I Got Life in Federal Prison for Trafficking Marijuana | Corvain Cooper
00:00 I've never accepted that I'm ever going to die in prison. I never accepted that. But in the same token, it's like when you're waking up and your out day says deceased and your kids are asking like, when are you coming home? You don't really have a date. You know, like that's when it hits different. Like those nights hit a little different. That's Corvane Cooper. He went from fraud to moving massive amounts of marijuana across the country until the feds took him down and he was sentenced to life in prison.
00:26 Today, Corvane reveals how big the operation really got, what brought it all crashing down, and how he eventually made it home. Where'd you grow up, Corvin? South Central LA, South Central Los Angeles. What was your upbringing like early years, childhood? Childhood. I hate to say it, but, like, you know, in the 80s, it's your dad sell drugs and your mother's on the drugs that your dad's selling. You know, so it's really, you know, we talk about a lot of my documentation. But, yeah, that was this really, really, like, a tough, tough time to grow up to see this many people on drugs and to throw away their life to crack cocaine was just a very, very tough time to grow up in America.
01:17 How old are you when you realized that was the type of life your family was loving? I would say, like, six or seven. Six or seven. Yeah. Because it went, it was a transition where my mother. actually had graduated from Cal State, L.A. She was my teacher. She was my kindergarten and preschool teacher. And from there, it just went left once the drugs came. So she went from being a college graduate to being on drugs and going to the streets. And was that influenced by your father?
01:49 That was definitely influenced by my father. So to come out when we filmed the documentary, and my director, Victoria, asked that question. And I found out, during that time, that watching the doc and watching their preview of making it, that it was the drugs that my dad, she got the drugs from my dad that she got hooked on. And that's how they met too through drugs? No, no, no. When they met, they were regular people.
02:18 They were high school sweethearts. They were in love. My sister was born. I came out there. Then they cracked academic came. Do you know how he got hooked on it and started selling? Just being a hustler, probably, probably just, you know, growing up in the ghetto, the only things that you've seen in South Central as in those days, as successful drug dealers, you didn't really see any successful people unless they play sports or something like that. And that was one out of a million.
02:48 So, you know, I was doing, he was good friends with her free red Rick is actually in the dock, too. Harry O's in the dock. And, you know, those on the east side of LA, those are the he. heroes or those are the big drug dealers at that time. And they all hung together. And that's what I think kicked it off. And he, my original Corvain Cooper,
03:11 which was my grandfather. He looked down on my dad for selling drugs and didn't want to accept the cars. He bought him and didn't want to accept anything that came from a drug life because he was a stand-up guy. And he got kicked out. my dad got kicked out at the house and then start selling drugs. What's it like from a child's perspective seeing your mom transform like that, right in front of your own eyes?
03:37 You get to see the power of it, and that's why I never, I only sold marijuana. I would never do that to another family. I would never sell crack or cocaine no matter. I used to get a thousand pounds, and then they would throw in like, hey, well, since you could sell a thousand pounds, you know, see what you can do with these 10 things, I would scream and like, if you don't fucking come come pick up this shit, like, I don't want to be around it, I don't want to make money from it, I don't want to do anything, I don't want her to another family, I don't want any dollars to come from this, right? So I never sold it because of the pain that I went and what got me closer
04:14 and know about God is that I believe I was 11 or 12 because she was on it for about five, six years and I went to the altar and I asked God to, you know, save my mother and get her off and get her off a crack cocaine and she was off. It was like immediate. It was like, boom, she just went into this thing and boom, got a job, cleaned herself up. Right there she went to jail. She came home and cleaned herself and she's been cleaned for over 30 years now, you know, so it's really, you know, like your faith in everything that you do in life, like whatever you put your mind too, like you can really, really, really do it. And then I seen her get clinked up, then I seen my dad get clinked up. And my dad hasn't hustled in over 25 years and has been
04:57 working at Mandalay Bay and one of the top workers. So I can see him going from hustling for making millions and millions of dollars and still has all this property. He still has this, still have that. So I can see a responsible adult that he has everything. My grandfather left him from Arkansas all the way to here. He's not sold anything, right, to hold on to the properties for 35 years, hold on to his name. hold on to his dignity, clean his act up, and he got clean. And now he works when he had never worked in his life to her working. And she's retired and clean herself up and get off the drug.
05:29 So I got to see the transition of both of the fall and the overcome of it. What was young Corvane like? He was always, I'm growing up, like, more in a drug dealer, like, kind of spoiled. But we're spoiled as far as, like, I was best drug. everywhere I went, but all those did, it will start new addictions. You just have to be fresh, I have to have new clothes, I have to have new clothes, right? Because I have a drug dealing father. So my allowance is a little different than other people's allowance, you know.
06:03 My granny worked for Harrison Ford, you know, so I got to see like real money of like, he was married to Melissa Ford at the time. So I got to go to all this Star Wars, Indiana Jones in the Last Crusade, fugitive. fugitive. I got to be a part of those things. And it was like, that got to show me, okay, like, damn, this is what the real money looked like on Mahal and I get to see the ghetto money. I get to see how that looks. Nice cars, big jury and this and that. I get to see that. So I get to kind of see both. And it kind of like shaped me. I got shaped. And then when I was young, it was a group called The Boys. And that was like, I was like some of my best friends,
06:47 as the boys, so I got to go on tour with them. So I got to see it, like, from a music perspective of Blau and Hakeem, and Hakeem was on a different world, and he had Rosie Perez coming by the house, to picket and all these type of people, right? And you got to see this at a young, different age. But you're going back to the ghetto, but when you leave the ghetto, you get to experience all these other different walks of life. So it gives you something kind of gives you something to chase and gives you something to
07:13 like, okay, well, I get some money, this is what I want to do, or this is, what I want to do. My grandmother worked at the board of education, so she kept me in, like, the best of schools. So I always was, like, in magnet programs and magnet schools and stuff like that. Even though your dad was in that lifestyle, did he try to teach you not to go down that route, or was he indifferent towards it? He was more like he would never show us. It's like you just, you kind of knew that your dad had mint coats on and this and a big jury and all these cars.
07:44 And he would try to protect me and my sister from it where, One time, my uncle, rest in peace, he took us, like, and my dad was, like, was in a gambling shack gambling. And I just was like, man, I see my dad's car. I'm like, stop. I want to talk to my dad. So he takes me in there, and I see him in there gambling on Florence. And he didn't like that.
08:07 My dad hated for me to see him, like, gambling or hustling or doing anything. It's like, he would just want to just pop up with the money in and kind of just, like, you know, just see me and my sister like that. How'd you get into the streets yourself? I think it started so, like, my first, like, nickel. Like, I seen some weed and I started selling it. But the first thing that I would, like, hustle with was, like, white collar. Like, I went to high school and Inglewood and you, like, learn white collar first.
08:42 So, like, when people, I still see people doing white collar, my brother, that was in the ninth grade. like people are still putting checks in the account and stuff like like it's like that's like so old to me right so you start off in the white collar market right so now when you when you when you start off there i would go like it was like white collar and counterfeit was like the first things that we will learn as like a kid right so i would get with the counterfeit you go by i think 200 for a thousand. You get a thousand fake for 200 real. So you're going to be, you can make $800 if you if you, uh, turn it all in. So what would I do is I would try to like meet girls at like Macy's, Northrums, like, you know, like department stores. And I would go buy $1,000 jacket
09:32 or whatever item that was expensive and then just go take it back and get the real money. And then I would give her 100. So now I'm down 300, right? So now I still made 700 or sometimes I would have to give the girl 200 to come to her store, right? So then you still make $600 profit. And you just rinse and repeat and just do that at all the stores. Go find a pretty girl. And now with the checks, I would do the same. It's like the same thing. It's like I was standing in a girl's line that worked at the bank or worked at a check. Get change for the $100, right? When you get change for the $100, I want to get, it's like, it's like you walk in like this. It's like you're like, okay, boom, give me change. Right. So now when you get the change, you let her see the knot, then you get the change.
10:13 Now you got her attention. Now you get her number. And if you do that five times a day, one of the girls are going to want to cast a checks or one of the girls are going to want to do something of that nature to maybe cast a check. If not, you tried and you didn't have to invest anything but your time. And what were you doing with the money from that? What was your plan?
10:32 I would just get fresh. Like, at that time, I just wanted, I was like best dress at every school I went to. Like, I just wanted to not repeat my clothes and wear new clothes. That's all was my only concern. I didn't really have a concern yet until, you know, maybe 11 grade was when I moved out and got kicked out. But ninth and 10th grade, I just want to be known as the freshest kid in school. Why did you get kicked out? So I went to Hollywood High, right?
