Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of a Hollywood Burglar

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Starting point is 00:02:30 So I would go to Santa Monica, Venice Beach, Bel Air, Beverly Hills. I'm literally in Hollywood living like a little GTA life. I'm getting away from cops and I'm breaking in the houses and I'm breaking in the cars. Listen, just about any near-death experience as a catalyst for change. So growing up, you know, my mom and dad, who my mother is phenomenal. So let me preface everything with saying she did everything she could to be the best mother she can be. But, you know, my mom and dad's so dope, dead dope, a lot of domestic violence. And so even though we had everything we ever wanted financially, my dad used to be my mom real bad, so we used to have to sleep on the streets.

Starting point is 00:03:05 Many a night, me and my mom, my brother, were sleeping at my elementary school, we're running from my dad. And so all my life I would hear, I'm not your real dad anyway, Gary Mullins is. So from a very young age, this need for validation, this need for attention, which kind of carried throughout my criminal life was very prevalent and present. And so at 16, I get shot. Me and this kid were going to fight. I'm waiting in my school bus. Now, mind you, prior to this, I was terrible in school. I was always suspended.

Starting point is 00:03:36 I get shot. And of course. How does that happen? What do you mean? You get shot? So me and this kid were going to fight, and he didn't want to fight. And so he's walking by the bus stop. Now, mind you, that morning, my mom and dad were arguing.

Starting point is 00:03:48 And I had tried to put my sock on the right way, and it wouldn't go on. I don't know why. And so I'm banging it up against the wall. I hit my hand. I'm already frustrated. So I pull up to the bus stop with my mom and my brother and a friend. And I see this guy that I don't like walking down the way. And I'm like, I'm going to go say something to him.

Starting point is 00:04:06 I'm not really mad at him. I'm mad at everything going on in my life. So I get to the bus stop and he's walking by and he's staring me down. And I'm like, yo, what's up with it? What's going on? And he comes up and we start arguing and he's trying to get me to go around the corner, unbeknownst to me what's about to happen. And so we're arguing.

Starting point is 00:04:25 we're about to fight. He pulls a gun out. I'm mad, I'm not tough. I'm not a thug. I wear my seatbelt. You can't be a seatbelt. You can't be a thug and wear a seatbelt. It don't work like that.

Starting point is 00:04:34 All right. So when he pulls this gun out, I don't know what I was thinking. I don't even know if I knew it was real. It was an old cowboy 22. So I took my book back off and was like, I know you didn't just pull a gun out on me. And I was going to go still off on him. I was going to swing on him. And did you think maybe like he's not going to, well, he won't do it.

Starting point is 00:04:55 I've thought about it so many times. I don't know if I thought the gun was fake. I don't know if self-preservation is the key to life. So as much as I may not be this hard thug type, I'm going to defend myself. Or maybe that. Maybe, you know, he's the B word and he's not going to do it, you know? And so I was wrong. I took my book back off.

Starting point is 00:05:15 I was going to swing on him. Next thing I heard was, phew, because it was a 22. There was no bang. It didn't burn. Didn't know if I was shot. He walks away. he was yelling something. I don't remember what it was.

Starting point is 00:05:27 I pull my shirt up, my best friend and my brother right beside me, and I'm like, am I shot? And my friend's like, nah, you're good. I said, nah, something's going on here, man.

Starting point is 00:05:37 Am I shot? And he's like, you are. Instantly, it felt like the worst stomach cramp you could ever imagine. They said they've never seen my brother run so fast. My best friend said he's never seen a human being run so fast. My brother runs down to our house.

Starting point is 00:05:53 All I know is I didn't know what to do. The pain was extreme. So I fall to the ground. And a friend of mine, God rest his soul, used to joke and tell people that I went like this. And it was hilarious. And so, yeah, now I'm shot. Nobody ever thought little Jimmy Nichols was going to get shot. I wasn't like a terrible kid in the sense that I'm fighting all the time.

Starting point is 00:06:15 I was just thirsty for validation. And my affinity for shock value gets me in a lot of trouble. So I was always the class clown. Where were you shot, though? What part of you? Right here on my chest. In your chest, Joe, it's just below your pecks? Yeah, right there.

Starting point is 00:06:30 Technically the chest, but kind of like the stomach. It went through my liver, nicked my kidney, and it's still in my back now. And it was at 22. And I had met a cop from New York who had spent 22 years on the force, ironically. And he said, I've never met a person take a bullet to the liver and survive. Yeah, I was going to say that's that. And, you know, it was so funny. I was watch this.

Starting point is 00:06:50 And I'm sure you know this. I it kills me when you watch these movies and they're like we've got to get the bullet out. I'm like they usually leave the bullets in. Like if there's no reason for us to go digging around, the bullet's not bothering you, as long as it's not close to your spine or something and you don't have like rejection or anything. Like if it's not causing problems, we really just need to kind of stitch up the organs and you and make sure there's no internal bleeding. But the bullet's probably fine where it is.

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Starting point is 00:09:17 Barely any blood. No blood. I mean, there was. a drip of blood. So it was kind of like, I remember riding to the hospital. The ambulance didn't pick me up. Some guy at a funeral home next door, ironically, backed up, put me in his car. Put me in the hearse. I know, hey, hey, we're not there yet. I don't know this guy. I've never seen him since. There's a place in Hebrews that says, be careful how you treat others for some have entertained angels that didn't know it. You can't tell me that this guy wasn't sent from God to save my life. So he's driving me to the hospital. He's rushing down Washington Street on the west side of Charleston, West Virginia. And of course, I'm like, am I going to die? And I just remember

Starting point is 00:10:01 the most peace coming over me. He put his hand on me, said, you're going to be okay. So I get to the hospital. My mom gets there. Of course, everyone's crying. People are frustrated. People are upset. And then I hear these doctors tell me, well, we don't know if it was a bullet or just a high-powered pellet. I was pissed. I was like, you mean to tell me that I went through all of this for a pellet gun? At least I could tell people I got shot. Yeah, that is, yeah. Yeah, but I was, I really got shot. And so after I got shot, just about any near-death experience is a catalyst for change. Definitely a catalyst for like a deeper spiritual awakening, if you will. Okay. So I felt deeply in love with the Lord. And I started doing poetry. And I started doing poetry all over my state, working with kids.

Starting point is 00:10:48 I was in my room one day. I'm crying, angry, frustrated about the kid that shot me. I couldn't play basketball. I couldn't go to school. I couldn't do anything. And I was reading Romans chapter 12, verses 14 through 21. And it talked about don't repay evil for evil. Vengeance is the Lord's.

Starting point is 00:11:06 If your enemy is thirsty, give him something to drink. When I tell you that in an instant, my heart went from anger and sadness to empathy and sympathy, I started crying for this kid. I started praying for this kid. I reached out to his family to try to get a hold of him. He called me from jail and was like, What's up, bro? And I was like, I just want to apologize to you.

Starting point is 00:11:29 He's like, why are you apologizing to me? I shot you. I said, yeah, but I used to pick on you. I used to start stuff with you too. And I just wanted to tell you that I'm sorry. It blew his mind. Now, at this time, I was the youth team leader for an organization called Chainbreakers. How old mentor?

Starting point is 00:11:44 How old were you? I was 16. No, you were still like 16. When you had that call? Yeah. Okay. I figured this was 10 years later. No, that was my 10th grade year.

Starting point is 00:11:57 The summer going into my 11th grade year, I had met a man named Andy Palmer, who I love to this day. He was a mentor of mine who had got out of prison, and he had started his own organization called chainbreakers. Him and other guys that have been in prison would go around the schools and share their testimony with kids. They would work with kids. he saw me while he was doing his story at the Boys and Girls Club. I walked up and introduced myself. And he said, hey, you're the kid that got shot. And I said, I am.

Starting point is 00:12:26 He said, I've been looking for you. I said, yeah, I grew up with your family. He said, what do you think about going to talk to kids? So I would love to do that. I had already got on stage at my high school and did a whole poem, six-minute poem, no piece of paper, straight off the top of my, not off the top of my head, but memorized. about standing up for Jesus, about doing the right thing. The day after I had chose to forgive the kid that shot me, I came to school right.

Starting point is 00:12:53 You know, I wrote apology letters to kids. I was apologizing to teachers. Something in me transmorphed. Something in me became new. As I'm talking to Andy, I'm like, hey, you go into the juvenile centers, right? And he's like, yeah. I was like, you think you could find this kid for me? I would love to go see him.

Starting point is 00:13:12 The juvenile centers wouldn't let us happen because it was a, conflict of interest. But when he got out of prison, me and him with Andy would go to schools and share our story with kids. So this is the guy that shot me. Yeah. So I would come out. I would. Was it like a bit where he'd go? Yeah. God rest just so Stevie. I was Stevie. I was Stevie was here. Stevie would love that. And so that was the friend they used to do that. I used to, oh, I used to irritate me with it. So I would come out. I would always share poetry. I'm very, very good with it. And so I would also share a little bit of my story. And then as I'm saying, hey, I forgave the kid that shot me.

Starting point is 00:13:49 Two seconds later, here comes this kid out. And I'm the one that shot him. And the look on these kids' faces to watch two kids that come from the hood where generally, that's not how the story goes. Generally, it's eye for an eye, get you before you get me. Or get you before you get me again. And so, yeah, we would go share stories with kids. I don't know what ended up happened with him. I would love to find out what happened with him,

Starting point is 00:14:17 but I think he went his own way. Now, I'm traveling in the state with Andy. I'm on TV, radio, churches, juvenile centers. I got a full ride to college. And at this time from 16, 17, 18, I'm not smoking. I'm not drinking. I'm not, I'm just trying to serve the Lord and help people, man. That's all I wanted to do.

Starting point is 00:14:37 At 18, when I graduated college, they said, look, all the work you've done in the community, we want to give you a full ride to college. I could have went anywhere if I had the grades. The board of directors was like, you think you can get into Harvard? I was like, no, that's not happening. I just want to go to Bible College. And I got sprung on the now my ex-wife, the mother of my four children, and I didn't want to leave.

Starting point is 00:15:00 And so I stayed locally and didn't do anything with it. If you've ever been young and in love, it clouded your decision-making. I've been old and in love and it clouds your decision-making. So, yeah. I've had my decision-making clouded for more of the things that just love. So at 18, I also. I also found out that my dad's not my real dad. Yeah, you had to see that coming.

Starting point is 00:15:19 Right, because you said he said it over and over again when he would get drunk or Yeah. You think he was just saying it to be an asshole? I did. Oh, really? Okay. I did, but I also always recognized that I was different from my family, not in a way that's better. I love my mom and my brother.

Starting point is 00:15:35 And I love my stepdad, who I only call stepdad for reference. I call him dad. He passed away, God rest of his soul. He put us through a lot. But you know what? he raised a son that didn't belong to him. He's the reason I'm so affectionate with my children. Right.

Starting point is 00:15:48 Because he would love on me. He would hug me. But it was confusing because on one hand, you're loving me, you know, kisses and hugs and all these things fathers do. But on the other hand, I'm not your real dad anyway. So I had to learn at a very young age how to pick my battles. I've been a pretty big dude since I was 12 years old. So from the moment I gained some size, you're not pitting your hands on my mother,

Starting point is 00:16:08 homie. I don't care who you are where you're from. I'm going to fight you to death. But I had to learn how to start picking my battles. I used to pick cups on the wall when they would argue. Because if it's just verbal assault, if it's just verbal assault to her, I would have to just listen to it. Right. Because the moment I get involved, then it becomes more.

Starting point is 00:16:26 Right. Now the cops are coming. Right. Well, the cops rarely ever came. But now we're out on the streets. Now he's actually fighting me and he's fighting my mom. And so when I found out that he wasn't my real dad, it was like all my life, this puzzle was sitting right here and magically it just came together.

Starting point is 00:16:43 So it made sense. Now I meet my real dad. How that happened? What do you mean? First of all, how you're given the talk that you give when you go into a prison right now? Because you've got 45 minutes. Yeah. You don't have 45 minutes.

Starting point is 00:17:00 We've got hours. So how did you find out that he wasn't your real dad and how did you find your real dad? Like, do you go find him? No, okay. So you find out it was just the next neighbor I've said. I've seen him my whole life. He's long in the yard. I questioned for years, my mother.

Starting point is 00:17:17 She didn't allow nobody to sign neither one of my brother's birthed at DeViz. So there's no father on neither one of ours. Right. Now, the story we were given is, if anything would ever happen, I didn't want. Visit BetMGM Casino and check out the newest exclusive.

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Starting point is 00:18:06 something's got to be wrong. Andy Palmer, I'm driving down the street one day, and I was frustrated. Now, Andy knew a little bit of what was going on in my life, but of course, I'm a kid going through domestic violence. I don't want to talk to this. I don't want to talk about it to people. And so I told him what he said about Gary Mullins.

Starting point is 00:18:26 Unbeknownst to me, Andy grew up with Gary Mullins. He took one look at me and said, oh, you're definitely Gary's son. There's no question of my mind. So that's like, oh, that's like the first big puzzle piece. Not to mention the being told this all my life. I called my aunt, who was actually down here, God rest her soul, before she passed in Orlando. And I asked her, and she said, baby, I know your mom's never going to tell you the truth. So I'm going to tell you.

Starting point is 00:18:56 Yeah, Gary's your real dad. So now at this point, it's getting confirmed more and more. And I'm crying. I'm frustrated. I mean, it's like I exited the Matrix. You mean to tell me for 18 years? I've dealt with you putting your hands on my mother. For 18 years, I have to walk through the streets, crying, wondering what's going on?

Starting point is 00:19:13 And so then I called my grandmother. And it was my grandmother that kind of sealed the deal for me because she said, baby, that's a conversation you need to have with your mother. You might as well have just said. Yeah. So I finally go to my mother. Now I have evidence. Now I have backup.

Starting point is 00:19:31 It's like, okay, I don't just have this hunch anymore. So I go to her and I'm like, listen, you can tell me what you want to tell me. You can feed me what you want to feed me. But I kind of already know. And you're not doing me or you any justice if you continue to hide this from me. And so I asked, and she finally said, yeah. And I said, well, where is he? Who is he?

Starting point is 00:19:53 She said, he lives down the street. Right. See? He lives down the street. I see him all over every Saturday. He mo's his yard. That's, hey, that's a. You know, it's crazy as I watched my mom pull a gun on a man when I was eight years old.

Starting point is 00:20:07 Okay. I didn't know who the man was. I never forgot about him. We pulled up to a 7-Eleven. She was going in the store to get me some zoom-zooms and wham-wams, whatever. And I saw a pull a revolver on a man. Didn't even know my mom had a gun. Right.

Starting point is 00:20:21 Never saw this man again until I meet my real dad. He swears up and down. It wasn't him. I know it was him. My mom confirmed it, and I know the feeling I had when I saw that man. I knew that man was somebody important. My mom drove me down to where she thought they lived. And it was a place called North Charleston, which is right beside Charleston where I'm from.

Starting point is 00:20:40 and I knock on the door. And the lady comes to the door. And it's my mama Mary. And the moment she saw me, she broke because she knew. Then I'm sitting there with her. And then my Papa Joe comes home. And this man, they told me that this man's been praying for me my whole life. And so I'm just overwhelmed with this love from them.

Starting point is 00:21:04 And then they tell me, you know, you have a little sister named Camille. And I was like, what? And so I want to say I met my aunts and uncles before I met my real dad. It maybe took a couple days. We had to come back and I can't. When I saw him walk through the door, I knew, I was like, oh, I look just like you. You're my real dad. You're my real dad.

