Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - POOR College kid Builds a MILLION DOLLAR W##D Empire

Episode Date: December 24, 2023

POOR College kid Builds a MILLION DOLLAR W##D Empire

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August 1st. My partner started selling boxes, and that's 100 pounds out of time. He ended up buying a jet. He ended up buying $300,000, $400,000 in cars. It started off as, you know, young college. college kids with like kind of this dream of selling pot to buying houses, jets, really doing big boy crime. I grew up on a small farm in what's called Bluntville, Tennessee. It's, you know, about 15 miles away from Bristol, Tennessee. Bristol, Tennessee, it's pretty notorious for being a town of two states. So one side of the street is Tennessee. The other side of state street is

Virginia. And where I grew up, you know, my story involves cannabis. So growing up in the South, you know, pre-legalization anywhere in the country is heavily, heavily criminalized. So meaning anything above 14 grams is a felony. And so, and that's including, you know, if you have seeds in the bag, stems, all that's included. The bag is included. So you could theoretically have an eighth, but you get charged with a felony just for having the on type of container. And so that's where I grew up. I grew up in a very small rule type area.

You know, I grew up Catholic, going to a Catholic school, choir boy type situation. Never thought I would even get into cannabis use, kind of, you know, was kind of sheltered. You know, I didn't really have too much public schooling until my parents got divorced. And then long story short, I ended up in high school starting to experiment. And that was only because I wanted to impress a female. And I was like, dude, this girl's a, you know, she's a stoner. She's beautiful. I want to, you know, smoke weed.

I'm like, and I always had been kind of fascinated about it because, number one, growing up in the South, you know, there's a lot of rebellious type back behavior, whether it's like moonshine or smoking cigarettes or whatever you're doing, you know. So when people were talking about cannabis, it kind of just always, you know, sparked my interest. Um, so I, so I ended up starting to smoke. Um, and the first time I smoked was with her and I didn't even get, you know, baked or nothing. It was like, wow, this is kind of weird. And then the second time I remember I was bliss and she would always smoke this insane weed. She'd always buy by the gram back then. No one bought eighths or it in Tennessee. People were buying grams of dang for 20 to

$25 a gram. And from then I was just like, I fell in love. You know, and then I, I will never forget. I was working at a place called Cheddar, which is like a cheesecake type factory place. And I was supposed to be a food runner. I trained to be a food runner. That was what I was supposed to be. And the day of opening, the culinary assistant, the guy that who actually placed the food didn't show up. So they're like, hey, you're not running food. You're being a culinary assistant. And the guy on the line was the former, I guess I don't even really know anymore, but he was a drug dealer, right? He was the guy selling pot in the town. And so I'll never forget the first night I met him, he sold me a gram of weed on the back line, like plating food for $15 a gram. And

I was 17 at the time. And I was going into my senior winter session and about to become, you know, graduate that spring. And so from there, I went from, you know, I bought an eighth. an ounce, a quarter pound, all within like three weeks. And I went from a guy who had never smoked cannabis before to now, you know, supplying all my friends allegedly. And it was, yeah, it was quite a, quite an experience. And so with that being said, it was, it was such a love. I wake up and, you know, I would brew a cup of coffee for me and my weed dealer.

And we would smoke a couple of blunts, have a cup of coffee, and then I'd go to high school, the last few semesters, or the last few months of this semester. And then that kind of led me into college. And college was just a real different animal. You know, I wasn't focused on selling grams to my friends. It was about, who could we get a good pound from? You know, that's under, you know, $1,000, $2,000 because, like I said, weed there was going for $4,000. a pound minimum, and that's buying it at a wholesale level. Most of the time, we were getting, I think we were getting quarter pounds of the time for

12, 1,300, just for a quarter pound. So I go to college. I'm 17, just to kind of give you a little, you know, I graduate. I'm still doing my thing. I go to Brazil for two months. I come back to go to college. And my dad's like, you cannot live in the dorm. You smoke way too much weed.