10:58 And during this time, I was like the PA teacher for, not a PA teacher, but like, I had to watch the lockers, right? So I'm watching the lockers at Hollywood High, and meanwhile, I watch the lockers, I have the code to all the lockers. So having the code to all the lockers was just not a good idea for me, you know, because then I went to school with a lot of, like, Armenians and just a lot of different kids. And then people would bring, like, $1,000 to school, right? So I'd go in that locker. It's going for maybe four or five months. And then let's say if you bought a thousand, I wouldn't wipe you. I just might take 100, right?
11:45 But if you take 100 out of five to 10 lockers, you're making probably like $500 a day, right? So you're making about $500 a day. This goes on for about four or five months. I put another kid on, and I explained to him he had the same job that I had, but he had it like seven period. And that's soon the day that I told him about it, boom, all hell breaks loose. I guess he gets caught and boomie tells on me.
12:15 And then they come walk me through the school, the locker bandit. I lost $150,000 or whatever is. They said the number is for restitution. Then I had to go to camp. I went to camp for seven months. And then I had to make it up to my grandmother. I told my grandmother I always graduate. So I had to double time, graduate on time.
12:35 and come out and graduate. And that really just taught me a lot of discipline because I was behind then, right, from missing the whole 11th grade. What's camp like, like, Juvie? Yeah, camp is like, so you got a juvenile and you got to camp. So in camp you learn, like camp is more like a teaching discipline. You know, you have to shave. You have to do this.
12:56 It was like a military, like it was a barrack. You learned military canes. I learned how to be, I like to lead, too. So I end up being one of the leaders. of one of the things in there was a camp scudder. I went to the camp scudder. Who paid off the restitution in your family? You just slowly, like, you slowly pay it off.
13:18 Like, they dropped it down. I think they dropped it down to, like, I think 70, and then when you get off to them now, and plus I think you earn something like in camp, too, like the money that you earned in camp, they were, like, taking that out, too. So do you still owe it to this day or? No, no, no, no.
13:33 It goes away after time. Yeah, it goes away after time. Okay. So what happens after that? After that, now I'm going to an adult, so now I'm getting back into, you're kind of, you're debor-dabbing with white collar heavy. Now, now I've opened like a fake rim company, right? So you got a fake room company, and you have to dress up like you had to wear, like, okay, say it all started, see, like, you get the best ideas when you're broke, right?
14:04 So we needed some brakes for the car. So we couldn't get any brakes. So when we couldn't get the brakes, we went down to the place to get the brakes and wrote a bad check. And it was like, boom, they just gave us the brakes. I was like, damn, that was fucking easy. Like, you just go and they just stamped and gave, I said, that's a fucking business.
14:26 We're just going to get checks, you know, go to all the body shops in the surrounding area, see what cars that they need parts for. Say they need 13,000 in parts for this car that they got from an insurance company. I'm going to get you all these parts for $6,700. You feel me? So we're going to go half. If it's $10,000, we're going to $5,000.
14:48 We're going to get $5,000 cash, and we're going to write a check. So it started off just like that. That turned into a whole business, and we called it priceless motoring, right? So then, like, it just stemmed off. We tore all the dealerships. down, right, boom, going to run with all the dealerships makes thousands and thousands. Then from there, it went after we ran out of parts, we went to rims because now at all the Ben's dealerships, you can get, like, Lorenzo's and Brabuses at the time.
15:19 D93s were like seven grams, so you can sell it for 3,500, right? And then once we hit all the Ben's dealerships from Bakersfield to San Diego to Calabasas, next thing you know, boom, now that was where a tire. company. So now we're getting their tires because people at this time needed 20 inch tires. So then we get the 20 inch tires and then boom, we go along with that. And then the 20 inch tires go. It was just, it went on and on. So then that, that was like a two-year run, I would say. And that came to an end. And they finally, boom, put the sting operation. It came in and got a year in the state for that. Before then, in the mid. And the mid-year in the middle. And then, in the
16:05 mix of those two things before I'm going to transfer over and be fully into weed. It was, I used to, I wanted to be fresh so bad or the bling, bling era was just such a big thing that I would like, I would put the Rolex on and go to the grocery and run out. So I did that like four or five times just so I can have, like if it was the iced out roll, you got a $40,000 dollar one and I couldn't have $40,000 at the time, I would put the $50,000 watch on it and get the fuck out of there. You see what I'm saying? Because at that time, I was always, like, one of those people that, like, I have to have it.
16:42 Like, I'm one of the ones I have to have it. And I want to do a crime that's not in hurting if anybody. I don't want to hurt anybody and I don't want to hurt a soul. It's all insured. And I don't want to – I never liked it that, right? So I'm never like – I'm not like the gun guy or this or that, right? So it's just like the same as we were talking about earlier. Like with the note, it's the kind of the same thing.
17:01 Because at the end of the day, it's just grant that would state only. been grand theft is not even nothing in LA anymore so anyway now I go do the bit but I'm the type of person like after I do that crime if I got caught with it that's it it's over I don't know I do that anymore so now I come home to see here I did the year for the for the for the for the for the for the for the for the for the white collar for the forgery so in the midst of doing that I go to one out one that the guys that are selling the weed, he's coming home. I'm coming home and he's like, oh man, you know, he's telling me about, you know, shooting the boxes of weed out of town.
17:43 I'm like, damn, that sounds like a, you know, that sounds different, right? So I started off selling like an eighth, and I just broke down an ounce and I'm just selling it, you know, in the blues. And the West Boulevard High Park, we call it the blues. It's in the 60s, right? So I started selling weed there in the middle. miss to selling weed there, now I'm learning how to send the packages out of town. At the beginning of sending them out of town, I'm just, I'm like on your program. It's really your plug. It's really your people.
18:22 But in the midst of learning the game, I'm like, I'm just going to get my own people, right? Because I see what's going on. Like, boom, it's flipping. People are making money doing this. So now, rewind, my home girl lives in a lot. Atlanta. So she's going to college in Atlanta. And I'm like, let me see you, let me sing you some weed so I can, you know, I'll tell my own girl. And they like, let me send you some weed. Like, let me see you some weed so I can, uh, so we can try something out. So boom, I said one pound. So boom, she said, I'm just going to give it to my deal. So he sold it, sent the money back. I was like, damn. That's easy. So now I'm learning like, let me just do it on my own.
18:55 Before you know it, we get to 10 pounds. But she's like, I'm in school. I don't have time to be fucking deal with this. I'm just going to hook you all my boyfriend. He's the one of really selling it anywhere. I'm like, cool. I'm still on parole. during that duration we sold we were at like 10 pounds a day right we moved up to 20 and before i even met him before i even met we exchanged 500,000 dollars before i even physically flew out there to even meet him just off of milling the wheat back and forth so now i'm just like this is next level you know what i mean like i just have to turn this up meet more people and expand and do more And that's how like kind of like the weed game originally, originally started, where it was like you have to play monopoly with it and just like, boom, okay, you're in Connecticut. Okay, I'm going to send you 10 pounds.
19:48 Okay, you're over here. I'm going to send you 10 pounds. Okay, you're over here. I'm going to see you 20. I'm seeing you 40. I'm going to see you 30 or however many that you can handle. Right. And at that time, the weed game wasn't so, like, saturated how it is now, where if you was to send somebody so weed now,
20:04 they couldn't sell it in one day because it's so many different kind. I got to ask what kind it is, finger, fuck it, and do all this shit. It was A-Z, Reggie, Chronic, or Cush. It was four kind of weeds. So it had it. The gang was more easier to think. It's like a thousand different kind now. So I don't know if a person can sell 40 tons of marijuana in this thing.
20:28 Maybe if you're a company or maybe if you, I don't, you know, maybe a person can. Who knows? but I just, with the pickiness of it, I just can't really see it happening. When I was in prison, the only chain I was worried about was the one they might put on me. Now I get to choose my own. And that's why I'm excited to tell you guys
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22:13 You get paid on delivering the product. It's more like if I'm buying it for $600 at that time, it was easy and now you sell it for $900. I want to know what your price is out there. So say if you're selling it, you say I'll sell it for $1,000. So if I could just give me $900. If it's 20 pounds, you just made it $400. free $2,000 a day for selling it because you have the customer. Or you can get in the box
22:38 and I'm going to let you get it at the LA price at $600 and then you can get in the box as well. So it depends on what it is that you want to do. But that's how I'm going to like line the contract up. Like you can either get it, get it for the LA price and then we both can be in the box if I shoot 20 pounds, 10 is yours, 10 is mine. Or what number do you need it to sell at where you're comfortable with. Where if we're doing a box every day, you want to put up no money in the whole $20B mine, and I take the risk for the $12,000,
23:08 but I get to make $6,000. You're going to send me back $18,000. Do I get to take the whole risk, or do you want to be in the box with me and get at the L.A. price and we both make $3,000, so it's no big me's little use. Or you could just make your free $2,000 every day
23:25 and just sell the weed. So you're always more than just a supplier. You want to be a part of the transaction, too? I want to be a part of the transaction. I want to be the supplier. And I want us to be partnered up where if you're in the box, too, then you have just much willing to lose. Now we're both equal.
