Locked In with Ian Bick - I Got Life in Prison — Then I Escaped | Stephen McCreary

Episode Date: October 25, 2026

Stephen McCreary was sentenced to life in prison for second-degree murder in 1977 after growing up in the dangerous streets of Detroit, surrounded by some of the city's most ruthless killers. While serving his sentence, he offered a deputy warden $10,000 to help lower his security classification, eventually escaping a Michigan prison in December 1987. He spent time on the run in New York and Hawaii before being caught trying to obtain a passport. After his escape, Stephen spent decades in maximum-security prisons, ultimately serving 41 years behind bars. Today, he takes us inside his life of crime, his daring prison escape, surviving some of Michigan's toughest prisons, and what it was like to finally walk free after more than four decades. _____________________________________________ Thank you to AG1 & GLD for sponsoring this episode: AG1: Go to https://drinkag1.com/lockedin and for a limited time, get a free Immune Support Bundle, 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. _____________________________________________ GLD: New customers get 40% Off with code LOCKEDIN at https://www.gld.com/ _____________________________________________ Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://ianbick.com/ _____________________________________________ Timestamps: 00:00 Introduction: The Hitman Who Escaped 00:40 Growing Up in Detroit 02:29 Parents' Divorce and Father's Breakdown 04:06 Falling In With the Wrong Crowd 07:39 Lost Basketball Dreams 08:52 Stealing Guns at 16 13:00 The Robbery Plan 15:52 Shooting the Kingpin 19:53 Arrest and Life Sentence 24:54 Tried to Escape Day One 27:51 Mentored by the Most Feared Man 33:47 Entering Jackson Prison 39:30 Prison Yard Politics 44:52 The Deputy Warden Connection 47:35 The Escape Deal 51:05 The Shakedown 53:00 Paying Off the Warden 56:03 Escaping Over the Fence 01:05:38 Mother Picks Him Up 01:09:04 The Failed Getaway 01:11:22 Fleeing to New York 01:14:04 Hawaii and Final Plans 01:15:30 The Capture 01:18:42 Testifying Against the Warden 01:21:23 Federal Prison Life 01:24:48 Back to State Prison 01:26:04 14 Years in Level Five 01:28:07 Targeted by Hitmen 01:31:22 The Parole Board Hearings 01:34:44 Codefendant Saves His Life 01:42:22 A Knife Attack Over a Book 01:47:47 Growth Behind Bars 01:53:02 Finally Free After 41 Years 01:57:00 Life Lessons and Reflections _____________________________________________ To advertise on the show, contact [e-mail] or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/LockedInWithIanBicka

If you robbed a kingpin back then, your life was over. They're going to catch you, probably torture some of your family. They're going to find you and they're going to kill you. So the plan was from day one, I'm going to kill this guy. That's Stephen McQuary. He was sentenced to life in prison for murder in 1977. Ten years later, he offered a deputy warden $10,000 to help him escape and actually made it out. But his freedom didn't last.

He ultimately spent 41 years behind bars. Today, Stephen reveals how he escaped, how he got caught, and what four decades in prison were really like. I grew up on the east side of Detroit, not far from Belisle, about 14 blocks from Belisle on the street called Hurl. And this was late 50s, early 60s in the beginning. And the neighborhood was great. I mean, matter of fact, I don't know if you've heard of the name Joseph Campo, but I think it was Michigan. against first millionaire. And so he bought a house for his son, and we ended up moving into that house. So it was nice. What did your parents do for work? Dad started off as a garbage man.

They called it, I think at the time, GPW, Detroit Public Works. But he started as a garbage man, worked this way up to an engineer. He was also a minister. And so life was great. We had everything, took little excursions every weekend. You know, we'd go to places that I'd never heard of. of, you know, out-of-the-way places, just eateries and things. What about your mom? Was she in the picture? She was. Mom was more like a princess than anything. Beautiful and stay-at-home mom, especially way back then, you know. But her strength and the things she gave most was love. The entire neighborhood loved my mom, and still do. They're crazy about my mom. She was,

she was quite something. I'm talking about it was like she's gone, but yeah. What are some morals your parents instilled in you as a kid? Probably the most important one was etiquette and manners. It was like do things the right way. Be kind, be nice, you know. Of course, I changed later, but in the beginning, everything, especially with dad being a preacher. Everything was, you know, etiquette, manners, kindness, do unto others as you want them to do unto you. Yeah. Did you follow those?

I did for up until I turned about eight or nine when my mom and dad split up. And that was one of the critical points in my life. When they split, I kind of drifted away from the teachings and all the things that he had taught us. Why did they split? I think it was PTSD. He was in the Korean War. And everything was wonderful. You know, like I said, we got this great house. We've got a six-car garage. He's converting to our first real church.

And right around the riots, and I think that's what triggered him. You know, tanks driving down, Jefferson and whatnot. And he kind of spiraled and put his hands on my mom just the one time. But that was enough for my mom to say, you know, no, we're not going to do this. What riots were those? The 1967 Detroit riots. I got to brush up on my history. Yeah.

It was a really huge deal. Matter of fact, they made a movie about it. And I think they called it Detroit or something like that. I'm not sure. But yeah, that triggered his PTSD. You know, for years my mom just called it a breakdown. She said he had a nervous breakdown and changed up. And so, and we saw it.

He went from the pool pit to kind of go into the pool room. you know, from preaching to gambling and doing all the things that he knew he shouldn't be doing. And it led to an eventual divorce. Where do you go once I get divorced? I kind of drifted towards my next door neighbors. It was seven children in our family, and they had eight. So everybody kind of had a buddy or a partner. And my hero, I adopted a new hero, which was, he was a few years old.

with me, but he was my next door neighbor. And this was, like I said, right around 67, because I can remember they got their first candy apple red Cadillac. And, you know, when you're a kid, this is a, it's a lure. You're like, wow, what's going on? And so I kind of left the path that I was on and started hanging out and doing things I shouldn't be doing. What was that? What was that first thing you did that you shouldn't have been doing? The very first thing, it's hard to, I think it was just changing, you know, giving up the good for something that looks good, but that I knew wasn't right. You know what I mean? I wasn't, I wasn't a bad kid. Matter of fact, I was a pretty good kid, but once my dad was gone and my older brother, who I adore, he was. He was a little bit. He was,

was like my dad's guy, right? Matter of fact, we'll tell you a quick little story. We had to set up church in the living room in the beginning before the garage was converted. And he's whistling and singing happy. He's putting the chairs as pews in place, and I'm dragging him. I'm hating this stuff. I've never, ever in my life enjoyed the religious part of our lives. And Yeah, that was some kind of... Do you think that caused a rift between you and your father, the religious aspect? No, no, I love my dad, and he loved us. After he left, I had to go stay with him once because I was starting to act up and act out.

Mom wasn't, she wasn't having it. She didn't want me to influence my little brothers. I had two little twin brothers, Tim and Tom. And she didn't want me to influence them with my bad behavior. So she said, you go stay with your dad. And I stayed with him. He was then, by then he was not doing great. He was like driving a taxi cab living in a hotel.

But I stayed with him for a time. Did you have anger towards him because of the divorce and because he had lost his way? I had to. And I am the one who ran to get help. and I don't remember it. So I know it must have been traumatic because Thomas told me, he said, man, you were standing behind a tree

and you ran across the street to get Mr. Boyer. And when he said it, I could kind of see it. Okay, I remember it. But if it were just left to me, I couldn't, I can't bring it up because I don't remember. You know, I suppressed it somehow. But

yeah, he hit my mom. I ran across the street, got Mr. Boyer, who was kind of the patriarch of the neighbor, and he came and squelched it and that was that. But that led to, as I said, an eventual divorce. If we had asked young Stephen where he saw himself in 10 years, what would that answer been at that time? I thought I'd be doing great, you know,

but when you're young, you don't understand the consequences of some of the choices you're going to make. I thought I'd probably be a ball player. I had a hell of a basketball game. And a matter of fact, I was Steph Curry before Steph Curry. Honestly, I had a shot. And people used to say, man, it's like you were born with a jump shot. So that was my aspiration.

And, you know, Thomas and I took a road trip to get here. And that was one of the things we were talking about. I never chose a profession. And that's one of the things that I want to stress to children who are younger and parents who have kids. Make sure they choose something definitive, you know. But other than basketball, I didn't see myself doing anything. I could see myself being successful, but it wasn't a doctor, lawyer, or the Indian chief or any of that. Now that you're older and you've gone through so much, what do you wish that profession was?

Oh, man, probably just an entrepreneur, a businessman, you know, real estate, something that pays well, and you don't have to do a whole hell of a lot. So now what happens that you can't pursue basketball? I started getting into trouble that I started getting high. I started smoking weed and taking these pills. They were THC. And it's like I would drop one every day. And so instead of being at practice, I'm drifting, you know. And as I said, my next-door neighbors were, he wasn't a kingpin, but he was getting money.

and so I kind of left the basketball court and I did one other thing. Matter of fact, this is probably the thing that changed my life now that I think about it. I was getting unemployment. I got a job at the post office. Great job. But it was only for like six months summer job or something. But they let me draw unemployment when the six months were over. So one day I'm looking for my check and I get a letter saying come down to the MD

whatever office they got. I go down to the office and they tell me, instead of me getting a check, I owe them like $2,400. And I'm like, what? So what I did was I went into Griswold Sporting Good store and they had these huge drawers for like fishing boots and things. When I pulled one out, it was full of stuff. I pulled another one out and it was empty. So I climbed in and I told a total stranger walking by saying,

and closed this drawer. And he used his foot, closed the drawer. They left. I ended up getting 52 pistols, shoulder holsters, ammunition. And for all intents and purposes, my life was over. Instead of shooting basketballs now, I've got guns, you know, and I'm shooting them. And eventually it led to prison.

Why guns for you? Did it interest you? No, I got them to sell. No, I got them to sell, basically. You know, I'm downtown, pissed off, walking around, and I was impulsive and impetuous. I'm at the time, maybe 16. And when I didn't get that check, I'm like, man, I got to do something. And the thought came, Vir's War, they got these guns, get them, sell them, etc.

But there's something about guns. probably illegal guns that changes you. You know, I think if they had been registered and legal, it's a different matter. But you've got shoulder holsters, you carrying pistols that you shouldn't have, that you have no business with. You know, it's like they begin to help you express yourself. They talk for you. Somebody say something stupid. The gun is like, just touch me, you know, and he'll understand.

