Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - The Case That Sent a Teen to Prison for Life | Sam Brown

Episode Date: August 5, 2026

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All you got to do is go through the due process machine. That led to the bill that I wrote while I was incarcerated to change the Constitution. New Orleans was unlike any place that I ever been or anywhere that I grew up. But I didn't know that living there. And it was just a murder capital. And what I realized, if you're not going to be. a drug dealer, a high killer, or your family's not connected. New Orleans is not the place for you because there weren't many opportunities.

And that's what my mom saw. So she was like, I'm a, you know, my uncle had just got beaten by the police, right about the desire projects. They really bust them up with their building clubs and everything. Damn, they killed them. And my mom was just like, I'm getting out of this place. We're going to go to somewhere better. So I had an auntie.

You know, everybody has that one family member that they think is rich. We got the rich aunt, the rich uncle. So we had the rich aunt and the rich uncle out in Sacramento. And he was rich because he was an airplane mechanic. So that was rich. Right. And so we moved out there because he was family and we were out there. So that's how it took place.

And at 14 years old, I moved to Sacramento. First day, day one. I didn't know any Mexicans, Samoans, Tongans, you know, Laotians. I didn't know all of it. I knew black, white, Vietnamese coming from New Orleans. And maybe like, you know, Jamaican, Caribbean, Haitian, stuff like that. So when I got to Sacramento, the first day, The first day I'm standing in front of this house, this neighborhood looks totally different

from how I grew up. The curves are different. They have hedges, two-car garages. And I see these Mexican brothers walking up the street. And I remember vividly they were talking about a football game at Burbank. And they're like, yeah, we won the game. And I'm standing here looking. This is totally new to me, never seen this before.

And then Batch me in my jaw. Just walked up and just, I just saw stars. And when I come back, they're like, yeah, yeah, motherfucker. Like, yeah. What the fuck? What just happened? And so I chase them to the corner. And when I get to the corner, they back up like, yeah, come on.

Come on. I stop at the corner. I look at my little cousin. I'm like, go get my gun. That's what I yelled out before I ran. I'm 14 years old. Do you have a gun? Yeah, I bought it from New Orleans with me.

Oh, okay. Well, I don't know. You're 14. I didn't have a gun in 14. Yeah, well, you didn't grow up in my neighbor. Exactly. And so I get to this corner. And when I get there, I just stop because this is all foreign.

to me. It's all new and I don't know where I am. But that was my welcome. Like, welcome to G. Parkway, welcome to Sacramento. Welcome to California. I go back home and I begin to unpack and, you know, see what this new house has to offer this new neighborhood. And I remember hating. I hated being there. I did not want to leave New Orleans. I did not want to move to Sacramento. Did not want to be in G. Parkway. They teased me. They said I talk funny. They said I dress funny. it would say stuff like say basketball, say tennis shoe. And I'd be like, how about I say fuck you? You know what I'm saying?

I get into a lot of fights and stuff. So that's what it was like for me when I first moved there. But what stood out to me the most when I moved there, I started having run-ins with the police. When I was like 14 years old, I moved that when I was 14. And I remember getting on my bicycle because I wanted to see the area in the neighborhoods. And I got on my bike and I rode over this overpass.

And this white police put me over on my bike. bike. And he was like, hey, what you're doing around here? Where you're from? I'm from New Orleans. I'm like, shoot, I'm just riding my bike. And he's like, well, why are you riding your bike over here? I'm like, is it a problem with me riding my bike over here? And he said, let me see your ID. So when I show him my ID, he says, oh, you one of them G Parkway niggers. Now, first of all, this is a police officer, just called me a nigger. Then he's a white dude, just called me a nigger. Then he's an adult. And I'm a kid. So it's like cognitive distance, cognitive distance, cognitive distance. It's just setting in, setting and setting in.

And prior to moving to New Orleans, California, my mama told me, when I was like 12, she said, if you're ever by yourself and you see the police, run. And I'm like, why? And she said, because you're black and they'll kill you. You're a little black boy and they'll kill you, right?

And this is how my mama was born in the 40s. She grew up in New Orleans, and she's seen a different time. You know, the police in New Orleans are so dirty and crooked and it's the South. So she bought me a watch. And she said, If you ever by yourself and you see them before they see you run. But if they see you first, then always have on the watch that I bought you so you could pretend like you have somewhere to be and somebody's waiting for you.

So when I moved to California and this dude calls me a nigger, that started to confirm what my mama told me about the police, right? Because there was no reason for this man to get in me like that. I'm a little kid. I just moved here. I don't like the neighborhood that I'm in either. So when he looks at my ID and he says, oh, you're one of them G. Parkway niggas. And I'm like, no, no, I'm not. First of all, I'm not even from here.

You know what I'm saying? I've been fighting these dudes. I don't like them either. They don't like me. You know what I'm saying? It's all good. But he said, if I ever catch your black ass over here again, I'm going to arrest you. Get the fuck out my neighborhood.

I'm like, damn, all right. I got on my bike, came back to my neighborhood. And that was like my introduction to the police in the city in that area. Then I had a friend named Matthew, Matt Black, I would call him. He was black as your shirt. shirt. And he was my partner, though. And we were both from, he was from Chicago. I was from New Orleans. So we kind of bonded together on our outcast thing. And I recall one time we were in an abandoned house doing little kid things like breaking the mirrors and the windows and all the

stuff that little kids doing. I'm 15 years old at this time. And I heard something while we're in the house. I thought I heard somebody step on glass. I said, hold on Matt, let me go. I heard something. He's like, you ain't heard nothing. I said, I heard something, bro. So I go, look, as soon as I stick my head around the corner. Boom, Glock to my head. He's like, drop the bat. I blow your fucking head off. And it was his big old cop named Fonsworth, cricket cop in our area.

Right? So he grabs me, yanks me, pulls me out. And he like, y'all knew around here, huh? Where y'all come from? Like, from New Orleans. And Matt, like, I'm from Chicago. And he's like, oh, okay, well, this is what we're going to do. Y'all going to work for me.

Since y'all knew here, y'all going to work for me, you're going to tell me who's selling dope. You're going to tell me, you know, who committing crimes. selling blow, coke, whatever, everything. You're going to let me know who's doing what, and like I told you before, man, we may not have been from there, but working with the police is a universal fuck no. So we was like, hell no. And this officer then said, well, I am going to place y'all in the backseat of my car

and drive you around for an hour pertinent pointing at all of the gang members and everybody pretending like y'all giving me information. And he was like, man, fuck you. And he did it exactly what he said he was going to do. He handcuffed us. He put us in the backseat of that car. And he drove us around for over an hour where all of the people was on the corner selling drugs, where all of the game members hanging out at.

And he's pointing and he talking like, and we just laying against the windows. I'm laying against one window. He led against the other window. And we're not saying a word to this dude. I mean, he's pretending like we're talking to him. And then he drives up to where like, I don't know, like 20 crips hanging out at. And he said, I'm fin to put y'all out in front of all these dudes and give you a $5 bill and say, thanks for the information.

So we're like, all right, all right, all right, we'll do it, we'll do it, we'll do it. Right. But then he drives off and he's like, you know, what's your name? I'm like, I'm Gregory. Give him a fake-ass name. He don't even know our names. I'm Gregory. You know what I'm saying?

He asked my partner, man, I don't remember what he told him. And he said, well, for now on, every time I call you and you see me, come to me and give me information. Yes, sir. Shit. every time I seen that motherfucker, I was running. From that point forward, anytime I seen them, boom, I'm breaking, I'm breaking, I'm hiking fences, I'm running around the corners, I'm on the bike. And I say, all that to say, I started running from the police, not because I was a criminal

because they was criminals. And nobody talks about this type of stuff in our neighborhoods. Come to find out, that dude was selling dope. He had people selling drugs. He got busted. He was a crooked-ass cop. How many people like me wind up in the system or wind up dead or whatever because of an officer So like him, him that really made their life trajectory change.

People don't talk about these type of things. So that was another, you know, welcome to the neighborhood experience that I had as a kid. How, I mean, so you're 14. How long does this, what do you end up doing? Do you go to school? Yeah. Do you start selling drugs? So at that, I did.

So at that point, it's like, fuck the police. I'd rather identify with the people from my neighborhood than identify with the police. So while I initially was fighting with people from G. Parkway in the area that I moved to, these are the same people that I go to school with. They're the ones I'm playing basketball with. I'm walking home with. So eventually they become all my partners. These are my friends.

They got respect for me. We have my, I'm at their mama's house. They have my mama's house. They're mama's using dope and all kind of stuff. So I eventually became like content with the neighborhood that I lived in and just embrace the culture. I embraced the people and embraced everybody that embrace. brace me and I thank God for that you know so I just couldn't identify with the police

and I eventually started selling grass I dabbled with with bar dress for a minute but it's like everybody was competing for the same fiends at the time so probably extremely available in that area because you're so close to Mexico too right it's not like it's hard to find you know I begin selling it to my peers you know people that I went to school with and um as a result there was a neighbor that stayed across the street from my mom's house. And he saw, you know, when I moved there, that we didn't have a father in the house. And this guy presented as like a role model.

He's like the age that, you know, I or we are right now, and I was just a kid. And I used to cut his grass, wash his cars, carry his groceries for little odds and ends to stay out of trouble. And as time went on, like, he saw me gain respect from my peers and everything, start selling grass.

And eventually he approached me and asked me to sell dope for him, sell drugs. That's not where... Oh, you didn't think that was coming. That was, I thought he was going to take you aside and say, listen, what are you doing? Welcome to the ghetto, man. So, you know, he pulled me over to the side and was like, man, I've seen you then came up.

I can get you whatever you want. And I'm like, I ain't with the hard drugs, man. First of all, I don't want to do it. I'm like, no, thank you. Because when I was in New Orleans, a friend of mine, when we were kids, so older people friended him some drugs. When he didn't come up with all of the money, they killed him. And they killed them really bad.

They dismembered his body, cut his head off, all the stuff. Put it in the garbage can with his head on top. And it was real messed up, right? So I never forgot that. And when I came to California, I always promised myself I would never let nobody from me. No dope. You know, not legitimately anyway. And when he offered, I said, no, thank you.

Right? Then as he continued to talk and I looked around, I'm like, shit, He got the house. You got the rides. He got everything I want. He's older. And if I can get in with all these older people, I'm already in with the youngsters. I'm going to be the man.

I'm barely a teenager. And if I'm selling to all these demographics and I'm in with everybody, I see a path of success for my criminal-minded thinking at that time. So I say yes. And he says, okay, we'll come back next Thursday and I have it for you. And when I come back next Thursday, he then says, oh, I don't have it. but there's something I forgot to tell you. If you come short on my money,

you know what's going to happen to you, right? And at this time, it's like, hold up. In my head, I think I'm a gangster at this time. So you can't even talk to me like that, first of all. Second of all, I'm like, nah, I don't know what's going to happen. So let's just call this off.

I don't want to do it no more. He says to me, oh, you're going to do it. I'm like, nah, I don't want to do it. So you're going to do it or else. I'm like, or else what? He said, I'm going to take you to work. for your little turf where you sell your little weed at. I'm like, man, get the fuck out of here.

You could be my dad, bro. I'm gonna, we kids out here. Right. You know what I'm saying? Trying to find our way. You're established grown-ass man. I'm like, no, you get, stop playing. That motherfucker was serious.

He wasn't playing. He was dead serious. He, I come home from a studio and him and his wife are standing outside. You know, he's tied in with the police. His wife's ex-hus. ex-husband is a sheriff and they all hang out. They smoke, they drink, they do all the stuff. So they all tied in like how we was talking about earlier.

But I didn't know this, right? And the girl, she confronts me, makes an issue, stages of an issue in front of my mom's house. And I'm like, man, get out of here, going with that. Later on that day, it was her and her father when I told him to leave the police office in an undercover car. They were sitting in harassing me. him and his daughter sitting an undercover sheriff police car harassing me in from my mom's house. And I'm like, I'm sitting from my mom's house leave. So anyway, later that day, when I come back from the studio with my buddy DMAC, he drops me off.

I have a house over here in these in the Project Area G. Parkway that I'm about to go to. And this dude is out there waiting with his wife and the cordless phone, right? the cordless phone back then. So I get out. I got a backpack full of tapes and CDs. And he said, hey, I want to talk to you for a second. I'm like, what's up? Why you disrespect my daughter earlier?

I didn't disrespect your daughter, man. I'm going about my business. He pulls out a knife and tries to stab me. Right? And so now I'm dancing because I got this backpack. I have sipping this absolute vodka. And he's trying to stab me. And I used to sag back then.

You know, my pants hanging off my waist for those who don't know what sagging is. and don't sag. Do not sag. Sagging is not cool, right? And while I'm sagging, and he's trying to stab me, my pants falling out into my ankles. So now this dude is trying to stab me

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With promo code Cox15. Please support our channel and tell them we sent you. Fuck your khakis. Get the perfect gene. He can't get away. I dropped my absolute vodka. It breaks. I dropped my backpack.

His wife takes my backpack into the house and now they jacked me. She didn't just took it. I'm running with my pants on my ankles like this. I finally get my pants like he's chasing me trying to stab me with his knife. I finally put my pants up and I had this gun in my pocket.

You know? So when I pull my pants up and I turn around, bam, and I whip this 38 out in his face and his girl is standing behind him, but she didn't came back out of the house and she has the quarreless phone, but she don't see that I have a gun in his face. And I'm like,

the fuck are you doing? Now, I ain't never shot nobody, never killed nobody. I carry my gun, though, at this time, because it's part of the lifestyle. Right. And I'm like, but what the fuck are you doing? I can shoot you right now. And he's just sitting there looking all scared. Now he feels stupid. And I fired my little pistol in the air in one shot and I walk off, right? And when I do that, he calls the police. And they pull up in the undercover unmarked vehicle, his friends or whatever. And I learned later on that he filed a police. report that said that he came outside to protect his wife and I put a gun in his face. And so I learned then that he was creating a document, a documentary trail to try to make it

seem like I was the aggressor in a bad person. You're a minister to the neighborhood. Correct. When really is him. And they know how the rules and the laws were because they're adults. And I didn't as a kid. You know, you're not going to call the police. We're not learning about filing reports, none of that stuff.

So they knew. And so that was all part of my welcome to this neighborhood, man. Then when I was 18, to bring it back to when I told you that the first officer on the scene lied about the mask. So I beat him up when I was 18 years old, him and his partner, Brody, on my mama's lawn also. And that helped lay the foundation for me getting a life sentence later on. I'll tell you how when I was 18 years old, By this time, I'm accepted in my neighborhood. I'm cool with my peers.

I'm content with making bad decisions all the time. And my mom, she's using my car to go shopping. And I'm babysitting my little sister that I told you about the one we just adopted. She's like a year old at this time. And the police officers pull up in front of our house doing a traffic stop. Now, we live on a dead end. And our house is one house from the dead end. It's a bridge right here.

and then it's the projects right here, and they cut the project, they cut the dead in on so people can stop going in and out, you know, the apartments that they call the projects and they put a fence around it. So basically they didn't create this spot

on my street where everybody can just pull up, hang out, park their cars, all this stuff. That's where I live, right? So the police following this car that pulls up to like these 25, 30 black males

hanging out here on this bridge and when they pull up, they get out of their cars with the traffic stop, you know, driver, freeze, this, that, that, that this, all the neighbors come outside looking. It's like 25 males on the bridge and young ladies.

So I have my baby sister in my arms. I peek through the blinds. I see what's going on. Let me go outside and look too like everybody else. Another bad decision. And when I walk out there and I look, the officer, Leon, he says to his partner, Brody, watch your back. Talking about me.

Now, mind you, I'm in the foyer, beyond the lawn, on the other side of the sidewalk, on the other side of the curb. Then there's the street where they are. So I'm nowhere near them. I'm really just came out my mama's door with a baby in my arms. And he says to her, watch your back. And I think he said that because he didn't want to deal with like the rowdy males over there anymore. And he was only 18 months on the force at that time.

So I think he thought it was easier to deal with me with the baby in my hands than to deal with all of them, not knowing that them was all my peoples, right? So he says, watch your back. And I say, watch your arm back. I'm not doing nothing. Then he turns 100,000 million percent of his attention on me. And he's like, would you say? I said, man, watch your own back.

I'm not doing nothing. And he said, come to me. No, I'm not going to come to you. You're not here for me. I didn't do anything wrong what I'm going to come to you for. I'm 18 and I think I got rights. Right? I think I got rights at this time.