23:44 And now it's not, if I want to go to the mall, you can go to the mall too. I don't want it to be like, oh, you're mad or you're hating because I'm doing this or I'm doing that. So if we're equal and I'm going to always start off to say we can be equal or do you want to just, be a dumper and just sell the wheat and just tell me what need, what price do you need? Because sometimes a dumper is better because imagine if you're out of town and you can sell 20 pounds every day in Connecticut and you make your $2,000, you're making $10,000 a week and making $40,000 of money, you don't have no risk. Because back then you just next day it, next day, next day, next day, next day, next day, next day, next day, next day,
24:21 and next day the money and put the money in the bank and, you know, so it was it was a little bit, little bit more easier because it wasn't so much on, on like, how hard it is on how hard it is to sell the week now because now with every state going legal, all that did was, was put too many people in the game. You know, it's like it's, it's, the game is so overcrowded and they can't fully, fully legalize it. That's why they keep going back and forth because you can't fully legalize it because if you did, who's going to supply CVS? Who's going to supply Walmart? The same way they have Newport.
25:02 They're going to have to have wheat. Who's going to supply the gas station? It's 7-Eleven. No one has a grow big enough for 7-Eleven's order. So they have to state the real reason why it can't be legal because they don't have the manpower to grow that much weed for real companies to even get involved. But couldn't they just make it legal and then only give certain permits? They just, it's like alcohol sales.
25:27 Yeah, but then, okay, now, now you're growing yours like this. Now you're spraying yours and now you're doing this. Now someone dies because now people are not good enough for just a regular high. So now you're putting all this extra stuff in the game. So that's why you can't just legalize it because it needs to still get tested. It still has to go through so much to get tested. So it's like who's going to be able to test all this enough for these big, real, real billion-dollar companies.
25:57 We're talking if you fully, fully federally legalize it, then that means you can go to Chevron and go get it. So who has the company big enough to test 50,000 products right now? But now what happens if every state legalizes it? What's the difference between the federal and every state having it legal? The taxing and all the compliance. It's one of the most compliantest things in the world. You got to think it's the only thing that they came out with that needed no advertisement and became a billion-dollar industry.
26:30 There's no industry that you can start. It's on the backs of the people like me who actually did the work and actually delivered and actually sold the wheat and the growers and the old hippies that grew the weed. If you don't have the Cheech and Chung, you don't have the industry promoting this, you can't just come out with it. And then it just wildfires and becomes a billion-dollar industry. case they would come out with anything. So you have to go back to like the roots, the Mary Jane, the Rick James, the How High movie and stuff like that, the things that, the chronic album, the things that really, really made weed what it really is. It's all the marketing that done before that to make it like this. It's no commercials or anything on marijuana. Why is it
27:17 a being out of industry? It's a being out of industry because of the culture. Yeah, you hear stories of it growing up, high. I mean, when, as a kid, when you heard getting high, you wouldn't refer to, like, cocaine or heroin or anything. You know, you think automatically weed. Now it's a lot different. Now it's like people are getting high of pills. People are getting high on this. Yeah. But back in the day, it was weed. Yeah, it was weed. So it's like, my whole thing is, I think the game has just came so far. And I just like to see where it's going to go. Like, I like to see, like, what is the next steps for marijuana? Like, does it keep going?
27:59 Does it ever make it do I ever live on this earth and walk into CVS and see it? And go to the counter and say, hey, let me get a, let me get that cush right there. You know what I mean? Like, does that day come, right? You know, that's the day that, you know, and hopefully, you know, and free all the guys that, you know, are still locked up for this plant because it's a plant. and has helped away more than it's hurt. And just to see people, you know, still currently locked up. And women, too, Clay and Parker Coleman, and, you know, people that are still locked up over a plant is ridiculous.
28:38 Ma'am and Tahrir 22 years. It could just, the list goes on because people don't know about this type of stuff. And that's what the problem is. The problem is that no one knows that it exists, that people are still getting locked up today for marijuana. They still think, oh, it's legal. It's legal. No, it's not. It's not federally legal.
28:55 in numerous amounts of states that are people who are still being penalized for it, and they're still not freeing people, and people are still locked up. And it's just not right. Now, how do you find new connections in different states that you can trust, especially back then? There's no FaceTime. There's no, you know, video calls. Are you flying to each state to meet that connection?
29:15 I hate to say, but the best people are the people you don't know. I made the most money with people that I don't. I made millions of dollars for people that I don't know. Even in my case, when I don't want to say her name, but when she testified at trial, it would end up being a woman. I was even selling some of the weed that I never met in Charlotte, right? And I've never met her. So what I've learned even when I just told you about the previous story about using, well, Big C, I can say him, but I'm saying, I didn't meet Big C for 10 months. You know, so like I've learned to not meet him.
29:54 The people that you meet and know, like, those are the people that you don't make money. Like, you're going to make the most money with the people that you do not know. But how do you find them to begin with, just referrals? You're just going to get referred. Just from being just like, okay, let's just say, I'm here. It's like referred. You say, you're doing good work in any kind of department at a game, whether if you're doing good interviews, whether if you're doing good this,
30:18 where you're doing good car salesman, where you're a good barber, whatever is that you're doing good. If you're doing something good and you're a stand-up guy, somebody's going to refer to you. You see what I'm saying? So it's like, you're just going to get referred. And I think that's like the best part of the game that you're going to learn and you're going to meet new people. And I've learned that people that you know are, first of all, the people that I know all testified on me. The people that you don't know, don't know you and have less things to worry about.
30:50 And they're not hating on you is what I learned. I think that's just how the game works in every department or in every business, not just a drug business or not just a weed business. It's not even in prison, even when you go to prison. Your inner circle is the one who's going to run you off the yard. It's not the guy that's on the other side. It's the guy that you're cooking spreads with every day. The guy that you're doing everything for,
31:19 that's the one that's going to stab you with the knife. That's the one that's going to run you up off the yard. The guy that you're with. with every single day. Now, why do you want to expand past Atlanta? You were making good money. You know, why bring more on? That's a good question.
31:34 It was just more, not, I wouldn't say greed, but you just wanted more. Like the more that you seen it was during the BMF era, so it was a lot of money being, you can see a lot of stuff in the streets, and it's just, you wanted more and it was so, I guess it was so simple, you know, it was really, very, very, very simple. You're mailing a box. And the person on, as long as you had a good,
32:01 now, you can mail a box all you want, but you have, it's a two thing component. You have to have a good dumper on the other side of the world that can actually sell it and send the money back. And once you had those two components, it was like you couldn't have enough weed. Like, you literally needed more and more and more and more and more. They were calling, I don't know what they were doing with the weed, but they were selling it. You know, you could send 80 today and they want 80 tomorrow. You could send 100 today, they want 100 tomorrow. You could go to a truck with a thousand, and they still would want more. It was never, you could never have enough weed, never. Now, do you have to start expanding your operation back in California? I mean, you probably need
32:41 people to help you ship it, bring it to the post office, do all that, pick it up. Yeah, but that's going to be easy. That's the easy part. Because the reason why I, I even went to trials because I never had to touch the weed. I never had to mail the weed. I never had to touch the money. You can, it used to be Atlanta used to be so cracking that you could get five girls. You fly them out like, you want to come to a party? I got a party out of here.
33:08 And you just give everybody 20,000, right? So now you just got 100,000 back over there. You know, and then you just learned, like, what I did learn to, like, never show nobody where your safe deposit box is. The guy that testified on me told to Feds where my safe deposit box was, right? So it's like I learned that. I learned that the horror way.
33:28 Like, don't show anywhere. We used to get the money together, so I thought that, you know, like it's in a safe deposit box, it's in a bank. I'm not thinking, oh, you're going to tell the feds where it's at and stuff like that.
33:39 But I did learn that in the game. Never let your right hand know what your left hand is doing. Never. I don't care who they are. Did you think safety deposit boxes were safer than a bank account? Yeah, I did.
33:48 I did. I learned the hard way, but yeah, I did it. Because they just put out a forfeiture on your safe deposit box. But I never knew that. I just thought that it would always be safe there. I guess the only difference is they didn't know what the exact amount is in that deposit box at the time. But they're just going to forfish the whole box. So they're going to take, you know, a lot of jury in there. You know, you're going to lose stuff in there too as well. So now where do you expand to after Atlanta?
34:12 Alabama and North Carolina. Yeah, so we went to Charlotte. Some of my case is out of Charlotte. So, but to Charlotte next. And that's where things got hot. That's where things got heated. Atlanta was just a good run. But once I submit to Charlotte, it was like a two-year run.
