Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - How Not to Get Away with Armed Robbery | Sandra Chotia

Episode Date: July 12, 2023

How Not to Get Away with Armed Robbery | Sandra Chotia

And when I woke up, he had already put a needle in my arm and was shooting me up while I was asleep. I jumped and screamed and turned around, and there's fucking nobody and nothing there. The girlfriend's behind me naked. So I turn around and block her arm like that, and they both just jump on me. You know, she jumps into the car and he just starts shooting. Now, in the police report, he says she fired first, but I know that's not true. When my lawyer showed me those, I was like, I was blown away. I did not realize how close to dying I actually came.

I opened up the back door and tell the little girl, I couldn't get out of the car, honey. She gets out. I open his door. He gets out. Buckle up. I look around and make sure I know what I'm doing, how to operate this vehicle, and then we just drive away. I was fucked. The cops had my car.

They had my name. They were after me for this. I was facing life in prison. and I knew it. Hey, this is Matt Cox, and I am going to be interviewing Sandra Chautia, and she's got an interesting story. Yeah, I don't know why I feel like every time I think about your story and I talk about your story and is that, you know, I'm, I'm, that it's, it's so touchy to me because it's so,

you know, you know, I'm saying, because there was a shoot, you know, there's a shoot at, well, there's robberies. There's a shootout. There's addiction. There's just a whole bunch of stuff. And that's not the null for, for, you know, for the people that I typically interview. But we had spoken a couple years ago. I think so.

Yeah. It was definitely two years ago because I was still living in someone's spare room. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I was out of the, I had just gone, I've gotten out of the halfway house. and you and I ended up talking and I think I was trying to convince you to write a memoir I'm working on it

I think that's why we ended up actually talking was I contacted you to get because you had you know I saw one of your videos and talking about how many books that you've written and stuff I was like maybe this guy can give me some direction right then I tried to I wanted you to come down

and get on concrete And then I wanted to come down here and get on my show and, you know, just arranging the whole thing just became, it's just becoming been more and more difficult. So I thought, hey, let's do a stream yard instead because because we did talk quite a while. And I know, I don't want to say a lot about your story, but I mean, I do know the basic, how it basically unfolds. And, you know, it's just like, it's just like super. It's, it's, it's very interesting. It's very, it's, I hate to say it very much could be a movie, you know. And I know you don't want to glamorize it or anything, but still, it's, it's, it's just a super interesting story.

You know, basically, you know, just the whole way it just kind of spiraled down the, you know, the rabbit hole. But, yeah. So let's let's go ahead and start off with like, you know, so where were you, where were you born? I was born in the San Francisco Bay area. Okay. And I only lived there until I was about five or so. Then my family moved to Utah, Ogden, Utah, which is where I pretty much grew up. Right.

And spent the last 30 years in Salt Lake City before my incarceration. And since then I've been up here in Oregon. Right. So brothers, sisters. So family, I have a. a twin sister and then I have an older brother and an older sister were your parents married and was a good childhood or no i mean my parents were married i wouldn't call my childhood happy at all it was you know i'm a the latchkey kid generation so there was not really any adult supervision at home

and my older siblings were monsters at the time are you the youngest uh yeah my my twin and sister and i are the youngest and they're just the thing that stands out the most of my mind from my childhood is just not feeling safe like ever so very like explosive and um environment in general to grow up in I moved out really young I moved out when I was 15 years old really 15 in Salt Lake City I moved from Ogden to Salt Lake City when I was 15, yeah. So how, I mean, what did you do for, were you still in school? No, I had dropped out of school.

And my natural father died when I was eight. And so I received like Social Security from the government until my 18th birthday. And at that time, you know, you could live on $600 a month. back in the late 80s, early 90s. So that's what I did. Okay. Lived in Salt Lake, got into the punk scene there, and, you know, found my tribe, basically. I still have a ton of friends from those days to now.

So, I mean, was there, were, you know, like, what kind of a kid were you? Were you in trouble all the time? Were you drugs? I was a monster You know I mean My brother and sister My older brother and sister

Both were pretty delinquent as well Both ended up dropping out And going back to high school And it was difficult for me In school at that time Because I don't want to say that people were overtly racist toward me, but I feel like back when I was a child, I thought people just didn't like

us. Like we just, you know, we got a lot of teasing and bullying from other students and even teachers would be like, they'd say our last name and be like, oh, you know, I know that name because of my older brother and sister. And we were just the most, we were the most ethnic family in the area where I lived. And that was just because my father was half East India. from India. So they knew my dad was brown, even though I totally don't look at it all. I think I pass as white very easily, but not back then. So I kind of internalized all of that, the disrespect and mistreatment, thinking there

was something wrong with me. It wasn't until I was an adult that I realized, oh, that was probably racism. I just didn't know it back then. Well, I mean, Salt Lake City is pretty, it's predominantly. I mean, it's very white. It brings white. It is. Salt Lake is actually pretty liberal, though.

You know, Ogden was where it was the worst. In Salt Lake City, it was, and to this day, I love Salt Lake. It's a great town. It's got a great art scene, music scene. It's beautiful, too. Huge day community. It's beautiful. Yeah, Utah is beautiful.

So did you go on to, you graduate? You know, you graduate. High school did you go on to... I did not graduate high school until I was in prison. I graduated high school in prison. That's right. You told me that you got your GED. No, I got my diploma.

Oh, in prison? Yeah. I had the time. It's like I didn't have anything else to do with my time. So I just... Isn't that you're just your GED? No? I'm sorry?

Isn't that just your GED? No, the GED is something that you can... It's a tent. you can take, and it doesn't matter how many credits you have accrued, you'll get a, you know, an equivalent diploma. Okay. Yeah. But when I had the time to go ahead and earn all of the credits that it takes for a high

school diploma, so that's what I did. Okay. So, so after you, so, okay, so 18, 19, so obviously you didn't, you didn't go on to college. You didn't have a high school diploma. You just started working. like what were you doing for for work in your well my first job official job was at 18 years old as a exotic entertainer okay i did that for a couple of years and then i met the man that i ended up marrying and um so i stopped that work and went on to like wait tables and stuff

off and on for years and yeah was he a customer or no no no no just somebody i met through friends and um you know he uh he didn't really object to my uh doing that for a living but it just i didn't want to be doing that for a living and dealing with uh you know the clientele and stuff and you know being under 21 it means you can only work in clubs that are are all naked. So, you know, it was a bad environment for me to be in any way. And I don't think anybody at that age should be allowed to do that kind of work. That's crazy to me.

How old were you when you stopped? I was about, I was 20. And I married just before my 21st birthday. And my husband went back to college. He had been going to the, he's from. Minnesota was going to the U of M, and then when he came out to Utah, he took a couple of years to get himself established there, and then he went back to school, which was all good until the master's program. He's an architect, so he had to do his master's degree, and during that time, I actually went back to dancing, but it was as 21 and over. So it was just like a standard what you expect for that kind of club.

And I did that for another five years while he finished his graduate degree and internship. Okay. Any kids? I have two kids, two beautiful kids. My son, Dero, nope, I shouldn't say, same. My son is 27 and my daughter is 21. And this is from that marriage? Yes.

Okay. Yeah. He wants Khan Bank of America out of $250,000, using nothing but a fake ID and his charm. He is the most interesting man in the world. I don't typically commit crime, but when I do, it's bank fraud. Stay greedy, my friends. Support the channel. Join Matthew Cox's Patreon.

So how, so what happened then? I mean, when did, or were you doing, were you into drugs at that time or? I always smoked weed. I started really young. My brother got me stoned my first time when I was like 12. And then by the time that I was 14, I was basically smoking every day in which I continued to do, to smoke every single day. God, until I was like 31. yeah until i was about 31 so and then it got too strong and i can't i can't even touch it now i'm

just like no so so when when did you meet um shoot i forget her name uh well we're not going to say her name my girlfriend yes so i should probably cover the marriage a little more uh before i got into her. So I married just before my 21st birthday, and we were pretty happy, you know, for the first 10 years or so of our marriage. But, you know, I had become a complete people pleaser because of the circumstances of my childhood, not only at home, but at school and such. Like, I just wanted people to like me and would do any.

anything. I was like, I'm the friend that will go that extra mile for their friends. But it was really like, I'll let people exploit me because I want them to like me. And it was no different with my husband. So, you know, he kind of got used to me structuring my entire life around him and basically not voicing real needs of my own. And he was like a, a bottomless pit of need for validation, sexual gratification, and just, you know, basically, but really, he was very dismissive. He still is to this day. It's very dismissive of women as people. Like, it was very, it felt very dehumanizing toward the end. I just was like, it doesn't matter what I do. I can't ever make him happy. He's addicted to porn. He's an

alcoholic he's constantly comparing me to women in these films and wondering why I won't do what they do and it just he became everything that I really disliked in the type of man that I really dislike which is you know objectifying women and acting like the world revolves around them and, you know, just gaslighting, all of that kind of thing. So it kind of all came to a screeching halt in the marriage in our third attempt at marital therapy. The day that I really made up my mind that it was over, the therapist, we were in session, and the therapist asked him what I did to make him feel like I loved him.

And he thought about it for a second, and he said, well, I feel like she loves me when she has sex with me. And the therapist was like, okay, yeah. And well, what else? Is there more? And he thinks about it for a second. And then he just said, well, no, there's not anymore. And I'm like, I think the therapist saw my face. They just went like, oh, shit, you know.

And I just kind of blew up. I was like, you're kidding me, right? Like I took my clothes off to help you get through your master's degree. I've given you two beautiful children. I do almost all of the child care. I work around your schedule. I celebrate every achievement that you've made and keep your house clean and do the cooking and do the shopping, all the good things that your good wife is supposed to do. But none of that tells you, I love you. I have to be on my back. That's how I can tell you that I love you. And he was just like, yeah, like he looked confused.

Like you didn't understand why I was getting upset. And I just looked at the therapist and I said, I think we're done here. There's not really much more to say. I mean, you know, I was done being an object to someone. And I was done feeling like the only way I had any value was if I was giving something, giving myself or something to someone, I was just over it. So how long, how long did it take for you to leave at that point? I was out of the house like three or four months later.

I mean, it was, it was really stressful time. I was 98 pounds when I moved out of the house. I'm almost 5'6. Wow. So, yeah, it was a really stressful time. And it's scary to me because I had never really been alone. I've always had a boyfriend or partner up until the divorce. And when I moved into a place on my own, it's a house to myself.

We were splitting the kids 50-50. But, you know, I was a codependent person and afraid to be alone. So I was just taking in whoever would, whoever wanted me, basically. and that's how I ended up with the first boyfriend after the divorce. He was the one that was a heroin addict, and I didn't know it. And it took some time, but, you know, when somebody goes and stays in your bathroom for an hour and a half, like twice a day, I started to get, I'm like, what are you doing in there? And he had really light blue eyes, so, like, he'd come out and heroin constricts your pupils. tiny and he would just it would be so obvious and so I started pressing him about it and finally

just caught him I just I just barged into the bathroom one day because the door didn't lock and caught him and that's when he started campaigning he's like please understand I have a really bad back which I was aware of and he's like you know I'm trying to get on pain medications I'm trying to get it handled but until I can this is the only thing that keeps me able to get up and operate during the day. And he's like, and you have a lot of back pain too, you know, and blah blah. Long story short, he talked me into trying it and then saw to it because I didn't know what I was doing.

He just saw to it that I was injected as quickly as possible and then, you know, got me addicted as quickly as possible. And then he made sure that I stayed addicted for almost a full year. And I wouldn't have said that except for one time, about three or four months in, I tried to quit on my own. And he had told me that, oh, you're going to be sick for weeks. You know, it's horrible. And, you know, at that point, when I decided to try and kick it, I hadn't, I wasn't really using that much.

So I thought it can't really be that bad. And I got through the first two days and on the third day was really, really hard. And I called him and asked him to come and watch my kids because I was, you know, kicking and fell asleep on the couch waiting for him to get there. And when I woke up, he had already put a needle in my arm and was shooting me up while I was asleep. And I mean, just trying to make sure you stayed addicted or? Yeah. I want me to stay addicted. Just being a douchebag.

He was a douchebag, definitely. Okay. So it was through him that I met my girlfriend that all of this shit happened with. It took me to a birthday party at her house, and she had just gotten off of heroin herself with a new drug at that time called Suboxin. Right.

It was just coming out in like 2000. 2005 and how old were you at this point 2005 I was 33 at the end of 2005 I would turn 33 so okay um what were you doing for for work at this point I was waiting tables um had a really nice restaurant uh but I was kind of on my last legs there because because of the heroin use. My boss could tell there was something going on. He didn't know what, but, yeah. So that's what I was doing at that time. At the party, I talked to Simon. I talked to them for a while about what it is to withdraw.

I was just like, this is what Chris is telling me, and all of this crazy stuff. And he's dead now, by the way. But you die. I don't care. I don't know. I thought maybe it was heroin. Could have been.

Drugs. Most likely. And my understanding is getting off heroin is horrible. It's horrible. Horrible. It is. I've never heard of anybody saying it was, oh, it was easy or it was a good experience. They're always like, bro, like, my, your bones hurt.

You don't even understand. Like, it's so bad. It's horrendous. The physical withdrawals. are horrible by themselves, but there's the psychological and emotional withdrawals that last much, much, much longer. But we can go into that. When we get to that point, but to stay on track, I was talking to Simon about the, you know, withdrawal.

And they said, don't listen to him. He's addicted to the kick. And she said, when you're ready, to actually when you're ready to quit come see me i will i'll give you some suboxone tell you how to take it and she said you know it is a miracle drug it you don't have to go through all of that withdrawal and illness like she's like you know you can take it for three days and you'll be fine afterward so uh within the next couple of weeks i lost my job and knew i just had to do something about it and went to her and she gave me the Suboxone, told me how to use it. I went to another

friend's house and kicked using this Suboxin. And on the third day or the fourth day, I mean, I didn't have to take any at all. I felt fine. I was, you know, super, super grateful. So I went back to my girlfriend's house and um thank to thank her and she actually was moving everything out of her house at that time she had done something a little crazy to get her dealers to stop coming to her house and it was bad enough that they they wanted to hurt her so she had to sell the house and move quickly and like where are you moving to she's like I don't know. I'm just going to couch surf for a while, I guess. And I had an extra room in my apartment. So I was like, well, you can come stay with me. You know, I felt like she had

saved my life, basically. And it was the least that I could do. Um, so she did end up coming and staying with me. And you still, was the boyfriend still there? Sorry. No, no. So he's gone. Okay. He's gone. Sorry. Yeah. I, I threw him out after after all that with waking up with him doing that to me. I was like, you get away from me, you know. Um, you, so, uh, you, so the girlfriend that helped you that now has a drug dealer looking for her, you thought, you need to come to my place. No, yeah, they had no idea who I was. Okay. I was not associated with her. I wasn't even a friend of hers, really. So. Right. Still. Questionable.

Yeah, they didn't know for sure that she was responsible for what happened because basically she had her friend and their cousin come and rob the dealer while they were at the house. So they thought it might be her. So they're not positive. They weren't 100% positive. And of course, she was like, no, I got robbed too. And then they're done. So I don't know how hard.

the dealer was looking for her but he had said i don't want to hurt you blah blah when he called her the next day i want my money my drugs and she's like i don't have them you know it was a crazy situation um but yeah it was i didn't feel like it was unsafe to have her come to my place just because they didn't know who the hell i was i didn't hang out at the house i was you know right you just met her like that one time and yeah i understand well i knew of her she been around town in the same scene that I was in as far as like the punk scene. So I knew of her, but we, we had not actually met until, until my boyfriend had introduced us at her birthday party. So she, there's so much to say. I don't even know. I don't even know.

if I should go into every little bit of detail, but I should tell you about what happened right before she ended up moving in. She had a... I'm trying to keep this straight. So when in between when I told her that she could move in with me, there was this point I'm trying to remember exactly the sequence of how this happened because yeah that's right okay so it was after the birthday party and it was before I got some boxing from her that I had this one night it was after I'd kicked my boyfriend out so I was at my apartment alone and I had started a job once I left the restaurant I was doing like I was in a tile store

right working at a tile store eight to five and I was still using and I would set an alarm for like four o'clock in the morning to do this tiny little dose that would keep me well for the next 24 hours um because i guess it my ex-boyfriend had told me like you know you only have to do it once every 24 hours to stay well to stay well and so that's what i was doing you know in the process of making my mind up to actually really quit but uh so i set the alarm at 4 a.m get up do that little bit and go back to bed um with the idea being that by eight o'clock when i had to be at work I would be over the nodding stage where you can nod out sitting up in the middle of a conversation and kind of lose consciousness. It's kind of crazy.

But so this is what I'm doing. This one night I'm home alone. I'm in bed. And about three o'clock in the morningish, I don't know if it was a bad dream. Something just woke me up. I woke up as I was sitting up, like going, ooh. And so I'm sitting up in bed. everything's dark in the middle of the night.

And I hear the ex-boyfriend calling my name outside my front window. I lived in one of those old shotgun apartments. It was like a little duplex built around this turn of the last century. And so the bedroom was like right at the front of the apartment. And the front windows, you know, my bedroom. Anyway, he's outside my window. Hey, Sandra, let me in. And I recognize his voice immediately.

and I'm like, what, what, Sandra, let me in, like, oh, you know, get out of bed, throw my robe, go around to the front door and just rip the door open because I'm pissed that he's bothering me in the middle of the night, I have work the next day, rip the door open and there's nobody there. And, you know, I'm just thinking, okay, I must be, I must have dreamed that, whatever, lock the door, go around and get back into my bed. I'm like head doesn't even hit the pillow and I hear him out front again Sandra it's Chris let me in you know and I yell out to him like god damn I have work in the morning why are you bothering me blah blah blah go around rip the door front door open again there's

nobody there and I'm just like what what the fuck step out on my porch and I look down the front of the building and there's nobody standing there I look down along the side of my apartment goes toward the back door. I couldn't see anybody there. And I'm like, Chris, where are you? Come out and I'm out the front door. And I hear behind me, I hear this. I'm already inside.

