All language subtitles for Incarcerating.US.2016.1080p.WEBRip.x265-RARBG2_English

When we think of prisons,

if we bother to think
of them at all that is,

there is a tendency
to see them as institutions

completely divorced
from human society.

[reporter 2]
The Justice department

said today
the inmate population

of federal and state prisons
in this country

is at an all time high.

[reporter 3]
The public sees a need

for more prisons

because crime
is the number one concern

of the people in this State.

[reporter 4] Too many inmates

and not enough space.

[female reporter]
Another crime,

another criminal.

In a country already
fed up with both.

[male reporter] People
stocked up like corn wood

on our prisons.

[female reporter 2]
There's a population explosion

in America--

Overcrowding in this country's
jails and prisons.

Populations are exploding.

Every number of people
are now being held behind bars.

[mixing reporters' voices]

[dramatic music intensifies]

[dramatic music decrescendo]

[reporter] A shocking new number
was released today

and it deserves
our undivided attention.

One out of every
one hundred Americans

is now behind bars,

locked up in prison or in jail.

[jail cell door closing]

[Carolyn LeCroy]
The most important thing...

is to talk from your heart.

If you have more than one child,

give like an overall message.

But then do an individual one,
to each child.

Throw them a kiss,

talk to them
about what you do daily.

The rest should be just you.

If you've written a poem...

we've had people pray,
we've had people sing.

One guy showed his little boy
how a shoot at basketball.

Be creative.

These are gifts
to your children.

And your families.

Ok, any questions?

[Carolyn LeCroy]
The families are punished

right along with...

the offender.

People don't think so.

But the collateral consequences
of somebody's incarceration

affects not just
that whole family,

but it affects
the whole community.

It affects you
as an individual,

whether you know it or not.

And whether you know
that person or not,

that's incarcerated,

you're paying for him.

You should care.

I have background
in film and video as a producer.

And I thought, there's got
to be something I can do.

So why not combine...

my career and my experience
with the prison system

and come up with something
for these kids.

When a parent looks
in that camera.

They're looking at their child.

And if they can look at them
and say,

"This isn't your fault,
you did nothing wrong."

It means a lot.

And for many
of these men and women,

it's the first time they've
really taken responsibility,

which is huge,
and that's the first step.

in recovery of any kind.

Any kind. It's to take
the responsibility for it.

"But even when I'm far away,

this love I have will stay,

and wrap myself around you
every minute of the day."

I just want you guys
to know that

I'm gonna do the best I can
to stay out of this place.

And continue striving forward
with my life.

I miss you guys all a lot.

I'm glad this is
the last Christmas

I'm gonna have to spend away
from you all.

I just want you guys to know
that I miss you all.

I can't wait to be
with you all.

That's it. I love you all.
Take care.

I love you all.

Bye. Bye.

Nice job.

[Eric Sterling] Modern prisons
are an invention of Quakers.

Quakers had this idea

that if you gave people
an opportunity

to silently reflect,
to become penitent,

leading to the term penitentiary

that they would reflect
upon their misconduct

and be reformed.

[Richard Wener]
The first practical use of it

was really in the US,
in Philadelphia.

It tried to provide
positive change

and change someone's behavior.

But it was partly
as a movement to get away

from corporal
and capital punishment,

to come up with
something better.

The problem in the thing
that people forgot

was going into
a monastery voluntarily

and isolating yourself
in order to pray and think

is very different
than being pushed into a cell...

by the State.

One of the things
that seem to be true

in the history
of prison's systems

is that the philosophy's changed
but the buildings remain.

So you have
these massive buildings

that are these
major expenditures

and very often just used as
essentially a human warehouses.

You would occasionally
get people

that would different kinds
of experiments in education

in therapeutics in some way,

in inmate self-government,

but usually they were
fairly quick overwhelmed

by the crowding in the system.

Or because
they were politically unpopular.

[Eric Sterling]
From 1920 until 1970

this whole half century
of American history,

the rate of incarceration
was roughly level

that about a hundred ten
per hundred thousand.

And this is a broad span
at our history,

this is near
the roaring twenties

and prohibition.

The depression and all
the social change there.

World War II.

The post-war economic boom,

the fifties,
the explosion of suburbia,

the sixties
and all the social turbulence

during this whole period

the rate of incarceration
is roughly level in the US.

at about 110 per 100,000.

And this reflects,

you know, the policies
of police departments

and prosecutors and judges

operating all over the country.

Local and state level.

And then, in 1970,
this all changes.

So that, by now,

the rate
of incarceration nationwide

is over 700 per 100,000.

The rate of incarceration
for African-Americans

is over 4,000 per 100,000.

And so you have to wonder,
what changed,

why did this half century
of stability

get up-ended with this dramatic
increase incarceration

in the US.

America's public enemy
number one, in the US,

is drug abuse.

[Tim Lynch]
Once the Federal government

decided that we were
gonna have War on Drugs

they were able to then...

take a lot of money
from the Federal budget

and then send it out
to states and localities.

I realize the need for money

and to deal with this problem.

I am glad that
in this administration

we've increased
the amount of money

for handling the problem
of dangerous drugs.

Seven fold, it will be
600 million dollars this year,

More money will be needed
in the future.

Virtually everybody thought,

the drug war
was the number one issue

and so you had politicians
in both parties

and district attorneys
and elected chairs

everybody wanted to get in
to drug cases.

And get aggressive about it.

First time recommending

legislation making the penalty

for all illegal trafficking
in hard drugs,

a life sentence in prison.

Issued before
the U.S. Supreme Court today,

mandatory life sentences

for possession
of large quantity of drugs.

That is the law in Michigan.

[reporter 2]
California's governor

Pete Wilson's signed
that state's new

three strikes
and you're out law.

It requires a sentence
of life prison

without parole,
for at least 25 years

for anyone convicted
of a third violent felony.

[Tim Lynch]
Most of American policing

is done at the State
and Local level.

So although the Federal
government may have expanded,

you may have seen bigger budgets
for the DEA and the FBI

and their drug investigations.

The bigger impact
was to sending a Federal dollars

down to state local police
departments

where they get to hire
more officers,

hire more prosecutors

and once you do that hiring

then they start arresting more.

And more and more people
start coming into the system

and you've got to expand
the prison capacity.

New laws to punish them,

new agents to arrest them,

new prosecutors
to convict them

and new prisons to hold them.

[Tracey Syphax]
We moved to Trenton

when I was very young.

When we moved here,
we moved to Miller Homes.

We use to always run up
and down the hallways.

Of course, it was the project.

So, sometimes we would sneak up
on the roof.

Which was the top floor,
the twelfth floor.

And, you know, look out.

And of course, that was
very scary as a young child.

But, you know,
when you're living in a projects

there's only so much stuff
that you can get into.

My brother was tragically killed
when he was ran over by a truck.

Now I remember specifically

going to the corner
where it happened

and seeing all the blood

'cause they left all the blood
still on the street

That traumatic experience
of losing my only brother

in that truck accident

and I know it had done
somethin' to me.

But, you know,
drugs were my escape.

That time was hard
all the way around.

because my son was doing drugs,

my nephews were doing drugs,
my nieces were doing drugs,

my sisters were doing drugs.

It was like an epidemic...

of drug abuse.

And I cannot explain it.

I cannot explain my feelings

because at that time
I didn't know how I felt.

You know, I was sad

because I felt like
they were ruining their lives.

But there was nothing
I could do about it

to change their lifestyle.

So, that was it.

[Eric Sterling]
Most historians look at

the origin of the War on Drugs

as something of President Nixon
with his speeches

and his creation of the DEA

and other agencies
in the 1970's.

But the War on Drugs
as we understand it

with enormous case loads,

and then filled up
prison population

is really a feature
of the 1980's

under president Reagan.

Drugs are menacing our society.

They are threatening our values

and undercutting
our institutions.