So, yeah, but that, that was one of those pivotal moments that changed my life. I didn't, I really didn't play basketball much after that, you know. So now you got the guns, what happens? Well, those guns were sold all except for a few. I got them, and this is a bad part of the story because I was corrupting my little brothers. I brought them to my mother's house. Okay, I put them in a little bit of the story. duffel bag, right? Couldn't get out the front door because of the alarm. I turned the alarm off,

opened the window, climbed out the window, down the firescape, and I catch a bus down Jefferson to my mom's house. Got this big, I'm talking about, I'm a skinny little kid, I got this big duffel bag full of guns and bullets and ammunition and whatnot, and I go and I put them under one of my little brother's mattresses. And I call them Tim, Tom, come here. And I throw up a the mattress and there and all. They're like, oh, man. And I said, pick one, you pick one. And, you know, years later, you're looking at it like, what the hell was I thinking?

Right. But they were to be sold. The cousin come get me. He said, man, we'll keep him over my girlfriend's house until, no, excuse me. My hero said we're going to keep him over his girlfriend's house. And we did. And he said, you sell them like two weeks later after the heat dries down or goes down. And so I took him over his girlfriend's house and I wasn't patient.

I'm like, man, I need money now. So I got a cousin. We go to her house. I lied to her because he didn't give me the okay to get my guns. But she said, did he tell you it's okay? I said, yeah, took the guns and I took them to another guy in the neighborhood doing wrong. He's, all these guys are a few older than me, but they've got like dope houses, joints. And so I started selling him out of his house.

My hero finds out, I didn't know him and this guy were beefing. You know, he comes down the street, man, let me talk to you. He kind of goes off on me a little bit. And I lost them all that day because all that weren't sold. We sold all, but maybe 11 to 12. And I think my hero called the police. I'm pretty sure because I was going to be. Going out the door, saw cars coming lights out. You know, I ran to somebody's house, tried to call the guy. Police answered, I was like, wow. So sold them all except for like 11 or 12 of them. So now the police are looking for you at that time? A little, a little bit. And I ran to, it's weird, I ran to Ann Arbor where my older brother was going to school. But I thought I saw them follow me there so I didn't stay there long.

But yeah, I never got picked up or arrested for that. Matter of fact, some other guy did because a few old guys got me together. They come to the park. I come to the park. And they were like, you're going to have to take the wait. They arrested somebody for that. I'm like, man, I'm not. I'm not fessing up to anything, you know.

So how do you end up in prison then yourself? I end up in prison. I had a co-defendant, still have a co-defendant. and he told me that this guy flashed, I can't remember now exactly how much it was. So I said, okay, but the guy, now this guy is a kingpin. And we're going to rob the guy. But, and I hate to say this, but, you know, you have to be honest.

I have to be honest these days. If you robbed a kingpin back then, your life was over. They're going to catch you. probably torture some of your family. They're going to find you and they're going to kill you. So the plan was from day one, I'm going to kill this guy, right? I'm going to be honest.

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For me, AG1 is just an easy habit to stick with, even when my schedule gets crazy. I use it as part of my morning routine, and I definitely recommend checking. it out. Go to drinkag1.com slash locked in and for unlimited time get a free immune support bundle 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. And but this is how it happened. Even though I had decided to kill him, we sit down, matter of fact, we take a rifle because we're there under the auspices of selling him some guns. And now that I sold those guns, I have a little reputation in the neighborhood for selling guns.

So we bring like a 380 and some other pistols over. And he's got a gun on his coffee table, 38. So I pick it up, it's a Roscoe. I don't know if you know what that is, but it doesn't have a hammered a cop, right? So I pick it up and I'm looking, I'm like, oh, man, I like this. And the guy, he's laying on the couch. And he's like, put that down.

He doesn't really know me, but he knows my co-defendant. Put that down. So I'll put it back down. 10, 15 minutes later, I pick it back up. Just looking at it. And he comes up, and he's got a sort-off rifle behind him. And when he raises up, I see the rifle. So I just turned and shoot.

I shoot him one time in the face, and he died. And for years, because it was written up the way it happened, they didn't know that I had planned to kill the guy anyway, right? So my co-defendant gets arrested, and I kind of coached him because, you know, you think you're watching TV, you're seeing people get arrested. All you have to do is if you don't say anything for 72 hours, they're going to let you go. So I tell him, I said, look, man. they're probably going to arrest you because you know the guy, he knew you, et cetera, et cetera. Just keep your mouth shut. We're good.

He gets arrested. So I go down to his arraignment with his family to see, you know, what's going on if they know anything. And sure enough, they asked permission for a secondborn, which had to be for me. So I slid out of the courtroom, got back to the house. But I rode with his family, and the police must have been. not far behind because I didn't get any further than his house. Standing in the backyard talking to his sister, they pull up an unmarked car, you know, what's your name?

And I was like, well, you know my name. So they arrested me and that was the beginning of my 41 years in prison. Was that guy going to kill you? The drug dealer? Yeah. If he had a chance, if we just robbed him, we were dead, you know. And it's like most people don't understand the dope game. They think they do.

But I've seen it. You know, I'm 15, 16. I'm going to an apartment. My next door neighbors, one of their joints, and their uncle is tied to the stove. Hands on the burners, burned up. He's dead. And I'm like, wow. But this is what they do when you cross them.

So in my mind, I couldn't let this guy live. I'm not coming. If I come to take his stuff, he's going to send his gooms and they're going to find us eventually. Either you're on the run, you know, life jacked up, or you're not. And I wasn't willing at that time to run and all that stuff. So I thought, you know, and I'm a juvenile, I thought in my mind that killing him was an option. Of course, you know, nearing 70 today, I realized that that was ridiculous. But when you're a kid, you know, and, You want to be a badass. These are the things you do and the thoughts you have.

Now, if he died with a gun, the shotgun on his hands, couldn't you have said it's self-defense at all? Probably could have, but Peewee was arrested and made a statement. So that kind of triggered everything. And they read it to me, and I'm like, wow. So he divulged the whole plan to rob and kill? Yeah. So if he never did that, you guys might not have gotten as much time as you've gotten?

I don't think we would have. But I think there's a thing in life called correctness. You know, if you get away with something like that, who do you become or what do you become? And how many times are you going to repeat this after that, you know? So for me, even though I hated being arrested and tried and going to prison, it was necessary for me to truly change, you know. Also, karma catches up to you. Absolutely. Absolutely.

How did you feel when you read that he wrote a statement and told the police your whole plans? Sick, because after that, I knew that there was no beating the case. You know, there's not going to be an acquittal in this thing. Your best bet is to come up with the best plea deal that you can get and move on. And so that's kind of what I did. But either way, it's your word versus his word, right? There's no other witnesses. No, there aren't.

But I didn't have money, money. Didn't have a good lawyer. You know, you have these court-appointed, state-appointed lawyers. You're not going to do very well in the criminal in the process. Did they get the murder weapon, or did you guys get rid of it? They did. How'd they get that? I foolishly sold it to a guy in the neighborhood.

just another so-called gangster, you know, and he ended up making a statement as well. Yeah. And they tied the gun and then he said he bought it from you. Right. Okay. So that was another witness then too. Right. So once you're arrested, do you ever get bail or is that it for?

No, I never saw the streets again until I escaped years later. And we'll get to that part in the story. Now, do they give you a plea deal right away? Pretty much because the guy was an alleged drug dealer, you know, they don't, they're not that hard on you if you kill somebody who's in the game, so to speak. So we plead it out, and we got life. We plead the second degree life, which means at the time that all you have to do is 10 years. You do 10 years. You've been pretty much rehabilitated.

You can go home. That changed quite a bit while I was there. They came up with not even a law, but a rule now that said life means life, even if it's second. So it went from me getting out maybe in 10 to 14 years to being extended indefinitely. So would they get rid of parole? Is that what it was? No, they didn't get rid of parole. It was still pretty much the same thing, but they had changed their mindset and public opinion. And it was, they had this big fiasco about ex post facto. They couldn't, they weren't supposed to change it, but they did, you know. How did your family react to this when you got arrested?

They were devastated, you know, because I've come from a great family. Nobody's ever gotten any trouble. You know, my paternal grandmother taught us to speak French, got us tested for IQs and all that, and guess who's was the highest? Couldn't believe it, but I threw it all the way. Where are you staying while you're waiting for trial, or a plea deal to happen? Is that like the county jail? In the county jail.

And to explain how I got, because I was on maximum security, but to explain how I got there, the very first day I was arrested, I tried to escape. When they put me in the car, I didn't know until then. They put the handcuffs on and I could take them off. My left hand was so little that I could squeeze it and take the handcuffs off. So I take the cuffs off. And I'm like, oh, shit.

I'm going to get a chance, right? So they take you down to this place called 1300 Bobian, which is like police headquarters where they get you in process, you know, that. And they take you to the ninth floor, right? I've never been here before. There's this huge desk, I mean, humongous. And the guy sitting at the desk to see me, he has to do like this. So I'm sitting on this little bench, and I'm saying, if he can't see me,

if I can't see him, he can't see me. So I get on my knees and I crawl, and I crawl into a room, and there's this terrace with a ladder going down. And I'm like, damn. So I go out to the terrace, look at the ladder. It doesn't go all the way down because remember I'm on the ninth floor. It goes down to maybe the fourth floor. And I'm like, man, if I try to jump, I want to break legs or something. So I act like I climbed down, came back.

This is a kid's mind working teenager. And I retraced my steps, jumped. and hid behind these lockers. Now my thinking is they're going to bring the dogs. The dogs get my scent. They'll think I jump. They'll, you know, look for me elsewhere. And now that they know I'm going, they're looking.

I can hear them. They're looking. They look behind the locker, didn't see me. And a guy called a trustee, I'm sure you know what a trustee is. He looks back there. And he looked, and I guess he waited till his eyes got adjusted to the dog. and then he starts hollering, here he is, here he is. He snitched on you.

So they didn't beat me bad. They touched me up a little bit. But every chance I got, I tried to run. And so they put me on maximum security, which was 5-11. This was probably the biggest blessing in disguise in the whole scenario. I met this guy, older guy, right? There's only 10 cells. I'm in the 10th cell.

And there's this old guy up here that I don't know who he is. And we only get out for 45 minutes a day. So whatever you got to do, you got 45 minutes to do it. Shower, exercise, make your phone call, whatever. Guys get out and they come out and they do push-ups or whatever in front of myself and they go to the other end. This old guy, he's walking and I'm laying down like I'm not looking, but I'm paying attention. You know, laying down like I'm, but I'm watching. He stopped.