His voice. I'm already inside. And like, you know, thinking to myself, did I give him a key? I didn't think I had given him a key, but there is a back door. So I go back in to the apartment. And when I'm, there's this tiny little vestibule of the front door. and then the living room and I go to that doorway to the living room and my apartment just is unnaturally dark and there's usually window you know light coming in from the windows and

stuff but the room looked just like black and I kind of got this cold chill I'm like Chris we what do you do come out come out um you're freaking me out a little bit here and it's quiet for a second and then on the front porch behind me, like four feet behind me, I hear, I'm out front, let me in. And at this point, I get, I got total, like, goosebumps, like, what the fuck is going on? And I turn around, the door has a window in it, that there's a bamboo blind over. And I flip on the porch light and lean, like, I'm leaning way over to move the blind out of the way so I can see on the front. porch and as I touched the blind and start to move it out of the way and something like tapped me on my hip and I jumped and screamed and turned around and there's

fucking nobody and nothing there and just you know I was done I went and got back back into bed pulled the blankets over my head and I'm like just I just start praying I just started praying really hard because I felt like you're hallucinating You know, I wish, I wish I could say without a doubt that it was a hallucination. I don't think that it was. I think that... Wasn't him. It wasn't him.

I did get a visual in my mind when I closed my eyes of something that was not human. And had... I mean, this is more out of the way, but my family does have something that comes around and harasses, we've got a lot of very sensitive, I don't want to say psychic because I don't really believe in that, but they're sensitive types in my family. I'm not one of them. Nothing like that had ever happened to me before. But the next morning, I called my twin sister because she had had something attached to her when we were in junior high, like seventh grade. she started sleeping with a knife under her pillow we shared a bed she started weird behavior from her a lot of weird things and i heard saying that she's talking to something um she's actually um trained clairvoyant at this point she's divination and stuff that she's always had a lifetime interest in this shit um back then i felt like i remember crying thinking oh i wish i had something that was supporting me and talking to me la la la you know

But I just never had anything like that happened to me before. So I call her the next day and I'm telling her what happened. And when I get to the point where I said, you know, I closed my eyes and I saw this face. And she's like, stop right there. And she's like, it looked like this. And she fucking described it to a T, Matthew. I get chills now thinking about that because I had a feeling that's what it was. And it just never had gotten to me because I've always had a really good relationship with.

with Jesus you know or the divine power whatever so you think it was some kind of a spirit that was pretending to be the ex-boyfriend yes kind of mess with you because it obviously wasn't him no it wasn't him I think it was this entity that has attached itself to not only my twin sister but a niece and a nephew I both had issues with this thing and uh honestly I didn't know how much I really believed that any of that shit you know my aunt would talk about it and my sister-in-law would talk about it with her son having the issues and I and I was just like oh my god this is just like this fantasy that's traveling throughout my family that-da-da-da until that happened and I feel like when you are on drugs

you are weaker obviously spiritually mentally physically there there's you're not you know a hundred percent and I feel like it was only because of of the addiction and the depression and fear that I was living in being on my own not having you know support of my my husband and people in the house with me every night that that able to get that close to me. It hasn't been able. I haven't seen it again since. Nothing like this has happened again since. But I was praying because I felt like I couldn't feel Jesus close to me anymore at that time. And I just used that word because that's the religion I was brought up in. I don't believe that Jesus is the one way only way in Christianity.

It's the one way only way. I really disagree with a lot of Christianity, but I use that verbiage because that's what I know. So I just want people to know when I say Jesus, don't get turned off by that. If you're not into Jesus, I don't care who you're into or if you're not into nothing. That's fine. But that's just what I use. Anyway, my prayers were, I'm, I feel like I'm in the wilderness and I need a light. I need something to help guide me back through this because I'm in, I'm over my head, clearly, uh, and need help. And it was like a couple of nights later that Simon showed up at my house. Now, at this point, I had met Simon at the birthday party.

I had told them that they could come stay with me, but they hadn't confirmed that they were going to do that yet. And so as far as I knew, Simon didn't even really, they didn't even have my phone number because I had gone to their house, just showed up, you know, back when you can still do that. They, oh, Simon. Oh, okay. They did not have my phone number. They did not know where I lived. so for them to show up at my door that was kind of weird but what i did the little that i did know personally about simon chris my ex-boyfriend used to make fun of her for being a bible thumper

for being born-again christian and uh she was pretty devout in a way even though she had a crazy life um but anyway seeing her there i was just coming in i was just grateful to see somebody that I could talk to about this. And when I told her about, I asked her to pray with me, which she did. And that's when the rest started happening with the kicking Suboxin, or I mean, kicking Subox, with her coming and moving in. She didn't move in right away. She would just come over, like, to visit for a few days, I guess, it was like spread out over two, three weeks. It was like a few times between them. And then she, when she moved in with me,

we hadn't started a relationship or anything, but it was not long after that, that stuff, you know, happened between us, and we ended up sleeping together. And it all, then all the relationship with her got started. Am I being cohesive enough? I feel like I'm kind of,

yeah. No, no, I, the entity thing is, you know, a curveball from what I, but I do remember you telling me that or mentioning something about it when we had talked like years ago. Yeah, well, because of that happening that way, and me praying so hard for a light. And then this Christian Bible thumper shows up at most. door but they are you know they're not like this missionary type person they're the kind of person I can relate to and I can trust because I know I know she's part of my tribe she's part of the punk scene and um that that she had recently quit heroin so ending up in a relationship with her

I had this feeling like God sent her to me right I had I believed and at that time I was more strictly Christian you know I hadn't really it was it was during my time in prison that I I opened up to like wait a minute this isn't this isn't the only way to to think and get to the divine you know other people have different spiritual practices and beliefs and they're all valid they're all good they're all good but at this time yeah it was it was pretty heavy head fucked to believe this person. God sent this person to me

to save me from all of, you know, this darkness that I felt like was around me. And you know, I lit up around her. I was completely infatuated. Like, you know, after we

slept together at first, I was like, I don't know if I should have done that. But that quickly changed to just being really stoked about her. I treated her like a rock star. She was a rock star to me. Well, what was she doing at that time? Because I know you guys were recording music and...

Not yet. We weren't doing music yet at that time. Right. But at that time, what was she doing for a living? She didn't really have to work. She is a single child of rich parents. Um, she had just sold her house and at a profit. So she had, you know, around 40 or 50 grand in the bank. Um, and she's very, she was, she was very socially backward. Like, she didn't know her social security number. She didn't know her bank account number. Like, these types of things she didn't, did not deal with. well at all uh she didn't deal with people well or anything that she saw as an authority type figure

she was very very crazy wild person but um so she you guys start seeing each other yeah she we start seeing each other and it was a It was very intoxicating in the beginning. The sex was great. And I actually felt like comfortable with her in that way, which was the first time in my life feeling that way with my sexual partner. Usually I was, I just kind of dreaded it because I hadn't accepted that I was gay yet. So, well, I was kind of assigned my sexuality as a child anyway.

So I figured it out, you know, by her. and it was great, but she was looking to, let's see, first of all, within a couple of weeks of her staying at my house, I noticed she was spending time in the bathroom. Now you have, yeah, okay, but now you're seeing, you've got it, though. Now you're like, oh, wait a minute. Now I know something's up when somebody spends that much. time in the bathroom. Yes. I was like, you know, but I didn't, I didn't want to confront her right away because she had to go get her Suboxone every morning. And so I knew she was doing that.

But then, you know, after the third time that she was in there for a long period of time, I just was like, I knocked on the door. I'm like, hey, I need to use the bathroom. Can I come in? and then I just opened the door and she was in there sitting on the floor with a little a little glass tube with a bulb on the end and a lighter

and I'm like, what is that? What is that? And she was like, well, I'm, it's just, I'm, I'm just, I'm smoking meth. and I was like, you can do that. You know, I had tried it a few times during my dancing days, but I had always just, you know, snorted it.

I had no idea that you could even use it that way. And I didn't know that she used it. I had known about her for years. I knew she hung around with, we called them the vagina junkies. They're all the gay, the lesbian heroin users, basically. there was like this subset of the social circles that I traveled in. So I knew, you know, about the heroin, but I didn't know about the speed. And me, not wanting to be alienated and not wanting to alienate, I'm like, well, can I, can I have a hit?

Let me try that. And to Simon's credit, she was like, I don't know, you really don't want to get messed up with this stuff. it's great at first but by the time that you really know you have a problem it's completely undermined your life like so she's like you know I don't know if you want to try that and I'm like oh I've done it before you know and and I can take it or leave it like I walked away from it last time no problem and dumb of course nobody nobody is immune to addiction um it's not as quickly addictive as as heroin is but um plus you said you had snorted it last time you hadn't is it is it different is it different smoking it as far as how quickly you become

physically dependent yeah like does it have like is it like the difference between like snorting coke or you know you know smoking crack you know I'm saying like supposedly the the addiction rate is is a massively different Oh, for between Coke and crack, me? No, between, well, I mean, crack is, is, is, is, is, is, well, it's crack is cocaine. Yeah. But one, you're snorting it, you know, so you're, and then one, you know, you're smoking like a rock. So they, they, from my understanding is that smoking a rock is more addictive.

Mm-hmm. And just snorting it. So I'm saying, since you snorted it before, is actually smoking it, you know, is it more addictive that way? Um, you know, it. It might be. It might be. I don't just ask me.

Yeah, I'm not, I'm not totally sure. I have, I mean, I've heard from, from people who, who smoked heroin that said that the, the drug gets into the tissues in your lungs and it makes it harder, the withdrawal is harder because it just saturates your lungs. some sort of way and I mean and smoking meth may be the same thing but it was you know it was fine at first I didn't do it all the time but uh once Simon knew that I was okay with her doing that I wasn't going to throw her out for doing that she was like offering it more often. And, you know, I was working, but, you know, I didn't have to get up super early in the morning or anything to go to work. However, getting so involved with Simon and staying, you know, staying up late with her and occasionally missing a night's sleep and such, you know, I was becoming

unstable and at least as far as my work was concerned and they they fired me and I freaked out I hadn't been fired for over 20 years you know or no that point it was like 15 years since I've been fired from a job and you know here I am living on my own I don't have support coming in for my ex-husband he said I didn't ask for anything in the divorce I just want it i'm like i want you to pay for the kids this college that's all i care about you know i'm not going to have a big contested divorce and ask for a spousal support or anything like that and so i was an idiot but that's what i did and um so i was really freaked out because how am i going to pay my rent how am i going to pay my bills like uh it was really really

fucking scary. But Simon had a fat stack of cash in her bank account and was like, oh, you don't need to work for now. Like, just take a little time off and figure out what you're going to, what you really want to do.

And, you know, she's like, I'll just take care of you. And so that just opened up a lot more time for drug use. And you know, they you like to have sex a lot when you're doing meth and I kid you not for the first year

we probably had sex at least three times a day if not more like it was a lot but you know it was the first time in my life that I was like comfortable with my lover and was happy when they wanted to touch me like it's the first time I felt secure that I wasn't being objectified and And I wouldn't be, you know, what's the word, denigrated or by, you know, just made to feel like less, anyway, by my partner. So, you know, that, realizing that that's how I felt with her, like, really was when I fell in love hard, I was just like, this is like a spiritual connection. felt this electricity when we touched like it was like literally this feeling

of electricity and pleasurable and so we were like always hanging on each other like for that first year we were like almost never physically separate at least we're touching legs while watching TV or touching hands

and so she started shopping for a house and at first I just thought she was going to buy a small house and move out but then she started saying that she wanted she wanted me and my kids to be able to live with her you know I did have my kids half the time so it would be four days when we'd wait three days the next so she started looking at bigger houses and the one that she ended up buying was large enough for me to have my bedroom for her

to have a bedroom and for each of my kids to have a bedroom so it was important that she and i had separate bedrooms because she's in the closet with her family right her father was our pastor we did Bible studies with them he baptized me it was her idea she just like we're at lunch with her parents and all of a sudden oh Sandra wants to be baptized

looking at her like do I? I don't but I think she did it because she knew that would endear me to her parents and she you know experience why she's spending so much time with me like she's she's getting me saved right i do this a lot because a lot of it was i know now it was complete bullshit but we're both good christians and we need to spend a lot of time together

and she's the kind of person that you want me to be around and so you're going to help support that and support us and be happy with the yeah i was her i was her best friend right you know i was she always had a yeah i'll keep doing that she always had a best girlfriend you know who was actually her girlfriend, but her parents' understanding for what she told them and the rest of her family was that this is my best friend. And so, you know, I was the roommate and best friend. Right. For that. So, you know, we started doing Bible study on Sundays with the family, and I'm going. and you know I I wasn't ready to in my view to be baptized because I was like I'm not done sinning

like I'm not going to all of a sudden become this a righteous person who is described by like the way her her parents describe good Christians to be right which is hilarious but anyway so you know I'm trying to take it seriously you know I don't I'm not a good liar. I'm not somebody who's comfortable deceiving others. And I do believe that omissions are lies. And, you know, it was when we started getting closer to the parents that I started to see assignment's capacity for lying. Not just like telling enough of a lie to get through whatever obstacle that it is with with the folks but tell them a doozy doozies yeah elaborate lies things that weren't necessary to say and i was just like i started to get really uncomfortable with the

situation and uh starting to ask asking her well how are you resolving your lifestyle with your your religious your religion um you know we're going to bible studies her dad makes pointed comments about homosexuality and about, you know, becoming a mature Christian, blah, blah, blah. And to me, I'm like, that was pretty pointed. Like, you know, is he guessing what's going on or he's just trying to, like, subtly get her to turn away from being a lesbian? Were they ever curious?

Or were they ever, you know, like, I'm not curious. guess suspicious like or like they thought way to something's up something's you know they ever i don't know how they couldn't right that's what i was thinking like i was thinking how could you not realize even if look even if you two the point is is that you know i i always say it's like intuition is you know it's a motherfucker like you can tell you can feel things and two people that are together that have a a romantic connection you spend a little bit of a time with them you're going to feel that like hey there's a closeness here that is more than friendship um i i i think you know and i'm a big believer in intuition so i would think that

they could they could tell something but i i'm i'm 99.9% positive that they knew the truth however they would never speak it out loud because then that would be concrete and the whole that she might change and she might find a man to be with, you know, could still exist. It could still hold on to that hope. However, in her entire life, Simon had one boyfriend. He was 10 years younger than her. He had beautiful long black hair down to his hips and a very feminine face. It was a very beautiful boy.

And that was the only male that she had ever brought around her parents because that's the only male she ever hung out with or dated. But that was enough to, I think, made their suspicions die down a little bit because I was the next partner after that person. however no I do think that they knew I know that her mother pulled me aside once and was asking me some pretty pointed questions and I'm going off of Simon's playbook and just like kind of you know avoiding the subject and you know placating as best as I could But that was the only time that she ever did that. That was pretty early on in our relationship. Simon, we'll go a little rundown with Simon's character and how she kind of operated. Like I was telling you, she did not know her own Social Security number. She was not, like, capable, life capable, adult capable.

She was very artistic, had a hell of a temper, like assaulting people on a regular basis temper. You know, she could be just vicious. And, of course, she was directing at other people at the time, not at me, you know. But there were a few times where I was like, Simon, you can't just assault people. You can't just kick somebody because they're in your way. like what are you doing you can't do that uh you know it wasn't long before she did start having issues like anger issues around me um nothing physical but she would she'd run off she'd run off and at that time i had a studio in a rehearsal space um with instruments and stuff and uh i get let her have a key so

you know she'd run off down there not tell me where she was not answer her phone or texts and basically you know if she didn't like the way conversation was going or what you were saying or she didn't want to do something that you were asking her to do it was a blow up she'd scream and yell and she'd do this to her parents as well um and uh i get the you know the i got the feeling at that time from her parents that they were, everybody was basically afraid of her anger. And so she would have, whoever she was with would basically handle all of the life shit that she couldn't handle. Like if some of a call needed to be made to the bank about an account or whatever, the person that she was with would do it.

And so when I was with her, that's what I was doing. And she just, I mean, she produced a lot of art. She was a great poet. And, you know, in my view, I was like, I'm just going to handle this routine shit for her so that she has all this energy to devote to her art because it's so great. It was so good. And it was exciting to be around, you know. I was a music. in my own right, but of course, I never felt worthy or good. So I, you know, I was always in awe of what

she could do. And, you know, eventually we did start playing music together, which was nice. But she had a, she had a hair trigger temper, basically, and a complete aversion to being a grown-up like serious Peter Pan syndrome and her parents pretty much enabled that you know

her dad was using her as a tax shelter anyway she never did her own taxes which is probably why she didn't know her social security number he was claiming her as a defendant he was claiming her as the VP of his company which she was neither of those things except for the allowance

he was giving her basically they they didn't insist on her acting like an adult and she basically trained everyone else around her not to expect her to be an adult and so that's how we kind of got into this relationship that so quickly we were our lives were so entangled like when she bought the house and we moved in it was my things that we moved into the house like i set up house housekeeping. The place that she lived in before, it was disgusting. It was piles everywhere. It was like nobody clean. Nobody touched anything. And I'm like, I'm not living like that. I won't live like that. So I move my things in, set up housekeeping. At this point, she's my source of income. So basically, she's covering my bills or whatever. And, you know, I'm basically being the little housewife for her and doing all, you know, being her good duty, doing all her errands and bullshit, which is a terrific way to avoid my own problems,

which was basically what I always had done, was involve myself in other people's issues and be the rescuer so that I don't have to look at and deal with my own. It's why I didn't graduate high school, you know, until I was in prison. And at that point, I was forced to go. right so at the time we're moving in together yes we are using meth and this is going on for about a year i had moved everything from my music studio into our basement so we had our music studio in the basement we had a terrific gaming PC a flat screen TV PS2 i think it was at that time we had this nice mac computer for doing film so like we were doing film music um writing as she was doing

art so i'm like i built her her art studio in the house the house was like an artist's Disneyland right the only people that we let come around were other artists so that's how we ended up meeting Jameson who he was kind of the downfall of the whole situation he was he's also dead he's a was a sociopath and how did he die heroin okay yeah so as far as like there were a lot of significant things going on around that time but he was a main character in that destabilizing the relationship I was in with Simon totally manipulating and doing crazy things to me behind my back wall to my face being my best my best friend because you know after after a couple of years Simon was not on her best behavior anymore

and she had me completely dependent on her. I was iced out of my other social circles and all the other friends that I used to be friends with because I was using meth. And nobody wants people on that drug around. No, you know, decent people. So at this point, I'm not having connections with any of my friends or family.

She's everything to me. I'm just orbiting her, basically. What about your kids? You're still saying your kids. My kids, they came. I was still doing 50-50 custody. They came to the house there. The first couple of years that we were in the house. It was just that as time went on, more and more shady people were being allowed into our space. Right. And I mean, Simon would let somebody move in, like a friend of hers. Oh, you can move in and just help do work on the house because we were

remodeling the house. Just help do work on the house. You know. in lieu of rent and you can come stay here and uh this it never worked out that way i was the only one that was doing work on the house everybody else was just there for the bag because she'd share her drugs uh with whomever because basically it's a reciprocal thing when you get into a circle of addicts right they're all using the same drug we all share with each other because then when they have the bag they come share with us you know what I'm saying it's like a way of mutually assuring

supply but these are shady ass people right and I have at that time a six year old daughter and a 12 year old son and this last person that Simon had let come into the house kept leaving the back door open

not just unlocked fucking open and my kids' bedrooms were right The second time I caught him doing that at night, I'm like, you're the fuck out. Do you get out? This is Simon's house, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, no, it's my house. And you've got to get out. No, I'm saying, is this Jamerson?