You're going to get arrested here in 10. to see. Live with your brother. And so I got an apartment with my brother and a soon-to-be fraternity brother and my cousin. And I met through my fraternity, I had met a couple people. And they were very significant people in my life. They became my best friend, Pledge Brothers. I don't know if you know anything about the fraternal life, but a little bit. Yeah. So it's just like, you know, a weird way to become friends. And you just, it's just interesting because these two guys, one, at the time now looking back on it one was so experienced in cannabis and we were the same age and he was 17 but his family knew a lot of people from california and so when he was 15 16 17 he was

selling 20 30 pounds you know a week easily and you know you're talking a lot of money as a young kid in tennessee you know his unfortunately his father passed away early on in his life and so he was kind of you know one of three boys and he's kind of you know we're And so that was one significant friend. And then I had another friend who I met my fraternity who would then become a way bigger player than the friend that introduced us in the first place. And so college really is where cannabis then kind of went to the next level for me. Like I said, I was, you know, just selling it by nickel and dining, just wanting to smoke for

free. And my life changed one day when I went to my fraternity. Brothers house it was like almost like that so 70 show they had a green room and uh they so I'm in this green room and it was a very it was like almost like a communal green room like you would go there just to smoke pot as a you know you knew it was safe like the brothers didn't care that you know they always had random people there and I'm there and I'm smoking and at the time I got obsessed with making edibles because I would have so much extra cannabis I was like let's make some edibles and um so I made these blueberry muffins. And this is where a beautiful relationship was formed. I'm in this green

room. I'm smoking. Everything's good. This guy comes in. Hey man, can I buy a couple edibles? My friend said you have strong edibles and my other friends in the hospital. I forget what it was wrong. He couldn't smoke, but he was a big stoner from North Carolina. So he was like, do you mind if I get in it? I was like, bro, here's a bunch of them. Take them to them. Have a good time. Like, because I didn't really care. I've always been very kind with my cannabis because I felt like It was something to be shared. And he literally looked me in the eye and he said, you don't know who you just met.

And I was like, no, I don't. What's your name? And he's like, Will. And this Will character, I don't even know if it was his real name or not. But he ended up being from Humble. And he was from a big farm in Humboldt County, California, and like the Eureka area and like all that big area,

like the Emerald Triangle, they call it. Right. And he looked at me and he was like, dude, you're such a nice guy. I'll give you pounds for $1,200. And I looked at him, I was like, what, $1,200 for a pound? I was like, I'll buy one right now. And he's like, all right, if you give me the money, it'll be there. And it'll be there.

And I forget, I think it was like five days, something like that. So it came in and it came in. And it was crazy because it was terribly shipped, terribly sealed. And we were like thankful that it even got to Tennessee. And we busted open. I sold it to four fraternity brothers, $1,000 a piece, allegedly. So I turned $1,200 to $4,000 in 10 minutes and just made everybody's date because they just got it for $200, $300 cheaper. And it was some of the best.

I'll never forget it was OG Cush. Like it was like the real OG Cush. Like you can hardly even find it on today's market. Like it was a very, like it was like I said, a beautiful relationship. Okay. And so that led into. getting another pound sent in. And they were mailing it in.

They were mailing it in from Humble to Tennessee, one of my fraternity brothers, who I'm about to actually tell you about later, this is where it escalates. It's funny because I got in trouble in 2013. So that's 10 years ago coming up December, I think it was 13. 12.13 is when I got arrested 13.

my my business partner we have a legal hemp farm wax brothers and uh he got federally indicted i want to say in 2018 so there's a there's a long it's kind of a long progressive of a story so i graduated 2012 right now what i'm talking about is 2012 the fall and going into 2013 i get arrested at the end of the year 2013. Okay. So I get this, this, uh, this connection in Humboldt. And one time I met my fraternity house and I was always the guy who rented a room at the top.

It was the window room. I rented the window room. I never really drank too much. Uh, you know, I try to make good grades and I would sell the, I would sell my weed into the parties. And, um, I'll never forget. This big, highly respected fraternity brother comes up to my room. He knocks on the door.

and it's like kind of a hierarchy thing. You know, we let him in. How are you doing? Very nice to meet you. I've been like dying to meet you. You know, everybody talks. You're a legend in the fraternity. And he goes, listen, he's like, I heard you sell weed.

And I was like, yeah, man, do you want some weed? He's like, no, I just want you to take me home and I want to smoke with you at my house. Long story short, this guy was one of the most talented cultivators I've ever met to this day. And so therefore, from that, and there was during the same period. So at that point, I had a local grower. who was growing like insane small batch indoor, which I would still buy it at almost $3,000 a pound. And then I would have my California connect having the $1,200 a pound flour.

Both very high quality. One was to make money off of one was to really enjoy the conno sewer level of flour. So that's where I was. I don't know what flour is. Flower is the actual like cannabis flour that you like grind up. You smoke traditional way to consume cannabis. okay and so i know i know nothing about oh really yeah sorry oh no it's okay it's okay so if there's anybody listening they'll know very familiar what i'm sure i'll get some comments like cox what like

what are like what are you doing you don't know what you know but i mean i've written some stories about you know guys that have sold but you know i've never heard that term but anyway so so what it's it's great that you actually ask what flower is because the next the next part of the story transition into when BHO, this butane hash oil came to the scene about 2012 to 2013 in East Tennessee. That's what is now known as dabs, concentrated cannabis. And so I was steadily doing my thing, had no problems. I knew everybody I was messing with. Fast forward to like, you know, fall of 2013. My brother, who's my fraternity brother, but my actual biological brother was dating a gal at the time.