He never looks at myself. And I'm like, there's something about this guy. He had this regal quality. I'm talking about it was just different. And I'm like, damn, right? So for maybe a week, a week and a half, doesn't speak to me, doesn't say a word. And then one day he looks in, hey, young fella.

And I'm like, how you doing? And he started schooling me. I'm talking about from A to Z. He said, you're going to prison, right? You don't have a mustache, long hair, skinny kid. They're going to come at you. They're going to try you. And I'm like, huh?

He's saying, I'm telling you. He said, this is what you do. And he gave me a list of how to escalate the violence when you're, he said, I don't care what happens. They Marquette you. Guy just looking at you crazy, he said, you can't let people disrespect you. And I'm like, oh, man, I'm trying to do push-ups now and get stronger, but I'm like, what the hell? I get a visit.

A white female attorney, she comes up, and she wants me to sign some paternity papers. Now, I knew that I had a daughter, but the girl was a woman. juvenile. I was, I think 17, and I wasn't about to sign anything. So I kind of went off on the lady. Cussed her out, and I told the depth. Debs! Come get this

bitch. Not realizing that they're going to take this personal. So they came and they let her out, but they tell me and they say, we'll be down to see you a little bit. I'm like, damn. Right? So I go to my cell. I'm like, man.

20 minutes later, 25 minutes, I hear. and keys jangling. Here they come. They're coming down the rock. I know you know the hawk is. A little mirror. I stick my little hawk out. I'm like, oh, shit.

And his voice said, don't fuck with him. It's the old guy. I knew it was him, but I never heard him talk like this. Don't fuck with him. They stopped in their tracks. And I'm like, what the hell?

Bagged up. and left and never said another word to me. And I'm like, damn. Now, this guy has been schooling me, but not just in a bad way. He's telling me what books to read. And I'm like, wow, but I don't know who he is. So the next day, I guess after he realized I saw this,

he said he gave me a newspaper, read this. On the front said, the most feared man in Detroit. And immediately I knew who it was, because like I said, my neighbor was into the dope gang. And I'd heard stories about this guy. I'm like, oh, man. But the blessing in disguise was he taught me how to navigate before I ever got there. This is what you have to do to make it out of their life.

And I was like, oh, okay, thank you. What was his backstory? And was he awaiting trial, too? I think he had come back to get resentenced because he had like 99 years. But he got up out of there. So, yeah. But one of the things I learned about the old guys, the old gangsters, they stayed in the law library. They would get jobs or whatever.

And they'd find ways to get up out of there, to get their cases overturned, excuse me, get resentenced, whatever it took. What do you think was the most valuable lesson he shared with you that helped you survive prison later on? To keep the wolves off you. to make them your friends. And how do you do that? Well, I did it. I looked out on the yard, and you can tell who are the bad guys,

who are the guys who are running things, and I don't know how I did it, but these guys became my dearest and best buds in prison. You know, it's not like I went out and trying to shake hands, but it's almost like you recognize one another. I know that these are the guys that you have to worry about. If anything goes wrong, these are the guys that you want on your team. And so

I befriended them, I think just in a natural order, because I can't I can't say how it happened. But when you need something to happen, you know, you work towards it. So how long did you stay in county for before you took the deal. I only was in the county for about 90 days. And then you took the deal within 90 days. That's fast. It is. As a matter of fact, I was arrested July the 29th, no, excuse me, June 29th, and was sentenced on, I think, September the 11th. Yeah, it was very fast. Were you remorseful at the time?

Not at all. I mean, not, I had no conscious at the time. And I, you know, you don't want to blame drugs or anything. But when you get high and you're in a stupor for the most part, because I got high every day, every single day, you lose a part of yourself. And so at that point, I didn't care one iota. I had no conscience, so I wasn't remorseful at all. Now, where do you go after 90 days? Where they move you to once you get your deal? They take you to a place called quarantine. and that's Jackson Prison, the most, the largest walled prison in the world and the worst prison in Michigan, right?

But they've got this, they've got a block, I think it was like an 11 block or something, that's kind of separated, and everybody comes in here to get processed. And so they brought us in quarantine, and guys came through, three guys. And I recognized two of them, like from the barber's, and they was like, yeah, man, we heard your rapy, he told on you, you know, and they pulled out horses

and knives, you want us to get him? And I was like, no, I said, I'm take care of this myself. And I wasn't faking. I'm serious. I said, no, I got this. And they're looking at me, but I could tell, they realize that I'm serious. And so one of the guys, I think his name was Earl, he pulled out a bunch of penitentiary joints, and he said, you want some of these?

I said, what the hell is that? He said, these joints, man, they go for like $5 a piece. I said, what? He said, yeah, you want to sell something in here? I said, yeah. So he gives me a handful. I sell them all. They come back because they're working on a crew called like the maintenance crew, right?

They've got two belts and things. So they could come in when they want to. So he comes back. I got all this money, got it right. I said, here you go. And he was like, we're going to do this again. He'll go $25. I said, no, get me $25.

For a week. Give me up. Whatever it goes for, buy me one because I want to sell my own. And so that's what I did. And when we left there, you know, had a nice amount of tokens so that we could eat and survive. That's crazy about them coming up to you with the knives. Look, they can walk in there as like they got keys. It's ridiculous. Was it normal for a co-defendant to be in the same prison? as you? At that, back then it was. But remember, he didn't get on the stand. He didn't testify. He made a statement, which is, even though it's telling, he gave me up, it's not the same as getting up and testifying under oath, you know. It's pretty much the safe thing. I don't know. I never looked at it like that. Because a couple guys, matter of fact, another old guy

who was kind of instrumental in helping me navigate, he was like, don't tell nobody. He said, just kind of keep it to yourself. And that's what I did. And I hate this part, but I dog my co-defendant for years. And this guy has six four, six five, big old guy. But I just, you know, because he knew and I knew, it was like I didn't give him the credit that he deserved, but the guy would end up saving my life in there. When was the first time you ran into him?

Oh, no, we were together. Matter of fact, they put him on maximum security as well. It was weird. So we were both on the same floors in the county jail. We go to quarantine together. We go to the reformatory together, which they called Gladiator School back then. But after I left there, I didn't see him for quite a few years, maybe 10 years after that. Did he get the same amount of time as you?

He's still in there. Wait a minute. You were the one that pulled the first. the trigger though. And he's the one that told. He is still there. Is that because of his actions in prison? Right. Yeah. Okay. He just, it's like he doesn't get it, you know. And a lot of people think he doesn't want to come home. I don't believe that. You just, you become institutionalized. 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 about today's sponsor,

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Use code locked in to get 40% off at glde.com. That's 40% off with code locked in at glde.com. After your purchase, they will ask where you heard about them. Please support our show and tell them our show sent you. Now, what year is it that you get on the prison yard, the first prison yard? In Jackson, from 82, I think. It was after we had riots in the reformatory, May 22nd, 1981. So right after that, I transferred to Jackson.

And it was different. It was like night and day. Yeah, what's that like in the 80s? Horrible. You're letting out almost 4,000 prisoners at a time. Just bam, doors open, everybody's out. You know, over the years they built fences and sectioned it off. But back then, it was ridiculous.

And an incident happened that kind of shaped the way I looked at Jackson. There was this getaway driver from my neighborhood named Rick. That's all he did. He drove, but he was a hell of a driver. So Rick, pack up Rick. He goes to Jackson. He gets killed the same day. We get a word.

I'm like, oh, man. What happened was they keep your property a day or two to go through it. and it was one of times, so somebody gave him a coat to wear, but the coat was stolen. He doesn't know. He put the coat on, got a saw his coat, stabbed him through the back, killed him. So when I get down there, I'm like, man, I'm not letting this shit happen to me or anybody else that comes after me. And so I got like three knives made every day for at least two and a half months, you know. And the weird thing about it is everybody knows what's going on.

So everybody, no, this young kid down here. Now, I got to go back because I became the grand chic of the Moro Science Temple of America before I turned 20 at the reformatory. And so by the time I get down to Jackson, guys know me or know who I am, but they don't, they don't know me. They know, okay, that was the young. Man, come over here to the temple. We want to meet you and da-da-da-da-da-da. I didn't have any clout, but when they see this young kid making these knives,

they're trying to figure out what the hell's going. But my whole thinking was when guys get here, because they're coming. You know, we're growing up, we're getting older. You leave the reformatory. You basically go to another prison. I want to arm them. You know, so me and this guy, my buddy Dino, I'm Dio in the joint. He's Dino.

We're hiding them everywhere, right? And so when guys would get here, I'm like, here you go, man, here you go. You're going to need this. Here you go. And the incredible thing was I never had any serious issues. You know, I had one, what I was earning the money to get the knives made. But it was just a challenge. Guys would challenge you to see what you're made of.

I don't know if you know how to play skin. No, what's that? But skin is, it's a game where the last. The last card wins. They flip cards. If you got a three and they flip a three, you lose. But you bet everybody. So you bet the guy with the four, the five, the six, the seven, the jack.

So I go to the skin table. And because my dad had started gambling, I had studied gamblers, right? So I'm sitting there, and I'll study first. I'll sit on the side and I'll watch these guys. And I said, okay, two of these decks are shaved. Right? And I said, okay, and it's the five in this deck. It might be the 10 in this deck.

So they think I'm green, but I'm not totally green. So I'll grab the five and play it all the way through, which means I win. And in one particular hand, I fall three or four times, but I had the last card. And the guy who was running the game said, you owe me a cut. I said, I don't know you, nothing, man. He said, no, young fella, you owe me a cut. You played the last. I said, man, I fell three, four times during that.

in hand. I don't know you shit. And I knew the guy was, you know, he's older than me, big, strong. I didn't know he was a hell of a boxer. He used to, he was one of the champs down there in the past. But I stood my ground. Another older guy tried to slide him. I said, no, don't give nothing on my account, man. I don't know you nothing, bro. Right. But it's like those are the challenges. They're going to challenge you if you can get through that. You can. You're you'll probably be okay. How did different races get along with each other? It's different in every prison all across the country, I think.

In Ionia, even though, now there was a time when it was extremely racist. And white guys, to me, caught the flux. You know, they had like this little section almost that they had to be in. If you weren't in there, you almost had to have a man, right? but there were a group of white guys, Ludwigs. They were just stand-up, solid guys, and they got treated just like everybody else with respect. But if you were weak and white, you would pray, you know.