No, this was another guy that she led at the house. I'm just saying why my kids stopped coming to the house was because I could no longer control these shady people being around. Right. Now, Jameson had moved back to Salt Lake City from, I think it was Santa Fe or somewhere like that. He was introduced to me through a mutual friend because that friend knew that I used meth, and apparently that's what Jameson wanted. He was looking for a connection. Jameson, more was never enough for that dude. Anything and everything he gives hands on.

but at the time when my mutual friend was saying well would you mind if i let him know that you can help get hook him up i was like well can he control himself he's not somebody that's going to go off the rails right and i mean how well do you know this dude because the person i'm talking to my our mutual friend i'd known for over a decade and he's like oh yeah he's totally got his together you know he's a they always say movies he's a scene painter I basically played him off like he was this guy that was a great artist and had to sit together.

Yeah. So I smoked with him that evening. Smoked meth with him, a puddle, we called it. And he immediately asked me, he's like, well, do you ever get to the point? Right over my head. I'm going to get to the point. I'm sorry.

He's like, you know, do you ever, you know, do you ever shoot it up? I was like, oh, no, no, no, no, no. After I got off heroin, I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no needles, no. He said, oh, that's cool. Like, do you do that? He's like, well, I have. I was just wondering if you did, you know? And so he, I give him my number. He starts calling me up to hook him up, which I'm doing, because when I do that for somebody, then I get a little bit for myself. So another thing with the, that addicts do. They'll hook you up, but you're going to pay it, you know. And before long, I invited him over to visit. He brought his girlfriend with him. They were both using.

Over the next course of the next few weeks, he started coming more and more, like both of them, more and more, earlier and earlier in the day. and we did not know at this time that Jameson was shooting up but he was shooting up Simon found evidence of that in one of the bathrooms

on more than one occasion and she was like she was really leery of him she's like this is the kind of person that wants to drag everyone into their own misery I don't think you should trust this guy and I'm like well you know, our friend told me this, this, this about him and just tell him, you know, not to do that. We can just make sure that he knows we don't want that being done here.

And so we had that conversation with him and things were fine for a while. He starts working with Simon. Simon's dad has a company that Simon would occasionally work with. And she ran a crew so she could hire her own crew. so Jameson starts working with her and long story short it's going well Jameson is a male Simon's father is chauvinist and misogynist so he starts looking at Jameson like he's the actual lead of the team not Simon even though it was Simon's team and Simon and I take a brief trip what when you say team what do you mean like construction are these i don't want to say what

type of business it was um because that's a little too telling uh i'm trying to avoid her family being brought into this as much as possible okay because they are still very much in denial about what happened um that will come out more later we might have to do this in two parts because I don't know how long my voice is going to hold out. It's such a long story, Matt. Okay. Anyway, Simon and I take a weekend out of town. It was like a four-day weekend out of town.

And while we are gone, Jameson directly contact Simon's dad, which is a no-no in Simon's book. That's a breach of etiquette in Simon's book. You don't go to her parents. You go through her. But he had contacted her dad directly. and was asking him for a company truck and, you know, for,

basically was trying to usurp Simon and get into a higher position around her. This, when Simon found this out, she was furious. She banned him from the house. She banned me from talking to him. She was like, you know, no forgiveness. no quarter you're done done get the fuck away from me and don't come around again

which is what happened and he stayed away um for a couple of months before he contacted me and was like oh I miss you I just want to take you to lunch just miss hanging out with you at this point I have been I'm on a yo-yo situation with Simon. Like, come here, come here. And then when I get close, she's like, get away me, get away from me, you know, it's a volatile relationship. Things have started to become physical. There are fights, you know, obviously we're not getting adequate sleep, not getting adequate food, not getting adequate water. Everything is just really unstable. And so our arguments are blowing up and they're getting physical. She got physical with me on a regular

races. So I was lonely and hearing a friendly voice that he wants to see me, I went to lunch with him. When I told Simon that I had seen him for lunch, she called me a traitor. She threatened to break up with me. I was like, what? It's not that bad. All I did was go to lunch with him. It's not like I'm asking him over or anything. She's like, I told you not, you didn't need to cut him out. I was like, well, I have it, you know, but, uh, you know, this one thing, I went to lunch with him, big deal. But, you know, she was furious. And so I, again, stopped talking. I'm like, I can't really see you. You can text me, but I can't really see you or talk to you. And, uh, within a week or so, he had got him out drinking with his girlfriend. His girlfriend was horribly sick. He begged

me to let me her come over she wasn't banned i was like well you can drop her off you know she can sleep on the couch i'll take care of her but you can't be here and because simon had was actually out of the house at that time she had gone somewhere right you never know how long she's going to be gone it could be an hour it could be a day anyway of course they get there to drop off the girlfriend and before they can walk out the door simon walks in. What the fuck are you doing in my house? I told you to fucking stay away.

Screaming at him, screaming at me. And I'm like pointing to the girlfriend. Like she's just really, really sick. Like she, like I need to bring her a waste basket. She's going to be sick. Like that's all, they're here to drop her off. That's it. He's leaving.

He's leaving. And, you know, she, Simon followed him out and argued with him for a while. And somehow he got her to. promise to talk to him, talk it out with him later, you know, um, which I don't know if she acquiesced,

but it got her calm down, whatever they left. And John, so that was his chink in the army, armor, right? He'd been iced out. He came to me because I get,

he's identified me as the vulnerable one. I'm the, I'm the one that's a people pleaser, clearly. And, you know, an empathetic person where Simon is just like, fuck you, you know, just get the fuck out. You get on kick rocks, basically. And I'll take them in because I'm lonely and I, you know, that's how they operate. So sociopaths operate.

They identify your weaknesses and they go after weak people because we're the ones that are easiest to get what they need or want from. so over a period of weeks is contacting me more calling me he chittled away he chippled away like and you know at this point Simon and I we have this music studio in the basement

she and her are playing music together with other people here and there but nothing's really um jelling and uh you know he's talking to me and through me a little bit, a little more to Simon. He's chinking away until he's like, I just really want to come over and play music with you guys. I got all these songs that I've written or poems that could be turned into songs. And he's like going on and on about it. And he got both me and Simon like,

oh, really? You know, well, you know, come over and we'll see what you got. And the, that was it. Like, once we played together once, we were playing together like three, four, five times a week. um we were writing music just fast and furious she had a backlog a backlog of poetry he had a huge backlog of poetry i had mine so all three of us are songwriters as well as poets as well as musicians and you know we just we we just started hanging tight together are any of those songs the ones you sent me do you remember you sent me a bunch of songs i like a Yeah, that's the album that we managed to record. Oh, okay.

Yeah. Yeah, you had, you thought you'd lost it, right? And then somebody actually said, hey, I actually have this and got it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I had to search for it because I didn't have a copy of it. I, you know, I lost everything that I owned when I went to prison, everything that I owned, except for what was in my camper trailer that I'd been living in.

Yeah, that's pretty much what happens. I was going to say, would you mind if Colby played some of those songs? Oh, not at all. Please do. I mean, that's not great quality, but I'm proud of the recording quality is not great. I'm proud of the music. Nobody's, nobody's watching my show because it's a quality program, you know, or that I'm a professional. But it, I thought they were, I thought they were good. I mean, I thought it was good. I don't know much. It's not really my kind of music, but it wasn't, it wasn't something that I turned off. I was like, oh, wow, this is, you know, like this is. It's listenable. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and I'm sure to somebody that's interested in that, it would, you know, it wasn't like it was super punk or anything. No, we called our genre. We made up a genre. We called it Garage Noir.

Well, I'll see if Colby can put, because, yeah, because there's not copyrights. There shouldn't be a copyright strike. I'm the only one in band left alive. Oh, well, then, yeah. So it's fine. One that could say anything, right. Yeah. All right.

I'll see if he, if he can play. maybe at the end of i was going to say he could play it like stop and then play but better at the end i could have a whole section where i could play some of them yeah that'd be cool i do have i could send you some photos uh i have forensic photos of my car okay that you might find interesting uh i find them very interesting um so He once got plastic surgery because he didn't like the photo on his wanted poster. His legend precedes him. The way indictments precede arrests.

He is the most interesting man in the world. I don't typically commit crime, but when I do, it's bank fraud. Stay greedy, my friends. Support the channel. Join Matthew Cox's Patreon. Of course, Jameson is still an IV drug user. Right. But we had told him, just don't do it here.

You know, when you're here, you can smoke with us, but we don't want you doing that. He was doing it anyway. He was, he talked me into doing it. It's like, you just, it's such a different rush, and you'll just, you know, you don't have to sit around smoking for an hour. You just get higher and you don't even need to smoke the rest of the day. Like, at that point, I'm like spending hours a day. Just smoking. So I'm like, I'm trying to remodel a house and I'm trying to get a job.

And, you know, I have kids. I just, I was busy and I didn't, I didn't, it was ridiculous. The amount of time that was spent on that, just holding it, smoking it, passing it. It was, it was getting ridiculous. It really was. And I wasn't feeling at that point, Simon and my relationship was so volatile. I didn't feel like obeying her. You know what I mean?

I knew she wouldn't want me to do it, but I'm like, I want to try it, so I did. And of course, I'm like, oh, well, this is the way to go because I don't have to sit around smoking all day. I can have other things, get other things done. How old are you at this point? At this point, I'm like 35. somewhere in my 35th year.

I was in a lot of emotional pain because I was starting to see that Simon and I was where we were not going to work out. I had basically told her I could no longer go to Bible study because I could no longer go to Bible study because I, I, I cannot stand hypocrisy and I felt like a hypocrite going in there um helping perpetuate this lie that simon's straight and omitting the true nature of our relationship all of that i just felt like i can't go and say that i'm that i want to pursue the truth and i want to know the truth and learn the truth and be complete hypocrite be a liar you know so i can't do that so that kind of put me a little bad foot with her parents as well did did you i'm sorry did you guys did you ever talk to her about getting clean like hey maybe we should just like maybe the crux of our problem is you know that the drug

use yeah i talked about getting clean on many occasions and there were times like i would go a week or so and then just get back into it but you're in a household where you're the only one getting clean She's not in. Simon basically was like, I will never quit speed. I won't be myself. If I quit speed, I won't do art anymore. I won't write anymore. I won't be myself anymore.

She was convinced that she was never going to quit. She just told me straight out. She was never going to quit. Obviously, it's really difficult to try and get clean when you're surrounded by addicts constantly. Yeah, you can stay in that cold. You know, as soon as I could get any kind of resources, anything going, Simon would undermine it. I couldn't keep a job. Simon would undermine that. Even with my children, like, she would like load up my plate when she knew my kids were coming.

And she's like, we've got to get this done by this day, da, da, da, da. and when my so I would have my kids you know and she'd be like well I'm going to take them to the park to fly kites you know you can finish this project blah blah blah it was kind of flipping to where she was spending all the time with my kids and I was always working on the endless projects in this house it was really difficult like we had planned on the remodel before she bought the house. house. Like, we walked through it. I had a friend of mine that's an architect. Look at it. My friend suggested not buying that house because they were like, this roof looks really, really bad. And these additions don't even look like they were permitted. They were like, I wouldn't buy this house. And of course, Simon does exactly what she wants to do and doesn't pay attention to anybody's advice or warnings. So it was a lot of work. I, you know, my ex-husband and I had remodel the house. I had worked construction when I was younger before I was 18. I had a friend

that let me work with him, his flooring company. So I had the know-how. And, you know, I'm every morning getting on Craigslist, looking at the free stuff, who's giving away leftover construction materials, because that was really the only way I could get materials to getting any work done because all of the money was going to drugs and the bills were still being able to be met at that point. But there was nothing extra to buy drywall or two by fours, you know, things like that. So it was a real struggle. And, you know, I still made dinner for my kids. I pick my kids up from school. I dropped them off at school. But my time with them was becoming less than less. they couldn't you know after after that point where it was just like all these branding people coming in and out they couldn't be there at all anymore i just didn't feel comfortable having there there

um i was getting deeper into my addiction and i was you know i felt like i was in mourning kind of for the relationship before it was even over when i knew that it wasn't going to work out you know and so I I turned back to heroin and I wasn't shooting it up I was just smoking it but one the irresistible thing about heroin is it removes all your physical and emotional pain you don't have any worries like you could have a million problems before you get on heroin but once you're on heroin you only have the one problem everything else just goes away doesn't matter anymore and I needed that

I needed to have that remove to just stay sane in the situation that I was in because drug addicts are crazy man they they work on a on a logic that seems

it flies in the face of real logic like I didn't I didn't grow up in this type of scene you know I didn't have experience with these type of people. I didn't hang out with addicts before my divorce. All my friends are like professionals, you know, musicians, artistic types,

like people who have their shit together, who can pay their bills, whatever. And people who, you know, I didn't dare bring myself around because of the condition that I was in. you know so i was isolated and uh yeah so i was hiding that from simon at first because simon was still off of heroin but still on suboxin um but you know she's taking meth she is taking meth i mean aren't these are these are uppers and downers right like what yeah is that that's okay truly it was so crazy that you know by the end i'm spending a hundred dollars a day just to feel normal just to feel normal not high not intoxicated but yeah it was it was ridiculous it just puts you on this treadmill that uh you become this like robot that's just completely

the only program is to get the means get the drugs use the drugs find a way to get more means get more drugs use the drugs same thing over and over and over you get sucked in further into that lifestyle and meet more of those people pretty soon. Everybody you're associating with is on drugs. They will steal your stuff and then help you look for it. Oh, that's missing. Oh, my God. Well, it's got to be around here somewhere.

Let's look at this. Da, no, no. You know, like so much thievery going on, which is freaking me the fuck out because everything in that house belongs. to me. All the music equipment in that studio, except for Simon's bass, an amp, and one other guitar, all mine. And I'm finding shit coming up missing. My effects pedals coming up missing, chords coming up missing. Like, my fucking Gibson, ES335 got stolen. And speaking of people who steal from you and help you look for it, it was a band member of the guy who had the guitar stolen, who finally brought it to my attention that was missing, because I was going

to sell it to that person who ended up having it stolen. So I had put it away, and he sent this little minion of his over, like, oh, they need a break from me. Can I stay with you guys for a few days? They just, I have this puppy, and they need a break from me, you know, so he'd been staying with them. So he stays with us for a few days long enough to figure out where I had a guitar put and steal it. And so this other guy comes over, he always loved to play it. He always loved to play it. He's like, can I play your Gibson? I was like, I guess so, it's in the, it's told him where it was at. And he comes back, he's like, it's not there.

Like, what? I go look and I pull the case out that I thought it was in, and the case is empty. I'm like, oh, oh, fuck, you know. And so I, my knees gave out. That was, I was, inherited that from my stepfather, which is where most of my equipment came from was my stepfather. When he died, that's what I had gotten. And it was a way, I'm not, I play guitar, but I don't play that well.

Like it was way nicer of a guitar than I felt like I should even have. That's why I was like I should just sell this to somebody who knows how to take care of it well and we'll play it well. And that was kind of my logic. And I also thought I might be able to help myself get out of there. So I was at that point thinking I need to get out of the house here. I can't stay living here. um so anyway the thing is is that the guy that came over and brought it to my attention that it was missing

he knew it he already knew it was missing he already knew where it was he just got he just was basically like giving me a heads up like it was gone right and uh that led to a whole ordeal we knew it was that kid i had a psych like a psychic I keep mentioning this shit, but I don't really, I mean, it's not like something I'm super into, psychics and stuff. Right. But this woman kind of blew my mind because she knew shit that, like about my older sister, that there's nobody around me knew. I didn't know this woman. And when she was describing who had taken it, she was, had described basically that boy that had stayed with us.

And she's doing this the whole time she's talking. And she's like, yeah, he has this mannerism or, you. he's like hiding something on him while she's actually physically doing it and this was something that kid used to do and noticed it he'd like pull his hands inside his sleeves so and she's like and people know about this and they're lying to you they're trying to send you on a goose chase blah blah blah blah so at that point i called the cops and uh filed a report whatever and i i basically i refused to accept that i wasn't going to get that guitar back like that this is I do not accept that I won't get back.

I'm going to fucking find this thing, which I ended back. Yeah, I got it back. Three months later, I figured out that the guy that had it was trying to tell me that he knew that it got sold to this other drug dealer who was this big bad guy and that he was trying to convince him to give it back and that he wanted $800 to return it. And this guy that's telling me all this is the one. one that fucking has the guitar. So he's like, oh, well, you know, he wants this money and he's just gone out of town. So I can't really even get a hold of him for a while. And he's just like pushing me off, pushing me off for months until I was like, I'm going to, I'm going to tell the cops where this guy is and where the guitar is. He's like, well, don't do that. Don't do that.

And I'm like, well, I have no choice. You know, you're not, you're not helping me. You keep putting me off. um in fact you know i'm going to give them your name because you're the one that knows this person who has it so just be aware that they're going to come and talk to you about it and that's all they just they just need to you know confirm for for you where his place is and blah blah blah he's like you're going to get me dead you're going to get me killed blah blah blah i'm sorry at this point you know i felt like he he made me he forced my hand i didn't simon's not a cop caller i'm not a cop caller Simon hates cop callers So of course I don't want her to think that I'm like reporting a friend of ours and I'm like no

He's just going to come talk to you So long a story short The cop goes over there tells him you know you've got until this evening to bring it to me or else you know I'm going to be back with a search warrant And lo behold The cop calls me later that evening and says you can come pick up your guitar tomorrow you know at that this is all of this is like getting me to where i don't know if i'm coming or going i was like i don't i thought you know i'm trying to do something nice for somebody i made meals for this kid i let him stay in my house like he prayed with us and then he steals

up my guitar and it was a repeat of this kind of behavior over and over and over like doing something nice for somebody and then they throw me under the best the first chance they get. They try to shift blame onto me, making me, you know, like, just wise. They're, I mean, they're sociopathic people in general. I don't know if they're all born sociopaths. I think addiction kind of makes you one. But as far as Jameson went, he was 100% born that way. So I'm pretty fed up at this point. I really want out of the house and really want to get clean. So I make a deal with my mom.