I'm still young and dumb. So he says, come to me. I'm like, no, I'm not coming to you. I didn't do anything. He hosts his pistol, walks across my mom, his lawn and cause itself apprehending me. Right? So I put my sister down.

I'm, my fiery shit up. I punched him in the jaw. Right? And when I punch him in the jaw, then me and him, we start tussling. And so now my little sister is sitting here in the grass. I'm right, I'm fighting with this police. And then the lady comes, and she gets involved.

So I hit her too. So now I'm fighting with both police on the lawn. And they're trying to, like, grab me and pepper spray me. I'm holding their arms, all kind of stuff, right? And then all of the homies, everybody's starting to come over here. Like, all of these males. And now they're getting scared. All the neighbors are outside.

And any neighborhood in America, in the city, especially in California, they're doing this substation in your neighborhood thing. You know, if you grew up in a certain neighborhood, you're not going to see that where they take a house and turn it into a police station. Right. In our neighborhoods,

they'll take an apartment building on a house and make it a whole police station, a substation. So there was a substation in my neighborhood. And when she called for backup, she's like, back up, back up, possible riot. It's what she said. Possible Riot, you know, on the Jeep Parkway. And so moments later, I hear scared all behind me.

And when I look up, all these police cars are coming around the corner, right? And when I look up, she reaches from behind me like this and pepper sprays me from the back, like almost blew my eyes out the back of my head. It's pepper sprays. You've been pepper spray before? No. That shit is powerful. It is powerful.

It propels out really strong because it goes far. So imagine being shot this close, right? and then it burns, of course, it's pepper spray. So that was my first time ever being pepper sprayed. It dropped me immediately, a ton of bricks. Boom. As soon as I fall into the ground, there's this big white officer runs up. And he says, let me break his nose.

And so while I'm laying on the ground like this, he goes to stalk my face. And as soon as I move my head, boom, his foot lands right by my head. I'm like, damn, that was close, right? So then they throw me in the back of this police car. And when they throw me in the back of the police car, are these all white officers or white and black? Leong, no black. I didn't see any black officers.

Oh, okay. Leong is Asian. Brody is white. Everybody else is white. Okay. Right? So that's another thing. Our neighborhood is being patrolled by people who don't live in them.

That's a whole different discussion, right? But yeah, these are all white officers with the exception to Asian, Leon, that I can recall. And they throw me in the back of this police car. And now I'm livid. Matt, I'm livid, bro. I'm kicking, you know, boom, boom, boom. I'm kicking the window. I'm kicking the door.

I'm spitting. I got all this pepper spray in my eyes and my mouth. I'm livid. And I'm burning. So I'm spitting, I'm spitting. I'm spitting. And then the door opens, boom. And who is it?

Fonsworth, the big ass cop that I was running from ever since I was 15 years old. And he said, oh, finally got your ass. That's what he say to me. Right. And so then he says, somebody go get me a stocking mask so we can stop him from spitting because they cut the foot off the stocking and they put it on your head so you can't spit, right?

And they went to go get that and then he came back and he says, oh, you're lucky we don't have a stocking mask to put on your fucking face to stop you from spitting. I said, oh, you don't have one? Right in his face. Fat-ass Lugie.

Right? So as soon as I did that, he got pissed, of course. And he's like, oh, we're going to fuck you up. So then they take this rope. They take this rope and they tie it around my feet. And when they tie the rope around my feet, they hang it inside the door. So now my feet are dangling in the air. I'm laying across the back of the police car seat with my head in the seat, my feet in the air.

My homies and everybody starts surrounding the car because they said, they was like, well, let's take him and go beat his ass with the police said. And so I do our little call back then like, whooo, come to the seat. And I said, they're going to beat my ass. They're going to beat my ass. And everybody starts surrounding the car, basically. And they're like, back up, back up. You know, back up.

It's a lot of commotion. And so then they say, well, drive Brown to the corner. So they drive me to the corner where they're trying to quell all of the neighbors and everybody out there. When they get me to the corner, then they have a powwow around the car. And they're like, well, what the fuck is going on? They asked the Asian guy Leon. What the fuck is this?

What's going on? Because it's a whole big old issue. And I'm not the reason they were there. Right. It had nothing to do it. How did this escalate to this point? They want to know. What's going on?

How did he get here? And he said, well, I was just doing a stop. And, you know, he interfered. And it was like, well, fuck all that. What were we going to do? And he said, well, let's beat his ass. Take him to the Freeport Crips and let them finish them off for us. That's what they said.

Like, kill me. And I was like, damn, I only seen this shit in movies. I'm about to die. This is it from me. I resigned. And I was really my hog tied, my feet are in the air. I'm laying across the backseat of the police car. The police said that they're about to take me and beat my ass and then drop me off to some gang members.

I resigned. was about to die that day. And then I heard my engine on my car. You know, you can tell your own car. I heard the engine come around the corner, and I knew it was my mom coming back from shopping with my car. And then I heard the engine come back to the corner. So somebody told her, hey, they got your son in the car.

Yeah. So the engine came back to the corner. And I heard the door open and closing. My mom said, what are y'all doing with my son? Oh, they start scrambling. They said, oh, he's going to go to the county jail for just a misdemeanor. interfering with a peace officer on duty, you can come pick him up right now.

She said, that's it, that's it. Okay, we're on our way to the county jail. I hear a scur, boom, boom, boom, three-car accident, smash me in the backseat of the police car. So now I'm hog-tied in the backseat of the police car, smashed up, messed my shoulder up, they come get me out the police car, and the dude said, man, you want to go to the hospital?

And I'm so angry, I'm like, fuck no. I want to go to a hospital. Just take me to jail, right? Just I want to go to jail. But then my arm starts hurting. And I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I want to go. I got to go to the hospital. So then he takes me to the hospital, handcuffs me to the bed, writes me a citation, says,

Brown, all of this could have been avoided if he just would have came to me, unhandcuffs me, and leaves, left me at the hospital. So then I call my mama, my mama come get me, we file a lawsuit against the Sacramento Police Department. Boom. That's when I was 18 years old. So from that point forward, every time something happened in my neighborhood, this officer wants to know, is Sam Brown involved? Is Sam Brown involved? I don't care what it is.

A motherfucker fucking candy got stole at the gas station. It's Sam Brown involved. If somebody got shot, it's Sam Brown involved. So when this guy that I did shoot got shot, the first officer on the scene was the officer that I beat up that I got a lawsuit against. Right. So I have on this ski mask. And the guy says, I was going to say, so wait, so what happened? How did that happen?

All right. What's the lead up to that? Oh my goodness, man. You and Brian, shout out Busy B, man. I want you to know, bro. I don't really talk about this stuff. I want y'all to know, yeah. I teach, but I don't really talk about my life.

I use it as a teacher too because I don't glorify it, right? My name is Sam and Nathaniel Brown. I'm the founder, director of the TMP program, and I'm here having a discussion with my brother Matt today, talk about true crime, but I want y'all to know, I do not glorify. I do not glorify none of this shit. You know what I'm saying? I lived it. I did it.

We can talk about it, but we don't glorify it. We're trying to do it. to get y'all to elevate beyond it. So peace and blessings and thank you, Tim P. What led up to me shooting that man was, again, he tried to make me sell his dope. And once he tried to stab me and I pulled the gun out, you know, and I pulled the gun out, I was like, let me just keep my eyes open for this cat. I don't really know what's going on, right?

After I pulled the gun out, I'm walking up the street one day. This is the neighbor, not the police officer. It's the neighbor. It's a mentor, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, who's tied in with the police, though. The mentor. That's horrible, bro. horrible. Yeah, this is a mentor.

You're smearing mentor name mentor. Isn't that something? Mentorship. Shit, mentor shit. And so I'm walking up the street. He drives by in his Cadillac and he says, get your gun out. I'm going to meet you at the corner. This broad daylight, like it's dusk.

The sun is going down. To get your gun out, I'm going to meet you at the corner. Now I got my little 38 with two bullets. Same, same rusty ass 38 I had when I shot. I had three bullets. I had three bullets. You know, poe little kid hustling. But he like, get your gun out.

I'm going to meet you at the corner. All right. I pull my 38 out. I'm walking up the street with it in my hand. Like, what's up? He'd meet me at the cone. He got a 45 with an infrared beam on it. Exactly.

And we like this on each other. He got the 45 with the infrared beam. I'm looking at it. It's like beaming in my eyes. It's on my head. And I got this dumb ass 38 with two bullets. And we aimed at each other like this in the middle of street, walking around like two outlaws.

And I'm like, damn, I'm trying to pick my shot. I'm like, I'm gonna die here. I'm about to die here. Or I'm gonna kill him. Something has to give, you know what I mean? And right there at that moment, when we look into each other, I'm like, I'm going to take my shot right. And I'm from the bus. My buddy pull up in a brand new Dodge Neon because Dodge Neon said just came out.

And he was messing with this girl and he was driving her car. Right? And he's like, what's up, Bo? Because he's from Chicago. What's up, Bo? What's going on here? And I'm like, this bitch ass motherfucker. I'm tough.

My heart is beating out my chest. I'm terrified. But I'm like, this bitch ass motherfucker. You know yada yada, bean bang. I get in the car like I'm hella hard. I'm like, all right, motherfucker. All right. All right. You dead, motherfucker.

I ain't never killed nobody. I don't know. What the fuck I'm talking about? I'm scared. I'm just popping off at the mouth. But what I did was I peer pressure myself because I didn't start telling all my homies, I'm going to kill that motherfucker motherfucker.

He disrespected me. He disrespected me. I'm going to do us. He disrespect in the hood. So now everybody waiting for me to do what I said. I'm going to do because I'm Mr. Mouth Almighty. Yeah. We make things.

just for college life, like the Rosenmando blackout curtains in gray. They say you can't put a price on sleep, but we did for the low, low price of $49. Why are you in my room? Shh, go back to sleep. You have a big exam tomorrow. Shop back to school at IKEA. So I peer pressured myself, but you couldn't have told me that then. So to all y'all are listening, self peer pressure is a real thing, right?

So I'm like, y'amma kill this fool. And, but I don't want nobody to know it's me. I'm going to do it in the ways of the serial killers and the mob and everything I had studied and seen and heard. They just got shot by somebody. Wasn't me? Yeah. You feel me? So I'm like, I'm going to lay them.

I'm going to wait. Like everybody think it's cool and all the stuff. So I waited like a month. I waited like a month. To me, I thought that was a long time. You know what I'm saying? And then one night, I went outside and I waited for him to come out to go to work. I knew his schedule at that time, you know.

And when he came out, I remember taking my little homie with me, rest in peace. I said, I'm going to show you how to kill somebody. Now, I never even killed nobody at this time, but I'm telling him. I'm going to tell him, I'm going to show him how to kill somebody. And he comes along with me. You know, his father was a police officer. And he got me my guns that I used, you know, for all the stuff that we did that came from the police, basically,

because his dad was the police, and he would get all these guns and give him to us. So at the end of the day, I had this gun that came from my buddy who got it from his dad, who was a police. Not the little 38.

No, not the 38. This time I got a 4-10 gauge. You know, not quite the 12-gauge, but it's a 4-10 gauge. And I load three rounds into it. Man, the three rounds. The three rounds again, right? And I hang outside,

and I'm like, three rounds is enough to kill him, man. This is a gauge, right? And I wait outside for him to come, outside and I run from under the bridge and I put the gun to the back of his head. He don't even know I'm there. He loaded stuff in his truck and he turns around and walk off and I creep up. I got the ski mask on. I got my gloves on. I got the gaze to the back of his head. And I could have just blew his head off right there. Unfortunately, or fortunately, thank God, I was tainted by all of this stupid shit that I used to study and listen to him watching here back

in the day. You know, a killer does this and you do it like this and you. There was this one line that I love so much, you always look a man in the eye before you kill him. So I took that shit to heart as a kid. And I felt like you need to know it's me killing you. Right. You know? And I wanted him to see my eyes. So I cocked the gauge so he can know that I was there.

But when I cocked it, the one that was inside flew out, of course. And he's looked, he's like, oh! And he took off running. I shot him in the shoulder. He fell. Then I shot him in the face. But by the grace of guard, it knocked out of eyes. teeth and all that stuff, but he didn't die.

Right. And when I ran off, I could steal him screaming and my little homie ran off. We hopped on the bicycle, you know what I'm saying? All the police driving by is not realizing it's us. And we got in traffic, right? It was gone. With that said, you left the shell? I left the shit with somebody else's fingerprints.

Oh, who's Jimmy? Yeah, but again, they wouldn't give me that. They made that disappear when they text. So now, we talked about it earlier. Right. I said they turned the criminals. And this is all the stuff that I was talking about. Not only did I wear a ski mask, when they found a shell in the driveway,

it had somebody else his fingerprint, my little homie's fingerprint on it. And all I know is it wasn't mine. What they said in trial was, they was like, well, it came back negative for brown. It came back negative, so we're just going to exclude it. So that's exculpatory evidence that proved my innocence, quote-unquote, technically. It gives them an alternative suspect. And they wouldn't acknowledge it. They wouldn't even honor that.

So these are the type of things I was talking about in my case. That's shell, the district attorney and my attorney, into stipulations. And he said, well, I will stipulate. If you give me this, then I won't mention this shell. We'll just take it out. That's not a good stipulation. That's a ton of shit they was doing to me, you know? That's a bad bargain.

It's not a good decision on that. That's a public defender. Or somebody who got paid very, very little. money. You're right. It was a public pretender. So, okay, so you, you run, the cop show up. Does he know it's you? No. He doesn't know it's you? No. You don't know it's me. I mean, you're, how tall are you? 6-1-6-2?

You're 6-1 and probably at that time 180 pounds, right? No, no. I'm like 165 with boots on. Yeah, come on. I mean, it's pretty recognizable. No doubt. You would think he would have been like, I knew immediately it was the kid next door across the tree. Correct. You would think that, right? So he can't ID you. So when he got shot, the officer that I beat up, first one on the scene, they said,

who shot you said, he wrote it. I don't know who shot me. It's written. I don't know who did this to me. I don't know who shot me. Then dude says, what was it, Sam Brown? Then he writes that he says, I think it was Sam. Right.

So that's the whole report. I don't know who shot me. I don't know who did this. I think it was Sam because it is dude always asking that stuff. Right. Right. So then an investigator goes to visit him. Well, why do you think it was Sam?

Well, Sam walked with a limp. The shooter had a limp. And I think Sam has a limp from a old basketball injury. Sam doesn't have a limp. Never had a limp. You can't identify anybody like that. Case closed. So they closed the case.

Now, it gets more interesting. I had a friend, my partner, Zoe, who was dating as white chick. Her daddy was the head detective. in Sacramento, police department. And when I say head, I mean, hey,

like I would be up in their house. And in the house, he had pictures on the wall with him and Pete Wilson. Pete Wilson was the den governor. He had pictures on the wall with him and George Bush, senior.

George Bush was the president at the time. So it was him and the governor, him and the president, and then in the middle it was Tombstone posted from the movie, the cowboy movie Tombstone.

Yeah. So it was Tombstone, governor, president. But this dude was really connected, right? And we would be up in this house, all of us little black asses from the ghetto. And his daughter was always, her mantra was, I hate my dad.

I hate my dad. So she was born in like England, supposedly. Her mom died at birth. They feel like her dad is less than or beneath them. She came to live with her dad, but she gets this money like every three months that she just blows on my friend. And by way of him on us too. and her mantra is always, I hate my dad, I hate my dad.

So I don't know if she's dating my little black friend because she really liked him or because the trauma that she has and she was just acting out towards her own father. Whatever the case was, we were always be in the house, they had a relationship. We're barbecuing in there. We're playing with his dog buddy, the Dalmatian, driving his vehicles and all the shit. And one day, I'm looking at his bookshelf. And I see these police officer yearbooks. And so I asked him, I ask Casey, you know.

I say, can I have this book? look, she said, I don't care. I hate my dad. Like on schedule. I don't care. I hate my dad. I'm like, all right. So I take the book back to our neighborhood.

And in it, you know, you have pictures of officers and everything. And we just start drawing horns on them, mustaches on the women, bullet holes on their heads. It was a K-9 named Rocky that got killed. And I remember writing, fuck you, Rocky, should have stayed a dog instead of a pig. You know, all that type of stuff inside the book. As a young kid, it was inside of a pre-ped. So we would go over there and rap. And the book was just a, people write shit in the book, whatever.

