Coming home the difficult transition from federal prison to society

e

plus r equals o

or event plus response equals outcome

i was 13 years old when i realized i had

to do something

i watched as my mother worked two jobs

to take care of my sister and i

have little to show for it i watched

this

crack cocaine decimated my community

i watched as many of my friends mothers

became addicted to crack cocaine

i watched as my friends came to school

with pockets full of money

and purchased their lunch while i ate my

free lunch

my friends who used to share pants with

me and others

in order to make it through the week

without wearing the same outfit

they were coming to school with new

clothes and new shoes

they were able to do the things we had

always wanted to do in the past

and this was in eighth grade i was

starting to

see that selling drugs was becoming more

and more popular

in my environment let me refer to this

quote from napoleon hills classic book

think and grow rich when men first come

into contact with crime

they abhorred if they remain in contact

with crime for a time

they become accustomed to it and endure

it

they remain in contact with it long

enough

they finally embrace it

growing up i witnessed all types of

crime

my early role models were numbers

runners and drug dealers

it was common to witness fighting

shooting drug transactions robbery and

more

i soon became a participant in these

crimes

and by the age of 14 i began selling

drugs

it seemed as if everyone around me was

selling crack

so i soon followed suit

i sold crack and over the years i became

very good at it wasn’t long before i was

a

big time drug dealer or kingpin

i had made a name for myself in the

streets and i was well respected

but was it worth it

i stand before you today speaking from a

position of experience

i served 17 years of a 30-year federal

prison sentence

my release date was 2026

before i had my sentence reduced to 20

years

that reduction in my sentence was a new

lease on life

i have been home now a little over five

years

i came home focused i was a certified

personal trainer

so my first job was at the gym i looked

the part

and i loved the job but things did not

work out

and i left i had many other jobs after

that

and i used each of the stepping stones

and i learned from all of them

i went on to become a loss prevention

agent

at a local gross grocery store chain

before getting a job at a beer warehouse

where i learned to operate a forklift

and became a certified beer server

after that i became a certified peer

support specialist

in the realm of mental health and

finally

a licensed north carolina real estate

agent

i am a homeowner i sit on the board of a

non-profit organization

fathers united i founded my own

non-profit organization

versatile development group i am the

brand ambassador for a non-profit

organization

village minded i’m a mentor a life coach

uh inspirational speaker and a member of

the deli eagle speakers bureau

i have a millionaire for mentor mr

joelle dudley

i’ve had my artwork displayed in

galleries and i’ve sold pieces

all over the united states

i did all this in spite of my 17 years

of incarceration

but i was not always this focused and

took a considerable amount of growth

to get to this point

early in my incarceration i was very

bitter i was a 24 year old boy when i

left society and i was mad at the world

i felt there was no way i deserved a

30-year sentence

i was in an institution with a lot of

guys with life sentences

i was surrounded by individuals who had

little to look forward to

the energy was low and it soon rubbed

off on me

i started to feel as if i may as well

have been given a life sentence

when my attitude only got worse when i

got my first cell mate

i ended up with a guy with five years

i hated this dude i hated the fact

that he had a five year sentence and he

cried about it every day

he cried about his five-year sentence to

a guy with a 30-year sentence

at some point i decided i was going to

kill my cell mate

i don’t know where i came up with this

stupid plan

but i made the mistake of sharing my

intentions

with some of my life for buddies

well i got screamed on and cursed out

badly for it

this big dude from indianapolis named

big ale

let me have it he called me stupid

and a lot of other things i could not

repeat

he told me to stop crying and to be glad

that i had to exit date

he said that his exit date was when he

was deceased

see big ale understood that although he

walked in that prison

that he would be carried out in the box

well i was embarrassed by the way big l

screamed on me

but i was also not crazy see big air was

the largest human

i have ever seen plus he had a life

sentence

so i just listened to him and i changed

my attitude

big air changed my life that day that

was

one of two major points of

transformation i experienced

while incarcerated the second

toastmasters international came to

pollock louisiana while i was housed

there

toastmasters was an international

speaking organization

i learned while attending their first

meeting that they boasted a one percent

recidivism rate

in their workshops in the state

we were to be the first established

chapter in federal prison

that was all the convention i needed i

joined

joining toastmasters was a great move on

my part

it helped to make me a more confident

communicator

it also set me on course to becoming an

internationally recognized

inspirational speaker

toastmasters was a breath of fresh air

to all of its members

we were in a hostile environment with

very little solace

our meetings became our solace

it was saddening to me when i was

shipped to another institution

and they did not have toastmasters

i tried to get the program implemented

at every institution i touched after

that but they were reluctant