Now, once we got into Jackson, and I hear this stuff, all the white guys sat over here, and the black guys sat over here, and the Muslims here, And it wasn't like that. Everybody was kind of like doing their thing. I mean, you're with who you're with. But you don't have to sit there, not in Jackson. When I did go to the federal system after I escaped,

and I saw that this is how they ran things there. How long were you in the state system before you escaped? I was in the state system about 11 and a half years and then escaped. Give us the lead-up. over those years to that escape? Like, what was changing in your mind? What kind of brought you to that decision? Well, I have to go back again.

There was this deputy warden of housing at the reformatory, right? He had done time. I didn't know him. I didn't know he had done time. Hadn't paid any attention to the guy. But one day, I'm working on the plumbing crew, and I come to work, and a couple of guys on my crew are pilfering a locker. I'm looking out like, oh shit.

I take a box, hold it out, they fill it up with, you know, chips and cookies and goodies, and I take it back to myself. Well, the guy who was responsible for the stuff came, found the locker pilford, and he just started hauling and, you know. So he ended up, I guess when he found out I got some of the stuff, he goes to the deputy warden, snitches, tells, you know, these guys got my stuff, and I'm going to have to pay double. dollar. So the deputy warden calls us out one at a time. Now, I'm the only guy who didn't pay

because I looked at it like, look, I wasn't stealing. Somebody gave me something. I accepted it. So he threatened to put me in the hole. You know, he said, look, man, I'm going on vacation. And I come back, if you hadn't paid this, if you don't have this money, because there's only like 25 bucks from each of us, I'm going to have to put you in the hole. And I'm like, okay, do what you got to do. But my plan now is I'm going to get this guy who told on me, right? So I put a little knife in a tired box, and I'm following the guy trying to catch him, don't catch him. When he realized I'm after him, he goes and tells again, and they transferred him. So by the time the deputy warden gets back, the deputy warden of housing, the guy's gone, it's a mute issue.

But he told me, he said, man, everybody else came in here talking like a mouse. He said, you talk like a man. He said, I like that. And we get to be pretty cool. Fast forward, years later, I'm in Jackson. No, I'm in Ken Ross, which is the finest prison you can be in in Michigan. They feed you well, let you out all day. But I hear that he was made Deputy Warden of Jackson Prison.

So I blew this joint when I actually assaulted the officer, but just with my chest. It wasn't serious. I got high off from prison hoots, got belligerent, bumped them. They did just what I thought, put me in handcuffs, took me to the whole couple of days later. I'm on a bus going back to Jackson. And we meet again here. He's got this big old office. You know, matter of fact, even before I get a cell, he sent the sergeant to come get me, right?

He's short, barrel-chested, strong as hell. I walk in his office, and I'm like, I said, damn. man, this is you? He said, this is me, man. He picked me up. Now, my best friend at the time was this guy named Demetri's Holloway, biggest drug dealer in Michigan. So I looked at Wayne, he got on a nice suit with some cheap-ass shoes. I said, man, you got a phone? He said, yeah, let me see it. I called me. I said, hey, man, he said, what's up? I said, you ain't going to believe who I'm with. He said, who? I said, W. Because we never called him, Wayne, called him W or Duff. I said, W. He said, man, this guy got on a beautiful suit with some cheap ass shoes.

We both laugh. He said, what size he wear? Now, he doesn't know this guy. He doesn't know. He doesn't know Demetri. And he tells him to the size. He said, okay, tell him, I got two pair of crocs and two pair of gators for him, man. I can get it to him. And he's just beaming, right? And this is how the escape came about. Once he realized that I was plugged in, okay, I'm adopted by a million at the time, too, I'll have to tell you a little bit about that. But when I came down to see him and I bring pictures of Demetrius and he's like, damn, man. I said, yeah.

And he said, I can get you out of here. I'm like, what? This is like music. I'm like, he said, yeah, man. He says, we made a deal. I think it was 10,000 for the transfer. which you can read in the newspapers. The second payment was $15,000 to get me a parole hearing

and $25,000 to get me a parole. I'm like, bad. And he thinks I'm on some nonsense at first. I said, look, when you go to this restaurant, my old man going to meet you. He's going to give you $7,500 in cash and a lithograph, Romare Bearden print. And I explained to him how to, you know, use the art to make sure it appreciates and all that old stuff.

He was like, okay, transfer me. I go to Western Wayne. I'm not supposed to be there. They've got a point system. 35 points, you're not supposed to be at a medium security. I've got way past 35 points. So I'm not even supposed to be here. So he tells me, he said, look, man, don't catch no tickets.

Don't get any misconduct reports. or else they'll try to send you back. I said, okay. But Thanksgiving comes around. The joint is dry. No one's got any dope. And I've got a girlfriend working there. And so I tell, I said, let, go see my buddy.

Get what he's got to give you. They found out that I was getting high because I was snorting a heroin from time to time. Somebody told him, so he ends up sending cocaine in volumes, right? I get an ounce of cocaine, two, three hundred volumes. I break off a chunk to all my buddies, you know, give somebody look, man, gas on the compound need just to have a good time for Thanksgiving, everybody straight. But they gave me a urine drop. They pissed me. And it comes back positive for cocaine and volumes.

So now they're going to send me back. So I call, I tell them, I said, look, man, I got caught up. I got two tickets. they're going to try to send me back. He was like, what? I said, yeah. He said, okay, I see what I can do. What he did was he got greedy. He calls up to the prison. This is count time.

Now, I know, you know, no, we're not coming out. You're selling at Count time. McCrary, come to the desk. It's Count time. I come to the desk. They give me the phone. It's the Deputy Ward. He said, man, I need $20,000.

my wife is divorcing me I've got litigations in the courts it's a squeeze play though and I'm like I say huh he said I need 20,000 man I said okay well I'm see what I can do he said don't tell you old man I said okay

so he's basically saying in effect go to your buddy get this money I go back to myself I am hot I'm talking about I'm livid I can't even sit down. I'm pacing.

And this sucker is trying to squeeze me out some money. Count Clare's, two of my buddies come in the cell, they realized immediately something's wrong. I'm like, man. So I tell them, I said, man, you ain't going to believe what this happened? They said, what? I said, this fool trying to squeeze me out some money, man. And they was like, what? I said, yeah.

So for that, I don't even think I went outside that day. I'm just, I'm pacing in myself. I'm like, man, I can't believe this shit. go to sleep that night and it's like that little light bulb went off, ding. It said basically write a note. So I said, okay, dig.

You wanted 20. Here's 50. All you got to do is send our man to camp. Those are the exact words. I called my adoptive father. I say, man, because he wasn't even supposed to come up. And they said, come on up. I need to see.

He said, okay, he came up. I give him, because I wrote it a piece of brown paper bag. I give him the note. I said, look, he's going to be at this restroom. Meet him, put $50,000 in the briefcase, put the note on top, open it, make sure he can see the money, slide him to the note, close it, and leave. He said, okay, did it just like that.

So now I hear on the intercom, McCrary, report to the deputy warden's office. I'm like, man, I go to the deputy warden's office, and he's suspicious. White guy looking at me all funny. And he said, the deputy warden of SPSM is on the phone. He's looking at me like trying to read me. And I was like, okay, he said, I get the phone. I say, hey, he said, look, if he asked you what this is about, you're helping me solve a gang situation down here between the Moles,

the L. Rubens and the black disciples. I said, okay. He said, look, I need something up front, man, to take care of some people in Lansing. And I was like, the guy's on me. I'm just like you looking now, this is how he's looking. So I'm like, I say, man, there's blood on that. I ain't got nothing to do with that. He said, okay, I'll see what I can do.

Hang up. But I knew, I said, I got this transfer coming, right? I go back, I call my two buddies. I take a foot locker. And I said, look, man, y'all can have this shit. I'll give this guy moose. I said, here, here go my pictures. Here's my phone.

When you hear, I'm gone. Burn this shit up. He said, okay. Next morning or later that night, they said, pack up. You're leaving. And for the first time in 11 years, I'm on the bus with no shackles, no handcuffs. I'm like, oh, shit. Send me to this place called trustee division, which is just like outside.

I'm like, oh, man. So I take my, get my property, put it in myself, come straight. down to the phone, see a familiar face. I said, come here, man. I said, what's the quickest way out of here? He said, the visiting room. So I'm talking in codes on the phone, visiting room. The old man don't want to do that for some reason. So I, I said, hold on. I said, what's the second quickest way? He said, there's a blind spot right behind his thing. You can hit this fence. Like six in the morning. I said, bed. He took me over that, showed me the spot. So I go to sleep that night. get up for breakfast. I put everything. I'd fold my mattress over like nobody's in there, put the

stuff I had in my locker, took the tag off the dough. When everybody went to breakfast, I hit the fence, boom. Now, I remember my adoptive father's supposed to be here, right? So I whistle for my ride, no lights. I whistle again. And, and, and, and, and, and this is the most responsible person I've met in my life. If he says he's going to be somewhere, he's going to be there. So I'm like, I'm thrown. I'm like, on the most important day of my life, I'm escaping, man. I'm a lifer.

They're saying I'm a hit man. This ain't no game. No ride. I'm like, damn. So I take off in the dark. I see a big old parking lot. And I'm like, I hate to do it, but I'm going to have to commandeer a car. Right.

It's the first person now. This is what I'm telling myself. First person out is getting jacked. They didn't even call the car jacking back then, but they getting jacked. Halfway across the lot, a perimeter truck or some kind of car, turned its lights on and, like, hit the gas. I'm thinking they see me. I'm damn.

I run, run into a barbed wire fence, cut my hands up, pull myself over. I go up this little hill, and I'm laying on my back, because I'm sure I'm caught. the same car or truck or whatever it was comes around this way. I'm like, I see a bunch of cows because it's early. It's dark, but I can see, I'm like, the freeway is like, well, I'm like, man, I'm through. And I hear another motor running.

Like, what the hell is that? Climb back down, crawl back down the hill, underneath the barbed wire fence, cross the street, there's a little shack, right? Outhouse or a guard shack. and a truck is running, a perimeter truck is running in the parking lot. I go, nobody's in it, I open it up, don't even cut the lights on, take off, get to a gas station with all the direction lights I can see. I said, okay, I know where everything's at, and I hit the freeway.

Why was that truck running there? I guess he went to use the bathroom. My guess, I don't know. And then did the other truck just never see you? I don't think it was actually, I don't think he ever saw me. I think it just, he took off maybe making a round or something, but it coincided with me moving and I'm, you know, you're panicking because I'm about to throw up. I'm like, man, I'm caught.