Starting point is 00:21:28 And we did a lot of catching up, you know. And of course, the blame game was there at first, which I understood, you know. I felt for him. I've always been empathetic towards people. So it doesn't matter if what you've done has impacted me in some type of way. I want to know what led you to these decisions. Right. Come to find out he was an addiction.

Starting point is 00:21:46 My whole life. You know what I mean? He did the best with what he had, you know, for me and my little sister. He ended up going to prison for like 10 years for kidnapping. And he was taking this old guy. And he would come to him every day and make him go to the bank and take out $2,000. So later in my life, as I'm becoming a criminal myself, it's like, well, no wonder I'm able to become a criminal. It's throughout my whole entire lineage.

Starting point is 00:22:10 Like, I come from criminals. So that threw me for a loop. That started me down a spiral. I started smoking black and mouths again, which doesn't seem like much. But at the time, I was doing nothing. I started drinking again. I started smoking. And then my mom was making moves across the country, for a lack of better terms.

Starting point is 00:22:36 And she had got hemmed up in Detroit. I'm in love with the mother of my children, and we're about to pop out our first baby. I'm smoking. Let's pop out. That's horrible, bro. Okay, go ahead. I mean, we went half on a couple babies. And so I'm smoking.

Starting point is 00:22:55 I'm drinking. 2011, they wrote me a script of Perkinset because my wisdom teeth had been taken out. Okay. And it was on from there. Now I'm doing this. And I remember the first time I had a child. snorted one. Not only did the pain leave physically, but now a bunch of other pain that I didn't even realize I had was starting to leave. Now I'm feeling really, really good about myself, not only

Starting point is 00:23:19 because I'm on this opiate, but now I'm not having to think about the fact that I just found out about not having a real father. Now I don't have to think about the fact that my mom's in a situation. I don't know if she's going to get out of. And now I'm on them. And they kind of take over my whole attention. And then, you know, she had my first son and now she has my second son. And everybody knew me as Jimmy De Poet. You know, you're traveling, talking to kids. You know right from wrong, bro. I didn't know what was going on with me. Now she has my daughter. By the time she has my daughter, it got a little deeper with the pills. Now I find out what 30s are, blue 30s. And now I'm into a deeper addiction with pills. Now I'm traveling across Charleston. I'm breaking in the cars. I'm over here

Starting point is 00:24:11 stealing from stores. I would go in there, get a bottle of simulac formula. I don't know why Kroger's was allowing me to do it. What is Simulac formula? It's a baby formula. Oh, okay. I would go in there. It's like a $30 bottle, $30 box. And I would take it straight to the front. No receipt. just give them some story. Like, hey, you know, I can't find the receipt and this is not the right one. But, you know, somebody went ahead and got us the right one that we needed. I really need to return this. They would give me the money.

Starting point is 00:24:43 That was able to pull off a couple times. This was able to get me the pills that I needed. They were enabling you. They were enabling you. Oh, a thousand percent. I know, right? Kroger's. I know.

Starting point is 00:24:54 And so I want to say maybe 2012, 2013. This is after. I've already got three kids. I'm not taking care of my kids the way I need to be. My kid's mom is struggling by herself. What are you doing for money? It's just whatever I can. Now, mind you, like, my people are so dope.

Starting point is 00:25:10 And so I don't really have to do a whole, whole lot to get what I need because they have what I need. However, how am I going to pay bills? How am I going to take care of these kids? I'm basically being a bump, bro. I'm living off my mom. My mom's helping me take care of the kids financially because they got it. You know what I mean? And so.

Starting point is 00:25:27 So it was maybe 2013. I went to go get a Roxy from somebody. And they didn't have one. And I was dope sick. Now, I had never seen H in my life up until this time, which what we call dog food where I'm from. I had never seen dog food. So I go to get this 30 from him and he doesn't have it.

Starting point is 00:25:49 But he's chopping up this chalky white substance. And when he told me what it was, I left and I cried. Because I'm very close to this person. And I'm like, man, I've never seen that stuff in my life. Unbeknownst to me, I've been doing synthetic versions for the last three years. Yeah. It's like you got guys that sit lean and then want to judge H users. Just because they're mixing your shit up in a lab and these guys are pulling off a plant.

Starting point is 00:26:14 We're both still itching, bro. Like, miss me with the BS, you know? And so I was just too dope sick, bro. So I came back and I did it. And now I'm on dog food. And now I am getting deeper. and deeper. And so 2014, I called, I have three dads. I have my stepdad that raised me. I have my biological father. And then I have a man that I call dad, which is like a spiritual leader. He actually

Starting point is 00:26:41 lives in Ocala. And at this time, he was in Los Angeles starting up a church, or at least taking over a church. And I call him. And I'm like, look, I'm on H. I'm on dog food. And he's like, wow. He may have shattered a tear. I don't remember. he's like, so what are you going to do? And I remember the first time I called programs. Like I called Teen Challenge and they're like, yeah, our program is a year. I got off the phone and cried. It's like, I don't want to leave my kids for a year.

Starting point is 00:27:12 What are you doing for them in the first place? I'm going to say, what are you doing any? Like, what does it matter? I mean, the thwarted mind of addiction. You're, you know, in your current state, you're useless to them. You know what I'm saying? You're a burden. More than anything.

Starting point is 00:27:27 Yeah. And so... That's just selfishness. Very much. Well, addiction is a disease of self-centered and selfishness. Yeah. Yeah. And so I called my dad and I'm like, look, this is the only options I have. He said, well, you want to come out here?

Starting point is 00:27:44 And I said, look, you're not doing anything for or to the kids in the first place. So it's not going to harm anything. Why don't we get you out here? You got a gift. Let's start getting you around the right people. And I'm like, all right. So I talk to my kid's mom and everybody's like, whoa, why do you need to go all the way to California? Why can't you just go to a rehab here?

Starting point is 00:28:03 Now, mind you at this time, I don't know anything about anything when it comes to addiction. I don't even know that I'm an addict. You know what I mean? I just know that I like to get high. And I continue to get high so that I don't get dope sick. But I find myself doing things where we call incomprehensible demoralization. I find myself doing things that I never would have done so that I'm not dope sick. But the problem is that may be understandable, I guess, but it's not an excuse because ultimately I have to pay the consequences for these decisions that I make.

Starting point is 00:28:35 So he's like, look, I don't know anything about addiction. Why don't we get you into a program? So 2014, around May, I leave. I go to California for the first time. Now I'm in Skid Row in Los Angeles in a program called the Midnight Mission. And the What? The Midnight Mission. Midnight, okay.

Starting point is 00:28:54 She said midnight. I was like, I don't know. The Midnight mission. Man, they're so dope. I met Smokey Robinson through them. They have a celebrity golf tournament every year, but they raise a bunch of money. Now, at this time, I think H is my problem. I didn't realize I was the problem.

Starting point is 00:29:11 So for six months, I'm in this program. I'm still smoking trees. I'm still snorting pills. It's the first time I learned how to perish you a pill where you break it down. You put it into a one-ply piece of till a paper. You swallow that. and then maybe 30 seconds later kind of hits you all at once. And so, but I'm not doing H.

Starting point is 00:29:32 And so in my mind, I'm getting better telling my kids, their mom, yo, this is what's going on. Life is going great. I'm not telling them that I'm doing these other things. Right. I'm not telling anybody. You're supplementing the H for the other stuff. I'm faking the funk.

Starting point is 00:29:48 Yeah. At the six-month mark, they wanted to test me. They're like, yo, I need you come take this test. They were about to give me a job behind the double doors, which was like this prestigious thing. In everybody else's eyes, I was doing pretty good. But I'm hiding. I'm being secretive, which is one of the cruxes of addiction, period, is we like to hide. We're secretive.

Starting point is 00:30:08 Because whether it's the guilt, shame, or I can't let you know what I really got going on, or I'm not going to be able to continue with the schemes and the scamming. You know what I mean? To get what I need. And so they drug test me. And I didn't even let them drug test me. I just was like, I'm going to let you know now I'm dirty. And they're like, really?

Starting point is 00:30:25 So they're like, all right, you can either leave or you can start over. Now, it's just six months. I'm supposed to only be here for a year. I don't know what to tell my wife. I don't know what to tell my kids. I'm, like, crushed on the inside because what do I feel like? A complete failure. Which is a feeling I felt plenty of times of my life.

Starting point is 00:30:50 And so I told him, I said, all right, I'll start over. So now I go from the second dorm where I have my own little bunk, my own little TV, back into the first dorm with 150 men in bunk beds. And so, of course, pride and ego were killed. And I sit there for about another month. Now, mind you, I've yet to tell my kids, Mom, anything that's going on. And after about a month, I said, I can't do it. I miss my kids. I want to go home.

Starting point is 00:31:22 maybe this much removed from the dog food, I'll be okay. So I got Catholic charities to pay for a bus ticket, and I moved back home. It took maybe a day or two before I started doing H again. And when she found out that I had actually, because actually my dad busted me out, thanks, Bishop. He had called her and was like, listen, I'm not going to let him lie to you. He started over. He got caught.

Starting point is 00:31:52 Right. And I think sometimes that's what we need in our life is somebody that's not willing to play those games with us. Yeah. Because I'm the type of guy like, I'm not going to bust you out if you're cheating on your wife. Don't ask me to lie for you. Yeah. I won't do it. Because if you're my homie and you're cheating your wife, I already don't trust you.

Starting point is 00:32:08 You don't put me in that position. Yeah, for sure. A friend's not, it shouldn't put you in that position. Who are you most vulnerable with? The person you pillow talk with. So if you're the most vulnerable with them and you'll do them dirty, you'll definitely do me dirty. So he busted me out to her and she was crushed. And, you know, I'm still trying to manage, like, I am not a representative for AA or any 12-step recovery.

Starting point is 00:32:28 But there's a part in some of the literature that talks about the mind of the addict and alcoholic wants to be the producer, the director, the screenwriter, and the actor in his own show. And so that's what my life was like. I'm trying to be the puppeteer, but I'm trying to puppeteer everybody. I'm trying to puppeteer here. I'm trying to make sure this works. I make sure this story lines up with this. I'm trying to, you know, coddle your emotions so you do it. really see me for who I am and none of it works. But you know, we think we're able to do it.

Starting point is 00:32:56 And it's like plugging holes on a leaky boat. And one hole comes up, you got to plug another. And so I end up getting a job. Things start to look up. They give me a job installing cable for some company. But every place I go to, I'm robbing them. I'm still in pills. I remember I was in one house and I found 500 opiates and they were all expired and they were like within like four to five different big bottles. They were like 90 count scripts, but they're expired. I'm talking. They're still good. Look, you can't tell me nothing. Ain't nobody going to know. I mean, I've got a year on a moxas sitting at the house right now for emergencies. So I start tucking them. And then one place, I find a gun.

Starting point is 00:33:48 So I grab it. Jeez. Now, at this time, this is the very, very beginning stages of me becoming a criminal. Right. So I don't know a lot of things. Stolen Avato watch from my house. Still a money. Or I messed up.

Starting point is 00:34:05 Stole a Mavada watch from a house? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But she said, my house. Did it sound like my house? I thought about it, but when I pulled up, you were really nice to me. So I was like, I'm not going to take his watch.

Starting point is 00:34:15 Not my house. I meant you said, okay, go ahead. And so one house, I'm a week, I'm three days removed from getting my own truck and my last day of training. We go to this house out in the country. And if I was smart, if I was smart, I wouldn't have done this stuff, period. Right. But if I was smart, I would have scoped out what I wanted to take and I would have taken it right before I left. This idiot right here decided the moment I walked in. in the house, I started finding stuff, found a revolver, and found some dray beats.

Starting point is 00:34:53 So what do I do? I tuck it. I take it out to the car within like 20 minutes of us being there. And this is about to be like an hour-long job. So I hide it in the back of the car. We're in there. You know, he's teaching us how to crimp wires doing all the stuff. I don't even remember.

Starting point is 00:35:09 But, you know, we're installing cable in these people's houses. We go outside to get a tool. We come back into the house. ladies got a gun sitting on the counter. She's like, both of you sit down. Snaps. She's like, where's my gun? I'm from the west side of Charleston, West Virginia lady.

Starting point is 00:35:31 I don't know what you're talking about. I don't know nothing. I don't know anybody that knows anything. One of you have my gun because it's missing from my drawer and I want it right now, or we're going to have a major problem. I don't know nothing. I was always taught as for a lawyer. So this isn't a court of law.

Starting point is 00:35:54 I mean, I know. To me, it was like, yo, I don't know anything. I'm not talking to nobody. And so she's like, I want you both out of my house. Do not leave the cops are on their way. And she's on the phone with her husband. Now her husband's coming home. I immediately went to the back of the cop car.

Starting point is 00:36:10 I mean, went to the back of our work truck. I grabbed the gun. I grabbed the Dre beats. I'm waiting. Nobody's looking. Throw it over the hill. I'm like, okay, we're good now. cops come.

Starting point is 00:36:23 And the lady's like, I don't know what he did, but he has it. One of them has it. Maybe he threw it over the hill. I'm like, did she see me? I'm like, what? I thought I was slick. The cops go over the hill and they find it. Now, I was all fine with keeping my mouth shut until I got to the jail and asking for a lawyer.

Starting point is 00:36:47 My trainee, he was about to go to the military. He was a relatively new father. He's a square dude that had nothing to do with anything. And this was the first time I had ever really been in trouble with the law. And I just could not see myself allowing him to take the fall for what I had just did. So I told him, I did it. So of course, they arrest me and they take me to jail. Ironic, I've been in and out of L.A. County jail so many times.

Starting point is 00:37:19 I've never been to jail in my own home city. My brother came and bailed me out from the police substation before I ever made it to county. And I'm fighting this case. They're getting me for residential burglary. I decided, you know what, I probably need to go back to California. Not to run. I waited until everything was settled. They ended up dropping that residential burglary to a petty theft because, as you may know, they have to prove certain elements of a crime.

Starting point is 00:37:45 Yeah, you don't have it in my possession. I don't have it in the vehicle. I don't have it. It's over the fuck. You found it over the fucking hill. They couldn't prove prior intent, and I had permission to be in the home. And so that they couldn't prove residential burglary. Now, knowing what I know now, then, I would have just kept my mouth shut, period.

Starting point is 00:38:04 Well, knowing what I know now, then, I wouldn't have been doing the stupid stuff. And so when I found out that it got dropped to petty larceny. He was like, all right, I remember telling my kid's mom the first time I ever said, I'm going to California. That hurt. when I had to tell her the second time, that crushed me. Because not only do I feel like a failure as a man, I feel like a failure as a husband, I feel like a failure as a father, I have all of these emotions aside of me. I love my kids, bro.

Starting point is 00:38:34 Like, who doesn't love their kids? There's nothing really to brag about. But like, I really genuinely love my kids. And all I want to do is be better for them. But I don't know what I'm doing. For a lack of better terms, I am literally lost in the sauce. So I go back to California. and now I'm living in a shelter and I'm doing okay.

Starting point is 00:38:54 Why are you going back to California? Like, I don't know. Is it because you want to get out of the environment that you're in? That was definitely a part of it. At the time, I didn't know how true this was. I felt like God had something there for me. Okay. And I know that sounds funny.

