Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - WILL DIDDY GO FREE!? | SDNY Probation Officer Reveals Truth About Celebrity Sentencing

Episode Date: July 10, 2025

Matt and Meghan Sacks break down the shocking details behind Diddy’s recent federal conviction in the Southern District of New York. As former federal probation officer, Meghan explains how Diddy was found guilty on two of the lowest charges carrying a maximum of 10 years, but why the real sentence could be much less. Get the real story on Diddy’s charges, the sentencing guidelines, and what’s next for him, plus insight into the bigger issues with the criminal justice system.⁣⁣Meghan's links ⁣https://womenandcrimepodcast.com⁣https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxfVg98aA6yHZCZvLelG2QQ⁣https://www.instagram.com/womenandcrimepodcast/⁣⁣Get 10% sitewide for a limited time. Just visit https://GhostBed.com/cox and use code COX at checkout.⁣⁣Do you want to be a guest? Fill out the form https://forms.gle/5H7FnhvMHKtUnq7k7⁣⁣Send me an email here: [e-mail]⁣⁣Do you extra clips and behind the scenes content?⁣Subscribe to my Patreon: https://patreon.com/InsideTrueCrime ⁣⁣⁣Follow me on all socials!⁣Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/insidetruecrime/⁣TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@matthewcoxtruecrime⁣⁣⁣Do you want a custom painting done by me? Check out my Etsy Store: https://www.etsy.com/shop/coxpopart⁣⁣Listen to my True Crime Podcasts anywhere: https://anchor.fm/mattcox ⁣⁣Check out my true crime books! ⁣Shark in the Housing Pool: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0851KBYCF⁣Bent: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BV4GC7TM⁣It's Insanity: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08KFYXKK8⁣Devil Exposed: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08TH1WT5G⁣Devil Exposed (The Abridgment): https://www.amazon.com/dp/1070682438⁣The Program: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0858W4G3K⁣Bailout: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/bailout-matthew-cox/1142275402⁣Dude, Where's My Hand-Grenade?: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BXNFHBDF/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1678623676&sr=1-1⁣⁣Checkout my disturbingly twisted satiric novel!⁣Stranger Danger: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BSWQP3WX⁣⁣If you would like to support me directly, I accept donations here:⁣Paypal: https://www.paypal.me/MattCox69⁣Cashapp: $coxcon69

I was a federal probation officer in the Southern District of New York where Diddy was just convicted. He's convicted in the end of the two lowest counts. These hold a maximum of 10 years in prison. Where we're at with Diddy, though, is, and this is what the public hasn't heard. I was a federal probation officer in the Southern District of New York. This is the very same court now where Diddy was just convicted. A couple things that are interesting is that he's been staying at the MDC, so Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. I don't know if you or your audience has heard of it, but it's one of the worst in the nation. It's so bad, it's almost like condemned. The numbers of people that are overcrowded, the lack of medical attention.

There have been a number of judges that I'm sure on the record have ordered like reforms immediately to this place. And so people who are there are actually given more consideration in terms of speeding up their sentencing or even getting released earlier because the conditions are that notoriously. bad. I used to go in and out of that jail all the time. I can tell you that it is bad. I didn't have very pleasant exchanges with the correctional officers there. In general, I found some of them to be disgruntled, you might say. Right. You know, as government workers, I can relate, but I'm still, I'm almost like, come on, you know, we're on. Yeah, we're on the same team here. Give me a break, you know, you're holding me up for this, you're holding me up for that. So it kind of

felt like that. But that's where he is now. He's awaiting sentencing. His sentencing is happening, I think, a couple months from now, but they might speed it up because of the conditions. I mean, his defense attorney, that's what they're going to be going for. Like, let's get this done. Now, he's been in about 10 months. Everyone's going like this. The news is talking about he's facing 10 years on two counts. So at trial, Diddy is tried for RICO, which is racketeering. that's huge. He's tried for two counts of sex trafficking, also huge, facing big numbers there, and then two counts of transportation for, of a person to engage in prostitution. Right.

He's convicted in the end of the two lowest counts, which is transportation for prostitution. These hold a maximum of 10 years in prison. It doesn't mean he's getting 10 years and everyone in the news is going 10 years. And on both counts, it's 20 years. Yeah. But that's like if your criminal history is off the chart or you've been doing it for 20 years or it's overwhelming evidence, you know. But the ordinary person, the average person who hasn't been in the system doesn't really know that. So what they're getting is, you know, he could do it 20 years. Right.

When the reality is now you step back and look at the sentencing guidelines because that's really what's going to dictate. Now the sentencing guidelines in 2006 became advisory, meaning they're not mandatory. But I can tell you in the Southern District of New York, a lot of judges still go. with the sentencing guidelines pretty much. Almost always. I mean, even now when we talk to guys all the time, they almost always go with, it's a decent range, typically. If it's, if it's, if it's, what, if it's appropriately calculated, it's a decent range. Where we're at with Diddy, though, is, and this is what the public hasn't heard, his guidelines, so his defense attorney is arguing, or defense attorneys are arguing that he becomes, see, I think offense level maybe of 16,

a criminal history category of one. He doesn't have criminal history. Right. He has some arrests. I mean, I think he might have criminal history, but nothing on the book. So he's in the lowest category. 16 and 1, I think those are the numbers, puts him at about 21 to 31 months. Right.

That's less than two years. Right. The prosecution is saying, oh, my gosh, wait, wait, wait, that's wrong. So these enhancements. It's not wrong. You overreached. You know what I'm saying? Well.

You didn't prove your case. Well, but they're saying that the calculations are wrong because the defense is obviously going to go with the lowest range. The prosecution says, we're counting certain victims, you know, every victim, you get an enhancement for the victims. I think they're saying he was the leader. You get an enhancement. I forget, well, gosh, it's been a long time since I've done these, but you get two, four,

six levels on if you're the leader of a crime as opposed to like a participant. I think it depends on how many people you're in. charge of. It does, but they're saying he was in charge of a lot of people and he was calling the shots. So it's probably four levels. It's probably the higher. Whatever it is, it's going to be high. Essentially with their enhancements, as they look at the guidelines. It's still not going to come to 10 years. No, what their enhancements are, they come out with 51 to 61 months. Okay. So 21's 31, 51 to 61. At the very, very max, we're talking about 61 months, which is five years.

He's been in almost a year with 85%, but it's not even 85% anymore. So 85% is the sentence that people serve in the federal government. If they're good, they can get out. But you have, what is it, the First Chance Act, which means that that's about, he'll probably, if he got the max, you'd probably get about half, which puts him at about 25%. months. Yeah. So you'd be in a halfway house and on an ankle monitor and sent home. Soon. Yeah. I mean, I don't think if he's, I would be surprised, you know, actually, I don't like to predict or speculate on sentencing anymore because sometimes I've been drastically wrong on that.

But I don't think the judge is going to go to 61 months. He probably won't go to 21 months. I suspect it'll be somewhere in the middle. He's, he's going home soon. He's done. He's going home. And he's within a year or two of being. Yeah. And they're at, he's at the MDC. And people get released earlier because of the, you know, conditions of the MDC. I was shocked that they didn't, he didn't get bail, let out on bail right away. Yeah, the reason, you mean after he was convicted? Yes. Yeah, so they petition for bail right away, but he's convicted of two acts of violence because

our acts of violence, bail can't be granted. And that's what it is. Somebody told me that, too. Yeah, yeah, because I thought the same thing. And then I was like, wait a second, wait a second. It's the acts of violence. So I think the judge's hands were essentially tied. Yeah, and he's convicted.

It's not like he's... Exactly. It's not accused. Yeah, exactly. But I think the thing that people are going like this 20 years, I'm like, you're way off. And I understand why, because you don't read it in the news. It's not like sexy news. Oh, let's talk about the sentencing guidelines.

Well, as bad as my sentence was, when you looked on the paper, it all says he's facing up to 156 years or something. They always say that, like, so-and-so was arrested for bank fraud of $2 million. dollars, he's looking at, you know, a maximum sentence of 30, he could get up to 30 years. It's like, wait, wait, it's $2 million. Like, I don't care if he had every enhancement there. He's getting, he's not getting 30 years. But the 30 years is a, that's, you know, that's the grabber, right? That's the, oh, my gosh, let me read this.

It is the grabber. That's the news. And it's also one thing that's about our system that has always been nuts to me as well is like, oh, he's convicted of multiple crimes. He's got 200 years. You're like, come on. Yeah. It was one, I remember, so on our show, we did an episode of Women in Crime where we interviewed a man to Knox.

Cool. Yeah. I mean, we have long been kind of supporters of her, believe that she was innocent and wrongfully convicted. And she was in Spain. Italy. But, you know, she's come back and she speaks out about her experiences and they did awful things to her. I mean, lied to her in prison. They wanted her to spill information.

So they told her she had HIV. She did not have HIV. They let her think that for, I don't remember how long it was, but some period of time. However, beyond all of that, she did say, I said, is there anything positive you could say about the differences in the system? Like, I'm just curious. You spent a couple years in prison. And she said, yeah, they don't do things like you're going to get 150 years because it's ridiculous. No one's going to serve 150 years.

They give you like a real sentence. Like, yes, 30 years. maybe 15 years, but they don't do that. And she did appreciate that she could wear normal clothing, which she said, like, made you feel, you know, better. Less like a, like a gumbag. Yeah, better, better something. Did you enter, do you, your podcast, is it in, I mean, is it a video podcast or is it just,

is it audio? We started off as audio, but now we do both. Okay. Yeah. Did you interview her in person? No, we interviewed her via Zoom. And I think when we, it might have even been like height of COVID time or something like, because it's been a couple of years since we interviewed her.

But, you know, she gave you that kind of look. And I always think that too. I go, yeah, why do we send someone to 200 years? It just doesn't make sense, some of the things we do. Yeah. Which is not to say, by the way, I'm saying all these things that I think are bad about the system. I don't think everything is bad about our system. It's just that as someone who was an insider too, and I've seen so many injustices.

I look in and I go, there are so many places where we could. fix the system and make things just better and just get rid of and, you know, it just becomes frustrating. Well, you know, we get this in the comments all the time and people, you know, you know, something has to be done. And then you get the people, we have the worst system. It's like, well, wait a minute. We don't have the worst system. We don't have the worst system. There is no perfect system. No. Like the moment, first of all, let's assume that you could design the perfect system. Yeah. As if that's possible. Let's pretend for a second. The moment you say, and who's going to, you know, put this into motion, people, you no longer have a perfect system.

People will manipulate and twist and, you know, it breaks down immediately. A system is comprised of the people in it. So, yeah, it's always going to break down, of course. And there is no perfect system. I mean, there's no perfect jury. There's no perfect. I think some of our, I think some of our, many of the sentences are, are outrageous because some people, they'll just never commit a crime again.

You know, like, you know what I mean? Like, some people, you arrest and like, oh, we gave him 30 years. Yeah, but believe it or not, if you gave them five, he'd never commit a crime again. Yeah. And then some, but it's a hard argument to make where you say, hey, the lowest recidivism rate out there is, you know, murderers. And once they get out, they almost never murder again. No, never. No.

But then you say, okay, well, then society's safe. from these guys. Right. Yeah, I know. But then, you know, I also kind of go the other way where it's like, yeah, but you did murder somebody. Yes, yes, it's true. You know, so sometimes it's like.

But the recidivism is high with those people who are in and out, always doing a year, two, three, even up to five. Right. Recidivism goes down drastically when people serve these long sentences. People are aging out of crime. They're rehabilitating there. Well, I think the aging out of crime is huge. It's huge.

People do, technically, most people will age out of crime in their late 40s. So I'm aging out of crime. You know. Yeah, yeah. You're almost aged out of crime. Me. I'm almost. I'm 50.

Listen, I. You've almost aged out of crime, like I said. I would never. Like, listen, even when I got out of prison, I was still so kind of just, you know, frustrated and irritated. Like, I still, there was a potential there. Wow. That's interesting. I was, you know.