34:30 It was like $4 million in two years. But it was just the people that were messing with were just really, really sloppy. And how old were you at that point? I was saying like 28, 29. Yeah, about 28, 29, yeah. So there was a good chunk of time. time you were working for the other guys in your early 20s in? All my 20s.
34:55 Okay. The whole 20s. I probably had like a 11-12-year run. Working with the other guys and learning the game? Just learning. No, no, no. The only time that I was doing the working was at the beginning. After about four or five months into that, I need my own plug.
35:13 And then I got Atlanta. I got Atlanta going in like 2003, 2003, 2004. Oh, so the two-year run was just Charlotte, was the two-year run that you were just referring to. At the end. Okay. Charlotte was the run out of the end that my case is on. Yeah. That was only like, yeah, about two years.
35:29 So now what happens in Charlotte that things get dicey? It starts with, okay, they get caught with a crate. So we start, the crates you can put 300 to 400 pounds in a crate. So actually, she stole the first crate. So one of the first crate, because we don't know this until we go to trial. Once you go to trial, then we start getting evidence. So then the first crate, it comes up missing. Right?
35:59 So then it's like, oh, shit, we lose 300 pounds. I'm like, I heard of fuck, 338 pounds. I'm like, all right. He wants to go again. He said, let's go again. Let's shoot another crate because you have to remember they don't, you could send 10,000 pounds. They're still going to buy it.
36:15 They just don't have enough weed out there for some fair reason. So, boom, they start following, the Fed, start. following them after they get the first crate. So boom, we go through another crate. We lose that crate. So now we're down there 700 pounds down. At this present time, my daughter's being born. So we fly out there just the first time, but we had to fly back because my daughter's been born, so I got to fly back. So he stays out there. He ends up going by some barbershop and some guy said, Yeah, they should have Sothea. And the guy gets him like 10,000,
36:59 so we split the 10,000, right? So at this present time, the dude was my partner. So I'm like, I just had my daughter, let's just figure it out. So he has a party at his house. Who is first staying together, right? In the other side of Hollywood Hills.
37:26 He has a party at his house. We'd come to find out the valet people at the party was the feds. So the valet people was the feds at the party, right? So I started backing up from him, but I didn't just leave him in the code. I still had like a plug to get weed. So he was like, I need 60 pounds to get back on to do this. I give him the 60 pounds. I go get some weed from one of my plugs.
37:51 He'll get 60 pounds. And he kind of like, like fake said that he lost it. But like the next three days, like his girl had like a binge truck and they had a little money and something like that. I was like, you just said you didn't have any money and it just lost. So I called bygones, be itacons. I said, I'm cool. You can just have that. I want to open up a clothing store and started building my own family and started getting back into my love of clothes and open a boutique and I was trying to, you know, going to ride to change my life.
38:18 And at this present time, I had started selling lean, right? So I'm selling lean and weed on the side, but I'm selling wheat. more like in LA. I'm not really going out of town anymore. I'm just middle many and just making my little money. Like if you want 100 pounds, I can get you 100 pounds and then I put the dollar on it. And I made 10,000 hours a day off of that and I could still take care of both my daughters. And I had them both in private school and had them both and had the store and I had their pictures on the side of it. At the moment, I would sell weed out the store. So to make a long store short, in 2009, I had got, I went to the Laker game and this one I won the championship and I got caught one pound of weed. So I got
39:02 caught a one pound of weed and everybody was in the car but I'm like a stand-up guy. So it was four people in the car. It's my weed. It's not everybody's weed. Boom. I think of it as it's nothing, but I get caught with a gun right after that. Right. So now the judge is saying since you're on joint suspended, I'm going to have to go do a year. So I have to go turn myself in to go do a year. in the meanwhile, in 2010, the case starts, and the guy that I got the 60 pounds to and they have the feds at the house and all the stuff and lost the 330 pounds with, he's being indicted. And they say, boom, he's been indicted, he's going to Charlotte, blah, blah, blah.
39:40 I'm like, you know, you're like, damn, I'm dodged the bullet, right? So in the midst of that, after I go get my family situated, get a crib, get everything situated, I go turn myself in, pay my debt. to society. I come home 2012. Got my family going, doing all the thing. After sitting on the bunk for a year, I figured me and him did make three, four million dollars together. Let me just see what I can do to help. I've heard his kids is in foster care now. His mom's die. It's just tons of things. So it hits my heart. So I go to like, it's LA. It's like a traffic thing where I knew what her friend worked at. I went to every floor until I seen her. I say, boom.
40:25 I'm like, go get her number. I said, yeah, get, get, get, get, uh, this is wife's number. Get her number. I want to, uh, write them. She gave me all that information. I wrote them, sent them some bread and, and just like, uh, just write me. I'm here for y'all. We'll do it. I know y'all going through it. Boom, boom, boom, boom. I'm here. I got some clothes for the kids or the kids in foster care where they had, so I can pull up on them. She writes back to, his wife writes back, but he doesn't write back. I'm like, damn, you get $1,000 a day? You don't write back? You feel what I'm saying? Like, you know, like, you know, like that just normally doesn't happen if you send somebody a thousand dollars in jail,
40:59 but I don't pay no attention. I'm finishing my thing with my family. So I'm home for about five, six months. January hits and then another guy that's on our conspiracy, but the original guy that I was talking about that actually taught me how to shoot the boxes at the beginning, they say that he's got picked up. I'm like, damn. Well, this thing like is everything bites the dust.
41:25 this was on January 13th, but I'm like, I'm not making any money with him. I have not seen the other people since 2009. They got it in 2010. I don't make any money with him since 2006 or seven. So, okay, boom, I picked him up at his house. I don't pay it no attention. I'm pulling into my driveway. I looked to my right.
41:53 I'm like, you know, like Leder is kind of like a blackberry hills of L.A. Right. So when you're pulling in your driveway and you see nothing but chargers, challengers, and fucking Durangoes and white people, you're like, there's no white people even over here. Boom. So they jump out, tell me to get out the car, get out of the neighbors. My daughter's looking at the window. I'm supposed to take my daughter to drill team practice.
42:16 It's the whole thing. You feel I'm saying? It's a whole thing. It's embarrassing. It's in front of my house. So boom. They take me down to, they take. to, um, they take me down to, uh, to the, uh, NBC LA and just like talking shit like,
42:32 yeah, I told us you we're going to get you motherfucker. So I'm like, oh, take me whatever. So to make a long story short, they, they, they, he's in the prison too. He's in the thing and they, we're on the same plane, the same bus. Got to go to those ceiling, go across the world together, chained up together already. I'm like, bro, this is going to be easy. Have you seen the indictment? Like the names don't even match.
42:56 Like this is perfect. Like, you know what I mean? Like they have a mixed up, a mixed up information. We get all the way to Charlotte after we've been chained up and been together for, this is someone that I've known for, this is almost 14 years old. The first day, we're not even there for five minutes. The lawyer comes back and says, well, he's already cooperating. We just talked about not corroborating.
43:22 We just talked about this. We just talked about that. We've been there for five minutes and you're already corroborating. It's insane. So I'm just like, fuck, I got to, I got to just, you know, strap it up. Like, you know, like, I have to, I'm taking this thing to try out. Like, I just, you know, like, the only information they got is from now. You know, like, I've never been to Charlotte to do anything.
43:48 I've been shot in any boxes and I didn't get any money back. So what did I actually physically do? So that just, all that does is. curates you to be in the leader. Now you get a leader role since they don't actually physically have you doing anything, right? So it's just like a, you know, and shout out to Dirk for being the feds. It's just like it's a very hard thing to do. You know, it's a very, very, extremely, extremely, extremely hard thing to do.
44:15 Like when you're going against, there's this letting in so much he say, she say stuff that is just like, I can literally say, I can indict you. you right now. A person from in jail can indict you. All they have to do is say that IAN did this and did that. They have to have no physical error in this. I have your number on the phone and y'all have conversations. During that time that Charles having conversations, I'm going to say that we were talking about this and that. And they're not going to really investigate it like that And to take a human being off the street off of the information that is given from someone in prison is the most disgusting thing. And the conspiracy law is the biggest law that needs to change because to give someone this power, but you don't have power to do anything else.
45:08 They don't want you to vote. They don't want you to get a job. They don't want you to think. But you could take another person from their family off your words because your story means something because you're really not doing your real job. if anybody learned anything that just during the dark trial, when the actual officers were on the stand, no one heard anything about their testimony because they don't have one. It was just jamming Bonnie. Where's the actual testimony that's coming from someone who's actually taking someone away from their family?
