Yeah, that's right, y'all. Welcome to another episode of Civic cipher I'm your host, Ramsy's Jah and a big shout out to q Ward, who is still dealing with the real but you know, true to form, we are still bringing you everything that is newsworthy and noteworthy in the world of black and brown folks. And this show has been a long time coming. You and I talked about this issue once or twice on the show so far,
but plenty of times behind the scenes. And you know, I really didn't know how to script the show like the one that I want to do today, And it wasn't until I sat down with a friend of mine recently over the holidays and we got to talking about some things that took place in the past but led to some incarceration. And you know, on the show here we've discussed, you know, prison reform, we've discussed things like do prisons work, but you know, we haven't really gone
into detail about that. And as it turns out, you know, you know a lot of my friends are brilliant people, but none quite as brilliant as my friend Gonzo, who has decided to join me today on Civic Ciphers. So thank you for joining us.
For having me us. Yeah. Yeah, so appreciate the little confidence there, absolutely absolutely.
So you know, let's uh, you know, I I know that you are not.
Just this thing.
You know, we we've known each other since we were children. But for today's purposes, we're going to talk about one facet of what I believe to be a very rich life that you live. And so I certainly don't want to reduce you to just an inmate, but I do want you to discuss your time as an inmate and your relationship with the prison system, so that we can bring our listeners up to speed and they'll know who they're talking to.
Well, definitely, you know, as you said, I've lived, I try to live a full life. I'm just not you know, the incarcerated number that they decide to give you. It does actually play though a large part in the overall development of my life. Sure, so you know to speak to that, you know I've done you know, I went through a period in my life where I felt like I had to do crime because I had been convicted of a crime. And so upon getting out of you know, prison,
you know your options are limited. Sure, I mean, so the mindset of a young man at that time, so I figured, well, I may as well commit more crime. You know, got into a lot of fraud I ended up doing you know, long extent extent of I did about a four year stretch. So within that time, you know, I've seen a lot of different things. I've seen a lot of policy that has affected other people that I care about, not only myself, and how laws are changed
and how they're kind of skew to actually target our community. So, you know, as far as that, I try to live my life as best I can of put the past
behind me. But you know, when I see programs like yourself and gentlemen out there trying to make a difference in our community, it's just something that needs to be addressed because I don't think the public truly understands, you know, to debauchery that goes on behind the scene, and how the system is almost skewed the way to kind of keep people incarcerated.
Absolutely. Now you've you've been in and out a handful of times. Can you describe the different places that you've been. I know you went to a jail one time and then a prison a different time.
Yeah, definitely, there's well, the difference between jail and prison. So jail is where you will wait to basically you're your charge, you're arrested, and if you can't make bail or you're not, they call it where if you're o ard, sometimes you release on your own recognizance. If you can't make that, you have to in turn put up a bail, which is this whole other system of a funny exciting ways to go. But for there, then you sit in
the county. So at one point I know a lot of Arizonians if they're familiar with it, was Sheriff Joe So. And then there's various jails that I've been to. I've done my tour of a lot of them, you know.
So there's there's Lower Buckeye Jail, there's Downtown, there's Madison, and then these are where you will wait to where you ultimately go to trial or where most people sign a pola parking deal or you know, if you're found innocent or sometimes you usually reduce I think they have a ninety five percent conviction, right wow, So yeah.
You know, I I read something about that not too long ago, and that's kind of a phenomenon. It's just a weird little quirk of the the criminal justice system in this country at least, where a lot of cases never go to trial because you know, folks will try to they'll take a plea deal and admit that they did something sometimes that they didn't even do to avoid
going to trial. So there's this idea, and we saw that with the the They now call them the Exonerated Five, but it's the Central Park Five that they may be more commonly known as. And they did a movie on Netflix when they see Us, But you saw these people admitting to crimes that they didn't commit because of police coercion, et cetera, and ending up during prison sentences accepting plea
deals that they shouldn't have taken anyway. And this is something that actually has happened to one of my older brothers. He actually went to prison for twelve years for he was there was some issue of confrontation in a parking lot. This was back when the new Escalade came out, and he had a gun on him. You know, California, there was a lot of carjackings, so he had a gun in the car. He pulled the gun out and shot
the gun in the air to scare the guys. Off from you know, messing with his now his wife, and it was on video, but they for some reason it couldn't submit the video in court like they.
Sometimes there's lawyer posturing sometimes to get you know, certain evidence.
Sure, and so they couldn't submit the video of him shooting the gun in the air. And so what it was. It ended up being an attempted murder case that he had to fight as opposed to you know, just discharging a weapon to scare these guys off. And so he was looking at eighteen years, but he could plead a twelve year deal, and he accepted the plea and fortunately he just got out after twelve years. But that's twelve years I missed with my big brother. So I'm familiar with that part of it.
And that's a scary thing too, because it's when you do enter a plea bargain. It's funny to judge, ask you have you been have you ever been coursed or intimidated to take this deal? Yeah, well you're like I've been sitting in this jail.
You're you're coursing me right now. I'm not my friend, you know, this is a scary environment, et cetera. But yeah, well, that's part of uh, I think what we'll get into today, because the very nature of the criminal justice system, it's it's sort of like a snake that's eating its own tail. It's a it's a it's a very weird, unusual thing.