You served over 12 years, right? Yeah, almost 13. Yeah. I round up to 13. Yeah. Um, but yeah, I just, I was just, you know, I was, I was, I was broke, frustrated. My probation officer was hell. Yeah. I had the highest level, um, supervision. So I have no drug charges. So she's piss testing me once a,

once a month. She's randomly showing up. She's walking through my place. She's calling me. She's constantly threatening to have me, uh, violated. And, and I'm going like, you know, I'm, you know, and it was everything about the situation was unreasonable. with her and I'm arguing with her and she's blatantly lying to me like I like there were multiple times that she's just blatantly like I didn't at the moment at the time I felt like that you're that's not true yeah and then I think would later find out like she tell me she filed a motion with the judge to see if that was possible and then it came back and then a week later she said you can't yeah the C's not going to allow that and then of course now if you go look it up

she never filed there was no record of it there's no motion um and and and then of course when I then after she I got my new probation officer and said hey hey, can I file something? Then she goes, yeah, go ahead. Yeah, you can file. You want to write it up? Go ahead. I file it.

Mine showed up. Do you see what I'm saying? Like mine showed up and I got what I asked for because she never did. And that's unfortunate too, because if you had a good P.O. from the start, too, with a good relationship or, you know what I mean? That might have also changed the way you felt. Well, she also terrified. So, I mean, Grant, admitted I was also terrified.

Okay. So do you think she kept you scared straight? Yeah, she did. All right. Well, there you go. But, you know, it's funny because when I first got out, I was more than happy to go, Listen, if my mother hadn't been sick at the time, I probably would have gone right back to prison. I wouldn't have cared.

After 13 years, I don't care. Really? Yeah. I would have been the happiest I would have been if I could have driven to the, my only problem would have been the transportation. If you could just let me drop myself off. I'll just drive back. Oh, I violated great. I'm going to go turn myself in there.

You know, my previous problem was I don't want to have to go here and wait to go through the proceedings to be driven. But yeah, she was hell. I mean, listen, as we were talking also about Diddy before, I don't think that he's going to want to go. go back. I'm pretty sure that when he's released, he's going to be happy about it. But people have said, now what happens now? Is this like, is this a deterrent? Is this justice? This is a question. And it depends on which side you look at it. So for people who thought that people were on the defense side and they thought, yeah, he's a bad guy. He's clearly a domestic abuser. I don't think there's any doubt about that. He's violent. I think he's participated in

other crimes. But on the defense side, they'll say, but these charges were a total overreach. Like the RICO, they're taking, RICO allows them to go back and take conduct from a long time ago, throw it in there. He's trafficking. Although, that being said, I did see the case for trafficking for Cassie Ventura, even though he was not convicted. I thought there was good grounds for a conviction. But again, so you could look at that way and go, yeah, he was convicted on the counts that he probably should have been convicted of. He's caught. The whole world, you know, has seen him.

So you might say, yeah, that's justice. If you're in favor of the prosecution and you think, like, tax trafficking, people don't understand the true nature of it and how it's evolved, you'd think, no, money buys you justice. You could have all these great attorneys, which he did the very best money could buy, and that's why he's barely going to serve any time at all. Well, I think if he hadn't, if he had not had those attorneys, I think he'd be, he'd be, he would have been, he would have been convicted if he didn't have those attorneys. Like he, he, he was able to level the playing field. And I think you're right, he probably got convicted of probably what he's guilty of. You know, he's actually,

he's obviously a sick, sick individual. But being a sick, listen, being an asshole, you don't have to go to jail for that. Like me right now, I don't, half the people I know would be locked up right now being an asshole got you, you know, that doesn't get you locked up. But I do think that he got off on the, I do believe that Cassie Ventura was a victim of sex trafficking in the way that the law prescribes for it. And I think, oh, that's exactly. How many times have I said that under the law? What he did is, was trafficking. Like I said that over and over again. I'm like now, I mean, you know, because everybody's like, you know, these are adults. They this. I get it. And you're right. They are adults and they do. I'm not saying it's the traditional what people are concerned about as far

as trafficking. But what it, what it is is under the law, this person's in another state. I contacted that person. paid them to fly here and come here and for sexual purposes. That's it. You meet the definition and they got on the stand and said that's what it is. Well, she met the definition by that, but I think she meets a higher standard, which was sort of the other people by fraud or force. He was, that video of him beating her. Yeah. That was allegedly during one of these freakoffs, right? So if he's beating her into staying, that's trafficking right there. Right. I mean, if you bought, if you bought that argument, you bought the trafficking. But I'm saying the other people contact people to come from out of state, too, that also is trafficking, right?

It is. And you know what? That's where it fractures for me, too, because I thought, I didn't think I saw trafficking as strong. I didn't see as strong of a case, to be honest. I understood why they did not find him guilty of trafficking when it came to the second victim who testified and he was found not guilty of those charges. I did see it for Cassie, but, you know, other people said they didn't see it.

And I understand that. But then again, she's a witness, you know what I'm saying? And so they don't want to charge her because she's helping with the case. So do we charge, do you want to be a witness or do you want to be a defendant? Like she's, I'll be a witness. Right. Okay, great. You're a witness.

We won't charge you, you know, for you to be a witness. So not that they don't. Okay. Not that they don't charge. So I'm saying maybe they thought, hey, there's, well, and I'm actually thinking about when she was contacting other people and bringing them in, too. Even when Cassie was. When Cassie was.

Like maybe they didn't charge her for that. I know you're saying, no, her being under duress and being abused. Yeah. She's for trafficking. Yeah. I always think traffing as you're moving them from one area to the next area. But, you know. So trafficking is one of those crimes, too, that is very new in our understanding in the law

and how people understand it. And I think the way that they were prosecuting it is extremely new. And I don't think people can I identify it. Just like with the, so with the RICO counts, we think of RICO traditional. organized crime, like mafia families, and that's how they were prosecuted. So this is a different use of that. Right. Right. But I think even if they proved one or two of the charges, even if you could say, oh, maybe they met the standard, jurors are still people in the going, is this really a criminal organization? Or was this an organization that sometimes committed

crime or helped him facilitate or cover up crimes? At the heart of RICO, is this? Was he running a crime empire? No, I don't think he's a weirdo. Like, I don't think that is a horrible, guy. And I mean, I really, really dislike him. And I think he's guilty of a lot of crimes, but I don't know if they, for Rico, it was kind of weak for me too. Yeah, everything's kind of trafficking now. Like when I was growing up, trafficking was just pimping. It's just pimping. Just pimping when you were growing up. Yeah. It was just pimping. But how can that? Old school pimping. I went and got some girls from the bus station. They just ran away from home from the trailer park and their stepfather. And, you know,

they just need some place to say. I'm giving an opportunity. So that was, you know, but now it's Now, because trafficking sounds a lot worse than pimping. Trafficking sounds, well, I think you do a lot more time for trafficking than just pimping, you know. Yeah, I mean, who could have seen this even, I wouldn't have seen this coming even when I was working in federal probation. And that's, I mean, that's 20 years ago. So granted, I'm getting there too, but you couldn't see this coming. But what you can see coming is that he is going to be walking free soon. And do you get, do you get, do you, do you, do you, uh,

have a TikTok account? I have a TikTok, but I have to tell you, I'm like a Luddite. I'm terrible at TikToking. They keep saying, like, be breezy. I'm like, I'm not really great. I'm not breezy in the way that, like, you know, kids or other young people make TikToks and it's all funny. I'm like, oh, my hair didn't look good there or I said. I don't mean you making them.

Oh. I mean, do you have an account where you scroll every once in a while? Well, I'm like, I have an account because I try to make them. But, yeah, yeah. Have you seen the ones, the Johnson and Johnson ones? No. No. No.

Are you serious? Oh, gosh. Yeah. No. You know, I watch these, I know I sent it to Colby. Hold on. So I know it's on Colby. Well, there was like another thing.

So someone asked me in an interview, like, what was the point of all the baby oil? And I'm like, they're just trying to. They're trying to dirty him up. And it's like, it has nothing to do with a, the baby oil has got nothing to do with a crime. They're just trying to make him so gross. And it works, but it's got nothing to do with the crime. I mean, there are so many. That's kind of funny.

That version of it is, see, I think that's the only one I sit. Listen, I don't in and date Colby the way I do other people. Like, I know Wade has at least four or five Johnson Johnson baby. You know, I really think in the, I could be wrong, but I really think in their closing statements, the prosecutor actually said something to the effect of, and he transported that baby oil or that lubricant across state lines. You're like, what? I swear, I think that was a thing.

And I'm like, oh, I mean, the baby oil. You're breaching. Like, it's so. It's like, can we get it? He's gross. Right. It's gross. Who likes that much baby oil?

I don't get it, but, you know, the memes are, yeah. Oh, but they're, they're so good. Yeah, they are good, actually. I should get more on TikTok then. See, I don't know how to use TikTok well enough. And there's, there are, so then people started using the AI where they've got his face on other people. And I mean, it's so over the top hilarious. Oh, yeah.

I mean, what a time to be alive. What a time. My problem is I watch these TikToks and I don't know what's real or not. I don't know if that's AI or not. I only know because I'm looking, I'm like, did. did not get out of prison so he could I know that's not him but boy that's good and all the

it's just just hilarious yeah I mean this is this is one of those interesting times for me I'm like I've been in the true crime world for now I mean over 20 years but I've never seen anything like the last two years with

trials in our world you know you just social media and that just what's coming out on social media because Look, look, up to, I'm sorry, did I interrupt you? No, go ahead. Up to the trial, leading up to the trial, the amount of social media speculation, which wasn't being, it's never presented as speculation.

Right. It's 100%. Oh, there are underage tapes. He's been called with the prosecutors. They're going to re-indy. They just got a whole. It's like, what are you doing? Yeah.

There's none of that. Right. You know, like they've got, if they, you think they wouldn't have mentioned that? They're talking about baby oil. Like, they'll throw, they're throwing everything against the wall. They would have said that. Yeah. I teach a crime in media class.

So it's, this stuff is kind of crazy to me too. Yeah. The media framing of, of this, the media reporting and the frames and the, the narrative and the lack of truth or. We, you know what I always mentioned is that, you know, when people are like, oh, this and that. I'm always like, well, wait a, you know, you don't really know yet. You got to wait and see and no, but you this. Wait a minute. You know, you have to understand, like look at, and I always go back to.

when, and I'm like, well, I'm like 10 years older than you, at least, okay. About. Okay. When the, I forget, I haven't a son, there was an older lady, a grandmother, drives through McDonald's, you remember this case, drove through McDonald's, went to get her, her coffee, the lid wasn't on top because the coffee was so hot, the lids don't go on tight enough and the the the styrophone would get soft yeah they hand it to her the lid pops off drops right into her yes burns her yes scolds her yeah she sues McDonald's goes to trial they don't

they don't accept the lawsuit right they don't I mean they don't accept a they don't mediate they don't we're not going to come up and settle we're going to go to trial they go to trial she gets three and a half million dollars yeah might be two and a half might be four it was a lot of money And the news went nuts on these lawsuits are ridiculous and this and that, it's horrible and it's this and is that. But here's the problem. What people don't know is, you know, there had been over 1,500 complaints about, and it was like over the last 10 years, it'd been like 15,000 or 20,000 complaints for McDonald's coffee. Right. Boiling hot.

Right. People were being burned. Right. So that, so they never say that on the news. No. They never say that this woman, not only did she, they always make, like, she got burned. Like, it was nothing. Like, it was a light sunburn.

Right. No, no, she had to have reconstructive surgery on her vagina. How much is that worth? And it wasn't that she, they gave, it was to punish McDonald's for doing something that harmed people, that you knew harmed people. And by the way, that the, like a food and drug administration had come in and find you. You're paying fines to keep your car. this hot to burn people because because in their little forms that you fill out,

what do you like? Oh, I love that the coffee's always hot. Yeah, but it doesn't have to be 200. It doesn't have to be scalding. It doesn't have 240 degrees. Yeah. So, yeah. And here's the thing is that, and this is what I was trying to mention to people. You didn't hear all that. You heard what was on the news. Do you know who heard the true story? What? Who? The jury. Yeah. And they determined that she, that she was burned. It was preventable. They, They've known about this. It's a problem. They want McDonald's to change their policy and to do that.