And she's like, hey, you know, I know you like dabbing. And my friend has, you know, a lot of wax. And he's a really nice guy. He's in this other fraternity. And I actually knew him through another fraternity brother that grew up with him. And so I started hanging out with this dude and I would sell him my super fire weed in order to buy all of his wax. It was a very interesting thing. And then at one point, he was like, hey, I can't afford this.

Can you front me? Enfronting means a consignment. I'm going to give it to you. You're going to pay a tax. You're going to pay me off the back end. And so I was like, sure, as long as you can give me the dabs, because that's my whole thing. I love concentrates. My alter ego through law school was dabino.

And it's just like, it's so dabs, I hit a heart. I'm like, dude, I'll do whatever you want just to keep the dabs coming in. So this is where it got tricky. And I started getting what was like at the time I didn't know, but I was being surveyed by local law enforcement, Johnson City Police Department, and a organization called Tennessee Bureau investigation. When you say surveyed, you mean like investigated? Investigated, like heavily investigated because at the time, the guy that was giving me

these dabs that I met through my brother's girlfriend. Right. He had totaled a highway patrol car with like an ounce of cocaine. in his possession. So he ended up having to become a rat. And so who was the easiest person to tell on? Fraddy Patty. The guy was, you know, my hair was like long, you know, I had the, it was, it was very interesting time of my life. And so I started working with him and these guys were surveying me. And at the time, I also, it's funny, because I never even really got that much weed from this guy that I got in trouble from. But during my actual arrest, I had met another guy I

got weed from from work, working at a burrito spot. And it was the best burrito spot in town. It's kind of like Tex-Mex. But it's really like family ran and operated. So it's just a really cool place to work. And this guy working was like, man, we're like family here. I'll do whatever. And so he would help me out and get weed. So I went to his house, which was, this is leading kind of when I was uh it's leading up to my arrest which was absolutely um caught me off guard because when i was when i was when i got arrested i had planned to go to colorado on a friday i get done at my classes and i ended up getting arrested and they're this but i'm going to tell you the full story of how i got arrested and okay um so it's like an every day and i'll finish my test and i go over to

my friend's house I well at first I go to McDonald's this is where it's very key key fact I go to McDonald's to pick up money that this guy John Doe uh that I gave him a pound he was going to pay me for I get to McDonald's and little did I know I was being recorded being recorded by Tennessee Bureau of Investigation over a single pound and this guy gives me Blue 100s and I don't know if you remember but when Blue 100s first came out it was like 2013 time they weren't very common you know so when i fat when he gave me 40 blue $100 bills i even remember in my head telling my lawyer i was like i thought it was crazy he had 40 blue $100 bills i had never seen more than like two at a time before um little did i know

that those bills um how tennessee bureau investigation how they did it um if they got these are Pokemon cards. But if they were dollar bills, they put them all like the same way and put a line, just a little marker line. And then they shuffle them all up. So you can't see the line unless the bills are all facing the same way. Right. So they recorded my conversation. I get this marked money. I go to my coworker's house. And thank God I wasn't with my other fraternity brother guy because he was, he's crazy. So I was happy. That never happened. So anyway, go over to his house. and I hated his house in particular because it was in a school zone. So in Tennessee, how they have it, if you get caught doing any transactions in a school zone,

there's mandatory minimums. Yeah. And so this was the mandatory minimum for this was two years, mandatory minimum. You're staying every single day of those two years in a state prison. So I go to his house. It's Christmas break. He's like, hey, do you want to make some wax? And so allegedly, we were like, sure.

I would love to. He got this beautiful flower. It was a biodiesel, which was like a popular strain. It's a type of cannabis. It was really popular in 2013. So he makes some wax, and I take my first real big dab. Like I am probably the most stoned I've ever been in my entire life. And little did I know, I was about to be arrested by like 17 cops.

So I leave his house. Everything's normal. I see a car following me. I see another one following me. I'm like, what is going on? Then I see the lights go on. I'm like, oh, God. So then I go, I pull to the Earth Ferris parking lot.