She's going to come out in a couple of months, pick them up, just to go there and get clean. At this point, we're playing music constantly. We've got over an album worth ready to record. I talked to a friend of mine who does a recording for us and basically we recorded the album

on one taken one morning and then that afternoon I left with my mother lust state to get clean. What did Simon say? She was all for it.

She wanted me to go. She wanted me to get clean because at this point I am using heroin and suboxin. She's figured it out at this point. She could smell it. And she thought, she was like, am I crazy? Are I smelling this?

She's like, if you have some, you better share with me. So she's using, we're just smoking. But basically all three of us in the band, Jameson, Simon, myself, we are, we're all using both meth and heroin at this point. It's fueling, it's fueling our creativity, but it's all. self-fueling really volatile situations and all the other headaches and bullshit that comes from associating with people who are in that world. So Simon was like, yeah, go, she gave me some supply of Suboxin. It was like, just go kick, you know, take a month, take two months, whatever.

And, you know, here's the thing, Suboxone does stop the physical withdrawals. You can use it to get you through that hump. But the emotional part, everything that you've been avoiding the whole time that you've been using is right there waiting to come crashing down on you the moment. It's out of your system. Right.

Which is exactly what happened. I'm missing Simon, like crazy. I'm, you know, just constantly hit with these waves of emotionality, like just feeling lost, scared. lonely, angry, all of this negativity that it felt like it just dogged me constantly, constantly, constantly. I made it three weeks before I went home. I hadn't taken my car out west. I'd ridden with my mother. So I'm like, I'm going to go back and get my car. I'm going to

any of my car um but really i wanted to go back and be able to use and uh uh see simon whatever um i so i go back and i arranged to stay with another friend that's in california um i'm only back I was back for like two weeks. Crazy things kept happening that kept me from leaving. I was going to go, come home, spend a day or two, and leave right away. And on two occasions, I'd go out the morning that I'd plan to leave and I'd have a flat tire. And I'd, uh, you know, things would just, James, would come over and we'd have an all night or something like it was it felt like later on i think

that james was the one that was flattening my tire that he drained the oil out of my car uh to prevent me from leaving why i'm not sure because at this point unbeknownst to me he's been in simon's ear saying i'm a master manipulator saying i you know telling his girlfriend that I make him spend all of his all of her money on drugs like I'll hassle him and hassle him and hound him until he does it and none of this is true you know I I take care of my own I'm doing my own thing but when I left the second time and went to California it was during that time that it's just everybody around us was trying to get rid of me because I was the only person who was paying attention to things going missing, to people owing Simon money or whatever, and she'll just

forget about it. And I'd be like, no, this person still owes you that. So you can't do that for them because they still owe you from the last time. Like, I kept a journal every day. you know, I've told you all about my journals that, you know, this is what I'm using to try to get this story out because it's so long, so complex. But because I kept journals, people weren't able to really get away with lying to me. They'd say, oh, well, you know, you remember this happened. And that's why I did that. And like, well, I remember those two things happening. Oh, however, they did not happen in that order.

because I have it right here in my diary, you know. So I was the party kill, basically. Like people couldn't get away with stealing and people couldn't get away with taking advantage of Simon because I was always there looking out for her interest because her interests were my interests, especially when it came to the house because everything that was in the house pretty much belonged to me. Right. So, Simon, I guess, before she lived with me, it was a free for all. Whatever was in her house, it would go stolen. She didn't give care. She didn't ever look to see who did it.

She just didn't give a shit, you know? It's like, whatever, it's gone. Her parents would buy her a new one. So she didn't care. And her friends are used to her not caring. And so I was a big roadblock, right? Like a very inconvenient person to have around. somebody who actually knows what happened and we'll call you out on it and,

you know, protect, protect me myself. Right. So when I'm in California, everybody's trying to get rid of me, including Jameson. But Jameson was trying to play it so that I would leave the house, but I would also leave the band room intact. so basically we're keeping the band together but uh not without your stuff they wouldn't right so he's trying to subtly undermine me with simon without he was very careful and actually there were a couple occasions where he would explain himself to me but not in terms of talking about himself he

would be like yeah well you know you can't really campaign too hard against a person because then people become suspicious of why you're campaigning against them. Because at this time, I'm pissed off it, another friend of ours who had been stealing, and I'm trying to get proof. And even after getting proof, having trouble getting, you know, Simon to cut that person out. And so Jameson sees me doing that and it's like, oh, yeah, if you campaign too hard, then they're going to get suspicious of why you're doing that and what you're trying to. to hide.

That's his MO. That's his MO. Disclosing his MO. Yeah. Calling me an emotional manipulator was it was sort of true. I mean, I could see,

and this is the thing that would blow his mind. Like he's saying, like, I'm being emotionally manipulative. And at the time, I'm like, well, that's where you're talking about. I'm not emotional manipulator. Emotional blackmail, blah, blah, blah.

And, you know the conversation didn't end well i was just like fuck you whatever and a few weeks later i'd be like examining my behavior and go oh you know what you you have a point you're right i'm going to do better you know i would admit that i was wrong and so because i would do things like that i would admit when i made a mistake i would admit when i was wrong i would readily apologize it was hard for him to turn people 100% against me. He could get it pushed the momentum going so much. And then I would do something that was so ethical and kind

that he'd have to fucking back off so that he didn't look like the monster. He was trying to make me out to be the monster. And I kept on making it hard for him to do it. And I think that's why it dragged out as long as it did before he finally blew up. right you know while i was in california he's in her one ear this friend this other friend friend who was staying at the house and stealing everything she could get her hands on i found so much of my equipment in her room like i had gone looking for my gaffing tape which she liked and i knew she liked so i was just going to get my tape and i see this i see the tape on the ground

by the bed i go to pick up the tape i see this box and i can see cords and shit hanging out of it I pull it up, pull it out, and it's almost everything that's gone missing from my studio. So I go through all her shit, and I'm finding toys that belong to my children, tools that belong to me. And so I, I, you know, this happened right before I left for California. So Simon is not one to take action on these sort of things. I'm telling her, look, this bitch is stealing, she's robbing us blind, she's drinking all her alcohol, like, get her out of the house. so well no she's being really helpful she's like doing laundry and she's doing dishes and she's cooking and basically all the things that i had been doing for simon before i left

and so okay that she's stealing well even though she's stealing simon's like simon like blows it off it doesn't matter to her she steals because it's not her shit she's stealing and anything that she does steal from simon simon's parents will buy her another one she just doesn't care um but i don't like having those kind of people around at all like so it was like basically i had borrowed money from that person and when i left i said i haven't forgot that i owe you a hundred and thirty dollars and i will get that to you as soon as i can and while i was in california i'm hearing from simon she's flipping out because i

the girl, the friend will call her L. L is the alcoholic stealing female, staying in my house, doing everything that I used to do for Simon. And at an earlier date, I had borrowed money from Elle. So while I'm in California, Elle is in Simon's, like, she owes me all this money, and this thing that she sold me is broken and da-da-da-da. And I'm like, okay, I'm going to get that money to her, or let me make a couple of phone calls. I got me a couple of phone calls. I got her the money, even while I'm out of state. Got her the money. So in my view, I'm like, I owed her on $30. She's like, I know what she did to the, the amp that I sold her. She plugged it into the wrong type of power supply because it worked on actual AC power. Didn't work

on DC power. So she plugged in regular DC and it blew it out again. I'm like, and I know it was working when I sold it to her because I showed her how it worked and all that. So anyway, she's making shit up. And Jameson is like, did you see what she put on our MySpace page? She just is like this reptile. Like she just wants all of the glory for herself because I had sent personal messages to people on my personal friends list. This was like in the last days of MySpace. and these people all knew who Simon and I was but none of them knew who Jameson was so I'm just, it's my personal friends

I'm like hey come check out my bands, me and Simon's band you know, I didn't say me swimming and Jameson but somehow he he probably got my he probably got my password at some point I wouldn't put it past him to be over my shoulder and write it down while I'm putting it in

anyway he got he saw all of these private messages And he was like, she didn't mention me. Like, she doesn't give me credit, blah, blah, blah. It's like, he has full credit on the page itself. It's full credit. But in these personal messages, I just didn't, I didn't mention his name. And so he's using that, like making me out to be a monster like that. And so they're both in Simon's ear constantly while I'm out of town. And I'm hearing about it through Simon, which is completely freaking me out. I'm just like, they're trying to destroy everything. They're trying to tear down my relationship. And This is all, like, happening while I'm out here, sitting on my hands, just trying not to be addicted to drugs and going through the withdrawals and shit that I was going through. It was, it was insanely difficult. It was just, like, my chest gets tight, even thinking about just the amount of fucking stress and fear and pain that I was in at that time. I ended up going back. I felt like I had to deal with this situation

with the band and with L because now Elle is saying that I owe her $300 and that there's other things that Simon didn't know about that I did and blah blah blah like really just trying to get rid of me

trying to get Simon to hate me so that she would get rid of me and too I mean at that point Simon standing by me which you know to my face but at now I don't believe I don't believe she stood up for me at all with them you know she probably commiserated with them but for the same reasons that Jameson had didn't want to lose the band equipment band room they were trying to just keep me around enough to where I wouldn't take all of that out of the house. But shortly after I got back, my and Simon's relationship is completely hostile, it is completely adversarial at this point.

Like, I couldn't really even be around her. She'd avoid me all day. If she was doing something that, like, she was trying to replace this front window in our, front door and frustrated and swearing and cussing and kicking things. And so I go out to help. And, you know, she accepts my help, but she also doesn't want me there. So she, you know, just biting my head off and saying mean shit. And I'm just like, why are you, why do you have to be so angry at me? I haven't done anything. I'm suddenly here trying to help you. And I just can't stand it. You just need to get away from me. Blah, blah, blah. Uh,

So at this point, I get fed up. I overhear her downstairs talking to Elle and Jameson's girlfriend. And she's basically talking the same shit that they are, you know? And I came down the stairs. I was like, that's it, we're done. I cannot believe that you, of all people, who know me and who benefits the most from being around me, like you're with these people, really? Okay. It really, it broke my heart.

And she was like, fine, basically. And within two weeks, she moved back to her parents' house. And, you know, this is my, the house, this is my house. I've been working in it. I've invested my own money in it for the previous three years. And, you know, no, I couldn't afford to pay the mortgage, but I also didn't think that I should have to leave. And she was like, you don't have to leave. That's fine.

she rents the front of the house to Jameson and his girlfriend gives them a lease doesn't give me a lease gives them a lease but she tells them these back two bedrooms I'm keeping Sandra can stay back there

and I'm going to keep these back two rooms for my shit but you guys live in the front of the house still using my dishes still using my linens I'd move some things out but into storage. But so Simon moves back to her parents.

And at this point, Jamison, okay, well, before she moved back to her parents, I should say, I had coming to Jesus moments with both Jameson and Elle. Elle's telling everybody that I owe them hundreds of dollars, but she's, I've tried to have a one-on-one conversation with her. I had a conversation with her with Simon, and just sitting there, Simon's like, I don't want to be here. I'm like, just be here to listen. You don't have to say anything, don't have to come involved

at all. I just want you to listen. Because I'm, Elle is spun such a web of lies and I guess good at picking things like that apart. So in conversation with her, having a face-to-face conversation with her where she can't just drop a bomb and leave or, you know, she's dealing with me face-to-face. and I'm knocking out the things that she's putting up, like, you know, either there's an explanation, or I happen to know that's not the way it went, or I happen to know that it's not even fucking true. But the closer I would get her L to the truth, the more she was trying to blow up the conversation.

She'd like get in my face, and I'd be like, you need to back up, you know. I can't have you this close to my face right now because I'm doing everything in my power not to jump. up and scream at you and fucking bash you over the head. So step back. But the whole point was that's what she wanted me to do. She wanted me to blow up because she needed that conversation to end. Right. She was caught out in her lies. Yeah, it was a defense mechanism. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, Simon always would do that too. She'd blow up the conversation so that she could get out of the conversation. And I was, you know, this is three years into this whole

situation i'm starting to get why is to what why they're doing this and uh they get mad and blow up and get me mad you know we use inflammatory statements and and bring up shit that has nothing to do with the subject that we're talking about or say or the other one is uh they break down or women will a lot of times i can't believe you would they get offended overly offended and start crying and and rush off yeah it's like there was no reason for you to it's just a way to not have to face your own bullshit behavior

so you know this conversation comes to an end she's just like I just have to go you know because she we were getting too close but after she left I turned to Simon and I'm like are you seeing what I'm seeing now and Simon was like yeah yeah I definitely I do see that okay

but Ellis now all buddyed up with Jameson. Jameson and I have had a couple of conversations trying to, I'm trying to iron things out with him only because I wanted the band to continue. So I'm just trying to get that piece back and explain, you know, explain what it ever was that upset him and just try to get him chilled the fuck out. But then Liza's going over there like, she owes me all this many and she is so Jameson contacts me

he's like well Liza's you know come over here and told us all this stuff and he's like I just want to get it directly from the source like what's going on do you owe her all this money what happened

and so I explained to him briefly everything to that point that we've been going on with her and he's like well no I feel kind of weird because I feel like she really got me even mad or like I was mad but I wasn't as mad until like

she and I kind of got together. He's like I just want to let's all get together and have a face-to-face conversation. Well I'm good at that so I was like yeah please let's do it you know and it got to all of us in a room Jameson his girlfriend L Simon me and the whole conversations between me and L to just hammer this out, how much is it that you think I owe you? Because I'm like, tell me when, where were you when you gave me the money? Where were we when you gave me the money? What happened around that time? I'm like, I'm not saying that it's impossible that I have forgotten that you let me more money. But I'm trying as hard as I can to recall that happening. I haven't

got it written down in my journal. I don't see it anywhere. And I am not, I just don't remember borrowing more money from you, you know. So I'm trying to tell her, look, if you can tell me where we were, whatever, that might spark my memory and help me remember, you know, that I actually did borrow another $170 from you. But so we get into the living room. It's all five of us. And, you know, I'm just after Eliza, like this is, you're doing this.

I found all this shit in your room. Like, you come over and all of a sudden our vodka bottles. like um and you know basically you are just going up and blowing things up and saying things that aren't true and i i have tried as hard as i can to remember borrowing more money from you and i and i didn't well you did you borrowed all this money and i can't i can't wait for it forever blah blah blah and i'm like well how much was it she's like oh it was uh you know we're like trying to get her Oh, shit. Spider hole.

So when Simon moved out and I'm in back room, after this, oh, blowout with L. He's still alive. After this blowout with L, you know, we're in front of everybody. We're all face to face. And it's mainly L and myself talking with James and asking a question here and there.

And basically, Jameson's girlfriend is the one that asked after about an hour of going back and forth where L. Guy's her name. Where Elle is insinuating that I owe her all this money, but she hasn't put out an actual number. So Jameson's girlfriend just said point blank, well, how much does she owe you? And Liza was like, well, it's not, it's hard to say because of this that, you know, and, and, uh, Jameson's girlfriend again, she's like, whatever, but how much does she owe you? What, what, how much does she owe you? Really? And basically, everybody, except for me, I'm just looking at her. At this point, I'm cold as I'm so over and done with this woman. I just want her to fuck away from me.

But they were like, what, how much do you, how much do you owe her? I'm like, I don't, I'm like, I don't think I owe her any more money because the only thing that I remember borrowing from her is 130 and I got her paid and she knows she's admitted that I got her paid that money um so they go back to Elle what did she she owe you else like three thousand dollars okay so she's a nut job so she everybody just laughed just laughed she's like I feel like I should just should get my things and move out and like you should well God you're really mean I am I don't care because you're not getting three grand. Yeah, I'm like, I don't owe you anything else. You, if anything, you owe us. And, uh, your thief, you're a liar. And, and you're not even good at it. So kick rocks,

be gone. And I mean, I was proud of myself that I did not get, you know, I was not yelling. I was not screaming at her. I, I just wasn't being baited. I was really, really cold. And yeah, you should go. Yeah, we don't want you here. Yeah, go. Which, it made Simon. Simon thought it was sexy, I guess. I don't know what it was, but she was just like, that was great the way you handled that.

And I'm really proud of you the way you handled that. And so it gave me a little cred with Simon for like a couple of weeks. like she was being nice to me right um we were sleeping together we never stopped fucking but uh you know basically we had broken up but we weren't really broken up she'd moved back to her parents house but she'd always come down and hang out sleep with me use my drugs and then leave um and it was really difficult because we had officially broken up even though Only in name, I guess. But during that time and after that talk, Jameson completely apologize.

He says, I can see how I misinterpreted all of that. And I don't think that you did it intentionally. And I'm sorry that I didn't handle it well. Like, told me everything that I needed to hear, basically. And then from that point on, like, his girlfriend would be at work. And he wasn't working at that point. I wasn't working at that point. And so we would pull our resources to get drugs for each other,

and we shared everything, and he would be my confidant. At the time, I felt like, I mean, I really loved him. We had our blowouts and shit, but like the conversations that we would have, and I just felt like he was like a brother to me, like I really loved him. And at that time, I felt like he was my only friend, you know. It's the only person that would listen to me, would talk to me, who cared if I was alive or dead, you know? And so we lived that way with Simonette, her parents, and Amison and his girlfriend in the front of the house and me in the back for a few months. until one day we I mean I would go to the food bank for us to get food

but it didn't give you everything right like we'd have to get some other things from the store so I had like $11 and I was going to go to the grocery store and just get as much as I possibly could with that money and I went up front and I asked them Do you guys have any money to pitch in on groceries? I'm just going to go to the store and I have all. This is all I've got, but I'm going to spend it all on food. And they gave me like six bucks. And they said, just come back with something sweet.

So I go to the grocery store. I had forgotten my phone at home. I go to the grocery store. And because I was trying to be really careful and make that money go as far as it possibly could, it took me about 45 minutes to the grocery store. Well, I didn't know, at that time, actually, I didn't have any drugs to share with Jameson that day, right? I had gotten well because there's a, there's something that junkies do, like, for those emergencies. Like, you save your cottons that you used to strain the drug through when you cook it up and all of that.

If you save those aside, you can heat them and rinse them again. get more drug out of them it's not ideal but usually it's enough to like keep you well which is that's how i had stayed well that day well jameson i guess didn't have any of that he was not feeling well but uh neither one of us had money to get any drugs and i felt like food was more important so i'm gone 45 minutes the whole time i'm gone jameson is blowing up my phone texting me and i'd left my phone at home and it was like after i've been gone 20 minutes why have you been gone so long what do you do? And then a text a few minutes later, you better be coming back with drugs, like, you know, you better not be, you know, using that for drugs without me. And if you did,

you better bring me something. It was just like upset, getting upset. I'm completely unaware of this. I come home and I had, you know, a few things and I bought, they liked this dessert that I used to make. And so I had enough to buy stuff to make that. I was like, I'm going to make this for you and putting the groceries away. And, you know, Jameson comes in to the kitchen. It was like, was this all you? How much was this? I was like, this was everything that I had.