They had to hit them where it hurt, which is in their pocketbook. Financially. Right. And that's it. Like, like, so you don't know. Just like before the trial, everybody's sure that there's all kinds of sex rings and all these things that are coming up. But it didn't come out. And let's point out also, the trial's over.

But unless did you watch every bit of that trial, did you have to really, like, if you missed witnesses, if you missed evidence, if you missed even pretrial motions, like things, if you missed all that stuff, you still don't have the whole story, but the jury does. Right. So when people get frustrated, too, with jurors, like, I remember when Casey Anthony was acquitted. I was just thinking Casey Anthony. I remember people calling me, your damn criminal justice system acquits people like this, they're always getting away with murder.

And I'm like, first of all, people don't always get away with murder. It's like, you know, you get really, we get really heated about these celebrity cases. that are like the 1% of 1% that we see and think like the system is based on that. But second of all, at the end of that case, I think she killed her daughter, of course. But the jury heard, the prosecutor saying, we can only surmise or hope that she used the chloroform

before she did certain things. It was like, we could only hope that this happened. So the jury gets back there and they're told, you have to have beyond a reasonable doubt that these things happened. They didn't know. They just didn't know. And even though you're frustrated, we're frustrated with that, I don't think that's the, if you don't know, or if you're not sure, you're supposed to, according to the law, acquit.

So I think that happens where we just, you know, don't know everything. Unfortunately, these cases, though, are going to shape our perceptions of justice when these cases are so extreme and it's not the ordinary case in our criminal justice system. Right. Yeah. I was going to say, OJ is another example that, like, do I think he butchered those two people? Of course he did. But then I also think, but the moment you have a detective who's willing to get on a stand and just blatantly start lying, and he was in charge of all of the, you know, the evidence and the blood evidence, like, you have to go. And this is the guy's word I'm supposed to take.

Like, then it becomes, I'm sorry, he's got to walk free. It's horrible. There was so much more going on with that case, though, too. It was about, like, you know, there was the race dynamic and frustrations. There was, you know, we always say that extra legal characteristics, They're so much more influential. Like the jury, they didn't like Marsha Clark, but they love Johnny Cochran. He made an impression on them, things that shouldn't have mattered to them.

But, you know, one of the things they all said was they believed Mark Furman was a dirty cop and that, you know, they didn't trust him. So it's like, I mean, I still think that's one of the biggest injustices. But, you know, you can't be in the mind of a jury and we don't know everything. Right. Right. But the jury, the jury made the, you know, unfortunately. I mean, I think they made the right decision. But I also think he's guilty.

Oh, I see. Yeah. You can absolutely think that. Yeah. There's a legal standard and there's, you know, what you think is there's factual guilt and actual guilt. Right. I mean, I could have been on the, actual guilt and legal guilt. I could have been on the jury and thought, I think he did it. And I still would have said, but I'm going to, I'm sorry, I'm going to say not guilty. But you think he did it. Yeah, I think he did it. Yeah, I think he probably did it. But the truth is this guy is part of the reason that I think. You know what I'm saying? Like this guy's lying. He's lying about this. He's lying about this. He's lying. He's lying. lying about that. He was in charge of the blood evidence. He was there when it was. He went from here to here. Like, is it possible? Yes. Okay, I'm not sending the guy to jail for the rest of his life because, and it's because of that. The moment you, that guy entered the picture, it was over. The process was tainted. It happened in the Karen Reed case recently, too. Karen Reed's case, like, you found out that the lead prosecutor, sorry, the lead detective handling it, the lead trooper. He was making all sorts of inappropriate comments about her, sending information to friends outside the case.

It's like, well, and then didn't they, the process was tainted. Before he and the other guys, their phones were going to be subpoenaed. We, we immediately wipe our phones and then, and then discard them, destroy them. I'm sorry, we're done. To me, I'd be like, she goes free. No, that case, I mean, I think acquittal was the only thing for them. And I don't know that they had anything to do with this guy's murder. Maybe they're all doing illegal shit or cheating on their wives.

I don't know. However, the optics look terrible. And when we're talking about reasonable doubt, it was right you know front and center so i mean it was so funny is you guys trying to ensure that she's found guilty just ensure that she's set free yeah it would have been better that they got your phones and found out some dirt that you're doing right she probably would be in jail right now and say what you did yeah yeah it's i mean it could have been enforced that could attain to the process too so so what so what is your thought process on what uh did he ends up getting

back to Did he? Yeah, I think he's going to get a couple of years and he's going to get out very soon. He's already, not 10 months, yeah. So do you think he's back home in a year or 18 months? Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I really do. Do I think that's justice? No, not exactly, but do I understand why the jury came to the conclusion?

Yeah, I mean, that's just a fact. He had the lawyers that he had and they created the doubt that they could. and I do think some of the charges maybe were just a bridge too far for them. So, yeah, you know, the most you can hope for at this point is that he learned maybe some type of lesson. Unfortunately, with guys like him, you know, he's got a history, and I know he's not convicted of certain crimes, but I believe there are other crimes that he's committed. I believe he's a violent guy. I believe he's used violence against men, females.

I do think he's committed sexual assaults. I think you get more emboldened, the more power you have. have, the less control that people have over you. But getting away with it just keeps reinforcing that you can do whatever you want. So some people might say, well, he's barely going to get a sentence. So isn't he going to learn that he can get away with it again? Other people might say, well, no, I mean, this is, you know, this was, he's in the MDC, it's a pretty bad place. He's going to do real time. The entire world has exposed to him. You know, there are probably going to be other crimes at some point that he's charged with in a different way. So maybe that's

the deterrent that he needs. The thing that we can just all agree on and hope for is that when he gets out, he doesn't do anything wrong. Like he just... Yeah, hopefully this is, this scares the absolute terrifies him. Right. Hopefully this is the deterrent, the scare that he needed. And he's also how old is he? So he's 55, or 54. So he's also at the end of, I'd say, for violent crimes, although people who are domestic abusers, you don't always age out of that. However, we can hope that he's aged out of crime. I hope that real victims file more lawsuits. I hope it gets bogged down a little bit in the courts.

I think it's what he deserves. However, this is what a jury decided. And, you know, I understand the decision, even if I don't agree with it. Well, plus, I think he's suing a bunch of people, too. I'm sure. Ariel Mitchell and Courtney Burgess are being sued because they went on law and crime and talked about how he had been, how Courtney had been gone in front of the grand jury

and been asked about tapes of children that he said he had. And so they brought him in front of the grand jury for him to testify about it. And he had a hand over his cell phone and I think they see some, they might have seized some computers. So wait, he's doing them for what, though?

So, so, um, Diddy's lawyers are suing, uh, suing them because they went, well, one, Courtney came on this program and said he had video of Diddy having sexual intercourse with, um, Usher, Justin Bieber. Okay. What, uh, Will Smith's son, which I should know his name. Uh, I don't. Jaden. Jaden. Yeah, okay. And Jaden's, so he.

So he said he had those tapes. We had this whole conversation. Okay. It went on and on. We've had them on a few times. And then- Well, if he didn't have tapes like that, and if he's not producing that, then- Well, here's, listen to how funny this is.

He says all that, says all that, they go to his house within a few days. Yeah. And they serve him a subpoena. And a couple days later, so then he gets this lawyer. Yeah. A couple days later, he's in front of a grand jury. Yeah. After they leave the grand jury, he and Ariel are on the courtroom.

steps. They do a little press conference with, I want to say, who is it the TMZ? Like TMZ and then they go from there. They go on to law and crime. And they do a, they do a little interview with them talking about what he was asked about. And then after that whole thing, he comes back on here. He talks about how on the grand jury, they played our interview and he had that he's like oh yeah he's like they love the the grand jury loves your interview our interview so he talks oh thanks did they have any feedback no nice um tell do you tell tell us subscribe so uh he does that and then after that interview they come back they subpoena him again and they ask him to come back because the truth is he's lying and by now he's changed his

lies a little bit and they want to bring them back they're going to catch him we're going to catch you now we're going to get you to come back and now lie again and we're done yeah and so The next time she comes in and she said, by this point, I think Ariel realized, oh, you're like a pathological liar. Yeah. You're constantly lying. And so at this point, she says, no, you can't go back in. I'm not let you. So she says, no, if he goes back in, he's pleading the fifth because she's realizing what's happening.

Yeah. The problem is, Diddy's lawyers filed suit against her and him, and they hired a lawyer who contacted me. And I talked to him on the phone several times. He's like, look, I've watched all your, because I did multiple videos about it. He's like, I watched all your. your videos. He's like, I found out more watching your videos about what was going on than I did researching the case. Do you think they're going to subpoena you? I don't know. It'd make great content. I hope they do. I know, right? I was just thinking that. It's super fun. It would make great

content. It sounds like they have a good lawsuit too. Yeah. Well, here's what's funny about that is that we did one thing where we basically were, so here's what happened. Initially what happened was there was a book that was written called Kim's Lost Words, which was written by Kim Porter. Yeah, Did he's a long time love, he said. Baby mama that died. Yes. So Courtney, this is how many times the life, initially came out and said that the day after her funeral, he was given a, the first day it was one, one, one,

Not flash drive, one flash drive. Okay. That contained a whole bunch of videos, those videos we talked about. Okay. And the manuscript to her memoir that was Damning. Okay. He then gave that, it's a long, I'm shorten it. I'm going to shorten it.

I'm going to shorten it up. So he then gave that, or he got screenshots of the videos and gave those to Todd, Chris Todd, a guy named Chris Todd. Okay. kind of a kind of a true crime writer and so he and Chris Todd then went

and tried to shop the videos around so then Jaguar Wright and a bunch of these people that are kind of like rap podcasters or influencers start talking about

there's there's people right now trying to find a buyer for the sex for for Diddy's sex tapes. Oh, my gosh.

This is all prior to him being arrested and indicted. Wow. So by doing that, it started a whole firestorm. And then Diddy, of course, is rated, indicted, arrested, grabbed. And then it really blows up. Then they put out the memoir. They then publish it on Amazon. It's up for about about a month.

Okay. Sells 30,000, roughly 30,000 copies. It's on Amazon bestseller list. Okay. And then it's taken down because of a lawsuit and a cease and desist because they actually use a copywritten photo of Kim Porter. So they take it down. They get taken down. Now, so, but here's the problem is because of all.

Then he gets, he comes on and we talk about it. We talk, Courtney and I do a thing. Then he gets subpoenaed. Then he has to go in front of the grand jury. But in the meantime, when all this hits, here's the problem. He may have done, like everybody's like, yeah, they're going to get things. they're going to use them. It's going to be there. You know, he's like, what he's done is great for the prosecution. But the truth is, if you know

anything, he really what he did, if you know the whole backstory that that's why that rumor got started by basically Courtney's just lying. He wrote, he wrote the whole thing. It's all fabricated. Yeah. There's no thing. He wrote it. He put it out the whole thing. Because what he did later was he starts telling lie. Then it becomes he got those discs or those flash drives. First, it was then it was two weeks before she died. Then it was a month. Then it was a couple months before she died. Then he, like, he's story. He can't keep his story straight.

And so then, of course, one of the things he was saying was he had watched the videos. Oh, gosh. He's like, yeah, well, I had to transfer him from the flashout to my thing. So now he's talking about transferred from. I was just going to say that. From one device to another, showing it to other people watching. He's not the whole thing, but I watched enough to know it was Bieber. I watched enough to know that so-and-so Usher was drunk when it was happening.

I mean, he's just put himself. You're watching shop. That thought you just admitted to C.P. You just had possession. Yeah, yeah. Manufacturing because you're, you're, you're, and you're shopping. You gave it to a guy to shop it. You're trying to sell it.

Wow. So first I think they've had them come in and talk about it. Now, of course, who knows what he said in front of the grand jury? And then, of course, he said, he said that they got, they got the videos. That they got them. Yeah. But they didn't get them. Because they never existed.