One day, they're doing a probation search at my mom's house and they find that book. And the book has his name monogram on the front of it, the head detective of Sacramento. And so when they go in and they find this book in my mama's house, on the south side of town, it created a fucking firestorm. What the fuck is Top Brass's book doing in this house on the south side. So I guess he had to either come clean my dad. daughter daced these fools or whatever, it was embarrassing, but they wanted me bad. So bad that they started having meetings at his house and she would go in with the caller's

phone and let me listen to the meetings while they're at his house, right? I took his 35 millimeter binoculars and they set up a perimeter around my neighborhood to get me, just me, just they wanted me gone. They were going to kill me, was the plan. It wasn't even legit. And one time I came out and you had the two officers. sitting down in a white unmarked vehicle. And I went and sat on the bridge.

And I'm looking through the 35 millimeter binoculars. And then he has his. He has this 35 millimeter binoculars. And he looks up. And when he looks up, I'm already looking at him. And he's like, oh, shit. And he started hitting him. Like, go, go, go, go.

And I just fall across the bridge and I hop a fence and I disappeared. It was hilarious. But these are the type of things I was dealing with from them. They really wanted me dead. And so then I'm terrified. I'm like, I'm getting the fuck out of California. I'm going back home to New Orleans. I'm gonna go back because I just shot this dude.

He's older than me. They got money. The cops are gunning for me. The cops are gunning for me. I'm barely a teen. I'm a teenager. I'm scared. I'm in over my head.

And he forced, trying to force me to sell his dope. But ain't nobody's going to give it for. Nobody's trying to take my side. He pressed the issue, try to stab me, tried to shoot me. And then when I took it there,

and then they bring the police in, you know what I mean? But ain't nobody's going to see her from that angle as a kid. With that said, I flee. While I'm in New Orleans, I wind up getting in trouble. That's a whole different discussion we can have. While I'm in New Orleans and I get sent to,

so the prison system, it went from Templeman to H-O-D to Orleans Parish prison, and then you might get shipped to Angola or something. So they took me to Templeman. What did you get in trouble for? If you don't want to get the whole thing, I mean, what's the short version of it? I mean, you can tell the whole thing.

Well, it's not even no big deal like that. The short version is I had a pistol when I was, I was in New Orleans. I was walking down the street with it in my hand. And the police saw me. And I went to run. You know what I mean? Because I was getting rid of the pistol at the end of the day.

And I went to run. And when I went to run, I hop the fence. And I was going to hop another fence. But when I got to that fence, it was two pit bulls looking at me like, do it. Right. Bring your ass up in here, right? They didn't bark. They didn't make a noise.

They just ran to the gate and just stood there like, do it. So there was no hopping that fence. I just threw the gun up in there with the pit bulls. Like, ain't nobody going up in there. You know what I'm saying? Through it as far as I could. I went back, the police apprehend me. And they're like, he threw something.

So they get the owners. They go find the gun. I get locked up. When I get locked up, I'm under an alias. But there's somebody that works there that knows me. And I used to bring pounds of weed from Cali to New Orleans. And this person was a part of that,

even though they was a share. Right. Right. And when I go in there, I guess they're afraid that our operation is going to get busted because this is the second time I get arrested once. I get right out. This time I get arrested for the gun thing. I don't get right out. And this person, when they see me, because they work intake, I guess they were afraid that our whole operation is going to go and they turned me in. So when it's time for me to bail out, I get bailed out. I come downstairs and bailed out under an alias. Yes. Okay. Under an alias. And while I'm sitting there, everybody's getting their clothes. We're in a holding tank, right? And this dude comes in with his clothes. Like, hey, man, I got my clothes. Other dude coming in like, hey, man, you want a cigarette? I'm like, nah, I don't smoke.

Got this pack of camels. I'm like, I don't smoke. Then I go to the counter to get mine. And when I grab my bag, because, you know, the bag is right there. I grab my bag. A sergeant lady walks up and she has this folder in her hand that says F-A-X, facts. And she's like, hold on, Mr. Brown. When was the last time you've been to California?

Just that question. Mm-hmm. I'm like California. And the person who knows me is sitting right here. Like, I'm like California. I don't know what you're talking about. She said, well, ain't your name? And she said my real name.

And I looked over at the person and they put their head down. And I was like, up, here we go. Let the games begin. It's on. So I knew this person that sold me out, right? Long story short, she said, well, we have you won it in the FBI Slick's computer system. And they have you down for attempted murder, armed robbery, attempted murder of a priest. A priest?

Yeah, they even charge me or attempt to murder of a priest also to have me listed as just this bad person. Right, right. And she says, so we can't let you go. I'm like, damn, I go back into the holding tank. It was like, where your clothes are? Where your clothes? I'm like, man, they said, I was going for this, this, that, and this.

I said, can I still get the cigarette? He said, bro, you can have a whole pack. He said, you can have a whole pack. And then I smoke cigarettes for 10 years after that. I ain't lying. I smoked camels for fucking 10 years, right? So once I

fight the extradition because I didn't want to extradite me back to Cali, I go to the judge in New Orleans. I go from the house of detention to Templeman to OPP, Orleans Parish Prison, which is a terrible prison.

The moment I walked up in there, it's like versus a guard standing there with a 12 gauge. It's a sign that says you are now entering a, it's a sign that says, you are now entering a real prison. First of all, then when you get into the holding tank, it's disgusting, and it was the word

AIDS written in blood. So somebody took their blood and wrote AIDS like this big, and it was like, ah, it was like smeared shit all up in there. It was just bad, bro. And I was like, here we go. This is all new to me. You know what I'm saying? However, in California, I knew.

I was like, I shot that dude, but I shot him with a ski mask on and, you know, quote-unquote, for as criminality goes, I thought I did it the right way. Right. So technically, while the streets may want me, as far as the law go, I got away with that crime is what I'm thinking, right? When I speak to the judge in New Orleans, he says, Mr. Brown, I'm looking at these charges. If you was in New Orleans, we wouldn't even charge you with this stuff.

It's like California just, you know, just shooting in the dark, right? They're just trying to get you for nothing. So this is what I'm going to do. If they're not here in three days, I'm cutting you loose. because I don't see anything here. I'm like, hell yeah. Three days? 72 hours?

I can do sit-ups for three hours, 72 hours, whatever. So 72 hours, I go back to court. And he says to me, Mr. Brown, man, I've been a judge for over two decades. And I have never in my life seen a governor's warrant. He said, I was all prepared to cut you loose today. But you, my friend, have some. something that I've never seen, which is a governor's warrant signed by Mr. Pete Wilson himself.

Right. And remember Pete Wilson was the guy who was on the wall in the picture with the officer who was house I was in. Right. So as soon as he said that, I've never seen a governor's warrant, and we have one here signed by the governor, Pete Wilson, for you, and they want us to hold you another three days, and Cali will be here. I knew the fix was in.

I knew the fix was in. That governor pulled, that officer pulled the string. They did that. So the officers came to see me. And when they escorted me from the prison cell that I was into the holding tank, it's officers, Detective Gardner and Overton. Detectives Gardner and Overton. They locked up X-rated, Honor Ray Brown.

And they wanted me to know that. He was like, well, you know I locked up X-rated. We locked up. Ina Ray Brown. He's a rapper in Sacramento, right? And I was like, I don't give a fucking anything to lock me up, you know, talking my shit. And while we were walking to the interrogation, room, he says, we found the book.

We found the book. You was pretty hot shit in Sacramento for a minute, but we got your ass now. But that's what he said to me. I'm like, wow. Okay. And so when they get me in this interrogation room, all this and yada yada, yada, being made, nothing comes from that, of course. They fly me.

The U.S. Marshals didn't come get me, strapped this device to my ankles, saying if I get too far away from the middle, shock me and drop me and all this stuff. They fly me to Sacramento. And then they charged me. All the other stuff that they said they was going to charge me with disappeared. And it just charged me with this, you know, attempt, murder, fire, you know, possession of a firearm, mayhem, so forth and so on. And that was the beginning of how I got locked up.

So when I fled to New Orleans and I got locked up and I came back, the new detectives went to go visit this guy. Well, they say he called them. and then they went to go visit him. But he says my memory came back. The mask was up. It was Sam Brown that shot me. And they put a warrant out for my arrest.

So that's where the warrant came from. So months after the case was closed, after they found this book, then the new detectives from the people whose house I was in go visit this guy. And then he says, my memory came back. The mask was up. Sam Brown shot me.

They put a warrant out from my arrest. They locked me up. When I go to trial, there's no mask. There's no lens. There's no anything. It's just I saw Sam Brown's face from the very beginning. In fact, I walked up to Sam Brown while he was kneeling in front of the truck. He didn't even know I was there.

I walked up and I tapped him on the shoulder and I said, Sam, what are you doing? And at that time, Sam then stood up, looked at me, turned back around, pulled his mask down, then turned back around and aimed a gun. And I said, oh, it's for me. And I took off running and then Sam shot me. That was the story they then presented. And they gave me life for that. And everybody knew that was a lie.

The judges, the district attorneys, myself, him, everybody. And I got a life sentence for that. So when I went to jail, to prison, I went in of the mind state that it wasn't about whether or not I committed this crime. It was about who could tell the best lie. And so from that point forward, I started studying the law. And that's when I learned about actual innocence and factual innocence and the difference in California, you know, jurisprudence in their law.

And so I start pushing my factual innocence. Factually, there was evidence that this dude said he didn't see who shot him. Factually, there are officers who recorded on their reports that this dude said he didn't know who shot him. Factually, he said he got shot by somebody with a limb. I got medical reports from doctors and said I never had a limb. So I proved all of this stuff to show that this wasn't me in established reasonable doubt and they would not allow it to prevail no matter what. And so I'm not complaining.

I'm not griping. I'm just highlighting what we were talking about earlier that it's not all. always just cut and dry as people think. And just because a person holds a position, it doesn't mean that they're infallible. Was it, you said they wouldn't allow it to prevail. Do you mean during the appeals process? Like you were appealing it and they were just denying it appealing? Or you can't even, you can't even get to an appeal process. I couldn't win the trial. I couldn't win my case, period. Well, I understand once you lost the trial and you went to prison and looked it up and, I mean, you did go to trial, so you should still have your rights. Are you allowed to file,

you should be allowed to file an appeal? I was. I was. I was. I was. I had. I had a direct appeal. I had a rid of habeas corpus. I want to tell you, though, I had a retrial hearing first. Okay. So let's start there, right? So I'm going back up. First of all, they told me I was facing two life sentences in 40 years.

That's when I first hit California. When I came back from the extradition, they said, man, you're facing two life sentences in 40 years. Then they offered me a deal. The deal, the first deal was 65 to life. Exactly. Oh, that's a hell of a deal. Hey, come on.

I'm only, I'm only 19, 20 years old at this point. You know, then the next deal was 35 of life. and then my fourth deal or my third deal was 13 years. And so at that point, I'm like, oh, they didn't went down from double life to 65 of life to 35 of life to 13 years. They know they're not going to win this case.

That's what I'm thinking. Yeah. In my head, like, they know, they know. So I'm like, I'm not taking no deals. And at that time, 13 years for a 20-year-old, man, I'm like, I'm going to be 33. That's ancient. Right.

You couldn't have told me no different. I'm like 33 is ancient back then. And so at that time, when I get convicted and I go to have a retrial, I had an alibi, right? And I had alibi witnesses willing to come say I was with them. Right. And I did. So when I first met my attorney and the investigator, I say, hey, I have an alibi, and these witnesses would tell you that I was with them. Right.

Okay, fine. Let me go meet them. So they went and met the witnesses. Yeah, we was hanging out watching movies and lifting weights. We were at my house. Cool. My attorney, after a year of preparation for my case, when it's time to go to trial, doesn't call him a single witness on my behalf, has been telling me he talked to everybody,

everything is good. And he says, Your Honor, we're going to close the case. And I'm like, Your Honor, we're not going to close the case. I need to testify. So I need to testify for myself, apparently. They're like, Mr. Brown, you're going to testify? Yes. I get on the stand.

I didn't do it. It wasn't me. You know what I'm saying? I was over here watching porn flicks and listening and lifting weights and listening to music. And these people will come in and tell you that. And I do not know why my attorney didn't call them in. As soon as I get off the stand, my attorney says, Your Honor, I would like to go on a record and say that. I've had numerous consultations with Mr. Brown.

The last one was at the county jail. It lasted approximately an hour and a half. And until this day, I've never heard these names and these alibi witnesses, ever. And I'm like, what the... Are you kidding me? Where's my life? My attorney's sitting here saying he ain't never heard of my alibi witnesses that he'd been known for about a year, right?

So when I hired this new attorney, he puts that attorney on the stand. He puts the district, he puts the investigator on the stand and everybody. And the investigator says, we knew about these witnesses from the moment we met Mr. Brown. I went and interviewed him. I took the reports and I gave him to Mr. Declere. So he's absolutely just lying. Flat out, because they're all against me. The police, the judges, this is a real conspiracy.

My case is big. They want me off the streets and everybody's a part of it. My paid attorneys, they scared them off my case. They told us, they like the police pressured us, Danny Brace and Don Massouda. Both of them. We hired them. They were attorneys and they're like, we got to get off this case. They're pressuring us.

Police want you off the streets. They want to kill me. They told my mama they was going to kill me. They told my mama they was going to kill her. Police told my mama that was going to kill her, right? And so when, what was I telling you just now? I was sharing some with you. They had the evidence.

They gave it to your attorney. Your attorney clearly lied. Yeah. So he lied. And he said, I've never heard of these alibi witnesses. So my new attorney, Daumersuda, puts my old attorney on the stand after the investigator. And he says, Mr. Declor, you represented to the court that you've never heard of these

alibi witnesses when clearly you have. And he said, well, I just. got to say that, I goofed. I goofed before and I'll probably goof again. Verbatim. I goofed. I goofed before and I'll probably goof again. So I'm cheering them like, yes, ineffective assistance of counsel. He admitted it on the stand. This is going down retrial. Shit, the judge came back and he said, Mr. Brown, although some very interesting stuff has come out today, and Mr. Decliffe said what he said, I can see how it may have impacted you, but it didn't rise to the level of egregious enough to be prejudiced against you in your trial so we're going to keep

the verdict and still just find you guilty and not give you a retrial well i mean i don't understand what what if that doesn't reach the burden what what would exactly brother exactly so i knew then i was like oh they're not going to let me out of here they're not let me get this daumasuda was like the hot he was like eight years undefeated it's doing eight years undefeated in these court in these courts. Everybody knew his name. It was like calling in the legal god. So once we hired him, my mama scraped up everything we could to get this dude on my case and he put that retrial together, you know, and they still did that. Like, yeah, they're not trying to let me out. So once they shipped me to prison, I then began going to the law libraries and learning the law even more

and I filed my direct appeals and I began writing Ritz of Habes Corpus, you know, maintaining my actual innocence. That's how that next part came to be. So when you filed your, when you actually filed the appeal, what, I mean, what happens then? Man, so I'm filing for like, um, exculpatory evidence. I'm filing for perjured testimony. I'm filing for ineffective assistance of counsel and actual innocence. They denied them. They would deny parts of them and say, well, you didn't prove the ineffective assistance of counsel, or maybe there's cause to keep the case going so you can show more evidence

or why you need this is exculpatory evidence, something like that. So I kept the door open for myself. But after your direct appeal is denied, there are only two things that allow you then to be able to traverse inside the court system in California. One, you have to have an illegal sentence. If you're sentenced illegally, that can never stand.

And they can correct that anytime. There's no time constraints on that. And then if you're actually innocent, there's no time constraints on that. So in order to keep the door open for yourself in a California case, you either have to have a claim of an illegal sentence or you have to claim of actual innocence. So in order for me to keep my court case alive in the courts, I had to maintain my actual innocence all the time, just so I could have an appeal. So it's like they force me to lie because they wouldn't honor it on the merits.

So, I mean, how long have you been locked up by the time you get denied on your appeal? Shucks. By the time I get locked up on my appeal, I got locked up in 97. I got my appeal denied. I stayed into the county jail until like 99. I got my appeal denied by like 2002. So that's five years. Yeah.

You've been locked up five years. Yes. Do you appeal it to the Supreme Court at that point? Are you in the district now or the lower courts? And does it go to the state Supreme Court? Yeah. So eventually, it starts with the Superior Court. Right.