I mean, I felt like maybe 57 cents left. And I was like, but I'm going to make you guys this, sir. And after that, will you help me clear up all this? So Simon wants us to clear up all this paint stuff in this backroom. And Jameson just starts, all of a sudden, he's really angry. He's like, oh, sure, I should just do that. I should just that. I feel like, she did that.

And starts punching the wall. And I'm like, what are you doing? We need your hands. Please don't punch it out of the objects, please. You know, he's our guitarist. I was trying to, like, make a joke and lighten it up. And he's like, you, la-da-da-da-da. And he picks up this box, two boxes of cereal and just fucking chucks them at me.

And I was, they kind of hit me. And I'm like, what the fuck? Did you just, what the fuck are you doing? And like, you can't act like that? And he comes up and he goes, oh, can't die? And he pushes me. And I go into the wall behind me and hit my head. And I was just like, you did not just fucking put hands on me.

What is wrong with you? And he's just like, has two pots that he grabs off the counter. he's like smacking him right in front of my face and just this barrage of insults and rage and uh vicious vicious vicious things he was saying the most vicious things and I was so you know I was just blindsided by this I did not see it coming like I didn't under you know uh and I like look you need to get away from me you need to go away and I'm going to go to my room and I just I do not want to talk to you right now until you calm down you know and i go to my room and he follows me and he's standing outside my door and just hurling insults i'm upset and crying at this point because i i was just

so blinds i was just like what the fuck you know where this is coming from and you know he started pounding on my door and like look i'm going to have i do not want to call a police do not make me call police just go away and calm down already fucking assaulted me you know you're freaking me out just go calm down he won't calm down you won't calm down well his girlfriend at the time is on probation so i text her and i was like if you can't get him away from the door i'm sorry but i'm going to call a police to get this something needs to happen he needs to get away from me and she told told him and then left and uh he like i can't remember how much longer he stayed at the door but he eventually gets away from the door but i i had called oh my god my dog holding stella out

out out oh oh you and your come on get out of your phone sorry about that it's all right um And his girlfriend leaves because she doesn't want to be around there when the police get there. Of course, I can't get a hold of Simon. She's not answering my text or phone calls. So I'm in the back of the house. Jameson's in the front of the house. While he was foaming at the mouth furious at me, of course, when the cops get there, he's the picture of serenity, right? He's totally calm.

He answers the door because he's in the. the front of the house and has a chance to talk to the cops before they come back to talk to me. I'm the one who called and they come in. I'm visibly upset and Jameson standing next to them just as calm as could be. And long story short, the cops basically side with Jameson and tell me that they're like, is there another place that you can go to sleep tonight? And I'm like, no, this is, I don't have any friends around that I can go stay at their house. outside and there's nowhere for me to go and they're like well we need you to leave the house for tonight i'm like you're serious i can't just stay in my own room this is my house too they're like well

they have a lease that he showed us and you're not on the lease i'm like i lived i've lived here for three years i lived here before they moved in like this is you know of course we can't get a hold of simon i said you know he's saying nothing happened blah blah blah blah. I'm like, well, call his girlfriend. You know, she was right there. She saw the whole thing. This is just a, this is ridiculous. And they're like, we did call her. She said nothing happened. My heart just sunk. I was like, oh, wow. All right. Well, I had a friend come pick me up, but I couldn't stay at their house. So I stayed gone for a couple hours and had them bring me back.

and I slept in the garage in February in Salt Lake City, Utah. It was fucking freezing. I can't get a hold of Simon. Things are just, you know, at this point, I'm afraid of Jameson. He's already hit me. I wake up in the morning and keep trying, keep trying, keep trying, get a hold of Simon. I'm trying to get a hold of her You're on the phone

She's pissed that I'm bothering her And I'm like, this is This is why I've been trying to get a hold of you This is what's happening I need your help I can't, you know, you're the homeowner And this, Jameson's got the police kicking me out of my own house Like I slept in a fucking garage

You know, I need your fucking help And she was just like, What did you do to him? You know, like I didn't do anything I honestly, I was going to make him some sweet and salty rice because he wanted a dessert like that. I thought it was being nice and it is what it is. But she's like, well, I'm going to all come down later.

You know, I'm like, great. Here I need to pee. You know, I'm in the garage. So I try to sneak into the house through my bedroom window. And I, as I'm going through my bedroom, I can hear. that the water's running in the bathroom so somebody's getting in to take a bath it's it's the girlfriend and uh so i go and i quietly tap on the door i'm like hey i need i'm sorry i just need to use the bathroom really quick and just let me pack my things so i have some things and i'll get out of

what are you doing in here she yells and then she yells for jameson and literally I'm all I'm doing is like trying to put some clothes into a bag and and pack some things and they both are like what are you doing yeah? And screaming at me both of them right on either side of me and I'm like look just get away from just let me pack some things. I'm not leaving here with nothing without a shirt without my toothbrush like let me just leave me alone so I can back some shit and a girlfriend's behind me naked full naked she was about to get in the tub and just Jameson's on the other side of me, and I could see out of the corner of my eye that the girlfriend's going to swing. So I turn around and block her arm like that, and they both just, they both just jump on me, like, scratching, pulling my hair, knocked me to the ground.

Jameson was stomping, stomping on my belly, like over and over. and it was finally the girlfriend that pulled him off of me and because I swung like that Jameson's like well you just assaulted me so I'm calling the cops and I was like oh fuck this I get up and run run to my car go to my ex-husband's house because I had nowhere else to go and just a wreck and scratches all over me bruises um but after what had happened with the cops the other night or the night before they they were going to take jamesson's side they they kicked me out of my own house like that i felt like i couldn't i couldn't count on the cops to help me that's for sure right so simon does come down later i told her she needs to arrange that jameson and the girlfriend be out of the house because i'm taking everything everything I own out of the house now. I'm not leaving anything there. So that's a lot because everything in the house was still mine at that point, pretty much, except for their bed and Simon's

bed that was still there. It's all the linens, everything in the kitchen, everything in the pan room, a bunch of shit out of the garage, all my tools and shit. Like, it was going to take a minute. I needed them out of there. So Simon, you know, got them to leave. We go over there. I'm, you know, know, packing up my things as quickly as I possibly can. I'm like, packing up the kitchen and Simon's like, well, just leave all those spices. You know, you don't need those. You can get more. I was like, do you know how much these costs?

There's like $6 a bottle. I'm not fucking leaving this shit. Oh, okay, of course. Like, I don't have a mama that's going to buy me new fucking everything. So I left the band room for last. Like I had my ex-husband's Jeep and she brought down her big vehicle. or like everything getting packed in there. And then I go down to start taking a part of the bandroom.

And that's when Simon starts crying. That's when Simon gets upset about the situation. Not when she found out Jameson had beaten me, stomped on me, not, you know, am I having to spend the night in the freezing cold? None of that. No, when I started taking the band room apart, that's when she cries. And I pointed out, like, this is what you're going to cry over? Really?

Like, you're insane if you think I'm going to leave this stuff here with them. So before I could even get it all out, James and his girlfriend come back. And they've got L with them and another person. And at that point, I had just a few things left in the house. And Simon was like trying to keep him at bay. And then after that, all I had left, after I got everything out of the band room. I just had to go in and get my tools and stuff out of the garage. So I'm going in and out of the garage, and Jameson's right there.

And they're all just spouting off all this. Oh, you're a horrible mother and la la la, la. You're just horrible person. Oh, this most scathing insults and just abuse, you know, being hurled at me. I'm trying to keep, I'm just like crying and trying to just trying to get my things, you know. I just wanted it to be over. and Simon was not standing up for me she didn't tell them to go away

she didn't tell them to shut the fuck up until like I took a kick I like swung a kick at Jameson because he was getting too close to me and just like the fuck away I have my hands full so I'm like tried to kick out of me he's like oh you're tempted it's all blah blah blah and Simon was like just

just let her get her things just leave her alone go back inside you know and remember as we drove away I felt like I just felt like somebody had just gouged this big hole out of my chest I had never felt that much distress and fear and sorrow and betrayal and like it broke it broke me more than Simon and I breaking up like because I had believed until them a few moments before all all that started that Jameson was like a brother to me like that he was my best friend like I had no idea everything that was going on in the background that everybody was wanted me gone

you know and then after that he just went on a campaign trying to destroy my character with everybody that we knew and it worked with some people they were like well what you're a lot of drama. So I'm just like, I need you to stop calling me. I can't be your friend. And then other people who are like, I'll make up my own mind. And you've never given me any indication that any of that is true, which was just only a couple of people. And Simon let them stay in the house. and Simon let them believe that she no longer spoke to me and she said she was doing it because she was afraid of crossing Jameson because he knew so much about her and he also had access to her dad's phone number

so that's how she justified basically never standing up for me, never, never retaliating against him for all of the horrible fucking things he was doing to me, not just that those two days, but constantly after that they would text me, both of them, tell him and his girlfriend that I should kill myself that, hey, there's six people in this room and we all think that you're the most shit parent ever. And I'm like, yeah, out of those six people, how many of you had children? And out of those who have children, how many actually see their children? None.

So shut the fuck up. But it was, you know, everything in my life at that point just had turned to shit. And I was living in my ex-husband's garage. I had no money. I had no job. I was hopelessly addicted. I only just sunk further into it because there was so much I was trying to escape from. and I didn't see any way out like there was no money for me to go to rehab like you can get a 30 day rehab if you have 12 grand but then what do you do 30 days isn't long enough to get clean off of heroin not not by a long shot right and to rehabilitate your whole life because once you know I've lost all of my work references on my good credit and my good name and everything that I had be going for me as a responsible

adult before all of this happened was all gone and I was afraid to get off of it the heroin anyway because I knew as bad as it was at that time that it was going to get a lot worse emotionally for me what were you doing for money whatever whatever I could so you know I did some things I just did you know theft fraud prostitution

just anything and anything and everything I could think of to part of my drive for wanting to have more than I needed was because that would bring Simon around and she was basically the only person I knew anymore that would talk to me

like there was I think one other friend that that talked to me and actually let me stay with them for a little while but was ex-husband making an attempt to help you at all or just he was like

no okay no he just wanted you know he just wanted to fuck me if he could get it out and actually he did I he paid me to sleep with him a few times so he let me be a prostitute to him but he didn't offer me any other kind of help this is the kind of man that he was that's why i divorced him he's gonna say

he's a good guy not at all it's not even a good father like the kids hate him he's a good provider that's it but he didn't have any obligation to do anything for me so of course he didn't I was a dirty junkie and that's a that's my fault you know nobody wants to be a fucking addict and nobody wants to have to hide from so much trauma in their life that they feel like they need that to numb themselves so that they can function and not kill themselves you know right I don't think I I I really wish that the stigma around addiction would change you know it's not fair and you know i realized once i was in jail like how horrible some people's lives are and i'm sure you heard plenty of horror stories too oh yeah it it makes it makes me complaining

about my childhood just seems so pathetic it's like you had i had a blessed childhood in comparison to some of these people in prison and and these you know it's just horrendous things that happen. I can't imagine that anybody could endure some of the things that have happened to people. So you know, me complaining about my childhood just seems so trivial. I mean, it helps put things into perspective, that's for sure. But, you know, you can't measure pain, really. No, I mean, I obviously your experience. It's a matter of perspective. Like, to me, it was horrible. But then you listen to somebody, you're just like, wow, like, I almost feel like I had it good. Yeah. And in many ways, they did so so i shouldn't say that it um but so i mean how long did you how long does this go on

where you're kind of now you're kind of displaced living in a garage you know three years through how long three years from when i first became homeless to when we started committing crimes i thought you were i figured you were so from when you went to to stay in your in your husband's garage, your ex-husband's garage. Three years in the garage? Yes. Wow. I thought you were to say a few months. No. It was, you know, basically the patterns obviously changed. Simon's living in her parents' home. And I was living in my ex's garage. At one point, my mother, oh, no, I had a friend who, he just recently passed, too, but he was a very rich man who really loved women.

And you could live with him if you slept with him. Right. So, you know, I reconnected with him. We had, I'd known him for 20 years, but we'd never had sex or anything. We were just friends. But he's patient. And it was, you know, it was basically. I know I know the deal if I want to come and stay with him I know the deal so you know I made that deal

and stayed with him for close to a year probably and I did not behave well I did not treat him well like I stole from him I stole cash I stole texts I stole items you know over the next few years like even after I moved out of there I would sneak in and I knew where to find cash in the house I knew where you know that was my bold burglary days I did a lot of other things of that nature during that time because I had learned if I was able to have the bag, then Simon would come and be with me and I would be alone. So we entered this new phase where I would find some sort of resource for myself, a place to stay or a way to get money. And Simon would come, exploit those resources until everything fell apart and I had to, like, leave.

And they'd just, she'd just go home. This happened over and over and over again. And basically, any time I was able to get anything going for myself, then Simon wanted to be with me. She wanted to come over and hang out with me. And she'd stay over for three days straight. And I couldn't just ask her to leave because I, I was afraid of making her mad and being completely alone, right?

So it was just, I felt like I was in a hostage situation, right? It was completely dependent on Simon at this point, and she's making comments like, I'm the only one that you can trust, huh? Oh, you can't even trust your family and your sister's a jerk and blah, blah, blah. Like, Simon was getting the best of both worlds. I guess. She didn't have me with, like, living with her. She could be away from me anytime she wanted. But anything that I had that she wanted, she knew I would give her. And I would do whatever I took to have that to give her so that she would be with me. So this was, you know, why, you know, for the first year and a half, two years, it was all pretty much me. I was coming up with ways and means. And, you know, occasionally she'd get money from her parents.

But because she was living at home, she wasn't getting like a weekly allowance from her parents anymore. So she just didn't have any cash. And every time she'd do work for her dad, he'd be like, well, you owe me this for this, da, da, da, da, and then not give her any money. So she just was cash poor. She had a credit card for like gas and that kind of thing, but she didn't have cash to buy drugs with.

So after I got caught by my, this male friend of mine with checks, suing checks, I had, luckily, I had a gig where I was cooking for this family who come in for ski trips. This was in a ski town where I'm from, Utah. And so I had the money for the prior check that I had written. I always keep them under 300, right? Because then they don't really need to call and confirm or anything. I even opened an account at the bank where he banked so that I didn't have to go in to catch these checks.

I was doing it so often. But, you know, when he caught me, I was able to pay for the last one. He hadn't caught all the other ones. I don't know if he ever did. I think he probably did. His accountant probably did. But by that time, I was already in so much trouble. And this was the kind of person that he was.

he would have just been like uh she's got she's going to pay for her behavior i don't need to add to it um which god bless him for that but uh i would still be in prison and paid press charges for everything that i pulled um but after that it dried up like i was like i'm out of ideas like you know i'm not going to being a prostitute because i don't know how to really do it and not get screwed over. So at that point, Simon starts, I mean, she lives with rich parents and they are like the world's going to end tomorrow. I didn't end tomorrow.

Well, the day after. Well, you know what? You can't leave. Don't leave the house because the world's going to end. Like, their house is full of beans and guns. Lots and lots and lots of guns. Oh, I remember this. Huh?

I said, I remember you saying something about that than being like a preppers or, you know, the apocalypse like it was, you know, the government was going to come for them or something or. Yeah. Well, you know, and this is what the environment that Simon grew up in being told this constantly and believing it because she believes that to be a dutiful child, you just believe what your parents believe and you don't question them and that's respect. the amount of denial and selective understanding and communication in that family is unbelievable but you know the Christmas before they had given Simon a gun for as a Christmas gift and her dad had they'd gone to a gun show and he had bought her one of those you know underarm carriers like cops carry for concealed carry she didn't have concealed carry permit guns weren't even registered in her name or his name A lot of times he take people to gun shows and have them buy the guns, and then he takes them home. He's got them walled up in the walls.

He's got them everywhere. And they have a safe in the basement. And in that safe, he's, of course, bought up a bunch of precious metal coins. Simon knows how to get into the safe. I'm like, well, why don't we just sell some of those coins? I mean, there's so many. He won't notice a few missing. So it started with her like taking five out and I'd go sell them at a coin shop and that was how we were getting drugs.

So we did that for like several months, all through that summer anyway. Thousands of dollars in silver coins. And, you know, she would take them and then give them to me and then I would do the part that would send you to prison. I hope the statute of limitations run out. It's been 10 years or more. But they caught her. They finally caught it that these were missing and asked her about it. And she said her excuse that she told me that she told them was that she had relapsed on the heroin.

They still didn't know about her meth problem. And then never been confirmed to them anyway. She had relapsed. but she had started taking her as a box in again and had stopped and you know that she was fine now and so they changed the the combination on the safe and left it at that didn't take guns away from her didn't remove her access to any of that shit um so simon starts carrying her her Christmas gift in her little you know hide a uh whatever concealed carry holster and that's when the talk about robbing a bank started right um and it was all talk as far as I

knew um I mean I had I had done some things but nothing like that involved a weapon or direct conflict with anybody that's a huge leap from what you've done so far yeah you know i didn't i didn't have a weapon so it's 1 30 my time are you doing okay on time there yeah um so she starts talking about robin bank and why she wants to and how she thinks it should be done and um you know one of our dealers had done a lot of time and um she was like asking him about it you know i'm like he's you can do something like that you really shouldn't talk to anybody about it right um but it was something he like they almost seemed like they were enjoying like the fantasy talking about how to do

it and you know um it was just going on and on and on and it wasn't just like whenever we'd go over to our dealer's house it was like with me and she'd rant and rant and rant and i was you know I was running out of ideas to get dope, you know, it was getting hard, really hard. And I was like, finally, like, would you just put up or shut up about this? Like, are you going to do it or not? I mean, I need to get well. You need to get well. What are we going to do?

I don't have any options right now. And you don't seem to have any either. Like, this is the thing. This has been your plan. So put up or shut up. I wish I'd never done that. Maybe nothing ever would have happened. I don't know, but because of that, I, well, I don't know if it was because of that, but after

that, I should say, uh, is when we tried our first armed robbery. She had me pull up behind a store and she took her little plastic shopping bag and her ski mask and gone and went into the store. It was like, this wasn't a bank. No, it was a store. It's just to get her feet wet, I guess. I don't know. Baby steps. Baby steps. Well, there is a reason why we never did rob a bank, but I'll tell you that in a second. Anyway, she goes in there, tells them to put the money in the bag.