You would think that, like most places in the world, the criminal justice system is supposed to, you know, restore justice to society or harmed individuals and rehabilitate the criminals. And neither of those two things are true, and very little of justice, almost none, and then everybody is just
okay with that. And so recently, obviously, there's been this push to rethink what does it mean because if you're just used to it, if you're born into a world where bad people go to jail and then they go back to jail, and they go back to jail, you know, that's just kind of the norm. And that's something we'll get into today. But a lot of folks recently have been thinking rethinking what it means to actually lower crime.
You know, obviously we talk about this a lot on the show, but the idea of defunding the police means reallocating police resources into community programs that prevent crime from happening in the first place, and believe it or not, there's a lot of people that don't want that to happen, not just police, but like people that you know are in this in the prison business, you know, exactly. So
the nature of criminal justice is very different. It's not it's not meant they don't want to rehabilitate it, and they lobby and they get politicians on their side, et cetera. And the ready assumption, and again we'll get into this little later, but the ready assumption is that there needs to be a certain amount of criminals as opposed to there will always be a some number of criminals, you know.
And those are two different approaches to criminal justice. One is like, we need it to be at least here. One of them is that, well, we're always going to have some so we need some institutions. But you know, it's not in us versus them sort of situation. And so we'll get into that. One of the things that I do want to start the show off with is a fact, you know, and for those that don't know, African Americans are imprisoned incarcerated at a rate five times
as much as whites. And then for Latinos, it's almost one and a half times as whites. And so you know that the three of our groups make up a good amount of folks in this country. I'd say somewhere in the neighborhood of eighty five percent ish maybe more with those three groups. And you know, you, being someone who can identify with being black and then obviously can identify with being a Latino man as well, have been able to see what that looks like, you know, along
those color lines as well. And so I want to I wanna what I want to get into first is do prisons work. I think I know the answer, but let me qualify the question. So one thing that I want you to talk about is I came across this. It's that the idea that low risk offenders people who might do things like you know, maybe they do a fraud thing, you know, maybe they just they see an
opportunity to get ahead. Whatever their story is, I don't know, and not trying to justify anything, but they do something and they're a low risk offender, they are also exposed to high risk offenders or they kind of get introduced into this kind of school of crime. Have you seen anything like that definitely, definitely.
So what we can agree on that, we'll just stay you know, some basic facts. So poverty, but you gots crime. It's not like, oh, this certain demographic is you know a little bit more has propensity to do crime. It's not that it's it's it's poverty. So a large part of what I'm seeing here lately is you know, the opioid crisis. So we'll take for example, so right now there are people who you know, for whatever reason, because doctors were prescribing oxycoton like it was skittles back in
the day. Now that there's a crackdown, a lot of these people are resorting to other drugs like fentanyl. So now to buy the illegal drugs look expensive, so there's there's no way you can work a regular job and in turn, you know, support your habit. So a lot of these people will resort to crime. So I'll use you know, just because it kind of feeds into you know,
other aspects. We'll use Walmart for example. So Walmart at one point was part of a law being group called ALEC and you know, that can be looked up and we can talk about that later. So what they did is Walmart was getting hit over the head with these people going into their store and stealing. So let's say you, you know, you stole something over a certain dollar amount, it could be deemed felony, but usually it got pleated
out to where it was a simple shoplifting. Well, now, because they were taking such losses, they then in turn had the law changed to where now if you steal something and you have intent, they can prove you had intent to steal. It's called an organized retail theft. So with an organized retail theft, that's a class four felony. So usually on your frat first time, if you get caught, you can get some type of probation or some type
of like deferment program. But let's say you know it's your second time or whatever, and you decide, they decide to go ahead and push prison time to you're looking at two and a half now with a prior years two and a half years now, right, But with the privor. The thing is is when you get arrested, though they charge you throw everything against you. So throw everything against the wall, see it sticks, to see if it sticks. And then what happens is you have a historical prior.
So with a prior that same f four now turns into four point five years. So that's four and a half years. If you think of it's almost half a decade. You're being locked up four And I'm not saying stealings, right, but I think that's a little extreme that someone goes in and you know, steal some items or and you know, and and the way the laws are written, those laws
are still being changed now. I mean there are people who go in and try to return things with like a new guy he tried to return an item with his brother's ID. Walmart will give you or credit for it. Sometimes what they'll do is you know, but that's that's changed now. Now the game is if they catch you, that's an identity theft charge.
You know.
Yeah, so they're trying to do that and sometimes I even heard depending on what you steal, they'll hit you with a burglary charge. You know, the days when people would go in and do a beer run and do things like, they're considering some of this burglary. So these corporations now, because they have the ear of certain politicians and they're in league with them, it would it behooves them to push harsher sentences because then what happens is
now these harsher sentences are are giving out. That's longer prison time. Longer prison time means more bodies to be put in these cages or to be warehoused. And with private prisons here running rampant, I don't know if you've ever heard of CCA. Yeah, they're a private prison here. So if they benefit immensely off of that because they need bodies, Like you said, we need that certain degree of something that maybe you know, five ten years ago, oh, wasn't such a large crime. Now in turn, I can
give you real prison time for it. And it's the rates are alarming because they target our communities. Of course, we're borck and brown or poor people, black and brown people, and surprising, I've seen a lot of women who are being getting incarcerated. Before it was you know, the joke was, okay, well they're nicer on ladies, but they're not stopping, and it's it's lack of it's a it's a big money grab.
