#RolandMartinUnfiltered - 8.28 RMU: Flint's special needs students increased 56%; NOLA's debtors' prison unconstitutional

Episode Date: August 31, 2019

8.28 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: New report says the number of Flint's special needs students has increased by 56% since the water crisis; NOLA's debtors' prison scheme deemed unconstitutional; Montgomery Alabama could possibly have its first ever Black Mayor soon; The fourth white supremacist convicted for his role in an attack on a 20-year-old African American man in Charlottesville is going to jail; Cop who questioned a Black man when a white woman claimed he was staring at her has resigned; A man suspected of a triple homicide leads police on a naked chase and still gets taken alive. - #RolandMartinUnfiltered partner: Life Luxe Jazz Life Luxe Jazz is the experience of a lifetime, delivering top-notch music in an upscale destination. The weekend-long event is held at the Omnia Dayclub Los Cabos, which is nestled on the Sea of Cortez in the celebrity playground of Los Cabos, Mexico. For more information visit the website at lifeluxejazz.com. - #RolandMartinUnfiltered partner: 420 Real Estate, LLC To invest in 420 Real Estate’s legal Hemp-CBD Crowdfunding Campaign go to http://marijuanastock.org Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Coming up on Rolling Martyr Unfiltered for Wednesday, August 28, 2019. Rolling is off today. I'm attorney Robert Petillo. According to a new report, the number of Flint special needs students has increased by 56% since the water crisis began. We'll be joined by Flint's mayor today. A court rules that the New Orleans debtors' prison scheme violates the constitutional rights of the city's poorest citizens. Montgomery, Alabama could possibly soon

have its first ever black mayor. The fourth white supremacist has been arrested and convicted over his role in the attack of a 20-year-old African-American man in Charlottesville. He is now going to jail. And the Royal Oaks, Michigan police officer who questioned a black man when a white woman claimed he was staring at her

has resigned. And get this, a man suspected of triple homicide leads police on a naked chase and gets taken in alive. You can guess that he has the complexion for protection. It's time to bring the funk on Rolling Martyr Unfiltered, let's go. He's got it, whatever the piss, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got the scoop, the fact, the fine.

And when it breaks, he's right on time. And it's rolling, best believe he's going. Putting it down from sports to news to politics with entertainment just for kicks he's rolling he's funky fresh he's real the best you know he's Yeah, yeah. Rolling with Roland now. Yeah, yeah. He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best. You know he's Roland Martel now. Martel.

It's been five years since this Flint water crisis began, and the problem continues. Last week, the city spilled two million gallons of raw sewage into the river. And to add insult to injury, a recent study shows that the number of Flint special needs students has increased by 56% since the water crisis began. Joining me to talk about the growing problem in Flint is Mayor Karen Weaver. Hello. Hello. Hi. How are you doing, Ms. Mayor? I'm doing just fine.

All right. So can you kind of explain to us what is going on and how has this problem persisted for so long? Okay. So what is going on in Flint? There are a lot of things going on in Flint. Let me just start by saying one is Flint has made progress. I do want people to know that. We are going to be finished with the service line replacement this fall, which is a year ahead of schedule. So that's a really, really good thing. We're working on the restoration, so the roads and the lawns are getting fixed. I'll tell you where our issue still remains, and why I am continuing to tell people to stay on bottled and filtered water. The first reason is we haven't completed the lead service line replacement. And until we get all of those lead and galvanized lines out, which I said will be this fall, I will continue to, you know, err on the side of caution. The other thing we've talked about, and I've had this conversation with state government and with federal government, while we can change the pipes and have brand new pipes,

we can have our water testing, you know, very well because it is, people's in-home plumbing, people that, you know, just like pipes were old, in-home plumbing and fixtures were old in some homes. And so they were corroded by that water as well. And so when you have your plumbing, your fixtures, your appliances that have been damaged, you still have that potential for lead in your system. And so that's what we've been asking the state and federal government for funding to complete the project. They haven't done that. You know, they started by giving us 4,000 new fixtures. Well, that's a drop in the bucket, and we need more. And they did that the first year, and they stopped, and nothing else ever came.

So that's one of the challenges. I also heard you talk about what was going on with the children in Flint and our special education rates going up. And that's something that is not a surprise when you see what happened when you had lead poisoning to our children, to this community. And that was one of the things we talked about was we knew there were going to be some cognitive damage, damages to our young kids as a result of this. And we knew it was going to be an increase in special education in the criminal justice system you know and and in mental health issues and that's one of the other things we've talked

about and that is a reason that we've asked for funding for the lead registry and and what we got was five years of funding but people are you know we had a public health crisis here in the city of flint and we said we don't know how this is going to play out. Some, you know, we're seeing things right now, but some things may not manifest for five years, seven years, 10 years, 15 years. And that's why it's important for this lead registry to be funded for a long period of time so we can track physical health outcomes, so we can see what kinds of interventions and what kinds of services make a positive difference. And so that's another thing that we're continuing to ask for money from the government for. You know, the federal government gave us five years

of funding. Well, one year is up. So we have four years of funding left for this lead registry, which makes no sense for a city that had a public health crisis and is continuing to deal with the public health crisis. So those are some of the things going on. Well, you know, we've known since the fall of the Roman Empire that lead and water leads to mental and physical health issues for human beings. What do we need to do to get our national candidates, the people running for president? You've got 25 people plus running for president right now. How can we get them to take the Flint issue seriously and make it a primary campaign concern?

Because Flint is not the only municipality in this country going through this. It's just the most public one. Exactly. And that's what we've said is pay attention to what going on in Flint, because what happened here, you know, we're a poster child for so many other communities across this country. And you better pay attention to what's going on in here because it's going to affect, you know, people all across the United States because of this aging, damaged infrastructure and because people have taken water quality standards for granted for such a long time, and the standards that are in place are old, antiquated, and outdated, and they need to be addressed. And it needs to be taken seriously because it's like you said, we're not the only one, but we've been the most visible and vocal. And we have said,

you know, I've said, don't let us go through a crisis and not learn from us so this never happens again. And that's what they need to do. You know, I don't want them stopping through Flint for a photo op. This is serious. And this is about people. And that's what we have to remember is to put people and public health and well-being over profit. And that's what hasn't happened. You know one of the things I think people forget is the genesis of this problem was a consent decree with the state in order to fill a budget shortfall so to try to save to try to save 200 million dollars over the course

of 25 years you diverted from the Detroit water treatment facility to build a new facility for stopgap measure with the Flint River, which resulted in this entire issue and also the Legionnaires outbreak between 2014 and 2015. Let's not forget we've had 13 deaths as a result of that as well. And so with that, what should the general public do? How can we pressure officials both on the state level and the federal level to help Flint, help other municipalities that are dealing with this lead issue? Even the federal government didn't hit on the lead issue until I think 1991. So we have millions of miles of antiquated lead and iron piping from the 1920s through the 1960s. What can we do as the general public to fix this issue? You know what? One of the things is we have to speak up and we have to come out and vote. And that's where we've been lacking as well. We've got to

come out and vote because your vote is your voice and it matters. And you better watch who you're putting in office. You better pay attention and get involved. That's one of the things that has to happen. Something else is I'm going to go back to when I was talking about the water quality standards. They're old. You know, when they say, you know, so in Michigan, we went from what was acceptable with 15 parts per billion and now to 12. And we're supposed to be excited because that's low. You know that. Well, that's the lowest there is now. Well, that's not exciting to say that the standards are going to be 12 parts per billion. That makes no sense because we know that is going to damage children. It's going to damage people.