They're killing our children.

[Eric Sterling] Under Reagan,
there was a tremendous increase

in Federal spending
for antidrug activity,

Cabinet level efforts

and congress creating
very powerful new laws.

All of what we understand
of the War on Drugs today

is really a creation
of the 1980's.

[male reporter] On day 2 of
his new campaign against drugs

the president backed up
his tough talk with action.

We're getting tough on drugs
and we mean business.

[Neil Franklin]
It's almost like overnight

we had this great idea

"Hey, why don't we go after
the users?"

And that's what we did,

we started going after the users

and the prison population
soared.

So obviously
there are far more users

than there are major
operations.

We started treating
sick people.

People who were addicted
to these drugs, like criminals.

[Tracey Syphax]
After my brother passed away,

I kind of withdrew
from a lot of things,

I didn't talk as much,
I was very quiet.

Probably as early
as my teenage years.

Twelve, thirteen years old...

you know, I started sneaking
and drinking

a little bit here and there.

I started smoking marihuana
at a very young age.

I started selling drugs and...

you know,
and he came right along with it.

You know.

Family...
you tend to trust family.

once I started selling
loose joints

I graduated
to selling nickel bags

and then I graduated to selling
half ounces and ounces.

So, it was a slowly progression

of me wanting more money,
me wanting to do more.

That I progressed
from the legal side

of shining shoes
and cleaning windows

to the illegal side of selling
loose joints and nickel bags.

When I first saw him,
it was in the hallway.

And I used to be
a hall patrol monitor.

And I was stationed
right in front of his locker

so when I knew
that he was coming to his locker

I would put my hands up
and I'd block his way.

So he would have to say
"Excuse me" or something.

And after that,
we started talking.

[Tracey Sterling]
We got to know each other...

I walked her home many times

and hanging out over
at her house...

you know, my home...

wasn't a really a home
compared to her house.

Margaret grew up
with her parents,

both her parent's home.

In a nice decent house.

Great mother, great father.

Something that I didn't have,

and I started
just being around her a lot.

And being around her family.

And next thing we knew,
I was pretty much...

once we started going together

I was pretty much,
living at her house

at the age of 14-15 years old.

I was pretty much staying there

because my mum was on drugs,
you know.

As long as she knew I was there,

she didn't really have
a problem with it.

I kind of started living
and staying with Margaret

at a very young age.

By the time I was 16-17,

I was fully engulfed
in a drug game

and Fitney was only so big,

Fitney is only 7.5 square miles

so a lot of rumors
started to spread

along to the Trenton detective.

Back then they had
two detectives

that worked high school.

And they kind of
got to know me very well.

I guess they relayed that
information to Trenton Narcotics

They started watching me
and following me around

and stuff like that.

I remember the first time
that they raided at my house

I wasn't there
but my other was there.

And I think
I just had turned 17.

And they locked her up

and I got a phone call
saying that,

your mother was locked up

and they wanted you
to turn yourself in.

So eventually,
turned myself in at 17

they let my mother go and I...

the first time
I ever went to jail

I went to the youth house.

Because I wasn't 18,
I was still a juvenile.

We were still in high school

and we missed the prom

and he missed graduation.

And I got out,

I remember the detective
telling me that

as soon as I turn 18

the day's gonna come back
and get me.

And if I didn't
straighten up my life,

that first experience
would be nothing

compared to
my other experiences in jail

because then I will be over 18,

and I will be gone
to an adult facility.

[male reporter] The reason
depths of athletes Len Bias

and Don Rogers

that made drug abuse
a political issue.

[Eric Sterling] Len Bias gone to
high school here, in Washington,

went to
the University of Maryland,

which is right here
inside the beltway.

And Bias was their star.

[male reporter]
The world champion Celtics

used their first round
draft choice

to pick Bias to play for them
after his graduation.

This morning Len Bias was dead.

A cardiorespiratory arrest.

No one knows why yet.

There are reports that
traces of cocaine

were found in Bias' system.

[Eric Sterling] The Speaker
of the House is from Boston,

Tip O'Neill,

and people are stunned
all over the country.

How did this happened?

Here we are inside
the DC beltway.

Congress just went crazy.

And emotionally starting
wrapping things up

and creating tough,
long crime policies

related to drugs.

[male reporter] Last week,
House democrats said

they would come up
with a legislative package.

And they criticized
the president

for failing to fund
any drug efforts.

Unfortunately,
there has been a...

failure to recognize

the vital urgency
of this problem.

[male reporter]
But at the White House

they got to this issue first.

No, there's no parties
going on here.

I mean... Five years ago.

I've been doing this
for five years, Chris.

The president has talked up
a good argument

in declaring war,

but he certainly hasn't put
together much of an arsenal.

Politicians in both parties

say people are so concerned
about drugs right now,

that no one in Washington

can afford to be seen as
ignoring the problem.

[Eric Sterling] In July, 1986
when the democratic leadership

figured out that
this was a big issue

and they wanted to make it

the central issue
of the election,

they only had four weeks
until the August recess

which is when people
are gonna go off and campaign.

So that's a very short
period of time

and they're asking committees

that had nothing
to do with drugs,

small business,

Merch marine
and fisheries,

post office and civil service

You know, everybody
is supposed to kick in,

every House Chairmen
who's a democrat,

is going to contribute
to this big stew of legislation

that's gonna be brought
to the floor

right after the Labor Day.

So this is an incredibly short
period of time

to write very complicated laws.

No hearings, no research,

no prison impact analysis,
racial impact analysis, nothing.

It was done as way too much

legislation is done in this
country very thoughtlessly.

[Eric Sterling] And if
you're moving very, very fast,

and you don't have time to get
the considered impact,

from people that gonna have to
live with and carry out this law

you're gonna make mistakes.

We made mistakes.

[Tracey Syphax] My birthday
was September the 12th.

In 1980, I turned 18.

They came back and locked me up

and caught me with drugs
September 16.

So they kept their promise
they made to me

and fulfilled that promise.

So once again at the age of 18,

I was back in jail,
facing...

numerous drug charges
this time.

Because of my juvenile record,

it was evident that I was
gonna do some time, this time.

[Margaret Syphax]
And when he came home,

he got a job,

he was on the right track,

and then he just started back...

doing drugs, selling drugs,

and at that time
we separated.

[Tracey Syphax] Even though
I remember my first bin,

and I know the pain,
that I put my girlfriend

and my family through
and everything,

my father,
and stuff like that...

by 1998, it had become
a complete distant...

memory for me.

And sometimes, drugs have
a way of masking your memory.

I knew jail was bad,
I never wanted to go back again.

But when you're hooked on drugs,

you just don't think about it.

You just don't want the money,

You want everything else
that come along with it.

Because when you're
at that level in the streets,

you could lose your life.

And sometimes drugs
help you forget that,

that part is still out there.

I could just focus on the money.

So I can get high.

And I can float away.

I remember talking
to my grandmother

and having that
conversation with her,

about my life
and how far I had fallen.

She said to me...

"You know, Tracey,
I'm gonna always pray for you.

And I'm gonna pray that
you change your life around."

One of the things that she said
that stuck with me was that

God is gonna find you
at your darker hour.

And only then will you
realize who you truly are.

And I heard her
but I didn't really hear her.

And I left her house,
that Thanksgiving dinner

and went right back out
into the streets.

I remember,
going to New York,

and coming back from New York,

coming down Route One,
coming through Union County,

We had drugs in the car
and we had a gun in the car,

And I remember being stopped
at a light,

and getting out
and switching drivers.

I got round
to the passenger side

and he took the driver's seat.

And not knowing that there was
a cop car right behind us,

so once again,

I didn't want to court,
I wasn't going to trial,

I told my lawyer that,

we just had to try to get
all the charges pushed together,

give me one sentence,
let me go do my time,

and hopefully
straighten up my life.