The guy throws the bag back in her face and says, get the fuck out of my store. That's not a good sign. Right? Simon comes running out, jumps in the car. Go, go, go. I go. And I'm like, what happened? She tells me, I'm like, yeah.

So do you see, can you see now that we are not these people? I'm like, you have Suboxin. Let's go to my trailer and just take the 24-hour hit where you have to wait 24 hours before you can take it, so you get a little sick. Like, let's just do it. Let's just kick, you know, because that's what's driving this. We don't have, we are not these people.

We don't have to do this. And Simon was like, well, just a minute. And she calls another dealer that we go to and sells the gun to the dealer for drugs. so that's how we got well that day and we didn't of course I'm not going to say no I'm totally addicted I was like how you got some good let's do it um and it was enough to last us for a few days she left me with a little to stay well and went back home um she came back a few days later new gun and dad's gun this time one of dad's guns one of them one of them one of the many I mean they were all basically his he paid for them all they but they were registered in all kinds of different names

and you know obviously his wife had one of her own I don't know how many she has of her own but there were several handguns things that they were just hidden all over the house so which when you have when you knowingly have a drug addict living in your house and you leave your guns unlocked and available

there should be a penalty for that you know but anyway they did she was able to access another one came back and she was like no I want to try again like are you real really I know I can do it I know I can do it

and so we did that other guy was unreasonable we need a reasonable a reasonable victim well you know that guy probably owned the store yeah you got to get in a probably yeah so you know we we do our first i think it was a baskin robins and it was right before

they closed um and you know made off with like under three hundred dollars but it was enough to keep us well for a few days and you know unbeknownst to simon i'm like hustling in other ways to get more drugs because at this point I require a lot to stay numb. I didn't want to just stay well. I wanted to stay out of it, oblivious. So we do it again. And then when the drugs run out, she sells the gun to another drug dealer and then goes home. And this pattern repeats over and over over a six-week period about eight times, nine times. Never a bank, though, because we could not wake up early enough to rob a week. You're getting a, so you're getting a gun.

She's getting a gun, robbing a store, you're driving the getaway car. She sells the gun. Or trades it for drugs. And then a couple days later, you guys need money. She grabs another gun. Yeah. and there were multiple guns

I don't think she I don't think she sold every single one of them immediately after one robbery like I mean obviously this is a little bit

of a fuzzy area for me but I do I do think that there were a couple of times where she hung around longer and committed more robberies with the same gun so as

as much as I can remember there were four maybe definitely four but maybe five even that ended up going into the ether which bothered me i was like really shouldn't be doing that you know those those guns are associated to your family and if they start showing up in you know in crimes that's going to be a whole other you know problem i was like i don't think you should be doing that and basically i wasn't invited to have an opinion at this point in our knowing each other so i was just do what she told me you know so are all the robberies going better than the first robbery yeah so now she's got a

she's got a she's got a mo at this point right right right he chooses younger cashiers in smaller places um she'll go and act like she's going to make a purchase and then when they open the till, she pulls out, produces the gun and says put all the money in the bag. But she was also in disguise a lot of times, like she wore multiple coats to make her look bigger. She was already like five, nine, five, ten. So she was pretty large, but it was all this kind of this, you know, trying to confuse reports of the description, basically. Some people reported them as male. Some people reported them as female and a male the skies, so on and so forth.

So on the last day, I think it was like January, no, it was January 1st or the December 30th, when the last robbery happened, I can't remember exactly, I'd have to look, but we had gone, you know, to a fast food joint. It's not like a small one. It wasn't a chain or anything, but Simon goes in, gets the money, comes out, we flee, counts up the money, and it's not even a hundred bucks,

like not enough to stay well. And so she's like, we need to do another lick. I'm like, um, where you want me to go? You know, like I couldn't say no. Yeah. Because that's just, at this point, the dynamic is I do what Simon tells me to do, and I'm scared shitless every other way without her. And, you know, I was, I was trapped. I felt trapped. You're also on this, on this, this pattern.

I mean, you're, you're on this train at this point. Getting off the train doesn't change much. You know what I'm saying? It's like, you know, you're, you're robbing the bank. I mean, you know, you're the get, being the getaway driver in the eyes of the law. you might be going in with the gun i got exact same charges that right right um but you know as far as where she directed me to go i in my mind was like this is not a good idea but i couldn't say anything because it was less than a mile from where we had just robbed right and her thinking was all the cops are going to be over there so we can

get away with doing it just over here um and it was some place that she had decided while ago that she wanted to rob dollar store. I didn't know why. But she had me park around the corner. And I was facing the street that the store was on. And she hops out of the car and turned off. She goes around the corner. Not even a full minute, I think, maybe a minute, went by.

And I see a police cruiser going down in the direction on that cross street in the direction that Simon had gone. and part of me was saying you need to leave you need to leave right now and then the other part of me is like oh you're you're going to just leave simon to get caught and yeah i can't do that i can't just leave her however i do believe she would have left me in a fucking hot second but uh not even another minute goes by and here comes simon trucking around the corner with a cop hot on her heels. Start the car. Start the car. She runs around, jumps in the passenger seat, and I see a hole. I mean, I've started the car, but I see a hole appear in my windshield. Before I even registered that I'd heard a gunshot.

This hole appeared. And then a second gunshot. And I'm like, ah, you know, I like laid down over the jockey box. I don't know what I did to like, the car ended up turning off somehow. I knocked it into neutral but I had to lay down as flat as I could get and I had my head behind the passenger seat because I still had my fucking seatbelt on. So I'm strapped to this car and this cop is laying

shot after shot after shot he was 20 feet from the driver's side of the car and all of the shots were coming at me. Unbeknownst to me, Simon had jumped back out and was hiding behind my car. So basically I'm caught

you know between his shooting and her potentially shooting and i'm just screaming please stop stop stop stop like all the flak on the that hit my arm that all the stuff on the inside of the door you know the car door was all exploding as the bullets were hitting it and just i mean my arm was black from bruises from not well did i i want to did i miss something like simon went into the store she went to go go into the store oh the cop the cop that passed by saw her oh he turned around and came back and you didn't see him come back no she was around the corner so it's kind of hard without a dog I'm sitting on a side street and I'm about three car lengths in the side street from the cross street that's where I was waiting for Simon Simon went around around the corner to the

north and that would take her past a backyard a burger joint and then the dollar store was right next to that okay she was in the parking lot of the dollar store the cops saw her um walking going walking into the store pulled out or pulled in got out and was like let me let me see some ID and yeah I thought he kept you mean when you explain it you said you saw him drive by like I thought he just kept going, maybe. I struggle. This is why I struggle with telling the story because there's so much of it. It's hard to make sure that I'm covering all of the vital details.

Right. I'll do that while I'm talking. I'll be like, oh, did I tell them that? No, wait. Because all of it kind of leads one thing into the next. Right. You know what I'm the same? So he whipped around, stopped his car, said, give me your ID.

And she just took off. And he got out of his car in the parking lot and said, like, I need your ID. um and you see your hands whatever takes off running he leaves his cruiser and chases her on foot okay right so they both come around the corner on foot and you know she jumps into the car and he just starts shooting now in the police report he says she fired first but i know that's not true right his gunshot wasn't right next to my ear for a shot to go through the windshield to me like i i wouldn't be very aware of that gunshot right i saw the hole appear before i registered i had heard a gunshot and he never stopped shooting this one after another after

another like i think he went through 17 rounds which is a clip and then some right like did he reload or i don't know why i think there's some a lot total yeah you're right i think A 15 bullet clip and one in the chamber would be 16, but there were 17 shots. Actually, he must have emptied his clip because I think one of the shots was Simon's. At some point, Simon did fire her weapon. And that's what allowed us to escape. Like, all of a sudden, shooting stops. Simon's pulling at me.

He's, you're okay. We got to get out. Are you okay? And like, start the car. Let's go. My car's riddled with bullet holes. I'm trying to start it. I'm trying to start it.

It won't start. I don't know what's wrong with it. I didn't realize I had knocked it into neutral. So, of course, it's not going to start. And then I start smelling gas. I'm like, it's flooded. You know, inexplicably, this cop is nowhere to be seen. I don't know where he went.

I'm like, we have to run. We have to leave the car. So we get out and we go running down the street. And we see several houses down, a little minivan pulling into a garage. And they leave the garage door open. As we're running, we run into the garage. we jump into that vehicle. I'm looking around seeing if I can find keys, anything.

Simon's like ripped off her fake mustache and dropped it in the garage, whatever. And we were in the car just a few seconds. And another car pulled up behind us in the driveway. I guess the mother and the son had been in the minivan, and the father and the daughter were in the other car. So Simon jumps out, jumps into the front passenger seat and was like, you're going to help us. And he's like, no, get out of my car.

get on my car. I come around his side and I'm like, so I'm really sorry, but we're going to take your car. I'm really sorry. But yeah, we need your help. I'm not helping you guys get on my car. I'm like, sir, we do have a gun. The most polite carjacking in the history of carjacking. I'm sure. I was just like, I'm so sorry. You will get your car back, but we need to take it. You know, we're going to take it. And I open up the back door and tell the little girl, I couldn't get out of the car, honey. She gets out. I open his door. he gets out and buckle up I look around

and make sure I know what I'm doing how to operate this vehicle and then we just drive away calmly he goes inside calls the police sure he did it took a little bit of time

for them to put together that we must have been the ones that carjacked the car right but that night like Simon was down on the floor of the car and like just stay down there

we're going to be fine. We're going to be fine. I'm like going around to the freeway, get stopped at a light. There's a cop on the other side. I'm like just bite a cigarette, trying to be as casual as possible, hoping he doesn't flip around and come after us. And he didn't. So we were able to escape that night. And that led to the next four days, which were our last four days.

what did you do with the car we just left it behind an apartment building a few blocks from a friend's house that we were hiding out at she was another drug addict and we just gave her drugs and she let us be there she didn't care about anything else that was happening she didn't ask she didn't care um so at first when we got back the like the next morning simon's like i need to go home i need to go home like you're not leaving me now I have no car. Do the police have my car? And I have I'm, you're not leaving me now. There's no way. I won't let you, you know, basically. And so she stayed and, you know, she had her truck. We didn't do any more robberies, but we did, we came close. She almost robbed a drug dealer and then chickened

out. So the, the police have your car. They know it's your car. car they've tracked the registry did they get to your go to your ex-husbands yes they contacted i had out-of-state plates the car was um registered to my mother she had given me the car so they called her first and then they called my ex-husband um called my sister my twin sister they were looking for me and that's how they found that's how they got simon's name or like if you're looking for Sandra she's going to be with this person so you're looking for them both

so they go to her house talk to her parents I'm sure I mean was this on the news like it was on the news all the robberies on the news yeah the shootout was on the news all the robberies had been on the news and then after this happened they really started putting them all together

and saying oh this is a crime spree right we're looking for this woman like me had my picture from the DMV everything your picture her picture probably there's two of them they're together yeah so the first reports they didn't have her name yet they weren't sure if it was a male or a female it was after they spoke with my family I think it was my twin that said you know Simon is the love of her life and she does everything by Simon's bidding and you know she I guarantee you that she is with her right

now and she says this on the news and it was put out on the news Simon had told me she would rather die than have her parents know that she was gay and I think she saw that at police report the night before she died she got up the morning that it happened and she was out of Suboxin, so we needed to kick, we knew it. So she was going to go to the pharmacy to get a prescription field. She made it to the pharmacy, but police had already located her truck. It was just a little ways away from where we were staying, and they put a tracker on it.

So when it moved, they knew she was on the move. She woke up that morning And she was going to go to the pharmacy I'm like oh I'll come with you She's like no no stay here Stay here I'll be back I'm like be careful And

She left She drove to the She didn't park in the parking lot Even at the store She parked a little ways away Went to the store Got this a box in And when she was coming back to her car

She gets into her car And then immediately is surrounded by police Her truck to get out and they surround the vehicle and you know what I know of what happened that day is only like what I saw in the police reports and what I've seen in news reports since I got out

because I didn't see any of that until I was released but in the police report it said that an officer standing behind her vehicle um shot her because she he said he looked she turned and looked me dead in the eye and put it reverse and floored it and so for all those years i was in prison i was like that sounds like something she would do i'm not surprised that's something she would do and uh it was when i was looking looking it up

after i got out and i saw a picture of the scene and um she she had cars close on both sides of her there's no way she was going to floor it and reverse it into anybody they executed her but she didn't immediately give up and um that was within a half an hour of her leaving that morning you know i woke i woke up and uh was waiting for her to come back and she didn't come she didn't come and I hadn't seen the news. And by dark, I'm like, I don't know where she is, but I need to get well. We had a airsoft gun that we had painted the tip. It looked pretty realistic, actually.

So I did my first and only armed robbery. Only got like 50 bucks. Tiny store had to be within walking distance. and running distance. I could get away from an hour before the cops came. Is this 11 or? It was a mom and pop shop.

It was just a small convenience store. I try, I, we both, we tried to stay away from major chains. But I don't know why. It was just closest. And would be the least likely

to have serious security of any kind. um i got or more money or serious security or money you got it was 50 dollars like but then the more secure ones too they'll they'll put the money in the thing and you just never get a lot of money yeah yeah i didn't really have any options i was just i bought as much as i could and did it all at once and went to sleep in my out and i had my trailer parked in the parking lot of my friend the girl's house that we were crashing at and i you know went to sleep as i did i was hoping i wouldn't wake up but it did what did you think had happened to her i wasn't sure i think i think in my like i had a sense that what had happened had happened um so i i don't know i i mean

The cops had my car. They had my name. They were after me for this. I was facing life in prison. I knew it. And now Simon's disappeared on me. Whatever, for whatever reason, Simon had disappeared on me. I hadn't seen the news yet. So at this point, I'm pretty, I wake up. I'm pissed. I'm awake. I go back into this girl's house. and uh i call her mother i call simon's mother um she's obviously distraught the mother um and i i'm like i'm sorry to call you i know i know you don't want to hear from me i's like but i i'm really worried about kelly uh i'm sorry i'm really worried about simon and uh But I was hoping that she was home, you know, have you seen her or heard from her? And the mom's like, why are you calling me?

Kelly's dead. Kelly's dead. Kelly's dead. And I were like, you're wrong. I'm like, you're wrong. You're just wrong. And hung up on her. And I'm flipping out.

I'm like trying to put my shit together because I know I have to leave this house now. And the girl comes in whose house. it was and I'm like I don't know what's going on I can't I can't get a hold of Simon and she's like Simon's dad I thought you knew she was shot and killed by the police this morning I mean wow she did she didn't come tell you I mean Jesus you just thought I knew I guess absolutely you know I'm see it all though she's like you need to get out you can't be here like I know I know I need to go just give me a second and get my things together give me a second to process what I just found out I can't even I can't even describe what

that felt like right like it's like my whole universe just collapsed and there's no I can't even retrieve any of my life like everything is over my life is over I was going to kill myself. She throws me out, and I'm just walking. I had a friend that was staying actually like a block away from the store I just dropped. But I go over there. They won't let me inside the house. He's like, go, go rest.

I have that car out back. He's like, you can go in there. and rest, and I'm going to see if I can get you a little bit of money. He also knows. They've been listening to the radio, the police scanner, so they know everything. He knows everything that's been going on. He knows that Simon's dead. He gives me 20 bucks.

I move on. I call my kids to say goodbye because I am pretty sure I'm not going to survive this, you know. One way or another. And my son gets on the phone who's like, Mom, we still need you. Please don't run. They'll kill you if you run. We still need you.

So he gave me the number of the officer in charge in my case. And I called and turned myself in. Even that, I'm on the phone. with a detective, I'm waving down the cops, and boom, all of a sudden there's 30 cops there, all of them with their guns out, all of them yelling and screaming at me, like three of them jump on my back. I get down, and they all jump on the back, knees in my neck, knees in my back, wrenching my arms back. I'm like, I'm cooperating. What do you, would you chill? Just get up off me. Like, they're screaming at me to drop the phone. Like, I'm on the phone with the detective.

Like, they were just treating me like I was super dangerous, super crazy, and dangerous, which I guess they had every right to assume. Yeah. At that point, I knew, I was terrified because I knew I was going to be very, very sick, very soon. And I told them, you know, yes, I'm going to be going through withdrawals. And for some reason, they didn't put me in. They have like a section for people who have withdrawals or going through withdrawals. Like they put you in there, at least through the worst of it. So you're medically stable.

Right. They didn't do that for me. They just put me in a cell. And I got sick and I stayed sick. I was like, it was unbelievable. Like, all they were giving me was, like, for the first few days, he gave me anti-naugia medication and then gatorade for the withdrawals. So that is putting you in acute, like, seriously, it's dangerous.

It's very dangerous to withdraw like that. And people die in jail there all the time from withdrawals. And I'm puking and diarrhea and it's black, green coming out of both ends. I am, every bone in my body just aches. My hair hurts. And I'm also in this devastating grief. So I try to kill myself. Like, probably the third or fourth day there.

I tried to cut my arm up and I bit apart her safety razor and took the little tiny razor out. My arm is just crisscrossed with scarring. I don't think you can see it, but you can see that big one. You can see it. I actually card her name into my arm. Like, it was just over the top. Pure desperation. Just in, right.

And, you know, I'd never been in a jail cell. I'd never been in trouble. Yeah. And here I am. It sucks in the soubarest of conditions. Yeah. You know? Yeah.

Yeah. No, it was just another, you know, dynamic to this shit salad that I'd made for myself. So they put me in Sub-A-Cute, suicide watch. If you wear the turtle suit, right? No. And then another day they put me back into General Pop. And I tried to kill myself again. I tried to throw myself off the top tier.

And this little 90-pound blonde. girl, grabs me around the knees, dislocates her, shoulder her, but stops me from falling long enough for more people to get there and all these women and they're all holding on to me. And I'm like, let me go, let me go, dangling upside down. And they held on to me long enough for the guard to get up there. And he just yanked me over like nothing. And so after that, I was in basically solitary. It's a sub-acute suicide watch after doing another day or two in the regular suicide watch they didn't want to put me back in general pop um so i spent about four months in there in a cell alone occasional you know therapists or whatever their kinds of excuse for

whatever they are counselors there will come by um i didn't know how to get all of my family i didn't know how to use commissary or have any money on my books i didn't know um if i was even allowed to get phone calls or make phone calls. I didn't have, I didn't know how to do it. It was, my family finally figured it out after like two and a half months. I finally got a commissary order and money on my books and figured out like kind of call card or whatever. But while in that cell, I just cried and cried and cried and cried and cried for Simon, cried for my kids, cried for my life, and prayed a lot.