I get into the Earth Ferris parking lot, and I knew I was getting arrested. My gut feeling, there was no, like, am I going to be able to get out of this? Like, no, you're not getting out of this. There's an open pound in your car. smell is probable cause there's a quarter pound in a lunch box that i had in my front seat that was just extra pot laying around so you didn't think they were pulling you over because you because you ran a

stop sign you know exactly no these somebody set me up oh so as soon as i left that and i saw all the unmarked cars it just like like i said it wasn't a police like sting it was like a real tennessee bureau investigation and I was like this is not good and I and uh so this guy I'm there forget agent Richie Walker he came came to my window knocked on my window and I'm like I crack in he's like um he's like licensed and registration not a problem sir insurance everything's here and he's like he's like he's like you know you just left a known drug house off a seminal drive And he's like, we can do this one of two ways. He's like, I want you to either consent to a search or tell me what everything, what it's going on in that house, who's there, what they have.

And I literally looked at him and I said, I said, sir, this is my father's vehicle. I can't give you consent to this vehicle. And he said, yes, you can. You can give your dad a call right now. And I said, sir, my dad's a busy man. He usually doesn't answer his phone at 2 p.m. afternoon, you know, I can't do that. And he goes, okay, so you want to do this the hard way. So it makes me step out of the car immediately, step out of the car. You know, please step over here,

hands behind your back, we're going to call the police dogs. And I'm like, you know, at this point, I know I'm fucked. I knew I was screwed. So I, so they bring the drug dogs in and I'm staying there, you know, hands behind my back. And one officer's telling me how I'm never going to be able to even graduate college. I'm going to be a convicted felon. I'm going to serve, good cop, bad cop, right? So this guy's telling me this. The other cop's like, hey, man, it's really not that bad. You're just a college kid. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Just please tell us where everything's at. Minimize your exposure. And I literally was like, I'm not saying anything. Because I had previously was like a handy man for my dad's criminal offense attorney who

handled contracts. And so he always said, he was a real Southern Virginia guy. And he's like, don't say nothing. And so at that point, I was like, yeah, I'm not saying anything. And Richie Walker, the big agent comes over and he's like, he starts asking me questions. And I'll never forget. I asked him, I said, sir, is this real life? Is this really happening? And because I was so stoned because I just took a huge dab.

And he's like, yes, you're really getting arrested. And I was like, I was like, you can't arrest me. He's like, yes, I can. He's like, I can take your car. I said, how can you take my car? he said, Mr. Quinn, I seized a private jet last week. What makes you think I can't seize this little ridgeline here? And I was just like, oh, my God.

And then I said some regrettably stupid stuff to the cops. He comes up to me and he says, what are you going to do with a felony on your record? You can't go to college. You're going to be a, what about he starts ridiculing me? And I looked at him, you know, and I'm very thankful for my parents. They've done very well. And so I looked at him and I said, sir i'll take a hundred thousand dollars out of my trust fund and start a business what are you gonna do

for the rest of your life bus kids for pot and this man i'm not kidding you grab me by my long hair i'll have to send you a picture after this grab me by my long hair and just boom right on my window of my car slam my head and that was that was it i was like yeah i'm not fucking opening my mouth again this is crazy like then he said i'll let you make one call who do you want to to be. I was like, I'm going to call my dad. Like, fuck this. I'm definitely getting arrested. So I called my dad. And they made me, you know, do the whole booking. I got arrested on felony. It was like conspiracy, possession of sale in a school zone. Like, this whole ordeal. Like looking at two years, mandatory minimum, potentially could even go higher. It was really scary.

I get to the jail. And this is pretty funny. They put me on like a high bail, like I had murdered someone type of thing i think it was like 200 000 and my dad's like i don't have 20 000 cash like you know my dad's a doctor he's a very old school guy like credit card pays it off to every month it's like who the fuck has cash just laying around so he calls his mechanic who knew a bail bondsman and they ended up bailing me out that night on just a consignment deal like just thank you know my dad's like the little local doctor in the rural town you know right um so then so then i get out a of jail and it was the most uncomfortable feeling I've ever had, not because I got arrested. I really didn't care about that, but just the look of not disappointment, but almost like my

dad wanted to almost kill me type vibe, because he looked at me and said, I will never forget. This is a true quote. He said, I don't know if I want to cry for you or punch you in the fucking face. I was like, oh, my God. And so that led to a full two-year process of litigating my case against me. Because I was in an actual sting operation where they had an informant that had marked money, recorded my conversation, how I was about to pick up the best flower for him. And so it took full two years of litigating. And we ended up doing what was called at the time.