But they don't have to hear it. I mean, the Supreme Court, of the state Supreme Court doesn't have to hear it, right? No, but if they don't, they then give jurisdiction to the federal appellate courts. Okay. So it's in their best interest to state why they didn't. Because the law says, like,

if they just dismiss it or they just pass it, pass it on and they don't like adjudicate the merits why then next court has jurisdiction and you giving them the ability to then answer your true complaints or your issues are so it started with the superior court then from the superior court to the like appellate court whatever first district or whatever california appellate courts then from there you go to the to the california supreme court then from the california supreme court you go to the ninth circuit then from the ninth circuit you go to one more district court, I believe. It's called the district.

You go to the district court, and then from the district court, you go to the United States Supreme Court. And so I did that too. You went through all those processes, denied, denied, denied, denied, deny. Hell yeah. Then I went to the board five times.

Denied, denied, denied, until they finally let me out. Yes, sir, I did all of that, 24 years. You know, do you know who Ephraim Devereoli is? So did you ever see the movie of Wardogs? No, but Devereaux sounds so familiar. Well, one of the lead characters in the movie War Dogs is a guy named Ephraim Devoroli. I met him in prison.

And I'll never forget, he said, because it's actually one of the few things he said that was kind of, you know, interesting that was like telling. He said, they can do whatever. People will allow them or they or the government can do anything they want to use. you as long as you will, as long as there is an appeal process. Because it gives them the ability to do something illegal to you. So true. And he's like, and that way when people complain, they say, well, you can appeal it. Yeah, so true.

Like there's a process to, if we're wrong, which they already know they're wrong, you can appeal it. Even though he was like, even though they're all in it together. I cannot tell you how many times I had a disciplinary infraction that was drummed up, that was false, that was bogus. And the hearing officer, you know, the S.HO, the senior hearing officer, is his buddy that wrote it. Right. And before they go against each other, I'd be like, check this out. This is wrong.

It don't add up. They be like, yeah, Brown, I see it. But I'm going to find you guilty. Just appeal it. It never fails. Yeah, yeah. Just pass it on down the road. Yeah.

Knowing that the next guy is going to rub it. stamp it. Yeah. And we got to suffer the consequences until the appeal goes through, if it goes through. Yeah, yeah. Got to lose whatever I had. What is it? You know what it does?

It gives you the hope that you'll be able to get it corrected. I used to always say it's hope that gets you through. Yeah. And so they use it against you. Well, you see Hunger Games. Hunger Games is like a little bit of hope. It's cool, but too much hope is a bad thing. And it's the same.

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which, by the way, should be coming very soon. Like any second now. Okay, Twizzlers, time to keep the fun going. In the prison system, they don't mind you having some hope, but... So what happens at eventually... What is the eventual result? Or is there anything else you want to cover before that? Or you just keep it's just basically the same basic, denied, denied.

I mean, if we wanted to get into the nuances of it, I'm not really sure of all of the stories I could tell you. Right. I mean, we're talking 24 years of me litigating for myself, of getting into it with officers, getting into my fellow prisoners, getting into it with myself. I could tell you a zillion stories, really, you know. It's not about that.

Are you doing other legal work for other? I am. I'm working in the law library. I'm a legal clerk. I'm a literacy tutor. I help other people with their work. I write my own, the whole nine. Okay.

So when you... Go ahead. And I caught a case while I was incarcerated, right? That's a whole different story, too. So I caught a case, and they tried to give me another life sentence for like 0.003 grams of grass. Yeah, of tree. Okay. Yeah, they try to give me another life sentence while I'm in this sale.

At this time, I'm selling tree in the prison. You know, the COs bring it to me. I'm selling it. We all get money and everything. I'm fucking this little chick in the kitchen in the freezer. And she gives me cash and the other ones give me dope. So we're just doing our thing, right? I can tell you so many stories, boy, it's so real.

Is this a, this is a correctional officer? Yeah, well, the correction. She's a free staff. She works in the kitchen. She's a cook. Okay. But I fuck correctional officers, though. And they bring, and they brain drugs too, so it's all good.

What are you, are you, have you moved from like, if you went in with a murder, right? Like attempted murder. So you started at a higher level. Yeah. And then moved your way down. Yeah. Okay. So you did move your way down.

But even on a higher level was they, that's where it started. The first time I got like, I felt nervous from a female staff that I felt was like, aggressively into me was on a level four. Okay. You know, when I first got out, we was walking to the shower. I'm on the top tier walking. I got my shirt off and stuff and she walking outside of me. She looking at me like, I'm a steak and she ain't eight in a month.

And I'm like, she wasn't hiding it. She wasn't showing them walking to the shower. Then when you get in the shower, then she just looked at you in the shower. He just stared at me in the shower. And I'm like, damn, this is pretty damn aggressive. I'm new. So then my first relationship that I had with a female staff was on a level of Mexican lady.

So, yeah, that level shit don't matter. Like we was talking about earlier, people are people. People do things and that stuff don't really much matter. Anybody can be the person that flicks a switch, you know, at any given time. So answering your question, at this time, I'm selling, and the police, the goon squad, come to my cell. First of all, I have a cell phone in my cell. My cellmate has a cell phone.

This is my first cell phone. Excuse me. This is my second cell phone. First one in this prison. And this dude, it was so amazing to me because he had a chick, like, selling pussy for him while he was in the pen. So she's prostituting, and he's in the bed. And, like, they'll get on the phone. He'll talk to her.

She'd be like, yeah, Daddy, I'm going to go to Vegas and do this for you, dude. And I'm going to send you all the money. And I was like, this is amazing. Right. I'm sorry. I'm like, this is amazing. You know, my criminal mama, how is he doing this? I want to learn this shit.

So at that time, you know, I'm criminal-minded. I just thought it was amazing. But so I get a cell phone and I'm like, I want to meet a chick and have her do this stuff for me too while I sell dope and everything else. Because I was with all the criminal antics that I could be with at that time. And I felt like this informant dude who was on a tear pushing the broom, we were getting ready for breakfast since normally we put the phones and everything up. I whip my phone out to talk to this young lady who was supposed to go with this. guys, your lady, just to both of them to do their things to make us money. So because I'm new to it, I'm talking to her at the last minute, like, okay, when you go,

you make sure you do this, yada yada, yada, bean. The dude with the broom walked by and he sees me with my phone. We make eye contact. I'm like, damn, okay, here we go. Minutes later, the Goon Squad show up at myself. I'm like, this motherfucker told on me. That's the first thing coming to my mind. He snitched on me.

As soon as they come, they open the gate, they're like, Brown. And I still had the phone in my hand. They're like, Brown, give us the phone. And I'm holding the phone like this. The Goon Squad is at the dough. They got the dog, the K-9 with them. It's a bunch of them. I'm just sitting there looking.

I'll breathe just like I did. I hold the phone to my side after I exhale. My suddenly left the cell. So now I'm sitting in this cell by myself. The Gunner got the mini-14 on me. The Goon Squad is all here with the dog. And they're like, give us the phone. I say, I ain't giving you shit.

I'm not giving up anything. You're not going to win that. You're not going to win that. No, but you couldn't tell me that at the time. Right. Right. My mind stayed then was never give up, not giving you anything. So I slammed the phone on the ground, pick it up, bang, I just start breaking it.

And they know not to rush in there because it could be a fight automatically. So when I slam it on the ground, then I go to the toilet to flush it. When I go to the toilet to flush it, then they try to grab me out. So now, they're grabbing me by my legs. I'm hanging on to the toilet. I'm flushing the phone down the toilet. Finally get it down. And when they put me out the cell, then they put our hands on the rail and they see

searching this and all this stuff, patting me down. And then I remember I got this little bitty grass that I was still smoking in my, in my boxers, right? So I'm like, oh, smack. So I reached my hand in my box. And it's like, he's making a move. He's making a move. And they rushed me.

And I threw it in my mouth. Boom. And I throw it in my mouth. They all slammed me on the ground, handcuffed me. And they take me straight to the potty watch, to the hole. Now, for those who don't know what potty watch is, potty watch is when they take me, they have all these officers surround me. first of all, they tape my ankles up.

They give me this long jumpsuit. They tape your ankles up. They take your wrists up. They take your neck up so nothing can come out, right? And then they sit you in a cell with no toilet, no anything, no nothing. And the officer just watches you. And then when you need to use the bathroom, like five, six, seven officers are going to come surround you. They're going to untape all this stuff.

They're going to sit a bucket down. And they're going to tell you squat over the bucket and shit. So whatever you ate, whatever you put in your mouth, whatever you're stuck in your ass, and they get it. That's potty watch because they're watching the potty, right? So. Very technical term. Technically, potty watch. So I'm on potty watch, man. And I'm in here and these offices sitting and surrounding me all these big dudes and they're like, shit them ounces out, Brown, shit them ounces out. And it's like, it's already embarrassing.

Right. You know what I'm saying? It's just like, come on, man. Prison. Average prison experiences are real, man, right? You get more traumatized in prison than when you came. And so they like, shit them ounces out. I take a dump and like this little bitty tiny 0.003 grams of grass that I was smoking comes out. Why does this dude say he got 4.4 grams from my stool? So then he goes and writes the report. He said, recovered 4.4 grams of marijuana from the stool of Mr. Brown. When I dump it, when I have the bowel movement, they're like, what's this?

I said, oh, it's just a little bit of grass. I admitted it. I acknowledged it. right then when I get the report it's 4.4 grams that turns it from like possession to sales which is a whole different why did he lie about it he's because he's trying to make you hit that that minimum exactly what we talked about earlier there was no reason for him to do that you already got it I didn't already admitted it you know what I mean now he's going to say 4.4 grams so when he did that I was like nope I'm fighting it because it's like my case all over again it's like when I'm in prison

for all over again you know what I'm saying it falsifying documents and they be coming the crooks. So once he did that, I said, I'm going to fight this. And this is the reason why I bought this up, because we were talking about legal stuff, and I told you I fought a case. So I caught this case. And then they come to my sale and they say, the district attorney has picked this up. The Sacramento County is now going to prosecute this, and you're looking at 25 of life for this grass. And I'm already in that one of a life sentence. I'm like, what? They're like, yeah. So they take me to court, arraign me, and they try to appoint me another public. defense. I say, nope, I'm going to go

in pro pro pro pro pro forma. I'm going to be my own attorney. Right. And like, Mr. Brown, we strongly advise you against this. If you get found guilty, you're going to get a life sentence. I said, I had one of y'all the first time and I got a life sentence. You know what I'm saying? So I don't trust y'all. So I became my own attorney for five years, right? You fought it for five years? I fought that case for five years. And I won.

Okay. And I won. Well, first of all, how are they going to provide the 4.4 ounces? Talk about that. Yeah, the 4.4 grams. Right. So there has to be a log, an evidence log. Right. They have to keep it.

So when you say 4.4 grams, well, let's see, where did you weigh it at? When you weighed it and you put it on the scale, yada yada be right. And you're supposed to keep it in the evidence locker. Right. So you say you tested it and it was 4.4 grams and you documented that. Now I'm going to hire an independent investigator to have it tested in an independent lab. When I have the independent lab go tested, all of a sudden, it's 0.0000.003 grams. where did the other four point one something go?

Either somebody tampered with it and stole or you lied. Yeah. Right. So once I got that, I started pushing the issue on them real tough. Who was the next person that signed this chain of evidence? Who touched it? Who did this? Who did that?

And nobody can answer for it. And they kept trying to avoid it. The documents was falsified. Then they took me to potty watch prematurely. They didn't even get authorization. As soon as the incident happened, and they were so flustered that they just snatched me from the scene straight to potty watch. They didn't get the documentation or the clearance from the warden, the custody captains.

So nobody even knew I was there. The whole thing looked legal, right? So having learned my skills from fight my appeal trying to come home, I took all of that and put it into this. And once I did, man, I was having a ball. I would be in there. I would get all the officers on the stand. I was talking crazy to him. Did you understand the question?

I'm going to ask you the question again. And if you don't understand, say you don't understand. And they hated me talking to him like that. And I was having a blast. And then the judge would be like, Mr. Brown is correct, sir. If you didn't understand him, say you didn't understand, he would ask the question again. I was like, yeah. Then I remember telling one, I was like, well, this is not CDCR.

This is a court of law. You need to answer the question. Do you not understand what I'm saying to you? Oh, they hated it, man. I loved it. So other attorneys will come in there and watch me. And they said to me, like, I went through 9. nine district attorneys, I went through six judges and two attorney generals that they sent

to try to prosecute me and I beat them all. You feel me? And they were coming there and watch me and they would say, Mr. Brown, like students, law students would come in and they would just watch me do my thing. And they'd say, man, where did you get your education at? Where did you learn from? And I remember this one attorney, he said, the judge is being nice to you, the DA is being nice to you, watch out.

Because that means you got them. So they're being nice to you. But the first chance they get, they're going to flip the screen. Yeah. So yeah, a lot of stuff, man. A lot of learning the law. What a waste of money. You know what I'm saying? Like, what a waste of money for you to go through this whole fucking thing so you can do whatever. I already got a fucking life sentence. Like, what are you doing? Like, you're just, that seems like they're just pissing away fucking money. Man, it was ridiculous.

So you, but, okay, back to your original case, the attempted murder. So you keep, you're still moving forward that. Eventually you get to, do you get to? Do you get to? to the, do you actually go to the Supreme Court? Yes. Of the United States and not the state, you're past the state, you're at the Supreme Court level. Went to the state Supreme Court, went to the Ninth Circuit, went to the district court, and then filed, we always butcher the name. We say certiorari, certiorari, you know what I'm saying?

So I filed a writ of certiori. And they say like 0.01% of practicing attorneys actually get a case before the United States Supreme Court. Yeah. But I wrote it and I filed it. And the attorney that I had at the time, they picked it up, and they said the courts didn't pick it up, if I recall correctly. So they refused to hear it. Yeah.

And it stopped there. And so at that point, I'm like, what the hell am I going to do now? And then lo and behold, I was told that I had an opportunity to go to the parole board and go home. And I never saw that because in California, when you sent this to life in the 90s, it meant life. Right. When you were sent us under Pete Wilson or Gray Davis and ending them, life meant life. So when I went to the pen and they told me I had life, the only way I saw myself come, home was through appeal or escaping.

Right. That's it. So once they approached me and said that I had the opportunity to appear before the Board of Parole hearings, I had no idea. How? How? I mean, why? Exactly.

Did the law change? Did the new governor? New governor? Newsom came in and said everybody gets a chance? Newsom came in and the whole, you know, California is considered progressive. No. At that time. That's not true.

What? Right. And so changing what criminal judge? was something that was a high priority. Addressing the Three Strikes Law because Three Strikes had ravished the communities out there and filled the prison bins with cheap labor for the corporations is what it did. And so people sought to correct that because it wasn't what the classes, with Poly Class or Richard Class or what any of them set out to do.

They wanted a violent, third striker who got out, you know, did what they did to their family to be held accountable. The way the Three Strikes Law worked out was it didn't matter. what you did, how long ago you did it, life. So this push came in to correct a lot of those reforms. So for like 10 years, they were changing the sentencing, they were changing the credits, they were changing three strikes,

they were trying to amend things. And people who were sentenced to life were then given an opportunity because CDCR placed rehabilitation back inside their mission statement as a priority. And at first, it wasn't. It was just California Department of Corrections. and they knocked off their rehabilitations so you weren't coming home.

But now they changed it. They started giving youth offenders an opportunity, elderly parole, an opportunity, L-WOPs, getting commuted, and it's changed everything. So did you go, did you get parole? Like, what happened? Yeah, so I parole. So let me tell you about parole, right? Right.

In order to parole in the California prison system, you have to start with doing five years' discipline. free. So let's start there. You got to do at least five years exactly, you know. It starts popping off in your head. I saw it. I was thinking you're already having a problem. You've got cell phones. You're selling weed. I've got 25 disciplinary reports. Then I have another 25, I have another 25 like informational disciplinary reports. So yeah, and I'm not even the worst of my kind. It's way worse than me. You know what I'm saying? But this is how bad I am. a hole for myself because I was content with making bad decisions.

So when they come and tell me on a level 4 180, which is higher than the level 4 that I told you about before, now I'm in an even worse one. This is a maximum security level 4-180. That's like Pelican Bay type prison, right? They come tell me while I'm in a 180 that all of a sudden I have action at going home. I've never at this time,

never seen anybody go home from a level 4 in my life, period. There was one person I knew who had a date, not even life. He had a date to go home. This brother I knew named Hogg and 30 days before he went home, the white boys killed him, stab him in the back on the way to the child haul, and he died. That was the only person I seen who had a date to go home from a level four, right? Then years later, this other white dude, a new name, Mr. Hunkekekekekeke,

he went home from a level four. He became the first person ever seen go home from a level four. But when they come and tell me in the same level four that I have action at going home and appearing for the board of parole hearings, my response was exactly what you said. How? How do I prepare? What do I do? So I go back to my cell and, you know, we in the vents. And the vents is like four cells up the one above me, the one next to me, the one above him and then mine.