It's going to damage seniors, those with compromised immune systems. And we don't know what it does to the rest of us. So we can't go for the status quo. That's the other thing. And then they put unfunded mandates in place where they say, okay, you've got to change all of the service lines, but they don't give the municipalities the funding to be able to do that. You know, people said, what did you all do on the private side? Well, we had to sue, you know, so the state, we had to sue

the state to get the funding, and the federal government under the Obama administration gave us $100 million for that. So we were able to go on the private side but we have to watch out for these unfunded mandates because because municipalities can't afford them and people the private you know that when they say well that's private so you have to take care of it too many families aren't in a position to be able to you know pay for that you know they're not in that position and so you're setting uh uh cities and and places up for failure when you do that and and so just just to close out because you mentioned the you you mentioned the part about you know 15 parts per billion i think at one point there were

some water samples taken in flint that were between 500 and 13 000 parts per billion when it comes to uh lead concentrations, not to mention the manipulation by previous administrations and previous officials when it comes to the testing criteria. I think the EPA standards were that you had to have a six hour hold before testing in order to make the determination of the parts per billion. You had local officials who were doing a flush right before the- They were doing flushes, right.

Yeah, they were doing flushes right beforehand. You have to look at both instructions that are put in place, because they gave out bogus instructions. And the instructions that were given were, well, yeah, when you flush, you are going to get lower levels. And so that's what you have to watch is how they tell you to do that and putting standards in place for that. There should be a protocol on appropriate flushing.

And that's something we've really been talking with our residents and educating them about because it's important to know when you're getting your testing done, the appropriate way to test to get the right reading. But I do want to touch on something because, you know, the headlines have read that the city dumped sewage into the Flint River. And that is not what happened. We had a storm here in the city of Flint. We had a rainstorm, and we got inches and inches of rain in a short period of time, and the reservoir at the plant flooded. That was what happened. So it wasn't like it was human waste sewage that got into our water. It wasn't that kind of thing, and we were able to address that because the sewage

was already caught. So this was other, you know, so what went, you know, what happens when there's a flood? And that was treated. So I don't want it to sound like the city of Flint was negligent and dumped waste into the Flint River, because with everything we've been through, I really don't want that to be the headline. But that was what they put out there. That was how the media put that out there. And that was not what happened. It was Mother Nature having a storm in the city of Flint. And that was something that we weren't prepared for. We weren't prepared for that amount of rain in that short period of time. And the flooding took place. So that was what happened with that. You know, we've just spent millions and millions of dollars, like I think it was $36 million cleaning the Flint River. So I just wanted to, you know,

get that out there as well. Well, I think it's very important for people to understand that now Flint is in good hands, under good leadership. There are people who are competent and in charge. I want to thank you so much for all the work you're doing. Keep us updated on what we can do in the rest of the country to help Flint, help the water situation there. Thank you, Mayor Weaver. And keeping this message out there helps us all.

So thank you for that. I appreciate it. And so do the residents of this city. Thank you so much. Mayor Karen Weaver from Flint, Michigan. Joining us now on our panel is political and social analyst Dr. Cleo Manago, and also

former chair of the National Bar Association PAC, attorney A. Scott Bolden. How you doing, guys? Good. Real good. So, on this Flint issue, why is it this is not penetrated and percolated up to being a national issue? We've had two presidential debates so far, eight hours of conversation,

and I don't think we've heard so far, eight hours of conversation, and I don't think we've heard anybody even mention the issues of Flint because for every Flint, there's also a Gary, there's also a, in Atlanta, there's also a Baltimore where you have similar issues, similar piping and infrastructure issues, but no one is talking about it on national level.

It seems like when it's just us, it's just us. There must be a plan for it. Flint can't catch a break. Mayor Weaver is absolutely right about this flooding piece because the headline said sewage dumped into the Flint River. The reality is that the residents of Flint, they don't get their water any longer from the Flint River. Yeah, that was a temporary. That's the temporary piece that went south.

It never worked out. But then they readjusted and they got there, they went back to getting their water from Lake Superior, which is off the, I was about to say off the coast of Detroit, but it runs through Detroit in their deal. They are talking about it when you talk broadly about climate change and infrastructure, but not specifically about Flint or any of the other urban centers and it really is a form of environmental injustice if you will environmental discrimination because even the DNC had a chance to have a debate on climate change and the environment and they voted that down at

their recent meetings last week and so it costs to take care of poor people and to provide good health care and environmental standards and all the things that all of our communities deserve, need, and want. But poor people, it costs a lot. And nobody really, whether it's public funds or private funds, just based on how they allocate funds, nobody wants to spend the money to take care of poor people, whether it's water, environment, health care, insurance, you name it. And that's why it's not at the forefront of the presidential debate right now. It should be. Absolutely. Dr. Monago, we had a situation where May 4, 2016,

President Obama went to Flint, said the water was safe, got himself a glass of water, drank it on stage. That was dangerous. Yeah, you know. Oh, it looked dangerous. Well, it's not that it was dangerous, but it was a political malpractice because basically he was telling the people there

that the water is safe, and now we got a 56% spike in the special education because they believe the president who said the water was safe. Well, the damage had been done already. Yeah, those pipes have been corroding for years, and for the president to say the water is safe and drink the water,

who knows what the lasting effect of that is. We haven't seen anything better with President Trump. So what should we do when it seems like both parties don't care? Well, that Obama went to Flint and said the water was drinkable happened around the time that this issue was in the press all the time. It was a hot issue. I think the reason why he went there and that was talked about, did all that,

is because he wanted to look good and take advantage of it. But the feds did give them plenty of money. Gave them a lot of money, not plenty of money. You mean Flint. A lot of money. Gave Flint a lot of money. Right. He did keep his commitment on that.

And they've replaced these pipes. Well, that's true. They've got a lot more work to do. That's true. And they did that re-deal with the Lake Superior. So there has been some progress made. Sure, but what's not true is that the water is good. That's not what's true.

And I think that Obama got caught up in the opticalness, if you will, of it all. And this gets back to your original question regarding why did it come up recently in the debates. Well, it's not the topic. Unfortunately, these presidents. Not sexy. Right. Unfortunately, these presidential candidates follow whatever is media savvy and that's why they talk about reparations, which they've never talked about before.