I remember specifically,
the judge,

the citizen judge,
telling me that...

now I'm a two time loser.

And he said, "Tracey you got
convicted in 1980,

and now you convicted again
in 1988."

He said, "Come back before me
for the third time

and the third time
is gonna be a charm for you."

[Eric Sterling]
The direction to a judge

to sentence
can be done in two ways.

You can say:

"Judge, here's a crime

and for this crime
you can impose a sentence

Here we're in this range
from...

probation to some terms
of years imprisonment.

The other way is to say:
"Judge,

you must impose some minimum
number of years or months,

of imprisonment
and go up from there."

So a mandatory minimum
is a sentence

where no matter how minor
the role of the offender,

no matter how insignificant
of violation of this crime it is

a minimum term must me imposed.

[Jdg. Robert Holmes Bell]
So I have all this

and then we get into
personal data of the family.

You'll see as you read this,

this gets really right down
the nitty-gritty.

"Removed from the home
at six years old

and placed in foster care.

Attempted suicide several times
during childhood

starting at age seven."

And where this individual
was placed

in the course of
the juvenile activity,

what their physical
condition is,

what their mental and emotional
health is

In this case we have
some diagnosis

of all kinds of problem

This takes quite a while

for a presentence officer
to put this together

but I certainly have

a pretty good idea
of what I'm dealing with

substance abuse, lots of that
in this particular case

Methamphetamines.

Education, that's
a little bit short.

Employment... you know...

here, there and everywhere
but not much,

financial condition,
as usually, real skimpy.

And then, this is
their five year minimum,

maximum forty years,

guideline range:
168 to 210.

That's the initial
guideline range.

And what
the sentencing options are,

they're all prisons,
what they charge to keep them.

Which never means
anything to us.

And then,
Mr. Hinkus signed his name

on this thirty page
presentence report.

So I have this whole thing
to look at.

I finished this,

there's not much more I didn't
know about this individual

More than I ever wanted to know.

[Julie Stewart]
Mandatory minimum sentences

are not knew.

They're being on the books
in this country for 200 years.

And there are about a 190
of them or something

And if you look at them
they read like the crime du jour

So you can see what the public
was concerned about

And then Congress
took that concern

and translated into law, into
like sentencing legislation.

So piracy on the high seas
in like 1790's

got your life without parole

robbing banks
and crossing state lines in 1934

was, you know,
ten years in prison

sky-jacking in the seventies was
ten or twenty years in prison

And so you could see what was...
what the headlines were.

The headlines were translated
into a mandatory sentence.

And so in the eighties
when drugs became a big deal

and lots of concern
about drugs,

it was in the top three
of public concern.

Congress was reacted by creating
new mandatory minimum sentences

for drug crimes.

[Eric Sterling]
I started work for

the House Judiciary Committee in
November 1979.

I had just turn 30.
Very young lawyer.

Not quite four years
of experience practicing law

to work rewriting the entire
Federal criminal code

for Fr. Drinan,
the Chairman of

the Criminal Justice
Sub Committee.

A few months later
Drinan announces

he's not running
for the election

and that is out of Congress
within fourteen months.

And I was traded,
in the beginning of 1981,

to the House Crime
Sub Committee,

to Congressman Hughes,
the new incoming chairman.

Where my responsibilities
were writing Federal law

dealing with drugs,
gun control, money laundering,

organized crime, pornography,
and a host of other issues.

In the 1950's, the practice
of giving mandatory sentences

as a deterrent,
became fairly widespread

by the nineteen seventies

the consensus was
they weren't fair

it didn't work,

and there was no reduction
in drug crime.

So a great many of the
mandatory terms were dropped.

Well, now they're back.

[Eric Sterling]
When I was asked: "Eric,

give us a mandatory
minimum proposal

in this week in August,
as this has been put together?

I said, "OK, let's see
what the Justice Department

is defining as the highest
level traffickers

and we will give them
this mandatory sentence.

These were hundreds of
thousands of doses of drugs

a month for at least
six months.

So when I bring this back to
the Sub Committee in our markup

Congressman Ron Mazzoli
from Louisville, Kentucky,

looks at this and says:
"Well, wait a minute!

We don't have drug-dealers
that big in Louisville,

we're not gonna use
this statute in Louisville.

Now, no one said, turned to
Ron and said:

"Ron, nobody goes to Louisville
to do dope dealing,

it ain't Miami.
It's not Houston!

You should be glad you're not
gonna need this in Louisville."

But instead, it was:
"Oh, yeah, Ron's right, yeah.

These high-level traffickers,
they're too high level.

Eric, bring us
something else."

It's all based on one factor:
your sense.

What was the drug and how much
of it did you have.

And that determines your
sentence.

So culpability no longer
really plays a major role

in a person's sentence
when the crime carries

a mandatory minimum.

[Eric Sterling] What Congress
sent to president Reagan

was five year mandatory minimum
5 grams of crack cocaine.

A gram is like
a sweet milk packet.

Ten years, minimum,
is 50 grams of crack cocaine.

That's like the weight
of a candy bar.

These are tiny quantities.

It goes back to the analogy
of a traffic ticket

with a hundred dollar cost.

Up or down, good attitude,
bad attitude.

It doesn't make any difference.
It's hundred dollars.

And it's the same
kind of theory

that's supplied over
into these mandatory minimums

in the serious crimes.

We don't care
what your attitude is,

we don't care how much
education you had,

we don't care
the ameliorating circumstances.

It's, where you did it.
So therefore.

And lot of us... Human nature
doesn't work quite that way.

And that's why we say:
"Wait a minute, wait a minute.

This is not
why we're here for.

We're here as judges.
Trained, dedicated

to look at the whole picture
and come to a just result.

The things that mandatory
minimum sentences do

is that they completely
remove the judge

from the sentencing equation.

And so, a person who
has never laid eyes on you,

some legislator in Washington
sitting on Capitol Hill

is determining
your sentence by saying,

"Well, if the person has
50 grams of methamphetamine

it's a five years sentence.

So, it's like, "really"?
I mean,

who do you want
to determine your sentence,

someone you've never seen,
who's never seen you,

or the judges in the Courtroom

and has the most information
they can about your case?

I think the, fair enough,
flexibility is

your liberal judges
are gonna give a lower sentence

and your hard-nosed judges
are gonna give a high sentence

so therefore
we're gonna have variances.

And I say,
"variances come with people.

Certain variances
come with people."

Certain communities
are different

than other communities.

There are some communities
more liberal than others.

And they have
more liberal judges.

Let them get what
their community wants.

It's... We're all
frail human beings,

trying to be the best we can.

And one can sometimes look at
the sentence and might say

"Why in the world
did he would do that?

Well, they weren't here,

they didn't see
what I had to look at."

Maybe my eyes were looking at
it differently than others.

But I have a colleague
that has a reputation for being

a little more liberal than I.

But when I compare that
colleague's sentence to mine,

roughly,

no, that person
is not liberal.

If I'm conservative

and they're liberal,
that doesn't work

when you compare
the actual sentences.

because the actual sentences
in this particular case

that person's is sometimes
heavier than mine.

But all depends on
the facts of the case.

That we approach it with.

And that's where it should be.

Because sentencing should
be individualized.

[Eric Sterling]
When president Reagan signed

the mandatory minimums in 1986,

the Federal prison population
was 36,000.

Now it's well over 200,000.

This is a growth
that no one could have imagined.

[Marc Mauer]
Mass incarceration in the US

is really unique
in human history.

There's no democratic nation
that's ever tried to have

such a massive social experiment
as we've done in incarceration.

We have more prisoners than any
other country in the world ever

by rate and numbers.

I've find it a bit disturbing

that we have more prisoners
than China.

And they have a billion
more people than we do,

I don't think it gives people
enough pause

when they hear that we have 25%
of the world's prison population

and only 5%
of the world's population.