The pain, like the grief felt like, it felt like a hole in my chest. Like, it was physically painful. And just kept coming in waves and waves. Like, it was just grief. And, you know, the guards even started making fun of me for crying all the time. I'm like, my fucking,

my wife just died i just you know you don't you don't get to tell me i can't cry you know don't get to make fun of me for it well you're not you listen you know prison is prison and the people that occupied are not the most sympathetic oh no especially staff we're all trash oh yeah they're disgusted by you they're disgusted by you they're disgusted they have to be around inmates yeah until by the way until they get get arrested or a DUI or get picked up for a sexual crime and then they end up in prison and then it's different yeah yeah all of a sudden they see the lay right yeah that we're all just people and people make mistakes and some people get caught for their mistakes and they go to prison

and some people don't get caught it doesn't make them any less a criminal and some people live wonderful wonderful lives and god bless them but that's just you know Sounds boring, AF. But that's not, that's not the lives that we've lived. I have a question for you. When did you see your lawyer and what did your lawyer say? Like, how did that conversation go? So I really don't remember a whole lot from the first probably four, four, eight weeks that I was there.

I was so sick for so long. The first time I saw him, I was probably still in withdrawals. I remember, all I remember telling him was like, this is going to be all beyond you because I don't have, I don't have anything to give you as far as a fight or a knowledge or a desire. Like, you're going to have to handle all this because I'm at my limit right now. you know and it took a long time it was several months before i finally was able to say hey okay i'm going to help i i can i can tackle this you know true you can contribute to your

defense at that yeah well and he wanted me to demonize simon demonize simon's parents and being the loyal person that I am, I refused. I'm like, no, I'm not going to do that. You know, I'm responsible for my behavior. You know, I'm not, she didn't hold a gun to my head. I mean, not literally anyway. Well, I think just explaining the behavior in general and then just the general dynamic of the relationship

would certainly help. you know, mitigate your role. You, you didn't, you did do one robbery with, with an airsoft, you know,

gun, but. Yeah. They didn't even charge me with that. They dropped it anyway. Yeah, well, I mean, you were in such dire straits to begin with,

you know, I mean, yeah, I had enough. That was just, that was just, you know, not worth charging you over.

So, I mean, so you're grieving. It takes a couple months before you're, willing to kind of help with your own defense what is he telling you like i mean you're you're looking at like they're charging you with they're charging you with everything that she did everything yeah so in in the beginning um he said they were looking at like 13

first degree felony charges and then a handful of incidental charges related to the night of the shooting uh he said they're charging you with attempting murder um but he said that will probably go away with the plea deal um and uh to to to be clear the attempted murder is that she fired a weapon at the police officer when he was firing at her and because you were in the car you're getting charged with attempted murder i'm getting charged with attempted murder because i was with her while she's committing her crimes right and the crimes that she committed and in Utah there's no accessory laws. If you

are with someone, knowingly with somebody when they commit a crime then you get charged the same charge. And you don't even really necessarily have to know that they were going to commit a crime to get the same charge. Right. No, I mean, I get that. I mean the attempted murder.

Right. The police officer, correct? Yes. Okay. Because you were there. Because you were there. I was there to drive her away. You know, I was her accomplice, but. you know when i finally did read through the paperwork and i saw the statements that the officer had made i was just like this is not true um he's saying that i that he saw a red light shining from the driver's side of the vehicle where i was and he there's no way i don't i don't have any kind of red light i didn't have any you have my keys you have my entire car you've been through my entire trailer

you know the exact route took to escape did you see a laser pen there anywhere i don't see one in evidence and he was my lawyer was like well bottom line is they're not going to believe you there's nothing you can say that's going to convince them that that the officer is lying because he also said that simon fired first and that's not true either so you know this is the first time i've been in any kind of serious trouble so i don't know how the legal system works. I don't know how plea deals work. You know,

uh, I still didn't know even when I was there for the sentencing. I didn't know, completely understand the ramifications from like the choices that I was making. Right. Um, especially with taking the plea deal as was because they, they were like,

they basically piled on all of these charges and then these pending charges, you know, that they were also going to file if I didn't take the plea deal. And those were, like I said, like 13 first-degree felonies, a handful of second-degree felonies, third-degree felony, misdemeanors. Like, there was a huge pile. And they were like, if you take this plea deal, you're going to get charged with two first-degree.

We're going to, you know, charge you on two first degrees. One of them is the attempted murder and the other one's aggravated robbery. So the deal was, I meet with the police and I tell them everything. I tell them everything that we did. They said they had video evidence and they wanted me to identify that it is Simon on the video. They've got tons of things wrong because by the time I meet with the police, it's almost a full year later. And I've read through all of the reports, all the paperwork, and I'm like, this isn't true. this isn't true this one they say it's me that went inside because after simon was dead

all of a sudden all the shift all of the blame was just like i'm the one that went into the stores i'm the one that wore a disguise i'm the one that pointed a gun at people um the the newspapers stopped reporting on her name like it was it was wild just like because she wasn't alive to fillify she she could yeah she got a pass she gets a pass yeah and so you know I'm like how the hell do they mistake Simon who is four inches taller than me almost and definitely 60 pounds heavier than me like how are they mistaking me for her on film on camera you know why is this report read that I went

inside. I did not go inside. And, you know, those were errors that, you know, my lawyer was basically, and he's a public defender. He's like, well, don't worry about all that. That doesn't matter because, you know, they're going to, they're going to drop those charges anyway. Yadda, yada, yada. What's important to him is that you plea as quickly as possible. Yeah. And get off his books. And so I didn't understand that. that didn't mean that they wouldn't be on my background checks. Right.

Okay. They're still there on my background checks. And they read like they read and they read like I'm the one that went inside. Not all of them, but on that, especially on that one. It was just such a so much fuckery. And he's like, don't worry about that. You know, that's not going to matter. It does matter.

As it turns out, it does matter. He told me not to worry about the red light that that wouldn't matter. Like I, my intuition is telling me that the state is making a big deal out of this red light so they can make this attempted murder charge on me because it makes it look like I tried to target him or help target him. And so I was like really on about this red light thing the whole time and my lawyer kept saying, don't worry about it, don't worry about it. Yeah. And so they mentioned it in the same. sentencing, even the, okay, so here's it, okay, the sentencing story. Roop, we're getting close to done.

So, anyway, I go to sentencing. It's a year and a half after my arrest, even though I pled immediately, the year and a half to my sentencing, and I go into sentencing, and the victims of my crimes are there to testify about my crimes there's one there the guy that we took the car from and uh obviously the officer that did the shooting was there and then simon's dad simon's dad was there as a victim of my crimes so the guy that we took the car from gets up i have complete empathy for that guy like I feel bad, but I've repaid him everything he was out. And then the officer gets up and I had been telling my lawyer about, you know, I was concerned

about this red light thing. He kept saying that it was no big deal. The officer, first, the judge calls the officer to come testify. The officer says, I have nothing to say. And the judge looks at the paperwork and she goes, well, there is an issue we need to hear from you from on this red light. Can you please come up and give us your version of those events? So he gets up and he goes through the scenario of everything that happened and says that when he came around the corner, he thought he saw, he might have seen something red. And he's

like in the process of saying, I'm not sure what that was. The judge of speech, speaking over him and says, but you saw a red light. And he's like, well, I thought I saw something red. And then he's saying, but I didn't look down at myself to see if it was a laser like on me. He said, I didn't look down. While he's saying that, the judge is talking over him again, saying, but you saw something from the driver's side of the vehicle. So he says, I'm not sure what I saw. I heard it. My mom, I heard it. My kids heard it. Everybody that was there. We all heard and say that. he gets down and then Simon's dad gets up and starts trying to speak and my lawyer objects and the judge says I know this is unorthodox they're not unusual but we we want to let him say

what he has to say and my lawyer objects again and he's like she could overturn these proceedings he is not a victim of her crimes his daughter died by her own actions and my client wasn't with her at the time and did not have anything to do with that happening um so the judge was like oh okay and her dad's like oh i don't want her to be at all i don't want to you know disrupt the proceedings whatever and the judge is like well if you want to talk to me in chambers afterwards that's fine her dad's rich right right he's can up until that point i've been writing to them trying to tell them how much i loved their daughter that their daughter loved me that um that she had been happy you know with me

me those first few years she was really happy like she had learned to do things that she'd never been able to do before she could you know she could manage her herself and manage her own affairs to use a computer you know uh balance her checkbook like there was things i taught her she became a she stopped assaulting people before the armed robberies like uh she just became a calmer better version of herself when she was with me and i wanted them to know that was because of my influence and that that's the kind of person I was to her and that you know obviously terribly sad that this happened and I'm so sorry and just wanted to know like as a mother I would want to know that my child was loved the way that Simon was loved by me you know she didn't spend her

whole life alone she she didn't spend her whole life unloved which is kind of what it looked like to her parents. But actually, I loved her deeply. And so I thought as a mom, especially down as Kelly's past, Simon's past, keep fucking up with the names.

I guess you would want to know. But they never answered. So after the sentencing, obviously I stopped writing to them. I was like, okay, they are going to remain willfully ignorant. And I told the cops

in the interview about the beans and guns in the house. You know, it's like, you should probably look into that because I'm pretty sure they're not legal right nothing nothing's going to come from that they didn't do anything I even I even told them one of the dealers that a gun had been sold to was in jail with me at the time and I asked her I'm like is it okay if I if I mentioned it so that you know you can help them track that down you can say where it went from you and she's like

yeah I don't care so I told them and they they didn't pursue that either it's like Well, you guys are sure. Dilligent. Yeah. It's just bullshit. So I went to, I got sentenced to two, two, five, two life sentences, Utah has indeterminate sentencing. Two, five years to life. Yeah.

Okay. I know it blew my mind too. I'm like, I could pay for it in five years or I could pay for it with the rest of my life. How'd that work? weird yeah i've never heard that that's well i mean i am paying for it for the rest of my life like the terms of my parole is life right um i don't think they'll keep me on for life i've already paid off all my restitution i'm on reduced supervision i have never had any hiccups with anything um plan to keep it that way um did did you i'm sorry i hate to interrupt did you know that

you were going to get five till five years to life i yeah i knew that i knew that yeah i knew there were going to be okay life sentences i mean yeah i knew and but did what were you thinking you were going to have how much time did you think you were going to have to spend in prison i thought i would spend 10 years at least but the way that that she did the sentencing she that was two five to life sentences concurrent where and credit for time served. So, you know, I thought, you know, they'll make me do those five years on each and, and then probably I'll have a chance to be let go. They did do, um, I had a parole hearing at the, what was it, the three year, three year mark or nearly, uh, yeah, nearly four year mark.

went to the hearing news media was there with cameras there was still interest in this story that was a bummer to see cameras there but you know the hearing did go well the hearing officer was like it's no doubt that you have been doing everything that you can to get yourself rehabilitated and your record shows that you have been well behaved and you've done this and that

And at that point, I'm working at the high school. I graduated high school and I'm working at the high school. I helped dozens of other women graduate high school. Several of them wrote letters to the board. So the board had a little stack of letters from my students thanking me for getting them through it and saying how, you know, they all said basically the same things about my character that I was really kind and never made them feel embarrassed. and I'm made learning fun and made them, I motivated them to want to get that done

because I would always tell people, like, this is a gift you're giving yourself, getting an education. Nobody can take this from you. You can have your life taken away from you. You can have your children taken away from you, get your freedom taken away from you, but nobody can take your education.

So what else you're going to do with your time, right? Right. You have to be here, so do it. It's not even that hard. and so that you know that was my way I thought because it was the lowest paying job on campus too but I was like this is my way of trying to do what I can to give back to the society that I fucking terrorized for six weeks and exploited for years as a drug addict you know I wanted to make things right as best as I could when I decided to live after I threw away the noose that I made when I was in subacute but I never really got to telling you about but I decided to live and at that point, I was like, I have to behave and I have to, you know, everything that I do is being clocked. Every person I speak to, every book I check out from the library, like all of that counts, all of that, you know, is going to count. So the hearing officer

said, you know, there's no, we can, I can see that you've got a lot of family support and I do believe that if, you know, if we release you on parole, that you can do better and you can reclaim your life. And he's like, I really do believe that you can do that. He's like, I am going to recommend a date. I won't recommend a rehearing. He's like, I don't know when that date might be. But he said, but I am not going to recommend a rehearing. So I'm kind of encouraged by that thinking, oh my God, I can't believe it. It's only been three years, like three and a half years. It was supposed to be at the three year mark, but they're always so far behind this as three years and some change, right? So I wait for a couple of weeks and

finally get the decision back and it's a rehearing for another year and a half. So it would make it six years total when I got the second hearing. And I think they did that because there was still media interest in the story. And I mean, I'm not, I'm not bitter about it at all. Like I was, I was working towards making myself a better person and, I got into where I could just accept, you know, I've been through drug rehab. I've been through a lot of therapy and just, you know, learned a lot about radical acceptance and about the importance of just, you know, working with what is and not, you don't really worry about what should, what should be. because it's not what it is. It doesn't fucking matter.

And, you know, the past, I had to let go. I've had to let go of the guilt that I felt for not being able to be there for my kids for the time that I was in prison. I mean, my daughter was 12, 11 when I went in. I was 17. And I was going to miss the rest of them growing up. I knew it. And especially for my daughter, I'd already missed so much because I spent all those years on trucks.

that tortured, really tortured me. And I had to let go of all that and just focus on what I had in my control to do. Because you don't have much power in prison. Yeah. Very little, actually. So what do you do? You control your behavior and take every opportunity to better myself and get an education and then do as good as I can at that, you know.

That's what you did. That is what I did. That's not what everybody else does, but that's what, you know, very, you know, what, three, four, maybe five percent of the people actually say, hey, I've got this time. I'm going to do the best I can with it. Most people are just sitting in there planning their next fucking indictment or their next, their next crime spree. Well, this was my first time in serious trouble. Right. Right.

I had led a, up until, you know, my divorce, I had led a pretty law abiding life. I mean, I may have drove drunk a few times. I mean, I definitely smoked a hell of a lot of weed over the years and did other things. But this was my first time even having to wear shackles. Right. And, you know, and facing life, but not being sure if it's really going to be life, this indeterminate aspect of Utah sentencing, I find especially cruel because you have no certainty. anything. So the only way I saw that I could have any kind of control over this situation

was by exhibiting these behaviors, controlling my reactions to things, identifying what was in my power to do, and then doing the right thing and making the next right decision. I would like spent minimally on my commissary. I saved up money. I actually saved money in prison to pay restitution when I got out. No, I did get a rehearing. You know, I was going to to be a full six years before I saw the board again. But, you know, I got to this place where I just actually was from reading the bag about Gita that I got this piece where it was like, I just accept what is and do do the best that you can with what is. And don't trip over the past because it's behind you and you don't live there. It's a dead thing. And don't trip over the shit. You have no

control over. You know, so I couldn't see my daughter when I wanted to. anytime I wanted to, but I could do everything in my power to be given another chance to be in her life. Like they still need me to this day. My son lives with me. My daughter's still back in Utah, but she calls me every night. And she's so sweet. She posts on Snapchat a lot. And she has this post that's like, I've been crying all morning because I love my mom so much. And if you're able to call your mom, you should do so because it is a real blessing. It was just like, that's so fucking sweet. Like, she had every reason in the world to fucking hate me. They both do. And they're both just these wonderful for getting

great kids. So much fun. They're my best friends. So at the second hearing, no news media present. They did publish transcripts from the hearing um my hearing officer like i had at that time i had done three years as a tutor at the high school and i was teaching anger management class on my unit and i was the unit coordinator of the unit that i lived in which was basically the the hbc the person in charge of all the staff workers the inmate staff workers in that building so it was basically it's a a position of a great trust because I had access to every parts of the building. I could

be out of myself when everybody else was locked down. You know, it was a high trust position and I'd been in it over a year when I saw the board. I had $1,000 saved up. Like, I had this plan to leave, come be my mom's caregiver in another state.

Basically, anything and everything I could think of, I was like, I'm just, you know, the first first hearing, they did bring up the red light, again, by the way. And I thought they would bring it up a second time. Actually, they did bring it up the second time, but she's like, you already answered on that, and I do believe you. Because when he

asked me the first time, he's like, you've been truthful with everything so far. You interviewed with the police and was very courageous and truthful in that. He's like, so I just have to ask you one more time, did you shine a red light at that officer? And I'm like, I did not.

And he was like, okay. So, it's just funny that all the lawyers, that I talked to over the course of all this shit all told me that wasn't a big deal and every fucking time I go in front of a you know, a justice, whatever, a judge,

they all ask about it. So the second hearing was a woman and she was really nice. She was just like, you know, you have every reason to be really proud of yourself for what you've done. And she's like, I just think that you're going to go out

and live a really great life. you've got a lot of support and I wish you the best of luck and she's like you'll have our decision in a few days I have to go back to the you know it's a board um she's like I'm going to recommend you be released to parole um so it usually takes a few weeks for a decision I had a decision the next day it was funny because I was telling my twin sister the day before the hearing she's like are you scared I'm like no I think they know what they're going to do and on Honestly, I haven't even prepared anything to say because it doesn't matter what I say. They've already made a decision.

You know, nothing I say is going to make a difference when I'm in that room. Just let my behavior speak for itself. And I'm like, I'm not scared of it. If they decide I need to do more time, then I need to do more time. It is what it is. You know, my sister is like, you're so brave to be that way. Like, I don't know how you're holding it together. It was just like, you, I'm not really brave.

You don't know how brave you can be until you don't have any other choice or what you're capable of until you have no other choice. I didn't have any other choice but to accept my situation. And I got tired of making myself miserable by grieving over it and everything else. I was making myself miserable and I decided, no, that's not going to be my reality. I'm not going to fuck to live like that. If you have to be there, you might have to be there. And I have no idea when or if it's going to end.

I have no idea. That is horrible. It's horrible. And I still have no idea when or, oh, I know I am up, I'm eligible to be released from parole in 2026. But the conditions of my parole are life. So I'm still living with that uncertainty, you know. Mm-hmm. I would love to go on a trip to year.