We had just had this Commission meeting with with Congress and now it's a hot topic. So unfortunately as opposed to following what's right for the people and be concerned about the poor and consider people's lives, people are concerned about being liked enough to get the popular vote. You know, remember one other thing too. There are a number of civil lawsuits still pending over this, and so whether they're suing the state or suing private sector participants

in what occurred in Flint, those cases, and there's several of them, and they're class actions, are making their way through the federal and the state judiciary system state judicial system in Michigan. So arguably, help is on the way. The criminal indictments, to be honest with you, those were dismissed by the judge, and rightfully so. That was a very, very high standard, going to be difficult to reach. But the real civil justice in all of this

has to come through the federal and state courts, and I think it will. And when they do pay up and pay out, including the insurance carriers, at least there will be some modicum of compensation or a lot of compensation to make this as close to right as possible. I think we noticed that at the very beginning

of Mayor Weaver's conversation, she wanted to get the record straight, let it go that was progress being made. But I think it's important real quickly, Robert, to point out the fake news angle. I mean, I heard all over the country, national news that sewage was flowing into the drinking water of Flint, Michigan.

And that was fake news and a lie. And I think she took it personally. It might be also because she's a black woman running a city and she doesn't want that kind of reputation because it's racist. And it may or may not be racist that they lied and claimed that the water is not only full of lead now, but it's full of human sewage. But that worked for the Republican narrative, though.

That headline worked for the Republican narrative. Well, I think it's a bipartisan failure because it was a failure under Obama. It's been a failure under Trump. You had local officials who were Democratic, state officials who were Republicans, and all of it didn't work. So I think it's important for us to understand that. Turning to the news, a federal judge in Louisiana delivered a major victory to advocates of the poor who have argued that the criminal justice system across the nation exploits folks who can least afford to pay excessive court fees and fines. United States District Court Judge Sarah Vance ordered courts in New Orleans, Paris to allow a neutral forum to determine whether defendants can afford to pay court fees before sending them to jail for

non-payment. So Scott, this is one of those things in criminal law that you find often, that the system is by its very nature rigged against the poor. You can violate your probation for not being able to pay your probation fees. You can get sentenced to a jail sentence because you don't have money. You end up in jail for a weekend or until you can make bond because you don't have money for a cash bond. Why is it so important that we take the economic discrimination out of the criminal justice system? Well, it's not really economic discrimination. They're looking for a way to force people to comply with orders.

Whether you're rich, poor, black, or white, if you don't comply with court orders and they're trying to get compliance and you've been either found guilty or this is part of your bail process, it's been the traditional way of forcing compliance. I think you and others are right that because of the widening gap, wealth gap in our country, we've got to figure out another way.

I don't know what a neutral form looks like because in the judicial system, you have the administrative side of this that looks at what's your ability to pay, what's your available pay. Do you work? Do you not? These are all factors that play in. But the problem is if you can't pay and everyone knows in the courtroom you can't pay, the only alternative is to go to jail to either not pay off your debt or to do something to force compliance. The problem is when you're in jail, right, how do you pay your child support? How do you pay court fees?

Are you gonna waive the court fees if I choose jail or if economically I've gotta go to jail? So this federal decision is the first step towards getting away from that, having a neutral form, but what does that look like, sound like, and feel like, and what's the alternative? Because right now, psychologically, the criminal justice system,

all we know how to do is do two things. Charge defendants and those who break the law or lock them up. And none of that is about rehabilitation, job, job training, entrepreneurship training, or anything that's going to break the cycle of poverty. Well, one thing, Dr. Managa, that I've noticed from practicing law is

putting people in jail doesn't give them any more money than they had when they went into jail. So if I couldn't pay the fine before I went to jail, let's say I'm working a minimum wage job, something along those lines, or just entered the workforce to try to pay these things off. Or I may lose my job. You put me in jail, I lose my job, I lose my house, I lose my car. Whatever progress I've made to getting back on my feet is now gone. And now when I get back out, I'm starting over from scratch.

And often they reenter the alternative economy, which is what got them in jail in the first place. So what do you think we need to do to focus more on restorative justice? You know, community service instead of paying a fine, ways you can work off the amount that you owe instead of having to pay cash and stopping the for-profit nature of the criminal justice system. One of the biggest issues I've always found is you'll go to a community where every single building is boarded up, you know, the neighborhood is burnt down, and then you'll see a brand new shiny courthouse because they're getting so much money from these people convicted of crimes that that is the nicest building in the entire area, the courthouse or the jail which is built there. Well, what you just

mentioned in terms of the aborted buildings and the shiny courthouse has to do with a lack of decency and human integrity regarding how laws fall out and how people benefit or do not benefit from being punished for breaking the law i'm real glad that this national this neutral form is being developed i hope it becomes a national model for the rest of the country because as you mentioned i I mean, I don't practice law, but it's logical that you cannot do anything while you're in jail to raise bail. But I think it's a good idea that this is occurring. And even though it's an issue of, you mentioned the issue of compliance, the bottom line is that the compliance issue does not make room for economic diversity. And that they're going to consider whether people can

afford it or not before they pile all these fines and put them in jail is a good thing. And of course, just like we have places like Ferguson, where black people were pulled over left and right, and this has been proven by a DOJ investigation, pulled over left and right to make money for the civic center in that city, that goes back to what

you said in terms of who's being valued. So at least in New Orleans somebody is seemingly seemingly in value value people in the poor and hopefully to be a wake-up call for other people I don't expect that to happen on a landslide basis alternative why not put it you know everyone that gets arrested the jails around this country are full of young black men and women brown black men and brown women and men. And instead of putting them in jail and putting them on some bail program,

why don't you put them to work and have them clean up the community? Their economic dollars for all of these community development programs and stuff, why don't you put them to work to clean up the community, to learn a skill? Oh, to clean up the community. And you can keep an eye on them if you will you can have your compliance by having them come back to court because they're working to clean up the

community whether you're paying them or not you're training them they have a skill set and you'd be forcing compliance for them to come back and forth to court and if they got sentenced and if they did those jobs well if they got sentenced maybe you sentence them to continue doing that or you sent them to educational training or workshop training or something that is going to rehabilitate them and give them alternative to the alternative that you just talked about the alternative economy exactly that is the fast quick money and that'll get you killed sooner than later well see again you're talking about in my opinion a concept that requires integrity and it requires caring about people and these systems do not necessarily care about

and it's value based though they're adding value to our unity well they're adding value to other people there's some of these business are working for people they're working for low low wages for corporations sometimes you answer the phone get customer service for a big corporation us of inmate who doesn't train answer that phone and do customer service for a big corporation. That's an inmate who is trained to answer that phone and do customer service work for a very, very low wage. So people are getting jobs, if you will, for a very low wage while they're in prison, but the jobs are not about making a community better.

It's about helping a corporation lower its bottom line. So again, we gotta look at whether we can have capitalist exploitation and human value at the same time. And that's a difficult juggle for a lot of people. I think the issue that fundamentally speaking, what we're doing is trying to put lipstick on a pig with our criminal justice system. We are taking the Anglo-Saxon medieval system from Europe and we're trying to nibble around the edges instead of blowing the entire thing up, starting over from scratch, figuring out something that works in the 21st century and not in the 13th century. And because of that, we're going to need a wholesale change in it. Because what you don't want to have is a new lend-lease system where as soon as you commit a crime, well, we're going to lease you out for

slave labor to pick up trash, cut grass, work on the chain game, which is what existed after the Civil War. And you also don't want a situation, which is we currently have, where we fine you to death, and then if you are too poor to pay the fine, you end up in jail. So we've got to find something to fix. We're stuck, aren't we? We're stuck trying to fix a broken system. You're going to blow it up, right? Yeah, you blow it up.