In other words,
we are way over incarcerating

compared to any other country
in the world.

[Richard Van Wickler]
Here's the thing I think

the public
really doesn't understand

about jailing in the US,

is that it's not just
detention anymore.

That's what it used to be.
Just about detention.

But now, in addition
to your detention,

we are now the largest
mental health facility

in your community.

Wherever you live,
if you go to the jail,

there are mental
health facilities.

Because there's no place
in the community

that will take care of
the certain kinds of population

who have a mental illness
and violate the law.

In addition to that, we're
a hospital in the community.

We have to meet all
the hyper regulations

for being a hospital in order
to provide inmate medical care.

In addition to that, according
to the Federal government

we have to be... a school

for people who are
under the age of 21

who are learning disabled,
we have to provide

an equivalent
high school education

a GED with not suffice.

So, a team has to come in,
do an assessment

and provide
equivalent educations.

So we're not just
about detention,

we're a hospital,
a mental health facility,

and we're a school.

And we have to do all of
those things in one package.

With all of the unique different
types of characteristics

and individuals
that are in here.

It's a very comprehensive
mission today,

to be in corrections.

I think, originally,
the purpose of prison

is to put people
that are dangerous,

that are a threat to the society

in a place that keeps them
away from us,

for some period of time.

Either 'til they've redeemed
themselves,

or been deemed on fixable.

But we are so far beyond
that original model.

We really do seem to think
we can solve our social ills

by simply incarcerating people.

[Carolyn LeCroy]
I had allowed...

somebody to use
a storage unit of mine

and the police found it.

And they came after me.

I ended up literally
holding the bag,

and in nothing, about,
the Criminal Justice system...

you know, here I was,
this middle-class mom,

career, never even
a parking ticket

and it was quite a surprise
when we went to Court,

and I got that kind of time
for marihuana.

I was charged with...
possession of marihuana,

with the intent to distribute
and I got a conspiracy charge.

I received a total of
55 five year prison sentence.

The judge suspended all but six.

I was fortunate enough...

to make first parole

and I actually served in prison
14 months

and I came home.

Use the cards that we put in
with the messages

and ask the family to respond.

So we've gotten
really good responses.

And this one was...

three members
of the family viewed it...

and we asked what were the ages
of the children whose are

and she put just one age,
she put six,

She says,
it's extremely meaningful

for the daughter of the mother
whose incarcerated.

She loved it.

We all did.

And this one said,

"What did the message
mean to your family?"

To know their family was OK.

And it's a huge part.

These children want to know
how their family was OK.

That their mom or dad
are OK.

[prisoner] There's so much
I want to say to you, guys.

I know it's been three years
since haven't seen me.

I miss you all so much.

And I greatly appreciate
everything you've done for me.

Nothing is your fault.

Just very good.
Nothing is yall's fault.

And anyone else in the family
that I've done

that y'all make feel that
you're at a fault

it's been me.

I've grown up a lot this time

in these last three
or four years.

I've grown up a lot.

Just want to say that...
I love you.

Bye.

Merry Christmas.

[Tracey Syphax]
They sentence me to...

one year administration
segregation.

And administration
segregation

is twenty three hour
lock-up.

You locked up for
twenty three hours each day.

You come for a half hour shower
and half hour break.

I've never been
a violent person.

At that time I was treated

like one of the most
violent persons in the world.

I remember going into that cell

and I believe there was
maybe a five by eight cell

and once that door closed

I knew I was gonna be there
for the next year.

This is an experience that,

either is gonna make you,
or break you

Either you're gonna come out
a better person

or you gonna come out
a worsen person

than you were
before you went in.

Being in a hole is an experience
that I wouldn't wish to anybody.

When you're locked up
for 23 hours,

the only thing you can do
is think.

The words of my grandmother's

just kept playing over
and over again in my mind.

And those words was that God
was gonna find me

in my darkest hour.

And only then,
that I realized who I truly was.

And when I kept hearing that,

I kept saying:
"I am at my darkest hour.

I'm at my lowest point."

And I think right then,

I realized that I've reached
my lowest point I life.

And that the only way for me
to go from here was up.

[female reporter]
Another crime, another criminal

in a country already fed up
with both.

Politicians say the solution
is simple: crackdown.

The reason the
Criminal Justice system

isn't working is that we're not
sending enough people in jail,

and keeping there
longer enough.

The people are saying,
in a very general way

that they want to lock
these rascals up

and keep them there
for a long time.

During the 1980's,
there was a major shift

in the Congress
and in State Legislators

about how long sentences
should be.

The public was alarmed

by increasing rates of crimes
from the 1970's and early 80's.

They wanted longer sentences,
the wanted cracking down.

And, that's what happened
across the board

for all kinds of crimes

not only the mandatory minimum
drug sentences.

Congress in 1984 established
a US sentencing Commission

made up of seven members,

four had to be federal judges,

no more than one from one party,
a very bipartisan effort.

And those members
were given the instructions

to create a sentencing
guideline systems

for all crimes
not just drugs.

Any federal crime

and it would give
the judges a starting point

and then they would go
up and down on a grid

depending on the culpability
of the defendant

and a few other factors.

At the same time,

Congress decides to jump in with
a mandatory minimums of 1986.

So before the before
the sentencing guidelines

have really been shaped

we now have
long mandatory sentences

for low level drug offenses.

So the Sentencing Commission
now has to build guidelines

on top of
the mandatory minimums.

So that a consequence
was that...

drug trafficking that might
not have been so serious,

let's say trafficking in
ten kilos of crack cocaine

now got you a life sentence,
under the sentencing guideline.

The effect of all
those sentencing laws

was not just to increase
the sentences that people

were exposed to
so the people were serving

longer time in prison
than they did before.

It was also to take
the discretion

away from the sentencing
discretion,

a way for judges and Juries

and shift it over prosecutors.

it didn't eliminate discretion,

it just gave prosecutors
the power to determine

what your sentence
was going to be.

by making charging decisions.

And even by bargaining over what
the facts of your case were.

So it didn't mean the discretion
was eliminated from the system,

it just put the prosecutors
in charge.

Prosecutors can negotiate
with you behind closed doors

It's not open to the public,
it's not reviewable,

there's no appeal available
in the way

you're negotiated with

And they can basically
say to you:

"If you plead guilty,
or if you cooperate,

and you give us other names,

we'll cut you a deal

and we'll only charge you
with one of these charges

instead of these three.

And you'll get five years
instead of 15."

So all of that goes on
behind closed doors.

And they say to you:
"If you don't cooperate with us,

if you don't agree,
we're gonna file a motion

because you have a prior
from ten years back.

We're gonna file a motion,
column 8.51.

And if you go to trial
and lose,

your five years sentence
is gonna double to ten.

Or your ten year sentence
is gonna be double to twenty.

Or we can even,
if you got two priors,

it will put you
in prison for life.

But all the decision

about how they charge these...
What charges they bring

knowing what the sentence
will be,

that's all done behind
closed doors.

It's absolutely
not open to the public.

It's not opened to review
by a court even.

And so the power
of the prosecutors is huge

in determining sentences today,

and I don't think prosecutors
are, per se, bad people

but I think power is seductive
and they have a lot of power

and they like it
and they get to,

not just rack up a victory,
a win,

but they can also say:

"And he's going to prison
for twenty five years."

[Nancy Ralston] Amy was born
in 1960 and she was very shy.

But by the time
she got in high school

people confided in her.

She played basketball,
she made good grades.

[Ginger Fenter]
High school that we went to

was 7th to 12th grade.

I was kinda the little
tag-along sister.

Amy and my brothers were friends

and Amy and my sisters
were friends.

But I just kind of watched her
she was...

always really friendly,
always really nice.

[Nancy Ralston]
This is a small town

and everybody knows everybody.

If she got in trouble
we'd know about it pretty soon.

[Amy Povah]
I had what I considered

an idyllic childhood.

