless to be one of the ones to be able to survive that experience going from having 60 years to now walking free.

So it was just a blessing. It was like an indescribable feeling. It definitely felt like a lot of weight was lifted off of my shoulders. And just once that door opened up, it was just like, oh, man, I don't ever have to worry about this place again. What was that first day like? First day, you know, I met my parents when they came out, met both my brothers, I met my son when I came out. And first day, we're just sitting back and just observing everything. I'm just watching how the world is operating, just used to being in the car again.

Because I got motion sickness probably like the first 10 minutes. And you rarely leave that building. So I had a little bit of motion sickness, but to be able to see my family of one of my guys, one of my closest guys. that I grew up with and just to be able to just wear my own clothes and just sit down and just eat what I wanted to eat is like it's an undescribable feeling. What was that first meal?

I ate some pizza the first meal. Yeah, I really didn't want to eat too much of anything heavy or home cooked the first day because I've been eating processed food for 19 years. I just want to eat something real simple and I just ate like probably like five, six slices of pizza. Did you actually go to the 19 years without eating street food or was there ever opportunities?

We get food packages in there from time to time. Like every six months, they give you the center of food package if you stayed charged free for a year. So now you'll get food from different vendors that you're allowed to get. So I ate some actual street food. And then along the way, you know, I've been in there long enough. I stayed out of the way. A couple of people that you might know bring some real food in there.

So I ate some real food from time of time. So you've been out for a little over a year now? No, a month and a half now. Oh, I thought 2024. No, no, no. That's when it happened. Just last month. Oh, so 2020-25.

Yeah. That you got committed. That's what I was free December 4th. Oh, okay. Well, welcome home. I appreciate it. What's been the hardest challenge since coming home? I would probably say job because you could have certain skills that you develop being in prison.

You can be able to talk. You can be able to do all this day. Even do the work. Be qualified. But a lot of people background check, that's one, and two, the lack of any employment history. So, like, most jobs look at me and say, yeah, you don't have any employment history for 19 years. What happened? Put that food service record down in the kitchen.

I worked at the bakery, this, X, Y, Z. Yeah, you could do that. But I was blessed since I've been home. I got my Fortlift certification. I got a couple other things I'm working on doing. So hopefully, dad, I help out the resume a lot more. How do you make up for a lost time with your kids? I don't think you can't.

I think that's like the one thing that everybody said, I want to make up for lost time with this. I don't think you can. I think you could just take it day by day because you're never going to get that time back. I'd never be able to get all those moments back, everything that I miss with my kids or anybody. So I think it's just about taking it day by day

and just making the best of this moment that I have a second chance and a second opportunity in life. If you could sit across from your eighth grade self before you ever went into the streets, what would you say to him? I would say, stick to what you're doing. You might not have the right support.

You might not have everything that you need. But if you just stick to what you doing, along the way, you're going to get blessed. Because I believe that we all got a purpose in some type of way. And then sometimes we get them obstacles. And if we choose to make the wrong decision, it's going to be a detour to get around to our purpose.

And then sometimes if we go through it and just stick to it, that we'll ultimately get there. So I would just say just no matter how hard it might be at home, just find something to do. Go cut some grass, go shovel some snow with something, and try to raise the money yourself. And stick to it because it would be a different type of journey. Well, Sean, I appreciate you coming on the show today.

I appreciate you having me. Of course, man. Thank you for reaching out. How did you find out about the show, too? I'm sorry, I had a phone in prison. You were watching those for prison? I watched you in prison. I watched your prison.

And then when I came home, I watched it. And then one of my guys in Canada, Jason, he got a podcast, broken home podcast. And he was like, yo, man, you got to reach out to Ian Bigg. And I'm like, all, I'm going to do it. And then I think I did it. I sent out the inquiry. And then one day I just like, let me just DM you directly or Instagram. And that's how I happened.

How do you find it when you were in prison? Were you just watching related stuff? Yeah, no, I was watching, doing a lot of different things trying to learn. Well, the phone I had was a smartphone. And, you know, it had Wi-Fi built in. So I was able to get on YouTube and all that stuff. It's kind of like one of those things. And there you don't want to get caught.

So it's like you're watching it. Like, you paranoid. Oh, I was there, Ben. I was in your shoes. Looking around and making sure, like, nobody ain't going to catch you watch a little bit and try to do something. I feel like it's worth the risk when you think about it. I feel that is worth the risk because my mom.

mentality was using the phone for to accomplish what I need to be where I'm at today. Be free. And that's exactly what I did. I wasn't one of those. I was going to sit here and just catch the shows and want to watch all miscellaneous stuff. My job was just to work to get as much done as I possibly can and I could. The stuff that I did in prison, books and stuff that I wrote is the reason that the governor's seen it.

Like, I see that you rehabilitated yourself. So all those little small things that I was. able to use that phone for, it was worth it. And they asked me about that. They asked me about that. They say, yeah, you had a phone. I'm like, well, you kind of see my resume. I ain't going to lie until you see what I put out.

Yeah, I mean, I don't blame guys for getting into trouble that get caught on a phone in prison as long as they're not using it for a new crime and stuff. But it's, you know, it's better to smuggle a phone than smuggle drugs or anything like that. You're mind your own business. You're not getting into violence with anyone. Exactly. And most places are given the tablets anyways. Exactly.

So, so, no, definitely, definitely it definitely was worth it. to me. Well, I'm glad it led you to hear. Yes, I appreciate it. And I wish you the best for the future, man. I appreciate it. I definitely appreciate it. Definitely was an honor.