Yeah.
Yeah, So when you get into okay, well are we incarcerating people so that we can in turn rehabilitate them, which it's all a joke. There's no rehabilitation or are we just you know, warehousing bodies so that then we can go ahead and you know, build the taxpayers for so much because a private prison gets typically about thirty
two thousand dollars for readmade. So as a private prison, I want to stack as many bodies, as many healthy bodies as I can because you know that thirty two two thousand pays pays for my guards, pays for my food, and they try to run it at you know, the lowest possible costs to where I mean the food rations you get are they're they barely hit the caloric requirements that you need.
You're saying it's not a lot of food or it's not.
Not a lot of food at all, and a lot of it is high carbs, you know, something cheap like so you'll eat a lot of pasta's something that's cheap to feed a large population. Because they're trying to run a profit. So with that thirty two thousand per inmate, they have to clear after they pay all expenses, like I said, guards, you know, you know, food, clothing, I mean there's now they're charging inmates. They'll give them maybe an issue two or three outfits and then they'll charge
them to buy other outfits. So now you're you have to pay you know, after you get a job on the yard, and typically, you know, your jobs can pay anywhere from fifteen cents to fifty cents an hour. So imagine having to buy clothing, you know, on the yard with that money, which should be issued by the state.
But and then with that amount of time, you know that that's just even more time in that crime school.
Right, Okay, so you look at so we'll take you take county jail. Sure, so in county jail, depending on how many times you've been there, and you know, a lot of times, I mean, the statistics are unreal, how they a lot of these people will have mental illness. Okay, so a lot of times these the mentally ill and homeless are picked on all the time. So you might go,
you might have gone to jail. I knew a guy who's like, yeah, I've been arrested thirty times last year, and you're just like, that is an unbelievable amount of times to be arrested. Really, oh yeah, and you know it might be just a turnaround. He might have something like paraphernalia, You'll have a pipe on him or something, or a trespassing, and so it's a revolt. So they get to clock every time they keep him into jail. And what happens is the guy might be nonviolent, he
just might have a drug habit. So with his drug habit, though, he progressively gets a higher ranking because the more times he's been to prison. So you know there's times too, and if there's any violence, which nowadays, you know, if you have a domestic violence dispute, if you punch the wall,
that's considered criminal damage. It's considered violent. So you might be in you know what I mean, you had a bad night with your wife, punched the wall, whatever, Well, you might be locked up with a murderer, a guy who like, yeah, I just shot two of my cousins right now, passed the bread and so wow yeah, and so you know it's like you look at this and because of myself, I've been to prison, you know what
I mean, I've had violent crimes in the past. So now when I go in, I might go in for shoplifting and my bunkie might be a murderer to where I'm like, wait a minute, here, I'm here for you know, simple shoplifting, trespassing, whatever. This guy is looking at a hundred years you know, what's to say, He's not going
to stomp on my head in the middle of the night. Sure, So you know, it's definitely one of those situations where you have a certain degree of anxiety in the pod as they call it, and then everything is run you know, is political. So when I say political, it's and it's something animated to do, you know. And I don't know if it all started out as you know, to protect, but everybody's kind of separated by race.
Yeah, yeah, I know that.
And I mean you'll even have guards that in turn will you know, talk to a certain race of people. So if you have a young kid who's being becoming problematic, they'll go to maybe his older the older guys in his race and be like, hey, talk to the youngster them. Man, he's willing out. And it keeps order to a certain extent, but at the same time, it keeps us all on edge at each other's throat. It's brown against black and
black against white. And even there's Mexican nowals who are locked up in there, which you know, you didn't think, you wouldn't think there'd be a distinction, but there's actually high contention between Chicano's who live here and pissas as they call them from Mexico. So a lot of times since I've been locked up, I've seen those two go at it more so than the other races.
So one of the things that I read is that half that's fifty of inmates return in the first two years of release. Oh yeah, and you mentioned something about, you know, the revolving door of I'm guessing this person might have been homeless. You said he had a drug habit or something, which, again, at least on this show, we are of the persuasion that drug use is indicative of a health issue, not of criminal activity, be it
mental health or otherwise. You know, self medicating for whatever your ailment is, or even for recreation is not indicative of you're not harming anyone else or society by you know that, that's just the persuasion that we are of on this on this program. So you know, to hear that half of the inmates returned in two years or less suggests to me that prisons are not working as
far as rehabilitating people. Because anything that you do where it only works half the time, that's that's not that's not a passing grade and anywhere, if you were to.
Buy a product and it works half the time, would you not return it?
Yeah, I wouldn't get on the airline where half the flights it uh And and so you know, so we'll go ahead and speak to like the drug problem.