45:37 That did the actual work. Now, maybe back in the day when it was John Gotti and back in the mafia days, you had to really get a phone tap and had to really get this. Now it's just based on people's information. just really thinks that, you know, like being in there for nine and a half years, you get to see, like, and read people's paperwork and see, like, this is some fucking bullshit to take this many people away from their family and all these built-up, beefed-up conspiracies that are not really nothing. I'm going to be honest, I'm not naturally a morning person,
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47:29 including a bottle of omega-3 fish oil and a bottle of vitamin D3K2 with your first subscription order of AG1 next gen or AG1 pro. That's drinkag1.com slash locked in. Now, what were the actual charges you were hit with? 40 tons of marijuana, money laundering, and tax evasion. And that's all based on his testimony in the beginning. That's like that's how they came up with that number to indict you. Yeah.
47:58 When really, y'all caught two crates at 700 pounds. You have no boxes. You don't see any in the box. You're just saying that you have the receipts from the boxes or from the box place. Or you have the money, you're balancing out the money and the way that you have. but you really only have, because she stole the other crates, let me correct. You guys only in court, you only have 338 pounds. You're saying that we shot this many crates, but where are they?
48:30 You know what I mean? Like, where's the proof of, well, we shot empty crates? What if we shot do-do? What if we shot fucking paper bullets? Like, you weren't there to know what were in any of those crates. So I'm just like, you know, that's what made me take it to trial. But you live and learn, I think it's the best thing that ever happened to me, actually. So now do you get bail or do you stay in Charlotte?
48:51 I stay in Charlotte. They wouldn't give you bail. It wouldn't give you bail, no. Okay. How long are you waiting in Charlotte for before trial starts? Well, I went to trial with Evelyn and Italia, so I went to trial with the two girls. And since they were trying to speedy trial them to get them off the streets, I would say like nine months. I was already in trial.
49:12 And you agreed to the speedy trial? Yeah. Because I felt at the time it's like you don't have any information. They have to show you your discovery. And then you go to it's called a reverse proffer where you sit in there with your lawyer and with them. Right. Now, proffer is when someone's having a proffer meeting to tell and they're giving out information. A reverse proffer is when you sit there and you sit there with your attorney and they're going to give you all the information that they have against you. And I'm just like the worst case scenario, this is a fucking tax evasion fraud case. You know what I mean? If anything, it has nothing to do with any marijuana because I haven't been caught with any marijuana. It's so bad that they had the Beverly Hills officer that I got caught with the one pound come to my trial. Because that's the only weed that I've ever been caught with.
50:09 And then they're going to show like that I had a drug dealer's ledger in a car for nine grand. or something like that. You know, so it's like, that's your information. You have a nine grand drug dealers checkbook that was in my car when I got caught with one pound of marijuana. You know, so it's just the things that they do, it's just, you know what I mean?
50:30 Like, you know, like, you know, like, it's all, the shit is all like fucking bullshit and it's all like smoking mirrors and just don't believe the hype. Did they offer you a deal at all? Yeah, it was like 20 years. And then you got a month. mind me when I'm trying to help him out. He has 19 years and he's told off to 19 years to get out of jail, right?
50:51 And this other guy has 22 years. So I know that they're giving you 20 years because they have it. And at the time, I'm like, what? I'm about 20 years for fucking some weed that you don't have. Like, no, I don't know. You're going to give it all. Now, granted, I don't think that you're faking with the life, with the, we'll give you life. like I'm from California at weeds legal like you're faking bring it on and give it to me right and he really gave it to me he really came back and gave me life and I was just like fuck like they'll really give you life for some shit that was grown out of the ground I was here way before you were here like I did not bring weed with me I did not in I did not introduce weed to society and to take someone's life and to say that they're never going to see their family or kids or anything again for something that's grown out of the the earth was just next level to me. Now, were the fed's investigating you in California at all or now? Yeah, it came to the house and then had a little slight investigation. But when they got on the stand, it's like, hey, have you seen Mr. Cooper committing in crimes?
51:56 No. Have you seen Mr. Cooper in Charlotte? No. Have you seen Mr. Cooper selling away mailing any boxes or do anything that was involved in this conspiracy? No. There's no further questions, Your Honor. I thought the case was over after that. These are the two investigating officers.
52:13 They've never seen me do anything. The only people that have seen me do something was my so-called friends and the people that I made the money with. You know, so, like, I want the kids and I want people that are trying to hustle and the people that are watching to understand, like, do not. When I mean, do not trust anyone in this game. this game is the worst game in the world. The drug game, the hustle game, everybody's a piece of shit. It's going to be 1% of the people that are not a piece of shit. But 99% is a piece of shit.
52:52 So basically you got convicted of solely because of testimony from your... Slowly because of testimony from your friends. Why do you think they were believable by the jury? You're in Charlotte. All right. So already like your... It's not a jury. of your peers. This jury of your peer shit is a whole other ballgame. Right. So it's not a jury of your peers. And the way that the jury instructions are, are written in a conspiracy is very, very hard to beat because it's going to be hard to say like, hey, we're not friends when these are people that you've known your whole life. So you can't say that you're not friends because they're going to show how long you've known these people when you have kids with these people and this and this and this and this. Right. So.
53:42 they're going to show that to the jury. So it's going to show y'all having fun, y'all out making the money too. They're going to, but that doesn't mean that you committed a crime. But they're going to show, okay, boom, they're at the club this day, boom, boom, this today.
53:56 But there's no action of you committing the actual crime. But the picture that they're painting to the jury is going to be these are friends. They've been a long-in-time friends. They've got to the club. They go party after their thing. Boom, boom, boom. So now when they are telling them,
54:12 the story, the juror has his instructions that are very, very tight net in order to be the conspiracy. You only have to have like the intent. Wait a minute. He has the money. He's going out to the thing. Like, it's going to be kind of hard to say that you weren't something. Well, what else were you doing? You know, so it's like you have to have something else that we're doing. And the more that you try to clean that up, one of the things that you are doing, when I was boom, I'm doing the clothing line. I'm doing the store. I'm doing this. Now you got some somebody's getting on the stand. He's selling weed out of the store. You know what I mean? So, like, even when you did do something good, they're going to bring it down with something bad because they're working for the government to get them a time cut. You know, so they're trying to get out of jail. How long does the trial go on for?
54:59 About four days. Four days. And it's joint trial with the two other girls? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it was like a week. And you guys couldn't separate that at all? We was going to separate it at first, but I think it was. was better to kind of do it together because I wouldn't change it because if you do it together, I think they would probably either make them turn or make us turn or try to make someone turn on each other type of thing. I think it would be like, I think everything happens for a reason. I think it happened like that for, for a serious reason for it just to see the people that you just met sitting next to you. And then you have the people that you grew up with,
55:49 split wings with, sodas, went to war with, did all these things, climbed through windows with, are all testifying. And you have two girls that's never spent on the sidewalk going to trial. It's like it really makes you look at things and look at people in a different light. like you really look at them like damn like this shit can turn on you and give him a second like you can build this whole thing and like no one care because they're only caring
56:20 about themselves where were your parents throughout the trial did they come no they come to Charlotte so my dad he's not like a he never visited sent me money every month but he's not like a go come visit you in jail type of dad
56:35 um my mother didn't come to Charlotte either. She didn't come to Charlotte either because I was like in a jail. So it's like They would have to come fly out of the world just to see me for 30 minutes through a glass. So I was like It's kind of like pointless to me. Right. So shout out to Parker Coleman. He had his sister come come come visit me and stuff like that but just to get visits but I didn't want anybody come from all the way from around the world to see me in a glass behind a glass. But once I got sentenced they came and said me. What about your kids and your wife or baby mama at the time, girlfriend? Yeah, I didn't let them come either.
57:15 It was just too far because I didn't want to mess the kids head up by seeing me through the glass. You're already not physically touching me. So we're going to seat through a glass and you're going to fly it and you're going to have to fly all the way back. And it's only a 30-minute visit. So it was just like, I don't know. It was going to be pointless to me. How do you feel once you got convicted? of course you're going to cry and you're going to go through those stages of like damn
57:47 no I'm really going to be here for life but the faith that I carry it's like a person can see I was like more happier with the life than I was even going through the trial was like I know that guy was working with me and he like just had a plan like it was like this is very very temporary like people used to say like what are you know shit I go home like I would walk around there like I had a date. And people like, damn, how does he do that? It's just, what life sends? Like, how does he have a smile?
58:18 It was just, I'm like, after I seen guy get my mother off of drugs in two days, I knew that the guy that I serve is just like, he's amazing and he can really do some things. So he started moving out and started getting really, really deep. We got denied on every level of appeals. I was the campaign for Prop 64 and Prop 47. I mean, got all my records expunged and got everything that gave me the three strikes to get in there. Got that off. They denied that in the Supreme Court.