I don't even know if the Tennessee Penal Code allows this, but it was called felony, judicial diversion. So the judge allowed me to complete an extensive list of things, which was like an 8% completion rate, to earn a set-aside slash like an expungement. So my record would be sealed, if that makes sense. Yeah. And part of the condition was, I kid you not, was going to intensive. outpatient rehab with real criminals that did real drugs and I've been at that time I mean I could see I can see that big part of yeah and I'll never forget I was in there with a guy who is one of the the best federal money counterfeiters in in the U.S. history and he passed I think I think it was like

10 out of the 13 bill tests they have at the federal level and so long story short when rehab it It was an eye-opening experience. You know, it was very heartfelt. I realized that I didn't want to necessarily, you know, do hard drugs. And I never really wanted to ever, but then actually seeing the impacts and even alcohol abuse. You know, I saw some people that were in there for like drinking, beating their wives type thing.

And I was a young 19-year-old kid, like, what the fuck? Like, this is crazy. So that leads kind of like into the other like exponential side of things too on my on my business partner's side. Because it's hard to tell my story without telling his story because we were we were business partners in this, this cannabis stuff. And so I get in trouble over one single pound. I remember I cut off everybody for a year because my attorney was like, hey, you can't talk to anybody. They want you to tell on everybody. And I come from an old school family.

like you do the crime you do the time like you're not telling on nobody i don't care like that's how my dad is like he's like one time i got in trouble with uh allegedly throwing water balloons at a homeless person in virginia and i was driving my friends older brothers and they take it really serious it's there's a missile they call a water balloon in the state of virginia and the and the cop that gave me my tickets like you'll see a counselor and no it was a judge and i had no attorney so my dad was my attorney and my dad requested them to give me the max when I was like 16 so that was no sympathy there so but as I was in trouble going through this rehab I contacted my my partner at this time this guy had exponentially grew everything you're talking from one single pound to 25 50 a single

box you know so he went from I went from supplying like your small local dealer to my partner supplying everybody and their brother at a wholesale level right you you you really at the time it almost felt like we were in a movie

because here I am I'm fighting for my life on felony probation not even felony probation yet felony court I go over to my friend's house and he's like a trap star I mean he had money watches girls go out to

the go out to the even even as funny as this because i think about it compared to some of the stories i've seen in california being a criminal defense attorney i mean you're talking about four hundred dollars at b-dubs in tennessee you know buffalo wild wings that that's not that's not something that's like you know what i mean that's it's it's not like uh it's a little flex in tennessee to be able to do something like that not care to go buy a two thousand cabin to go gamble five grand at the casino like this was a very small town like you know it was crazy and then it ended up um being to the point where my partner started selling what was called boxes and that's a hundred pounds you know at a time and so this guy that he was working

with was getting it from Oakland and through Oakland he he would supply everything I mean some of the best cannabis that I've ever seen still to this day and it was all flour that was all he sold there was no carts at the time cartridges or like vape cartridges there was nothing like that really at the time and then the DEA started investigating them and so the DEA started investigating my partner and this other gentleman, and it was, it was really a full circle moment because the postal inspector, it goes back to the original person I was getting my cannabis from in Eureka and Humble, we ended up stopping doing that because we had packages seized by law enforcement. One of the postal inspectors, his name was Postal Inspector

Rob, is what he called himself. And he always came in like a lu out. shirt. Well, he had busted my partner in college and said, hey, quit this shit. This is a simple pound we're taken. You're not going to get in trouble this time, but you're on the radar. Well, my partner, I guess, didn't get the memo. And so here I am. I finally get my felony granting of diversion. My partner's trapping harder than ever before. I get on felony probation. And it was very strict. You know, I'm having to pee in front of an old man, literally looking at me naked, like it was, it was not, you know, what, uh, an easy feed. I remember at orientation, felony orientation, uh, once the judge granted, I go to, it was an orientation,

literally, there was like a knights of the round table of all felons. And some people had got out and were on parole. Some people were just starting like me. Like, never forget, I met a guy who got caught with, like, a few hits of acid. And he had done like 10 years, full 10 years in the state penitentiary and he was finally out and doing felony probation. And that's when I realized that the criminal justice system is completely set up for failure. And by the grace of God, I got the nicest probation officer in the office named Mr. Mays. And Mr. Mays at first it was a very strict probation officer, but as time went on, he let me have

my freedom the last six months and by the grace of God I got off felony probation um got felony probation and at that point I uh no there's a key there's a key aspect you wanted to bring up too because I was on felony probation unexpected to us postal inspector Rob was investigating my partner everybody knows I'm on probation because a small town vibe one day i don't go to my mom's house for the weekend i stay at home i get a box and i'm like what is this open up this box and it's like pounds on pounds of weed so i call my my partner i'm like yeah what the what is this dude like is this you and he goes fuck i'll be right over and i was like i remember i i yelled at him and i'm like man