So where you look at other countries such as you know, Amsterdam, Portugal, a lot of these they come with it as you know, a compassion approach and have higher success rates of people, you know, getting off drugs. And then you look as far as a homeless situation. Number one reason for homelessness is there's usually like uh, you know, loss of family, so there's no loss of support system. So now to have that demographic of society be so criminalized, it's it's
it's it's it's horrible. And I'll just running through a quick scenario of course. So you have a guy, he has a drug habit, He comes into a into a into a jail hasso environment. Nobody's happy to be nobody wants to be there. Let's say he's hurting. He's hurting really bad because the effects of you know, getting off of an opioid, you know, you actually feel physical pain. So now this person is at the mercy of those prisoners around him be victimized. Hey, we don't want to
see him. I mean I've seen people, you know, they come in and they're throwing up, and the guy's gotten beat up because he's you know, throwing up, making a mess. So mind you in an environment horrible food, okay, I mean they give rice on Friday sometimes where you're like, everyone looks forward to it. The rest is you get that sloppy rule. It's it's really discussing. It doesn't even
look like it's fit for human consumption. And now you're going to a courtroom full of people who don't look like you, who you know, they almost don't even understand a lot of the legalese atret speaking, and they pop aloi in front of you. Okay, hey, this is your public pretender as we call it, or your public defender. He's gonna get you the best deal you can get. So a lot of times guys will take deals, like
you said, just to get out of that environment. So they came up with things because they were so I want to say it was back in maybe ninety seven ninety eight, they came up with something called Prop two hundred. This this is gonna be fun, all right. So Pop two hundred came up, and what it was, they sold it to the public because drugs wire affect everyone's families.
So there was an outcry like, hey, you can't lock my little Johnny up, my sweet little you know, for drugs and give him hard time with those other animals. So he gave him a Prop two hundred. So it was kind of a diversion program. You went in if you basically did probation, and if you got tested for drugs, you know, they would keep you incarcerated for a little bit while. But it was basically they couldn't send you to prison on this drug because you had a drug problem.
The problem with it was, so let's say Johnny had went in and he got caught with, you know, for personal use, you know it's methamphetamine. He would then let's say, they would have given him a sentence of one point five two point five. Well, the thing is is now with this Prop two hundred, Johnny has a problem that's not being addressed, and so he's coming in and out of prison and their oh, violation, here's thirty days, Ope, violation,
here's sixty days. And then they're letting him write back out for him to go ahead and get high again. Well by the time he's done after so much time. There a people who have been on this prop two hundred for five years. They could have done the prison time, They would have done less time incarcerated if they had just taken the original one point five or a two
point five. Because he spent so much time in and out of jail two months here, three months here, ninety days here, six months here, there's no way to keep any type of semblance of really, you can't keep a job, you can't hold an apartment. So this program that was made to help people to keep them out of prison actually cripple people, and in terms people like that who are coming in and out instead of addressing because there's no real rehab.
That's what I was gonna have. Is there any So if a person comes in off of the street and they very clearly have a drug problem, or they're on drugs, or they're throwing up, as you say, well, first, let me say something. So Q and I we do a show called or we do an outreach. We've done it for about ten years now. It's called hashtag lunchbag. We feed homeless people in downtown Thames. So this is a population that we're familiar with. We go, we partner with CAST,
the Central Arizona Shelter Services. We have a food pantry supplier, the Midwest Food Bank. We have lots of people that have supported these initiatives over the years, including this radio station and other media outlets as well, and of course we have a thousand plus volunteer base, so this is a well established outreach. This is the first time hearing, after ten years of working with this population that there's nothing for them if they end up in cost rebrating.
I know that sometimes folks will disappear because the police will pick them up for whatever. But my assumption has always been that you know, if they're involved in you know, the criminal justice system that keeps them away from their habit long enough at least to get them clean or to there, they teach them something about like the harmful effects or anything like is there anything like that?
So prison economics will go ahead. Well, you can also get into that at one point there's nothing in there. There's there's nothing on the streets that you can't get in prison. Just the way the prison economic system works out and they might tell you, Okay, well we run this program or we run this program for people. Those programs are a joke. They really give there's there's really no counseling. And the only people I've seen who've been successful usually do it on their own or decide to
seek out religion. There's a lot of religious based programs that are excellent. I knew a guy he got himself clean. He decided to, you know, give his life over to Mormonism.
OK.
And they're very involved in there to where you know, they'll come visit you and things, but.
As far as the state is concerned, programs are not.
I've heard like sometimes they'll give you like they will give you some type of medication to kind of help out, like if you get the DTS if you have alcoholism. That's like you get the shakes when you drink, if you if you're an alcoholic, because you have a physical dependency on that at some point to where and but very very little, like I said, there's no and I've heard a of in her rumors that even that's gone.
So sometimes they'll put you on you know, sometimes they'll give you like psychological meds to try to help with but some of those things. It just seems like like it's all like experimental drugs. It almost seems like.
Well, let me let me posit this. If what you're saying to me is that everything that's available outside of the prison is still available on the inside of the prison. If you're saying to me that you know, there's no programs in there to really address the root of the issue.
And I think that this is another point that a person can make that you know, prisons are not working or not, you know, I think the most telling statistic is still the fact that fifty percent of the folks are back in there after two years.