A some point when I'm in college

I meet a guy that works for
Southwest Times Record,

the newspaper there,
in Fort Smith, Arkansas.

And he asked me if I would be
a subject for him

and go out and take
some modeling photos.

We went to, like,
several locations

and he instilled at me
that I really had to pursue

a modelling career
consider it.

My mother said: "Did you know
Amy Ralston moved to Dallas?"

And I was like:
"Oh my Gosh, no!

Mom, what's she thinking?
What's she gonna do?"

"So well, I think she's going
to model."

[Amy Povah] I created
a little portfolio

before I moved to Dallas

that I could show
to the modelling agencies.

I was on a double date.

I wasn't really interested in
the guy I had been set up with.

And Sandy, approached me

and asked me
if I'd like to go out

and I rejected his offer

and he looked so deflated
so I said,

"If you can remember my phone
number, you can call me.

Sure enough he called a week
or so later, we went on a date.

He was well read,
well-traveled, well educated,

graduated
at Stanford Law School.

I had gone to
Princeton Theology School.

So it was very appealing
to be around somebody

who I was frankly
very impressed with

and so fascinated with.

And eight months later,

we were getting married
at the Dallas Arboretum

and all of our family
and friends were there.

And at that point it seemed
like a dream come true.

There were red flags
before we got married.

There were frankly red flags
all along the way.

Sandy has what I consider
to be a dual personality,

and this other character
would emerge whenever he drank.

I literally had to
do something radical.

The only remedy
to remove him from my life

was for me to leave Dallas.

I had to leave Dallas and leave
all my friends behind

and completely move to
a different city.

Amy finally left Sandy
but he wouldn't leave her.

I just kept saying:
"Let's be friends."

He wanted to be more.

So he told me that
he was going to Europe.

And then I didn't heard anything
for a while.

The word got back to me
that he'd been arrested.

I hadn't been in Dallas
over a year.

So the only thing I knew to do

was to book a flight
and go to Dallas

and see if I could go
through the house

listening to
the answering machines

and try to piece this
thing together

and eventually you think you're
gonna find out more information.

And while I was in
the Dallas house, the phone rang

and it was Sandy's German
legal council

who had been assigned
to the case in Germany

And, at that time,
he gave me very thin details

but said that Sandy
had been arrested

for manufacturing ecstasy
and he wanted me

to retain an attorney for him
there in Dallas.

It was
a pretty interesting revelation

but I did,
there was money in the safe

that was in the house in Dallas

and I took that money
and I retained an attorney

to go over and meet
with Sandy in Germany.

Seven months after
Sandy's been arrested,

and I pull into the garage
my car is rushed

by law enforcement people
who were screaming

and they have a gun out

and they're pointing it out
at my face.

I'm being told:
"You're in hot water,

we know that your husband
was arrested,

we know you know, we know
you visited him in Germany,

and they said:
"We know you have information.

And all you have to do is
tell us what you know.

And I wasn't going
to say anything

because I'm literally seeing
these people destroying my home.

So this isn't someone
I really confide in.

So, it wasn't very long
after that

that my lawyer explained to me
exactly what it is

that my prosecutor wanted.

They wanted her to wear a wire.

And try to implicate
other people.

People she didn't even know!

And she refused to do it.

She said I don't know
these people.

I'm not gonna do this.

And this prosecutor said:
"You either cooperate"

- and I'm paraphrasing now -

"You either cooperate
or we'll ruin your life."

I was in Los Angeles,
and it was March 1991,

and I go over
and I look out the window

and there they are.

So, I was arrested that day.

Her father and I wanted her
to play bargain.

But... I understand...

Amy is not gonna
implicate somebody.

And like a criminal,
out of all of them,

she didn't even know.

Just to save her own skin,
that's not my daughter.

So she wouldn't do this.

And as a result,
they ruined her.

[Amy Povah] I could not
plead guilty to everything

that they accused me of.

So, I plead not guilty

and ultimately
I was convicted for conspiracy

and I received
a 24 year sentence.

There a way in which you have
to see the conspiracy law

is a very important tool
of law enforcement.

If the crime is selling drugs,

and some man in Miami sells
20 kilos of cocaine

to an undercover agent...

you want to ask:

"Who is the seller working for?"

"Where does the money go?"

If the money goes back
to a drug lord in Colombia

who's gonna keep the proceeds

he's in the conspiracy even
though he actually wasn't there

when the sell took place.

He's a conspirator.

And so part of the goal
of the conspiracy law

is to make sure that the most
senior level

of those in
the criminal organization

are justly punished.

The problem is
when you flip it around

and the lowest level people
in the criminal organization

get punished just like
they're the kingpin

And that's the big problem
in that the way

in which the conspiracy laws
are being applied.

[Amy Povah]
I ended up in federal prison

in Dublin, California,

I realized that I would need
to spend a lot of time

in the law library.

And I needed to familiarized
myself with my case

and everything
that had gone wrong.

If you further
the conspiracy one step,

you're guilty for everything
in the conspiracy,

no matter when you entered
the conspiracy.

It could have been
on the last day.

So, because I had
collected some money,

I technically was guilty
of conspiracy.

And I was held responsible

for everything
that everybody else had done.

And my sentence,
my 24 years sentence

was established based on
the sum total

of all the ecstasy that Sandy
has manufactured.

That's where my years came from.

My years didn't come
from things that I did.

It came from three point
something million

tablets of ecstasy

that he had manufactured,
put my on the chart

at this level just
twenty four years.

That's how a judge
sentences you, based on a chart.

You end up being the subject
the way the sentencing law

is applied to conspiracy.

You end up being subject
to being punished,

for all the conduct that
everybody in the conspiracy

has been involved in.

So, the idea of
proportional punishment

can be lost,

if this triggers
a mandatory sentence.

One of the most controversial
things about

the way the Federal Criminal
Justice system works, now

is something called
the trial penalty.

And so it's just become
standard practice that

prosecutor will go
to a defendant and say:

"You've been charged with
a crime and you either gonna

plead guilty and cooperate
or we're going to crush you."

And so, the defendant
is confronted with

a favorable offer

for a plea agreement
if he pleads guilty

and potentially
decades in prison

if you exercise
this constitution

of right to go to trial

Because he's not gonna
get any credit

for accepting responsibilities
if he goes to trial.

Prosecutors have a lot
of discretion

to add charges to people.

You know this is false
under the category

like throwing the bucket
on somebody.

Sometimes they have
that discretion

and they do not want people

exercising their right
to a jury trial

so they will threaten people

and the Courts
have upheld this tactic.

It's not like they're doing
something under the table.

But if people insist on
the right to a jury trial,

they faced
the prospect of the judge

imposing
a mandatory minimum sentence

or the prosecutors adding
charges

and that's the type of pressure
that they face

and why so many
do plead guilty.

[Amy Povah]
To add insult to injury,

while I'm incarcerated
for 24 years,

he comes back to the US
and goes before the same judge

that sentenced me to 24 years

and he got
three years of probation

because he cooperated
and snitched down everybody.

The person who comes in early,
and cooperates

usually ends up
with a lower sentence

than the person
in the conspiracy

who walks up two days
before the trial,

and tenders a plea,
that sentence will be different.

Even though they may be
situated the same,

it just plain different.

And those are the yings
and the yangs

of the sentencing process

that the Court has not
a whole lot of control over,

and the US attorneys
and the prosecutors' attorneys

have control over

but it does result
in a different sentence.

When you are facing a mandatory
minimum drug sentence...

there's only one way out.

You must offer substantial
assistance to the government

in a prosecution
of someone else.

That means you've got to work
for the government.

Means you've got to set up
someone else,

you need to give information
to the government

that leads to the prosecution
of others.

When you're facing
something like 20 or 30 years,

you have people that are...

do things they never thought
they would do,

which is, turning their friends,
testifying against friends.