58:50 We made it all the way to the Supreme Court. That got denied. Went to the Obama administration. That got denied. That clemency got denied. Then I started doing advocacy work from in prison, right, and got with several groups, you know, tons and tons of groups. And the Nause did a documentary called Smoking Black America, which I had a 30-minute biggest segment of, on there, Snoop Dog, Kamala Harris was on there, 30-minute segment during the hip-hop awards.
59:18 That was huge for me. And I started getting letters, and I did Complex, and I did National Geographic and a few other things of being in prison, right? And once we made it there, we made it to the New York front page of New York Times. My attorney said, how are you going to get your friends out and leave Corvanc Cooper in there? And then boom, they started getting a little bit more viral. Now I'm up to like 177,000 signatures on change.org. And the day comes where, you know, the 20th, January 20th,
59:51 and Trump is leaving office. And they have a thing on your ticker at the bottom of CNN and you listen to NPR and you're just sitting in there, you're waiting. And it's like, damn, I've got to sue that suit back up and wait. Like, boom, it's at 10 o'clock. I'm not on the ticker. We're on lockdown.
01:00:09 We're on a four months lockdown. They just stabbed somebody in the neck and one of the COs. And so we had to get chained up to go to our, go to showers. So the morning has hit. It was at 11.30. I called down because I can't see the bottom ticker from my cell. So I'm calling down to a guy as closer to the TV. It's like, damn, bro, I don't see your name.
01:00:33 Now, mind me, everyone's voting for me. I'm the only person in prison that maybe, I don't know if it's, ever or what, but I had every race watch the documentary on every TV at Polack, every TV. This is like, if you've been to a USP, to a top maximum level security prison, the white boys and Hispanics cannot turn their TV on BT. They can't. It's against the rules.
01:01:04 You can really get stabbed in your neck for this. Like, this is a very, very serious thing. every TV was allowed to watch PT so everybody can see me on the screen and see what I'm trying to do for to get people out of prison and stuff like that and they all watched it and I just feel like that was like breaking the barriers inside the United States penitentiary so everyone's voting on me so now when the thing everybody like man keep your head up for they're thinking like I'm for sure going to be on the list after there's nobody's in jail but had their shit on the TV yet right so the morning comes. I look out the TV. Biden is getting on the fucking plane waving by, and Trump is getting on the helicopter coming in. I'm like, damn, I guess I got to do this time.
01:01:51 You know, they still, they never call my name. This is fucking five, six in the morning. We got to just, we get chained up. We go to the showers. So, boom. We got the showers. I wouldn't forget. Just doing any marquees from D.C.
01:02:03 He's like, you like, Slim. They can say Slim. And D.C. is like, Slim. Keep your head up. Man, they probably just slow on the pace. paperwork or something because he's saying I'm looking down because now I'm going to have to I don't even know if I'm going to have a push like this again ever or two not only do I have to have another push but like it's going to let it all out you feel I'm saying like boom Trump's going
01:02:27 in the thing Trump's leaving office Biden's coming in I don't know if Biden's going to be at Biden didn't really let anybody out you feel I'm saying so do you still have people in there so it's like damn I got to depend on another president it's going to my third president it's already a long shot because it's winning the lottery. I own the statement. I trademark. Clemmacy is better than the lottery. 40 tons.
01:02:45 We own that. So it's already the longest shot in the world. I get back to the cell. I'm in there maybe like seven minutes, eight minutes. They like counselor on the range. Counselor on the range, right? And I'm just like, no. We're already been on a like.
01:03:05 There's no reason for like a counselor to be on the range because they don't really care about you like that to be called, come and checking on you. Now, we just got chained up to go to the showers. It's already against the rules to even be able to see out without your handcuffs on to go to the shower to wash your fucking ass. So when he come and he unlocked the door and crank the door open, that's already something. We couldn't even go to shower without being chained up, without putting your hands through the thing. You're like, Cooper, man, pack your shit up, man.
01:03:41 you got five minutes, man, you're out of here. It was just like, I had a big chain in there, the Cartier's. I fucking took it off, gave all this shit away. You know, all my shit, went to the door. I went by every door, and I told everybody in there, man, walked by face, not by sight, man. And walked out the front door, and I called my mom.
01:03:59 She said, Ivanka just called her. And they give you a call. I went to the front, started 40 tons. My partner was outside. Started my company. I came out of jail wearing 40 tons, wearing my own brand and been on the run every since. How long had you been in prison for up until that point?
01:04:18 Like nine years. Now, when you were found guilty, is it mandatory life or did the judge have discretion? You say he had no discretion, life without the possibility of parole. I was supposed to never come home ever again. And that was written by the law because of the amount of a weed they were acclaimed? Not just the amount, just like I want to tell people today that it can happen to them today. Like, my two priors is one pound of marijuana and one bottle of kosher. That's my two priors.
01:04:49 All right. So if a person got caught with, okay, boom, you got you doing zanis, you got caught with zanis, and you got caught with the pills. Now you're on this conspiracy. That's three strikes. Oh, it's a career criminal. Those are three different crimes. Even though you didn't do no time for those zanis, you didn't do no time for those, what's the call it, right?
01:05:05 They're so minor, but they're two drug priors. And if you get a third one, today you can get life. It's not, it doesn't change because of the time it is. And people are thinking that it's what's called get into a weak conspiracy today and have two drug priors and that's your ass. How old are you when you got life? 30, I think, 32. What are you thinking when you're that age and you're handed a life sentence?
01:05:32 Like, what's the first thing that comes to your mind? Your kids. Like, damn. You know, like, damn, I'm never going to see. My kids, you know, like, you're never going to grow up with them. You're never going to be able to, you know, things like, you know, I lost my granny in there, you lost your uncle, couldn't go to the funeral, you know, stuff like that.
01:05:52 Like, you're not going to be a part. I'm a real family person. So, like, not being a part of, like, real family shit is kind of like, damn, you know what I mean. Do you actually expect to serve life knowing that there's appeals and just so many possibilities in the world at that point in time? I'm never accepted that I'm ever going to die in prison. I never accepted that. But in the same token, it's like when you're waking up and you're out, they says deceased and your kids are asking like, when are you coming home?
01:06:33 You don't really have a date. You know, like that's when it hits different. Like those nights hit a little different. Where did they send you to first? I went to Atwater first. So Atwater's like up north. So I did like four or five years there. I went to Polack after that.
01:06:48 Polacks in Louisiana, it's pretty, it's pretty vicious. Is Atwater a pen? Yeah, I only been to prisons. I've never been to like a low or medium or nothing of that nature. I was only at USPs. How is Atwater? When you first get there, it's open, right? So it changed where they did one side, but like everybody used to come outside at one time.
01:07:14 So you're just first day, boom. You're getting your laundry. me get stabbed and stumped out. You know, like you're only there five minutes because some people aren't supposed to get off the bus. Like, so some people are going to get a kite that they're not supposed to get off the bus. And they got off the bus and got around the yard, right? So I got sprayed my first day because I was right by the dude.
01:07:34 You know what I mean? And it's crazy because you talk to these people on the way there. And they're like, yeah, I'm this, I'm that. And you see this happen to them. So, you know, you've seen so many of the toughest people that's supposed to be the toughest people in the world, those of people in prison are usually the first ones to go. They're usually the first ones to go. They don't really make it that long.
01:07:55 No, you weren't a violent guy. How do you survive? Do you have to click up with anyone? I mean, you're clicking up because you're already from Cali, so you're already going to be involved in that, like, you know, but then you know more cribs and bloods. I know game bangers and stuff like that. So you click up with them. But in the same token, I'm more like a, I'm more.
01:08:16 business-minded. So like, I went in there starting businesses. Like, boom, okay, you know how to cook. Okay, boom, I'm going to back it up the thing. We're having a restaurant. So I start a restaurant. Boom, I had a ticket. So now I'm a bookie now. You know, I'm this. I'm not, I'm trying to figure out how to not call home for money and send money home to my kids. I didn't miss a month sending money home to my kids. How much money were you talking? My counselor said I sent home $88,000. I send $88. Over nine years? Over nine years. Probably all tax. Like an eight year period.
01:08:47 Tax free, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow, that's crazy. And you still had money to live off of two. It was still, you still not ask for money. Now, when you're the new guy on campus and you're making businesses, doesn't that cause riffs? It calls rift. But when you're coming already from poverty and you're coming already from a struggling
01:09:10 situation, all that is like the most easiest thing for me. Like, I'm the one, like, they actually moved me out of Atwater for having too much influence. Like, I got shipped for having too much influence. Like, what happens is, like, once the bigger that you get and the more influence that you have, that's where you become dangerous. Because now the young ins are listening. The riffraff is listening. The gangbangers are listening. I'm coming in there with a business mind on how can we do better?