Well, the racism rate is even higher than that, like just people who that's within the first two years though, it's like eighty five percent racism rate of people who actually end up not coming back to prison. And it's funny because you know, there's a saying like, once you have a number, they're all they're your hooks are in you. So if you get pulled over something that something you might be able to get away with or get let go of, which a misdemeanor, you know, you have a history,
you have a they love it. Hey, you've got a historical prior. We're talking prison, do not pass go, you know, so it's not like to where you can get certain you know, you're just not you're not eligible for those programs.
This is this is something that really speaks to I think the black experience. I'll speak for black males myself in particular. You know, my whole life, I've never drank alcohol, I've never done any drug. I've never done anything, you know like that because of my connection with you know, the police and those substances, right, and there's a lot of things I've never done because but it's very much shaped by police interactions with black men that I've seen
in my lifetime. And again, I think it speaks to the fact that there's something in me that spoke to me at a young age that says, well, you know what, I can't be regular. I have to be better than regular in order to be good enough.
Right.
And so I'm obviously not just for black and brown folks, but for anybody who's incarcerated. Once you're out, you have to be better than everyone in order to be good enough, because you know, so you can't afford to make any mistake, you know, you know, if you if you have a New Year's Eve party and you have a toaster champagne and you drive home. That could be another you know, potential years in time. I guess I never really thought about it in that way, but for me, I knew that,
you know, for me, at least, blackness was enough. I don't want to ever have a reason for these people to say anything to me, and so I've always kind of kept, you know, everything clean. So's it's very interesting that, you know, that's the way that the prison system can change and shape outcomes, and I'd imagine it's obviously way
worse for black and brown folks. And then the way they tell the story after they murder you, for you know, it's like, well he did one thing when he was fourteen, and you.
Know, wait a bit, yeah, you know, you watch these these shows and they bring up well and he was seventeen. He's shoplifted and make you sound like you're a terrorist. Time.
Well, if you're just tuning into siving side, bro, I'm your host Rams's job. Our guest today is Gonzo. He's talking to us about his time in prison. We're discussing whether or not prisons work, how effective they are. One of the most telling statistics that I've come across is that, and I'll say it exactly the way I have it, is that half of the inmates will return in within two years of their release. Now, we talked about if
there are drug rehabilitation programs. I do recognize that the way this country looks at drugs like it's a criminal issue, not the whole country, because in Oregon, I know that they've recently changed the laws to where they started treating drugs like their health issues and not criminal issues, which I'm really excited to see how that program works. There's going to be some people who don't like it, but those people that don't like it are people that stand
a profit from most people being in prison. Everyone else in terms of the ways Societe works, should be happy, you know, but because the effect of it should be that there's less crime, less things qualify for crime because they're not crime, and then more people get healthy when you know, we were able to realize that they have a problem. And then the neighboring state. I know they're two different places, but Seattle I was just there. I
was just in both these places. Actually, in Seattle, there's a lot of homeless people there For some reason, I didn't know this, but man, they treat the homeless people like super cool. They're just like kind of they're you know, they're not they're they're just people. They just happen to be unsheltered, and so that's super cool.
That's really expensive to live in.
Yeah, I guess that might Yeah, that might be part of it as well. But yeah, the drug rehabilitation, if they give you some medicine to help you kind of wean you off of it, you know that that's that's okay. But in terms of like attacking the root of the problem, it doesn't seem like there's a whole lot that you've encountered that that's really takes place in the prisons. Now, what about folks where they very clearly have mental health issues.
Do you know of any programs where you know, they are their doctors or there any anything like that that you've encountered.
So, you know, so to get back kind of to to what we were talking about, as far as you know, the jails run like a business. So if I give you certain medication to keep you, you know, stabilized off of whatever drug you're coming down from, that comes out of my profit, so they try to wean you off of that as quickly as possible and if they can get something, you know, because there's FED the Feds A we look at all as the government, but you know
there's a difference between the state and federal. So there are some programs that are supported by the FEDS with they'll put which is what's what they'll push. And this happens in prison a lot of times too, to where you know, they'll push a program and it's it's really just a joke. They do it to get the funding for it. You know. It's usually taught by you know, some counselor who's you know, ready to be retired, and they go through the bare minimums in order to qualify
for the program. And now I know in jail a lot of times, you know you might have like AA, but see, everything in the jail is a security issue. So a lot of times those meetings that you were depending on to go to, well, you know there's security. We can't let you out. You can't go especially now with the COVID when they're short staffed. Oh we don't have anyone because they have to have a guard posted so that you can go ahead and go to those classes,
so nothing overrides security there. So a lot of these programs that you think would go to help people, it don't. That's not happening at all, And there's all to me, I've always thought that there was an excuse to where what they do offer it just it's not enough to really help somebody who really even if the person we're serious about trying to change their life around, there's really no incentive for them to do it. They're just warehoused
to where. Okay, well to rock this time down and play some dominoes and maybe play some ball and okay, my release date comes. Now.
You said something earlier. You talked about a person coming in and he's throwing out and then the people beat him up because he's throwing out, and you said he was making a mess. Now I know that this goes without saying, but have you seen a lot in the way of violence in prison?