I ain't made 20 miles away from this place. Now, why did you decide to escape? Did you think the warden wasn't going to pull through on his end of the bargain with the deal? Yeah. You just didn't want to wait anymore. And how much time had passed already since you guys made that deal? No time had passed since we made the deal. We made the deal.

I'm saying maybe three, four weeks from the time we, no, from the time he sent me to Weston Wayne till I escaped, couldn't have been no more than, might have been a month and a half, two months. But I just, I was never comfortable in prison. I was never, it's like, they call it rabbit. You got rabbit in your blood. I had rabbit.

in my blood. When I worked in I on you on the plumbing crew, we had this old guy named old man Jim was our supervisor from the streets, civilian. And I would tell the guys, keep Jim busy because I'm running trying to find a way out underneath the prison. They got all kind of doors and hallways and like caves. I'm like, but I'd heard that a couple of them came up in a MTF, which is a facility across the streets. I'm just trying to find my way up through the sewer system and out. I don't think days went by without me thinking about escaping. During the riots, guys came and tried to tear my door off the hinges.

No lie. I'm watching little darlings on TV. And somebody said, Dio, you see that? I'm thinking he talking about something on TV. I'm like, what? He said, man, look him in the yard. I turn around.

All hell breaking loose. I'm like, damn. So I started putting valuables up and hiding shit because I know it's going to be a wild night. And guys come through this door, about four or five of them. They tried seriously to tear my door off the hinges. I'm like, man.

So I tell them, I said, look, go to the school building because we had small engine repair. I said, get some gas and make some cocktails. We're going to burn the roofs up, you know, so they don't have a place to sit and all that. And we're trying to come up out of here tonight. So every guy who was serious about escaping was kind of with me. They're like, man, we're going to find out of here tonight.

And that was my attitude. It was like, I know I did wrong. I know I'm supposed to be here, serve my time. But if I can run, I'm gone. So if he had never pressed you, you never would have asked to go to the camp. Like you wouldn't have taken that opportunity to go to the camp? No, I'd have went to camp. But very few lifers get to camp in Michigan anyway, unless you've got a parole already.

If you've got a parole, they'll send you to a level one. If you don't have a parole, the lowest you're going to get to as a lifer is a level two. A little harder to get out of. But you wouldn't have gone to the camp that quickly, though. No. You just took it that situation. You jumped on it because he asked you for more money. Right.

Okay. Well, yeah, I felt disrespected, right? And so I knew when I escaped that it was going to look bad on him if it ever came to light. And it did. And he ended up doing, he ended up doing a little time behind that. How soon after your escape did he end up getting arrested? Did you ever find out? I escaped.

They say December the 19th. I think I always thought it was the eighth. 18. And I got arrested. The newspapers say February the 1st, but I always thought it was February the 3rd. So there was not a great deal of time, you know. And that was because me and my adopted father fell out. When we fall out, he caused the feds until them I'm coming in on the 1 o'clock train from Toronto to kill him. My sentencing judge. And the weird thing about this is I knew my sense. Now differently. He and my mom got together, right, as a couple. Oh shit. Weir. And so I called his house before and the whole nine. So he actually called my mom and told her, he said, I don't know what's going on,

but somebody trying to have your son killed. That's what he told her. And because they put him in the house arrest, you know, helicopters and all that old stuff. So now the stepfather that you referred to a couple times, how did he come in the picture? He was a school teacher. He was a school teacher back in the day, right? He was an art teacher. And I had already been kicked out of the school. I'm pretty sure I'm not enrolled, but I would come up there periodically just to hang out.

And I would run dice games in his back office, right? So, and I don't know what brought this about. I'm in Jackson, oh, my sister, and one of the basketball stars had got married. And so he asked him one of the basketball star whose name is Terry. He asked him to ask my sister to ask me if he could visit. And I'm like, hell yeah, more visits than marry him. And he visited, we hit it off. He was on a plane to come see me in Marquette and the engine caught fire.

And so when they circled back, you know, he came up with the concept of adoption. You know, if something happens to me, I want to make sure, you know, you're taking care of and all that of those stuff. And he happened to be rich? Happened to be rich. So it worked out. Yeah. And he was a wonderful guy, but he was a crook, right? Which is, you know, me, I can't judge.

But he would like steal art. He would go into a vault. And they'd trust him to get this one piece and he'd have another piece up under it when he walked out. So was that a real painting that he gave to the warden to sell? It wasn't fake or anything?

No, no. I've got it. Matter of fact, I sent my mom one years ago and she still got it in the house. It's probably worth something, right? Yeah, yeah. The lantern. I can't remember which one we gave Wayne.

but yeah okay so you make the escape what happens after the escape where do you go okay um this is when me and the old guy fall out i escape he's not where he's supposed to be i'm like what the right and if you knew my mom you you died laughing because my older brother found out this he was he's like what this is the first time i heard that when i escaped i take the perimeter truck to Ann Arbor. I leave it in a parking lot and I go walk, find a phone booth. And I never use address books for numbers. I kind of remember most of them by the heart. But this particular day I just dialed my mother's number by heart. She's supposed to be at work. She picks up the phone. Hello. I say, ma'am, guess where I'm at?

she said where i say i say ann arbor she said what i said yeah she said give me some streets so i look up i tell her this street in this street she said she must have knew the town pretty well she said there's a a macy's or something right around the corner go there and browse i'll be there as soon as i can my mom came to pick me up man that's a real one

I mean, and I don't know if all my brothers and sisters knew, but yeah, mom came to get me. So I get in the car and I tell her, I said, look, I don't know where this guy had. You know, the first time he's not been where he was supposed to be, et cetera, et cetera. I said, so we're supposed to have the vault and the Fisher building, right, with stock. Because I'm a detailed plan. When I plan something, I'm pretty meticulous. So we planned it out.

If somehow I don't get this right, get to the Fisher Building. So I tell Mom, let's go to the Fisher Builder. Every 15 minutes and so I get out the car because they didn't have cell phones and all that stuff. Make a call, still nothing. Get to the Fisher Building, my mom pulls up. And she said, man, you're not going to believe this. I said, what?

She said, that's your baby sister in there eating. She looked through the window. I'm like, what? She said, hold on. me go get her and tell her not to scream because she's a drama queen, right? I'm sorry, sis, I shouldn't say that. But anyway, she gets out, goes get Sharon, tells her, look, your brother is on the run. He's on the skate.

Don't make a scene. She stepped out of there. She hollered, brother. I hug her. So I sent her upstairs. I said, look, go up here, see this guy, make sure there's a little. this vault is ready so I can get in here and shut it down for a couple

weeks, right? She comes back downstairs. She's looking all confused. He says, he don't know nothing about that. I'm like, oh, strike two. I'm like, okay. Drive.

Now, the third place, the next place is a Burger King in Harper Woods. So I tell mom, go to the Burger King and stop about two blocks before we get there. Because if I see a mail truck or anything, I'm out, right? I look at Burger King.

He's in the car in the parking lot. I slide in. Remember now my hands are cut. So I tell mom, I say, you can go ahead on, Mom, I'm good. My mom ain't like that. We go to, he had a townhouse. Go to the townhouse. I take a quick bath, patch my hands up, put on the suit.

And I love hats. I put on a ham. and we've been to go get on the train because my first thing is get out the country, go to Canada, get on the train, right? And I've taken a picture for a passport. So knock on the door. It's mom.

Like, mama, she said, man, I'm not going nowhere till I know you straight because she don't trust my adopted father, right? I said, okay, so she actually drives us to Canada. right we crossed over to Canada there's uh we stop at a little restaurant nobody can eat because on my stomach I got the butterflies but we stopped there for a minute

and probably just to say buy the mile more than anything so we get on the train headed to Toronto remember you just met Thomas he gives me not supposed to be $40,000 I'm thinking pretty sure and the passport.

He gives me first to 40 no 20 excuse me it's supposed to be 20 I riffled I said man this ain't 20

oh that's only 10 I had to do this that and another and I was going to get the other I said okay we still talking about strikes and I'm like man he gives me the passport

he's got his picture on I swear it did I'm like how you kidding. But they tried to get a 24-hour passport. The lady looked at him and said, you got to give me, because he got my pictures, she looked at him, man, you got to give me another picture. So he gave a picture of himself, but I didn't know it until we were on the train. I'm like,

man, I'm not going to be able to get out of the country with this shit. Get up to Toronto. He gets a room. I remember I ain't got no ID, nothing. He gets a room. He's gay. And this is what threw it off. When he adopted me, a part of it is so the incest doesn't enter the picture and all that. He gets one room, one bed. And I'm like, oh, man, what the fuck? So he says he's hungry.

I say, I said, well, I'm tired. You know, I'm winding down. I say, you're going to get you something to eat. I'm going to take a quick nap. He's okay. He leaves to go get something to eat. I take the tin, take the passport. and I leave pretty much right behind him,

catch a trolley bus to the airport, come through customs, give the lady the passport. She looks and sees him. And she says, sir, whose passport is this? I said, excuse me? She said, sir, whose passport is this? I said, lady, I've contracted the AIDS virus.

I've lost about 120 pounds. I said, I'm going to New York to be with friends and family until I die. Do you mind? And she snapped it. Stead it to me. And I was like, I'm like, damn. So I go to New York, come back around. And this is when I find out,

this is when he called the judge and told him I was coming on a one o'clock train to kill him. I was like, Lord, have mercy. Why New York? It was just a way to get out of Toronto, to get away from him. You know, I'm just. Looking back on it, should you have stayed in Canada or no?

Looking back, it probably would have been best. You just escaped the U.S. You want to go back to the U.S. Looking back now. Yeah. But then, you know, I don't know if you've ever been on the run. No, I've never been on the run. But it's like you're not thinking clearly.

Make a few bad moves. But because I got as far away as Hawaii. I moved to New York, Florida, Hawaii. Man, maybe somewhere. Yeah, I think that's it. This is also a different period of time, too. What is this, the 90s? No, this is 88.

Oh, this 88, okay. Yeah. So there's not really, well, there's TV, but probably you weren't, your face probably wasn't all over. Well, they, and this is the first time that they called me a hit man on TV. And I find this out through a little guy who used to come up to see me with his mom. And we're talking and he said, they called you a hitman on TV. He's maybe 11, 12. And I said, what do you think about that?

He said, I know how they're a sensational. I said, there you go, man. I ain't no hit, man. So now why Hawaii? Why do you go there? Just to get away. I'm running. Don't really know what I don't have a plan.