Because they, because it's a lie, the big lie. And if they got them, they would have indicted you. I mean, yeah. So anyway, and that's why I think they brought them back once they realize there are no disc, there are no tapes, there are no this. And you've changed your story multiple times. We're now going to get you to go back. And then Ariel, being a decent attorney at this point, realizing what's going on,

she's like, yeah, I'm not going to let you go back in front of these people. But the problem is, is because all that came out, Dittie's lawyers are suing them. And then his lawyer reached out to me. She hired her lawyer. He reached out. He reached out to me. And, you know, he was like, you know, he was like, you know, he was like, is it possible. Do you think it's possible that those tapes exist?

I was like, absolutely not. I don't believe that. Like I felt like, you know, and I know he would have loved for me to say absolutely yes. And then he'd be like, great, I can use you as a witness. Right. But I don't. And I've already gone, I've already done multiple videos where I said, it's all a lie. Yeah.

You can't believe anything that says, according to court he says. So, but I'm saying he's, Diddy's probably going to get out. He's probably going to sue a lot of people. He's probably going to sue several of these organizations that have come out and said, did he this and did the he's suing a long crime no i'm sure he's going to right but i think he's going to get sued as well i think he's going to be oh yeah yeah well because now he's been found guilty of well but it's it's prostitution yeah but there are members so he can be sued by other victims that could come forward in a civil court the standard for conviction is much less

yeah you know yeah preponderance of the evidence so i think he's going to be a party to lawsuits i mean i think this is going to be you think about ruin him or i think it's probably I think he's ruined. But will it drain him of his resources? Well, I don't think civil suits ever drain people of their resources and the judgments, maybe the legal fees, because if you've ever heard people talk about, like, the most famous example you can give in my classes that I do is the OJ case and the Goldman's. Because they've never gotten anything, right?

So Kim Goldman, when we spoke with her, talks about, like, you think, like, we were awarded this money. We never saw a dime. And you have to chase that money. So she's like, even us, you know, vigorously chasing it because we just didn't want him to have it. Yeah. And we still never got anything.

So I think even if there are settlements against him, I don't know, that'll drain him. Legal fees might drain him. How much is he really going to be drained? How much did this defense cost him a lot of money? I think it'll be unending. And there's going to be, you know, like you said, you guys, you're talking about this guy who's like exploiting this situation and making everything worse and wasting people's time and resources.

because obviously, if there are videos of Diddy having personal relations with children, you have to, you know, the investigation, you got to, you know, this is serious. And so, like, look what he's done. I mean, look what that's done, that misinformation. Well, now, listen, in Courtney's defense, okay, we did get a lot of views on those videos. I mean, it is. So, you know, Courtney, I, you know, I'm, I don't believe you. you've got some issues, but we did get a lot of views.

I mean, you got a lot of views. And honestly, in the podcast world, that's really important. I mean. I don't think that was part of his plan, but he did make a chunk of money. Those got the guy, they made a chunk of money. I almost wonder if he was hoping you would make a lot of money and get a lot of views. No, he wasn't, but he sold a lot of books. Yeah.

He told, I mean, listen, 30,000 copies in roughly a month. I don't know if it was like. Not good at math, though. What are they charged for the book? Like, how much money was that? 30,000 times what? Oh, I know exactly what they made. Oh, you do?

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So here's the multiple problems. One, I've done several. Stop. You know how fast. you were going, I'm going to have to write you a ticket to my new movie, The Naked Gun. Liam Neeson. Buy your tickets now. I get a free chili dog.

Chili Dog, not included. The Naked Gun. Tickets on sale now. August 1st. Podcast on it. Okay. On this already with a few different people. Okay.

And I've been saying he's getting 15 to 20 years. Did he? Yeah, I'm wrong. No, no. Prior to being found guilty. Oh. Because here's what I was going on. Oh, yeah.

Well, at first, I thought he'd be convicted longer too. Yeah. I thought he was going to get trafficking, for sure. And I said it because knowing the federal system where everybody's like, and I'm thinking, you guys don't seem to understand, they're going to say enough bad things about him in front of the jurors. The jurors will hate him. And because he's sitting there, he's been indicted. He's sitting in that chair.

The judge hates him. The judge says, okay, which of these counts? They've decided he's a despicable human being. They're going to find him guilty of every, even though he wasn't like, even though he doesn't meet the, meet the criteria under the law, they don't care. They don't like them. They're going to say, okay, we got an opportunity to smash this guy. They don't know what he's going to be sentenced to.

Yeah. They're just, is he guilty? Yeah, yeah, he's guilty of that. He's guilty. And that's what I think, despite whether he was found, whether he actually meets the criteria of those, or breaking the law, those laws or not. That's what I thought because that was my, that's my experience with the federal court. And I was wrong.

And then so he ended up with two charges. Yeah. And the problem is, I made a bet with James. And he immediately, now I remember making the bet, and I shouldn't say this because James will take advantage of it. I made a bet that I said, I said he'll get more than 10 years. Oh, okay. James goes, I think it's less than 10.

He goes, so if he gets more than 10, he's like, you win. I go, yeah, you're like less than I win. I say, yeah. And I said, okay. And so, and we had a dollar amount. And so as soon as he was found guilty and people were saying he's going to get whatever, he came back and he said remember our bet under 10. I think he gets under 10. He goes, I've already won because he can't

get more than 10. He said, so it's under 10. He said, you lost the bet and I went and I said, if I remember correctly, he said we bet a million dollars. So where is my I'm thinking to myself, I know I didn't bet a million dollars. I sure hope you didn't. Well, I'm, you know what I'm pinging, but it was either 50 or a hundred. And just me saying a hundred right now, he's now going to come back to say, you already said it was 100. Yeah, but if you look at it like if it's not a million, it's 100. That's probably a deal. It is a deal. I'm more than happy to pay James the 50 or 100.

Yeah. Yeah. So, but yeah, he, he said a million. I don't think it was a million. I feel very confident. I know what I'm positive is not a million. I mean, I really hope it wasn't. Unless I could give him a million of, of Ray's old coin that won't. Or like monopoly dollars or something. Right. Like, I don't know. Is that pesos? I don't remember. Did we say dollars? So, but, yeah. So anyway, yeah, I'm going to have to pay, pay James. Okay.

I feel like I stiffed them on the last. I owed him 50. last time. I feel like I, I paid for, I paid for dinner. Oh, that's not stiffing. I'm sure he feels like it's stiffing. Okay. So, because he's paid for lots of dinner. So he's like, no, I feel like you owed me dinner. No, then that's different. I was like, no, I got this. I already owe you 50, so we're good. He's like, I feel like we're not, I don't feel like we're good. So, yeah, so I've definitely been wrong on this and we'll see what he gets. But I think you're, yeah, I think he'll get under five. But a lot of people have said that the judge just despises him. So I don't know how much. I mean, I think that weighs a lot. You know, yes,

but we don't know anything. The judge is fairly new in Southern District. So we don't even have like a like a history. Like some of the judges that I worked with, I'd be like, oh, I know this judge. They have a history of going low or high. This is an anomaly the case in a lot of ways. He very well could wind up getting five years, but I don't know. But think about it this way, even if he gets five years, he's not getting five years. He's getting two and a half probably. He's still going to go home and he's not going to live like a normal like if he's not going to live like a normal he's not first of all he'll probably go to he'll go to a low most likely I think um what he'll go to a what a low low low security oh a low I'm like is this a new word for halfway house

yeah no no no like in in this district even if you come in with camp points yeah you go to a low first and to work your way up or down yes so I think because he's I think he's it's semi like you said it's a violent crime it's a violent crime so i think he goes to a low yeah and then i think he's he goes to a low and he's got five different people in his unit that he's putting money on their books they're buying all of his stuff for him yeah they're making his bed they're cleaning his room they're making him dinner he almost never is going to have to go in the chow hall yeah and he's going to live really as best as you can live he's going to have people looking out for him he's going to be able to watch movies and play on they have those pads now like you know he'll be able to

I think you can get you can get movies on the pad like he's going to he's going to listen to music all the guys that are want to be rappers are going to be hitting him up and he's going to be a god and they're going to think he's amazing this is even if he does anytime he could walk out of MDC and go home yeah okay yeah we'll see well you might be the Martha Stewart where somebody comes and says look at all these designs I have and she says I'm going to turn you into somebody. There you go. That's what he's going to have, he's going to walk out of there with 10 different new rap guys. A new label. Yeah, the new label. It may be the best thing ever happened to them, really. So how'd you become a probation officer? One of the things that

my mom and I love to do together was to just watch crime shows. Like I shouldn't have been up at 10 o'clock on a school night watching LA law or blue bloods or whatever it was, not blue bloods, but some other ones. It wasn't like documentaries on. Ted Bundy it was no she liked she liked law and order and no shows yeah I mean I do too I tell I tell my students don't believe it's real no but I watch it anyway um so I just yeah I was gonna say that the Jack McCoy where he's it's it's it's nine o'clock at night and they find out that the guy didn't do it and they they call up the prison and they run down there and they get the guy and get him out of prison and we have to fix this we have to do get the judge right and they get him out and

And in truth, in reality, what McCoy does is go, well, they found him guilty. I mean, it's, you know, he's got the court. It'll work itself out. Right, exactly. But you know he's innocent. Listen, you sound guilty. A jury said. Or the fact that every case goes to trial, which is ridiculous because no cases go to trial

just about, except for some of the famous ones we know. But that's where my interest came. I really just loved the shows. I wanted to be, I remember, I was watching L.A. Law, and there was a prosecutor, Grace Van Owen, and that's who I wanted to be when I grew up. I was like, I'm going to be Grace Van Owen, and that literally stuck with me all the way through college. So that's kind of... You're going for? I was going for that. So I took an internship in college. I was studying political science. I wanted to study criminal justice, but my advisor told me, I'll never forget this,

he said, criminal justice is just a passing trend. It won't be popular in a few years from now. Yeah, I know. Just like that internet thing and crypto. So exactly. So I wound of doing political science. I didn't love it. But I got- Like, you're an advisor. You look back now and you're like, why was this guy, what were his qualifications again? Yeah, I look back and I'm like, he definitely had that wrong. But that's okay. That's fair. People are going to stop. People aren't even going to be committing crimes in a couple of years. Yeah. That's where I went, though. And I did an internship with the public defender's office. And I remember I was just like all about I loved it. I loved, loved it. I liked being in the jails. I liked being in the courts. I loved the law. And so I got a job after school as a paralegal. And then I realized, oh my God, I don't want to be a lawyer. This is the worst, all these hours, briefs, litigation. I mean, it wasn't what I thought, but I loved criminal justice. It looks sexy on, on L.A. law.

It looks so good on L.A. L.A. or suits. I loved suits, too. Yeah. I mean, I still love these shows. They read three paragraphs and they've got the whole case wrapped up. But that's not really... No, it wasn't like that. It happened. So I was like, what am I going to do now? And I got my master's in criminal justice from John Jay College of Criminal Justice. If you live in the city, that's like the premier place.

And that program I loved. That was awesome. And I had a federal probation officer as a professor. I remember he was like this older guy and he used to just tell me, you have to go take the exam for federal probation, you know, he called me Sacks. Sacks, you got to be a P.O. That's where it's at. That's what I did. I never really thought about it. So that kind of led me to my path in law enforcement. And I applied for it. The market was great then. The market was like awesome for jobs then. So I applied for a couple jobs and I was between two.

I was offered a job as an investigator for the district attorney's office, which in New York is a really cool, prestigious job. or this job is a federal probation officer. And I went with a federal probation job, but it was a tough call, tough call. So what did the probation, what did that entail once you were told, hey, you've got the job? Like, do you actually go to, like, I mean, police go to an academy or something.