Yeah, violence is a way of life in there, so it.
Certainly okay, so talk about that a little bit.
So you have to think you're in a small, encapsulated environment with no one who wants to be there. No one is getting happy news, you know what I mean? Every time they go to court. You know, some of these guys are looking at some really serious time. So you know, I know the way that we were broken up in races, certain races, that's how they handle They discipline in their people. So they just you get disciplined to where if you're out of line. Let's say, you know,
guy's not taking a shower. You know that's unhygienic in that small area, so they beat the guy up. The guy might be on a power trip that day. And I've seen some really ugly things happen to where there's a certain rule set in prison, which I believe nowadays has been so watered down, and it gets manipulated because these are people. A lot of these guys are the criminals.
All these guys are just the biggest poles you will ever run into, people you would never ever associate with, we say in real life, to where they see you know, they prey on the week. So you know, I've seen it to where a guy is okay, you get you know some money from the front, you know, commissary, well, people will be like, oh that guy's a snitch, like what So usually you have to produce paperwork, but you know, mob rules, Oh he's a snitch, so they beat him
up and take his commisary. Now, if the guy decides, hey, I don't want to get beat up and goes and tells the guard that justifies se told J was a snitch. So it's just like you'll see things like that. So in order to survive, you have to fight. So it's a lot of times, you know, I've had to fight people just because it's like fight one, fight a thousand, you know, because you don't want to seem like an easy mark, because people will manipulate you and that people will take advantage.
So I think that for someone you know, obviously, you know, prison has affected my family. It cost me time with you, right, and I recognize that it is a problem just because I mean, the reason that this very show exists is to give a voice to people who otherwise don't have a voice, especially in areas where one is necessary. And you know, for as far back as this country goes, this whole criminal justice system has been very unfair to black folks, especially brown folks as well, and it seems
like nowadays it's unfair to everyone. It doesn't really seem like it's you know, working at all based on the numbers that we're looking at. But there is one thing that I came across, and I want to get your thoughts on it, because I have some thoughts on it as well. But there is a school of thought that says that mass incarceration over the past will call it thirty years in this country, thirty forty years, mass incarceration
has led to a marked drop in violent crime. Do you have any thoughts on that?
A lot of thoughts actually, So violent crime, if you look at just historically, it's going to have an ebb and flow. Nowadays, it's not as profitable to do violent crime because usually the reasons for doing crime, unless you're as sociopath, is to have financial gang. There's no reason to do Why nowadays would I put a gun in your face when I can just steal on a computer
or a laptop and never have any interaction. So I think that's what's contributing to it more so than the whole Okay, well, we're incarcerating more people because those crimes. If you take the numbers of property crime and you take the numbers of white collar crime and compare that to the drop in violent crime, well you've just replaced one crime with another. Sure, So you know, and as a society we're moving away from violence to where it's
frowned upon. I mean, think about it. When's the last time you saw a fight in the street to where I know growing up that was every other day. I think just as a society, we're changing. So I think that's a misleading statistic when they're like, well, look we're incarcerating more people, so violence is going down. I don't think that has anything to do with it whatsoever. Sure, Now, as far as the mass incarceration, I know a lot of people are getting rich. Yeah, you know, are getting
rich off of this because it's this whole industry. I mean, you look at there's like the little podunk towns like Florence, Arizona, which is majority has a majority of prisons down there. Those tax dollars keep those that keeps that population working, and you know, those tax dollars that goes into that little city, you know, if you look at them, I think down there too, they think the tax rates a little bit higher. I think it's like twelve percent on sales tax.
It's specifically for the prisons.
Well, it's not spetificlar prisons. It's to keep the town going. Oh okay, so but those the majority of everyone in that town works in the prison. So in turn, you're just you know, you're reallocating money. So the state basically is paying these people to keep this town going.
You know what blows my mind is that, you know, it almost behind every single curtain, not like behind two to three. Let's not levels like layers involved. It's just behind every curtain at almost every level of politics or anything, especially things that affect black folks, brown folks, poor folks, and young folks, there's a huge cash grab always and it's the wildest thing. And then and I'm not one of those people who's not not patriotic, right, I love this country same as anyone else.
Right.
I get emotional when I see the flag at the end of the movie and all that I live here too, you know, I'll bleed to keep the stripes red.
I love that.
I love that. But this idea that people, some people have that this is the greatest country in the world and the history of the you know, and they're just it's it's like, you do you do we see the same thing that's happening here.
I mean we're great at incarcerating people.
That we're number one. Yeah, And I think I saw a listen not too long ago that said the things that the USA is actually number one, and it's all these terrible things and then all the things that you know are metrics that you would use to measure a society or actually, you know, we're pretty pretty near the bottom. We can't take care of people's health. You know, we obviously have you no issues with you know, people having safe lives on the street, and we're not addressing that in a proper way.