Starting point is 00:39:11 But I think it probably sounds funny to other people. It doesn't sound funny to me. Me, go ahead. Well, I think a lot of the times we think that the path God has for us is going to be wrapped in rainbows and ribbons. Right. And it very rarely works out that way. Yeah, sometimes you have to climb through a river or shit to get to it. Or quite literally go through the desert. Right. The wilderness, like many a biblical characters had to do. Jesus himself had to go through the wilderness. And so literally,

Starting point is 00:39:36 I'm out in California, which is quite literally a desert and a wilderness. And so I'll move back out there. Now, for like three months, I'm working. I'm selling solar. I'm so I legitimately didn't have any substances in me. You know, I got my little food stamps, my little GR, which in California, it's crazy because in West Virginia, now you can, but for the longest, no grown single man was getting food stamps in West Virginia. California, you can go there and get GR food stamps. GR is general relief, so you get cash assistance every month.

Starting point is 00:40:07 So I got that. Yeah, it's crazy. So I got that. I got a job, and I was doing okay. Doing okay in the sense of not having substances in my body. So they wanted to come out, my kids and my wife. And they did. So now we go into this program called the Dream Center, which is a big Christian ministry in Echo Park.

Starting point is 00:40:31 They have a rehab. They have discipleship program. They had a family floor. And so we are now on this family floor and all we have to do is work or go to school. We don't have to pay no rent. We just have to work, go to school, make it to a certain amount of church service. and save up money. I don't know if it was the pressure.

Starting point is 00:40:52 I don't know what it was, but maybe like 30 days into that, I got kicked out because I had relapsed because I started smoking crystal. And so I remember when they kicked me out and I looked at that building. Now, I don't believe I ever would have left my wife and kids in that situation

Starting point is 00:41:12 if they weren't in a safe, protected environment because it was a very safe and protected environment. But looking at that building, I just cried because I was like, you know what? I'm never going to be good for them or to them. The best thing I could do is just exit their life. And so what do I do? I hit the streets of Skid Row. This is around 2015 now.

Starting point is 00:41:32 I'm in Skid Row. I'm smoking crystal. I'm stealing from stores. I am, I remember the first time that people would take, they would go to Home Depot. They would still a drill bit. It's like 90 bucks. They would give it to somebody else to try. trade in with their ID to get a gift card.

Starting point is 00:41:52 So me and this guy, we go from Skid Road to MacArthur Park, and there's a Home Depot there. And I go in, I do my little thing, looking around, you know, I'll take the drill bit. I walk out. I'm a firm believer that if you just play the part and act like you belong, most people are not going to question you. And so I walk out with a drill bit, and I give it to the guy, and he has the ID. from the time the idea hit our head to the time money hit one of our hands, it was like three hours. To do what?

Starting point is 00:42:24 Split $50. So I just spent three hours to make $25. I was like, never again. I started getting receipts. So I would take receipts that I would find. It's an age-old game. I would take receipts that I would find and just go in there and get the item. And I was like, oh, I don't even have to leave the store.

Starting point is 00:42:40 I can sometimes leave the store, sometimes not leave the store. And I started developing these little methods. I would get books that I would find receipts in. I would flatten them out. I would put them in the middle of pages. And I would have receipts on receipts on receipts, just sitting there flattened out, looking like they were newer than what they were. They weren't crumpled and crumpled up.

Starting point is 00:43:00 And so, I mean, you look at Koreatown in L.A. There's a Staples. There's a Walgreens. There's a Ralph's. There's an AutoZone. There's a ride aid. So I can find one. item here, traded at this other one, started learning what school numbers were, started learning

Starting point is 00:43:19 like Ross and DDs are the same company. So 4011 is the beginning of all their school numbers. I started learning that some places, school number on the receipt does not match the item. It's not always the item number. And so I would just, you know, I might get some robotussing from here, trade it in the right idea. Now, mind you, I'm not trying to pay bills or anything. I'm just trying to keep crystal in my system. Right. And so I also had this loose idea that I was going to be able to take care of the kids doing this.

Starting point is 00:43:51 Lots of loose ideas that never really worked out on my head. Right. And so I might take some robituss in here, trade it in it, the right aid up the street. That's $7. And then I'll get some laundry detergent from the right aid while I've just made money here. Take that to Ralph's. That's another $15. And slowly I'm making, you know, sometimes $50 to $100 in one hour doing this.

Starting point is 00:44:12 More than enough to buy. my drugs, more than enough to buy my food and things like that. I had this alternate ego called Fiasco Baldwin. I also have Johnny Jr. face, light bulb Lenny, Forest Fire, Foster, and Catfish Kelly, and Barnabas Williams, he's my favorite. So I would go to MacArthur Park, and I would go to one of the gangs that sold fake IDs, and I had bought a lesser version. Now, you could have paid more and got it to where you could scan and all that.

Starting point is 00:44:42 I didn't need all that. I got an ID for Fiasco Baldwin. And I went on Home Depot's online account and created a pro account. And I called it Fiasco's Handies. And I would go get, I'd stole from a construction site, a construction vest. Because once again, if you just walk in playing the part, nobody's really questioning you. So now I'm going in the Home Depot and I'm not even making a lot of money. But in my mind, I'm doing big things.

Starting point is 00:45:10 You know what I mean? Right. So I had a Home Depot Pro account. Now I don't even need receipts. I would find receipts. I would register to my account. I don't even need the receipt. And now it tells me where the item is in the store.

Starting point is 00:45:21 Because I got to the place where I was having to look up these items, see exactly what they look like. Because the more time you spend in there looking around, the more likely you're going to get caught. You need to be to go in there, get the item, come back out with it, either take it to another store or come right back in. Now, what I learned, Home Depot, you can return an item even if it's for debit and get cash. Walmart, if you have, if it's less than $25, you don't need ID or a receipt. They'll give you cash, but you can only do that three times a year. Walmart.com, I would get their app. I would go find receipts in Walmart parking lots.

Starting point is 00:45:59 I would spend hours. At night, I would get high and I would go to different shopping plazas across L.A. and I would just look for receipts. And I would register the receipt into the app, Walmart.com, all I got to do with the app, it go right in there. It takes me right to the item now. I'm going in there, I'm filling up.

Starting point is 00:46:18 Now, mind you, if I get caught, I have the receipt. So there's nothing they can say. I never got caught doing receipts. I only ever got caught actually stealing. So, of course, I've been in handcuffs and Target. If Target, Walmart, if you don't have ID, if you cannot identify yourself, they're calling the cops. If you can identify yourself, they're going to write you something.

Starting point is 00:46:41 They're going to trespass you and send you something in the mail. So now I'm doing this receipts. And in MacArthur Park one time in Home Depot, this guy dropped a stack of receipts in the trash. So I go grab it. It's like maybe $6,000, $7,000 worth of merchandise. The ones that are credit, I can't use. I took everyone that was cash and debit. And I never made a lot of money, but the most I made at one time was like $3,000 in a month with these receipts.

Starting point is 00:47:13 And so I'm traveling all across L.A. County. I would catch buses with my bike. I would go out to Pomona. I would go out to Bell Gardens. I would go out to all these different places because L.A. County is so humongous that there's different parking structures. Because you don't want to, you know, poop where you eat. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 00:47:31 You don't want to hit the same spot over and over and over. Now I'm not only just doing receipts. Now I get into breaking into cars. Now, I've never broken a window. I never would break a window. I was just like, I don't want people that have broken windows. When I was on dog food and H, I still for my mama. It didn't matter who you were.

Starting point is 00:47:52 I'm not going to be dope sick. When I was on Crystal or Scante, I would. This spring, denim gets a softer, lighter update. Introducing Old Navy's drapey denim wide leg, a new fit that moves with you. It's everything you want denim to feel like for summer. Easy, breathable, and effortlessly cool. With a fit that creates natural movement

Starting point is 00:48:14 and a wide leg that feels modern, not overwhelming. Plus, that signature, wait, for this price, moment. Old Navy's drapey denim wide leg. You never take from a friend. And I had these little principles that, I guess, didn't really matter, but I was like, I don't want to rob people that are poor. I don't want to take from people that don't have anything. So I would go to Santa Monica. I would go to Venice Beach. I would go to Culver City. I would go to Bel Air. I would go to

Starting point is 00:48:40 Beverly Hills. And these are the places that I would choose to try to break into stuff. I'm never broken a window. I don't know why. Probably should have. I'm not playing. Never should have did that. And so if the door was unlocked, I would go in. And I quickly learned that you look like an idiot if you open up a door and you're just in there messing around. So I quickly learned that I just would get in. I would shut the door. I would sit down in the car. I would immediately put the car seat all the way back to her. Nobody can see me. And then I would slowly raise the car seat up and look around. And it's like, oh, I've got time now. Nobody knows I'm here. Another thing, people don't pay attention to the car alarms. You would think they do.

Starting point is 00:49:21 Right. Yeah. When a car alarm goes off, I just walk away for 30 seconds. And it goes, goes off and I get back into the car. So now I can take my time. I can check this. I can check that. I can open up the little middle console. I found $1,000 one time. I found $300 one time. I found one lady was working for Burberry and so she was suing Burberry. So I had her all of her legal forms. This was, she lives in Hollywood. And I'm sure you know what a profile is. I mean, a profile, there's different profiles. There's credit profiles. So loosely, if you can get a person's name,

Starting point is 00:50:00 Social Security number, and their birthday. Yeah. Yeah, that's a basic profile. Now, those are, of course, more extensive versions of that. I try to dibble and dabble into the scamming, but I was just trying to get high, bro. I was not a criminal mastermind.

Starting point is 00:50:14 I was not trying to damage people's lives. I remember the first time I found a keys to somebody's car in the car, and I took the car. And later, I felt so bad. because there was a car seat in the back, and I was like, man, what if this? What if that, you know?

Starting point is 00:50:31 I never wanted to ruin people's lives. I just wanted to make enough money to get high on. You know what I mean? And so I broke into that lady's car with the information from Burberry. And I was very, very close to selling all of that because it had our social. The guy wasn't going to give me a hundred bucks for it.

Starting point is 00:50:49 But right before I was going to sell it to him, I was just like, ah, I don't want to do it, bro. I didn't want to damage her whole life. You know what I mean? And so I remember I found $1,000 at Anytime Fitness. One thing I used to do is if I found $1,000 in a car and it's like the second car I've broken into, I'm gone. I'm not sticking around. It's like I've already won.

Starting point is 00:51:09 I found $1,000. Right. There's been times I'd break into 15 cars and not find anything. You know what I mean? It's like a gambler who wins $50,000 and then still sits there for two more hours and loses all of it. You know, so you were up $50,000. You should have walked away. Bro, if I buy a scratch off and I win $5, I'm done.

Starting point is 00:51:25 Right. I might take one more dollar and buy another scratch off because it's like, hey, I didn't lose anything. So now I'm getting braver and braver with the little things that I'm doing. You know, I've done started from stealing drill bits from Home Depot, which only took me one time to realize that it was quick cost analysis, realize it's not worth my time doing that. Stilling receipts, you know, getting the items. Now I'm getting comfortable actually going in the car. I was always on a bike. So I would go to like a high-end area of Santa Monica.

Starting point is 00:52:01 And there's these alleys where, you know, you got two streets and these high-end loss here, high-end loss here. But the alley is where you get access to the garages. So I would just ride up and down those alleys until I would see a car come out. And I would just stroll in there like I belong, just like I live there. I mean, who's going to question me? Who's going to say anything to me? And so I would park my bike in the garage. The first thing I do is I'm looking for every car.

Starting point is 00:52:27 I'm looking for cameras. All right, there's no cameras. Some places did. Some places didn't. If her car was unlocked, I do my thing. I sit down. I get in it. I open up the trunk.

Starting point is 00:52:36 I look in the trunk. At first, I would take bags. I would take duffel bags. I would take a North Face vest. Whatever. Quickly started realizing like, okay, you know, you can't carry everything, bro. So I really just was looking for like jewelry, money. I never found no drugs or anything.

Starting point is 00:52:56 I think I found some pot one time, but that was about it. And then once I get through there, I'm going to go into the apartment complex now. I'm going to go to the mailroom where all the packages are. And I'm going to see if there's Amazon packages. I'm going to see, I found a Rolex once, and I don't think it was real, but it might have been. The fence told me it was fake. He was like, I can give you $100 for it. And I was like, okay, shoot it.

Starting point is 00:53:22 You know what I mean? And you know how many times I found Amazon packages that I thought were something special, but it was dog food? Right. Or Kleenex or Klorox? Waste of my time. I remember the first time I entered a building, an actual residence. I had noticed that there was this space between the door of one apartment. And I looked, I knocked on the door.

Starting point is 00:53:50 Nobody came to the door. So I walked down the way, making sure nobody was coming, then I went right back, put out a credit card, slipped it in, now I'm in this apartment. And this place was nice. I have never seen nothing that's nice in my life. Mind you, I'm from the west side of Charleston, West Virginia. Like, we don't have that type of stuff here. The bar's low. Yeah, very, very, very.

Starting point is 00:54:10 And so I'm going through this place, and I've never broken into a house of my life. So I don't really know what I'm doing, but I just immediately start opening up couch cushion. I go right upstairs. There's like this big guitar. There's a bed that's made. I just look under mattresses. I look under pillows. I'm opening up drawers.

Starting point is 00:54:33 I don't know what I'm looking for. I'm just trying to find something. So downstairs, there was a key. And so I took the key. I couldn't find anything else. I left. But I kept that key because I was like, I'm going to come back.

Starting point is 00:54:43 You know what I mean? I'm going to keep coming back to this place. Idiot. And so now I've done stepped up from receipts, cars, still in cars, and now I'm actually going into people's homes. I never thought that I would do stuff like that. It just became easier and easier.

Starting point is 00:55:00 You know what I mean? So, yeah, I got the key to the house, and my plan was to go back into the house. Right. I probably lost the key or probably forgot where the house was, to be honest with you. Two of the four or five cars I've stolen in my life, I lost them.

Starting point is 00:55:16 I didn't know where they were. So you're not great at this. First time, no. No. I thought I was, though. Yeah. And that's the delusion of crystal and being on drugs. You know what I mean? And now I had a blast.

Starting point is 00:55:31 Like, yeah, do I want to go back to a place in my life where I'm doing drugs and I'm homeless and then breaking into houses and stuff in Los Angeles? Of course not. But I still had a blast and I had a lot of fun doing it. So the first time I ever stole a car, I had broken into this one car. It was a Nissan Marano. It was white. This was in Santa Monica. Monica. And I'm going through the car. I open up the glove box and there's Nissan Morano keys.

Starting point is 00:56:00 But they don't go to this car. I blurp them. They go to the Nissan Marano beside me, an all black one. So I'm like, all right, I go into that car. The keys to this car were in that car. So apparently, I thought they were being cute. I don't know what they thought, but they thought wrong because I stole that car. And I remember the, I'm sitting there in the nervous. I mean, roller coasters don't even compare. The adrenaline that's going through my body, like, am I going to do it? Am I not going to do it? Should I take this car? Should I not?

Starting point is 00:56:33 I'm out of here, bro. I turned the key on. Once I got out the building and got down the street, you couldn't tell me nothing. Took that thing, drove it all the way back to Skid Row, which 25, 30 minute drive, took it to the homie down in Skid Row and was like, hey, this is what I got. He was like, all right, immediately. He went, did something. underneath the bottom of the steering wheel underneath that whole compartment, took off the lowjack.