Do you actually do like a, you're going to be, they put you with another PO for six months or something? Or do they actually have like a course or something? Yeah, they do an academy now, but when I was there, came in just before, you have to do a lot of training. So it's not like you're not prepared, but it was all randomized, like a week of self-defense, a week of firearms, a week of handcuff training. And then I had to learn the federal sentencing guidelines because there's two parts of probation. There's the pre-sentence part, which comes when someone's been convicted,

but before they're sentenced, and then there's a supervision part. So that's your traditional probation, right? Like being supervised on parole or supervised release kind of thing. Um, well, this is going to be good. We got to talk about, we have to talk about Zach. I have a buddy who is a guy I met in federal prison in the medium federal prison in Coleman. And he was in there for fraud. I was in there for fraud. Yeah. And so he and I, because most of the people there are, you know, they're, I don't say gang members, whatever, they're drug dealers, gang members, whatever. And so, you know, he and I, there's, there's, there's, There's, I don't know, 15 white guys on the whole compound out of 1,800. Oh, wow. Well, no, I'd say there's 30. And I'd say that 27 of those guys were there for meth. So, and then you've got out of fraudsters, there's maybe five or six fraudsters at that time.

So he and I, this guy, Zach and I get to be buddies. And at some point, he goes, I go down in custody, he goes up. And eventually he gets out about six months. months to a year after I get out of prison we end up it was just by a fluke just a friend somebody had bought a painting from me and it went to it was talking to his buddy and Zach was his brother and that guy had bought a painting from me gone to his his friend's house and his friend was Zach's brother and Zach's now wearing an ankle monitor at his house and he's like you're oh he's like oh this is my brother he's like oh okay he's like yeah yeah um you got he's like oh yeah you yeah I just

got out of, you know, whatever, got out of prison. And he's like, oh, okay. He's like, oh, I know, I know a guy. I just bought a painting off of a guy that wasn't locked up in Coleman. And he's like, really? He said, oh, yeah, yeah. He said, what's his name? He goes, Matt Cox. He's like, you know where Matt Coxers running. He's like, yeah. And I mean, we were only maybe 10 minutes away, 15 minutes away from each other. Oh, really? Got on the phone, called up right now. And he goes, do you know a guy named, you know, Zach? And I was like, yeah. And he goes, hey man what's going on so we start hanging out which you're not supposed to do i was going to say that but yeah of course uh you know we hang out and he six months later six months later to a year

he um ends up you know basically shows up my house one day and says so listen you're going to be upset um and i'm like what he's like i'm probably going back to jail and i'm like what what And you're like, don't tell me too much. Yeah. Oh, no, I've had that conversation where I've been like, you know, we've started to have conversations. I want to know anything about nothing. I don't want to know nothing. I want to talk about it.

I want this. So anyway, he ends up getting his probation. I don't think it was violated. The guy, I know it was, it was violated, but he ends up getting arrested for a state charge. The state was looking into it. It was a PPP. No, it wasn't PPP. It was a, these guys were getting these, the government, the COVID checks.

And so they were making COVID checks And somebody gave him like two or three to deposit They cleared He kept one And then gave the guy the money Okay And then didn't think it was going to catch up to him For some reason

Like you don't think this is going to catch up to you So like two years later It catches up to him Oh was it a lot? That sounds like a low level fraud It is a low level fraud But it's it's counterfeit He's on federal probation for fraud

This guy This guy went off the chart Criminal History chart A long time ago He's not at like a three. He's, he starts, he's been starting at seven every time he's gone. Okay. So, I mean, he's been getting locked up since he was 25 years old.

And, and listen, talk about, you want to talk about a tragedy? Like his whole life, he's done everything, right, college degree, everything, everything, never broke a law, nothing. He's till he got to be like 24, I think it was 24, 24 years old. That's really bizarre. Yeah, never, never been in trouble. And if you talk to him. Very articulate, funny, smart, very chrysmatic.

And here's the, tell me about this old criminal, talking about chrysmal injustice. Then he's, I think he's 24 years old. He and his wife had just, were just finishing college. They had a little boy. And he's at work one day and he gets a phone call. Well, he didn't get a phone call. His boss calls him in and says, hey, can you come in here for a second?

He's like, yeah, what's up? And he's like, did you drive today? And he goes, yeah, I drove my car. Why? Why? He said, okay. He said, we're going to, he said, well, we're going to have someone to drive you to the police station. He's like, why? And he said, so I just got a phone call from the sheriff's department. Whatever's wife's name was, Jennifer, whatever he was. She was in a head-on accident. And it killed her and your son. You have to go downtown and you have to ID the body. No. They take him downtown. Cops to meet him. He IDs the body. It's them. Oh my God It takes the next four or five days

Or a week to put together a funeral And then he's like And I was like And what happened? He's like, um You know, he's like I I couldn't go back to work Like he can even when you talk to him

He can't explain it I couldn't do it And so eventually he gets his He's behind on the rent They shut off the electric Right They then he finally goes back to work And they were doing

doing the credit cards, right? The AT&T Universal Credit Cards is what they were doing. Okay. Because he works for a phone center. They're just calling up, this was AT&T. They were offering these credit cards. You call up, say, hey, would you like the AT&T credit cards? Okay.

He goes back to work finally, and he talks to a guy for 10 or 15 minutes. The guy got like a $30,000 credit card. And just as he's about to agree to take the card and everything, the guy suddenly, his wife says something in the background. and he says what you know and they have a little conversation he's yeah yeah I'm not interested and he hangs up the phone and Zach's like like and he's like the guy dragged it out for whatever 20 minutes 30 minutes 30 million you know it was and he was like any and he's he's he's like this guy just had $30,000 credit card for free doesn't even want it cost him nothing okay

and he's like and I'm going to be out of my house and I can use the $30,000 credit card so he changes the address to where it's delivered it gets shut to his house he takes it He pays off everything, able to go home and see his family, able to, like, just everything. And so he just, at that point, he starts committing fraud. Right. He starts committing fraud, and he's never stopped. He started by opportunity, though, and out of utility. Yes.

So there are certain career offenders who start really young and it's not necessarily utility. Right. So it's interesting that he started at that age. But how long? Right, because it's usually incremental, right? Like, it's from little things over time. Yeah, yeah, but usually younger. Yes, for sure.

That's what I'm saying. And when I was locked up and I was, we used to talk, you know, you tell your stories. And I knew him. I'd been hanging out with them for like a year or so in prison. And I had always asked him because he had always said, yeah, yeah, I did. Oh, no, no, the first time I got in trouble. And he told the story when he got in trouble, he did this, never talked about. One day, by happenstance, he mentions his son.

And I was like, no, your son, you have a daughter. I thought you have a son too. He's like, well, no, I had a son. All right. Tells me the story. And I'm like, so you don't think. that that had any impact on you at all? Because I'd asked him many, many times,

why did you ever start committing fraud? Right. I don't know. I was broke. I needed money. And I was like, you don't think. And he's like, no. He's just completely, no.

No, of course, no. It had nothing to do with that. And then like the next day, he came back and walked up to me and looked at me in the face. He said, well, I've been thinking about it all night. Yeah, of course. He's like, I never put that together. I've never thought about that. Really?

And he was like, you know, just, you know, guys, are they shut themselves down. They should. He never taught. I'd been hanging up for over a year. I'd never even knew he had been married and had a child that died. Never, he never brought it up. So if he, if his wife and child never died, he probably never would have entered any type of criminal world. There's a theory in criminology. We call that, you know, there's lifetime social bonds, things about that. So life course offending. And it's like people don't commit crimes because they have these really strong bonds. Right. So like he has a wife. He has a family. He's invested in society. Once you lose all those bonds, crime does become not such an unlikely thing that'll happen. And couple that

with the opportunity he had, the desperation he has. And it makes sense. It really does. So understanding the tremendous loss, it's surprising that he didn't put that together. No, you know, listen, once I said that, like, he couldn't stop think about it. He was like, and he used to say, he was like, I had done, I'd done everything right my entire life. And I struggled my entire life and he's like the person that he was like living for is his wife and his son you know and his son's like he's like 18 months old and he's they're they're just gone he's like and I remember thinking like I'm done

I'm done playing by the rules I'm done you know struggle with going through college you know working two jobs while it's going to full time like his wife you know juggling a baby juggling who's driving the good car in the back car like he was always So, yeah, he thought about it. It didn't matter anymore. Yeah, it was over. I'm done. I'm done with it.

But yeah. So he, um... So is, is he back now? Is he in jail? Is he in jail? No, I went back to jail for like a year, got out. Okay. Six months got out.

I helped him. Of course, I mean, I help him do, you know, I help you with this. I'll get you a phone, get to this, whatever you mean. I send him money now. He's in jail. I send him money every time he calls. Can you send me $150? Absolutely.

Yeah. So I do that. And then he, he had been out maybe six months. You think it was a six months or a year he got out recently that when he just got arrested? He was out for probably a year. A year. So he got up for a year. We helped set him up with a YouTube channel.

Because in between the arrest, so before his first arrest, he had came on the show. We had just started the podcast and he had became like a favorite. Like, oh, these guys have good rapport. Love him. You know, they have great stories back together. Then he goes away for a year. Comes back and everyone's like, yeah. He's back.

So you set him up with his own show? Of course. Got him monetized in third. Do you do YouTube? Or is it just, I don't know if it was just Spotify, but so within, within 30 days, he's, he's fully, he's monetized, 30 days. 30 days? Yeah, that's. Took us like two years.

That's, I'm saying that's how his watch time, when we do a show, right, it's like 22%, 25% watch time on like, you know, a, you know. Yeah, there's a drop off. Right. Well, I'm saying if it's a two hour video, we got our watch time's like 30 minutes. Okay. Roughly 25%. Right. Okay.

So when Zach comes on, it's 55%, 42%, 47. So he's a fan favorite. He's so jovial and happy and energetic and fun. And anyway, yeah, he, so yeah, so he would get him started. Everything's going great. And then it's, I get a panicked phone call from his daughter. Oh my God, they just arrested my dad. And I'm like, you know, no.

So do you, he's a guy that's deterrence doesn't work for him. So we talk about deterrence. And like sometimes deterrence work a lot of times it doesn't. But getting caught, getting punished, that doesn't deter him. Right. Okay. That's interesting. He still has a daughter, too.

So he still has like a bond there. She's 18. She's just graduated high school. She's now going to college. Yeah. And I think that I don't, you know, I don't know. He's just, and you know what's funny about it too is if I broke down, like what his, how his crimes worked.

and how he got caught, the way he would set up the crime and everything, you would go, brilliant. Yeah. Like, brilliant. And then you'd say, and here's how he got caught. And you'd be like, what an idiot. Like, are you serious? Like, like, Matt, running a massive, he's making several hundred thousand dollars a month.

He's been doing it for years. Nobody can see him. And then you go, you and your wife go and you rent, you go on vacation, and you rent a hotel room for five days, and you just stolen credit card. You've got $400,000 in a, you're going to. in your own bank account right now. Oh, that reminds me of, um, what do you do? Robert Durst, you remember him?

Yeah. He got caught. He had all this money. He's on the run. He gets caught because he stole like a $6 or $7 sandwich. But he had $40,000 in his car. It was like, you know, there's, obviously, you know this. It's, it's mental problems.

It's, it's the guy that's driving around with a, you know, he's got an expired tag and he's got a body in the trunk. Yeah. And it's like, yeah. But that's those, you know, the guy, this, um, A guy I talked to yesterday, I had lunch with him. We were talking about that. We were talking about, we were talking about just behavior in general.

We were talking about one of the things was like, it's funny, you know, the Jordan Peterson thing where it's like make your bed in the morning. You know, clean your room up. Yeah. And people think, you know, what does that mean? No, it means everything. It means everything. And he was saying in law enforcement, it's don't worry about the felonies, worry about the misdemeanors. if you find the misdemeeters, they'll lead to the felonies.

Like, the guy that's driving that car that has a broken taillight for four months, and he's also transporting drugs. Well, I don't have to, I can't, I don't know if he's got drugs. He's kind of broken taillight. Get the broken tail light, you walk up. He seems nervous. Let me search the car. You know, he's, it's those little tiny misdemeanor, stupid things that they do that

arguing with the cops when you've got a dime bag, or you've got a bag full of rocks in your pocket. And you're, like, you're in. inviting it. And then they get a red, and they like, what are you doing? You know what I'm saying? It's like, what did you? But it was the arguing with the police officer and the missed me, I'm going to put you in cuffs. Now I've got to search you. Now you're done. You knew this. Yeah. You definitely knew it. Yeah. Well, we call it too, like in criminology, we call it people make, they say people, everyone has free will and makes rational choices or can make rational choices.