01:09:43 I'm the first person to do the above the rim contest. I'm the first person to do, to bring things to the yard, to bring people life, type of stuff. And then they sent you to Pollock when you got moved. Yeah, and Polack is a whole other ballgame. Yeah, it's like, Polack was supposed to be like my punishment. Like, okay, boom, we're taking away from my water. All right, boom, you're getting shipped. You think you're a big shot.
01:10:04 Okay, let me take you over here where the first day, as soon as you get off the bus, here's your knife. You know, and it's dark and it's dirty and it's swampy, like on the way there. It's like you see all the swamps. Like, you know, like, you know, guy got stabbed over radio. This guy got stopped for cutting the line. This guy, they're stabbing the police. Like, you know, you're seeing real deaths. And to people, like, we're going so many lockdowns.
01:10:29 I've seen a guy with six years. We go to the thing to the wreck to go take pictures, come back, he didn't kill yourself. You know, so it's, Polack was like a real, real learning experience. And then when you get out of jail and then people, I went to Walmart to go get like a phone and some draws when I was like my first five minutes out and people are like cutting the line and doing it. I'm like, bro, like that should have get you killed from where I was living at for nine years.
01:10:56 This should get you killed and you're just cutting the line. Like it's just, it shows in the USP it's so respectful and so zero tolerance that you just learn like a lot about respect. You learn tremendously about respect because everything. more respects everybody until that disrespect comes in there. And that disrespect comes in. It's a different animal. What do you think of the most disrespectful things in prison?
01:11:30 You got the people that, you know, like to jack off on the police or a guy might, like, you'll have to, like, you could just put yourself in a situation. Like, what if you're in the room, you're out to sell in him, lockdown, and he probably jacks off every day. He can't jack off today. And he tries to maybe try to jack off. And now you've got to stab him or snitching is one of the very, very, very. bad thing. Like, you know, that can happen to you, a rapist or anybody that's dealing with any child. People, we don't care. Like, if we have to be on the lockdown for two months because they stabbed the child molester and so be it, right? So you have those things. Yeah, just, you know,
01:12:09 those are kind of like the main, the main, main things. Do you ever feel like you were losing yourself throughout prison? No, you have, you have down times. You have times where you feel down but then like it's just in retrospect of like high it goes it's like no like I it made me so stronger because where else when I read 500 books where else would I read up on all this type of stuff like I didn't have the the time or I didn't utilize even if I did have the time I didn't utilize it correctly on the street. Right. So I got to better myself as a man, learn things and mistakes that I made, and then learn more
01:13:00 about business and how to, I can go in and make him do my own deal. I don't need anybody to do the deal for me. I can be my own agent because just things that I learned. And even writing my book, it got to a point where I can perfect it because I read so many autobiographies from Mandela to Tina Turner to this, to that, to Charlemagne de Gaid, to this, to anyone's that I liked to, Mike Tyson has a great one, you know, Bobby Brown. Like, you know, like, I got to see, like, this is how a novel, this is how an autobiography is supposed to be.
01:13:39 Like, you're not supposed to leave anything out. If you did something bad in your past, let that be known. Then let people see the person that you have become. but don't, I didn't like, I don't want to say anybody's names, but there was 20 books that I didn't like because they were just too perfect. You didn't do nothing in your past. You didn't do nothing in your, you know, like, you know, it's like everybody has some kind of glitch or some kind of mountain that you have to climb, but I can't learn from you because you're not showing me any steps. I need to see the steps that you have to take to get there. When you're in prison, did you think to yourself, you know, if I'm given the second chance and I'm able to get out, this is what I'm going to do? I just wanted to like, after it happened, really like, how am I going to have purpose now?
01:14:27 Because I start looking at life as like, what are people going to say when you're dead and gone? Right. So I lost my daughter, right, to Lupus, right? And I got to see like what everyone said about her, you know, all the cheerleaders, all the volleyball people, what they said, right? Things that I didn't know. And I always asked myself, well, what is people going to say about you? you. Or they're just going to say you just had a bunch of cars and clothes. Did you ever help anybody? Does you ever do anything? Does you ever have any purpose on this earth? Or you just made other brands and other things rich? So you really worked for them your own life. Right? So that's what made it when I have changed where it's like now, okay, now I can come home and say, you know, I've done six career fairs worldwide. I've done this. I've been on 100 publications. I've done
01:15:18 MJ Bidscon four years in a row at 40 tons. Like these are these are accomplishments that I set on the bunk to think about like how you guys have a bunk up there. I'm the first person to put a bunk in the middle of the convention center, right? And show the hypocrisy of what this industry is that you have people locked up for marijuana crimes and you're having a billion dollar conference. Make it make sense, please. You know, so these are things that are on my resume now that I'm more proud of of, of
01:15:48 of what I can do with the change if I have a chance. If, like, if you give me a chance, I can make change. What happened to all your possessions when you went to prison? Did you have anything to your name? So they take your car, they take your, safe deposit back, say, take your money, freeze your accounts. Yeah, the feds just make sure they strip you of everything. So it's like, it's no fighting. Like, the only reason why dirt helped because people came in and helped them,
01:16:17 but they froze all the Dirk's accounts. You see what I'm saying? They don't want you to be able to help yourself, right? So luckily, and God blessed that he had, you know, Kanye and people step in and come with the money for the legal team because they freeze all your accounts. Because they're relating it back to a criminal conspiracy. Yeah.
01:16:34 Especially with my case is Money Lauder. It's even hard for me to get an account. They've cutting off my credit cards. It's hard to get an account. My uncle left me $100,000. And Wells Fargo, I was the beneficiary at the Wells Fargo, Wells Fargo, and it's so bad with this money lodging and tax evasion that they told me to come pick up the check. No bank's job is for you to try to take the money elsewhere. They just gave me a cashier check.
01:17:03 They didn't even want to bank with me. I said, no, just leave it in there and just I open account there. Wells Fargo didn't even want to bank with me. So that's how deep it gets. You see what I'm saying? they don't even want the hundred grand, you know. And a bank's job is to keep your money and make money off your money and use your money. They didn't even want to use the money.
01:17:21 So that's when I knew that it was kind of serious. And I got like two credit cards approved. Then cut off the credit card. Like, oh, yeah, you didn't money. I'm like, you know, I'm still on parole. I had to ask to be here. I've been on parole going on six years. I had to, you know, get approval just to be here.
01:17:36 You know, it's still a process. Like, you know, it's still a process that you, that you physically go through. because you're not all the way free. You know, so you're just doing the best what you can. What kind of commutation did you get that you're still on parole? 10 years, 10 years papers. 10 years papers. So they reduced it from a life sentence to time served in 10 years?
01:17:57 So you're probably coming up on that pretty soon then, right? Yeah, every year you can actually get off. So this will be my six-year. January would be my six-year-old. And will they let you off? I'm praying everybody else is off. For everybody I came home with it's off. Yeah, usually for drug cases,
01:18:15 I thought they only make you do a couple of years. Yeah. Everyone that I got out with is all off a parole besides me. What do you think was the most important lesson prison taught you? Discipline. I think. And, like, knowing how, say if you're going on, like, a six-month lockdown, how are you going to survive?
01:18:38 You got 10 soups, two chicken macros. to the, you know, like you got, you only got so much, you got to work with it. So you have to work with what you got. And, and now another thing, too, like, you only have three outfits. So it's not like me, I have five closets at all, right? So you can't be able to, you're going to have to work. This is going to be your chow outfit. This is going to be your outside outfit.
01:19:09 This is going to be this. Like, you're going to have to work with so much limited stuff. You can only get these. A pair of shoes from the store, you can only get this. So everything that you're doing is limited. Rather, you can only go to 300 at the store or whatever that looks like. So it teaches you how to save and it teaches you how to work with what you have. And since you worked with that for nine years, eight years, or five years, or two years, or however much time the person is done,
01:19:33 you shouldn't come out here and not be able to work with stuff when you just were surviving well and living well and looking healthier than ever with just these three things. So if I can show you a picture of me looking healthier ever and I live in a box and never got out the box for this loan and I still survived. I still lived. I still my skin still was good, right? Then you should be able to survive in this big world with everything in it. That's how I look at it. When you spend nine years in violent pens, the worst federal prisons, there are, you know, does that give you? some PTSD coming out?
01:20:17 You definitely, I think everyone needs definitely trauma counseling and definitely I think like I would like to like induct a program like that. Like people that come home like she gets like that's done a certain amount of time. She get counseling every like month or every other month, right? And go talk to somebody about the things that because sometimes you could just spark a button and then when you're arguing or when it's coming from that or it's coming from that or it's coming from this place of aggression of so much that you had to physically go through. You know, it's like it's a very, very, very deep-rooted issue that people are not talking about.