Starting point is 00:56:58 Now they can't track the car, and I'm riding around for like a week. Now, mind you, the title was in the car too. So one thing I tell people all the time. Not the registration. They own the car, title? I mean, of course, registration was in there. Insurance was in there. The title of the car was in there.

Starting point is 00:57:15 Never leave your title in a car. All I had to do was fraudulently sign it over to myself. What could they have said? Now, of course, once you go to court and do all the extra stuff, but I tell people all the time, now in Atlanta, from what I hear, people will roll their windows down because people don't care. They'll break your windows. So to prevent their windows from being broken down, they make sure there's nothing in the car and they just leave their windows rolled down or they keep their doors unlocked. I tell people all the time, keep your doors locked. Never keep your title in your car. Always make sure you don't have nothing that you really, really want or need. Laptops. bags, don't keep the stuff in the car. It's nothing for somebody to come in there and take it. And a lot of people don't care. All you need is a little piece of a spark plug, that ceramic, that white piece, and that busts car windows.

Starting point is 00:58:04 It's like the best thing to bust a car window. So I take this car. I'm driving around for like a week. I think I'm hot stuff. You know what I mean? Now not only do I have a car. Now I got a car to go hit Licks in. So now I get into mailboxes.

Starting point is 00:58:20 So it's, you know, receipts, cars. houses still in a car. Now, at night time, I would drive through Bel Air. I would drive through Beverly Hills. I would draw through Sherman Oaks, a thousand Oaks. And I would just, at night, drive, put the mailbox down, grab the stuff. Now I'm driving around with a seat full of mail. I don't think I ever found anything important.

Starting point is 00:58:44 When I would find what we talked about as profiles, I had too much of a heart to trade them over to people. And so I'm downtown one day. I was very good about not letting cops get behind me when I had this car. I got caught slipping, bro. And a cop got behind me. And my kids say I lived a little baby GTA life, which I didn't, but, you know, it sounds good. And they blurt me, which is long story short, they turned their lights on on me.

Starting point is 00:59:12 And so that's what we call it. They blurted me. And so I get blurped. And there's like five LAPD cop cars. There's probably seven to ten cops. they're yelling at me. There's a helicopter over me with its light shining down on me. Now, mind you, like I told you before, I wear my seatbelt.

Starting point is 00:59:30 I am not a thug. So I immediately, I turned the car off. I did everything they asked me to do. I'm not running from these people. And I'm got, you feel me? And so they get me out the car. Put your hands down. I mean, put your hands behind your head.

Starting point is 00:59:45 Interlace your fingers. Get on your knees. Lay on the ground. I do all that. They come up, take my arms. You know, they're mad. they obviously know I don't stole a car. They put my arms behind my back real aggressively.

Starting point is 00:59:56 They're standing me up. I don't think the cop fell for it, but you wasn't about to tell me nothing. I was acting like I didn't know what was going on. And they're like, I'm like, what is going on? Like, I'm just going to the store, bro. Like, what are you doing? They're like, bro, this car is reported stolen.

Starting point is 01:00:13 I said, look, man, it don't matter. This is what I'm telling him. You know what? It don't matter. He was like, what do you mean? It don't matter. I was like, what do you want me to tell you that it's not my car, that I, that my, my friend, let me borrow it, which is what happened. I was just going to the store to get blunts, bro.

Starting point is 01:00:29 But he's like, well, whose car is? I said, come on, man. Obviously, if my friend stole it, then now I'm getting caught. I said, I'm not going to tell on my friend, so just take me to jail. I don't know if he believed me and I'm pretty sure he didn't. All I know is the next day, I'm sitting in L.A. County about to go to court. And not L.A. County, but I'm sitting at the courthouse because in, When you go to jail in Los Angeles, which is I'm sure like other places, it depends on who catches you where you go.

Starting point is 01:00:58 So if LAPD catches you, you go to an LAPD substation and you go to court the next day or if it's a Friday, you go to court on Monday, and your regular clothes, minus your shoestrings, because all jails take your shoe strings. So you don't commit. Yeah, yeah. And so I go to court and we're sitting in this pod with, I don't know, 100 dudes. And they call me up. Charges dismissed. And I'm like,

Starting point is 01:01:27 what is like... So for them to be able to charge you with Grand Theft Auto, they can't do that if you have the keys to the car. Right. The worst they can do is driving without owner's consent, which I don't believe was a felony. So I'm racking my mind, like, I'm not a snitch.

Starting point is 01:01:44 I don't have anybody too snitch on. Like, what is, like, what's going on? And I never found out, the charges got tried. You had the keys. You said your buddy gave it to you. Sure, the owner said that's not true. Someone stole it. But we can't prove that the guy that stole it didn't give the keys. Do we want to expend, you know, $40,000 trying to take this guy to fucking trial so that one person on the jury might say it's reasonable and let him go? Or did we just let him go now? Oh, because I was taught at a very young age. You don't talk to cops. You don't talk to CPS. You don't talk to these people. My mom used to tell. Meese said, hey, son, if you ever sell drugs, keep your W-2s on you, which means keep you a job. You know, if you ever get pulled over and it's serious, you just ask for a lawyer. If it's just traffic stuff, just play it cool and play the part.

Starting point is 01:02:36 And so, yeah, I wasn't about to tell them myself. So yeah, and I thought, you know, maybe the people were just happy to have their car back, you know, whatever. So that's, I guess, caught with this car. Right. They got real crimes in L.A. County, bro. Oh, yeah. They're not worth. Look, there's nothing I ever did that was.

Starting point is 01:02:51 that serious. You know, I think one of the scariest situations I was in was we were in Skid Row and we were in a apartment and we were all getting high. Now, I've never used a needle in my life and I'm not judging people that have, but I don't like even when I was getting high, I would not like being around people that were using needles. Just because it's like the chances of you overdosing are like exponential, you know? So we're getting high on crystal. This girl comes in. She's using the needle, but I thought she was doing the same thing we were doing. She wasn't. Next thing I know, she falls back. Her face is turning blue. And I'm like, guys, guys, like, look what's going on. And they're like, they're all freaking out. They don't know what to do. And I'm like, what do you

Starting point is 01:03:37 mean? Call the cops, bro. They're like, no. I said, listen, one of you who's better call the cops right now or I'm going to do it or I'm going to fight every one of you in here. Now, mind you, I'm not a thug. I'm not hard like that. When it comes to defendant and protect, and other people, something different comes out of me. So I was like, look, if you don't want to be involved, just leave, but I'm calling the cops. So we call the cops, which I don't even think the cops came, to be honest with you. I think just the ambulance came and she got revived. She was so mad.

Starting point is 01:04:08 She was so mad that she got revived. You know why she was mad? Yeah, because what? They narcanned her and her high was gone. Yeah, yeah. It immediately puts you into, into, like, withdrawal. Yeah, withdrawal. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:04:21 You wake up and you're in extreme pain and you're sick and all the things that you were trying to avoid to begin with. Yeah. And you're not thinking, well, at least I'm not dead. You're just thinking, oh, this sucks. And it blew my mind. Now, you know, as I'm in Skid Row, I've been in more tense in my life in L.A. County than I ever was in West Virginia. Right.

Starting point is 01:04:43 And West Virginia is the country, you know. It's like I'm from West Virginia, which they always claim is super racist, which there are parts, you know. But the most racism I've ever experienced is the California prison system, period. Oh, it's all racially segregated. And so, long story short, not only am I dealing with addiction, you know, are you familiar with Maslow's hierarchy of needs? Yes. Yeah, yeah, the pyramid, right?

Starting point is 01:05:09 Yeah. And so, you know, with level one. You're not able to break level one. Yeah, barely. Yeah. And so I also got four kids and a wife that are in Echo Park, 10 miles of way, if that. And they're wondering, where's the headie? Right. Now, when they see me, I've been over 200 pounds since I was 12 years old. I was a county wrestling champion. I've been a pretty big dude.

Starting point is 01:05:32 I'm down to like 190. You know, mind you, I'm on crystal. I'm obviously not eating like I need to. I used to race cars on my bike. At least I thought I was racing them. They hit that 30-mile-hour mark. They're gone. It's crazy because I learned some things when I was on drugs about 40. that you may think you wouldn't learn in those situations, but Diamond Bar is a part of LA County and there's a hill that's very steep. And even though I was on crystal when I did it, which gives you a lot of energy, I rode that whole hill up, did not stop once and I never stood up. And if you ever rode a bike, you know, you get a lot more ease when you stand up when you're

Starting point is 01:06:13 riding in the bike. And that taught me like, oh, man, I can do anything. It goes back to these transferable skills. It's a crazy way to learn it, but I learned that there's a lot that I can push my body to. And so all of this depression is setting in at nighttime, man, I'm riding around L.A. I'm screaming. I'm crying because I miss my kids. I know what my purpose is. I know the Lord.

Starting point is 01:06:37 I know right from wrong. But none of those things stopped me. You know what I mean? So a second time I ever went to a house. me and a friend of mine had drove to Sanpedra. Now, I was in love with this person. And we were friends first. And she ended up getting a boyfriend, me and her remain friends.

Starting point is 01:06:59 But she kept saying, I'm just look at you as a friend. Okay. Well, why do you got to lie to your boyfriend about us being together? So one day, her boyfriend calls. And I'm like, hey, so-and-so, she's pissed. She's angry because I didn't bust it out. Like, I'm not about to hide. I'm a grown man.

Starting point is 01:07:15 I'm not hiding from nobody. for the cops, period. So we're at San Pedro one day, and she's like, sometimes you make me so angry, I just want to walk away from you. I turned around and looked at her. I said, I highly encourage you to exercise your rights then. Right. She did. She turned away and walked, left me 30 miles from home in San Pedro.

Starting point is 01:07:37 And so I'm like, all right, well, I'm going to go flocking then. Flocking is a term that they use out there for residential burglary. Now, whether it means breaking in the cars, breaking in the houses, or breaking in the mailboxes, I'm going to go do my thing. I'm on crystal. I see this cliff. And it's got to be every bit of 50 feet from the base of the beach to the top of the residential street. And I'm like, I'm climbing it. I'm going to climb this cliff just because I want to get to the top and say I can do it.

Starting point is 01:08:09 I got a backpack on with roller blades. I'm climbing up this cliff. I'm pushing my back against it, got my foot up against a branch. I'm making my way up. I'm nervous. I'm scared, but I'm doing it. I get halfway up and I had to throw the bag off. Forget the rollerblades.

Starting point is 01:08:24 I don't need them anymore. Throw the rollerblades off. I get to the top of this clip. And it's crazy that I'm homeless. I'm on drugs. I'm not being a father. But when I climbed that cliff and I looked over to ocean, you couldn't tell me nothing. I was like, hey, I just climbed a mother cliff.

Starting point is 01:08:43 Man, I'm going to tell my kids one day that they can do anything they can set their mind to. Now I'm going to go break in some houses. And so now I'm walking through San Pedro. Now, actually, this is the first time I broke into a house. The one I had talked about with the key, that was the second time, actually. Okay. So nights coming down. I end up finding this one house.

Starting point is 01:09:08 Now, it was really, really nice. It was on the corner. and I go up to the porch, knock on the door. Because there was times I would pretend like I was DoorDash. There were times that I would pretend like I belonged there. Because what are they going to do? Call the cops. And if they call the cops, as long as I'm gone before the cops get there,

Starting point is 01:09:26 I don't really care about calling cops. I never cared about cameras neither. I never tried to hide my face. I was just like, look, I'm living in the moment. If I get caught, I get caught. I go into this house. I'm guessing they were setting it up to show. They were going to sell the house.

Starting point is 01:09:40 And so water's on. I went in there, took a shower. I got put on the same clothes that I had on before. Now I'm still traveling to all San Pedro. And I see this one house with a window open. And there's a car here. So I go up to the window. I look through the window.

Starting point is 01:09:57 I can't see anything. So I knock on the front door. Nobody comes. So I walk away. I go back up and I set what I call an alarm. It's not a real alarm, but just something that if it moves, I know somebody came.

Starting point is 01:10:11 So I go to the window and I make a real loud banging noise and I walk away. I leave the scene for like two minutes. I come back, that little thing that I sat by the door never moved. So I know nobody opened up the door. I made one more bang and walked away for 30 seconds. When nobody showed up, I would just rush the adrenaline hit. I went straight into the window. And I went into the window.

Starting point is 01:10:36 I immediately went to the bedroom. Some guys in there is knocked out. He's just dead asleep. 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 Ghost Bed can help. As the makers of the coolest beds in the world, Ghost Bed is your go-to for cooling mattresses, cooling pillows, and cooling bedding. From their signature ghost ice fabric to patented technology that adjust to your body's temperature,

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Starting point is 01:11:36 Even better, our listeners can get 50% off. site wide for a limited time just visit ghostbed.com slash cox and use the code cox at checkout again that's ghostbed dot com slash cox with the code cox at the checkout to save a whopping 50% off site wide I looked through a couple of the drawers and I was like nah I saw his keys and his wallet and a book bag I grabbed those three things and I dipped and I took the car that was in the in the parking a lot, and I took the car and I just took off. He's got like $3,400 in the wallet. He's got some credit cards.

Starting point is 01:12:16 So I immediately went and filled the car up with gas. And what do I do? I drive it back down the skid row to my homie. My homie takes the low jack off of it. Now, all those little things I did about making noises, knocking, CNNFA, nobody taught me these things. So it's like, I'm literally out here teaching myself how to be a baby addicted criminal. And in my mind, it's like, I don't know, man. I was living some type of thwarted fantasy.

Starting point is 01:12:47 It was definitely a false reality. And so the guy takes the low jack off. I end up leaving that car somewhere. Couldn't find it. It's like the second car I ever took was a Jeep Wrangler from USC University of Southern California. And I'm driving that car around. There's like a thousand dollars worth of Nordstrom dresses in the back. I'm about to go trade in. The receipts are in the bag. I didn't even have to do no work for that one. And I'm running out of gas. I keep a bike with me at all times because I'll run for my cop in a bike. I'm not going to run in a car. And so I parked this car in Hollywood because I was about to run out of gas. Bro, I looked for that car for months. I kept I forgot where the car was at. I never found the car again. And it's like, bro, you're all here still in cars.

Starting point is 01:13:31 It's like at least make some money off of it. I never made a dollar off any car. I showed up to some shop shop shop on Tom on Alameda and they were like, Like, mind you, I'm not really that much of a criminal yet. Right. Learning, you can't just show up and ask questions like this, bro. How much for this car? Yeah, I don't have the title, nothing. They didn't be like, yeah, kick rocks.

Starting point is 01:13:50 Yeah. And so, remember when I told you I had a Jason-born moment? Mm-hmm. That's what I call it. It wasn't a Jason-born moment. But it was this moment that after this happened, you couldn't tell me nothing about playing the part. I had asked someone to let me into this building to use the bathroom.

Starting point is 01:14:09 them, they let me in, and they did. They weren't even tripping. Because once again, I would always just play the part. I would pretend like I knew somebody. It don't matter. I just needed to use the bathroom. And I checked the office. This was a place called Skid Row Housing and Trust.

Starting point is 01:14:22 It was a set of apartment buildings. It's a whole program where they would take old hotels and turn them into apartments for homeless people. Now, mind you, the majority of the time, I would go to high-end places to do what I did. I just had this thing about I didn't want to rob poor people. You know what I mean? Well, I go into this office, and I'm looking for checks. I'm looking for money, but I see a whole set of keys.