out of everything we've been through i've had to bond out pay a lawyer fight a case, now I'm on felony probation and you send this shit to my house. And so he got crazy with it, you know, and the guy that he was working with got crazy with it too, because he ended up buying a jet. He ended up buying like $300,000, $400,000 in cars. He bought cleaning businesses. He bought, I mean, it was to the point where it started off as, you know, young college kids with like kind of this dream of selling pot to the point where the people we were helping or move this cannabis were buying houses, jets, you know, really doing big boy crime, you know, really money laundering. And that's what my partner ended up getting

indicted for was a huge indictment of money laundering, conspiracy, but at a federal level, because Postal Inspector Rob had tracked down almost everything. But you're out of it by net. By this point, you're just finishing out probation, right? You're not telling anything. By the grace of God, I never got brought into it. Because at this point, me and my partner had started a business, started a business.

And the startup money came from this guy that was the guy, the head guy. and I'll never forget my mentor attorney called me and he's like dude I can't be associated with you right now because of this he's like you got me freaked out I'm checking your partner's indictment every day pretty much um and so it was it was a very crazy thing so I ended up getting my case dismissed never never it's not on my record anymore um but it it really defined me as an individual And when I mean that, number one, it really made me lose kind of trust to an extent, well, it kind of goes into the other story that I got to tell, too, to reflect on it. But it just really raised awareness on the racial disparity because I was able to get my case dismissed, no problemo, right? after paying a lawyer a premium coming from Nashville to East Tennessee I have a friend who's Puerto Rican and Dominican and you know he he doesn't have you know parents that have that much money and he couldn't hire a private counsel and he's a convicted felon over half an ounce of pot with seats um so from that when I went through my experience becoming friends with him seeing his

experience and outcome, actually having to serve jail time, it never sat right with me. So that led me into my entire career. I was already studying criminology in college. I was already wanting to become a lawyer. I really wanted to make change in the system, not just be another pawn in the game, but really be a game changer. And so that's kind of what led me into my actual career. And so I I met Mark and Craig, the Pop Brothers at Law, very early on in their debut online. It was about my junior year of college. This is right when I was getting off felony probation. And like I reached out and I told them, you know, what I wanted to do and it was a great fit.

And that led me to traveling the nation to actually really getting a lot of experiences like really meeting George Jung. you know, from below and really meeting some of these big criminals like that, that then ended up, you know, telling their stories and really having, you know, really impactful conversations. And I think it all boils down to now me, um, looking at my path from date of arrest, 10 years later, you know, I'm out of law school. I, you know, don't sell weed. I do social media management and in law. And so I always tell people just because you were in a situation where you've been in trouble, you've had to go through the ringer, you know, that doesn't define where you can go.

And so that kind of, that's like my personal story. Now, you know, building, piggybacking off my partner's story, he, you know, he got indicted, you know, and he pled guilty. He was the last to the table, meaning everybody pointed on him, and he was the last to the table. So he got the butt end of the stick. He went to jail, but he had the same mindset as me, and he was always infatuated with numbers. He's dyslexic. And so when he got out of jail, he started doing pallets, flipping pallets.

And the pallet business is just like any other, you know, drug or any other thing. is just numbers. And he found tremendous success through flipping pallets, even after being a convicted federal felon. And it's been very interesting for me to see people that I know personally been in trouble and still have success and not let that define them. Because I think there's a lot of people that get in trouble and they think, oh, this is it.

I can't do anything. So like I always like to speak when I tell my story to, encourage others that if you have been in trouble or, you know, are in trouble, you know, it's not the end of it. It's not all say be all. You can file for expungements later on whenever you complete probations. And I encourage everybody to try to look into that if they've been convicted because most of the time it's a simple form and you just file your form and you get expunged. You know, lawyers charge tens of thousands of dollars for it. But, you know, it's actually very straightforward. So I just like to always encourage people of that.

it's a little harder federal the federal is you got to get a pardon and the pardon is it's a long shot you know and and that's when uh when you're talking about crime and criminals and you know my whole thing is cannabis like we've been talking about and you know we still have you know upwards of 30,000 plus

non-violent you know cannabis offenders in the federal system that are, you know, still serving their time. And at this point, we've had multi-billion dollars of investments from, you know, all around the world pouring into the cannabis sector when there's still people in jail. You know, and I think it comes down to it's kind of almost like a human rights issue. I don't think it's fair or right. And I think most people agree with that. But it is what it is.