01:20:57 They're not talking about. And the reason why they're not talking about it because everybody didn't have rough time. So if you were at a camp, maybe your time was cool. Maybe you were at a level one, maybe your time was cool. I don't know, you know. Or maybe it went by easier because it was easier to move around. you didn't have to deal with a six-month lockdown in the sale. You didn't have to deal with every time the yard went up.
01:21:21 Like the three years I was at Polack, I maybe was out of the sale eight months out of three years. Like total though, not like eight months straight, like two months here. Like it was, I was getting visits and then, you know, your people then flew all the way out here and you can't go. And like it's really, really mind-fucking, you know, to deal with a problem that's not. yours. You came to work on time. But this building got shut down today and you can't film today because what somebody did next door. But in your studio, everybody was on time. Everybody was here. You had the lights on. You pay for the lights. Your guest is here. Which means I can't film today. I'm trying to keep getting the thing going. But you're always dealing with someone else's issue.
01:22:10 There's four people or two people that are having a problem. There's a thousand people. here. Two people caused this. He cut his line and he stabbed him. But since they're from two different cars, two different races, he has to get investigated. Now, they got everybody to miss their business.
01:22:29 Everyone is supposed to call their daughter on their birthday. All these people are supposed to do that. So, people have missed milestones, and that's where the trauma is coming from, from everything that they missed. Do you think the prison system handles that the wrong way? It's only one way to handle it because you don't know how what it's going to go because you do have situations where that situation did and then the doors
01:22:50 popped and now someone just lost their life because you didn't investigate it properly. That's what I meant by doing it at a USP is different from doing it at a camp and they were just fought the fight and we're like now because they had a fight. People are playing with swords in the USB and people are getting stabbed and sent out of there. You know, so there's several deaths I've seen, right? So when you experience and see that, you know that everything's serious, and that's what's going to make your respect level for human beings and other men, like, okay, I respect you. Do you think they should do better in the classification area?
01:23:30 I mean, a nonviolent lifer probably shouldn't be housed with violent lifers. Well, they want you to do having a life period that puts you with it in that kind of environment, and they want you to do 10 years clean behind the wall first. then you can go down to a lower level as a lifer. So they want you to do 10, but I'm just like fucking 10. I'm at 9. So I was already about to get to the point, but it's like, well, what I'm going to do. Now, another thing, right?
01:24:00 So now go to a nicer jail, right? Or go to a medium, right? So now the medium is ran like a fake prison. So now you're around people. You just was at the prison. And now, what I've heard, I've never actually physically been. but it's just like now they're trying to run it like me tomorrow you're around the people like he wouldn't have made it on this yard right so the lower you go out here it's like they got to like mind
01:24:27 your business because these same people wouldn't have made it at the usp so now you have been in the usp for all these years you start getting institutionalized too because now you're like uh uh yeah he's not even did anybody check his paperwork but now you go down there you can't press the line about checking paperwork because they're not checking paperwork down there okay people have bad paperwork. So if you come beat a bad flower and come and checking paperwork, they're going to get you out of there. Now you're back up top again. Now you got to, you know, so it's a give or take situation. It's, you know, it's very, very extremely bad. Ohio goes, you know, so. Once you got out, how long did it take to readjust?
01:25:06 Immediately. I immediately went to work. Immediately was doing interviews. Immediately was doing my thing. I did Good Morning America four days out of prison. Did Fanny Fair two weeks out of prison. And what was the logic behind that? Get the story out. The story needs to be told because at the time, it was like during COVID. So during COVID, you can hear it louder and you can hear it now. Like, it's hard to hear it with so much confusion going on in the world.
01:25:35 You can't really hear it as loud. So, like, if I got out today, I don't think that it would have been such a big, cool how it was, how every news station was there. They announced it on the plane. It was, you know, it was a whole thing in L.A. and all that news stations was there. I did a press conference at the airport. I don't think in this day and age, in this time, I think that, thank God that was COVID to make it better, but I don't think that would happen if I was released today. Do you wish you did anything differently in prison looking back on it? No, nothing in my life. I wouldn't change. Not one thing in my end.
01:26:16 life. I want to take all the licks, all the falls, and I want all that to shape me to the man that I'm going to be. What do you do now? I'm an activist. I'm an activist for my brand, so I have a brand 40 tons. I have a wee brand. I named it
01:26:34 after the same thing that I was took me down. I got the fuck lupus campaign going on for my daughter. I have a documentary coming out soon. It's called Licking to My Eye. along with the book, looking to my eyes,
01:26:47 will be coming out soon. I'm just working on, you know, getting a story out there and trying to tell an L.A. story from my L.A. perspective in a different light. Like, I think that were looked at as, like, khakis and chucks
01:27:02 and, like, Go, Dayton's and Jerry Crews and gang banging. And everybody was in BMWs and Aston Martins and Lamborghinis and stuff like that in my crew, you know? So, like, I want L.A. to be seen in that.
01:27:18 But if I was to look at TV, I would only see, like, snowfall. I'm in society, baby boy. Or, you know, if I was never, if I never went to L.A., I would think that's just how L.A. was. I wouldn't think that they had people that, like, I've only had foreigns. Like, you know, I'm on my 49 foreign, you know, so I don't know anything about this other stuff that everybody's talking about. So I just want L.A. to have a new light and just, like, be seen that from a different angle. of what I seen life as and the people that I looked up to and the people that I looked at. You know, I just don't think that we have that light.
01:27:54 And I would love to be the person that brought it. When you add up all the money you made in prison and divide, I mean, all the money you made overall in your drug career and divided up by nine, the amount of time you spend in prison, was it worth it? No, no dollar amount is worth it. I don't care if I made $50 million. It wouldn't be worth going to jail. I don't know what I changed.
01:28:15 to jail, I wouldn't change it, but there's no dollar amount like, hey, I'll give you 10 million to go sit down. Like, you can't give me 10 million to go sitting down in jail. I think that my mind can make 10 million. I don't think that I need to go sit in a sale in order to do it, right? So I wouldn't say that. I just, I just, you can't, like, the times that you have and the things that come with some of the money or just come with some of the times, I wouldn't have those memories or what's called without. The money. You see what I'm saying? So it's like you kind of need both to kind of to do and to be shaped. You have to have it and lose it. Like you have to start over when I came home. So it's like you got to see what can you do with nothing. Okay, you strip me everything in jail. I still was a provider. I had nothing. I still provided. I came home. You stripped me of everything. I came home after life sentence created a company and went global. It's had nothing. So you have to see what you can do with nothing in order to really see what you really, really, really, really made up. So you think you needed that? Yeah, I think everybody, not everybody does.
01:29:27 Doesn't everybody need to go to jail, but the life that I lived and the life that of things that I was going through at the time, like, you have to do something in order to create change. Like, you want to have, and something drastic has to happen in order to get this growth that you're getting. because if this was me having this interview at fucking 25, oh man, you're popping it. You're giving out the wrong message. You're not saying like, no,
01:29:54 it's fucking fools gold. You feel what I'm saying? Like you're fucking selling foolsgoat. They're all going to tell and they're all going to jail. And it's all going to be all bad. It's just a temporary. It's a temporary fix. You have to play this game for keeps.
01:30:07 And I have to learn that with the growth. And it's always interesting to see, where someone is at life getting out of prison, you know, some person's message is either a lot different than their first day out versus, you know, three, four, five, six years later or even before they go to prison too. And not only that, some people like glorify their own things and they might want it to be the gangbanger,
01:30:33 I wanted to be this, and that's something like, that was the first time that they got a chance to do that. So it's like, that's what gets your, that's what toots your horn. you know, then hey, toot it, you know. But as for me, I want to stand for something in life. I want people that follow me that that's into my journey. I want them to be on the journey with me and see the growth. I'm like, damn, I remember when he was this.
01:31:00 Oh, shit, he was, damn, he used to run out a Rolex. Like, you know, I want that to be like, I would never look at him like that. Like, I want to say some things from my past. And I want to look at it like, damn, I wouldn't think he would do anything like. that just because I'm so mature now and I'm so this now. He's such a good father. He's such of this. Like, what are you going to be known for when people do look you up or do look at you? Like, okay, if you've done that, but what are you doing now today? And what can you change and what, you know, remarkable things are people going to say about you when everybody is guaranteed
01:31:36 death? So, like, when they do go up to the podium to talk about you, what are they? they're going to say. And that's what it means something to me of what is people going to say on your last party, your last day on Earth. The day that everybody gets together and celebrates your life, what are you going to be known for? Well, Corvane, I appreciate you taking the time to come on the show today. Yeah, yeah. Thank you, man. I appreciate you for having me. Yeah, of course. And we'll have the links to everything got going on in the description of this episode. Okay, let's get it, man.
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