Sometimes they will even make up
false information

to testify falsely
against people

just in order
to get themselves out

from under the terrible
legal situation that they're in.

The pressure to provide
information is huge

and coercive...
and un-American.

But that's the way
mandatory minimums are set up.

My mother calls me and says,
"I need to tell you something."

And I'm thinking, "the worst."

She says: "Well, Amy is featured
in Glamour Magazine.

She's been in prison
for a number of years.

[Amy Povah]
And why that was such a catalyst

was suddenly we had something
tangible to hand to people.

The community find out
and my brother got involved

and of course my father
and Senator Bumpers

and Senator Pryor.

Everyone started
actually looking into the case

and saying, "Well,
what could've possibly

happened here?
This just doesn't seem right."

[Amy Povah] My story and case,
started gaining momentum

and we got, I think, up to
15 politicians

who wrote letters
supporting my clemency.

When I read it,

I was sympathetic to her,

because I thought,

that her husband was the primary
driver of the offense.

She clearly had a subordinate
role in the offense.

And she was caught up in the web
of these conspiracy laws

that are extremely broad ranging

and you don't have to do
very much

to get yourself stuck
in a case like that.

I went to
my case manager's office

and walked in the door
and she said,

she was in a frenzy
and she said,

"Where are you going
to release to?"

And I was like,
"what do you mean?"

And she said,
"Where are you gonna live

when you get out of prison?"

And I said, "well, I guess
with my parents for a while."

and she said, "Because I got
to set you up on probation."

And I said, "why?"

And she said,
"you're going home."

And...

I couldn't process it,
I was like...

and so...

My reaction was...
I think I was sitting down

so I stood up and I sat down

and then I stood up
and I sat down

and I said, "why do you mean?"

And she said, "You've gotten
executive clemency."

President Clinton
has ordered you out

and you have to be out today
by five o'clock.

[Sam Morison] The president
had granted her petition

and she was home that afternoon,
that evening.

They let her out that day.

[Amy Povah] It was really great

because we always got
bad news in there.

Nobody ever got good news.

And...

It was really nice to have
all the women walk me

across the compound.

And there was that moment
on the compound of victory

but it was really hard too,
because you had to leave...

you have to leave
so many people behind.

We can confidently say today
that we are finally beginning

to win the war against crime.

Now it's the time to show
drug users that...

we mean to reach our goal
of a drug-free generation

in the United States.

You will be put a way
and put a way for good.

Three strikes and you are out.

[Richard Van Wickler]
The primary mission of...

the drug war, as stated
by the Nixon administration

is to create
a drug-free society.

That's what is all about.

That's why we spend
the billions of dollars

and incarcerate
millions of people

is to create
a drug-free society.

And we've been at this now,
good and hard

for forty years,
trillions of dollars into it.

No one didn't strike really.

And when a reasonable person
says, "How much closer are we

to creating
a drug-free society?"

You begin to realize that
perhaps we've been giving

a mission here
that is impossible to achieve.

[Neil Franklin]
As we release these drug laws,

we went out and arrested
anyone we could find,

who either using drugs
or selling drugs.

And you try to personally remove
yourself from that.

"No, this is just our job,
this is what we do."

And we had no idea of
how we're affecting society.

You don't think about that.

[Richard van Wickler]
It lines up perfectly

with alcohol prohibition.

When you're looking
at alcohol prohibition,

the richest man in the country
was Al Capone.

He controlled it.

If you try to get in his market,
he would kill you.

There all sub-kinds of...
you know, sub-factions.

They're trying to manufacture
in their bathtubs and stills.

It was unsanitary.

You didn't know
what it was cut with.

Sometimes it had anti-freeze.

People would drink this
and go blind.

People would drink it
and get cirrhosis.

Kids would die in the crossfire.

It's sound all too familiar

'cos it's exactly
what's happening on the street

today in the United States
when it comes to

gang violence
and the drug war.

The DEA has said that
the majority of gang violence

in the United States

is over illegal drug market
place disputes.

Fighting for that territory.

We saw violence crimes go
through their roof as these...

criminal gangster organizations
fought one another.

So we're seeing
that type of phenomenon today

in our major metropolitan areas
like Los Angeles,

the Crips against the Bloods
and of course,

their horrendous violence
that we're seeing in Mexico

and in places
like South America,

as these very rich, powerful
cartels fight one another.

[Neil Franklin] Me as
a police officer for many years.

I policed
and really thought nothing

about the effects of my work.

But when I retired

from the Maryland State Police
in 1999

and started working for
the Baltimore Police Department

as a Commander training.

That very year,
I had a good friend of mine,

Ed Toatley,
who was working undercover

for the Maryland State Police.

He was working on
a safe streets campaign

with the FBI, on a task force.

He was assassinated
by a drug dealer.

Where he was buying
cocaine from.

That made me stop
and think for a while,

it drew me right to the violence
of this business.

[Peter Moskos]
A lot of people blame drugs

and not prohibition.

When this is really
the problem,

the violence around drugs

when it's destroying cities
and communities

is much more prohibition
than is the actual drug.

One of the problems that we have
with drug prohibition

is that is so lucrative
of a business.

You can make so much money
in such a little time.

And the difference between

arresting someone for
dealing drugs

and arresting someone for
committing rapes or burglaries,

when you arrest a rapist,

or someone
committing burglaries,

you know what, the rape stops.

The burglaries stop.

When you arrest someone
for dealing drugs,

dealing drugs doesn't stop
on that corner.

You just created
a job opportunity

for someone else to come in.

And unfortunately,
when a job is filled,

there's usually some fighting
going on,

some shooting
and people get hurt.

Drug enforcement is...

relatively, an easier kind
of crime to prosecute

because the government
gets to control

the commission of the crime.

You pick your target,

you trick them
when to show up...

if you're the government,
you actually maybe...

provide drugs to the case.

Ordinary kinds of crime,

you've got to investigate
what happened, who did it.

You've got to gather evidence.

Long-- sometimes after
it happened.

So the...

The challenge to investigating
robbery, murder, burglary...

those take lots of resources.

And there's much lower return...
you just...

you can do lots and lots
of investigations

and never find the target.

We evaluate you
as a police officer

many times on a number
of arrests that you make.

So the more arrests that
you make,

the better your evaluation is

and quicker you're gonna get
promoted.

Also, if you have to make
an arrest,

you can work more overtime.

Work more overtime,
you get more money.

It's very easy to make
large numbers of arrest

in poor and black communities
because the drug dealing

occurs on that street corners
out in the open.

And it's very easy for anyone
to go in,

any police officer going in
just scoops up

a large number of people
on any given day.

We need to change the incentives
for our police officers.

[Eric Sterling]
The other pieces of it is

with drug cases,
there's asset forfeiture.

You can get all the property
that's associated

with the
drug trafficking offense

the cars, the real estate,
the airplanes,

and that money
goes into your agencies budget.

So you get a very powerful
economic incentive

to do this kind of work,

especially when times are hard.

The emphasis
of our Criminal Justice system

should be on violent offences.

These is where most people
are concerned about.

They want murderers apprehended,

they want murderers
and rapes solved,

and they want these people

taken out of the community
and locked away in prison

so our communities can be safe.

I think a significant problem
in policing

is the limited resources
that we have.

And if you look at the data,
in the late 1960's,

before the drug war,

We were solving 9 out of 10
murders in this country.

We made arrest 9 out of 10
murders in this country.

Today that number
is 6 out of 10.

And those numbers are similar
for other violent crimes

such as rapes, and robberies.

And we know it's directly
related to us being misdirected

within
a law enforcement community

and focusing on drug crimes.

I mean we have
better technology,

we have computers,
we have DNA...

We should be solving
more murderers.

We should be better at that.

Another significant peace
here is that

the relationship
between police and community

has been broken,
severely broken.

And that's because we're going
to these communities

looking for drugs every day.