So give me the top three aspects of what it should look like if you blew it up. You do criminal justice. Yes. What would you do? Absolutely. Number one. Number one, if you are arrested on a drug crime, you are sentenced to rehabilitation, not to jail time.

Even if you're selling drugs near school. Even if you are selling drugs next to a school, we send you to rehabilitation. You want to rehabilitate a drug dealer that's selling drugs to kids. I can show you 10 drug dealers. I can show you 10 drug dealers I represented who now are real estate owners or former football players. With the proceeds of their drug sales, right?

Look, if however you get the capital, you get the capital. Bare Chemicals in our community, so you want to get them ownership. You don't think Dow Chemical is making money from poisoning our community? You don't think BP is doing the same thing? Wait, wait, wait. Does that make it better? So they're even. Dow Chemical

and the drug dealers in our community. You just had a court. Number two. What's the number two thing you would do? Number two, you have to address the mental and health care issues which result in criminal and interactions with the criminal justice system. Got lots of money for that already. But they're not using it because most of the people sitting up in the courthouse on Monday

morning are people with mental health issues, physical health issues, or drug addiction issues. Number three on the list is. I didn't even got the number three, but okay, number three. I didn't got the number three on the list. Number three on the list, you have to address the economic aspect of it. Criminal justice interactions are far too often a result of poverty. You address the poverty, you reduce the criminal justice interaction rate. That poverty you reduce the criminal just criminal justice interaction right side of the That's not outside of it because you have to have a holistic conversation

The same people who signed the the check of the police officer who signed the check of the DA who signed the check of the? Judge also signed the check for the City Council and the mayor and the public policy people So they need to be working together. And we don't get the money from. The same way we get money for everything else. We got money for stadiums. We got money for infrastructure projects. We got money for tax cuts. We only don't have money for things when we don't want to do it. We got a $22 trillion deficit because we got plenty of money for whatever we want. We haven't made it a priority. You have to elect the right people to make it a priority,

a budget priority, and you have to elect the right people in order to reprioritize those dollars and put them in the right place. But look, you see, look, in the crack epidemic in the 80s, we ain't have no money for treatment. We ain't have no money for nothing. Opioid epidemic hits West Virginia, we got money out the wazoo money just shows up. Oh my god

Was a criminal issue It's true because you heard him. The opioid issue was affecting white folks, so now it's a health issue. Just like, for example, all these murderers. It is affecting white folks. These white mass murderers have mental health issues, and their father wasn't there. You know, you don't hear about that when a brother kills

Pookie at the... Well, Pookie's an old name, so I'm dating myself. Shanique or whatever. The bottom line is that... Over that crack shell that went bad 20 years ago. But your debate sounded just like a city council meeting that you just two had. Because you have two different values. And this issue that we have in our country in terms of what decisions

to make are based on people's values. Right now we have white supremacists and white nationalists and their values are determining how legislation is done, how policy is done. Robert mentioned that if someone was selling drugs outside of a school, maybe they should be rehabilitated. And you said, no, they can be rehabilitated.

You're not going to rehabilitate them. I've seen it happen too many times. And you gave me some examples, and I have some examples too, of how people can be rehabilitated. They're going to do some time before you get to rehabilitation. Okay, well, see, that's your punitive value system. That is the only value system you can have when you've got a drug dealer dealing drugs near a school. They's your punitive value system. That is the only value system you can have when you've got a drug dealer dealing drugs near school.

They have got to be penalized. But hold on, Cleo. Inside of that same school, we're prescribing little black boys Ritalin and every drug you can think of on the face of the earth, and none of that, and we're not penalizing those people. You are comparing Ritalline to illegal drugs, drugs and opioids and crack and cocaine. I think if you look at the analytics, we have seen the same effects out of both.

How far left can you go with this? Look, you called me conservative last time. But you've laid low on this criminal justice bill. My goodness. No, I'm saying drug dealers got to go to jail. Bottom line, you can rehabilitate them later. But drug dealers got to go to jail. Bottom line. You can rehabilitate them later. But drug dealers got to go to jail.

If they're dealing drugs near your school, you're never going to put up. That's never going to pass. Look, what is that impact? Well, sending somebody who is selling drugs because they have no other options to jail going to do because when they get out of jail, they have fewer options. Well, they got lots of options. They can go to school. They can get a trade. They don't want to do that. Those who choose to sell drugs. You just made my same point. You mandate that.

Those who choose to sell drugs. Cleo, go ahead and we'll move on. I don't know. See, you work in law. I work in behavior. No, I work in reality. And I'm going to tell you right now, if you're selling drugs near school, you need to go to jail. Because you're doing that by choice. You're doing that because you're poor and disenfranchised. You made that perspective. And I'm going to tell you right now, if you're selling drugs near school, you need to go to jail. Because you're doing that by choice. You're doing that because you poured this franchise. You made that perspective. And that's a valued decision.

Well, I'm speaking for you because this is right. You're speaking for me. This is right. Well, I'm quasi-articulate. I can actually speak for myself. I know you can't go on. But the point is that I think, and Robert can interpret himself for himself, but two things need to happen simultaneously. I have people in my family who have been involved in drug dealing,

and I've seen them when they were little bitty babies until they grew up. And I can actually tell you, we don't have time, and it's not the point of today's show, but I can tell you what happened that led to that. And what you're considering a simple decision, it's not a simple decision. There's trauma going on. There's confusion going on. There's people who need brotherhood and fellowship and they join these small communities where drugs

are being dealt to belong. There's sometimes a missing gap in their personal life or in their development. They have inadequate parents. But what does that have to do with choosing to sell drugs near school? Well, first of all, you're the one who brought it near school. No, that was the basis of our discussion. Okay, but the bottom line is that people are selling drugs wherever they can

sell them. There's not a drug that only gets done near school. To kids in schools is never appropriate. But my point, my point, before you go back with your value system, is that we need to do two things. And this is fantasy land because it's a society that does not care about this community. But we need to do not just lock them up and throw away the key, but we need to start immediately with mental health. We start immediately with some kind of transformation. So every drug dealer. All right.

All right. Fellas, come on. We got to move on. Check the young people. All right. Let's move on. We got to keep moving on to the headlines. I see.

Great discussion. Just like he said. We got to keep this going into an after dark session. Alright, headlines. The Royal Oaks Michigan police officer who stopped and questioned a black man because a white woman said he was staring at her has resigned. The woman called 911

and reported feeling uncomfortable after 20-year-old Devin Myers circled her vehicle on August 13th. Myers says he had parked his car and was walking to a restaurant when he was stopped by police. Royal Oaks Police Chief Conrad O'Donoghue, the most Irish name I've heard, announced the resignation

of the city council at a city council meeting, saying that the officer quit Friday when faced with the consequences of his actions. O'Donoghue said that the stop shouldn't have lasted 20 minutes and that the officer shouldn't have asked Myers for his identification. Also in headlines, Montgomery's first black mayor. The numbers are in, and it appears that Steve Reed and David Woods are headed to a runoff for Montgomery's mayor seat.