We call it bounded rationality. The decisions that certain offenders make are, you can't understand. because it's not a perfectly rational person. Right. And everyone comes with their own set of rationales. They were rational. They would be working a regular job. They would have done that. Yeah, they would have done something a little bit different if they were rational.

Right. For sure. Yeah. Well, I'm sorry about your friend. I mean. No, but I, oh, I know why I said probation. I never got the probation part. Here's the thing.

Okay. The, he came on the program and we were doing a, we did a thing and he kept saying because we had him and another guy and we were reviewing fraud videos about fraud like where they go wrong what do you think and we're arguing and I'm like no this is exactly what's going he's like no I think this is I'm like what do you you know we're arguing it ends up it's it's easy content it ends up being two hours and it gets 100,000 views because people like all of the banter oh that's interesting so but the prior to prior to prior around the time when we were off camera

he was we were like man you're off probation he's like I haven't gotten the letter yet and we're like the letter doesn't mean anything and he's like I know but I want the letter yeah and I'm going yeah but Zach when I my PO came and said hey by the way on you know whatever the 12th you'll be off probation I'm like I'm like and you're going to send me the letter and she's like yeah I mean I'll get to the letter eventually I'm like well because everybody tells me the letter's important she says the letter means nothing you're off probation at the end of the 12th she's but I will mail you the letter and I was like okay so he and I'm trying to tell him that And the letter didn't me, and he's like, I just want the letter.

Now, he knew in his mind, you know, he knows he's doing stuff. He's like, I'm not really a probation. Well, yeah, well, no, he's thinking like I've been doing stuff and I'm nervous. He knew things were happening, but I didn't know that. I'm like, that means nothing. Well, here's what happened was he never gets the letter. He gets arrested. So two months later, he gets arrested.

He's never gotten his letter. And every time I talked to him on the phone, he was like, man, I still haven't got my letter. And what are you talking about? Like, I'm not realizing. And so what had happened was the detective in the fraud case goes to his PO and shows them, he says, do you know who this guy is? And that the PO says, that's Isaac Allen. He's locked up for fraud.

He's violated before. Right. He says, okay. And so he does a line up. They note it, everything. Now that's how they get the warrant, and they arrest him. As a result, by the way, they've gotten most of those charges dropped because apparently your probation officer isn't allowed to identify you in a criminal proceeding

or something. They're not allowed to participate, whatever that reason is. And so they've dropped a bunch of those charges. He's going to plead guilty to this one charge of fraud. They're giving him time served. I think that's coming up on the 18th. They're going to give him time served, and then he's going to the feds to be sentenced for his probation violation.

So, okay. And then they're going to extend his probation, too, which is... Starts all over. Starts all over. You said he committed his first crime at 24. I don't want to reveal age, but about how old is he now? He's two years older than me. So he's in his 50.

He's 58. Oh, so, I mean, yeah, he has not shown signs of slowing down. A lot of people age out of crime, but white color offenders, in fairness, don't age out like the same way that kind of what we call, like, street offenders do, who do more violent crimes too. So that definitely... Yeah, I could... There's a longer shelf life, probably.

But still, that's a long run. It is a long run. It's, you know, it is... You already know this. How long were you a probation officer? Only about three, a little over three years. That's probably enough. It's enough to be, to see people with potential and just be extremely disappointed.

Oh, for sure. You know? Like, I look at him. He's got so much potential. Yes. Yeah. I mean, that's probably the shame of it because a lot of the cases, and I did, I mean, even in three years, I had over 120 cases, you know, and I saw a lot of people who didn't

have the potential or didn't have a chance, didn't have opportunities, didn't have that. So I imagine for you it's a little bit more frustrating, like, oh. Yeah. Well, you know, it's, well, I mentioned this in the last podcast. I just, I did where it's like the, and I hate to say this. because this is such a stereotypical thing to say. And, you know, it's, and look, and there's plenty of guys that are born in the projects that work their way out of it

and end up being middle class and whatever. But the truth is, you know, you go to prison and you hear these guys' stories and you start to realize, like, this, you know, I do feel like if you're a white guy who was born middle class, you were given a lot of opportunities that you squandered as opposed to the black guy that was born in the projects who his mother's in and out of jail he's got three brothers and sisters they're on section a they're receiving food stamps she's never getting out of that situation his father's in and out of jail or he doesn't know him at all his uncles and brothers are in and out of jail um everybody the only successful people he knows are drug dealers right and then what happens he becomes 18 years old and he ends up doing what selling drugs and it's like yeah Oh, he's a horrible person. It's like, he had no row models, you know, none. As opposed to, like, in my, you know, me personally, upper middle class went to college.

Yeah. Graduated. Yeah. Starts committing, you know, well, I ran, I had a mortgage company, but as soon as things went bad, starts committing fraud. Right. Like, I can't, I don't have the, the luxury of being able to say, well, I didn't know anybody. Right. You know, everybody was doing it.

Right. I mean. So, so it's, you know, like, it's upsetting to see. So as a probation officer, I can imagine seeing these guys and knowing their situation and being like, fuck, this guy's got no fucking, this guy's got no chance at all. Like he's got, he's back in the same place. Yeah. Everybody he knows around him.

Can't even, you like these guys, can't even find any place to go because everybody in the household's got a felony. No, it's true. And I wound up seeing a lot, a lot of offenders like that. same thing in and out. In my head, too, I knew like there's nothing that is going to happen that's going to change their scenario because they are going to still have grown up with, unfortunately, not the right role models, not the right opportunity.

They live in socially disorganized areas that are poor. So, like, the strikes are really against people. And I think it's like the anomaly when people are able to become super successful when they come out of, you know, such hard beginnings. So I will tell you this also as a probation officer. my most unfavorant cases were white collar offenders. Those were the cases I didn't like. Okay.

Because I felt like all my guys that I would get, like, who possessed firearms or assaults or other things, they kind of just, they were who they were. They just owned it. Yeah, I had a gun because look where I live or, you know, because of X, Y, and Z. But the white color offenders, I felt there was a lot of trying to sugarcoat it, hide it, hide behind family. there was just a lot it was different you know they weren't as they didn't own it as much in my experience and again that was a short couple of years but you know I would look at them and go god I had some people

committed like these super awful frauds and they had a lot of money so I'm like wow you know that's it's the power of greed versus the other guys who're like they're just trying to like make a living here yeah we get those we get guys every once a while like I love the guys that come on and just just own up to everything yeah but we get guys everyone why they come on and they'll tell it'll be a two-hour podcast and you're kind of waiting for them to say like you know at this point this is what I did and I should and a lot of times they they don't a lot of times they're you you're talking to me you're like and you know they're like yeah and then I was indicted and you're like wait a minute we what why were you indicted and then well because

they said this and this and but really that was normal and you're sitting there talking and you're like I was locked up a long time yeah and I've talked to a thousand people at least yeah and heard hundreds of stories, and I'll be honest with you, there's maybe one or two guys that I thought, you shouldn't be here for the length of, you're not innocent, you're not innocent, but I think you got a raw, you shouldn't have gotten 20 years or 10 years, but I don't think, listen, you should have got three for stupidity, but maybe you didn't, the crime you're here for, you didn't really commit, but just you, the problem was, you were so stupid because you put yourself in this situation and this and this and this and now there's nothing

you could have done. And then you could have pled guilty and gotten probation, but you didn't. You went to trial and now you're doing 15 years. Trial penalty. So, yeah, there it is. Yeah. So, I mean, I hear you because I like the guys that will just say, you know, yeah, and this happened and, you know, I could have done this.

I could have done this. I didn't think anybody was going to, you know, they'll just say it. I feel like more, maybe not in probation, but when I got out of probation, like as an academic doing criminology, I started writing books, visiting prisons, taking students in. So I got to know this group in New Jersey called the lifers group. You ever hear of them? It's kind of a famous group. Like, they were the first to have people come in the prisons and, like, meet with them

and question them and ask them about their crimes directly. So I would take students in. And these guys are, they're there for 30 years to life. They're all there for some form of murder, whether it be felony murder, which I think is actually an antiquated, silly rule whereby you have to spend, you know, life in prison for a murder if it happened in the course. course of a different crime even if you didn't pull the trigger you know these guys you know a lot of them are caught in this felony murder loophole but you know the guy that goes in the bank kills

somebody and the car sitting in the getaway car is now doing 30 years but the crazy thing with that also is that some of the guys that I know that got caught in there the actual trigger man turned and got much less time oh yeah yeah which to me just it's so it doesn't make any sense but so many of them are so honest about their their lives and their backgrounds and it's all bad like I don't know any one of those guys who's like, I grew up in a really good home and I'm just an idiot. They don't blame it on the circumstance, but they're like, yeah, I grew up selling drugs because that's what we did. That's what my father did.

My brother did. Like, that's what our lives were. But like most of the guys I know, at least they were in there for a very long time, totally own their offenses. You know, it doesn't make them monsters. It doesn't make them innocent, but it means they're people. And they messed up and they're going to get out, hopefully, you know, 30 years and do something. I like what Tom Simon's, he's a retired FBI agent that says, and this is, he always says

this in his, when he would convince people to, when he'd interrogate them and get them to sign a confession. Yeah. One of his things that he always said was, listen, you know, he's like, I know you didn't mean to do this. I know this. I know that he's like, and nobody should be, nobody should ever be judged on the worst thing that they've done.

He's like, it was a one-time thing. I get it. But you know what I'm saying? Yeah. Because nobody wants to be judged. Nobody wants to be judged the rest of their life on this one moment or this one thing that they did. So, yeah, whenever I do like keynote speeches or I'll talk at universities and stuff,

you always by Zoom on the universities. Oh, okay. Yeah, they're not paying. So, but the kids ask questions, you know, the students ask questions. But I'm always so blatantly open and honest about everything. They're always just like, like everybody, you could, the look on their face. are just, I think, because I'm just not justifying anything and this is the way it is and that's it. You're telling your story. You're sharing it. But yeah, you're not justifying it.

You're open about it. And the teachers and they're always coming out like, wow, like we've had people on before, but they've always, like, you know, they always sugarcoat it. They always try and put a twist on it like it was just a mistake. I mean, I did now. It was blatant from the very beginning. Yeah. So you had to learn the sentence and guidelines. I think that's what We were about to talk about it because I was going to ask something about that. And then I immediately thought about Zach. Yeah, I had to learn the sentence and guidelines. And I didn't know.

I didn't really get it because I thought traditional probation work was you supervise people. Right. And so when I got the interview, they were like, are you interested in pre-sentence or supervision? I was like supervision. And they were like, you know what? You're a pre-sentence officer. I was like, oh, okay. I didn't realize that.

They were short on them. But that's true, actually. Yeah. I thought they did, but I just assumed that they did both. They do in certain districts. Ours didn't. But they do. Federal and states, everyone handles it differently.