Seventy percent
of what we do everyday

illegally searching people,
searching their cars,

racial profile.

And because of this conflict

we don't get
the information we need

from the community
to solve crimes.

Any police officer,
any chief who knows his business

will tell you that
we cannot be effective

in preventing
and solving crime

without the cooperation
of the community.

We've lost it,

completely.

So I was a colonel
in the War on drugs,

during the 1980's, when I worked
for the US Congress

writing this drug laws.

Overseeing the drug enforcement
administration

going to their secret
intelligence center

going to their laboratories,

watching what they were doing.

And at a certain time,
you begin to say

is this strategy
capable of working?

Are we going to stop
the drug traffickers?

Well, it's many years later
and the answer is

clearly we have not.

You look at Mexico

and the drugs traffickers
are running amok.

You look at the headlines

and we are having
heroin overdose epidemic,

it's worse than it's ever been.

What we've been doing
is not working.

And I would suggest,
it can't work.

It can't work for a very
important economic reason,

which is, that the harder
you squeeze the drug traffickers

and try to create
a scarcity

the more valuable
you make the drugs.

And the more valuable
you make the drugs,

the more people who will
come in to make those profits

if the price of anything
goes up

more people
are gonna go into it.

So the very economics of what
you're trying to accomplish

guarantees more people
are gonna sell drugs.

It's illogical.

It's fundamentally illogical.

It's irrational

to think the drug enforcement
can stop the supply of drugs,

because it doesn't make
any economic sense.

I don't know what
the criminal justice

world would be like
without the War on drugs.

My only experience of it

has been during
the War on Drugs.

I mean, I started FAAM in 1991,

the War on Drugs were really
heated up in the 80's,

kept rolling through the 90's.

You know, it sort of started
tapering off in the 2000's.

But it still alive and well.

It was like a pounding thunder
of anti-drug hysteria in 1986.

We must do something,
anything.

And that meant grasping
at straws

and not looking ahead
at what the cost

was going to be
or what might be effective.

While I was on the hill
I increasingly became convinced

that the War on Drugs
was a mistake,

it was... counterproductive.

And I wanted to put my energy
into ending it.

And so in January 1989

I started the Criminal Justice
Policy Foundation

and that has been
the opportunity for me

for the last 25 years to...

mobilize different kinds of
strategies

to end drug prohibition.

A lot of it has been through
other organizations I helped

start...

families against
mandatory minimums in my office.

I'm still very active with

Students
for Sensible Drug Policy

and with Law Enforcement
Against Prohibition.

And so a lot of my work is,
advocacy, strategizing...

you know, what are the ways
to change drug policy

and before
Criminal Justice System.

There are countless numbers of
people who are...

in prison for unconceivably
long sentences,

for being minor offenders
in the drug trade.

These are just a handful
of files from families

against mandatory minimums.

Where these people...
You know...

James Belt, life sentence.

Daniel Clarke, 35 years.

Timothy Tyler, life sentence.

Sharanda Jones, life sentence.

This is not an aberration,
this is...

the life blood,
the is the typical case.

This is the typical pattern.

You know, Clarence Aaron
who has numerous cases.

I mean, these are all
excessively long cases.

These are... Do you see
Colombian drug lords here?

Do you see Mexican, you know...
Chapo Guzmán?

Do you see
the Mexican lords here?

No.

I was so glad to start to work
my way out of the prison.

So going to the Clinton house

was a halfway house.

You were half way home,
but you were still in prison.

So I got the Clinton house.

I already had some experience
in doing roofing.

I had a roofing background.

I called my old boss up.

He was in a halfway house
at the time,

and I think someone,
I don't know what company

had him doing roofing.

And his mother came to me
and asked me,

would I buy him
a pair of shoes

that he needed to
do his roofing.

And he just blossomed.

He just blossomed from there.

When I came out of prison,
and he had a job,

and he says, "Hey, cub, you came
by man, nice to see you home",

and I said, "Yeah, you know..."

All the time in my mind,
I was thinking,

"maybe I can get me some money."

You know,
'cos I heard he got a job,

I could get me some money,
and I could get up and running

But me...

with that old stinking thinking,

we're trying to get him
to come in

'cos I can't trust nobody.

He said, "Man, I'm not living
like that no more."

And I really didn't
believe that.

Because I couldn't see myself
disconnecting myself from it.

So I couldn't believe
it for nobody else.

But he showed me.

He didn't tell me.

He showed me.

He stayed loyal
and cut it out for real.

And that's what I admire
most about him,

because he was
in a bad place like I was.

I was so happy to be at work
and to be there,

and have the ability
to work again,

that I never missed a day.

I was always there.

I was always there an hour early
before anybody else get there.

So, in essence, I was hungry.

I was hungry to work,
I was hungry to... be free.

And I had the ability
to change my life around so...

all those things,

made me a good employee.

And I think
he'd seen that in me and...

he allowed me to work my way up
from labor to mechanic...

to form into supervisor

within a number of a matter
of a couple of years.

And then, that's when he just
made his mind up and said

that he was gonna go from...
going to business for itself.

And that's how it all started.

I just really felt
that I had what it took

to be entrepreneur
and to be successful.

So I quit my job,

and I fully-fledged
into business

and I believe my first year
in business.

I made about thirty something
thousand dollars

in my first year.

I remember investing
back into the business

and buying tools
and buying ladders

So I'm growing the business,

and I think my second year

I probably did about
eighty something thousand.

The third year I did about
a hundred something thousand,

so slowly but surely
progressing.

So now, I'm up to
a half a million dollars a year.

And the next thing I know,

I'm up to several hundred
thousand dollars a year.

Then you're already,

two thousand
nineteen ninety nine,

and early 2000,

I finally went over
the million dollar mark.

And I said, "Wow...
you know...

I never thought that I would
own a million-dollar business."

[Lois James] A person
has to have a dream.

You know, they have
the one to do better,

for themselves,

you can bring a person
out of prison.

And they can have nothing

and they can make something
of themselves

if that's what they want.

But if you have a low
self-esteem,

you don't think good
about yourself.

So when you come out,

you're not gonna think good,

so you're not gonna get better.

So when you start thinking
that I'm better than this,

then that's
when you can overcome...

the obstacles in your way

at the time that's blocking you
from a dream.

But you have to have that dream,

you have to want
better for yourself.

And that's hard for people
that are coming out of prison.

[Tracey Syphax]
Not having the ability

to number one, get a job,

not having the ability
to redeem yourself...

I think that's where recidivism
rate goes to the roof

because you have people that are
coming home from jail

that are looking for
opportunities.

And I know they're looking
for opportunities

'cos my office is located on
Martin Luther King boulevard.

A lot of them come to my office.

I hear them so many times,
guys tell me,

"Trace,
I just need an opportunity.

"Trace, I just need a job,

Trace, I don't want to go back
to what I used to do.

Tracey, if you just
gave me a chance,

I'll prove to you
that I got a value and..."

And that hurts.

You know when you look at...

a lot of these guys.

I know for a fact
that a lot of guys

are good people.

Everybody that goes to prison
is not a bad person.

So when you look at
the folks that I know,

I wanna change their life,

they're just looking
for an opportunity

to change their life
but never get it,

it's hard not to go back

to when you know
you can make a dollar.

And I've seen that happened
so many times,

you know, I've seen guys
that said, "Tracey, I tried,

I couldn't get a job,

so here I am back out
in the streets.

Here I am back to doing
what I've always done."

[Gregory Marshall]
When you lived a certain way

for so long and came,
as far as he did,

he came a long way.

That needs to be put out there.

Because a lot of people
don't know how to break

the change
from the street thing.

That thing get ahold to you,

that thing will hold you
until you die.