Starting point is 01:14:48 So I take the keys. And I took it to a friend of mine around the building that used to work for Skid Row, Housing, and Trust. And he was doing dirt, too. And I said, look, like, what do you think I can do with these? Do you think I could just sell them? I just wanted to sell them to somebody, make me, you know, $200, whatever. Keys, what do you mean keys? I found keys to the bill.

Starting point is 01:15:09 building. Okay. Yeah. Well, the guy was looking through the keys and on there was, because he used to be a janitor for the right, was a master key, not just to that building, but to all their buildings. So now I'm traveling and I'm checking doors. Now I don't have to just check car doors or check a house door. I can see if this key fits. So I'm on the outskirts of Skid Row and South Central. And I'm checking doors, none of the keys are working. Well, like I did in Santa Monica, I had a bicycle, I went behind a building, I waited for this garage door to come up, and there's guys coming out. I don't know where I thought of this story, but it literally just came out the top of my head. He stopped me. He was like, hip to the game. He was like, so what are you doing? And I was like,

Starting point is 01:15:56 I'm coming to work. He was like, you don't work here. I said, yeah, do I work security here? And he's like, I'm security here. And I'm like, well, you better talk to Frank then. I don't even know who Frank is. I'm like, you better talk to Frank then. He's like, who's Frank, bro? I was like, listen, bro. If you don't know who Frank is, then you're probably not doing your job right.

Starting point is 01:16:20 And the last thing I want to do is get you in trouble. This guy's not falling for it, bro. I was going to say, he's not, look, he's not following for it. I've spit similar stories to people. And they're like, they don't question it. But this guy come to find out, just dudes from Compton. You feel me?

Starting point is 01:16:37 Like, he's not, he's not, he's like, look, bro, you're trying to hit me with the okey dope, which is long story short, you're trying to play me. Right. Like, all right, bro, you know what? I'll have Frank deal with it. So I'd take off. And I don't know what it is about me sometimes

Starting point is 01:16:52 in these situations that I wouldn't just immediately leave, immediately leave the situations. Because there were times to where it was like, you know what, let me stick around a little longer. and play this story, and it would work. This time it was not working. So I pull off, I go behind the cut. He pulls off coming behind me.

Starting point is 01:17:10 He's looking, looking around for me. I'm in the dark. He can't see me. So then I start following him. Why? I don't know. But I was like, this seems like the cool thing to do. So I follow him.

Starting point is 01:17:22 We go around the corner to a 7-Eleven. I pull up on him, start chopping it up with him. And I am little, are really probably 15 seconds from just spilling the beans. I had this thing about if I was about to try to take something from you or play a scheme on you, but we have a heart to heart, especially if we get into a deep conscious conversation about life, God, whatever, I now feel obligated not to take advantage of you. I just can't take advantage of you anymore.

Starting point is 01:17:58 And which is ironic because when I was on H in dog food, it didn't matter. I've broken my mom's house, stole her safe. I used to steal from my kids, their mother, to prevent myself from being dope sick, there's nobody I'm not willing to take from. When I was on Crystal, I guess I had some type of moral barometer. But if I had a deep, dope conversation with you, I couldn't get you. I'm 15 seconds from spilling the beans. Just being like, you know what, bro, I ain't even going to hold you, bro.

Starting point is 01:18:23 This is what I got going on. LAPD comes up. Cop pulls up. They get out their cop car. Matt, when I tell you I didn't give them a chance to breathe, something inside of me said, act with authority. I didn't give them a chance to even say anything to me. I said, can I help you?

Starting point is 01:18:41 They said, yeah, actually, you can. There's a person matching your description going around checking doors off the top of my head. I said, yeah, you probably did see that because I worked for RTC, round the clock security, and I work for a group of older men that don't like domestic violence, and we have contracts with certain women to keep them safe. So I have to go making sure that these doors are locked and making sure there's no weirdos around. They don't know whether to buy it or not. I don't know if it's going to work. I don't know.

Starting point is 01:19:09 I'm just trying it, bro. I'm just going with what goes. And thank God the homie didn't bust me out. He could have. He was like straight across the board. And they were like, you know this guy? And he was like, hey, I don't know him at all. We were just, he asked me for a cigarette.

Starting point is 01:19:25 He said something like that. They're like, you know, you can go. So I'm just acting like an a-hole with them. I'm just acting like, I have this air of authority about me. Something in my mind is like, bro, just keep playing the part, bro. You're going to make it out of this. So then they asked me who I am. I didn't give them a name.

Starting point is 01:19:43 They were like, well, let us see some ID. I pull out some hard card. It was a plastic card. It had a, I don't know, maybe it was something to enter and exit or work building. It's probably something I just stole from a car. It had no picture, just the name on it. And I give it to them. And they're like, what is this?

Starting point is 01:20:00 I'm like, you asked for ID. They're like, this is not ID, sir. And I'm like, that's what I gave you? They're like, what's your name? And I was like, Mike Shishamish. They're like, Mike, what? I literally looked at him and said, Mike, you know I don't know the name. So why do you keep asking?

Starting point is 01:20:20 Bro, they, okay, now they're coming at me. They're getting my book bag off. They're about to put me in handcuffs. They're taking stuff out of my book bag. They find IDs. they probably found a social security card or two. They're like, what's all this? And I said, I told you I worked for security.

Starting point is 01:20:34 I had to take those. I had to confiscate those from weirdos that are around our women's buildings. Something inside of me is just like buying this. They don't buy this, bro. Tell me that you don't get out of this. When I told you my Jason-born moment, you'll understand. I don't know what it was, but something inside of me was like, bro, you've done sold it down the river now. Stay on the raft.

Starting point is 01:20:57 You're already down. you know what, Creek without a paddle. Just keep going down the river. You can't back off now. Bro, I'm telling him I confiscated this stuff. I got other, I got keys in my bag. Thank God I didn't have any burglary tools. That's another story.

Starting point is 01:21:13 And so they're pitting me in handcuffs and I'm like, man, I don't know what this is about. And they're like, sir, you lied to us about your identity. Did you tell them to call Frank? Watch. They said, you lied to us about your identity. I looked at them and said, I don't even know if you're really LAPD. Bro, in my mind, it was so magical because I was like, it all lines up. Like, I'm telling you that I'm a security guard protecting women that are in hiding.

Starting point is 01:21:42 And it was like every 90s movie, every Beverly Hills cop, every thriller, every thriller, it's like all went into this algorithm that just pushed out this answer that said it makes so much sense now. Now I'm really going to sell this story because I don't know if you're looking for this woman. And that's what that statement said to me. So they put me in the cop car. By this time, I gave them my real name. Now, I had obviously had to have never been in trouble in L.A. at this time. And they look for my name in, like, three different databases.

Starting point is 01:22:12 I don't know what, I couldn't tell you what databases they were. Maybe like ATF or FBI. I don't know. The story already sounds so far-fetched. I don't want to add extras to it. Sergeant shows up. Now, something told me, acted a little less authority. with this guy.

Starting point is 01:22:30 Don't be such an a-hole to this guy. He pulls up, he talks to them, he comes back to the car. He's like, so what's going on? I give him the same spiel, but I'm calling him boss. I'm like, listen, boss, I don't know what they got going on. I work for round-the-clock security. Yeah, I lied to them about my identity. I can't be telling people who I am.

Starting point is 01:22:51 I'm giving him this spiel. And this is years ago. I was Ohio, so I don't remember everything I told him, but these are around the things I told him. He goes back, talks to them. He comes back to me. And he says, listen, one of them's new. Let them do their job.

Starting point is 01:23:08 They're just trying to do their job. Let me get you out of here in a couple minutes. You can't tell me nothing no more. Man, they come to that car. They are pissed. They're like, look, you can take all this fake stuff and get out of here. Or we can take you downtown to find out who you really are. I said, well, I got a job.

Starting point is 01:23:29 to finish and I got two more routes and I'm a fit I said you know what even though I know Frank will have me out in a couple hours it's not worth going all through all the processing man they let me out the car gave me my book bag gave me all gave me the IDs back gave me the social security cards back gave me my keys back I get on my bike I start riding off normal the moment they're out of view I'm gone dipped off went back down the skid row And now at this point, you can't tell me nothing no more. I'm going to play the part everywhere I go. I'm going to pretend like I belong.

Starting point is 01:24:08 Now I think I'm Spider-Man because now I'm jumping over gates and I'm finding different ways to maneuver in and out of situations. What usually would be an obstacle now no longer is an obstacle because if the gate is locked to the outside of the loft, I'm just going to jump over the gate. I remember one time I had walked into this building in Hollywood, There was like a high-end loft on Hollywood Boulevard at the strip. I'm into this, man, imagine an area just like this, but there's a big TV, big sectional, big community room.

Starting point is 01:24:41 They got four pools, two right here, two right here, right outside this window. This is a nice loft. People probably pay upwards $10,000 to be in this loft. I'm in there watching TV. Just chilling. I really came in here to break into stuff. But I'm like, eh, I'm going to watch some TV. People are coming down.

Starting point is 01:24:59 And they're like, hey, well, we were going to watch this. I'm like, when I get done with this, I got you. I don't even belong here. So now I end up getting into this conversation with these people that live there. And I'm sitting there chopping it up with them. They all live here. Remember when I told you that if I have a real conversation with you, I can't get you. Right.

Starting point is 01:25:17 Man, the conversation took a conscious turn. And we were talking about some deep stuff about community membership and all this. So I said, listen, guys, I'm going to be honest with you. I came in here to rob you guys. They were like rob us. I said, not like that. I was just going to steal some packages and stuff. I said, but I just can't do it to you, man.

Starting point is 01:25:36 You guys are pretty cool with me, man. And I'm homeless. I'm on drugs. And I ended up spitting some poetry to them. We ended up having a real deep, dope conversation. They didn't call to cops or nothing. They was like, man, you can really do better with your life. And I was like, I know, man.

Starting point is 01:25:49 It was a genuine heart to heart. I genuinely was having that conversation with them. But I knew I was going to go back out and smoke some crystal and break into some other people's stuff. So it was like, I thought, I thought, worked it here. I can't do it here, but, yeah, I'm going to do my thing. And so, yeah, man, now I'm, man, you can't tell me nothing, man. I just, I'm thinking way higher of myself than I am. Like, I'm literally in Hollywood living like a little baby, baby, baby, GTA life. I'm getting away from cops, and I'm breaking in their houses, and I'm breaking in the cars. And, and

Starting point is 01:26:22 listen, if I could smoke crystal, take care of my kids, Do God's will, make money, fulfill my dreams, I would never stop. It's a phenomenal drug. I just don't have the skill set to do it. I'm being honest with you. I don't have those skill sets. I can't just smoke pot. It always leads me down to another place.

Starting point is 01:26:46 So that's why personally now I have to stay completely away from all of it. On the other side, it's true, too. If me getting out of certain places in my life and doing certain things like 12-step recovery and making better spiritual decisions, if after 10 years, after two years, my life's not improving, you ever watch like those AA meetings on movies? And it's like, well, you know, it's been 10 years and I'm just trudging along, man, scratch that. Give me some crystal. What's the point? If my life is not approved, I'm going back to getting high, you know what I mean? So now I'm going back and forth to L.A. County.

Starting point is 01:27:24 And the first time I catch a felony, I was in this apartment complex. Now, it wasn't nice like that one I just told you about. But they had a community room. They had a bathroom. They had like a refrigerator with drinks and all that in there. So I break into this place to do what I do. And I go into the bathroom, bro. And I was in there for probably three hours, butt naked, smoking crystal,

Starting point is 01:27:49 with all of my stuff just spread around the bathroom. And anybody that's listening that's been on the streets smoking crystal, Scante, what they call it in L.A., they know what I'm talking about. You cannot do crystal and not be a tweaker. Everybody's a tweaker that doesn't. People just have different tweaks. Like me, I'll freestyle for 12 hours straight. Or I go like breaking into stuff.

Starting point is 01:28:14 Some people pick their face. Some people like to look through the blinds and be paranoid. I like to go into bathrooms and just sit there for hours. And so I get a knock on the door. LAPD, oh, man, you know, my eyes can be. I'm like, I don't know what I'm going to do, man. I'm butt naked. I'm like trying to put some clothes on.

Starting point is 01:28:36 And they open up the door. When I open up the door, they look, they're like, what are you doing? I don't remember what I told them, man. But of course, you know, they, I think I had waited until it was like 8 o'clock in the morning. So I guess somebody that lived there and found out that somebody was in the bathroom for too long. And this is the first time I went to jail for a felony charge this time. And because they saw me go into the refrigerator and grab a 2-liter of Coca-Cola, that is enough to get you for a residential burglary, ironically. But more importantly, they saw me go through the

Starting point is 01:29:08 garage without anything come back in with some ray bands and a book bag. They had enough to get me for residential burglary. And so I'm sitting there in L.A. County. I'm trying to fight the case. And I'm thinking just like back home, I'm going to get out of this. My mouth has always gotten me out of stuff. I never really had to pay real consequences to my actions. And so now I'm in LA County for five months. I'm still getting high in there.

Starting point is 01:29:38 You know, if you do certain prescription pills, they give you certain effects that street drugs do. Nothing's changing. I just thinking I'm going to get sober. They give me a program. But it wasn't a program like a drug rehab. It was a place in MacArthur Park where they had once again taking an old hotel. They turned it into a program. I'm giving probation.

Starting point is 01:30:03 I don't even have to drug test or anything. They're just like once a week we show them our ID and it's like, you have any interactions with cops? Nope. All right. I'll see you next week. That program was a housing program. All I had to do was get an ID, which I got and find a sustainable source of income. And then you qualified for your own apartment.

Starting point is 01:30:23 And all you had to do was pay 30% and you can have that apartment for life. Well, once I got out of L.A. County. Say that again? Yeah. It was called ODR, Office of Diversion and Reentry, which is not to be mistaken with officer dining room, which is what they called it there too. So they had created this program in January of 2017 and around, August of 2017, I qualified for it. It was Office of Diversion and Reentry. It was like, okay, instead of sending you to prison or instead of keeping you in county jail, if you meet the parameters, which I did, addiction. I didn't really have mental health issues, but L.A. County Jail is set up as in Men's Central Jail, Wayside, which is up in, I think, Santa Clarita, Linwood, which is the women's prison or women's county jail, and then Twin Towers.

Starting point is 01:31:19 Now, in LA County jail, it's all about gangbanging and it's all about racial politics. Now, Twin Towers, that's mental health and medical. Most people there are not gangbagan. And if they are, it's probably because there are nobodies in Men's Central Jail and they're coming here to be a somebody or they're hiding. So like a lot of the Hispanic gangs, the Southsiders, they don't play that. You're not allowed to be a Southsider and go to Twin Towers. Do you go to court in yellow and blue, which is what we wore in Twin Towers? the homies would tell you straight up, you got 24 hours to get back into blue.

Starting point is 01:31:54 Blue is the GP main color for LA County Jail. And so because I was in Twin Towers, I automatically qualified for some of the mental health programs that the court systems were creating and trying to do to keep the prisons not full and to keep the L.A. County Jail not full. So I qualified for this program. All I had to do was get a source of income and an ID. pay 30% of my income, I got an apartment for life. Okay. The thing about addiction is you can take away the substance is all you want. But if you're not doing the real deeper work, none of it matters.