If he wins, Reed will be the capital city's first black mayor. Montgomery is one of only three cities in the deep south, in deep southern states, that has a population of over 100,000 or more and has not had an African-American representing them in the highest executive position. According to the latest census numbers, black people make up about 60% of the city's population. The runoff election is set for October 8th.

We're going to take a break. We'll be back with more discussion on Roland Martin Unfiltered. You want to check out Roland Martin Unfiltered. YouTube channel. That's youtube.com forward slash Roland S. Martin. And don't forget to turn on your notifications so when we go live, you'll know it. All right, folks, you've heard me talk a lot about marijuana stock.org. Why? Because I want to keep you informed of investment opportunities that make sense. We've all watched the growth of the cannabis industry. A recent report by New Frontier Data estimates the global cannabis market at over 340 billion dollars. Now we know that marijuana legalization is sweeping

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They buy land that supports hemp CBD grow operations and lease it to licensed, high-paying tenants. That's right. They are hemp CBD landlords. And you can get in on the action. Folks at 420 Real Estate decided to do something special for Roland Martin Unfiltered family. Originally, the minimum investment level was $500. Right now, you can invest in this crowd, the minimum investment level was $500. Right now, you can invest in this crowdfunding campaign for as little as $200.

That's right, $200 up to $10,000. Let me recap. This is a $340 billion worldwide industry, and it's growing. You can participate with as little as $200. To invest, go to marijuana stock.org. This is marijuana stock.org. Get in the game and get in the game now. Delvin Carter, the fashion designer who designs everything from shoes to jewelry.

Recently, he sat down with Roland to talk about what he does and why he does it. Delvin Carter, welcome to Roller Market Unfiltered. Thank you for having me, sir. How you doing? Doing great. So I saw your interview on The Breakfast Club, and what I was intrigued by was the fact that something that we talk a lot about on this show, this being a black-owned, independent

media outlet focusing on not asking other folks for permission to do what we do and that's what I thought was also intriguing about what you are doing with see a collective in and and your deal is there's nothing we can't make and so where did it all begin for you you know what was that moment where you said you know what I'm gonna do to do this. I'm actually going to build it myself and not actually wait for other people. So that moment, that's a great question. So that moment happened for me. I was still enlisted in the United States Coast Guard.

And at the time, I was living in New York and my daughters, because I'm divorced. I was divorced at the time. I'm married now. But they were living here and I was living in New York. And I just was like, you know what? I can't continue to live like this to have my kids have to only see me on holidays and stuff like that. So I got the military to transfer me back to the Bay Area. And when I got here, I said, you know what? I need to make extra money. So I was always good at customizing shoes, which is like taking them apart, remaking them. And I had a lot of orders and I'm in my military uniform at the post office

and I have like 10 boxes of custom orders that I have to send out to the clients. And I'm sitting on the line, not sitting on line, but I'm standing on line and I'm looking at the cashier in the post office. And this is no knock to postal workers, but I looked at him and I said, you know, when that, when he was a kid, did he tell his mom, you know, I want to work for the post office when I get older? And, you know, and me as a parent with daughters, and I want to tell them, you know, follow your dreams, but here I am compromising my dream, you know, just for a paycheck. So it was at that moment in the line, I said, you know what? I have to start making my way out of the Coast Guard and making my way as, you know,

as what I feel like my God-given talent was, and that was to design clothing, shoes, and things of that nature. So it was at that moment at the post office where I said, you know what? I have to, I can't be scared because I don't want to be a hypocrite as a parent. I want to tell my child, like, you can do this. It's okay to chase your dreams. And if I didn't, if I didn't like give up an 11 year military career where I only had

nine years left to get a retirement check, I felt like I would be a hypocrite to tell them, no, chase your dreams because it was never my dream to be in the military. It was my dream to be a designer. But I made a promise with my sister, if I didn't make it in fashion by the age of 25, that I would give the, you know, the armed forces a try. And that's what happened. And one of the things that I think is interesting about that, again, you know, we're living in a time where folks want to take chances, want to take risks, but also there are people who have fear and you talked about you know seizing the moment and so how did you explain to others who I

guarantee you there's no doubt my mind though people who can't even say do you crazy you're absolutely out of your mind what's wrong with you you you can't you can't do this so you you actually think you can make shoes and clothes and shades and everything else. You're out of your mind. And so how did you respond to folks who doubted you, who may have been haters, who had fear of themselves? All right. So when you're in the military, it's pretty much, you're just, you're a prisoner. You know what I'm saying? You have the same exact mentality as a person in jail because the first and 15th, you know, you get paid.

Uncle Sam's telling you when you're going to get doctor's appointment, such and such. So we have that same kind of mind state that we are like prisoners in a way. So when I was going to get out of the Coast Guard, a lot of my a lot of my military brothers were like like man you know the economy's not good man they were so they were more scared for me than i was scared but i was i was terrified because see the thing is when i moved out here um uh i thought i was gonna stay in for for 20 years but after um i was here for a year they tried to move me again to New York City. And I was like, I promised my daughters I would never move again. So I said, listen, I'm not going to take that billet because that's what we call it.

I'm not going to take that billet. You're just going to have to let me out of my contract because if you deny your orders, they'll let you out of your contract. You'll still get your honorable discharge. But at that time, Roland, I only had $1,300 in my bank account, you know. And I had my apartment was $1,300 at the time and my car note was $1,000. So I didn't even have enough. It was like at that moment giving up this career and then it's either what do you want? You want to live in your car or you want to live in your house? So but at that moment, it sunk in with me.

I cried. I'm not going to lie. I have a daughter who passed away when she was 11 months. And that but at that moment, it sunk in with me. I cried. I'm not going to lie. I have a daughter who passed away when she was 11 months. And when I made this decision, I went to a grave site and I said, Daily. I need you to watch over daddy. I'm going to do something that's super scary and I need you to be my guardian angel. And I said, you know what? I'm going to trust the process. So I told them I want to get out. I got out, had $1,300 to my name, and I just started taking a lot of custom orders.

And I started taking a lot of orders. And the way my discharge was, it was so bad that they, because I got a hardship discharge, which I didn't get unemployment so I didn't even have unemployment to pay my rent so I literally was living like off of my talent alone and I said all I needed to do was to last four months until I could go to college because I had the GI bill and the GI bill would pay me um since I live in the Bay Area it would give me four thousand dollars a month just to go to school and and it would help me, and the $4,000 is your rent money.