You know, I've been I've been to you know, we've been fortunate enough to be be to a few places, and I've seen how it runs. And listen, this is
a great country. Of course, it's just one of these things as far as you know, this incarceration thing, and it goes so deep, and it's like the public has been so fooled that I really think it's almost like we have to re educate the public on what's actually going on, because they'll give something and they'll sell it to the public in one way and the public will be like, hey, that sounds like like the prop two hundred, Hey, that sounds like a great idea, let's not send these
young kids who have a drug problem to prison. But then when you actually look at the way the program is laid out and it's the way it's actually working out, it's it's it's it's it's horrible. Yeah, And I think the powers that be plan this, They they know what's going on.
Oh listen, I'll tell you this. So I went to school. So my my bachelor's is in marketing. My master's is in management. I just say that because I.
Can't wonderful thing.
But so I went to school to learn marketing at Arizona State WP Kerry. So it wasn't It was a good school. And one of the things that we learned in school is that sex sells. But there's something that I learned when I got out of school, when I got became an adult, I was able to function in the real world where things really happen, and I realized there's something that sells easier, faster, and it's more readily available than even sex.
Fear. Fear.
That's it. If you can, if you can get these people afraid of something, man, you nailed it. I didn't know if you would have seen that coming. I should have known. I should have known better.
Listen, people will make horrible decisions, I mean out of and and just even people who have been close to even with this COVID situation and some of the other things, they're just like, well, hey, you know what, I'll give up for civil liberties if it means I'm safe. Yeah, And that's just really I'm just like, Wow, it's it's you know, it's it's frightening, you know.
There. I think it might have been uh uh, maybe Edward Snowden or one of those guys that you know, love him or hate him. He said something like you know, you know you're you're on he was He was talking about like your online privacy, you know, like the privacy of you know, your the contents of your telephone, the privacy of you know, everything. Why it's so important to
keep that separate from the government and to people. A lot of folks says, well, you know, I got nothing to hide, so you know it's fine, let's grant the government access to to catch the bad guys or whatever. And this guy made a statement that I thought was so profound. He says something to the effect of well saying, you know, I don't need rights to my privacy because I have nothing to hide. Is akin to saying I don't need freedom of speech because I have nothing to say.
And I thought that was such a profound statement that it really it stuck with me. But I do want to get back to what we were talking about, that argument that mass incarceration has led to, you know, a drop in violent crime. If I were to challenge that, you know, I've talked with some people, one person in particular,
her name is Zara She. She works with Black Lives Matter Phoenix Metro in Arizona, where I live, where we live, and you know, she she made a great point, and you know, there's something that if you really think about it, it makes sense. You know a lot of the mass in car incarceration didn't come from violent criminals at all. There was no there wasn't that wasn't what it was. It came from this misguided war on drugs. And and uh, I don't know if many people know the name Brian Stevenson,
but that's someone very much worth looking into. He runs an initiative called the Equal Justice Initiative. They actually did a movie about him and Michael B. Jordon is the stars in the movie. But I've known this guy and watched him for a very long time because he's kind
of one of the heroes that I look up to. Anyway, you know, there's this misguided war on drugs that again affects communities where drugs were deliberately put into those communities by the very government that imposed the laws onto those communities.
They're coming after issue, you know.
And the thing is sometimes people will you know, hit me up online and they'll say things like, you know, you know, black people are just playing the victims or you know, those troll sorts of folks. You know, people are not taking responsibilities whatever, or they they have this sort of delusional view of the facts, you know. And you know, and I say that as often as it can, but the government is admitted to these things. The government
has it will stand by, Yeah, we did that. These are things that we did, and this is what we're currently doing now, you know what I mean. These statistics are like it's on Google, like you can google it yourself, you know, And there's a to steal a phrase, this stunning silence, like everybody sees it happening, and there's there's
nothing you know, and so in our own way. You know, I like to to talk about it, but yes, this misguided war on drugs that takes folks with an entrepreneurial spirit that might be met putting it kindly, I'll admit that.
But I've heard this argument.
Yeah, yeah, but that might be me putting it kindly, but it's I think it rings true, you know, taking advantage of the resources that they have at their disposal. You know, I see where the money is, how the money's moving in the environment that I'm in. I recognize the pit falls, and I get out there and I play the game. Either I'm going to steal food or I'm going to hustle to make make enough money to
have food. You know, people do a lot when they're hungry or when you know there's you know, I come from California, so the the gap between poor and rich is way bigger than in a lot of places because you know, on the same street where you have to drive to the grocery store, you have to drive to go get food, set whatever it is that you're doing. On that same street, you could drive and there's ferraris and rolls races using that same street, you know, and
that will motivate you to do something eventually. And that's not to say that you know, people can't have nice things and that the poor won't always be with us, but I think that there's certainly something to be said about, you know, when the poor have really nothing and they're starving and they're scraping to get by, and the rich have way more than any human being could ever do anything within a lifetime I mean two or ten.
I mean, we'd have to almost a whole another shit different just on like poverty, and you know, even the effects of the school system, of how schools are funded to where it's like a prison to a school a prison pipeline, and to what they're causing a lot of time.