So when we go into the vent, I'm like, hey, y'all, they just told me that I got action that going to the parole board. but I don't know how to prepare for Boy, like, can somebody give me some insight? First neighbor, like, man, I got like 500 classification points. Classification, that's like the higher, the more points you got, the higher your level. Yeah. 60, they only take off like four a year. Right. 12 a year or something like that. If you got really, really excellent behavior, you can get off like eight a year, 12, whatever it is.

But you got like 500 of them, 600 points, six stabbing, seven stabbing. 12 stabments or whatever, staff or so. So their points is up, thousands of points. Someone got thousands of points. And he's like, man, I got, I thought he said, I'm just bringing it down and saying 500. I got like 500 classification points. I ain't never going home.

Okay, can't get no advice from him. Right. Then the other dude, like, man, I got like six life sentences. Can't get no life from, no advice from him. The other dude like, I'm an LWap, life without the possibility of parole. I can't get no advice from him. And then the only thing they could tell me was,

just don't trust the site. Don't trust the site because they do a psychological evaluation when they send a psych to come talk to you. And then the report that he prepares, they give it to the commissioners. And then they go off of his report. So everybody was saying, don't trust the site. Make sure you get all your accomplishments on the record because he's not going to do it for you. So when I met this man, I walk in, I go to shake his hand. He looked at my hand like it had shit on it.

Okay. Then he would ask me a bunch of dumbass questions. like you ever burn a bird, you ever mutilate an animal, you have a baby, you ever, no, no, no, you know what I'm saying? And because I was maintaining my innocence, I'm thinking manipulative. I'm like, I got to give them something to establish credibility to not just come in here and act like I'm this saint, I'm this innocent guy who's never done anything. So let me tell them something I did so they can be like, okay, he's working with us. So I would give him some of the other criminal things that I did that wasn't going to get me in trouble anymore. And so he'd be like, well, you ever drove drunk?

Yeah, I drove drunk. There's no proof that I ever drove drunk. Right. But yeah, I drove drunk. Everybody didn't probably drove drunk. You know what I'm saying? Under the influence. And it felt like every time I told him something that he could use against me, he was like a snake.

Like he licked his eyeball. I promised he seemed like he didn't blink. So he's like, have you ever drove drunk? I'm like, yeah, he's like, yeah, he's like, damn. Right? I'm like, that was odd. But then he like, I said, yeah, so I got into like, this is not in the record. man, but I did a drive-by before.

Oh, yeah? I said, I said, I said, well, what happened? I was shot, nobody got killed, but I did that, though, and that was the way I used to live, you know? Man, when I went to my hearing, everything I said, he blew that stuff way out of proportion. He was like, Mr. Brown has alcohol disorder because he's driven drunk as a kid. He has substance abuse and marijuana disorder because he smoked grass. he has a high alert like there's a medium

there's a low there's a medium there's a high report he gave me a high report sent I was a risk of society and all the things so when I went to the board they basically based their whole ruling on what this site did so at that time and that was my first hearing I had no idea

on what to do to go home none and it didn't make it any easier with that site but my first hearing I got denied second one I got denied third one I got denied Fourth one, I got denied. How many years between these?

So each, in California, the minimum that they could deny you is 15 years, right? So you get a 15-year denial, and if there's mitigating evidence, then it goes 15, 10, 753. Okay. So for me, they kept giving me three-year denials. And then because I would get, if I, because my reports on those sites change from medium to medium, from high to medium to low, they then had the option. at bringing me back in at 18 months if they felt like I warranted that. So for the majority of those, I would go back and bust my ass to change the circumstances, try to stay out of trouble, and they would bring me back in 18 months.

So I kept coming back in 18 months, but I kept getting three-year denials, right? Okay. By the time I went to like my fourth one, let's say COVID hit, right? So I was the first person in the state of California that had to disinfect with COVID entered inside a prison system. Because in the prison that I was in, the staff. You had to disinfect, what, what? COVID.

Like, I was the first person that had to clean, like, disinfect, get rid of COVID. I didn't understand. Yeah, and the California prison system. Yeah, I thought you were being cleaned. I was like, what, where are they cleaning you? Man, I wish. I wish. It was terrifying, bro.

You know, you had droves of people dying in Spain, Rome, New York. Nobody knew what was happening. And here I am. I'm sitting in prison like, man, mass incarceration is a smorgas board. for a pandemic we stacked on top of each other it's recycled air you know you can't breathe really everybody's using everybody's touch you got hundreds thousands of guys swamp coolers touching the same thing over and over and over and over again doors cars in prison i wash my hands probably 60 80 times a day yeah you know what i'm saying and it and honestly it's probably not enough because you know anything

you go you use a typewriter get up and go get up and go yeah exactly exactly get up and go wash your hands go do you know and that was that was no COVID that was just because if one guy got sick if you heard somebody in the middle of the night you know it's coming I thought two days from now three days from now half the fucking units cough in there all night long it's like Jesus yeah man thank you being sick in prison oh trust me you want to be sick at home comfortable I care about you yeah you're so uncomfortable and then it's like oh well go to medical you put in something for medical in two weeks I'll get seen I'll be better by then I don't even you heard me say yesterday right I said that the leading cause of death in federal in Coleman was medical wasn't the stabbing's

it wasn't it was medical killing these dudes wow you know guys guys not getting their insulin guys not getting their inhalers guys not guys walk around for four days going to medical every day saying I'm telling you I have chest pains I have chest pains right boom then they die That's part of what the overcrowding issue was in California. When the feds came in and it was like, y'all need to reduce the overcrowding. It was because the medical issue. Y'all can't even properly service everybody and give them attention that they need because there's too many people in here. But what you're saying, man, you hit it on a nail.

So I can imagine COVID. So think about COVID. You're sitting in there and then you hear the people coughing and you know it's COVID. And you know that it's coming. And so this person came and tested positive. She was a staff member. She tested positive for COVID. Instead of staying home, she bought it in the prison. Once they realized, they escorted out of the prison. Once they escorted out of the prison, I have to go disinfect her office because I'm a health care facility maintenance worker. I'm a hospital janitor. That's my job. And I'm the lead man and the crew. So they bring me and my crew and they'll go clean her office. We do that. But then now she didn't pass instant pass into the population. A guy comes in. They bring him in. He test positive. And the nurses were scared. The officers were scared. And I remember calling me like, Brown, we just sent him to the hospital. The ambulance came and got him. We need you to go disinfect his cell. My job, I had to clean behind it, like in a psych ward,

if a person tried to commit. If they took feces and smeared it all over the wall and in the windows, I had to go in and clean that stuff, right? So when they bring this dude over here in the psych war with COVID and they rush out the cell, it's the blood pressure machine still sitting there. It's still whizzing. It's like his draws are still sitting there stanking. and they send me and I can see little COVID buzz. I'm like, I'm terrified from my like,

I swear I see COVID bugs. You know what I'm saying? Because I don't know what they expect. They give me this hazmat suit. This is new to all of us. And they're like, Brown, go clean that. I'm like, oh, my God.

And I go in there and I get it done. Then after that, it's another one. And then another one. And then another one. And we went from a 12-man crew to a one-man crew, just me. My neighbor, Umar, died, rest in peace, from COVID.

My partner pee-wee died from COVID. Rest in peace. The brother above me, he died from. COVID, rest in peace. And I'm the only one on this crew left. And I tell my supervisors, I'm like, listen, I'm scared. I have a chance to go to the board of parole hearings to go home. And it came a long way. I don't want to die doing this, dog. You know what I'm saying? Let me come to work every other day. I know I can't just refuse to come to work, but give me that

because y'all won't even come past these double doors. I walk in here, they'd be like, okay, bro, good luck fighting COVID today. And they'll stay way back here. Like, all right, brown, All right, bro, all right, bro. Y'all won't even come down this hallway into these doors where I am, but you're sending me to go do this shit every day. Give me the grace of just coming to work every other day because I don't want to die.

They laughed and was like, you got to come to work. I stayed in my cell. They sent for me, and it's like, if you don't come, you're going to get a 115. When you go to the board of parole hearings, if you walk in with a 115, that's an automatic 15-year denial, period. And then through this mitigating evidence,

still walking down. So that led to the bill that I wrote while I was incarcerated to change the Constitution because most people don't know, but Article 1, Section 6 of the California Constitution is a derivative of the 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution, which holds that

involuntary servitude and slavery are prohibited except as punishment for a crime. So what that means is, for those of y'all who don't know, that you, your uncle, your cousin, anybody can become a slave. All you got to do is go through the due process machine. Because once you've been, you know, fully afforded your due process and they find you

guilty then, they can make you work for Target, Walmart, lens crafters, you name it. And many people do it. And when you get out, you can't get a job by some of these same people. So when I was being forced to work and told that I had to work, I was like, listen, something got to give. So I told my then partner, I don't want to do this. She said, well, appeal it. She said, appeal it. Do they pay you guys? Or it's just you just you have to work. Some of us have paid numbers. Right.

The whole 12 men crew didn't get paid. It's like that. Like 17 cents an hour or something like that. Yeah. And you know, that's big time. That is. That is big time. Big time.

Oh yeah. That's unicorn would make some of the guys that unicorn made like, you know, like 60, 70 cents. I think what I think if you've been there like five, six years and you were a grade one or something, you might make like a $1.17 or something an hour. I mean, these guys. working 40, 50 hours a week. No overtime or anything. Like, they're working, and they would make, like, you know, 50 bucks, 60 bucks. And this is factory work.

These guys are riveting. These guys are riveting shit together. They're making stuff. They're making stuff like, not cars, but they're making, like, what do you call them, the partition walls for, like, cubicles. And, like, so they have the machines that bend the stuff. And they're doing, it's factory work. Yeah.

You know, so for $1.15, you'd be surprised how much stuff comes out. It depends, man. Did you know that every single, like in California, I don't know if they ship them across the country, but every single handicapped sticker that you see, every plaque that hangs, those are made inside prison. Did you know that? I thought, I think, I feel like there's some place they make bulletproof vests. They make, they make all kinds of stuff.

Man, people would be surprised. Yeah. From the lights and place to the street signs, to all of the furniture, the state buildings. you'd be surprised what's coming from prison. Even sometimes when people make calls to these large organizations and they think... We already had a guy. We already had a guy, dude. We had the guy that came.

It was a phone room, right? Yeah, he was making so much money. They fucking revamp the whole thing because he was making more than the fucking warden. Come on. Yeah. He got out and started a whole company doing it because he was so good at it. That's my point. Yeah.

But he was getting paid. It was a private contractor came in who the private contractor came in, thought I'll use these prisoners because I can pay them very little money, but they were so good at it. Like he was so good at it. He started making tons of money. They revamped it several times and pay him less and less. It didn't matter. He was just really good at it. Nice. I'm glad he did that then. He got out and started the whole thing. He married a correction officer. Nice. Yeah. Sorry. I remember. Go ahead. It's okay. So you wrote this bill. You send in, so what, did you first appeal it? So she said, she said, can't you appeal it? And I'm like, well, I could,

but we will lose because the California court of regulations is predicated upon the Constitution. That's where it gets its strength from. He said, well, change the Constitution. I said, well, give me the paperwork. She went and got the paperwork from me. I researched labor law, family law, California Code of Regulations,

and then I wrote the amendment. And I sent it out to her, and she went and shopped the Capitol, and then Assembly member Com Lager picked it up. And it became ACA3, like an actual bill. And it got knocked down in the Senate. It passed through the Assembly and the Senate, and the last day on the Senate floor, it got knocked down and didn't make it. So then Assembly member Sidney Comlager then became Senator Comlager.

Then she became Congresswoman Comlager, and she's now in Washington. So then Assembly member Lori Wilson picked up the bill. And now she's carrying the bill, and it became ACA 6, and then it became Prop 6. So it became, it was on the ballot this last November, and it got 13 million votes, but we lost by 1 million votes. you know and that was a pretty significant accomplishment because that was a piece of legislation the original legislation i wrote for myself and to have it picked up and potentially change the whole prison system like that um i was given a lot of a lot of love and respect for that but at the

end of the day i certainly didn't do it by myself it was already a movement before i came along people had been trying to end slavery before i was born and that i just happened to be the person in the right place at the right time to do that So when I wrote it, it went all the way to the ballot like it did, and now it was going to be on the ballot again. Assembly member, Lori Wilson, just reintroduced it as ACA 3. I believe it's already passed portions of the assembly, the safety, public safety committee, an assembly, and it's going to be headed to the Senate. So anybody in California, please keep your eyes open for, you know, the bill to end the monetary servitude and slavery. But that was something that I'm happy to be a part of.

It didn't grow on legs now, and it's running on its own. so many people behind it that I'm not even really automatically all the way involved with it, but I'm still happy that the change is taking place. And so moving forward, it went from me working for HFM to all of my friends and coworkers becoming sick, some of my friends dying, and me writing this bill. And then when I went to the board, again, I walked in this time with 2115 and a 128. Why the 115? So my ex, I asked her to send me this picture that I took on a cell phone. Years, years, years.

I had long dreds down to here, right? And I hadn't had hair in almost a decade, almost a decade. Five or seven years or something, seven to seven years at this point when I asked her to send me the picture, the Goon Squad, somebody intercepts the picture in the mail, and they take it and they say, oh, Brown has a cell phone in his cell. this is a picture that was taken on a cell phone. They then come in or grab me, you know what I'm saying, on the way back from work, telling me that this came in the mail. They think I have a cell phone, yada yada, yada, bean.

I don't have a cell phone, y'all. This picture's almost 10 years old. What are we doing here? They then approached me and tell me, got to give us something. I went through this numerous times over my incarceration too. Well, Mr. Brown, this picture was taken on a cell phone and this officer named Lugo.

to see all, Goon Squad. He was running the Goose Squad. He comes to me with this report written. And he, come in here, Brown, you know, sit down and talk to me. He said, you know how this works. He opens this folder where they have this 115 written saying that I have a cell phone in my cell. I took this picture. I'm 30 days to the board, Matt.

I'm 30 days to going to the board of parole hearings. This dude walks in with this folder and says to me, Brown, you know how this works. You got to give us something. It's a lot of drugs on the yard. You know, we believe they come. in from your job, this, that, give us something and we'll make this go away. I'm like, man, I'm 30 days to the board, man. I'm not no snitch.

I ain't gonna tell nobody. I don't get down like that. And he's like, well, you gotta give us something? I'm like, that's messed up, man. I don't sell dope no more. I ain't into this stuff no more. I didn't left all this stuff alone. And you're trying to make me get into other people business.

It ain't got nothing to do with me. I'm trying to go home. He said, well, you gotta give us something. I said, well, let me think about it. I said, well, let me think about it, because I was trying to buy it some time. I needed to buy some time to get out of there and go tell people that he was trying to to coerce me. You know what I mean?

And so he said, well, you better think fast. I think he knew what I was up to. And I immediately went out on the phone. Man, he trying to make me becoming informed me. They're trying to do this, trying to coerce me yada yada, yada, beam bang. And at the end of the day, they still found me guilty on that. But one officer who had a higher rank than this duel, he told me, he said, Brown, don't worry.

I just want to see how this is going to play out. And he never said anything else. then once they found me guilty, he popped back up. And he's like, man, I cannot believe that these fools really went through with this shit. You know what I mean? Clearly, you cut your hair off almost 10 years ago.

This is not from this prison. This is from a different prison. You do all this positive stuff around here. You're helping all these people, and I'm not going to sit back and let them railroad you. So I'm going to avoid this 115. And he stepped up and he did that for me. However, I also wrote an appeal

against that officer that was trying to coerce me and I put it all out there. So he was like, I'm gonna get rid of this, but you get rid of that. Right. Right. So I'm like, I got rid of that appeal. He got rid of my 115, but I still had the answer for the 115 at the Board of Parole hearings. They still want to know about it.

Then I had another 115, 30 days before the board. Okay. I had two 115 and the 128. This is like legendary stuff, the fact that I made it out of prison. Right. Seriously, bro. Legend. And so the first June.