[Tracey Syphax]
To be on that boulevard...

for me it's to be,
that beacon of hope of...

no matter where you come from,
no matter what you've done,

you can come out of that

because that same boulevard
I sold drugs on

And directly cross the street
from where my office is,

I used to sit in a bar called
"The Night Life"

that I've sold drugs
out of that bar

for a number of years
inside and out.

So they have my business on
Martin Luther King Boulevard,

and to show people that,

Yes, I was there once,
drug dealer,

that ran up and down
the streets,

and I sold drugs
and did all that stuff there.

I'm now a changed person,

I'm now somebody
that they can expire to, also.

Executive clemency
was a bitter-sweet victory

to be honest with you

because it didn't take me
very long after I got out

and the excitement,
the exhilaration were off

that I realized that...

I may be free

but so many of my friends
and other people aren't.

And as long as they're not
then I'm not really.

So I started
the CAN-DO Foundation

which is clemency for all
non-violent drug offenders

to try to continue to help
some of the women I left behind.

I did time with Danielle,
Barbara, Mary Richardson...

they've all done
well over 20 years.

These are all guys
who were serving life.

These are for pot,
these for LSD,

I have... I just got back
from Washington DC.

I was there for a fundraiser
about the whole clemency project

that's happening.

And, in fact, I took...

all these guys to the front,
in front of the White House,

And anyway,
there's several of them

that I stood up in front of
the White House

advocating for their clemency.

When I started practicing Law,
almost forty years ago,

there were about half a million
people in prison.

And today there are
2.3 million people in prison.

The rate of incarceration,

the number of people in prison
per hundred thousands

is going up from about
a 130, 140 to over 700

per hundred thousand.

It's an enormous increase
in the number of people

we're locking up in our society.

In a course of
my professional career.

[Tym Lynch] Billions of dollars
have been poured into...

the prison expansion.

Not only of the Federal prison
capacity

but billions have been sent
to state and local governments

to extend their prison capacity.

And during the 1990's

we were building
on average a prison a week.

And as soon
as these prisons were built,

it's important to emphasize
that there were immediately

filled up with prisoners.

And even today,
many of our prison facilities

are operating beyond
their design capacity.

If you compare the US with
other industrialized nations,

Canada, Western Europe,

we lock up our citizens
at 5 to 10 times the rate

of those other nations.

It's not that we have
5 or 10 times the rate of crime,

of those other nations,
but we have consciously chosen

to have a much more puny
of an approach

to crime than other
cooperate able nations have.

And that's the result that
we see in mass incarceration.

America's supposed to be
the land of the free

and when you discover
how many people

that are being locked up
in our prisons,

it should make people set up
and take notice.

I often get asked:

"How did you feel...
how do you feel now...

that you have written
federal laws

that are probably
the most unjust federal laws

that have ever been written.

You know...

15,000 people
go to prison every year

getting this mandatory
sentences.

So this is 20 years,
this is... you know...

300,000 people who've gotten
this mandatory sentences

that I played a role in writing.

Um... It's horrifying.

If I'd been a better attorney,
maybe I could've...

if I had been craftier, maybe...

if I'd taken...
they might not have been as bad.

I'm grateful that I've had
the opportunity now since 1989

to try to end these laws.

Fortunately,

many former prisoners,
many prisoners who write to me

are grateful for the work
that I'm doing...

and I take a great deal
of solace

and I'm in a position
where I can sort of help

try to end these mandatories.

[Carolyn LeCroy]
What keeps me going...

are the children.

And the love that the parent
has for their child.

And the love that the child
has for their parent.

The children love
is pretty unconditional.

Pretty unconditional and...

they don't stop loving you.

Just because...

you're behind bars.

[Brett Gelico]
My name is Brett Gelico,

I went to 637 06.

My first encounter
with the prison systems

started pretty young.

Life style with drugs,
you know, I started early.

The thing with me was,
I got out in February,

I think it was in 2012.

Within three months
I got out, I paid my court funds

I paid my restitution,
paid...

child support,
I paid everything.

I was at zero.

I started my own business.

I got a vehicle, I had a tags,
licenses and everything.

And in October that year,
I decided to smoke some weed.

And I thought
the worst case scenario,

if I go to probation officers

is that I have to go
to a program

were I'd be
urine tested regularly.

I'd go to NA and AA meetings.

Well the reality of the fact is
a dirty urine is a violation

and the probation officer
I had was new

and she was a stick up
for the law.

She violated me there
on the spot.

I wept like a little child,

I couldn't believe I had,
I mean, all this work.

I'm like, "I have all this
to show you, look at all this.

I've done it."

She's like, "you've done a lot.
But you're still using drugs

and it's against the law."

I got a sentenced to four years
for a dirty urine analysis

It's a lot watching
your children grow up

and miss you and wave
and say: "Bye, daddy"

as you're walking
out of a visit.

It's just, it doesn't get easy.
You know what I'm saying.

And then you get older,

you think you'll become more
accustomed than this

but it never,
under any circumstances,

gets easier.

Hey guys,

how are you doing?

First off, uh, Zean:

I wanna say thank you

for spending as much time
as you do at the house

watching everybody
while Mom is at work.

I know you miss out
on play time.

I know you miss out
on a lot of things.

So I just want to start off
by saying thank you.

I'm proud of you.

For wrestling.

I'm glad you're sticking
with it.

I know you're getting so worn
but just like I said

try to stick with it.

And you know, buddy,
you're the man of the house,

do the best you can,
take out the trash,

try to stick to manners

I love you.
And I'm so very proud of you

and your haircut
looks wonderful.

I'm glad.

You're growing up so fast.

From 7 to 13,
you've really grown up.

And I'm sorry
I'm not there to guide you

as much as I like.

But...

you're turning up very good
and I'm very proud of you.

I really am.

Now, I wanna know,
Serine, my baby.

I love you
and I miss you very much.

Recently,
you just got a Honor Roll

I'm so very proud of you.

I know you worked hard.

Mom was telling me
how you were doing.

And you've just grown up
so fast.

And knuckle head, my little
knuckle head Brody,

all right... I want you
to know that I love you

and I miss you very much

I have a book here, where
it says, "When I miss you."

There's a bunch of books
that I went through

and this is the one I thought
would be more appropriate

so anytime you think of me,
you're missing me,

there's a guinea pig

that's gonna do the same thing
as Mom when she's goes to work.

I love you
and I miss you all.

And I hope to see you soon.

Daddy loves you.

Bye.

It was a little harder
than I thought.

[Julie Stewart] Because of
the fact that so many of us

have lived for 30 years in
this box of mandatory sentences

and federal
sentencing guidelines

and you know, the drug war,

we have to start
breaking out of that box

and thinking about
a world without...

the outside of those confines.

If you're interested
in reducing the injustice

and reducing mass incarceration,

you have to go
to the root of the problem,

which is too many laws
on the books.

And what is
the primary problem there

is for us prioritizing
which laws ought to go first.

The top of my list
is the drug laws

because I think we are
in another situation

that's very similar to the days
of alcohol prohibition,

where the government
has just declared

millions and millions of people
to be criminals.

And that's what they've done
with this drug laws.

So... We have to move away
from the drug war

the same way
in which we moved away

from alcohol prohibition.

They'll be some problems
when that's done,

but that's far and away
the primary problem

that needs to be addressed.

The danger of looking

at one outrageous case
after another

can blind you
to the broader perspective,

that there are
so many of these cases

that these are actually
the typical pattern,

this is the system,

it is broadly unjust,

and that it is...

so wasteful,

it is so counterproductive,

it's so inefficient,

one has to be outraged.

Why does it continue?

Why are we unable to stop

promptly,
more efficiently a policy

that's been going on since 1986?

Of locking up
so many low-level offenders

and treating them
as major kingpins.

That's a very deeply
disturbing indictment,

that we're willing
to waste so much treasure

and inflict so much harm

and cause so much injustice

in a society where our credo
is about liberty

and justice for all.

[music fades]

[slow taciturn tune]