Starting point is 01:32:33 It's like putting lipstick on a pig. You can clean the pig up all you want to. You can pit Mabeline on the pig if you want to, but it's still a pig. And so I get out of L.A. County jail. I'm super grateful to be out of jail. And it's like, oh, man, I can really do this thing. bro, within two days I'm smoking crystal again. And now not only do I have a place to live,

Starting point is 01:32:56 I have a place to bring all of my stolen stuff. I remember one time I got on the bus in L.A. And in the front of the bus, they have bike racks. So I get off the bike, the bus real quick, and I took the bike off the rack and took off. And the crazy part is maybe a month later, that bike was stolen for me. You don't know how many times I've been up for like seven to 10 days and I fall asleep at a bus stop because people will tell you, man, I've been up for three months.

Starting point is 01:33:29 No, you're not. You're not up for probably even more than seven to 10 days. You're getting sleep. Your body is shutting down. You just don't have any memory of it. So there's been plenty of times I would go sit down for two seconds. Next thing I know, I wake up, all of my stuff is gone. And who can I be mad at it?

Starting point is 01:33:46 Right. All the stuff they stole and stuff anyways. like a cycle. It's like everybody's recycling stolen stuff on the streets of LA. And so now I've just got somewhere to bring my stolen stuff, man. I had hit a Hollywood open mic and I did so well with it. And people are coming up to me. It's like, man, who are you? Like I'm very, very good at pit and bars together in poetry. And it's very impactful and moving. But once again, it's like lipstick on a pig. It's like, I know I've got these certain skills that are maybe even attractive. I know I got a little bit of game. It got me out of a cop car. You feel me? In handcuffs, my little Jason-born moment, but

Starting point is 01:34:25 nothing on the inside of me is changing. It goes back to Maslow's, you know, level one, level two, level three. If those things are out of whack, you're not being primed to have good self-esteem. You're not primed to meet self-actualization. And all of that sounds great, but until the, the substances are removed, period, nothing's going to change. So for five months, I'm in this program, and I'm just still doing what I'm doing, bro. And it was actually towards the end of that five months. Remember when I told you I had broke into the house and I had stolen that key? That's when that actually happened.

Starting point is 01:34:57 I apologize. I had did that. And I had did another thing where I went into this apartment complex. Now, I'm pretty smooth with it generally. I never really, that one incident with the cop car was one of the first times that happened. And I have got caught. But a lot of the times I never got caught breaking in the car. I never got caught breaking into places.

Starting point is 01:35:21 I more so got caught like stealing from stores when I would do little stuff because I had little things like I'm not going to get greedy. If I find $1,000 in a car, I'm gone. I won't do dirt with other people. I think energy mattered. The one time and the last time I did something with somebody else, they were acting like a chump the whole time. And I had to tell him like, look, bro, we may be doing wrong, but you have to have this

Starting point is 01:35:44 air about you. Like, we're not doing anything wrong. And he didn't understand it. I'm like, bro, cops know how to read energy. Say a cop comes to an intersection. He knows he's supposed to go left. He's got somewhere to go. But something tells him to go right.

Starting point is 01:35:57 Something gives him that unction. Go right. Because you're scared behinds down here breaking into a car and you can't control your emotions. You're acting hell of nervous. You're giving out all of this nervous energy. I would think like that. And so I would be in situations where I was doing wrong, but I would just pretend like, I'm not doing anything wrong.

Starting point is 01:36:13 I belong here. So I go into this apartment complex one time in Hollywood. And I would always check mailboxes first when I would go into an apartment complex. And I go upstairs. And I don't know what I was thinking, bro, but I was reading something as I was coming off the third floor. And I literally didn't even try to go into this apartment. I just thought it was the exit to the stairs because I wasn't paying attention. So I go, I'm reading this.

Starting point is 01:36:37 And then all I hear is a bunch of screaming. And I look up. I'm like, oh, this is an apartment. And I hear like, I don't know. It sounds like Russian or you cry. I don't know. I didn't know what language they were speaking. So I'm like, hey, I'm sorry.

Starting point is 01:36:48 like, you know, Blase, Blase. So I go to leave. I should have just left. But something told me, maybe you should go explain yourself. Right. Because it's worked before. But like that guy from Compton,

Starting point is 01:37:01 he wasn't falling for it. So I tried to go explain to them. I was just delivering some food. I was just drunk because I've done that. I've told that story a thousand times and it's fun. Not even a thousand because I rarely would interact with people. I would do a lot of stuff at night. So this guy's not falling for it, bro.

Starting point is 01:37:17 And there's a language barrier too. He can't really understand what I'm saying. I can't really understand what he's saying. So he's like, get out of here. And I'm like, all right, I'm gone. I should have just left. What do you call the cops? The cops are the, what I'm going to tell you.

Starting point is 01:37:32 I should have left and dipped off. I broke one of the rules. I got greedy. And I said, I'm going to go through their apartment. I'm going to go through their parking garage now. So I go and I've got this foldable bike. You ever seen one of these foldable bikes? They're small.

Starting point is 01:37:48 You can take them everywhere, everywhere. So I go into the parking garage, and now I'm looking in the cars. None of the cars are unlocked. So I try to go through the door that I just came in. Door is locked. You can't get in from the parking garage. You've got to have a key. The garage door that rolls up, the big one that let the cars out, it's locked.

Starting point is 01:38:09 It's down. I'm like, oh, Jesus, I don't know what I'm going to do. Next thing I know, here comes this, like, Russian dude or whatever he was, out the door with this big, it looked like a Kendo stick to me, like what Ken Shemrock used to have on WWF. And there's this big old white boy, and he's like, looks like a kickboxer.

Starting point is 01:38:29 He speaks English. So I'm thinking, you know what? I can explain to this guy what's going on, bro. I can just explain to him, hey, I was delivering, I was reading. I wasn't paying attention. Bro, they're not falling for none of it. The white dude's like,

Starting point is 01:38:43 nah, bro. No, no. We know what you're up to. dude hits me in the leg with the stick. I'm sitting there limping now and it hurt. And then the guy's at the bottom of the ramp. And he's like, guys, what's going on? What's going on?

Starting point is 01:38:54 And they're like, yo, keep this guy here. Don't let him go nowhere. We're going to call the cops. So they go. They call the cops. I had just broke into a car maybe three blocks before. I had found a doctor that I think was from Germany. I found his passport, his iPad.

Starting point is 01:39:13 I had foreign money, had credit cards. So in my mind, I'm like, I hit a lick. You know what I mean? And I got this new foldable bike that I stole too. I don't want to leave this stuff here. But all I know is, like I said before, I don't care if you call the cops. As long as I get away before the cops get there. I realized that I'm on a second story.

Starting point is 01:39:33 Man, I went over and looked over. I left all that stuff. I jumped over the second story, landed on top of her car, rolled off, jumped over a fence. I was gone. I don't know what happened, but I was gone. And so these little incidences where I keep getting myself out of, me getting that program at five months, you know what I mean,

Starting point is 01:39:52 where I fought five months in Lally County to fight for. It was the little housing program. It's like I'm building this arrogance that says I'm above the law. Now, mind you, I'm doing nothing that's like crazy. I can imagine the million-dollar schemes you've heard of on this podcast. I'm just, I'm a crystal addict. I'm homeless and I'm lost in the sauce and I'm having fun too. I had a lot of fun doing these things.

Starting point is 01:40:18 So the day I got caught the last time. Right. I broke into that house that day and got the key, was going to come back. And I had broken to this underground parking structure. So within elements of like residential burglary, like we talked prior, prior intent, permission to be there. And there's other elements that they have to prove to be able to land that type of conviction. Otherwise, that's a lesser crime. Well, I'm breaking into these apartment, these cars, and I feel like a stack of lottery cards. I still to this day be like,

Starting point is 01:40:56 man, I wonder what the lottery cards had on them. And the way I got in was there was this little window, like a grate, like a metal grate that was a window, had slats, and it was unlocked. And so I snuck in that way. As I'm coming out of it, I guess somebody saw me from the streets. And as I'm coming out of it, there's a gun pointed to me. And it's the cops. And at this time, I was like, you know what? I'm done.

Starting point is 01:41:24 I was tired. I was like, I don't know how long I had been up for at this time. And I was just done. I was just completely done. And so I gave myself up. It was the first time of my life that I just was like, well, that time and home when I gave myself up so the other kid wouldn't have to take. the fall for it. This time, it was more like they took me to the Hollywood substation

Starting point is 01:41:45 when the detective, the, I guess it was a homicide and robbery detective game. He just asked me, and I just told him straight up. He was like, you know, you can have a lawyer. I said, look, bro, I did it. I'm done. Take me to jail. I'm done. I'm tired. I don't want to live this life no more. I don't want to live this life no more. Now, at this time, my kids and their mom had already left back to West Virginia. So I didn't know if I'd ever see them again. I didn't think I never leave Skid Row. I didn't think any of that was ever going to happen. And so, yeah, I was like I'm done, you know.

Starting point is 01:42:17 And then I spent about five months fighting that case. I tried to get back into the ODR program. And even, remember I told you I had a man I call father, but he's like really a spiritual leader. He had came and spoke for me too. The judge was like, nah, you're done, bro. Like, you're in and out of L.A. County jail. Like, you just don't learn. We just gave you a program and you still didn't learn.

Starting point is 01:42:40 So 4-5-9, PC-459 is residential burglary in California. It carries 2, 4, 6. So, you know, the first time you caught, two years prison. Second time, four, third time, it's either six or they have three strikes law out there, 25 to life. If you get caught three times in a row. So I already had a strike and a felony from the first residential burglary I had. Now they give me another strike and another felony. So that's called an enhancement.

Starting point is 01:43:10 So they have gang enhancements. Like if you're a gang member, you automatically get your sentence enhanced. If you've been caught for the same thing before you get it enhanced. So any of your strikes get you enhanced. So it was supposed to be four years. But they had passed up that called Prop 57, which was an attempt to minimize the population of the prison system. So basically it said if you do your base term, which is two years, we'll knock off the enhancement. So yeah, they send me to prison.

Starting point is 01:43:40 So how much did you get then? You should have got four. I was supposed to do four. I went to prison and I start to tell you a little bit more about prison. It was from L.A. County jail. The day, up until the day the prison bus came, I thought something was going to happen. I'm going to get out of this. Like, I remember the first time.

Starting point is 01:44:06 They're going to realize I'm a good guy. They're going to realize that. They're going to change their mind. A thousand percent. The judge is going to go home and sleep. on this tonight. And he's going to be like, you know what? That one out of the 45 cases I saw today,

Starting point is 01:44:19 Jimmy didn't have that coming. Jimmy can do poetry. Jimmy knows how to use words. Jimmy traveled the state of West Virginia for three years, helping kids. Jimmy loves his kids. These are the thought processes that are in my mind. I remember one time I was in L.A. County J.

Starting point is 01:44:35 It was the first time I had spent more than an night in L.A. County. The next day, I got some sleep. So some of the remnants of the drugs was wear it off. And it hit me like, oh, bro, you're really in jail right now. Do you know that my punk self went and cried to the cops? It was like, man, my kids, they got a Christmas program. I have to get to it.

Starting point is 01:44:59 Literally an hour later, I got released. And it had nothing to do with that. Yeah. I still at that time didn't know how all of that worked. You know what I mean? It just so happens to be that whatever my stuff was, it was like you said earlier. They got more important stuff. So the system just kicked my name up to be released.

Starting point is 01:45:16 But I thought it had something to do with that. So once again, in my mind, there's this perpetuation that my mouth can get me out of trouble. So L.A. County Jail, my last time I spent in L.A. County Jail for five months, I'm still snorting prescription pills. I'm not really thinking about changing my life. I'm not really recognizing what the issues really, really are. It was the bus ride to stay prison. When I one realized, oh, you're really going to prison, bro. Like, you're going to prison, bro.

Starting point is 01:45:50 Like, you're not getting out of here tomorrow. On that bus ride, I asked myself one question. Like, either there's hope for you or you're a loser and there is none. And I chose that there was hope. I chose that, you know, the plan. land God half of me. I could follow it. I chose that I did not have to live like this the rest of my life. And something happened. Just like, remember when I talked about me forgiving that boy that shot me? This was the second time in my life that in an instant something had happened,

Starting point is 01:46:21 like just a complete spiritual awakening. And when I got to the prison, they, I told them I didn't want any mental health medication. I didn't need any of it. I didn't want any of it. Now, mind you, in L.A. County jail and California prison system, you have to run with whatever race you are. You don't have a choice unless you gang bang. Like, they'll have white crips and white bloods, but the woods generally have a problem with that. Now, me, I'm white, obviously. But growing up, all of my kids were mixed. Growing up, the majority of my friends were black.

Starting point is 01:46:56 So in my mind, it was like, I'm not going to come to jail in prison and just switch up who I've been hanging out with my whole life. And so I chose to run with the blacks. Now, I made it to a very low level one where there was everybody was short time in it. The only lifers we had on the yard had already been in prison for 25 years. And some of them are what we call L-WOPs. Are you familiar with the term? Life without the possibility of parole. So I know plenty of men that were sentenced without the possibility of parole and just through their own good work and through God's grace have been released.

Starting point is 01:47:30 So there were a couple of them on the yard. and my celly on the yard when I made it to actual prison because when you go to prison first, you go to reception for three months, they figure out your points, they figure out where they're going to pitch you. He, residential Berkeley, 25 to life. So I had a great example for a year of where this could really lead me. Right. And so, yeah, man, I had decided to change my life on that bus ride, man.

Starting point is 01:47:55 And I thank God I made it to a level one. None of the white boys were tripping on me. everybody was just trying to get home. I mean, there was a little bit of politics in there, but it wasn't like level two. So in California State Prison, you have level one, two, three, and four. And I don't know if there's anything past that, but it's all based off points. So I had, I think, 13 points, which they figure out, I guess, your criminal history, your convictions, they give you a point system.

Starting point is 01:48:22 The higher your points, the higher levels you make it. Now, if I would have made it to level two, three, or four, God pit me where I needed to be because I was safe. I never got into a fight. I got into one fight in county jail because some guy threw my stuff out of myself. And I was like, I don't have a choice, bro. Like, I don't have a choice about to fight you right now. And so I get to prison, man.

Starting point is 01:48:44 I'm reading a gang of books. I'm playing chess every day. I love chess. I still play chess to this day. I got really, y'all play chess? No. I was just thinking about this buddy of mine. I went to Vegas recently.

Starting point is 01:48:59 We were talking about chess. And I was like how, you know, I think I've mentioned this before. I know if you ever heard me said it. But like, you understand that chess is a game of the aristocracy of kings. It's played with thought and it's dignity and quiet. And if you go to prison and watch the way these guys, they've turned it into just street level, guttural. it's horrific the way they play it. You know, like, you know what I'm saying?

Starting point is 01:49:34 It's played by King. You know, you move the pieces and it's subtle and it takes time. There's lots of thought. And you watch these guys in prison play it. And it's like, uh, I got your fucking bitch, bro. Got your bitch. And they're like, yeah, oh, I'm in your fucking house. What you're going to do now, motherfucker?

Starting point is 01:49:50 I'm in your house. I mean, it's horrible. That wasn't my experience. Really? No. I mean, there were. It's, it's, you've turned this. They, they have turned this into, it's, it's just, I don't want to say, it's, it's, it's just

Starting point is 01:50:09 gutter all. That's what, you know what I'm saying. I mean, I understand what you're, like, you obviously played with somebody else, but I would, and this was every place I'd been. You'd see these guys like, yeah, oh, that's right. What's you go? Oh, that's, I got your fucking bitch. And the terms that they come up with for the names of the players, like it's not like

Starting point is 01:50:26 your bishop and you, they've got different names. for the piece of, I got your house. You have my castle. That's my queen. You know what I'm saying? I mean, it's just, I got your horse, bro. Yeah, I got your horse is done.