Juneteenth comes around where they made it official. Because of this bill that I wrote, and I'm a person that's incarcerated, the bill is to end slavery. Juneteenth is about, you know, slavery ending. Okay. At the Capitol, it's Martin Luther King III. It's a lot of prominent figures there, and they're waiting for me to call from the prison to talk on the phone over this press conference.

I stay in from New York. I tell the CEOs, I show them a flyer. You know, all these people are waiting for me to call, politicians, everybody. And I say, man, I'm a lot. I'm going to stay in the cell. My call is at, you know, 215 or whatever it is. Please open my door. Oh, no problem, brown.

213. Phone call. 214. Hey, cell 122, phone call. 216. Hey, it's my phone time. 217. Hey!

Hey! 280. Stop hitting the fucking door. We was going to let you out. Now we're not going to let you out. Come on, man. Really? Really?

So y'all gonna do me? Y'all gonna play games like that. So my cellie comes back. They won't let him in the cell. Your cellie's in there wigging out. We don't know what he's going to do so we're not opening the door. Eventually they have to let him in.

They open the door and they let him in. I calmly walk to the podium. Man, I spoke to y'all in advance. What's that about? Why you didn't open the door? We were busy, Brown. We were busy. All right, man.

It's this white lady, and then there's two white officers that are not our regulars. They're not our regulars. One dude is like 23 years old. I've been in prison 24 years. This dude's like 23 years old. You feel me? And the other dude is just like this fat 300-pound terrible attitude dude. And neither one of them belonging.

The only one is here is her. She's normally the regular. She knows all of us. She knows how everything works. But she's allowing herself to just go with whatever they say, right? even though it's her building. All Brown, we were busy. Well, can I please go use the phone? No.

Well, can I go talk to the sergeant? Can I get out? No. Well, man, you made me miss my phone call. Now, I'm getting angry now. Now, you made me miss my phone call. You're telling me I can't go talk to the sergeant, wrong. You're telling me I can't use the phone, wrong. What can I do?

You can go back to your cell, and you're going to get a 115 because you call this lady a bitch. And you said, bitch, open my door. No, I didn't. I'm 30 days to the board. I know not to do it. Old Sam, dumb ass the scenes like that, it's long gone. That me has been so gone for so long

that there's no way in the world I would allow myself to do nothing like that, right? But classic officers, you know, they say anything, put it on the paper, and it's a rap for you. So, and it's so funny. I don't know if you ever experienced this, but they come up with this jargon

or this colloquial way of thinking how we speak, and they'll put it on the paper like, he said, yo, cop, fuck you, bitch. And it's like, bro, I don't even talk like that. You put your cop, fuck you bitch on the paper. Stop, you're lying, dog. I don't even talk like that. So it's the same shit right.

He's like, you said, fuck you bitch, open the dough. No, I did, man. I never used no profanity, not one time. And then I looked at her and I said, you know he's lying on me right here. You're going to let him lie? I didn't never call you out your name. She said, Mr. Brown, let this be a learning experience for you. I said, I'm 30 days to the parole board.

If y'all do this, you're going to kill me. He said, it's got to be a learning experience. And I just looked at all through them. I felt like Emmett Till. I felt like I was being lynched. Right in my face. They had no mercy for me. No nothing.

They were just lying on me right in my face, right? So now I'm like, damn, what do what? Cognitive distance? Once again, what do I do? Do I do? Do I do? I say, can I get out here to go talk to the sergeant? No.

Take it back to your cell. Once they lock me in the cell, it's a wrap. And then they're going to write that paper up. It's going to be too late from me. So I'm like, what do I do? What do I do? I lay it on the floor. Right there front the podium in the middle of the day room in front of all the prisons.

Everybody just laid face down on the floor. And the officer, he said, fuck! He didn't like that shit so he need to snatch me up. And he acted like he was pushing me to myself. When he pushed me, I fell back on the floor. And lay it back down again. And he didn't like that. So he kicked all my paperwork.

Boom. All my paperwork go flying. Then he presses the alarm. And I knew by me laying on the floor, he has to call somebody in. You can't deal with me by yourself no more now. Because now it's going to become a use of force and all this. And you have to call your ranking officer.

So I made a strategic move and everybody thought I was tripping. It was like, man, this food crazy. So when they put the yard down and they escort me out, I run the programs. I teach everybody how to get out of prison and all the stuff. So when they see me coming across the yard, 30 days to the board, everybody like, they're shaking their heads and stuff. They're like, oh, he's stupid. People smiling like, yeah, fuck him because not everybody's your.

friend, you know, and at the end of the day, they wound up moving his ass off the yard, and I talked to the captain, and I'm going to tell you how they moved him off the yard, because this is that type of show, where we get into it. So I talked to the captain, and he was like, oh, Brown, we're going to deal with it, man, just we're going to get to the bottom of it. All right, cool, Cap, because I'm 30 days to the board, and this will really kill me. I'm going to come see you tomorrow. Hey, Cap, we still get into the bottom of it?

Oh, Brown, you just got to. to let the process take his course. I know what that means. Y'all fin of lynch me again. Fuck that. I get on the phone. This is what they're doing to me in here. You know, I call my ex.

They don't know that I have these lawmakers that are working with this bill. Y'all dummies waited to Juneteenth, the first official June team where it's official holiday, to then jump on the back of the dude that wrote a bill to end slavery in the state. Right.

Real genius is here. Right? So once the lawmakers get word of it, they call the governor's office. The governor calls, you know, the prison and head start to roll. So then the sergeant comes and he said, Brown, why you didn't tell me who you'd be talking to on the phone? Not your business who I talked to on the phone, right? And this sergeant was a really good deal, rest in peace. He's resting in peace right now.

He said, from this point forward, instead of going through all that, if you ever need the phone, you just come use my phone to my office. I said, yeah? He said, yeah. I said, all right. A week later, I was over there in his office using his phone. I would step in. I said, I need to use the phone.

He would step out. And I would sit down to his desk, hit nine or zero, whatever. And I would make my phone calls right there from his office as the true boss that I am. That's how I played out. And so what happened to the 15? You went in front of the parole? Yeah, man. They did write it up?

Hell yeah. So I went to the board of parole hearings. And they told me it was voided. They told me they were gone. all the stuff. And then there's a third one. I didn't tell you about the third one, but when I go in there for a moment,

I didn't even want to tell you that. So when I go in there, they're like, Mr. Brown, look at this 115. Mr. Brown, look at this 115. And I've made, I'm determined. I didn't, I went in there and expressed that I was guilty. Remember, I'm 24 years maintaining my innocence. I'm walking into expressing that I was guilty

for the first time. I'm walking there with two 115's and a 128. supposed to be five years disciplinary free. I'm walking in there with all that, man. And it's my fifth time going to the board of parole hearing. But it does seem like because they're all right before, it does seem retaliatory, especially since they were all. 30 days.

Yeah, well, 30 days and they were all, or they were, you know, they dropped this one. You know what I'm saying? Like it, what is it not? Is it dropped? Dismissed. Dismissed. Yeah.

Yeah. I keep on it. They appealed. But you'd appeal it. dropped it or they dismissed it, whatever. So it looks like it was retaliation for something. Thank you. Two of them, one day.

Yeah, which is big, you know, cops are big on retaliating for you, mouthing off. And then you walk back two days, you know, the next day you walk in your cell. They've taught the one guy's tossed your whole fucking stall and trash yourself. Oh, man. Pictures and shit. Yeah. You're like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, they stay retaliating.

And so that's what I did when I went to the board. I talked. And I told them, I said, don't take my word for. for it, they voided these things, and they avoided them for a reason. They didn't void them because Sam Brown's a good guy. They didn't void them because they like me. They avoided it because there's something wrong with it. So I'm just asking y'all to honor that.

And I talked and talked and talked on that point to the lady who was like, all right. Because I'm like, man, they voided it for a reason. Don't see him and deny me. You know what I mean? So that's how that went. But at the end of day, I still had the answer for him, though. And I became real discouraged. For anybody out there, I just want you all to know, I became real discouraged at one point during my hearing.

And it was a four and a half hour long hearing. And the lady kept asking me all these negative things. She kept bringing up my bad history again. And 70% of all communication is nonverbal, right? And just as you and I are sitting here, when you have to sit before the board of parole hearings, like the commissioner's right there, you got to sit right here. You need the hands a certain way.

And this one was on camera by the grace of God. And the commissioners kept asking me, this lady kept just peppering me with my disciplinary history. And at one point, I became this encouraged. I lost my, I lost my composure, right? So I put my head down. And when I raised my head, because you keep asking me questions, I raise my head like this.

I'm mad now, right? But their heads are looking at their paperwork. They don't see that I raise my face up mad. And so when I raise my face up mad and I look at them and I see they doing that paperwork, I'm like, oh shit. I'm like, I hurry up. and I fixed my face. And when I fix my face and they look up,

I'm back to normal again. And that was, I promise you, I felt like that was my saving grace in that whole hearing because she had beat me down. She had beat me down. And I was already, I was like, you know what, I'm not going to get out of here again.

And I was ready to throw in the tower. I got angry. But when I looked up and they weren't looking at me, I sucked it up for a second. I got my composure back, and I finished that hearing, and here I am. So when did they tell you,

is it like a month later, two weeks later. No, they tell you on the spot. So that's the thing. Imagine this. Imagine going to the Board of Prohrooms. You got to do five years disciplinary free to even start. So first you do the five years discipline. If you're missing the drama, not arguing nobody, not fighting. You do that. Then you got to take all these classes to show improvement, learn your cause of the factors, your triggers, your anchors, learn the language, the language going there and talk, you know, all the stuff. Then your family members and community representatives, they need to write support I need a letter saying I'll give you a job when you come home, a transitional home when you come home.

You have a support network, somebody that believes in you that you can talk to when you come home. So you get all these people to write all these letters, do all these things, then you go and then you talk to the board and then within moments you start seeing, I'm not going to go home. My chances at leaving is hemorrhaging, which each one of these questions is hemorrhaging. It's like I feel it. And now I'm thinking, darling, I got to tell my mom I'm not coming home. I got to tell my sisters I'm not coming home. I got to tell everybody that wrote a letter for me. I'm still sitting here and thinking about how I got to go tell everybody.

I'm not coming home. And by the time when you walk out, there are always these guys waiting at the gate. Some want to, yes, you made it, you made it. Other one was like, did he make it? I don't really, I just want to be here for the news. I don't care. Hopefully you didn't. You can see it in their eyes.

So I said all that to say that there was so many times sitting there when they tell you right there on the spot. Mr. Matthew, we see that you've done a lot of work and we respect that, but unfortunately today, we don't think that you are currently, you know, you don't pose an unreasonable risk to society. So we want you to go back and continue to work on alcoholics anonymous, right there on the spot. Right? So they told me, Mr. Brown, this was a hard one for us, a tough one, but you've done the work and we're going to let you. go today. That's got to be like,

it's got to be like, cut the shit. Like, come on, man. Is this real? Because it's still, but it ain't complete then. Then you have another 150 days for the governor to decide.

So then you have another 60 or 30 days for the board to decide if they want to overturn it. Then another 120 days for the governor decide if he wants to overturn it. That's a fucking other year. That's practically a year. So then you sit there like this,

not want to get into a riot, not want to get ridden up by a CEO, because that's going to negate you. You're going to stay there if you get to any trouble. You can't, I mean, would you, you didn't tell people that, hey, they're considering it. I would have been, like, denied. Nah, everybody know. I would be denied.

They denied me because the other inmates would come. Somebody'd be like, damn, man, he's going to get out. Fuck him because he's never leaving. That's true. And try and start some shit and get me written up for that or plant something. A dude did that to me. So in my third hearing, right before I went to the hearing, a dude put in a kite saying that I was going to attack him. So when I go to my hearing, they say, Mr. Brown,

We got a kite right here says that you are going to attack somebody. Are you having issues on the yard? No, man, well, why would somebody do this? Ma'am, I can't tell you why somebody would do that. You can't have me answer for them? You know what I mean? Well, we don't know what this means. You're not being accountable.

We're going to deny you. So they use that. What you're saying, somebody wrote an anonymous kite and sent it in and said that I was going to attack them like a day before I went to the board and they used that shit. So what happens eventually? So what is it, another six months before you, Do you get a letter that your counselor call you in and say, guess what? Yeah, so they say the judge, the counselor calls you in.

I forget you know the, you know all the stuff. So the judge calls you in. And I'm not the judge. The counselor calls you in. And they're like, good news. The courts, I mean, the governor sided with the board and he didn't take any action. So you would be going home on his date. And it's like, you know, a week from now or whatever it is, for now a couple days

from now like that. So that's pretty much how I went. And for me, go ahead. I was just say after 24 years, listen, after 13 years, the closer I got to the door, well, first, the closer I got to the door, the more uncomfortable I got.

Like, I was like, because all I could think about is, what am I going to do when I get out? What am I going to do? I don't, I don't, like, you know, the judge was very, um, he was,

he was like super clear. I can't commit fraud. anymore. He said that's a no-no. So what I like to do, which is commit fraud, he said, that's not good. You can't do that. And so all the things I could do run a financial institution, work in real estate. Like there's nothing I could do. So all I could think of was you're going to, you know, of course, you know, remain humble, be appreciated. You know, you need the things I'm telling myself to keep myself out of trouble because I'm extremely arrogant and entitled. You know what I'm saying? Like I'm supposed to be working here and making this. And you know,

So I'm telling myself, like, you're going to fucking work at McDonald's. You're going to be thankful. You're going to be humble and be appreciative that you got out of prison. But I'm also still thinking, like, can you even get a job at McDonald's? Like, and you're an old man, bro. I was 49. I'm thinking you're going to be working. You're going to be a fucking laborer.

You're not cut out to be a fucking labor. You're going to be hanging drywall. Man, come on. So I'm laying in my book. So I was very uncomfortable, like, what am I going to do? But I also kind of felt like they're not really going to let you out. And you know what the other thing they did? You know what they did?

Multiple times, they changed my halfway house date. They kept giving me less halfway house. And they didn't even tell me. One time I walked in, put in my paperwork, and I was like, listen, you know, did you send off this yet? Because I don't know if I have enough time to get my stuff back. Like, did you mail it off? And they're like, gosh, you got like up two months.

And I went, no, I'm leaving on the 15th. And they went, got the paperwork. Oh, no, no. Oh, that was the old. No, no. That got changed. And I'm like, like, you were going to. You were going to have my fucking mom and my sister and my brother, my brother come up here.

And they would have. If I hadn't said that, and that happened twice. Not that one. That was the time I caught it. The other time they called me and said, hey, by the way, your halfway house got pushed back. But regardless, I felt like I'm not prepared to do anything. I don't know what's going to. And I don't think they're going to let me out.

And then, of course, and I know you are, I already know you went through this because everybody goes through this. Once they let you out, every time there was a knock at the door, Like every time I got out of the halfway house, I thought they caught it. Man. You know what I'm saying? They caught that they made a mistake and let me out. They're coming to get me. That went on for six months.

Or what about at, I don't know when they count in the state, but at four o'clock they count in the feds. At four o'clock for three, four months, I got anxious if I wasn't like, I'm like, because I'm supposed to be in my fucking cell. And I would feel uncomfortable. And I'd be like, what? Like, I don't have to be anywhere. Like, it's okay that I'm at this. restaurant or it's okay that I'm here at work or like it's okay but it didn't matter I would feel start

feeling anxious around 3 30 345 you know like I'm supposed to be in my cell and that's only 13 years what's what's 24 feel like did you I can tell you like they're not going to let you out to this very day I still go at 4 o'clock I still go sit on my bed with my spoon in my cup and wait to be counting oh shit if you sleep hot at night you know how disruptive that can be. Whether you're having trouble falling asleep, you're waking up sweating in the middle of the night or all of the above. That's where Ghostbed can help. As the makers of the coolest beds in the world, Ghostbed is your go-to for cooling mattresses, cooling pillows, and cooling bedding. From their signature ghost ice fabric to patented technology that adjusts to your body's temperature, every ghost bed

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dot com slash Cox and use the code Cox at checkout. Again, that's ghostbed.com slash Cox with the code Cox at the checkout to save a whopping 50% off site wide. I'm just kidding.

I'm just kidding. That's over. Man, I still go sit there and wait to be counted. My wife'd be like, clear. All right, babe. I would say when it's time to go to bed, if it's like 9 o'clock night, my wife wants me to come to bed,

she just flashes the lights. Did they do that? They flash the lights and everybody knows. Go to your cell. They sure did. They start flashing the lights in the dayroom. Dayroom clothes and all the stuff. And so for me, what you said is so true.