And then you've got to even think about today that cannabis is still criminalized. people would be like maybe listening, like, what are you talking about? Cannabis is legal. You know, it's legal to an extent. You only possess a certain amount. You, you know, if you can't smoke it in public, you can't smell like it in drive. I mean, it's pretty strict still and still highly criminalized. You know, we see, you know, at our office that we work with, we see dozens of people get, dozens and dozens of people get cannabis DUIs. And a lot of it is just because they were speeding and then they smelled like cannabis. So the, Officers try to corroborate the two and equate, you know, impairment.

So how did you, so right now, what are you doing? So right now, I am, I work for a workers' comp firm and a criminal defense firm. So I write motions for a criminal defense firm, and I primarily do workers' compensation with helping injured workers getting money from insurance companies. Right. So this is the pot brothers. The pot brothers at law. Yeah.

So I was intern to kind of associate with them. And then I had what's called a provisional license through COVID. So I never even took the bar and they gave me a license to practice under Mark Wasserman. And Mark and I, we did a lot of great things when I was licensed for him as three years. And right now we're actually writing in opposition to a motion from the district attorney that we actually had a DUI diversion grant. meaning we had a client that got a cannabis DUI and we convinced a judge to grant diversion. And then the DA came back two years later saying that her dismissal should be set aside and she should have a conviction because there was some case law that came down a couple

years after we had entered this motion. And that case is really frustrating because that's a single mom who works for a very reputable city here in California, first-time offender, and her DUI stems from not using a turn signal and possessing an unopened cannabis vape. And that's what they wrote her up for a DUI. And she said, and they said that because after they arrested her, she wasn't impaired. She was not impaired. Okay, she just had an open. No, she didn't even have an open. They just said because she didn't use a blinker and she had some cannabis in the car that she was impaired and then they take her blood so this is their this is how

they get you once they say hey you're you're arrested for DUI cannabis you got to submit breath blood or urine right if they if they request it so especially with drugs so they will do blood anybody who uses cannabis it stays in your blood for days you know so she had cannabis in her blood which is makes an argument for them to say there was impairment accompanied with no And it's just crazy to think about of all the things they could be prosecuting in Los Angeles County, that they would go to the full extent to try to have a hard working single mom's dismissal be set aside. I just think that's assonite, you know, and I, they based it on a vehicle code that's 40 something years old. So much of the legal system is, you know, assonine. so right it seldomly is it connected to logic um it's you know more like they're just trying

to you know gain points um so um okay so that's what you're doing now and you're doing stuff with the pop brothers yeah so you're doing a comp i was a for i do From all this cannabis stuff, we created a brand called Wax Brothers. And we're a licensed hemp farm in Tennessee. We started in 2018. And it was right as my partner got indicted, actually. And, you know, he's not on paper, a partner because he's a federal felon. So his dad is my partner on paper.

But we had a nice project and we killed it. unfortunately we're currently in a lawsuit someone stole 24,500 pounds of our hemp that we contracted with um and we've been in a very serious civil dispute uh for almost four years now and they they got it and just they so they received it and didn't pay for it they well no what was we did a deal for we did it was supposed to be a deal where we delivered we pay you X amount you extract it you give us the concentrate, we sell it as we go and we pay you the rest of your tab off the back end. Long story short, they didn't even have the license to extract. They didn't know what they were doing. They were kind of trial and error. And after deposing them and all this stuff,

we found out just it was a complete shit show. So we sued under the New Jersey Fraud Act and that's been going on for four years with a final arbitration date coming up any day now. Now, the judge in arbitration, these guys, these old retire mediator arbitrating judges, they just are so slow. They don't care. Even if it's a lot of money, they just don't care. Okay. All right. Well, I mean, I hope that works out.

Yeah, I mean, time will tell. You know, like I said, you want to do big business until you have big business problems, right? You know, everybody wants to have, you know, the big glamorous farm and see. all the stuff, but at the end of the day, there's risks, and that was part of it. So what, and what did the pot brothers do? The pot brothers of law were criminal defense attorneys and cannabis licensing experts here in California. So we help people get licensed and be compliant.

We help them associate with the right vendors. And then on the other side is, like we said, so when people are operating, there's still people that get arrested. And there's regular people every day that get arrested. So why just survive back to school when you can thrive by creating a space that does it all for you, no matter the size. Whether you're taking over your parents' basement or moving to campus, IKEA has hundreds of design ideas and affordable options to complement any budget. After all, you're in your small space era. It's time to own it. Shop now at IKEA.ca.