For the most part, I'm just gone. Do you have any friends or family there? Not a one. So what do you do? I just hung out for a couple weeks until I could get a passport. That was like the theme. You know, let me go down. sit somewhere because my buddy end up calling me after I went to Florida. We're talking. And he said,

I got a guy. All you need to do is come sit down in this chair and take a picture. We don't get your passport and you can get the hell on. I was like, bad. I drove back from Florida all night. I got to the window down, James Brown blowing to keep me awake. But I never made it. The next day I was arrested. What was your plan? What country were you going to go to? It's Belize, the old British Honduras. I think it was the British Honduras then, because I'm pretty sure they didn't have an extra distant treaty with the U.S. So my plan was to get there, you know, meet some little Mexican girl or Spanish girl, have some little babies, and live out my life.

That was the plan. How old were you at this point, too? I'm about 29, I think. Okay. Yeah. So tell us how you get caught and arrested. I got caught. I went over my girlfriend's house, foolishly.

And because I buy me a BMW while I'm out, but the plan is to leave it to her. She's been such a good woman. I'm talking about up. Not every week, but every month. She'll bring her children, and we'd have great visits and all that. So my plan was when I go,

here's a BMW for you, et cetera. So I came over. and they followed me, right? Because I make a right, you know, you can tell when you're being followed, I make a right turn, somebody else makes a right turn. I make another right,

they make another right. I'm like, damn. I make like the third right, and they were everywhere. You know, keep your hands on the steering wheel and that whole nine. And these are federal agents. Some of them were, right?

Because one of them, or the one who recognized me, was a childhood friend of mine. because I've got identification now, and it's saying Stephen Nicholas, which is my adoptive father's last name. So they pulled me over, and you got in, here you go, they look. They said, man, you're not the guy we're looking for, but why were you at this house? I said, that's my girlfriend. She worked at the Mazda plant, so I got a Mazda hat sitting on the seat.

I said, we work at the monster plan together. And they're buying it. And I'm like, oh, man, I'm about to get out of this shit. And then he said, he said, man, we're going to have to keep you one more, a couple more minutes. He said, we have a sergeant from the abscounding division who knows this guy. And I'm saying to myself, oh, shit. This guy named Greg Sykes.

He pulls up, comes to the car. What's up, Steve? I said, excuse me? He said, he said, he. He said, what's up, fool? And I couldn't help it. I just bust out laughing. I'm like, damn.

So he takes me, puts me in his car, calls my baby sister sharing the same little drama and said, tell your mom, I got him, and he's okay. This guy's driving through back alleys, pulled up in a funeral home parking lot, told me you got to search me again. I'm like, yeah. Did he give you a last meal before you went back or anything? No, no, no Greg Sykes.

That would have been nice if he gave you a meal. Yeah, no, he didn't know. Did you know what you were facing going back in? I didn't right away until I realized I made a mistake that I do. I think I told the federal agent something about Wayne Jackson, and that changed everything. So now they're like, look, you can't go back in there. You're going to have to go to the federal system for your protection for the most of it.

I'm like, okay. I'd heard how different the state and fed was. I was like, okay, I can do that. They sent me to Mariana, FCI, Mariana for a couple of years. Then I went to FCI Phoenix. How much time did they give you then? They didn't give me any time. Oh, they just brought you.

Because I testified on a deputy warden in front of a grand jury. And the horrible thing was, for me, I didn't say anything wrong, right? Everybody tells on the administration, everybody. If you've got a problem with the sergeant, what do you do? You tell the lieutenant. You got a problem with the officer. You tell the lieutenant. You're telling, but because I had kind of rose up in the ranks in prison.

To me, any time you make a mistake after that, here comes the guys, the vultures, the guys who've been wanting to get you but couldn't, you know. Did people give you a hard time for telling? They did, but they didn't really have an opportunity because I was gone for four years, four and a half years in the federal system. when I came back, guys would tell me, guys that I was extremely cool with, they said, look, man, we still cool. But if you have a problem about this, I came back here. And I was like, I understand.

And the same guy that I mentioned earlier, another guy told me, this man, he ought to get you because y'all was so close, he feels betrayed and all this old shit. And I was like, oh, he said, yeah, man, if you see him, watch out. And I saw him. they were about to let me go home years later and we're at the same place and when he saw me it was tears because he was like man but we talked about it and once we talked about he was like he said I should have no man because all I said I kid you not all I said at the public hearing I mean at the in front of the grand jury was yes I paid him I told my father to pay him the money right now they did that

asked me about one inmate, they said, what's his name? They used his nickname and said, what's his name? And I'm, I got to say it, right? I said it. And so I'm pretty sure that they would use that to like, man, do you told on old boy? I ain't, I ain't told on a soul. How much time did the warden get? I think he only got like four years. Yeah, but it ruined his life. And I hate that. And now how much time passed from your escape? You said December to February, but is that a few months or was it a... No, that's a few months. Just a few months.

Right. Okay. Because you said you were able to get a car and all of that, so that happened pretty quickly. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So now once you're brought straight back to federal prison once they capture you? Pretty much. Okay, yeah, they put me in the hole in my island, and I was there for the duration of

his trial. You know, I didn't even go to the trial, but they're holding me there, I guess, until after the trial is over. And then they sent me out to Florida. What do you think of the feds? It was a whole lot better than the state, if you ask me. I was like, wow. And by the time I got to Phoenix, I'd understood a little more about, you know, doing

Fed time. And let me see, Sonny Barger was there. Oh, you were there with Sunny? Yeah. Rick Ross. So what was his early 2000s now when they were there for the... Right. Yeah.

Matter of it. I didn't even know who the guy Rick was. We're playing tennis. Rick Ross, the... Freeway. Yeah, freeway. And I'm playing tennis with the guy. And that's what the guy said.

He said, man, you know freeway? I said, no, who the hell is this freeway? He said, man, you play tennis with the guy. I said, man, I don't know that guy. We just played tennis, you know? Did you get to talk to Sunny at all? Yeah. Look, I was telling Thomas, I always thought,

motorcycle guys were racist until I meant Sunday. I got a girlfriend who got up every week, every weekend anyway, and he gets a visit too. And he would bring me his grandbaby. This is, and I was like, he said, they call me Steve-O, Steve-O, you want to hold a grand? I said, hell, yeah. We would hold a grandbaby for a hour or two, just, you know. And I was like, all my life, man, I thought you guys were racist. he had the little thing in there.

You want to hold a granny? I said, yeah. Yeah, I like those, sonny. Well, it's freeway, like? I didn't really get, we didn't get chummy. We just, and I don't know how we got to playing tennis. I think he might have been over there with a racket by itself. And I went and got a racket and just played with him.

Yeah, but after they told me he was, you know, a dope boy, I was like, Hey, what's up, man? We never got chummy. We never really hung out, never broke bread, anything like that. And none of those guys cared that you were testifying against a warden? Well, it was over, and they didn't know. Oh, it never got out? No.

So what would you say when people asked why you were there and why didn't you came from the state? Something about a silence, so I lied. You know, because I could show him the hit man thing, so I act like I was in there for a silence. How long do you stay in the feds for? I think it was only four years, maybe four and a half years. And they bring you back. No, they tricked me. I was supposed to come back just to see the parole board.

The parole board asked me, they contact me. They say, look, do you want an in-person hearing or telephone? I'm like, I have a much better chance of getting parole with an in-person. I say, in-person. They said, okay, we're going to bring you back. You had a hearing and we'll bring you back to Arizona. I was like, okay, cool. what happened was the deputy warden's best friend was the deputy director of prisons this happened

while i was gone i didn't know it or i would have said oh no i'm good so they kidnapped me i'll kid you and kept me in level five man i was in level five for 14 years wait so there was no parole hearing no i had a parole hearing but you got rejected right so they use that as their why because they need And so they said these are the exact words they used. We can take care of his security needs right here. They never sent you back. So the feds would have kept you then for the rest of your life until. Until I got, yeah, yeah.

That would have been a way because you're... Look, and I've lost my juice. You know, whatever cloud I had is pretty much gone. And they tried to kill me. How do they treat you in a max when you've escaped from their prison? Is there no free time at all? Like, are you just in the hole? You're in about 22 and a half hours a day.

It's kind of be brutal. Well, my thing was I'll get along with people so well that I can generally get the jobs I want. So I got the laundry job, which means I'm out from six in the morning to basically nine at night. And that kind of helped a great deal. And I still felt myself losing it. You know, it's just the sensory deprivation. After a while, it becomes a little too much. Would the guards beat you?

I never got beat by the guards that I didn't have it coming. You know what I mean? They wouldn't. They wouldn't. And it's weird, man. I have this knack for getting along with people. I do. Well, you're a nice guy.

You know, it's like there's a woman guard who told me, she said, out of all the guys I met, you're the only guy in here I'd invite the dinner with me and my kids, man. And I was like, what? She said, I kid you not. And I was like, damn. So even though I was in Max, I wasn't locked down, locked down, 24-7 like everybody else. You must have been like a legend in there. People were probably talking about you and knew about you.

And I'm sure many of them still do, even though times have changed. But I've met people who said that. And they said, man, I've been looking forward to meeting you, D. And I said, huh? He said, man, out of all the guys they name, he said, you'd only want to skate. This is an old guy. The old guy, now, he was younger than me. But he said, man, I always wanted to meet you.

So I don't know if it was legend status, but it was pretty nice. I mean, I didn't have the problems that most guys have. And I think a lot of it is due to the old guy's school in me, you know, me being a little lucky, getting the right buddies and friends and treating people right. You know, it's like I'm doing great. and I share. So, let's say you, my bud, and you see this shirt, you say, can I wear that shirt on my business?

Yeah. I might not get that shirt back, honestly. But I got so much of this stuff, I don't care. So guys, it was like love, hate. They love me, but some of them hated me, and that's okay. Now, at that point, when you go back to the state, how many years are you in for already? I got about 15 years in, so I,

I had to do another, what, 26 years? You did another 26 years? Wow. So those 14 years in the max, what happens at the end of the 14? Okay, they take me, they try to kill me. All right. This is obviously. In Michigan, they don't transfer you during blizzards.

It's not going to happen. They don't have transfers on the weekend. It doesn't happen. McCrary, pack up. It's like Friday. like what pack up a van comes to get me i'm the only guy transferring now you have to learn how to read lips in my shoes i read lips i'm sitting in the back and i'm looking in the rearview mirror i'm watching the conversation the part i get for sure was the deputy director said to get him

out of here today right damn that don't sound good so they sent me to this joint called muskegon All right. Now, guys who are serious about time know how to keep a weapon in their property, but I can't get my property. I'm walking down the hallway, and this little guy walks up on me, and he says, you got a brother named Tim, don't you? I look at it, I say, yeah. He said, man, don't go around that corner.