Once the governor didn't take action, the most challenging day for me was the day I was getting out. Because it was the day that they were supposed to come get me. If they were supposed to get that six, when six came out, they didn't come. I was like, hmm, here it is. They're not coming.

They're not coming. Then six 30. Then seven. I'm like, yeah, they're not coming. This is bull. I knew that one going to let me out. I knew this was bullshit. And they're like, brown, the door open.

I'm like, oh, it's happening. Right? And I really walked out. But that was the most excruciating part for me was the very last day, thinking that I really, because it's hard to believe. I believed it and it held on to it, but so long. What people don't talk about what I learned in my own studies to me, optimism is a form of disassociation because I disassociate from whatever it is going on, so I can be optimistic

about it, right? So I was so disassociated for so long, even though people don't say that, but I'm not, but people don't say that, maintaining this optimism that when it finally did present itself, I was like, this cannot be real. I cannot see them really let me out of prison. Despite all of the hard work that I didn't did, despite the man that I become today, it just didn't seem real, bro, until I walked all the way out. And even then, it took me months. Like you said, there's certain things people don't talk about when you come home. I was scared of the dark. You know, I was so used to being able to step on the prison yard, there's always light for 24 years. I never

was in a dark place for 24 years. You know, they got these bright lights on the yard. They're so bright to take away the stars. I don't know about the feds with the lights on the state yards that when you look up, you might see one or two stars. But when you leave that yard and you look up, the sky is full of stars. But the lights take them in the prisons. And I had become so accustomed to being able to walk out and say, like I told you earlier, that's 30 blacks. There's 30 whites. There's 30 message, okay, it's a guy by the handball court, it's a guy by the bleachers. You can see everything. Yeah.

But when I came home, that first night, my girl at the time, she was like, oh, I left something in the car. I'm like, oh, I'll go grab it. I walked out the Airbnb, man, it was so black out there. I froze. It was like, f-thole closed behind my black ass. I was just sitting there. I was like, what the hell is going on, right?

Somebody could be right there by that tree. Somebody could be right there by that car. Somebody could be looking at me through the window, somebody. And I froze. And I was like, why didn't anybody tell me about being seen? scared of the dark when I come home because I'm so security-minded and my mind is so analytical that it made me freeze for a moment and other things. Well, I was going to say, can I ask you, in the units, you know how they have how in the

unit, if you woke up in the middle and, I mean, I understand you were in cells. I was in sales like for three years. I was in the medium, but when I went, then it was an open bay. But so you have a group bathroom, right, like a public, but like if you got up in the middle of the night, it's, the lights are out. Right? Like if the windows are like, there's no light coming in. But what they have is they have these, these lights in the walls. So there's always illumination everywhere. Always. When we're done here, I'm going to walk you upstairs. It's illuminated. Oh my God.

Listen, it's so, I have so, look, they're, they're everywhere. They're everywhere. Oh, the night light. See the night light? They're everywhere. And so if you wake up in the middle of the night, I can walk all the way downstairs here. It's always, there's always illumination all the way. And it's so funny because I have a buddy who, actually I've had a couple of, I had one

buddy that lived here for about two, three years. He's been locked up over and over again. And I have another buddy who, has come and stayed the night one or two nights because this is close to his work. And so my wife makes fun of me. She was locked up for five years too though.

Oh, nice. But what's funny is he like, I said, hey, I gotta go, go, I go. I go, what do you think about the lights? He goes, I like him, bro. He's like, yeah, it's all he needs. You know, it reminds me of the unit. I said, right? It reminds me of the unit. But, like, she used to. Because I used to, when I got out, it was so dark.

And there's no. And if you wake up in the middle of the night and you roll over it. Not in the halfway house. Because in the halfway house, they had something like this too. It's always kind of light. But when I got moved into this, I moved in a rooming house. So when you close the fucking door, it's dark. It's black. And we're not used to that. Right. And so if I rolled over in the middle of the night, I'm like this, I'm feeling. And it's a very, so I started putting night lights and I got to, I built my own, when I got my own unit here. Nice. Wow. I got you. But I'm saying, you feel me. Oh, no, everything you're saying about like, especially being. And I got to, I got to, I got my own. I got to

alone because I used to always say people people when they think of prison they think about how lonely you are but the truth is you're never alone in prison and it's always loud ever always I used to want quiet so bad like I just it was you know even in the middle of the night it's the coughing and the burping and the farting and this in that and snoring and it's just it's all the time screaming the yelling yeah don't never stop the doors the clanking the clanking. It's constant. But you were saying, sorry, I want to interrupt. I just thought it was funny.

I'm happy that you did that because when I tell people about that, really do I ever have anyone who can add on to it and affirm what I'm saying? So it's really nice to hear you because we, you know, two different backgrounds and all and stuff. Yeah, well, you don't feel you're crazy. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Because it's even like I might disappear into the bathroom.

I'll tell my wife, my wife would be like, babe, where you been? I'd be like, babe, I've been in the bathroom. I could be with my tweezers, like plucking hairs or something, but that was a meditation for me in the prison. I couldn't go out my cell. We had this little bitty mirror by barely this big or one that I can hold, and I would just be able to hold my tweezers, and that gives me something to do and think.

And I found that now that I'm out of prison, I find myself doing that sometimes. Or when I go to the shower, that was the only place that I can get silenced depending on where I was housed at. Because if it was one of those situations where you say it's like 30 people in the shower or 20 people in the shower, then that's a rap. But if it was one of those ones where it's a one-man shower or two-man shower with bars and I can hang my towels and stuff on it and if CEOs don't say anything, that would be like the only closest to privacy I could get. You know what I'm saying?

So now that I'm home, I find myself taking these long showers every now and then because it still feels like the place where I get refuge. And so I'm breaking myself out of that. But it's just those little things that we talk about right now that I won't call them quirks or little nuances, but they socialize them to it. so to speak as a result of being in those environments for so long. You know? Another one was driving on the freeway. I hadn't driven a car in 24 years. So now that I'm driving, especially at night and these bright lights in my eyes,

oh my God, I thought that was like the end of the world. I was like I can't do. I got to pull over. I felt like I needed to pull over or get to the furthest lane away from the other side because I wasn't used to those bright lights being on my face like that. So it's so much that comes with it. I had a hard time with gauging speed. There were sometimes I was driving and I thought I'm doing fine.

And all the cars are right by me. There are other times I'm going way too fast. I had the same thing. So it took a few weeks where I really had to pay attention. Like you have to, you know what I'm saying? Yes. And I don't know what, unlike L.A. and Florida, like they drive. Like if it's 35, like they're driving 50.

If it's 70, they're driving 85. I mean, they're fast everywhere. They were moving fast here when I was driving here. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, driving was really, it was odd for the first, you know, like I knew how to drive, but it's just you don't understand the feeling that the touching the brakes the first time. You're like, you know, it was big in the dash.

Yeah. I'm still struggling with eating too, bro. You know, when I first came home in the halfway house, you know, we shared these fridges and these refrigerators and everything. prison mentality get a lockdown box I get as many soups as many canned goods as many soaps as I can

I stuff them under my bed I stuff them in the shelves and everything when I came home I was like oh I can go shopping I got to fill the fridge up with all the food that I can get this is fresh food

right this food's gonna go bad this is not the stuff that I'm used to that can last for a year you know what I'm saying these are vegetables and things that I hadn't had

so I bought all this food and it spoiled since then, I've dabbled here and there with, you know, eating properly. However, being totally honest with you and everybody else, I've noticed that I struggled with putting together a proper diet for myself all the time because I was so used to eating what was available to me. Yeah, yeah. What are they serving the child hall?

Yeah, I'm so used to it. So even to this day, like, I don't prepare my meals. the way I fantasized that I would when I was incarcerated. I was like, well, I can't wait to get some vegetables and some tomatoes and some, you know, bell peppers and onions and this. And now that I'm home. Did everybody, did people ask you, like, as you were getting closer and people realized like you were going on, did people say,

what's the first thing you're going to eat? I got so tired of that question. I know. I got all the time. What did you say? I didn't have an answer. I did. And every time my answer, guys were like, what?

Because people have a certain image, especially in prison, right? because the bar is much lower. They had an image of me, and they used to always like, bro, what was the first thing you got to eat? And I was like, a McDonald's cheeseburger. The baby one,

not the big, like just a baby cheeseburger and a Coke and fries. And there we go, what? I've been fantasize. I had been, you know,

since because that's when you were a little kid, I guess maybe. And I didn't really eat that a lot when I was, you know, but for some reason, it stuck in my mind. And the guys would be like, bro, I think you would say like, you know, steak.

Yeah, steak or lobster or, and I'm like, I don't really think about that. Like that's that hamburger, even now. I may, I may, I may go get one, you know, I'll get one every once. I'll love to cook too, yeah. I've eaten more now since I probably did the prior 10 years because I do. And you know what? It's freedom. It is.

I think that's what in my mind, I associate. with freedom. The hamburger? Yeah. Oh, so good. Interesting. And it's the exact same hamburger, by the way. That hamburger tastes the exact same it did today as it did when I was 13 years old.

That's the best. Because I came out to Popeye's chicken. I was like, it's not the same. I was pissed off, right? But I'm happy for you. That's good, man. I love to cook. I love to cook.

I just don't make the time for it like I should. I think I've been working so hard on my organization, my business and everything that I don't do it. But I actually love to cook. I enjoy eating and when people ask me what I wanted to do or what I wanted to eat when I came home

I used to just tell them like I have no idea but I'm gonna eat something I'm enjoy it you know but the one that got me that I did have an answer for that tripped them out

was where's the first place you want to go or what's the first thing you want to do they asked you that yeah mine was take me to a gas station

and let me sit on the hood of the car and watch everybody go by without paying me attention. That's what I want to do. And everybody thought that was like, like, what? You don't want to go to the beach. You don't want to do this.

You don't want to do that. I said, I just want to be somewhere where I'm not being surveilled. Right. You feel me? I've been surveilled prior to coming to the pen. Like I was just telling you the story. I'm so used to being studied and watched and scrutinized from when I was a kid making bad decisions all the way through the pen making bad decisions.

I finally turned my life around. I want to know what it's like to not be scrutinized, to not be wise, to not be considered to be the bad. I want to just relax and chill. I deserve that. I want to operate from my parasympathetic nervous system before I die. You know what I'm saying? I don't want to always be in fight or flight.

So for me, just going to a place where I could just sit and watch the life go on when nobody paid attention to me was the Holy Grill. You know, I love the beach. I went skydiving. I love jumping out there playing. That was dope. I'm with all that. But I like being places where nobody pays me in.

attention because I've been watched and scrutinized for so much and so that was my answer. When you got out, like what was your, did you have a game plan when you got out? I mean, do you know what I'm saying? Like, did you have a game plan? Like, I mean, you started an organization, but was that formulated when you were incarcerated or was that something you thought about like once you hit the streets and thought I need to try and have a purpose? Like, I didn't do something. Like, wouldn't that happen? So that's a great question. So like I was expressing to you earlier, I've been doing a lot of work from behind the walls since before I became free, physically. I've been running these programs. So this is my organization. The TMP program,

I created it in 2014, inside prison. And it was to help people prepare for the board. So I would run around and talk to men about emotional literacy, talk to them about their traumas, help them prepare for the board. And it kind of became my thing, whether I liked it or not, right? I continues to get my degrees and just continue to grow and learn. And with the woman that I was with at the time, we had a lot of political connections and aspirations and things we were doing. So my plan, when I stepped out, I have my clothing line, I have my publishing company, I have my music company, I have my consultation company, I have my nonprofit. So I started all of these. I had a different nonprofit that I started, probably to me getting first.

So I utilize my time a great deal of it to prepare because I knew one day I would come home. I've written six books. Lots of poetry. I'm a spoken word poet. I've written 15 albums. You know, I write music. I'm a writer. And so I have all this stuff stacked up.

I've written these proposals, these programs. I have these ideas of where I want to see the community go, economic changes, all of these things. So I've been implementing them to the best of my ability as one man coming from prison that I can. And so when I stepped out, I stepped out to the businesses that I created for myself, I stepped out to my nonprofit, this right here. And I was able to, with the other nonprofit that I started with my wife, we got like a $125,000 grant while I was incarcerated. We would do these fundraising calls where I would be on the phone from prison and they would

be on a Zoom call with the fundraisers, talking to the fundraisers, and I would be on there talking to the fundraisers, and this particular guy, he felt what we were talking about, and he gave us $125,000 while I was still incarcerated. Jeez. Right? Yeah. And so it was $25,000 a year is what he would do, but that's cool. That was my first time making something like that happen and being a part of it.

Then once I got found suitable, I went back and I wrote a grant for my program, and by the grace of God, I made history not only is creating this program, but then having it funded by the California Department of Corrections. So then they gave me a grant for $176,000, right? And I was only months out of the prison. So I stepped right out and to be my own employer running my own business. And since then, it's just been continuing to grow and grow and grow. And I help as many people as possible.

We're in 20 prisons now. Do you go into prison or you just have a program in the prison? I'll be in the prison tomorrow. Oh, geez. I'll be in the prison tomorrow. I'll be in Lancaster tomorrow. And what is that? does it entail you teaching a class?

Yes, can I show you? Yeah. So this 10P program Boys 2 Men Workshop. Okay. This is the Holy Grail. This is a book that I wrote, right, while I was incarcerated, but I didn't put it out until right now. And this is like the workbook for people who are incarcerated. And it covers everything from cell phone addiction, prioritizing, setting educational goals,

peer pressure, decision-making, emotional literacy. And it's my life story and my experiences basically put into this book. And it's been helping so many people, so many people have come home from this book. So I go in and we teach this. We teach emotional literacy. But we teach it from a perspective of our phenomenological, which basically means lived experience. And this is a hit, right? And it's changing lives.

It's saving lives. This is on Amazon. And it's also on our website at 10P, the number 10, the letter p, program.org. And if you know somebody that's in prison, you can order this form. If you want somebody, you know somebody you want to keep out of prison. You can order this form. You can study this with your people in prison. And it's been really handy.

So I go in and I teach these groups that I created. This one is the Boys to Men Workshop. In Solano Prison, we're going to be teaching the 10P Belt Program, which it stands for basic emotional literacy tools. And it's the first one in history like it is because I was able to create what they called a new 10p California family model. And they allow me, they just gave me approval to create a self-help program in this new prison, well, not new prison, but this new program in this prison that allows for us to have the people

who are incarcerated sit in the circles with their family members and their friends. Have you ever heard of that? No, not with your family and friends. It makes me think of, it makes me think of ARDAP, the federal residential drug. assistance program it's something program it's like abuse drug abuse it might be drug abuse program I don't know what the A is but I think it's abuse drug abuse program um but uh and you know there's lots of where you sit but obviously they're not bringing in they're not bringing in your fan they not that they shouldn't but in the art app program they don't but if they have all the

they have workbooks and everything and I and Colby's heard this about a fucking thousand times where I say first of all the art app I don't even know why they call it that because it has it has almost nothing to do with drugs. I think it was a way for them to get funding because Congress needs a reason. Like, oh, yeah, yeah, we need to fight these drug addicts. But the truth is, it has nothing to do with drugs. It's really just about behavior modification.

And I've had this conversation. You always heard this over and over again. And guys, whenever they talk about, what do you think you should do about? I think everybody should take ARDAP. Or it's not ARDAP, but an ARDAP style program because, bro, I had this conversation. yesterday is that these guys go into prison and they are completely reactive, right?

Not responsive. No, they, something happens and they react, right? Like, I'm going to this, and you've been doing it the whole time. Like, that was your whole growing up. It doesn't matter what the circumstance was, but you were reacting, you were in a shitty situation, but you were compiling the problem by reacting badly to it. 100%. And it's so funny because you go there and there's three phases to the program.

And like the first phase or two when someone like me who I don't have that problem, you know what I'm saying? Like I'm in the program listing these guys and they're giving different examples. What would you do in this situation? And I'm sitting there thinking like these guys are telling what they do. And I'm thinking, holy shit. Like that was your response? Right.

My, my, my, my, I'm naturally thinking, that's so deep, you know, this happens, this is how you react. Like, they immediately go to the worst possible reaction and they don't even think about the consequences of that. Where to me, the, the event happens and I already think, before I react, I'm thinking, I'm, yeah, what is the consequences if I act this way? Because I have that reaction. I have the same reaction you do. I think that's my first response, right? is to say something smart ass or rude or attack the person. Then I think, well, wait a minute.