But you know, so so back to as far as you know, with the drop in violent crime, I just feel that's naturally where we're headed as a society, to where if there's something as you say, you know, like let's say this COVID and it was there's no jobs and there's nothing, I'll definitely will definitely see an uptick in violence. So I think just where we are society wise,
the way crime is done. A lot of times, you know, crime is done like you said to to you know, obtain financial goods and violence just it's not the easiest way to do it now. And also taking into effect, it's funny because we would always say, like when we're in jail, you'll see someone who always and there's always that person who's never been had any encounter with the cops and now is coming to jail. And you know,
I know my rights and this isn't right. I'm not supposed this is nots to have it, and like, welcome to the real world. That is, it doesn't work that way in the in the in the prison walls, does not work at all. And and and you'll see that, and it's you'll you'll see the difference in sentencing along racial racial lines. Yeah yeah, So I mean you'll look
at so like you said, take violence. So if I go into a bank and I wave a gun around and say, hey, there's a robbery, and now that was becoming so prominent at one time that usually that was always a federal crime. Now sometimes if it's not enough, the person didn't get away with enough money or there's not enough you know, instances of them doing the bank robbery, they'll kick that to the state. So it's nothing to Okay, hey, I robbed a bank with a gun. Usually that would
go federal. No, they'll let the state have it. So I've seen that to where you know, or someone who goes in and passes a note. Very very different sentencing guidelines when it comes to that now, because if you use a weapon during a crime, I mean you're looking at you can look anywhere from five to twelve to where if you just passed a note and rob the bank and you just you tell her, hey, I'm gonna
blow this place up if he'll give me money. You know, I've seen people get away with you know, two and a half three, you know, I saw this one guy. It was funny, you know, all American, you know, blonde hair, blue eye guy. He had done a few banks where he robbed it with a note. So we're like, man, you're done, kid, you know what I mean, they got you. Well, his lawyer came in and they were offering three years. Lawyer's like, don't take that, sweetye. We're gonna go ahead
and work that down for you. Like wait a minute, this guy robbed multiple banks, you know, and then you know, and then on the flip side, you know, who could say I've seen guys who go home invasion they're getting twelve years right off the gate, and.
So yeah, yeah, So I think you hit the nail on the head when you said that. You know, sentencing, the way sentencing is passed down is it's it's very I guess confusing is not the right word, but inconsistent.
And that's the problem with the inconsistency of it all. And then that's the problem when you get mandatory minimums. You know, it's like, well does this qualify for this? And very to me, very very very racist. So they have this program. Now it's funny to where if you're a repeat offender, it's called you know, the repeat Offender program, but they label it rope so and it brings up you know, you're being lynched, like right, so when you go in there, So you go in and no, it
is it's funny, it's so on the nose. You have to do it. So, you know, so go in, you go in with a procession of people and you sit in a jury box when you're incarcerated to address the judge. So your lawyers will come by and they'll talk to you. And then if you see the prosecution's desk and you see that pink fi and with your name on it. That means you've been roped. And you know, people make joke about it like, oh they rope like even that is really how it is, and they take pride in it.
They think that's that's hilarious and not seeing that that's the most racist thing. And listen to sentencing guidelines if you're roped are almost double what it would normally be. So back, So I was telling you that it's only four Well now you're looking at seven point five nine. Yeah, you know, you know I've known guys stole video games, got sixteen years what a.
Yeah, well I think that. So I want to say this. You know, I read a report about a prison that had a contract with the state. They're going to build this new prison and they need to have eighty five percent capacity, can't go below that or else, you know whatever, And so the state has promised that we're going to have eighty five percent of your prison filled up to this company that built the prison, right, And I think that to make a promise like that.
It's so nasty, isn't it.
Well, I think it's beyond nasty. It's I think it's what's the word I want to use. It flies in the face of what the state should be pursuing, which is the exact opposite. Right, we want this prison to be at most ten percent full, you know what I mean. We don't want to have to use the prison. We want people to be free. We want there to be no crime. We want a society where there's no harm, everyone is harmonious, and things are equitable, and we really
don't have to worry about this sort of thing. Obviously, crime is going to be with us in large complicated societies. But to promise anyone eighty five percent incarceration and I think that that sets into motion a chain of events actions, you know, and the right right with the sentencing and the police sing and you know, and neighborhoods that are
overly policed, et cetera. And you know, at the end of the day, when we look at you know, I think just the the the repeat offender rate, you know, well, like I said, within two years, fifty percent of the folks will be back in the very prisons that they left. And I think that that speaks to the fact that there's not only corruption, there's not only backwards promises, you know, the states should have have a promise and an obligation
to society, not to prisons, you know. And that goes from the governor in Arizona's name is Doug Deucy, all the way down to the people who are policing on the streets, you know. And all these people are civil servants. They have a commitment to society, to better society. And understanding that you're a part of a system that's corrupt doesn't exempt you participating in that corruption. You know, you have a moral obligation. The universe will get you eventually,
you know. And so I think that when you take all of this stuff and you mix it together in the same pot, and you see that prisons are not working, it really, at least at the very least, should cause you to take a step back, pause and reflect on what exactly are we doing here. But we're out of
time for this episode. So I want to thank you Gonzo for coming to hang out with me here on Civic Cipher today, and I want to invite all of the listeners of the show if you have any questions, any topics you want us to discuss, If you want to donate, we appreciate all the donations. The show is supported by you. Please head over to civiccipher dot com and follow all of our social media at civic cipher and we'll see you next week, all right, Peace,