He said, you go around that corner, they're going to kill you. I vaguely remember this little face, so he must have been my little brother, his twin. Must be Tim's bud who was over at the house, you know, years ago. But how, and I'm like, how would he know that they were talking about me? He said, man, you got a brother named Tim, don't you? I said, yeah. Go around that corner, man. So I did the moonwalk before Michael Jackson.

I eased my ass on back down the hallway, told me to get me a couple of them things. And now that they can't get me there, they send two hitters into the day room, right? And I missed it for a second. But there's a guy sitting here. And when he looked at them, he broke his neck to look at me, which let me know. I said, okay, this is them. They look at me. And I got my arm folded.

He hadn't even made it back with the weapons. I'm naked. And the guy looked at me, and I started laughing. I just busted out laughing. And they walked on out. I was like, damn, this shit then got serious. So I had lost my clout for the most part. And, yeah, because one guy told me I got a parole.

I'm on my way home. He told me, because I came out and I'm working out. And I said, what's up, man? You know I don't fuck with you, D.O. That's just how you said. And I was like, my man, I ain't got no problem with it. But it was like older, hard coal guys. I don't know how they got the story, but they're like, no, we don't mess with you no more.

But that, too, was a blessing. Because I was like, I no longer want to be respected in your eyes. You know what I mean? It's like time, so much time had gone by that I changed. because I told the parole board the truth. And they held me another seven years. Yeah, why did the parole board keep rejecting you? Well, they kept rejecting me for the first time because I don't think I had changed.

I mean, you had just escaped too. Right. I wouldn't have given you really. So in Michigan, you have to get a public hearing to get a parole, right? So they give me a public hearing. Matter of fact, a beautiful guard told me years ago. She was not my girlfriend, but friend with benefits. She told me, she said, write the parole board by hand once a month, every month.

And I'm like, girl, I ain't doing that shit. She said, I'm telling you, man, write them one page. Write with an ink pen. Don't type it. She said they get to the point where they get to know you and they get tired of getting these letters. I'm like, so years later, I'm thinking, I said, I'm going to try this. So I wrote them every month, one page, just, I'm not having a good day, whatever. And I sent it, and they started taking what they call interest.

So then they send somebody, I have a good interview, they give me a public hearing. You get a public hearing, you pretty much go home. I get a public hearing and I'm sitting there and they asked me about that case. And I've reached a point where I don't, I hate lying. I just hate it. And I told the truth. Oh, my goodness. Snat coming out my nose.

I'm crying. Everybody on my side is crying. The victim's family, they're like, oh, yeah, they're going to frame now. So obviously, they didn't let me go, right? And the lady told me, she knew. she said, don't hang your head, man. She said, we're going to see you again soon. I'm like, all right, three years later, they see me again.

They try to give me a parole. Now, the successor judge blocks it because he said, when you told the truth, that was when your sentence started. I'm like, what? So now I have to wait for them to change the rule. They changed the law. So successor judges couldn't veto. And then they come on back here.

We got you. And I mean, when the parole world wants to let you go, it's a wonderful feeling. You're like, man, I've reached a point where they want to kick me out of here. Love it. Wait, how is that when your sentence starts? Now, this is, he was pissed off, I guess. But he was saying, because you finally trod the truth about the case, remember for years they looked at it like it was now.

accident. When I stepped in there and told him, I said, no, I was going to kill this guy from off the rip. They were like, what? Everybody. My family, none of them knew. They're like, oh, my God, you know, went crazy. But I thought you took a plea deal. Why? I did. So you didn't admit that aspect on the side? No, to take a plea to second, you can't say, it's like you take a, it's like you charge with first, but the plea is a reduction. So I just went with whatever story they were saying, okay, I'll take that life sentence. What would first have been if you pled guilty to first? First would have been.

Life without parole? Right. Okay. But they're letting those guys out now. You know, they came up with this law about juveniles, right? So I would have got out on, that's matter of fact, my co-defendant just wrote me a couple weeks ago and said he's in line to go to court and get resentenced. So he should be coming home pretty soon.

What kind of issues was he getting into? prison that he's still not out. People were just crazy. And he wasn't a beast. He wasn't a bad guy. It was just he never got it. You know what I mean? But again, the guy was always there for me.

I like leathers. He gets a beautiful leather one day. Now come out, I said, damn, man, I like that. He was like, I said, where do you get that from? He had a sister named Deloese. Delores sent it. I'm still, I'm ugly now, you know. So I was like, I said, oh, wait right here.

I go in, I get a pipe and I get an ice pick. I come back and I give him the ice pick. He said, what's this for? I said, either use that on me, man, to give me that jacket. He was like, what? I said, man, either use it or give me that jacket, man. He said, man, you ain't shit, man. He peeled out it and I put it on, one, about my.

my business. But the guy saved me years later. He got stabbed for me. And so I, and when you changing and growing up, you start feeling bad. Now I got a conscience. And I'm like, damn, I had to apologize. I said, man, I apologize for all the dumb shit I'm dead to you over these years. You put me in here, but I truly believe that you saved me because I'd have been dead if I'd have stayed out there. You know, I got these shoulder hostas. I got these guns. I'm thinking I'm some kind of mass, you know, I'm not a hit man. But I would put in, I probably would have become one. So I apologize to them.

I said, man, I'm sorry. You were allowed to have leather in prison? Oh, man. Get shirts and stuff from other. Look, I wish I had pictures. They stopped it now. But I had everything in there you could have. This shit was, it was ridiculous.

I was telling Thomas. I said, I'm on my way on a visit. And a guard looked at my feet and they see them all the time. He said, man, if I wore your size, I'd go up there and I'd steal your shit. I'd say, huh? He said, man, you got nicer stuff than me. And I said, man, you can't be serious. But remember, Demetrius is my best bud.

Nick is rich. We wear the same size shoe. So he'd say something like this in the visiting room. He said, you see anything you like lately? And I'm honest. I'm like, nah. And then I haven't thought. He said, what?

I said, man, I saw a pair of crocodiles in a GQ magazine. The little dog was biting the heel. I didn't even know what they were. They were Baker Bengers. He was like, and this is what he do. Okay, they made 175 pair. He went and got number 173. Brought him up.

We changed shoes in the visiting room. and I walked in with some brown crocodiles. So I had pretty much every color. And this is, do you know how suicidal that is? In prison. And Jackson, to walk around with this kind of stuff on it. It was nuts. But at that time, I hadn't lost what little clout I had.

You know, I was not untouchable. but because I didn't offend and all that and I'm in the sharing and I've got a crew it's kind of hard to explain but it's like when you become a grand chic you greet it everywhere you go

Islam king Islam prince and I greet them I don't I don't come to services I don't do anything but some of these guys I raise I brought him to the temple. And so if I got serious problems, two things used to always help. These guys, the wolves, who were my guys,

and the fact that I kept spies in everybody's camp. You know, that comes from reading. You read The Art of War or the Prince. You keep people in other camps. You have to. So you know what's going on, you know. In my heyday, it took me at least 20 minutes to get through the kitchen. Just shaking.

I can't even eat. Just shaking their hands and people whispering, they're going to hit the old boy today. And you're like, okay, my man, how y'all doing? What's up? Watch out deal. This is going. And you're like, okay.

You know, my peewee, my co-defendant got stabbed. He didn't even do anything wrong. And the guys who stabbed him, I know him. I'm supposed to get stabbed the same night. I'm like, I got a house coat of. And I started breaking the rules. the big head, you know, I'm like on the gallery with a house coat and slippers, taboo, right? But I used to, it was a guy in there. I used to like the school young guys if I could, right?

And this is after I've changed. I'm not teaching them how to be bad guys, crooks and criminals. I'm teaching them how to be men. So this particular guy was bright. I'm talking about he was just, he was a bright young guy. So I'd go to his cell and I'd sit out in front and we'd read a couple chapters and sell the prints. I said read chapter 24. He'd read it. I said, now what is it saying? And we talk about it. Well, his buddy, who was the younger brother of the most powerful prisoner, took offense. I didn't know, right? I look up. It had to be five, maybe six of them. They jumped the wall. You see pipes and knives.

I'm like, y'all from the test somebody off, huh? They say, yeah. I said, okay. He said, man, Dee, get that knife for me. I reach down and get the knife that I'm supposed to get stabbed with. We on First Gallery, a guy on base got the knife for this guy. I reached down and get it and give it to him.

He's supposed to hit me the same night, right? A couple minutes later, they run. and they jumped back over the fence. But here come my Rappy. He said, man, I've been hit. I said, where? He opened his shirt. Little trickle of blood.

I said, man, that's an ice pick. I said, you better get on over there to an infirmary. Right. And I break down to myself, but I'm like, okay, this shit's going to get ugly. He don't even make it. He falls out. Punctured along. A woman liked him.

I know her first name was Sharon. I can't remember her last name. Or guard. She got him on the cart and got him over there And I guess saved his life I was like damn So the guy didn't hit me And they butchered him

I go out on the writ Come back He coming out the hole He got patches Pink patches in his head And I said what the fuck happened He said man they hit me because I wouldn't hit you I was like oh shit

Right But the little guy's line to me this is where the spies come in. I got a spy in they can. He comes to me. He said, D. It wasn't he about it. Because they lied and said it was about my co-defendant taking their drugs.

He had a job. He could get to the hole. He might have been a porter or something in the hole. But they said this is what they're telling me. No, we did this man because he was just taking shit. He took, we said and busted some pills and he

took some. So I'm bad. The guy told him, he said, no. He said it was about that little guy you were schooling. He felt like you were stealing him because he thought this guy would get out and help him get out. That's what was about. I'm like, are you kidding?

I said, I'll be there. So, yeah. That's crazy. That is. It's nuts. Did that happen a lot, attempts against your life? No, not a whole lot. No, that was one.

That was, that was, that was, was one, the thing that Muskegon was another, I gave a guy a knife, and the three guys that he got into it with, they came to get me. Homeboy, I can't leave him naked. And like I said, I got a maid everywhere. So he said, hey, man, I need a thing. I said, okay. I give him one.