However, I can't leave the country right now. You know, like, it is what it is. But I was released. I didn't even know it was going to be a life parole. I thought it was going to be like six years because of the laws. But the laws changed like a month before I had my hearing to automatically, the terms of your parole will be the same as the maximum penalty that you were sentenced to. so it used to be six years but 30 days before my hearing it changed to the maximum penalty of my charges so when I thought that I was like I was mad for about four hours thinking fuck

this might as well just put me back like why should I be out here struggling to fucking you know find my way in a world as a fucking multiple felon with attempted murder of a police officer charge on my record. Like, ha ha, fun trying to rent an apartment or get a job. Anywhere decent. Like,

it's fucking hard. I mean, you probably know. Can't have your own thing going, don't you? Yeah. I mean, I,

I, I'm still on supervised release. They call it in the federal system supervised release. So I'm still on supervised release. I still have another, like, 18 months to go. You know,

but, um, Yeah. I wish I was as smart as you and could have at least enjoyed that much money for a minute. So just barely scraping enough together. Listen, I'm happier now than I ever was back then. Oh, I bet. It's peaceful. Living an honest life is peaceful. I think being in prison and being okay with it, like just like you were saying, you know, like getting to that point, like changed my outlook. look, knowing that you can be there and be okay in your own skin for once, it changed everything

for me. Yeah. I mean, I didn't have a girlfriend. I'm gay and I go to prison. So I'm surrounded by women. You think you'd be thrilled. You'd think I'd be thrilled. I didn't, I still haven't.

I had a brief, like, I wouldn't really call it even a relationship. It was like three months. This summer, it didn't work out, but that's the only person that I've been with or tried to date in the last 10 years. Yeah, but you have to make an attempt. You know what? It's just a lot easier being alone. It's cheaper. And I don't.

That's not good. I don't know. That's no good. I'm okay. In the end, in the end, maybe. making that attempt is worth it. Well, I mean, I'll attempt it if somebody catches my interest, but it's really few and far between that I see somebody.

I'm like, ooh, I want to get to know you. Yeah, but you can't wait for it to just, oh, well, if it happens to follow in the line. No, I mean, I'm on, you know, Facebook dating. I'm sort of on Tinder. I look at it. I don't really interact with it. But I'm also living in a very concerned. small town mostly retirees there's not one single gay bar or lesbian bar the only kind of

community queer community at all is all through Facebook well you're you're lucky then because like three out of every five relationships that start on the internet you don't even have to it's actually stupid to go to a bar now you save so much more time dating apps I have to meet somebody in person to know if there's any kind of chemistry You do. That's what you say. You say, listen, there's no reason for us to go out and spend three hours on a, on a, on a, at dinner. If there's not going to be any chemistry, let's just meet for coffee. Yeah. And that's typically what I do. I mean, when I first got out, I tried to give men another shot, but. They're not worth it. They really aren't. I might my son is like his son is gay. And he's like, mom, I'm, I'm attracted to men. I don't like them. But I'm attracted to them. So, emails, what's up.

When I was in prison, I said, if I was gay, I'd be so much happier. Well, relationships in general, especially with an unhealthy mindset like mine, like, I was very codependent. And, yeah, but you seem okay. But having been in prison and being alone and being forced to be in that environment and be okay with it, which you obviously were. Yeah, I became my best one. now. It seems like you realize, hey, I'm good alone. I'm okay. I am. I don't want that was the problem with this girl that I saw for a few months this summer. She's very codependent and I'm very not. And that I feel like I try to spend time with her often and call her and text her and send

her flowers and come by and work just to give her a kiss a few times. And that was me trying to go out of my way to make her feel safe and comfortable of my care for her, but that it still wasn't enough. Like, it's, she just was always feeling insecure and needing reassurance and stuff. And that was too, it's too much for me. I'm like, I can't be somebody's everything. Right. I don't want to be somebody's everything.

I don't need somebody to be my everything. So, you know, it's, there's, it's not, it's not, there's, the problem is there's not a lot of, options. There's ways to meet. There's Facebook groups and stuff. And when I was in school, I hit up one of the lesbian face group groups to get clients to come in to help me get the procedures I needed to get to graduate in aesthetics school. And that's actually how I ended up meeting the girl that I dated for a few months. So I'm trying. I am trying. But I'm also like, I'm not going to force it. I'm just trying to make a point of getting out there and going to events and, you know, interacting with some people online.

But lesbians are notoriously codependent and impulsive. Like, have you ever heard of U-Haul lesbians? U-Haul lesbians? No, the only thing I heard with U-Haul is what does a, what does a lesbian bring on the second date, a U-Haul? yeah exactly literally it is that like I had one of the first people I went on

on a few dates with and I slept with just you know not cobweeds out but they were talking to somebody in Chicago

during the time that they and I were hanging out it was pretty clear that we weren't like a romantic thing where we could be friends but

they met their now wife in like January of 2021 and they got married this summer so yeah the the wife was living in Chicago a nurse in Chicago she packed up her whole life and moved out here six months after they started seeing each other they had been going back and forth visiting each other moved herself out here proposed and then and another six months later they got married so all happened really really super fast and i'm like that that's codependency that's you just want to nail it down because you don't want to be alone like um they may be married forever maybe love it it may be total of maybe perfect it sounds a lot like a divorce to me but a future divorce but it's but hey i don't know yeah for

sure we'll see i i i mean i've already seen there's there's definitely some problems like the wife is not happy living here in this teeny tiny little rural town their houses surrounded by vineyards and and wild land behind them and i mean it's absolutely beautiful absolutely a beautiful place beautiful home but she misses the city life she doesn't like having to do yard work or have a garden and you know she's she's already like I don't really like it here and uh my friend that you know that lived there before like they moved here from Oakland sold their house in Oakland and moved up here because they needed to get out of the city they're on the spectrum right they needed to you know so long story short like I could

probably import somebody if I look far afield enough but as far as what's available here it's there ain't much and they're toxic and yeah I'm like I got other things I need to do I need to finish this book like it's just dogging me now it's a paragraph a day couple paragraphs a day oh that's what I've been doing and I've been like I've been reading through all my old journals and marking out relevant entries, and then they'll enter those into my computer. So I've got a lot of material. I just haven't got it organized.

And I feel like... You should organize it pretty well here. See, I feel like I jumped around like I was all over the place. I don't feel like you jumped around at all. I mean, I think, like, in a book form, I probably would have dragged out the actual crime more. But, I mean, I also know that we're coming up on four hours. hours.

Yeah. I need to go to work here. Yeah. So I mean, I get so I get it. But I think other than that, I think you did a great job. Okay. I would love to tie in for you to somehow tie in the whole, I don't know, ghost or spirit thing. Like, you know, throughout the whole kind of like a subplot throughout the whole thing.

But I don't know how to do that since you said you had the one kind of, it's kind of interesting. Just because it's kind of off. It's like it comes out of nowhere. Yeah, but the only, the reason that I, I retell it as part of this whole story is because it was an integral piece of why I stayed with Simon. Because you thought it was, you almost felt like it was God throwing your lifeline or throwing you out, you know, saying, hey, this is a sign. This is the person. Yeah. It started you down this whole kind of, you know, journey.

So, yeah. Journey is the nicest way to put it. but hey listen you know you seem like you're doing great you made the best of a bad situation you made some bad decision but hell everybody does but but not everybody not everybody bounces back from from such a shit show you know like not everybody bounces back from that you seem like you've bounced back maybe things aren't exactly where you want them to be but guess what we don't could depict those life and you seem like you're doing great you know and every time i talk to you i like talking to you so i i mean i just think you just you know you're clearly slacking on the

writing you should have had but but you do i have ADHD like when i feel like i have to do something it makes me not want to do it so hard and you know it's like i don't have the structure here that kind of kicks my ass out of bed every morning and you know it's like a paragraph here and a paragraph here and and and six months from now you'll turn around and go Jesus oh my god I almost have this thing done yes you don't have to do it but you know you should do it you should just do it for you even if it's never possible for you to send me um this this program in its entirety so i could like get a get a transcript from it honestly this is probably going to be the entirety this is like i think everything we've talked about i think is is you know is it look at the very least

it may not all be fascinating but it's certainly interesting and i really don't think you got off on topic or off topic at all i think you know i would like um i would like to talk more about this the change in mindset that happened while i was in prison and how it came about because I went in still, I mean, okay, I was still Republican, conservative, lesbian, drug addict when I went in. And that's exactly what Simon was, too. Like, we were both hardwired to hate ourselves. But, you know, over the course of that six years incarcerated, you know, I had to overcome this grief of her and for the loss of my children and the losses they suffered because of me. you know, for my life as it was before, which was completely irretrievable, right? And rumination, torturing myself for things I couldn't change. And getting from that place where I was just this tied up in a billion different knots to where I felt this piece about just my circumstances, not only that,

but also the people around me. Just trying, you know, trying to get along as best as I can, not get my ass kicked, control my responses to things. You know, I ended up teaching an anger management class. Right. That's a, and I also participated in Toastmasters for like four years there. So I was speaking. Right.

Talking about my story. Talking about radical acceptance. And, you know, like the first time I heard about it, it was like, that sounds kind of cool. But what does that look like? right like what does it look like when you get good advice and you think oh that's great but how do you walk it out in your own life like it was a process of discovery going oh i don't have to get pissed off about this i can just look at it this way i can let it go or you know 24 hours from now that's not going to matter to me so i'm not dying on that hill the day like just uh feel like that's where my message is ultimately out of all of this crazy shit yeah it's an interesting story but there is a under you know there's this underscore of serious um mental health wrangling that's that's a term you know like you only you only afforded so much care by professionals in prison right i had a serious drug addiction so i was able to go they had a therapeutic community

buildings i was able to do that um which taught me a lot about myself so yeah i want to i need to i think so i think if you could just get the gist of it down the basic chronology of the book down keep in mind that you know i forget who said it i always i made this quote a bunch of time forget who the who quoted this word that he said uh you know there's no great writers you know there's great rewriters. Nobody sits down and just knocks it out the first time. Wow, it's amazing. Everybody writes it and they rewrite it and they rewrite it and they go, wow, this is as close to a polished gym as I'm going to get. You're never going to be happy. You know, 100%, but you get it down and you write it down. Because the hardest thing to do is to look at that blank piece of paper and put something down. Once it's down, like it's way easier to be an edit. editor than it is to actually be the person who's writing that book yeah so going back and rewriting and touching up your unpolished gym is way easier and that so that's what you need to do you need to just write it down even if it's shit it doesn't matter that it doesn't matter that it's crap do it do it

but do it yeah you know you're right and nobody's making you do it that that's the problem you know you want to do it i know i want to do it And it just keeps coming back into, you know, my, my life, like, that there's really no escaping it. That is, that is my way forward. And I just, I just have to, it'll take as long as it takes, but hopefully not much more, not too much longer. The great thing about writing is it helps you really clarify your thoughts and put things down and helps you think. So, you know, just write a paragraph. You know, write a paragraph tonight and go to bed.

It's three sentences, write three or four sentences, you know? Yeah, yeah. You know? Well, like I said, there is a lot of material like I've got on my computer already. But I do want to tell the story about the artistic side of our life. And I do want to kind of tell Simon's story a little bit because she wasn't just a drug addict. you know there was a lot of really amazing and beautiful things about her and she was an amazing artist and so was jameson even though he was a royal piece of shit and the world's a better place

without him you know i i did not even shed i did not shed even a half a tear when i heard he died i was just like good he was just evil now that he's dead i can have some mercy for him but he was evil in life man um you got to send me send me those uh the music again I mean, I'm sure if I could, if I had to dig through and find it, I could. In your email? Yeah. Is that where you? Just put a search into your email with my name and it will bring up everything I've sent you.

Yeah. You're right. You're right. I'm just trying with each other a whole lot. So I'm wondering. Well, I was wondering if I had, I was wondering if I had maybe downloaded it. And then because I did, I did get rid of a bunch of emails. You know, it just piles up and piles up.

And every once in a while I'll go through, I'll just start erasing them because it's just, it's insane how much stuff I have. But I can't imagine I would have, I would have done that. Yeah, I named the tracks on my files here, but I've been told that the names aren't going through. It's just coming through his track one, track two, track three. so that's probably hard to find if you've downloaded it and be like it'll crack from what you know when i got album part two my long lost album oh okay i got it it's there's definitely something attached here okay and you don't mind me putting it on you know taking the taking it put in on the back of this like right now uh no i don't mind which one do you think you'll use uh i don't know

I'm probably going to listen to, I'll probably listen to a bunch of them. I may stack them all together and play them. You know, yeah, if you, if you have any photos to send me, send me the photos. Send me, send me a photo of you, a clear, as crisp of a clear photo of you as possible that we can use in the thumbnail. Yeah. You don't want me to, where you want me to pull, I mean, if you leave it to Colby, he will pull up your mugshot. I mean, he's welcome to use it as long as he juxtaposes it with how I look now.

That's, I mean, then you got to send me the photo. I will have to send you a photo. I, uh, oh, I'm doing all right. Yeah, I can probably do that today. Okay. Well, I am going to wrap this up because I've had to go to the bathroom for about an hour and a half now. Why don't you just go?

You know, I didn't know why you were on a roll. it's okay I went I got water so you're going to be posting this on you it looks like you have YouTube Instagram and TikTok YouTube what at the bottom this shows Matt

Matthew Call yeah yeah YouTube Instagram TikTok I will post the entire the entirety of the video on YouTube okay I have a YouTube channel nobody's going to want to watch a four hour video you'd be shocked what these guys want to watch the every i'll i'll even have and the worst

thing is is like to me i'm thinking wow this is great um but then i've had interviews that i thought man this this was a whole you know i've had interviews that i thought were hilarious and funny and great interviews they get no watch time i've had other ones that i was like yeah that was okay and they do amazing so i right now i can't even tell you whether it'll do good or bad I'm such a horrible judge of what people like to watch. But because you went into such detail of your story, I wouldn't be shocked if I don't get great, you know, get a bunch of, you know, 10,000, 20,000 views.

And the big thing is watch time, you know, people watching like a good chunk of the video. And I'll send you those forensic photographs as well. That would be great. That would be great. When my lawyer showed me those, I was like, I was blown away. I did not realize how close to dying I actually came. Yeah.

It's a miracle. Did you say they put the, put the pole? trajectory rods through all of the bullet holes. And it's, it's just a miracle that I was not killed in that situation. All of those bullets were coming right at me. But inexplicably, like six of them hit the frame. And then the couple that hit the door didn't go all the way through the door. And, yeah, where they just went right over.

my body into the backseat or out the back window. It was a miracle. So also another thing that kind of gave me like, okay, is there a God and does he have his hand on my life? And for what purpose? For whatever reason that I'm still here, right? This couldn't all be for no good reason. He's working with you.

You got to stop fighting him. Yeah. You fought him for a long time. All right. I appreciate you. give me the other opportunity it's always fun talking to you no this is great i i really do i appreciate it i just wish it hadn't you know taken you know two three years well yeah hey i appreciate you guys watching the video um i i i thought it was a great video i'm gonna play i'm gonna have colby

we're gonna play um some of sandro's um music in the um right right right after this thing ends, I'm going to try and get Colby to attach it. You know, listen, I'm not a super huge music person, but I actually thought it was pretty cool. It was definitely something that I would listen to. So it's actually pretty good. So I appreciate you guys watching. Do me a favor. If you like the video, hit the subscribe button, hit the bell so you get notified.

Leave me a comment. And everybody try and be cool in the comment section. and I will try and respond to as many comments as possible. Thank you for watching. If you watch this whole video, you're amazing. And I appreciate it. Thanks. And I will see you.

on the sidelines Oohie Oh Right Somewhere in the confines of your memory All right

All right I ride away and watch the day Turn in the night All right It's the same day, it's the same day. It's the same day, it was a day, only yesterday. Got to get up long enough to say I was away. all day daylight

savings time till the day after tomorrow rewind all right all right I'll use this I'll use this ladder

here to get closer to what I feel to that thing whatever it is whatever it is whatever it is yeah whatever it is whatever it is all right whatever it is whatever it is Yeah, whatever it is Yeah, whatever it is, it is, it is. Don't know what you're saying, but I'd like the sound your mouth is making. So stand up straight while you're wailing it. All right, yeah. Yeah, alright, whatever it is, whatever it is, all right, whatever it is, it is.

I know it's not my business, but standing here makes me a witness to that thing, whatever it is, whatever it is, whatever it is, whatever it is. whatever it is, is yeah, whatever it is whatever it is yes, yes, whatever it is it is. Yeah.

All right. Good morning. I'm in love with the concrete It's parapherly jet palpino It's a six-starremont of the street Selectively the death of me Oh, selectively the death of me Selectively the death of me

Oh So don't be the death of me I'm in love with the death of me I'm in love with the gunshot searching birth of an 9thia It should be happy for a size of thought Selectively the death of me

Oh Selectively the death of me So let's be the death of me Oh, so let's be the death of me I'm in the north of me I'm in the north of the cat's fight Hollowhauer love a dreamer As a lacerate the moon night

So let to be the depth of me Oh, so let's be the death of me I'm in love to clean the death of me Oh, so let's be in the back of me I'm in the death of me I'm in love for car crash The caliper, parloritas

pirouettes, pirouettes, stained glass So let you clean the death of me Oh, so let you clean the death of me select to leave a death of me oh so like to be the death of me oh so like to be the death of me I'm in love what's what I have lost the same mistake I love to repeat oh but you know why would I already have so like to be the death of me oh so like to be the death of me oh so like to be the death of me So let me be the death of me

Oh, so let to be the breath of me Take a while To lose some time And leave your wasted world behind And Ship is dreaming once poor returned to me

I'll make a view so much more when I will I'll be a day ooh are you

are you uhu uhu uhu uh... What to be you without awake and dream

Life is but a mind So it seems Oh Shake the Santa Croils Core And break your ride On numerous shore And he does

While Sound the home The moon is blood There's sun and storm storm Aaloo Aoo Aoo

Ode Oh Oh To Oh, to be consumed with an awakened dream Dejahoo burst through my sleep We'll sleep to dream of stars that have died the seal has flowed

the span of time the word has clashed teeth and bone and sined breath against us all I will his eyes and I slow Ah, ooh Ooh Oli

Oh, too, days without a dream of sight Raising off the rings you've been tonight Oh Sacred To walk this world A change thing's time And I'm Ooo

Ooo! Aoo! Ooo! O'oo! A'oo! Oh Tid dreams

Life only lasts a little while Ohiardy Wait, wait with me, wait with me. with me realize we still with me listen listen

and we will hear we will have a still small voice to assure that we need nothing to feel that we be long hair that we be long hair that we be long. Wait Wait with me

Wait Wait with me realize you still with me we were here we were here I still

smile voice to shore that we nothing to fear that we be longer that we be long hair

Oh. Came a knock upon my door. She's here don't know what for Now I know everything's all right Now I know everything's alright Because I knew what's down She showed me the way in life Life

I Life I I was down a well in the desert of my mind In the darkness of the world That's where I found my heart To lie

I was down She showed me the way In light Life Ain't Isn't it funny how it goes Just when I'm Maybe eternal night

Underground and grows some flowers only bloom at night though I was down she came and brought me back to life. Life

Life Oh, ha, ha, ha. Thank you.