We serve the Southern California and all the state of California for criminal. defense needs, ranging from jaywalking to, you know, you know, pretty much anything unless it's, you know, we like to stay away from, you know, domestic violence to an extent, you know, we don't want anybody. We don't really do murder cases, primarily drug cases, you know, stuff like that. But we handle all of DUIs, stuff like that. Is, are these, are they on TikTok? Yeah, so the Pop Brothers of Law, we're on all social media. So they are on. on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, LinkedIn, they're known for what's called the script is the 25-word script that make sure you, all your rights, remedies, and defenses for court

are reserved for when you go to court. We tell people it's not something that's going to get you out of jail-free card, but if you get arrested and you stick to the script, you're going to have the best defenses for your attorney to use because admitting guilt and consenting to searches, all of that stuff, you know, it's not, uh, it's not in your favor. But to answer your question, yes, they're on social media and like, um, they've, they've done work with Snoop, Matthew McConaughey, Daniel Tosh. Uh, they, you know, they've done work with a lot of cool people on, um, you know, they're, they're continuing to grow. You know, right now I think they're at like almost 750,000 followers on Instagram alone. Uh, you know, I think they're at 400,000 on

Facebook. I don't know the numbers as well as my partner does, but I can assure you that when you retain them, you get guys that care and love what they do. And I think that's why they've built a good reputation in the cannabis community and like the Southern California area just for being straight up because they're not going to tell you what you want to hear. They're going to tell you the reality of the situation because there's a lot of attorneys that just take your money and then tell you what you want to hear until you're out of money and then that's it. Right. Okay. Yeah, I'll, I mean, I know that I should probably interview them. That would be a good interview. That would be your interview to connect with your interview, actually. Yeah. Yeah, Mark and

Craig and I love, the thing I love it about them is they knew my story from the get go. And so Mark always tells people, you know, he was my felon intern to associate attorney, you know. And Mark is really like my biggest, you know, cheerleader always supported me when I was even freshly, uh, provisionally licensed to the bar. We were doing some like very intensive motions and people were like, this kid's going to argue these motions. And Mark's like, yeah, and he's going to win them. I have no doubt. And we won them, you know, and it's been a blessing. Did you ever pass the bar? No, I haven't passed the bar yet. So I'm taking the bar in February. So my provisional license expired in May of this year. So they gave it to me from 2020.

to May of this year. And then it expired. And so now I just do motion work. So now I just, you know, help write the motions. And Mark will then argue those motions on the record. And then in Workers' Comp, it's administrative court. So you don't have to have a license to be a hearing rep and appear on the record there. Right. So with my experience, I do some hearing rep appearance work with Workers' Comp. And I always have loved to help people. Both my parents are doctors. So, like, I really, uh, like helping people in law, especially both sides, criminal defense and workers comp. You know, I'm helping injured people, you know, either get a medical buyout that they need or get the medical treatment that they are due through

workers' comp. And criminal defense, like I always tell people, I'm helping good people out of bad situations, similar to myself. You know, I was a good person in a bad situation because someone else had totaled a police car and had an ounce of cocaine and it's possession it got me felony charges felony bail intensive outpatient rehab like the whole nine yards i forget what the fines were the fines were crazy like it was just it was set up for failure but through and through i you know i just stuck it out and i really just um believed in i wasn't hurting anybody and if i was in california this would be technically legal um you know so i i i um i'm thankful for how everything panned out. And I'm happy to be able to have a platform myself and for,

you know, being able to be with the Pop Brothers of Law to be able to help, you know, I think we hit like 7 million accounts in the last 30 days, you know, 10 million accounts. So it's just nice to be able to help these people understand their rights when engaging with law enforcement, understanding, you know, where to store your cannabis properly, understanding that, you know, you don't want to tell on yourself. It's just, it's a really big blessing, you know, because we get DMs and we get messages all the time and people thanking us. And, you know, I get clients, you know, messaging, former clients messaging me on holidays thanking us for our service.

So it feels good to really help out the community. Cool. All right. Well, good. I appreciate, listen, I appreciate you coming on and, you know, being interviewed and speaking with me. And so is there anything, any anything you're pushing? Like any social media links, any, do you have anything like that?

Or it's just you're kind of under their wing? No, I'm, I'd like to say I'm under their wing when it comes to the criminal defense and stuff like that. And speaking platforms, we usually attend the same events. You can check us out, Pop Brothers allowed all social media. My brand is Wax Brothers. That's kind of, you know, my journey of getting arrested. We still stuck it out and created a successful farm.

And, you know, we're looking to expand into the hemp market in Tennessee. And then hopefully one day international. But yeah, so Wax Brothers and Pop Brothers at Law. I'm Patrick, the Dabino, as people call me, because I love concentrated cannabis. And so if you guys ever need anything, feel free to reach out. We love helping people. We love chopping it up in the DMs, emails. We like to communicate with our following.

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