Starting point is 01:50:39 Yeah, exactly. I'll be honest with you. There was a little bit of that. And I look, I grew up, like, I'm a west side baby from the west side of Charleston, West Virginia. I grew up in the hood talking trash. Right. Like, when we play Madden, when we play pool, when we play anything, we grew up talking

Starting point is 01:50:54 trash to each other. Right now on death jam comedy, there's a channel on YouTube called Roe to me, I love watching it. I grew up like that. You know what I mean? And so yeah, even if I'm losing and mad and I'm talking trash. And there was a little bit of that sometimes in chess, but the greatest moments I had in chess were these older men that were like, had been in prison for 15, 20 years already. And they had this peace about them. And I learned so much through them and about life, learning how to play chess to where now it's like when I play chess with people, which I really just play on my phone because nobody, I don't have a lot of people to play with.

Starting point is 01:51:30 It's really more of a quiet game because I agree. It is, it's a very, to me. I guess I could see some older guys that have been playing forever. I could see that happening. But you got to just think, I'm thinking about these, the 25 year olds. Oh, yeah. Because there were guys in, in Coleman, where they, they literally had 30 chess books. I mean, they've been locked up 25 years, worked their way down from the pen, never get now. You made yourself to the look, made it to the low, you're probably never getting out, right? You probably got, you're 65 years old. You got another 20 years.

Starting point is 01:52:02 You know, you're done. But they, they can, they little, they could play with five different guys at one time. They knew that they, they, they, they walked around with cards. They had cards that they, with different moves on it, things that meant, they were memorizing things. They knew the, the, the names of all the different pieces, not the pieces, but the, bro, they would, they're in like the shoe. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:52:21 Or the hole. They could play through the vent. Yeah. You know, B, you know, B7 to, you know, B7 to, You know, from B7 to be whatever or see this or move. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:52:31 Yeah. One of my favorite openings I learned from a book. It was actually chess for dummies. Yeah. Listen, those are great series. I always say that like I've read like the writing true crime for, you know, true crime for dummies. Yeah. You know, I've read all the different screenplay writing for dummies, you know.

Starting point is 01:52:46 Really? Yeah. And they also have the Idiot's Guide. The True Crime for, you know, the Idiot's Guide to Writing True Crime or Idiot's Guide to Writing Memoirs. You know what the modern day for dummies books are? What? YouTube.

Starting point is 01:52:57 YouTube. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's all you mean anymore. Anybody who ever said like, yeah, bro, I couldn't figure it out. Bro, there's 150 videos on whatever you want to know on YouTube right now. You know, they say there's no such thing. It was a dumb question.

Starting point is 01:53:08 Yeah, there is. One's you can easily Google. Stop asking me for directions. How do you get there? If you don't Google that and leave me alone, bro, you're not my face. Like Apple Maps or what's it, ways? Do you turn, I love it when people have those conversations like, so do I make a left at the seven? Bro, I don't, you've got a, you got the most powerful device ever created in your pocket.

Starting point is 01:53:26 Why are you wasting my time with this conversation? Thank you, bro. Why are we even waste the time? Look, I'm a nerd. You know what I mean? Now, like when I talk about growing up in the hood, Charleston, West Virginia, every place has a hood. You know what I mean? Yeah.

Starting point is 01:53:39 Where I'm from, I never really had to worry about walking down the wrong street necessarily. Never had to worry about colors. There's not gangs like that there. Now, there are people that come from bigger cities. And I guess there, look, there's real ones every one. where you go. You know, I would tell people in the streets of South Central, I'm more scared of these hillbillies in the hills of West Virginia than I am of any of you because they'll take you

Starting point is 01:54:00 to a place that you'll never get found again. Just like down here, they'll take you to the Everclays. You're done. You're eating by alligator. And so, my wife. You know, in 2004, Charleston, West Virginia had the most violent crime rate per capita in the country per 100,000. You know, they say we have a population of about 50,000, but I look at the metro population

Starting point is 01:54:19 of areas, never just the population. and then we have about 270. But, you know, it's just part of the backwards thinking, too, growing up in, you know, the hood or whatever, my city's more dangerous than your city. It's like, bro, that's really not a barometer of success. I guess if you want to be a rapper, which, I mean, I've been rapping all my life, but even when I rap or do poetry, it's all about how can I utilize this gift to help other people. And so it goes down everywhere. You know, my mom and dad so dope. I got shot.

Starting point is 01:54:47 Plenty of my friends that got shot. I know people that have been killed. You know, drug deals gone wrong. But it's also a great place to raise a family other than the fact that it's hell of boring. You know what I mean? Now, if you've got the resources, maybe you're middle class and you can get out and explore a little bit more, leave the state, take a couple of vacations. It's a great place to raise a family. Like I'm super, super grateful to be from West Virginia.

Starting point is 01:55:08 I am a 304 baby, which is our area code. For years, we only had one. That blew my mind. I got out to L.A. And it's like, man, there's a different area code for there's like 15 area codes. And it's one county. It's crazy. And so, yeah, going back to prison, man.

Starting point is 01:55:21 I played chess, you read a gang of books. That's all I would do is read. I remember I read Sister Soldiers, the coldest winter ever. It's probably like a 500-page book, read it in 24 hours, couldn't put it down. I'm reading, I found out that teen dystopian books are fire, maze runner, Hunger Games. The pretties, the uglies, the specials, and the extras is a phenomenal series. You know, I'm reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad, of course. Ironically, when I caught the plane here in Huntington Airport in West Virginia, I found an original copy, I believe, of the richest man in Babylon. I'm reading my Bible, of course, but, you know, Vince Flynn, who has a character Mitch Rapp, love. Because 24 is my favorite drama of all time, and I'm a big Jason-born fan.

Starting point is 01:56:07 Michael Conley, of course, John Grisham. James Patterson was kind of looked at like, it's a baby book. Yeah, I was going to say it's written for like people to do. like a fifth grade education. Really? I mean, they're very formulaic. It's the same thing

Starting point is 01:56:21 that they tend to happen over and over again. Formulic is perfect because he's figured out the algorithm that if I give these people very short chapters, they can get through it faster.

Starting point is 01:56:29 And it's not to take away from James Patterson. He's a phenomenal author. It's just that James Patterson books and what we call Urbans. Does he have the Stone Barrington character?

Starting point is 01:56:39 James Patterson? I'm not sure. I know he has Alex Cross. Oh, yeah, yeah. Alex Cross. Alex Cross. You're right. Sorry.

Starting point is 01:56:44 I read a lot of John Grisham. You know? I love John Grisham. John Grisham is far. I actually really like watching litigation. Like the Lincoln lawyer, which is what Michael Conley wrote, I love that series on Netflix. Yeah, they make it sound like being a lawyer is exciting. Like it's like it's like reading the like the Alex Cross thing.

Starting point is 01:57:04 Like they make it sound, they make it sound exciting when really being a cop is not exciting. You know what I'm saying? Well, they have to romanticize it. Yeah, yeah. Same thing with being a lawyer. I mean, boy, you, you listen, this is not exciting. Like those courtroom moments, those aha moments are fleeting and rare and almost never happen. And most lawyers have a horrible.

Starting point is 01:57:26 It's a horrible job. Oh, yeah. And most of them are in debt. Yeah. Oh, yeah. They don't make a lot of money. Listen, if you said, Matt, you can be an electrician or you could be a lawyer. I'll be like, oh, I'll take electrician.

Starting point is 01:57:37 Oh, Dave. Well, huh. Electricians are making $150,000 a year. The average lawyer is making like $160 and $180. He's probably got $500,000 in student loan debt to get to that. point. And how many hours? I read the four-hour work week by Tim Ferriss, I believe. And he said, person A makes $100,000 a year, but they work 80 hours a week to get it. Person B makes $50,000 a year, but they only work 10 hours to get it. Right. Who really makes more money? Yeah. Person B.

Starting point is 01:58:05 You know, and so as I'm reading these books, I remember one time a guy gave me a TV. And, you know, like people look out for each other in prison, but to give somebody a whole TV, that's a lot. That's a lot. That's a lot. And I guess he had gotten a new, everything electronic had to be clear. I don't know if it was like that where you were at. Yeah. Yeah. We had that little radio, the AMFM radio that was clear.

Starting point is 01:58:27 And so, you know, you get your TV through your packages. Like you can get quarterly packages. Like you had commissary where you can get. I remember how any TVs, brother, was in federal prison. There was no TV. Oh, really? No. This is in LA.

Starting point is 01:58:37 Like, this is like where I, listen, I know there were places where they could have, they could play video games. Oh, Arizona? Unbelievable. Arizona. I'm in prison thinking that's, that, they need to take those away. That is not prison. How dare you water this deal? Well, even my prison, man, I was in a place called Tahachapi.

Starting point is 01:58:59 It was in Bakersfield, which was in Kern County, which was, you got L.A. County, Ventura County, Kern County. Remember I talked about the wilderness stage earlier when we saw my biblical characters. Tahitapie was really in the wilderness, but it was so high up that it snowed. I didn't even think it snowed in Southern California other than Big Bear. It was literally an old army barracks that they turned into a prison. And so we had long dorms. We had some other buildings that had like two-man rooms. There were no sales on level one.

Starting point is 01:59:32 Now, I think once you got the level three and four, they had actual cells. Because the higher the level, the longer you're on lockdown throughout the day from what I believe. We had yard all day long. We, you know, yard open at nine, yards stay up until six or seven. You know, there were certain rules like, it was like an unknown rule amongst the inmates called 10 to 10. So it was like from 10 p.m. to 10 a.m. it's quiet. So you're waking up at 7 a.m. and another guy's brushing his teeth. Top of the morning, you know, very something subtle, kind of keep you quiet.

Starting point is 02:00:06 Different races, they did different things. Like, I know the South Siders, you have to work out. out in their program. But they also have like the South Sider spread. So like a spread in California jail in prison is where they just throw a bunch of stuff together. Man, I've had orange chicken. Do take chili ramen, apple jelly and pork rinds. Bro, it tastes just like Panda Express.

Starting point is 02:00:28 Crazy. And so the Southerstiders have a soft sider spread. It don't matter if you got money or not. If you're a South Sider, you're going to eat. You know what I mean? And so other races have there are other types of programming. But mind you, where I was at was level one. And there was hardly any politicking.

Starting point is 02:00:44 There was hardly any worry about a race riot or any of that. There were a couple things in the yard. But though we had the dopest library. It was like this old portable where when I was in elementary, we had a portable where the sixth graders would go. And it was like this trailer outside of the main building. And the library was so dope. Yeah, God gives me a TV man. And two days later, I gave it back to him.

Starting point is 02:01:08 And he was like, I was like, bro, I was so grateful to you. You, I really, really am, but it's interfering in my reading, bro. Remember how I used to say that the books are way better than the movies? Yeah. I never believe them until I read Ready Player one, and then I watch the movie. But I get it. You got to take all of this and dumb it down to 90 minutes. You got to take 10, what was probably 10 or 15 hours of screen time, and I got to jam it into two hours.

Starting point is 02:01:34 Yeah. Listen, I tell you, I read a book, I think it was Nelson DeMille. it was called Upcountry. Okay. And it was probably 400 pages. Maybe 450 or 500. Actually, it was a really thick. Now I think about that, that thing was thick.

Starting point is 02:01:51 But listen, I'd never been, never read or seen anything. It was probably, that was probably the first book where it literally, I was so into the book that, and the woman character in the book, which is CIA, but she's like not admitting she's CIA, I think. and she's constantly, he's catching her in these subtle lies and stuff. And there would be times I would be reading and I'd be like,

Starting point is 02:02:16 oh, oh, I'd have to, so upset near it. I'd close the book and I'd have to walk around myself. Like, like, you know, it's like, it'd be like you finding out your girlfriend blatantly lied to you.

Starting point is 02:02:30 Like you're like, you're so, but you're so angry, I can't even yell at her. She's a picture. She's a fictional character in a book. But I'm walking around in circles. And then,

Starting point is 02:02:38 And I'd be like, like, I'm under enough control I can continue to read. I'd get down, I'd read a little bit more. And, you know, 20 minutes ago, you'd be like, oh, oh, hell no. She did not. What? If I was this dude, I can't believe he's still with her. I can't believe he has it left her in the middle of the fucking jungle. Oh, this fucking, oh, I'm just pissed at him.

Starting point is 02:02:59 I'm pissed at him. And then towards the end of the book, it got to be the last 50 pages or 30 or 40 pages. I started feeling sad because I knew it would be over soon. That's how good the book was. I was like, this is going to be done soon. What am I going to do when this book is done? I will never get this much entertainment and enjoyment out of another thing. The rest of my, I mean, that's how great it was.

Starting point is 02:03:25 Oh, bro, it's true. You know what I'm saying, right? I know very well. You get so into these things. I used to be like that when I would complete a video game. Like, I still play a PS5, you know. I still play sometimes. And when I'm finishing a really, really good video game, it's like, or when I'm finishing

Starting point is 02:03:41 a really, really good series, but it was prison when the first time I learned, oh, my God, it's like that with books, too. That's why I would fall in love. I would get every Vince Flynn I could get. Vince Flynn was my main go-to. Every Michael Connolly I can get, every John Grisham I can get. You ever heard of Master of the Game by Sidney Sheldon? I feel like I have.

Starting point is 02:04:02 What about Game of Thrones? I never read it. I wanted to. Listen, I had a buddy named Harold Munn's. I remember he had gotten like the next, the next book in the Game of Thrones series. Because it's not called Game of Thrones. It's called something else. No, but whatever.

Starting point is 02:04:18 It was, it's funny because he would tell you what it was, but he would say Game of Thrones. Because they have made it into a series, but we don't have the series. He's reading the book. And he had the book. And I remember he's walking by me. And I was like, hey, bro, what's up? He's like, I can't talk to you, bro. He's like, I just got the whatever from the Game of Thrones.

Starting point is 02:04:35 And he'd walk off. Like, I'm going to read or he. We can't discuss this. I need to. And he'd go and lay down and just lay in bed. And, you know, you were like, that's how these guys, they get really. And you understand. You're like, no, I get it.

Starting point is 02:04:46 Right. Listen, man. When I read Master of the Game by Sidney Shelton, so Master of the Game and Swan Song are the two ones are, because I call what they call prison classics. It's like, you know, in L.A. County Jail, California prison. They're like, hey, you know, you get around the readers and they're like, have you read this? Have you read that? And the two, I. remember the most are

Starting point is 02:05:03 Sidney Sheldon's Master of the Game and Robert McCannan, Swanson, who also wrote a boy's life. And there was this other guy that wrote a book about the building of a cathedral in Rome. And the book takes place over like 400 years. Bro, you're talking about pillars of the earth. Pillars of the earth.

Starting point is 02:05:25 And the, I think the second one is like the grapes of habit or the heavens. I'm sure I got it wrong, but pillars of it. I never made it to Pillars of the Earth. I wish I would have, bro. It's, it's, I want to say, what the guy's name is, something to build her. Listen, because I read the whole thing. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:05:39 You know, it's funny you saying that? Haven't really thought about that book since. I was in, I was in Vegas, and I went into a coffee shop, got my coffee, was walking by a guy who was sitting there reading Pillars of the Earth. That's crazy. And I stopped and I took a two step backwards and I go, that is an amazing book. He is, it's getting good. It is getting very good.