Some will split that right down the middle. For us, we were strictly divided. And this was 2003 when I started, Southern District of New York. So I was a pre-sentence officer. And I still thought it was kind of cool. Like you're investigating people who have been convicted of federal crimes. And you're making a recommendation to the judge. what do you think is an appropriate sentence for these people? So I went, yeah, this is. At that point,

that was the sentence, right? That was before it was advisory, right? Yeah. So that's what I didn't know either. And that's where I was like, this kind of sucks. The sentencing guidelines dictated the course of everything. And for people don't know sentencing guidelines, it's basically like a chart. And you have a vertical, sorry, a horizon, you know, axis and a vertical one. I'm really bad at the opposites there, but on one side of the page, you have the offense you've committed, and that's given a score. Across the top, you have your criminal history category. You draw a line between two of those, and you have a sentencing range in months. So anything that we were even doing outside of that, I was like, I'm investigating, I'm meeting with their families, I'm looking into their

education, child support payments, mental health. I'm like, why are we doing all this if we're just going to give them a range? And the explanation was that, you know, they can go, they can go lower or higher in the range, and sometimes there are departures from the range in extraordinary circumstances. But it was like very perfunctory. It was just calculating a range. These people came down to, you know, a chart in a range. And for me, that was, you know, it was a little bit, it was disillusions. And then also there was the mandatory minimum sentences. A lot of the cases that I got were drug offenses. And I thought, oh, that's good because, you know what, there's a lot of drug kingpins so we can help get, you know, reduce some of these kingpins and we're

going to be, you know, doing this work. I never saw a kingpin. Okay, I saw a lot of people who were poor and running drugs. That's what I saw. And with that one act, most of them who committed an act, we're going to get a mandatory 10 years. Nothing anyone could do about that. And, you know, after a couple of years, I was like, gosh, do I really want to do this for 25 years? You know, people were burnt out. I'm going, I don't know, this system kind of sucks. Like, this isn't right. And then when you come up with that, then the, you come up with a number. Yeah. And then the defense attorneys argue. And then the court or the, I'm sorry, the U.S. Attorney's Office argue. So then now you're in between that whole argument of that, you gave him an enhancement.

Oh, yeah. That doesn't qualify because of this. And so now you're arguing this. And then there's absolutely, in fact, he also deserves this enhancements. Like, that's got to be even more of a prolonged part of So that's an interesting point you bring up, too, because even though there's guidelines, there's discretion in those guidelines. There's, you know, with a prosecution is going to lean towards the heaviest or, you know, get those numbers up. And the defense is going to say, no, no, no. You've assigned this wrong. This is the wrong enhancement. There was no bodily injury. I mean, for example, like discretion. If you looked at the robbery, the guidelines for robbery, you'll see there are enhancements. So you add levels on. There's bodily harm, serious bodily harm,

critical, like, and it keeps going up, too, four, six, eight levels. You might think something like, you might think, hey, someone got punched in the ribs. That's nothing. And I might go, well, they couldn't breathe or they lost, you know, I think it's serious. So there are, also, there's discrepancies about where you want to wind up. And, you know, this is most relevant now because of the Diddy case. And this has come up in this case, specifically, what the prosecution hopes for, what the defense is going for, and how far off they are in those recommendations. Well, I was going to say, and that's a great segue, except I want to make this about me. Okay.

Yeah. So my base level offense was, it was for bank fraud. So was it eight or 12, I forget. I think it was like a 12 for bank fraud. Oh, well, that's low. What was your criminal history category? I think it was two because I was currently, I was on federal probation when I caught the new case. So I think it was criminal history too.

Okay. And so I, and it was a loss of $6 million. Oh, well, that's where all your, so. What did the base level go to after that? So it wasn't that bad. I should have gotten, I should have gotten, was it, was it like, I was still at like, six or six or eight years okay i got nearly 20 years of enhancements for what kind of things uh changing jurisdiction to evade detection sophisticated means uh using a specialty device and furtherance of your

crime which was a computer that's a specialty device that's what they that's what they had yeah more borrowing more than a million dollars from one financial institution okay uh You know, over 50 victims, which they manufactured some of the victims. So listen to this, this killed me. I love this. When they were coming up with the victims, I was like, I don't understand. I said, you have countrywide loans, you have countrywide bank, you have countrywide home loans, and you have countrywide financial.

Aren't they all the same? I said, they're all owned by countrywide. And they said, no, these are all individual corporations. And each corporation is a different individual. And you borrowed from them. And I was like, and I look at my lawyer and she's like, yeah, that's how it works. And I was like, okay. But then wait.

Then I said, okay, that's fine. I said, but you have me borrowing over a million dollars from one financial institution. They are right. I said, you have countrywide. I said, countrywide home loans, I owe $250,000 from. Countrywide bank, I owe $600,000. Countrywide financial, I owe. And I said, you're adding them up.

to get me to over a million dollars. Yeah. And I look at my attorney and she goes, they can do that. Yeah. And I'm like, but you can't do both. You're counting them one as individuals. And then you're combining them. I said, that's like double jeopardy.

And she's like, they're like, no, Matt, that's not how it works. And then I was, then the other one was. And she, so I said, and she was going to argue that one. Don't worry. I'm going to argue that in front of, okay. And then the other one was, well, you, I was surveying. don't judge me. Okay. I was surveying homeless people to get their information so I could then go get driver's licenses, passports, open up bank accounts, buy houses. Because they're somebody that isn't

using their information. Like my fear was, I would put an ad in the newspaper to take applications for homes. I then do the same thing. My problem with that was, what if this guy gets a DUI two states over? Right. And I get pulled over and I don't know it. Yeah. So I don't want these people looking into their credit. So with the homeless people, they weren't using it. I gave them 20 bucks to take a survey. So I had a survey. I made up a statistical, federal statistical survey, you know, 2705. Federal statistical survey. It looked very official. It had a little logo and everything. I mean, that sounds. It did. It was great. It sounds great. FBI asked me where I got it. And I was like, no, I made that. I used a special device, a computer. And I had a badge.

it said statistical surveyor. And it had a picture, which was my mug shop. So I would go around and I would take surveys from home. I'd go, hey, by the way. And here's where it fell apart. I said, hey, I'm taking surveys. And they said, for what? And I said, well, basically what I said was I'm a surveyor who's taking surveys

for the Salvation Army to determine where we place our next homoicility. They say, oh, I'm not interested. I go, it pays $20 cash right now. It's 17 questions. Take five minutes. Okay. You go, 20 bucks right now, you're going to, right now. Yeah.

They go, yeah, what do you need? Yeah. Take their information, go home, order their birth certificate, you know, social security card, everything. And then I go get a driver's license, their name, passport, whatever. So when I, so I got an enhancement for using a charitable institution and furtherance of my crime. It's not only right. the here's the thing the um they give an example to help clarify if that's not clear then they

they they and they send us the guy like they give you an example of what do we mean by this right here is the example someone's going door to door knocking and saying that they work for the american cancer society and they're asking you to donate to the cancer society so my that was my lawyer and i was like that's not i didn't borrow i gave these guys you didn't take any money and i'm like And first of all, these guys didn't care that I said Salvation Army. I could have said ABC Lounge. I could have said anything, and they would have given me them. It had nothing to do with that.

I just threw it in there. I could have said anything. Like, there's no way that you can prove that that contributed that. So she's, I'm going to argue that. So. I'm guessing she lost all these arguments. Oh, my God. Yeah, I mean.

I never are you going to have a long sentence. And like it. I got 26 years. So I never occurred to me. Like, she was so. confident. And here's the thing. Look, in her defense, she's a good lawyer. She's a nice person. She did everything she could do for me. And I didn't give, it's not like I gave her, it's not like she had a chance. But you see what I'm saying? Like I'm 100% guilty. But yeah. And so, but every time

she lost, it would go from, it would go up three years, four years, five years. And you know, you start adding it up. You're like, oh, my God. Because I should have gotten. what did I say, six or eight years. I think I was supposed to get, like, I think it was actually a reasonable part of the sentence. It was probably, I think it was supposed to be like 10, like 10 or 12 years. Okay. Because if she had won the argument she made, I was supposed to get 12 years. And then you would have been out in 10?

Yes, but she didn't win any of them. And I mean, you know what the judge said when he sat there and when she explained the whole thing, the judge goes about the Salvation Army one, the judge went. Yeah, but I feel he sullied their. their reputation. Wow. Solid. Like that, I have to do four more years because of that. The Salvation Army has a good reputation.

What are you talking about? What are you talking about? Okay, I don't know about that reputation, but I do know that probably tells you also the difference, like with judicial discretion. Like, you had another judge who would have been like, okay, well, that doesn't mean anything. Four years.

Another jurisdiction I would have, it would have been. But yeah, it was one, it was like that. It was one after another after another that were they just hammered. me. It was just, they were, it's like they were coming up with, to get, they, they, every single person that I had a survey or a name, they were adding $200 to them as a victim. I'm like, but that person isn't a victim. Like I, this person, I just have a name on a thing. They're like, no, he's a victim. I'm like, he's not a victim. I never used to, I never used any,

anything in. I never had any idea. This is a name I put on a form. And I remember one of them was called David Freeman. And she's like, well, and I go, and David, where's you? Who's David Freeman? She's like, yeah, you had this on this form. And I went, David Freeman, I said, I had never had an idea. I never stole his identity. I don't. And, and this is what she said. Literally, the secret service agent looked me in the face and said, somebody's named David Freeman. And I went, what fuck are we doing here? What are you doing? Like what? And, you know, my lawyer's like, come on, what are you doing? They argued it. We were trying to get them below 50 victims. And it didn't matter. Every time we would, we would lose one, they'd come up with someone. Another one. We're just going back and forth.

back back. Like, you're trying to get, their goal was to get over the 50. Is there a reason you felt like you were, I mean, not targeted, you were guilty of crime? So does there a reason you felt like they were dropping the hammer on you? Were you go, because it was 2000. Because it was because, you know, so, you know, whenever people talk about this, 2008 financial crisis. Oh, right. I was sentenced to 2007 and people were like, yeah, but it hadn't happened. No, no. In 2007, banks were going on. It's not until the bailout was in 2008. Yes. Yep. But for a year prior to that, there's every day there's a different bank, a different bank, a different CEO is indicted or looking into or this crime or this one.

So when I get in there, I'm the poster child of mortgage fraud. Yep. And, you know, and it looks bad. And the PO or the, I'd also been on Dateline. I'd been, like, there were all these articles out there. And I was on these TV shows that had done. So the publicity. Publicity, yeah.

Yeah. No, that explains it. It makes more sense to me. I mean, it still doesn't make sense. it seems like, and I also saw this a lot. In fairness, I knew a lot of good prosecutors. I knew a lot of good defenders, but in my own research in my world, my research focuses on the coercive nature of plea bargaining and bail. And I just think prosecutors have entirely too much power. And, you know, I've seen them with a lot of overreach and overcharging and what you're

describing. I just, you know, there's the fairness. So it's not fair. It's so disproportionate. I do think prosecutors just have too much power in that regard. And that's why people have to plea bargain because if you don't, as you described too, you had a friend who you exercise your right to go to trial. You're punished so much more harshly. They called the trial penalty because you took your right, your Sixth Amendment right to go to a trial. Also, another thing that's awful about the sentencing guidelines,

the judge can ultimately sentence you as well for conduct you haven't pled guilty to or found guilty of. And so that became a point of contention. with the guidelines, especially in 2005 when they had Booker v. United States, that was the case. That was the case that made the guidelines advisory, no longer mandatory, because judges were using conduct that you hadn't been found guilty of enhancing your sentence, and that violates your Sixth Amendment. And so, you know, that was also, what do you mean? So Richard Bailey was found guilty of running these rich widows. He would date them,

and then he'd sell them a horse. But the horses, you're buying, you bought the horse for $5,000, and they're racing horses. And then he'd have these rich widows invest $100,000 and then also pay him to take care of and train the horse. But he bought the horse for $5,000. It's not a thoroughbred. It's not, like, it's not going to win any races. Right. So, but they don't know that.

They like him. He's a good looking, charismatic guy. And he, well, one of the women in his case goes missing. Now, he says he doesn't know anything about it, but there's like a, you know, a couple of career criminals are saying, oh, he, he approached us to kill her. And they're like, did you kill her? He's like, no, we didn't kill her, but, you know, we'll testify. And they never found the body.

He says they don't know who killed her. There was never anything to him. They don't know if she's actually dead if they haven't found the body. She's got to be dead. You assume it, but, you know, of course, his thing is the last thing, time I saw her she was getting on a cruise to go to Europe like that was it and it's that's true he did he knew she was going what they're saying and they found her car like in the parking lot what they're saying is he went there grabbed her yeah yeah and killed her these two guys are saying did he drain her bank

accounts is that what happened no no no she had she'd invested in a couple horses giving them a couple hundred thousand dollars and they were saying that she was threatening to go to the police I see okay now nope the police weren't contacted that that was just their there they're there that's what the The prosecution is saying, this is what we think is what happened. What really happened is I was dating this woman that disappeared. Now, other women are saying, hey, this guy, we think this guy is running kind of a scam. He's a con artist. He's a con artist.