So I was like, if I can make it four months, I'll be good, I'll be in school, and I won't have to worry about looking for a job. So I actually was able to do that. I was able to maintain and not be homeless, but I told myself at that moment, I will never, ever live check to check. I will never, ever allow a company or an organization to have this much power over me where I'm crying because I'm a check away from being homeless. You know, so at that moment, I said no more reckless spending. I started

sacrificing. That's one thing people don't do. I started eating and living as if I was poor. Even when I started making money, I would eat top ramen. And then I would only once a week treat myself to like steak or shrimp, you know. And then it came a point where I invented this rubber dye where it could dye like the clear soles of a shoe like this. And it can make it red, yellow, any color, any way it come out. In one month, I made $50,000 off of that dye. And so now I had a $50,000 cushion in my savings account, and from there, I became a religious saver

and not just spending money. And I knew from that moment that if I wanted to get a loan from a company to start my own business, that it wouldn't happen because your oppressor is not going to finance your freedom. So I just said, I'm going to keep saving and keep saving because anything that I want to do and want to achieve is going to have to come up my blood, sweat and tears because a bank is not going to give, they'll give me a hundred thousand dollars school loan, but they're not going to give me a $15,000 business

loan. You know? So I recognized that early and I said, I'm not even going to put myself in that position to beg somebody to help me chase my dream. So I'm glad that I did that. I'm glad that I already knew how to sacrifice, being that I was raised by a single black mother. And I watched her work three jobs, you know, sleep only four hours a day. So because I seen that, I was already prepared for it unknowingly. So I never even struggled when I had that $1,300. I never had a point after that

where I was almost homeless. I was scared because of what I had financially and what was ahead of me, but I never even struggled. And I went and it took like two months. And from there, I started making the most money I ever made in my life. light going through all of that also means that you have to do more than one thing look the reality is same thing when it comes to doing this show there were people who said you got to be crazy you know you know why won't you watch why won't you go to try to go to CNN or MSNBC or try to work at one of these networks and I said I'm not interested in asking asking somebody else Why don't you go try to go to CNN or MSNBC or try to work at one of these networks? And I said, I'm not interested in asking asking somebody else permission.

Can I go cover this? But what it also means, though, is that you have to learn different aspects of the business. And I think to be perfectly honest, Devlin, I think there are a lot of people out there who say they want to be entrepreneurs who say they want to have their own thing but don't really understand the level of sacrifice and commitment where you may have to where you have to may not be able to pay yourself but pay your staff I mean look I'm in a position right now I live off of my speeches and I said look we've got to build this thing up and and I try to get people to understand that yes yes, there's flexibility, there's freedom. But one of the greatest things about being an entrepreneur is you have to sacrifice.

And you have to do more than one thing. And you just can't say, well, we'll just hire somebody else to do it. Now the money's not there to hire somebody to do it. You got to learn it. So for me, I had to learn how to be my own photographer. I always was good at marketing, even in, I graduated from the Fashion Institute for Design and Merchandising in San Fran.

And I was elected to be on the Elite Marketing Group because I just knew how to market myself, market any product. So I never had that issue. But I'm also a workaholic. And probably just like you, I don't like waiting on anybody for anything. No. Exactly.

I can tell. Like, I'm very impatient. Like, if it's something I want to do, I do it like that. I'm probably one of the only Instagram pages that can post, like, four times a day. And I'm always posting new stuff because I'm constantly working. Like I'm a father of four kids that have three daughters and one son. And that's the only thing in the world that means anything to me. I don't care about going out to clubs, meeting people. It's making sure that my kids have a better life than I had, you know, and the sacrifice thing that these people say they want this life. They want to be entrepreneurial. No, they don't. They just look at your page and say,

oh, this guy's making some money. I want to do that. But that's not how it works. You actually have so much more work that goes on behind the scene than the pretty pictures and the pretty filters that you see on social media. Like they're not up with me last night when I didn't stop working till 4 in the morning and had to wake up at 6.30 to take my daughters to school and then unload a truck of shoes that just came in a couple of hours ago. You know, they can't do that.

Most of these people are lazy. Like, we come, this new generation, they're lazy. They want everything handed to them. Everything that I've done is off of my own research. I've learned how to source. I've taken 15-hour flights to China to go and visit factories, walk around the whole country to find the things that I wanted, because I know that the more research that I do, the more possibilities of financial streams I can do. Even if I didn't design clothes right now, I could start my own

sourcing company and have people make their own goods now, I could start my own sourcing company and have people make their own goods. And I can take a percentage as a middleman because of all of the hard work and the legwork that I went through. And that's why when I tell people, it's a smack in the face when you tell a black-owned brand that their price is too high or you should give out free stuff because Gucci does that. Well, I'm not Gucci, and I don't have a million-dollar, $3 million budget just for marketing. See, they don't understand when, for us, like me, if I make $50,000 this month,

I have to turn it right back into the company so I can keep the company afloat to keep making things. If I give $10,000 of product away and it doesn't do anything for my business like that, because a lot of these celebrities, they'll take the stuff from you. They'll never post it. And even if they wear it, they won't even tag you in it. You cannot teach business with free stuff.

Right. You know, you can't. Well, look, the reason I fully understand that is because it's like what we do. I mean, I've had people who come to me and they say, man, we would love for you to do your show from our event. And I go, well, you do know that that means getting on an airplane, hotel rooms. That means flying staff. We have equipment. We're paying for stuff. And so it's not just, hey, just pop up. No, there's a cost involved. There have been other people who have understood that and they've actually paid us.

And then what was also interesting is when you want to do something, then people say, well, you know, why is it that much? Well, because that's actually what it is. And so, I mean, it is a business. And I think that one of the things that I – look, my grandmother had a catering business. And then, you know, I worked at it since I was seven years old, and I saw how different things work and how I felt she often would undercharge folks as opposed to saying, no, you're going to pay the full freight. And this is why I said to me and my brother, we took the business over later. This is what I said to him. I said, you know what, if somebody is going to give me $20,000 worth of headaches, they're going to pay me $20,000.

Because what's not going to happen, you're not going to give me $20,000 worth of headaches, and you're to pay me $20,000 because what's not going to happen, you're not going to give me $20,000 worth of headaches and you're paying me $5,000. And now I'm mad as hell because I'm dealing with all your BS. And that's just sort of how I operate. And I will tell somebody no, as opposed to go through with that. Because again, I know the work goes in it. I know what I bring to the to the table and so and the other thing is when you talk about one set for free you know I you know I i keep to our audience you know we've been doing this show we've

to take it on YouTube cells from 170,000 that more than 50,000 in less than a year we are averaging you know 8 million total views on Facebook YouTube and Periscope what I tell our audience also is like, look, we are providing the service, but we also need them to be financial supporters of the show because they can't say, man, we need this, but then don't want to pay for it because it's like, yo, will you pay that cable bill? You're actually paying CNN.

You're paying MSNBC because they're getting a certain fee per subscriber every time a person turns that cable television on. And so it's just trying to get people to understand that. And I think that's what's critically important. And one thing about like what you touched on is one thing is people think because they pay you for a service that they own you. And that's the thing we have to get out. Like, for instance, somebody be like, okay, well, I spent $200 on a shoe or something, and they feel like they could talk down to you. They could be like, well, if it was Nike, I would have got it in two days. Well, you know what I do?

I do the same thing you do. I was like, well, what's your order number? Okay, here you go. Here's your refund. Because one thing about me and the way I was raised, I was raised under the mom code, which is M-O-M, morals over money. I will not let you demoralize me for a financial gain. Everything that I'm doing, I love that I do it by myself because I don't have to deal with the BS.

When you're in the military, you cannot not deal with the BS because if somebody outranks you, they talk to you how they want. They try, but they'll try to talk to you how they want to because they know they outrank you and you have to listen to them. Right. You know, and because of that, I'm not going to – I didn't leave a career to be a free man, in a sense, to have you treat me the same way that I did not like to be treated already. Just because you put – you spent a little bit of money. You know, I'd rather not have your money. It's like you said. I'd rather not deal with the headache. You know, I'd rather not have your money. It's like you said, I'd rather not deal with the headache.