fortunately for me not long after

leaving pollock louisiana

i had my sentence reduced to 20 years

that left me with roughly five years to

my release date

i spent every day of that five years

preparing for my release

when i was released july 1st 2015

i was ready i felt i was prepared for

every variable the world had for me

i had my family support in place i had

my short-term goals and my long-term

goals written down

i had even vowed to abstain from female

contact for 30 days after my release

in order to concentrate on what was

important

i immediately began my job search and i

immediately ran into problems

i could not figure out how to explain

the 20-year gap

in employment

i didn’t have a car so that eliminated

me from many positions

i wasn’t allowed to use my cell phone in

the halfway house

in order to check my email messages

my son had a child had two more on the

way

by two different women my mother did not

live on the bus route

so when i moved in with her i had to

walk two miles daily to the bus stop

despite these obstacles i was able to

overcome them

and find employment however

many come home who have far more

obstacles and far less support

what happens to those individuals a good

friend of mine came home after

18 years he could not get around to

questions

about his past so he lied about it

he did not answer truthfully when asked

if he had ever been convicted of a

felony

well he got the job did well at the job

and they loved

me but at some point they found out

he lied on his application and he was

released

even though he was perfectly capable of

doing the job

and had been doing it for a time

fortunately for him

he was able to find something equally

rewarding at another company

the truth is that even after serving our

debts to society

we are treated as second-class citizens

we are faced with many obstacles and

many are not able to overcome them

mentally they often revert to old

behavior and re-offend

76 percent of state inmates reoffend

and 44 percent of federal inmates

reoffend

our prison population is over 2 million

and we have not changed our approach to

incarceration

yet my story is an exception to the rule

i’m a licensed real estate agent because

of persistence

not because the door was opened at all

i recently published a manual to help

individuals

coming home from prison i outlined 10

steps that i took

to increase my chances of a successful

transition

i was impacted by a video i watched

while incarcerated

it was about a guy from richmond

virginia who came home after 14 years

he had a positive attitude and a

supportive family like i did

and he went on to become one of the top

car salesmen in the city

he was featured in a commercial and he

made very good money

that video changed my outlook

before seeing that video i thought i

would be relegated to a life of

fast food jobs and minimum wage

after seeing that video i became more

ambitious napoleon hill states

in his book think and grow rich that

there is no remedy for lack of ambition

maybe that explains the higher

recidivism rates

individuals need something to look

forward to

incentive is a strong motivator for most

if you think that you will be relegated

to a life of fast food jobs and minimum

wage

then it is easier to get back into a

life of drug dealing and stilling

there’s high risk but there is also

greater reward

the fifth habit in the seven habits of

highly effective people

by stephen r covey teaches you to

seek first to understand then to be

understood

if we don’t try and empathize with the

situations of our brothers and sisters

then we will never truly feel for them

as an inspirational speaker i understand

the importance

of positive reinforcement

we must try to work with these people

and change their minds mentally

if we want change golf taught

treat a man as he is and he will remain

as he

is treat a man as he can and he should

be

and he will become as he can and he

should be

i know that my story is different

i’m i i i made an exception where others

have failed

i’m i’m my fifth year as a positive

contributing member of society

i live my life for my family but i will

never forget

the people who supported me on the other

side

i would never forget how big air changed

my life

i implore you i know that there are

people

who live vicariously through me i

implore you

as members of society to let the judge’s

sentence

be the end of judgment

prison is often a result of a mistake in

judgment

mistakes are correctable if people are

allowed to learn

from those mistakes let us not forget

that some great men were incarcerated at

some point in their lives

martin luther king nelson mandela

even jesus christ and they all went on

to inspire

nations after incarceration

if we want these men and women to

succeed after incarceration

then maybe we should do what we can to

facilitate these track transactions

and not add to the many obstacles they

already face

another quote from seven habits of

highly highly affected people states

that

he who could not change the very fabric

of his thought

would never be able to change reality

and would never therefore

make any progress

i have theorized that humans are a lot

like caterpillars

when we are young is when we are most

destructive

some are more destructive than others

my point here is not the the amount of

destruction or the reason

for the destruction my focus is that

like the caterpillar at some point in

our lives we

go through a metamorphosis at some point

in our lives we change

unlike the caterpillar our change is

mental and not

physical we go into our cocoons

figuratively and come out butterflies

prison is that cocoon for many

i implore you to accept

the change and stop expecting the

butterfly

to revert back to the damage that it

caused as

a caterpillar thank you

you