Con artists and murder are very different. Right. But so he gets sentenced. Turns out it's $160,000. I want to say it's $160,000 fraud. He's convicted it federally. Okay. Goes to be sentenced.

Right. He should get. he's supposed to get like a year or two nothing oh my god i see where you're going oh life they took the murder and they made it relevant conduct so he gets life but then they goes back and he fights it and the judge is like you're right the appellate court said i cannot give you i cannot do that it's too much you're right 30 years you know i don't know if he did it or not and it doesn't matter that's such an abuse of power and i just can't you know i'm so bothered by some such a blatant abuse of power.

Yeah. I was in prison with him. Nice as guy. I mean, he didn't know me, and he didn't take me for any money. But he, you know, and I'm, I'm healthy as a horse. But he, not one of his horses, but he, Bailey, very nice guy. He did get out. He died, well, like a year later.

How long did he serve? 30 years. He did? He served, like, 26 years or something like that. He really did. He got on, like, compassionate release like a year and a half before. And he got, by the way, he's like 90. He was like 80 or 90.

You could look. If you look, he's like 80 or 90 years old when he died. He was super old. Yeah, but I mean. But he was prison old. Yeah. She's in pretty good shit. Yeah.

Preserved him. Yeah. He's walking around. Like, you would see he'd walk every day. Hey, how are you doing that right here? Yeah. I mean. Yeah.

So, I mean, I'm just saying that's a good example of it. It's like, that's insane. I had a couple cases that really bothered me too. I mean, like really bothered me. I thought, I remember having one of my last cases was a, this guy was convicted of what they called like a lifetime distribution scheme. He was a marijuana dealer, and he would fly back and forth, like east to west coast.

No violence ever associated, no, like, no violence, no guns, nothing. He had a scam. I don't even remember how he did it, but he flew it. And I remember I had that case, and at the same time, I had a case, a guy who murdered someone else. And he was like, I think he murdered a drug dealer. He robbed him, he tortured him. And he wound up cooperating,

and they were recommending a sentence of like eight to ten years. But my guy was getting life. And I'm going like, how am I working in a system where you murder someone, you torture them, and we're talking about eight or ten years, and this guy's shipping me on it. And listen, I don't think you should be shipping large quantities of maybe back and forth using planes illegally. I'm not saying what he did was okay, but I couldn't wrap my head around this. And I was like, I think I'm out.

I think I'm done. Like, I think I'm out. You know, I think I'm going to find another way to be part of it. of the criminal justice system and not be part of recommending sentences that I don't even believe in. Right. I leave. It's not I'm quitting.

I leave. And my dad's like, what do you mean you're quitting? You're a federal officer. You know, this is, you know, for my dad also, he was a mechanic and like he thought I had landed a job that was like the dream job. And I'm like, 25, 25 years and you're on a fucking 80% pension or something. Exactly. And my dad's like, how could you leave?

I'm like, you don't get it. I just don't feel good about it. So I applied to John Jay College, where I went for my master's. I applied for the Ph.D. program. It's the only school I applied to. And I'm on the cusp. I've never been one of those like, oh, my GREs or SATs always wound up, or those standardized tests, I wind up a little bit above average,

but I'm not knocking it out of the park, you know? And I apply anyway. I get denied. And I'm like, oh, man, I don't know why I thought. Look, I went there. I got my master's. Surely someone will let me in, you know? But no, they sponsor you.

They pay for that. So they only let the top people in. It's like two weeks before the Ph.G program is about to start, and I'm still at work, but trying to figure out what am I going to do now. I get a phone call from the guy who runs the program at John Jay. They have a cohort of 12 people. The 12th person, there was a woman. She got pregnant and decided to drop the program.

I was the next one on the list. Nice. So they're like, you're in. And I was like, oh, God, win by default. Great. Who cares? So I was in. Yeah, I started.

I went there. I did my four years for my. Ph.D. And I thought that was a much better fit for me because I'm researching about this system. I can write. I can critique the system. Maybe people read my research. Maybe they don't. I don't care. I just feel better about what I'm doing. And I want to teach. And so after that, I start, well, I got a job as a professor with a new criminology program in New Jersey. And that's where my, that's like I was going to say, like my third career was. So I've been there for about, oh my gosh, 15 years.

And then, like, I have to say five years ago? In 2019, well, we get letters. I get letters from offenders all the time. I think people also don't understand, like, I'm not a lawyer. I'm a criminologist, so like I study crime, I research, I write about it. I do a lot of different things, but I'm not a lawyer. Right. But I get stories all the time.

Can you help me? What can you do piles on my desk of letters? And there was a female inmate. inmate in Jersey who was looking to tell her story. Her name's Melanie McGuire. She's not your ordinary inmate. She was convicted in 2007, now is it convicted of murdering her husband, dismembering his body, putting it out, his body parts in the Chesapeake Bay in three suitcases. So she's known as the suitcase murderer. In our area, it was a pretty big, famous case. Okay. And she wants to tell her story. And I'm like, well, that sounds interesting, you know.

I'm like, how am I going to tell her story, though? I'm, you know, I write, I'm a writer, I'm a researcher. And so at the time, my boyfriend says to me, she'd do a podcast. And I'm like, kind of like cereal. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm like, I don't even know about, I don't know what podcasts are. I'm like, I don't really, I don't know how to do that.

And he's like, you know how to get the story. You know how to interview her. If she wants to tell her story, I'll figure out the rest because he had done like video production and all of that. So we wound up doing that. We wound up interviewing her. She's one of the most interesting people you'll interview. and we got like 50 hours with her.

And we put out a podcast that was called Direct Appeal, and it is like a serial one. And it did pretty well, like surprisingly. We didn't know if anyone would listen or if it would be a total bust. Now, people fell very squarely on one side. They either think she's innocent and total wrongful conviction,

or she is so guilty and, you know, how could you tell her story? We hate you. Yeah. I got some of the funniest hate letters. My, so, I'm sorry. a sidekick. I don't want to say sidekick, but my, I'm trying to think... Co-host. Thank you. I'm like, why are the words not coming to me? Because we wouldn't hear.

But my co-host, Amy, she takes reviews and letters more personally. I think they're very funny. I like constructive criticism. Right. But I got like, you know, dear Dr. Dumb bitch, where did you get your law degree or like things like that? And I'm like, I get very creative, right? I'm like, ah, that's Dr. dumb bitch, exactly. And it's not a law degree. You know, things like that. But what's, really happened after that was that people started writing a lot. They wanted us to look at different cases of females. There's this female case, because we talked about also a lot in the podcast about females and how they do in the courts and how they're treated differently. I teach women in crime. That's one of my core classes, that serial killers, a couple other courses that people

are really interested in. So we just kept getting these case suggestions. Like, can you look into this case? Can you look into that? I'm like, I spent like three years on Melanie's case, you know? So no, but I can do a different case every week. Yeah, people don't realize the, the amount of research that was required. No, it was. For a four-hour podcast or a two-hour podcast, you're like, this is... The writing, the research, it took forever. Plus, I had to figure out what I was doing.

Yeah. But so that's how women in crime came about. So women in crime, we do a different female case every week. And so we'll do a victim or an offender. We tell the story. But then we break down at the ends, like the criminology, the psychology, and the criminal justice system. Why did this happen? Is it wrong? Is punishment fair? What would have worked better instead? And that's kind of how I evolved into this next career podcasting. And I love doing

women in crime. I think it's great. Right. But you're still, are you still doing the, you're still doing the professor, being a professor. Yeah. I don't say professering. I'm still professing. I'm still professing. Yes. I profess. Yes. Yeah, I profess. I am still doing that. I still teach. Okay. Because you said 15 years, I thought that made it sound like it might have ended. I mean, sometimes I'd like it to. But I don't know. It's also, you know, do you go full-time podcasting? Sometimes I really miss working in the field. I just wish I could do it in a different, more meaningful way. Can you put yourself, there's like an investigator, but like a, you know, you're a subcontractor

or something. And then they come to you and say, hey, we'd like you to do this. And you take it or you don't take it. I mean, I guess I could do that too. I'm still, I still love the whole pretrial process. So I was really into bail reform. And, you know, the bail reform movement is kind of still in, in the middle of happening in flux. So, I don't know. So do it. Would I work at pretrial operations again?

And then I love, like, policy work. So I'd love to work for a, you know, the U.S. Sentencing Commission and make real policy recommendations. Like, let's change something and make it better. Or am I just going to profess and podcast? I mean, I could do either. Where are you getting the people that you? Well, so it's usually- Is it still just people sending in? It's usually my co-host and I, we talk about a case.

So I pick a case that interests me of a female, and I tell her the story. But are you picking them from the media, or are you waiting for people to are people writing into you still? Oh, yeah. Well, we have all different ways. So we have a case suggestion list that has over a thousand suggestions on it now. A lot of people reach out to us through Instagram and other ways. I love taking cases.

I've taken a number of them specifically where there's someone who, a woman who's missing. a woman who's been murdered and her case isn't getting enough attention and people are asking for help. Can you please tell her story? Please get it out there. I really try to prioritize those. But other people want to learn about, I thought a lot of people who make suggestions, they want to learn why something happened. I've heard a podcast on, you know, this case before. I've heard the story told, but no one's ever talking about the reasons why it happened. Like, what do we know? What does the science tell us? And, you know, how did the criminal justice system? fail or not address it or things of that nature. So sometimes we tell stories that you haven't

heard of and sometimes we tell ones that everybody knows. I just covered Ruby Frankie and people want to know, well, how did she go from being an influencer to an abuser or, you know, things that is the one where she stabbed her boyfriend? Is that her? No, that was Jodi Arias. Oh, Ruby Frankie. No, no, no, no, there was an influencer in my, I want to say it was in my name. Oh, Courtney Clenney. She's, yeah. Yes. We covered that case. Oh, okay. We covered that one, yes. Ruby Frankie was the one whose kids were, you know, she had the eight passengers. I think it was called and they were always in these videos and come to find out she

was like really severely abusing her children. And I think people just go like, why did this happen? So we try to cover the things of the why. She's the one who says, fake it when she's like, you know, fake being happy. Yes. Yeah. Yes. Yeah.

So, yeah, we cover a different case. And sometimes I get like, I like to geek out about cases. So I'll sometimes pick ones like this week. Our case that we released is doll remap. Map versus Ohio. So it's the Fourth Amendment case. Basically the one that says, you know, you have to have a warrant to come into someone's house and search. She was the one who they wanted to get in her house.

They faked a warrant. They got in. They found pornography. She was taken to trial. So it's a Fourth Amendment case. So sometimes I pick cases like that or Miranda. I just recently did the true story behind Miranda. So it depends.

I get my cases from everywhere. I get inspired sometimes by the law, by an issue, or by someone who just needs help. But it's all women. It's always a woman as the offender or the victim. But obviously, and most of the times, there are men in these stories as well. Because, look, a lot of times when women are murdered, it's at the hands of men. And there could be multiple people involved, but there's usually a female who's at kind of the heart or the center of the story whose case is kind of in the middle there. Okay.

All right. We're not thanking you or anything. That's not happening. We don't do any of that. I notice that people like look at me. Like as soon as I turn, they like look at me like you're not going to thank me for something by? No, we don't do that. No.

Okay. I don't think you need to. This is a very selfish, selfish vodka. All right. I love it. Hey, you guys. I appreciate you watching. Do me a favor. Hit the subscribe button and hit the bell so you get notified of videos just like this. Also, please go in the description. In the description box, we're going to leave all of Megan's links. It's women in crime. It's women and crime. So click on, you can click on the link. It'll bring you right where you can subscribe and follow. Please consider joining our Patreon. It's $10 a month and it really does help Colby and I make these videos. Thank you very much. See you.