You know what I'm saying? Because there's so much more people who appreciate it and respect it. The thing is, between us and people of color, we have to start seeing value in our own skin, in those relationships. You know, like on The Breakfast Club, I said that, you know, the biggest threat to black-owned businesses and stuff is black people. We're always so quick to say we need this, we need that, but then we don't pay for it. You know, like you see a show like yours.

Like I'm sure you probably have a Patreon or something where people can donate money. You know, there's people who probably watch your show every day, and they never put money in your Patreon account. When they can put $2 a month, that $2 a month from 100,000 people, that's enough to keep you going. And pay your staff and even get better equipment. But they don't understand that independence. Like, $2 is nothing.

As much garbage I buy, like $2 is nothing. If you are watching something like me, I watch your show from time to time when I'm shipping orders. And I'm going to start paying it to your Patreon because I'm not just going to be about it. I'm not just going to talk about it. I'm actually be about it because it is true.

We don't know. And for some of us who are watching right now, they may not know. Like, oh, man, you know, I never thought about it. You know, Roland Martin is 100% independent. I should start paying. If we could pay for Netflix and Hulu and all those other things, why can't we pay for our own brother to give us the truth, the type of media coverage that we do not get? You know what I'm saying? We have to start supporting those things. And those,

because our people, we are the only racial group that does not believe in group economics. And it's interesting. And we're the number one shoppers. And it's interesting. We're the number of consumers of everything, but we don't believe in group economics. And we're the number one shoppers. We're the number one consumers of everything, but we don't believe in group economics. You made that point. I've been saying that for years. And so, for instance, there are numerous times when I go into black-owned businesses, restaurants, and things along those lines.

I remember I was at two partners' barbecue place in Dallas, and the brother who owned it, he said, I got it. I said, no, no. I said, I'm' barbecue place in Dallas. And the brother who owned it, he said, no, Roland, I got it. I said, no, no. I said, I'm going to pay for it. I said, because the reality is that plate, that fork, I said, you've got employees. I said, I'm going to pay for it. I said, you know, no problem whatsoever.

And the people who would say, well, you know, hold up. You know, you got free. Somebody's giving you something for free. I said, no, what you don't understand is, I said, that brother has a business. And what I try to get people to understand is that when when just like for you I'm sure the people who come to your go to your site and like well why is it this much guess what when they walk into Walmart or they go to Macy's or they go to Saks Fifth Avenue they don't ask the question how much is it and they say what the tags say and then if there's no tag

they'll scan they'll scan something and they say this is what it is and so my deal is i i'm right there with you we've got to stop looking for the hookup with black owned businesses and understand that they are a business just like any other business last Last question for you, how did the, just very curious, obviously the Breakfast Club has a huge platform, how did that how did that change your business? Do people all of a sudden, did you all of a sudden start hitting you up because they finally, some people say man, just like me, I didn't realize you existed, like yo, I gotta get this brother on and so what was the reaction? What was the fallout from it uh so um so my my fbcc page i had 148 000 followers i have like 185 000 now my

clothing line played to saiyan collective went from 30 000 to 85 000. the funny thing is though i get messages now some guy dm me a few hey man i see you I seen you on The Breakfast Club. Super inspirational. I've been following your page for years. You know what? I'm going to go buy something. I'm like, I didn't even respond. So I'm like, you've been following me for years. You've been seeing the hard work I've been putting in.

You didn't want to buy nothing until I was on The Breakfast Club. So The Breakfast Club is what made you be like, you know. They validated you. Oh, you legit now. Like, I've been legit for the last five years killing stuff. But because I'm on The Breakfast Club, now you want to spend some money with me. Like, you've been following my page for five years. You done seen me go through struggles. You done seen me keep consistently bringing this.

You done seen me do free programs for the kids. I teach young kids and children of color how to sew for free. I teach them how to do fashion design. And I don't charge the parents. And the sad part is most of And I don't charge the parents. And the sad part is most of those parents don't even come back to the store and even buy a T-shirt. I feed their kids. I told them, I don't want no money from you.

I take their kids on field trips. And this is all on my own dime because nobody did this for me. And one thing that I want to be a part of the change, I want to spark that change behind me. Those young kids coming up, maybe one day they'll be a big fashion designer. They'll be like, hey, man, Devlin Carter was my teacher. He taught me when I was eight years old.

Now look at what I'm doing. You know, it's crazy. But the Breakfast Club definitely brought a lot. But the good thing about the Breakfast Club is I get celebrities hitting me up now, and they're like, yo, I love your stuff. And I don't want it for free. I want to pay for it. You know, so at least I'm kidding.

Like I had Shaq hit me up last night. So I'm working on a shoe for Shaq. He's like, hey, man, I want you to make me some shoes. I buy in bulk. I don't want it cheap. But can you make a size 22? I was like, I hit my factory up. I said, hey, can we make, he wants like this shoe right here.

I was like, can we make a size 22 in this sole? He was like, yeah, we could make it. So right now we're working on, you know, making Shaq his own shoes of my shoe, which is crazy for an independent company to be able to make a damn size 22 shoe for Shaq. But it's real cool. He's like, man, I don't want no discounts, man, and I want 20 pairs of each. You know, so that was a blessing. Hey, that's what I'm saying.

So, again, congrats. Give people the website again. Okay, so the website is S-I-A-C-O-L-L-E-C-T-I-V-E.com. That's SIA Collective, which stands for Somewhere in America. And I have my own app where you can shop on the app, and it's called Somewhere in America. That's the app, and the page is SIA Collective. So S-I-A underscore America. That's the app. And the page is SIA Collective. So SIA underscore collective.

That's at Instagram. So that's the Instagram handle. And FBCC Bay Area. And you're based, where are you based? I'm based in the Bay Area, California. But I'm from Brooklyn, New York. Okay. Well, hopefully when I get to the Bay Area, our paths will cross.

Dale and I appreciate it, man. Thanks a lot and good luck. All right. Thank you, man. Appreciate a lot, and good luck. All right. Thank you, man. Appreciate you having me on, man. Stay blessed and keep doing what you're doing. I'm a huge fan, and I'm going to donate to that Patreon. And I'll definitely be going to some more.

Actually, we have a setup where we don't even use Patreon. Go right to RolandMartinUnfiltered.com. And so I definitely will download your app and check this stuff out, pick up a couple of things. I appreciate it, brother. You take care. All right. You too, brother. All right. You too, brother.