Starting point is 02:06:04 And this guy's like, it's funny too, because he's probably in his 30s. Like, who the fuck reads? Bro. You know? Lonesome Dove. Have you heard of that one? Lonesome Dove. That's an old Western that's like also one of those prison classics.

Starting point is 02:06:15 Like everybody's read. So what is Pillars of the Earth? Like what is it? It follows this guy or really like a family through the building of a cathedral. Because these cathedrals in, in Europe, they're not built in. in two years. They're not built in 20 years. They'll build over the course of, you know, 80 to 100 years. And so like there's a builder. He's starving to death. And his wife, I think, and I'm sure I got this wrong, but like he gets a, does he get a woman pregnant and

Starting point is 02:06:49 she has a baby and he knows it's his baby? And the baby ends up getting, they end up giving the baby to the church. And the baby's raised in the church. And he becomes like, it's, it follows all these people that are interwoven throughout the throughout the this this 400 years it's insane how

Starting point is 02:07:11 but you know everybody in the whole system and who they're related to and look and they're not like some of them are great characters some aren't you know some are and horrific things happen to some of these characters

Starting point is 02:07:23 I mean you know like it's tears you're crying watching this I've just read I've been following this kid since he's a little kid and he just got butchered or whatever happens. You know, these, it's horrific things that happen.

Starting point is 02:07:36 But you're involved in this whole thing and it takes, takes forever. And it's, it's an amazing book. You get so emotionally ingratiated with these characters. Like, Master of the Game by Sidney Sheldon takes place in the beginning is like the 1800s. And it follows this guy who becomes like the great, great, great grandfather of the character you end up with. Okay. And he's in Africa. And it's either gold or diamonds, but he goes there to find diamonds.

Starting point is 02:08:01 And he finds it. he builds this legacy, builds this empire. And over the span of the book, you read about him. I think you read about his son. Then you read about like the granddaughter. And then you ultimately get to this lady at the end who's really the master of the game. And I cannot remember her name, but she was so, you ever watch Animal Kingdom? Yeah.

Starting point is 02:08:21 The drama. No, no. Okay. I just went to the series. Phenomenal show. And so Smurf is the main character. Oh, okay. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:08:29 No, I've watched the whole thing. My wife and I watched the last year. I've watched it twice all the way through. Of course. The office is something I will watch for the rest of my life. And there's other shows like 24 I will watch for the rest of my life. Animal Kingdom. She's pulling the string.

Starting point is 02:08:41 She kind of... Sometimes I wish I had that man in black tool where I can shine and forget everything just so I can go right back to watching these shows again. But yeah, this lady reminds me a lot of smirth. It's because it's somebody you love to hate. You're watching this lady and it's like... He's manipulative. She's...

Starting point is 02:08:55 And there's other times she's amazing. And then it's funny because it's one of those few shows that... You know, the ending art is never good, but it was a, it was a fitting ending, you know? Oh, yeah. You know what's funny is at the moment, the way it ended, you've, I felt like, you know, you're kind of like, oh, I don't know. I don't want this guy to, this to happen or that to happen. But it's kind of like a character that you love and he's a horrible person. And that it, it ends badly for him.

Starting point is 02:09:28 And you're like, oh, I didn't want it to end like that. But you kind of have to remind yourself. well, wait a minute now, he he killed that kid. Yeah. And he did these horrible things and he's a horrible person. And Pope was my favorite character. Right.

Starting point is 02:09:40 That's just, that's just the way, you know, it's fitting. Unfortunate, but fitting. You know, I mean, yeah, it was a good. I mean, I've always been into the anti-hero. You know what I mean? Like, I've always been into the person that I think it's very important to be able to look at people beyond the surface. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 02:10:02 Right. It's like, yeah. you know, you were selling dope. You were doing all these schemes. You were doing all these scams. And you probably were foolish for doing it because now you're about to miss out on your family for the rest of your life. But you know what? You are a solid dude for not telling on nobody.

Starting point is 02:10:16 I can't help but to look at you like that, you know? Now, right now I drive Uber and I tell people, bro, don't ever get in my car having me rot it dirty. I'll have 15 fingers on the stand. I'm not playing with you. I'm not going to jail for nobody, bro. Now, if I'm doing some dirt, I'm not going to tell on you to get myself out of trouble. I just got to take what I got to take. I'm a square now.

Starting point is 02:10:34 I don't sell dope, which I never was good at anyway. I don't steal. I don't lie on my taxes. I don't, like, I try to live as honest of a lifestyle as I can and honor my mistakes when I make them. So, like, I had this guy in the car a couple months ago. And we're on the east end of Charleston at the 7-Eleven because I do private Uber's too. And so he comes up to the car. We've been there for like 10 minutes, bro.

Starting point is 02:11:01 And he's like, yo, just give me. I said, bro, it's hot up here, bro. I don't play all this. Like, I'm not trying to be sitting up here, bro. He's like, all right, man, I'm sorry. I was like, it's good, bro. Just like, come on, bro. And he gets into the car.

Starting point is 02:11:13 And next thing I know this other dude that looks homeless is getting the back of the car. And I can say that because I was homeless. People's feelings would be okay. The other dude gets in the back of the car. And the next thing out here is like, man, you got any Chris dude. He was like, no, but I got, I was like, bro. I can get the about my car right now. Like, don't play with me.

Starting point is 02:11:28 And there's like, man, I'm sorry. He was like, you ain't going to give me a ride. I was like, I'm going to still give you a ride, bro. But don't ever do that to me, bro. And you ever have people when they know you're mad at them try to, like, create random conversations that have nothing to do? You know, what you think about? I was like, all right, bro.

Starting point is 02:11:44 And I didn't want to be a jerk to him, but it's like, my kids did not have a father for years. Right. I can't let your fucking, your shit. Never. Right. Never. So, like, I've never put my hands on a woman in my entire life. But if you think ever that a woman is going to put the hands on the mother of my children,

Starting point is 02:12:02 especially if I know she did nothing wrong, I will knock you out. Now, more than likely, I'm going to use my mouth or I can restrain you because I'm a big dude. But I tell my boys, if I ever see you pit your hands on a female, you're going to have to fight me. But if they're trying to jump your sister, we protect family at all costs. Every other principal flies out the window. So, yeah, man, we can't allow. And even with the enabling, you know, I've definitely been enabled. I remember the first time I showed up to my mom's house.

Starting point is 02:12:30 It was 2.30 in the morning. It was probably snowing. It was cold. And she cried, and she would not let me in her house in the middle of the cold because I had just stole from her like a couple days prior and got caught. And even though my life didn't take a positive turn after that for years, I always think back to that moment. That was like maybe the first time that the will started spinning, like, oh, you got to be responsible. for your own choices, bro. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 02:12:59 And so, like, even with prison, I started developing these little curriculums in prison and teaching myself stuff. And I get out of prison, I had to wear an ankle monitor and I had to go to Long Beach. Now, at this time, they wouldn't, you couldn't work for 60 days.

Starting point is 02:13:16 You couldn't get a phone for 30. And I had called my sponsor immediately. Well, I called a guy that I had known. He agreed to sponsor me. So now I'm working the steps. I get a little job at a gas station. This program was called MCRP men's community release programs. It was essentially like a halfway house work release program.

Starting point is 02:13:36 I had to turn all my checks over. We couldn't cash our own checks. We were only allowed to have access to 25% of our own money at any given time. And it was only for tool of trees and bus fare. Weren't a lot to smoke cigarettes. Weren't a lot to send money to the kids because they were teaching us. You got to learn how to take care of you first. Now, if we provided proof like, hey, look, man, I got 25%

Starting point is 02:13:57 $1,200 saved up. My kids need $1,200 or they're out in the streets. They would work with you. But I didn't need none of that. And so I remember I got that job at the gas station. And I just told myself, bro, I'm going to show up on time. I'm going to add value. And I'm going to live an honest lifestyle.

Starting point is 02:14:13 I added so much value to that gas station with customer service that when COVID hit, which was January 2020, now we were technically still incarcerated. So the state of California would not let us. us leave. So we all had to quit our jobs. So a couple months goes by, I get released one month early in April of 2020. I'm going to Hollywood to a sober living. And I'm literally delivering food on a bike for postmates, which is very similar to Dooredatch and Grubhub. And the gas station called me. Now, this is in Bell Gardens, which is like, it was taking like 30, 45 minutes to get out there on a bus or on a train. And so they called me. It was like, hey, you want to come out

Starting point is 02:14:57 and pump gas because we're starting a full service gas pump service so that people don't have to touch the pumps. I said, shoot it. Because I added so much value there and because I was honest, the first time a guy gave me a cash tip, I took a straight to my boss. I said, hey, what do you want me to do with this? He said, that's all you, buddy. I made an extra $300 a week in cash tips, which isn't a lot.

Starting point is 02:15:19 But coming out of prison, I'm, you know, making 12 an hour. I get these little extras. I'm able to drop that money off at the bank every day. And another time I went to a rehab just to share my story. Now, when I do shares for like AA, I don't share poetry. I don't do all that. It's just like you don't share financial advice from the podium. It's what's your story?

Starting point is 02:15:39 How'd you get sober? But poetry is a part of my story. And so at the end, they asked me to share some poetry and I did it. And they were like, hey, do you mind to come back every week and like do some creative writing classes? I said, absolutely for free. I don't need no money from you. I just want to add value to the lives of other people. It automatically adds value to your life.

Starting point is 02:15:59 So as I'm going back and I'm teaching creative writing, I also develop other curriculum. I start learning about Maslow hierarchy of needs. I found a creative way to teach that. In prison, I developed a thing called the forgiveness practice, which when my mom told me that my dad wasn't my real dad at 18, I tried to forgive her. I knew what the Bible said about forgiveness. I had enough empathy towards her that I wanted to forgive her. But a lot of the times we've been indoctrinated with this false ideology that how I feel doesn't matter. And because of that, we supersede how we really feel for how we want to feel.

Starting point is 02:16:34 So it's like if you were to hurt me and I want to forgive you, I won't even worry about processing how I actually feel. Oh, I'll forgive you. And it's like been in a Band-Aid on a gunshot wound sometimes. So as I'm, you know, doing these creative writing classes, I'm creating this curriculum. I realize the thing I used to tell people in Skid Row was keep your crown on king, Keep your crown on queen. I got to jail. I drew the symbol up and I was like, man, I don't know what it is here, but this is something.

Starting point is 02:17:02 And I always wanted to get back to that Jimmy the poet that performed and talked to kids and did public speaking. So as I'm in this rehab coming back every Tuesday, my sponsor was like, you know, you can get paid to teach groups and rehabs, right? So I come out of prison, bro, I'm making $60 an hour teaching groups and rehabs. Now, that was independent contract work. So it wasn't like 40 hours a week benefits. But nonetheless, bro, I'm coming out of prison. Remember when we talked about transferable skills? Now, this same mouthpiece that I used to get out of a cop car and feed some stories,

Starting point is 02:17:33 I'm now using the same mouthpiece to teach people on how to get sober. You know what I mean? And so for the last couple of years, I've just been building up and figuring out what's going to become of the Keep Your Crown on project. Because the mission statement is teaching emotional intelligence and processing trauma through creative expression. because when I started teaching these groups and rehabs, I said, why are we not preemptively giving these tools to adolescents? Remember the DARE program? Just say no? Yeah.

Starting point is 02:18:01 Well, they failed for three reasons. One, they tried to convince us smoking pot wasn't fun, and we realized that's a lie. What else are they lying about? They're trying to tell a bunch of kids with a whole bunch of trauma that just saying no works. And yet, that does work for some. And while Nancy Reagan's telling us to say, no, Ronald Reagan and his cronies are bringing it. into the streets of LA through Haurin and Contra. And so just telling a bunch of kids, oh, this is bad.

Starting point is 02:18:27 You shouldn't do it. Okay, cool. Did you go back and look at Maslow's? You get a 12-year-old kid that comes home with a mom that's addicted, a father that's not there. They're moving from place to place. He doesn't have clean clothes. The love and belonging is already out of whack. They're not primed to have good self-esteem.

Starting point is 02:18:46 You know what I mean? And so it's like with everything that I've ever gone through, I'm not tripping, bro. I'm grateful my dad beat my mom. I know. I'm grateful that I was homeless in Skid Row. I'm grateful that I know what it's like not to be a father. Because now sometimes when I randomly post on Facebook, hey, kings, these boys need you.

Starting point is 02:19:07 I don't have to come at them like, you need to be a good dad. I can come at them like, I know what it's like to think that the kids don't care about you no more. I know what it's like to be in that guilt and shame. I've been there, but I promise you they need you. So every experience that I've ever had, I'm not tripping on because it's been given to me because I feel like, was it God's perfect rule for me to smoke crystal on the streets of L.A.?

Starting point is 02:19:31 Probably not. But I think he's blessed it to say, I trusted you to go through it. Now use this same gift, use these same experiences to go help some of my other kids that are going through it. And if I can help another person that's gone through it, it makes it all worth it to me. I'm not tripping. I'm Jimmy the poet from the west side of Charleston, West Virginia, and this is a piece called Message from the Maker. I understand your pain and fear. My son shed blood like you shed tears.

Starting point is 02:20:01 So please believe I truly see how difficult it is to be like me. But I inspire you to see that it's a lot less stressful, plus worth it to aspire to be me instead of everyone else you admire and envy. They're not perfect and they're all going to expire within the time I've given. So if it's in you I'm living, it's because I chose to. I know the thorns seem thickened, but it's within you I rose through. You see, I don't create junk because if I did, you think I sent my only son for them to pierce his rip? For me to shed my blood, the most delicate element never developed embellished so that with you I can share this love? Nah.

Starting point is 02:20:41 So let me pose to you a question. If after creating Pinocchio, which you know to be a blessing, he jumps off the table comes the life start disrespecting himself. He hates the mirror, so he spends his whole life corrected himself. And you know that as his father said in a couple blessings would help, but like the rest of himself, it gets rejected as well. So what would you do as his maker? The creator just disrespected creation. How would you feel as his creator?

Starting point is 02:21:08 Send him a savior, right, to save his life? Take away his sin, pitting him in a robe. Why does so? He says it's appreciated, but that that boy, Phonokio, his nose to grow and grow. So why do we lie to ourselves? We claim we want Jesus but won't die to ourselves. It seems to me like we only allow for the wealth and prosperity, but what's scary me is the way they deliver that whole package is a lie in itself.

Starting point is 02:21:30 We ain't blessed and prosperous for our own desires. It's so his kingdom could be advanced so we can snatch sinners out the fire. So if it's within our acceptance that his death and resurrection was to win our affection, then why every time he blesses, we disrespect them. And if we think that's crazy, that ain't it. The craziest is all he's ever asked from us as a relationship. But men and women, we as well have felt victim to apply and plan a lives that have been devised to have us killed ourselves. Because we're pursued by an enemy who's misconstrued our identity.

Starting point is 02:22:03 And he's had us for thousands of years as practice. You see, we bear the father's image. So all Satan had to do pervert our perception of our father in heaven. And since the beginning, that's basically his number one tactic. Strategies of Warfare. I appreciate you watching the video. Listen, we're going to put all of Jimmy's links in the description box. Please go to him.

Starting point is 02:22:23 Check him out. Check out what he's doing. Please support him. I really appreciate you guys watching this. And thank you very much. See you.

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