They catch him in the movie theater, dark as hell. And I'm sitting right away. I'm seeing them work, right? I keep a pair of isotoners. I get my isotoners, they go. What the fuck? Follow the trail of blood. My homeboy then grab my isotoneers,

they don't got him pretty good. But he didn't stab one of them through the arm, right? So a rotten guy got my homeboy to tell them to put on a kite that I gave him the knife. So somebody Come to my room I'm on fourth gallery Somebody comes to myself And he said hey D

I said what's up man Man And I'm guys out there I'm looking for you I said huh I look out I said okay And I had a guy

Who worked in the vegetable Prep room Who could get the meat cleaver So I got this A meat cleaver I come out I got on I'm telling

This shit is real It sounds like A damn joke But it's real I got a burberry Trench coat on A dog A firewood hat turned up in the front.

And I come out there, and they can see the handle or the cleaver. I come out. And I said, what's up, man? And they say, uh, I don't put your name in a kite. I said, let me see it. They give me the kite. I read the shit. I bawled it up and throw it on the ground.

I said, so what's up? The whole joint watching. I said, so what's up, man? No, man, we just wanted you to know, man. I said, okay. I go to the whole. Ando. He said, what's up on, boy?

I said, don't put my name in on more motherfucking kites. He said, all right, man. Does you need anything? He said, no, I shut the door. Walk back across the yard. Two of these guys are in there for killing state trooper. They're wolves, right? But they're not, they guys I know and I'm all right with.

But you gave somebody a knife to go to, you know, you're at odds. I just, but I could feel every eye. But it's like these are tests you have to pass. You know, you don't, you can't run from it. So as the years go by, what's it feel like, you know, once you start getting into 20, 25, 30, even 35 years, what does that feel like? It's, it's different. You know, I listen to other people, my little brother. He had a big problem with that.

He said, you know, 10 years, he's not a whole. 15 years, 20 years, 25, 35, he said, I just kind of gave up. But when you're there, in the midst of it, it doesn't feel like it. You know what I mean? It just doesn't feel like it's been, it was 41 years. It goes by in a bluer. But it's because you're in it. You know, you don't have time.

to do a whole lot of, you do self-reflecting, but it's a different kind, you know. And with me, it was, I was always trying to change after, even when I got there. First book I read was thinking grow rich. And I'm thinking it's going to, you know, okay, it's about money, right? I read it and I'm like, whoa, shit, it's different. second book, How to Win Friends and Influence People. And this is in the Reformatory. I was reading in the county jail, but in the reformatory.

And after I read How to Win Friends and Influence People, I was floored because I was convinced that I wasn't this image that I was portraying. I'm a sniffling coward. I do what I got to do. But my stomach flips and all. the rest of that shit. I was like, I'm not cut out for this shit, but I've got to survive it, right? And so most of my time was spent growing.

I'd come in. I'd shut that door. They'd clang it shut. I got two, three books on the bed. I'm reading, trying to understand. And I felt like if I grew a little bit, if I understood a little more, each day, I could stay a step ahead of the real dangerous stuff, you know. It was like when I became the grand chic of the Moroscience Temple, it just happened.

You know, my buddy, he lived a couple blocks from him. He came, and he became, he was the grand sheep. And so obviously he said, come on over, man, at least listen. I come over, I listen, he leaves. I've got, they say my IQ is exceptional. And I think it's been tarnished over the years. But when I was a kid, they said it was 149 or 152. Three suits came to see me in, and I can't remember what the year that was.

But they had sent me from Jackson back to Ionia and I hated it. So I started a little riot, right? And what they called in sighting the riot, got a ticket and all that. But these three suits come see me. And one of them looked at me and he said, man, do you know what you're out of Q? is? And I said, yeah. I said, it told me between 149 and 152. He said, no. He said, yo, IQ was 162. And he looked me in the face real hard. And he said, what the hell are you doing in here? And I looked him. I knew what he was asking, but I looked, I'm stupid. And I said, I'm doing a life bit, man.

The fuck you think I'm doing in there. You know, and that was my attitude. I felt like I could handle anything. I knew I was bright, but also knew that I had damaged a lot of brain cells getting high and all the rest of that old stuff. But, yeah. How were you as a parent from prison? Were you active in your kid's life? No, horrible. And I didn't meet her until she was 33. She finally came up to see me at 33 years old. And I'm sure she was looking for the things she had heard about your daddy

but by now I'm through with that I don't even have a pair of reptiles right now I don't even want them but she's my baby got on a Rolex it was funny man the first visit was awkward you know first time we met

she's looking at me I'm looking at her second we just laughed like for two hours right and now that I'm home it's like we talk but we don't talk often you know, my priority was and still is, take care of your mom first, right?

And so I haven't gotten around to becoming successful and all that old stuff. And that's kind of what I need, I think I need anyway. That's the way I look at it, to really be able to relate to people. It's like I've been not a total recluse, but pretty much since I've been home. Did there get to be a certain point where you, in your mind, thought you weren't coming home ever?

No. I didn't. It's like I'll say things and I'll say it like if I make it out. But in my heart of hearts, I always knew I would. There was never a doubt in my mind that I was coming out of there. Did you know the year that you got parole, you were going to get parole that year? I mean, they'd let you know ahead of time. So with me, they sent me to the place that I met my old friend, which was a level one.

The only way I could be at a level one is something good's about to happen. So they tell me, you've got this class that you have to go to. So I go in, I sit down, and I ask a lady, I say, who put me in here? She flipped through paperwork. The parole board, I was like, bet, I'm good. What I need to do? And they were basically fulfilling all the requirements, you know, because when I was locked up at 18, I'm impulsive.

So they say I need an impulse control, but you never get it if you're doing life. You're on the bottom list. You're on the bottom of every list, so you don't get to see anybody. But now that they're about to let me go, they've got to meet their quotas. So they had me go over here and study this and sign this. How did it feel finally getting out after 41 years?

Oh, my goodness. What's that first day like? It was unbelievable. You know, it's like he, like the time came to get me here and his wife. And walking out of there is like you want to get as far away from the place. as possible as fast as you can. You know they're not going to change their mind that nobody's going to come say,

hey, we made a mistake. But it's like, finally, you know, I'm out and I don't have to look over my shoulder. It's pretty hard to describe. But it was, again, remember, I've always had a problem being cooped up in case. So it was like I was back in my element. you know but the world had changed so much it's like I'd never had a cell phone I used one one time

and that was they were they were closing the facility down and I needed to tell my folks because somebody was trying to come up the next day so my buddy he just he keeps a cell phone I'm like man I'm trying to go home I don't I don't even want to use it he said man go on just call I call but yeah the world had changed so much it's like you're not afraid But you're an unfamiliar territory. You know, it's the thing you've been wanting all your life. You've finally got it. You don't know.

What are you going to do with it? Is it what you expected it to be? Pretty much, yeah. And I'm one of them guys. I don't complain. You know, if I have to lay on that floor and sleep, I'm going to lay on the floor and sleep. Because it's because of the choices I made.

I did something to put me on the floor. So when I got out, it was like, yeah, and I was the first one out the door. Let's say it's maybe 19 guys going home. And when they said, who, I was like, I'm at the desk. I'm wow. Yeah, it was a big weight off your shoulders, too. Does it hit you hard freedom when you come out? It does.

Is it too much, you know? No, it was never like that for me. and probably because intelligence was always explained to me like it's versatility of adjustment. You have to be able to adjust. So I heard the stories, you know, guys in the supermarket and it's just too many choices and they get overwhelmed. And I think there are times.

Matter of fact, I went to Costco a couple times with my wife and I'll be like, I gotta go. In the beginning and she's like, huh? I said, she's just too many people milling about, you know. And she was like, oh, okay. And we leave. And I've gotten a whole lot better. And I think it only happens a few times to me.

But I've heard stories where, you know, guys are extremely uncomfortable. Maybe, like I said, in a Costco or something like that, early on in my parole, because I had to do four years parole, too, you know, which to me was good because I get a midnight job. I basically can't get in any trouble. I work, midnight, come home, sleep, and get on back to work. And I forgot, I say, I do that four years, and it's over. How long have you been out for now?

Eight years. And did you meet your wife afterwards, or you met her in prison? No, afterwards. We got married last year. Oh, congratulations. How did you guys meet? Online, plenty of fish. Oh, you used FOF on all the dating sites.

You use POF. Yeah. What did she think of your story when you met her? She loves it and thinks I should have done this long time ago. She's like, that's your platform, you know? And I'm like, so I'm trying to, I got an LLC, a nonprofit, and she's like, babe. Your platform, for the most part, is you. Your story, tell it, and help those who need to hear it, you know.

because you've got families with kids just like me, just got caught up, don't know what to expect, what to do, and I could help those people, you know. How do you think you're doing mentally? That's a big question because I haven't talked to anyone. My parole agent told me, she said, matter of fact, gave me a list. She said, you need to talk to somebody. Nobody does 41 years and comes out of the unscathed, right? And so there are times, like I was at a little meeting the other day, about to become a life coach.

And then telling my story, I started crying. And I'm like, man, I still haven't done or dealt with all this stuff. So mentally, I'm okay because I'm, you know, you become mentally strong. But I know I need to sit down and talk to a therapist to somebody like that. Well, you didn't cry today. Right. What would you tell your teenage self? before you ever, you know, stole those guns and committed the crime you committed.

Follow your big brother's lead. You know, follow the lead of somebody who's doing the right thing. Because this guy, man, he was voted outstanding young man of America. Not Michigan, America. You know, he's a clinical psychologist, REM doctor, you know, and now he's the president of the oldest seminary in Michigan. And that's our little brother. And he looks up to us both.

He looks up to me, but I look up to this guy. But that's what I would say. If you've got a good role model, follow him. Follow that person to the letter. You know, and don't, if somebody gives you a blueprint, don't venture off that path. Try to stick with it. When you look at the 41 years,

what do you think was the biggest memory that you lost and didn't get to experience? 41 years is such a long time. Probably fatherhood more than anything. You know, because you can go there and still pretty much see your kids. But it's not the same. You know, it's like right now I realize that I've never transformed my love from my parent to my child. you know, when you start having babies,

mom and dad are not your focus anymore. You know, it's like you love them the most until you have a kid. And now you've got somebody who needs you 24-7 and I missed all that. You know, and so I kind of beat myself up sometimes because I didn't give her all the love she should have got from me. How do you make up for that?

I don't think you can make up, but you can just do right, you know, try to talk and laugh and hang out. And so she's been to the house and, you know, we'll meet up, especially on good occasions like Father's Day. And I hit up for a daughter's day the other day. But yeah. When there's a daughter's day? Huh? Yeah.

There's a day for everything now. I'm sure you found out. Well, Stephen, I appreciate you taking the time to come out here today. I thank you for having me, man. It's been a really nice experience, too. The pleasure's all mine, and, you know, if you ever need anything, just reach out. I will.