Even if I'm triumphant and I beat this guy up or I do. I lose because he's going to call the police. The police are going to come. And you know, start breaking it out. You do the whole, whole cause and effect thing. And, you know, in the end, I don't, that doesn't benefit me. They don't think that way. Like 90% of the guys sitting in that circle, you're like horrible fucking decision,

horrible decision. Right. And the ARDAP program teaches you, it immediately has them, you know, jump to thinking about your reaction and how it changes. And they do, they have multiple workbooks. Man, which I think this is the same. We got much for us too. This is the same. I think it's the same thing.

But you're not saying, you're not saying drugs. But I feel, I really feel like they said drugs to get the funding. Because you get in there. They don't really talk about drugs at all. They mention it. but really it's a behavior modification. And that sounds like brainwashing. And maybe you could say it is brainwashing.

Brain was dirty. It's cool. Right. But if you need that brainwashing, you can call it whatever you want. And I even say all the time, a lot of guys will go in the program and be like, I'm going to fake my way through it.

You know, okay, that's fine. You know, and the guys are like, settle in. Right. It doesn't matter. You're going to, I said that yesterday. I said, you can't go through that program without taking away something.

Something's going to set in, yeah. And the recidivism rate for those guys drops dramatically. It's the same here, bro. It's the same here. With the 10-P program, they never seen anything like this. When they asked our supervisor,

my supervisor, then Ms. Dale Hamad, shout out, Del Hamad, why did you approve this program? She said, because the change is most effective when it comes from the people who are in need of the change.

And I never forgot her words. You know what I mean? Because when I created this program, it was on a maximum security 180, level four. There was no parole preparation. I created this because of what I told you. Remember I told you I was like,

I didn't know how to go to the board. Yeah. And I asked all of these men, and none of us knew. And I was like, something has to be done. And it was a lot of riots, a lot of homicides, a lot of drugs overdoses on this yard that I was on. And I remember talking to my then supervisor, Ms. Castro,

older white lady, awesome. That's my girl. She's like, I said, man, that's a lot of homicides and shit around here. And she said, I said, the men got nothing to live for. She said, we'll do something about it. And I'm like, oh, this lady didn't call me out. Old lady with a cane didn't call me out told me do something about it. And I thought I was tough.

So at the time I was researching emotional literacy and I was writing a memoir on myself called how I overcame emotional literacy, how I overcame anti-social personality disorder through emotional literacy or self-study. That's an extremely long. That's extremely, right? That's way too long over time. That's why I never came out. So that was the memoir I was writing for myself.

And once I spoke to her and she said, do something about it, I then took my memoir and I turned it to a curriculum and then I put a proposal with it and I sent it up to the wardens, the associate warrants or deputy warrants the principals and they approved it so then i had to go to the yard and get all of these dudes to come in and participate i had to go highlight killer wig splitter head buster dude duster hosers stanky all these dudes like bro uh why don't you come in here and learn about your emotions right so you can go home it's like bro i got seven life sentences my name killer yeah i ain't never going home like killer don't believe that bro just because they send you to seven life sentences you still may go home come here and learn something so once i was able to

get like 25 people, then it became 50, then from 50 to 100, then 400, then 2,000, then that whole prison, then a whole other prison, then it just took off. And now I got out of prison. You know what I mean? But while I was incarcerated, I'm sure you know this, when we're incarcerated, they don't view us as valuable. When I say that, they view you as valuable if you can benefit them. If you can write their reports, if you can do something that makes them look good, they

can take credit for it, you're valuable. but they don't identify you as an individual that you created something that brings them value or helps other people. They'll take it from you rather than lift you up. So that was what I dealt with a lot with my program. There were so many people who were not incarcerated who had money and connections

and they would come in and meet me and see what I was doing and they were then able to go emulate or talk to the governor or talk to a ward and they'll implement these programs but they were motivated and inspired by people like myself. In the federal system, the ARDAP program, if you, because obviously you're trying to go out and have these guys take this program with no incentive. Like you're what I'm saying? Like you don't have an, there's an incentive, but there's not an immediate incentive, right, for them.

So what is the incentive? Because in ARDAP, what they did was they said if you pass the program, you get a year off your sentence. That chain, now these guys are trying to get in the program. What is the incentive for these guys to take the program now? So you get what they call rehabilitation achievement credits. Okay. And with this one, this one and with the other one I just told you about too. So they knock off, the California Department of Corrections,

the time that they knock off is different. They don't just automatically get, you know, six months. You know, they would, when you complete this class, I think it knocks off like three months off your sentence, something like that. So, excuse me, that's better than nothing. Yeah. To say it was created by somebody that's incarcerated,

that's significant, and that's the maximum amount of RAC credits you can get anyway, no matter if I created the program or not. So that's the maximum. You get that, but then you get a certificate saying that you completed it. You get a support letter if you need one saying that we'll help you with transitional housing, will help you obtain in the job, you have a whole community that we're a part of, safe spaces, support networks, groups on the outside. So it's not just completing the book.

You get the knowledge. The knowledge is important. That's really the most important thing. But then you also get time knocked off your sentence from completing the class. You get entered into a community of people who are sincere about this word. So those are some of the incentives that's been a big draw to this program. And the other thing is we teach emotional literacy. We're pioneers of it.

We're evolving what emotional literacy looks like. Like the 10P program, we've put forth a whole new emotional literacy system that defines emotional literacy as the ability to be able to identify how others feel and how you feel and then emotional intelligence as the ability to select the right tools once you've identified how everyone feels. So there's four quadrants to emotional literacy, self-awareness, social awareness, self-management, and then social management. And so the intelligence part is the management.

That's the tools. The awareness part is to being able to read. And so that's how we're teaching, and it's so simple. And I'm also the pioneer, Matt, of the theory of emotional, literacy-based criminality. That theory posits that nobody's born bad, nobody's born evil, but when people adopt criminality is a coping mechanism for unprocessed traumas. Utilizing this approach,

we had a lot of success with reducing recidivism, with actually getting through the people, because going back to our earlier conversation, when we were talking about the officers, having a very adversarial situation with Americans' jurisprudence in the courts, they don't care why you committed the crime, They don't care what led you to it. Did you do it?

We just want to convict you. They don't care if the victim is hurt. They don't give them answers, none of that. The theory of emotional illiteracy-based criminality is comprised of adverse childhood experiences, social ecology, strain theory, cognitive behavioral therapy, and one more. I'm missing.

And these take a well-rounded approach to understanding why an individual chooses criminality as a coping mechanism. So what it looks at, it looks at criminal behavior as a coping mechanism, just like smoking grass, just like retail therapy, just like having a sex addition. Everybody I know in prison, because I did a study, I did a two-year longitudinal study. Once I created this theory and I walked around, I collected Bukudadha. Everybody that I met in prison 100% was a casualty before they were an offender, period. I never met anybody in prison that was trauma-free.

You know what I'm saying? I don't care if they're mama called them stupid. I don't care if they got molested. I don't care. Beat. Seeing their uncle get killed. Something happened to almost everybody I met in prison, been through something. You know what I mean?

You don't even need physical abuse for the have trauma. I used to think trauma meant you were physically abused in some way, but you don't need physical abuse. I only know this from doing the serial killer book. So they talk about, like, they have like several of the serial killers. Like I was trying to do a correlation. And there was a bunch of them that I looked into. like there was all of them have trauma some of them were all them were beaten or tortured but a lot of

them it's just something that happened in their childhood with their family it may have been as simple as a divorce but it was a horrible divorce and it made that person fee and that person got switched from their their father to their grandparents and then from their grandparents their aunt took care of them for a couple of years then their mother came back and then for six months and she met a guy and they didn't get along and now he's back with the like you got passed around and you think, okay, well, he's been passed around. Lots of people have horrible things happen. Yeah, but that was traumatizing to that person,

or they maybe were premeditated or kind of predisposed to a certain behavior. Now you threw trauma in there, and it just turned them into a monster. Man, lights out because it comes to so many forms. You got personal trauma, you got transgenerational trauma that people inherit from their families already. I mean, you imagine being born into a house where, you know, your parents ain't working on your parents' own drugs or your parents have been beaten, and never dealt with these issues, and now they're raising you with their own mental health.

That's transgender trauma that you just inherit. You know what I mean? And I just want to say, because you made a good point about trauma. My name is Sam Brown, right? But right now, my name is trauma. And as trauma, I just want to say, I don't give a fuck where you from.

I don't give a fuck how old you are. I don't care what your race is, your gender, your tax bracket. Trauma don't know none of that shit. Trauma does not discriminate. Trauma does not care. Anybody can get it. My name is trauma and you can get it.

Anybody can get it. Your mama can get it. Your sister can get it. Your daughter can get it. You know, it don't matter if you blood, cripp, vice lord, gangster disciples, star, Zilla, where you from. Trauma does not discriminate. Anybody can be molested.

Anybody can be called stupid, made it feel like they're less than. And this is what we don't pay attention to. This is some of the things I learned in prison is that we allow these superficial issues to separate us as people. But at the end of the day, we all have more in common. then we like to give each other credit for. And so the good thing that I learned about trauma and with the TMP program is while trauma doesn't discriminate,

neither does healing. All right. Anybody can get that too. You talked about getting them into a group, a circle with their family. Yes. And you can go back to that, but I wanted to mention what they do in ARDAP

is they have these guys. Luckily, I never had to do this. I didn't get to this part. Okay. They have these guys write letters back to a family member. No, that's not true. No. They have them write a letter asking them to fill something out.

And then they send a paper. They have like a form that says, hey, we'd like you to write a letter to your son. No, no. So you would mail a letter. You're incarcerated. You're in this program. You mail it to your father or your mother, whatever, some family member. You're whatever, sister.

And you mail it. And then it's with a piece of paper that she says, look, could you do a favor? Write a letter and address these four issues. Like how did, you know, how did Sam's, whatever, criminal behavior affect you? How did Sam be, you know, that's sort of basics and they mail it in? Because they can't bring the family in, in this, you know, in the, and they read the letters in the circle. You've never seen. grown men, gangsters

gangsters cry like fucking children. Yeah. I mean, can't even, so bad, they've got to hand it to the other person, have them read it. And these are guys who, you know, or just, you know, fuck this, fuck that.

They're just, they're tough guys. They've been in shootouts. They got bullet holes in them. They got, and then their mom, and then, of course, it's stuff like they never knew. So that's what I'm talking about. That's what I'm talking about. That space.

That is what rehabilitation looks like. That is what healing looks like. That is what healing looks like. And it's about pro-social opportunities and pro-social capital. So when you talk about the family and when you said, you know, I can bring it back up about the 10-P belt program, the reason why I mentioned that is because, again, I feel like I, Samuel Brown, cracked the code on rehabilitation. When I went to the pen in 1997, nobody told me. They was like, the judge was like, rehabilitate Mr. Brown.

One day you'll come home. What the fuck is rehabilitation, judge? What does it look like? Where do I find it? My question back then, we all thought we were smart, was like, how do I rehabilitate when I never habilitated? Didn't even know what that meant, but that was our thing, right? Because we didn't know what it was. So it took me all of those years of making bad decisions to understand that antisocial is the linchpin of criminality.

If antisocial is the linchpin of criminality, then lightball moment pro-social must be the linchpin of being social, of being somebody that could be in society, of being. rehabilitated, right? And that was so simple that nobody said that to me when I walked up in there, because if you got a 115, if you put up a shit sheet or a sheet while you was on the door, you was in a bathroom and you didn't want to be seen, they'll give you a 115 for that. When you go to the board, they'll say, well, Mr. Brown, your antisocial personality disorder persists, and that's indicated by this 115 that you just got, so we can't let you go home today. So if all this time, if antisocial keeps me in a pen, then I need to be pro-social. Why y'all just didn't tell me that when I came to the pen, that the goal is to get me to become pro-social.

Anti-social is synonymous with not rehabilitated. Antisocial is synonymous with emotionally illiterate. Rehabilitated is synonymous with prosocial, which is synonymous with emotionally literate. So once I realized this, then emotional literacy became the core of the 10P program and I teach it. And I'm always seeking to create these dynamics that cause social capital to just flourish. And people have pro-social experiences. And with that program that we were just talking about, the Tempe Belt program, I've never heard of it. Most of what I create, what God give me, I've never heard of.

And so I've never heard of a program that allowed family and friends to come sit inside the circles and learn with the people. And for me, it was a no-brainer. We want people to come back and be able to function with their family and friends. We want people to come back and be pro-social. We need to break down barriers. Something else that I learned. When I went to the pen and I learned about all of these things, when I learned about, you know, what led me to adopting criminality.

When I learned about triggers, when I learned about trauma, my family wasn't learning this stuff. So my friends wasn't learning this stuff. So when I come out, I have a vocabulary that they don't have. I have concepts and things that I talk about that they don't talk about. And when I talk about them, I didn't look at me foreign. Some of them creating barriers to us getting along.

And that barrier is like, wait a minute. Y'all told me to go to jail and become a better person. I came out a better person. Now I'm clashing. Right. With my folks. Because they didn't do the same work. Because they're not required to do the same work.

And so creating a program like the 10P belt program helps reduce those barriers, but it also creates encouragement for people who are incarcerated because now imagine sitting inside of a self-help group with your mom or your son or your daughter. You know what I'm saying? That puts focus. That puts it into perspective. Like, why am I really doing this? You're learning what I'm learning.

You get the encouragement. When we have these conversations on the phone, now you can talk to me about interpersonal communication because we're studying it together. It's a no-brainer. If you really want people to heal, make it a community thing, make it a village thing. So I'm introducing, and the CDCR approved it, a program that allows family and friends to actually come sit inside the circle and learn with the people. And it had never been anything like this in California or the country, to my knowledge.

And y'all, don't be afraid to say you heard it here first. It started with the 10P program. So if we start seeing incarcerated people sitting in groups with family and friends, y'all got it right here first with me and Matt when we was talking. We're going to let that be known. 10p, baby. Are you good? I think we're good?

Yeah, we have plenty of content. That's good. Are you good? Yeah, can I just big up this one time? Can you what? Big up. Can I shop this out one time? Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah. All right. So I just want to say, first of all, thank you for this opportunity, bro. Sure. No problem. Thank you. And to anybody out there, again,

we teach emotional literacy of the 10P program, and we teach it in all walks of life. Our motto is there are more people in prison and they are incarcerated. So our teachings are applicable to everybody. My wife is a two-time Olympian and an Olympic bronze medalist from Beijing. And we wrote this book. Also, emotional literacy for athletes, you know, because it's important that people who compete and fight for us on the field and everything know that they are loved and cared about

and you're not by yourself. So we have emotional literacy for athletes that we teach. We have emotional literacy for corporate. We have it for the youth. And we also have it for people who are incarcerated. So go online to 10Program.org. We do workshops, we do seminars, we teach classes, we got books, and check us out and source some support.

We need all the love we can get. You can find us at 10P program on Instagram, sam.netonio. Brown on Instagram, and 10Pprogram.org. And if you're feeling, you know, kind, we need all the donations we can get to. I was told that many black organizations come up with great ideas, but they fall and crumble because they don't ask for money. I'm not scared to ask for money. If you got a dollar, send us a dollar, we need it.

We're really out here doing the work, and we need all the help we can get. Peace and bless us, Tim P. Hey, you guys, I appreciate you watching. Do be a favor. Hit the subscribe button, hit the bell so you get notified of videos like this. Also, we're going to leave all of Sam's links in the description box so you can go to Instagram and subscribe or his other social media, his website, and if there's a donation link down there, please click on the donation link and donate.

I really appreciate you guys watching. do me a favor and please consider joining our Patreon. That's $10 a month. It helps Colby and I make these videos. And also, we have a clips channel and a shorts channel. And the links are in the description too. So if you don't want to watch a two or three hour podcast, because I get that sometimes people complain.

And they say, man, I don't have three hours. What are you doing? Why don't you have a clips channel? Well, I do have a clips channel. So you can go to the clips channel and watch just clips of the videos. Thank you very much. See you. My name is Sammy Nathaniel Brown.

I'm the founder-director of Tim P program, and I'm here having a discussion with my brother Matt today. Talk about true crime, but I want y'all to know, I do not glorify none of this shit. You know what I'm saying? I lived it. I did it. We can talk about it, but we don't glorify it. We're trying to get y'all to elevate beyond it. So peace and blessings, and thank you, Tim P.