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It is an amazing experience. I can't wait for it all to happen. So go to lifeluxjazz.com to sign up today. The fourth white supremacist was arrested and convicted for his role in an attack on a 20-year-old African-American man during the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. He was sentenced

Tuesday to a little more than two years in prison. Tyler Watkins Davis of Middleburg, Florida, entered what is known as an Alford plea in February on a malicious wounding charge in a vicious and wildly seen beating of DeAndre Harris, a former special education instructional assistant. The plea meant that Davis, who belonged to the extremist group League of the South, announced prosecutors had sufficient evidence to convict him if he had gone to trial. Even though Davis's assault on Harris probably resulted in Harris's worst injury, he was given less time behind bars, two years and one month, than the three other defendants already sentenced. All right, we'll go to you, Scott. Because the Alford plea is where you're saying,

look, I'm not admitting guilt, but I am saying that there's enough evidence to convict me if I had gone to trial. The judge made the point that because he only struck the assailant one time and he didn't stomp him and beat the hell out of him, that that's why they gave him a lighter sentence. But what do you think about that justification,

even though the one time that he hit the assailant resulted in a head gash and eight stitches being required? Yeah, it's totally discretionary on the judge, and this judge certainly felt that way, but there seems to be great inequity because while the other two were sentenced, and I believe they tried, one of them, the defendants in that case,

they got a longer sentence. Here, the Alford plea had a lot to do with this. You do an Alford plea, the government agrees because they got problems with their case and you got a defendant that won't admit guilt but doesn't want to go to trial. And so it's a little bit of both. But he admits that if he went to trial, they have enough evidence that could convict them, just for our listening audience. But he

did the most damage. But the Alford plea saved him. And that's the rationale the judge gave. I disagree with the rationale, quite frankly. They've all been since the same because they acted in concert. You can see from the video, they acted in concert and they acted in a conspiracy. As a result, the level of damage and the level of criminal intent, if you will, is irrelevant. It's all the same. And had I been the sitting judge, I certainly would have treated that that way, especially

it being a race-based attack and what we all know about Charlottesville and what happened shortly after that, where a white woman was killed fighting Nazis in Charlottesville in 2018. Just really tough, really tough. And Cleo, on that point, I've tried plenty of cases where an African-American bust somebody who was out of the head one time

and was charged as an aggravated assault. If they did a part of a gang, then they would charge them, as you said, in concert with others, and the mandatory minimum would be 10 years or 20 years to serve 10 uh credit for time serve something along those lines what does it say about the inequities of the criminal justice system well early in the show you made a passage that said to projection the protection say it for the complexion for the complexion for detection clearly that's a um issue here but i also think

that the people that were defending this guy were concerned about precedence. It's a precedence to make sure somebody don't get as much as the others, particularly if they did the worst damage. You understand what I'm saying? When there's a white supremacist, a white nationalist in biased context behind the whole thing and driving the whole thing, because if it had their way and it wasn't for the national coverage it probably would all got away with it and if it wasn't for the video coverage of the whole thing i remember the the victim the complaining witness in these three cases he was tried and and it was out of any wrongdoing but he was arrested and tried because uh he defended himself. I remember that but you know this is another cliche the Alfred plea possibly was a good strategy but also

being white was a strategy. That's always a really good strategy and I recommend that for black folks if you can be white when you go to trial I'll probably cut the sentence down by a third okay is that time again all right today in crazy-ass white people news, 18-year-old Matthew Bernard of Neeling, Virginia, was arrested on three counts of first-degree murder this week, according to Pittsville County Sheriff's Office. But before he went down, he led police on a low-speed naked chase.

Here's young Matthew. Apprehend him and take him to a local hospital for treatment. I wonder how this story would have ended if Matthew was black. Cleo? Well, there is a story. The police are running from him and the police are armed from him, and the police

are armed, and he's chasing the police. Did you see that? Yeah. It's ridiculous. And he's committed another crime right there. And the police are there. He has the stick in his hand and didn't hit him with the stick. He has an AR-15

in his left hand, and he is chasing this man. Well, see, I can't laugh as hard as y'all because even though you asked the question, there's a real case where there was a young man named Anthony Hill in Decatur, Georgia, who was 27 years old, who was a veteran, who was running around in the days, catatonic, nude, didn't have on nothing,

and of course he had no gun or nothing because he was just as nude as this guy, and he was murdered by the cops. So people can be treated differently. His name was Anthony. He was 27. Decatur, Georgia, if you want to look this up, since it's no longer... It never did make national coverage,

but it actually occurred that he was murdered under the same... But this guy didn't kill nobody. I think it's important to make the contrast here. Yeah, this dude killed three people. Who was 27 years old, didn't kill nobody. He was a veteran. He was in good standing as somebody in the military. He never hurt anyone, and he was murdered by the contract. This dude killed three people. The veteran, who was 27 years old, didn't kill nobody. He was a veteran. He was in good standing as somebody in the military. He never hurt anyone, and he was murdered by the cops.

This dude killed three people and was allowed to run around like he did up in the cop's face. And commit another crime while the police were in light pursuit of him. But they're still right there in the video. He didn't get tased. He didn't get bustle-sided. They didn't throw a rock at him.

And people will argue, some of us, up and down, that there's no racism in this country and that we're delusional and we're race baiters. Why do you have to bring race into every conversation? I don't even see color. You know, we live in a colorblind society. Ask Laquan McDonald's family.

Laquan McDonald, when he had on clothes, he was walking away from the police, clearly catatonic, clearly high on something, clearly not all there, right? Not sure whether he had a weapon or not, and he got killed. It's unbelievable. I want to spot something Robert said earlier, kind of in jest, about when you go to court, be white. Well, Michael Jackson did it, and he wasn't very successful.

So, you know, it don't always work. Matter of fact, he got arrested and made to look bad after he died. They ain't even finished with him. Well, we will monitor this situation to see what things are going... We're going to monitor what happens to Matthew Bernard. We'll find out if he's actually convicted of these murders

or if he is given a trophy and taken to Burger King because you never know in these situations. Or considered mentally incompetent. You know, it's the video games. Incompetent. It's video games. That's the problem. Video games. All right. In memoriam today, Greg Hinton, a Chicago native who became the Democratic Party's first chief diversity officer, has died at the age of 66. Hinton was hired in 2011 to ensure diversity of staffing and vendor contracts at the Democratic National Committee, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and Democratic National Convention Committee. Virginia Roll, chair of the DNC Black Caucus, said Hinton made them accountable for diversity and you could see his impact at the 2012 convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. He was survived by his son, Kyle Hinton, Christopher Brenton, Greg Brookings Hinton, and his daughter, Alfreda Brookings Hinton,

as well as two granddaughters. We'll keep the entire Hinton family in our prayers. Also in the memoriam, we also mourn the loss of fashion icon, Isabel Toledo. She presented her first collection in 1985, but her fashion grabbed the national spotlight after Michelle Obama wore some of her looks at her husband's 2009 inauguration. She was an independent designer,

but served briefly as creative director for Anne Klein. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Toledo family as well as her loved ones. That concludes this edition of Roland Martin Unfiltered. I hope you enjoyed the show. Be sure to join Roland Martin when he returns tomorrow. Also, if you like what you see, go to RolandMartin.com and join the Bring the Funk fan club

to support great journalism. Until next time, I'm Robert Petillo. Enjoy your evening. Thank you. We'll be right back. forward slash Roland S. Martin. Subscribe to our YouTube channel. There's only one daily digital show out here that keeps it black and keep it real. It's Roland Martin Unfiltered. See that name right there? Roland Martin Unfiltered. Like, share, subscribe to our YouTube channel.

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