tv Lockup Sacramento Extended Stay MSNBC March 19, 2016 6:00pm-7:01pm PDT
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"caught on camera." announcer: due to mature subject matter, viewer discretion is advised. ♪ >> this is really scary. but i just stay in my bunk and just mind my business. >> it's like a fish in a tank full of sharks. >> a new inmate fears the worst. >> being in a gang is not something that i choose to run behind. it's a choice that i made and something that i joined. >> a gang member asked for help to change his life. but first, he must convince a
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staff member with plenty of his own experience on the inside. >> they say you don't understand what i'm going through. i said wait a minute. i was here. i was in the same colored shirt as you was, and now i know what it takes to live a better life. >> and -- >> yeah! >> he's very comfortable here. he's been here so much, it's like his second home. >> in sacramento, heck, yeah. gotta be proud of something. ♪ >> nestled along the gleaming skyline of downtown sacramento, say block wide, nine-story-tall building that exemplifies the term no frills.
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this is the man branch of the sacramento county jail system. housed inside are some 2,000 men and women. most of whom have only been accused of crimes. they're awaiting trial in resolution of their cases. one of two jails under the supervision of scott jones. the downtown branch contains the main booking department where new arrestees are processed, booked and, more times than not, sobered up. >> we have about 58,000 bookings a year in this county. we track folks that come into custody intoxicated or under the influence of drugs. it's remained fairly steady that 75 or 80% are under the influence of drugs or alcohol. >> i see, we have the usual cast of characters. >> when they're under the influence, they're placed in a padded cell for their own safety. it's a padded room in there. once they've sobered up enough, they're moved out of this cell and moved on.
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>> 13 hours earlier, the sobering cell was occupied by the man who has probably spent more time in it than anyone else over the past 20 years. chris laforce was arrested for public intoxication. his latest probation violation on top of dozens of prior violations and convictions related to drugs or challenge. >> he's well over a thousand arrests for our county. he's very vocal, very loud, very intoxicated. he knows most of us by name. >> he is very comfortable here. he's been here so much, it's like his second home. he's homeless out on the streets so this is almost better than what he's got when he's out. >> out on the streets, he's known for drunk in public, lighting things on fire, meth use, drug use, alcohol use. he knows when he does that, he comes here and has a place to sleep, a place to eat.
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>> it's kind of a drag on how our system works. knowing we arrest the same person for the same charge over a thousand times. other than that, it takes him off the street and out of the public. so that's the good thing. >> he remembers the day one of his arrests made the local newspaper. >> that was the 856th arrest. the sacramento bee mentioned my name five times and said, yeah, you got her done. ♪ the pride of sacramento, heck ya. got to be pride of something. >> laforce has been homeless for nearly as long as his arrest record is old. his hundreds of mugshots represent convictions for crimes from everything from petty theft, possession of a controlled substance, trespassing, illegal camping, loitering with intent to buy
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drugs, and most recently, arson. a felony conviction for which he's still on probation. >> i was trashed, piece of wood. the gasoline and rubbing alcohol i couldn't drink the rubbing alcohol, so it started catching on fire and it goes om. >> generally, the judges can sentence them to county jail, can mandate that they take classes, put them into treatment facilities. >> one option for sacramento county judges is called the serial inebriate program. sponsored by a medical center and other local agencies. it provides a 90-day in-patient detox program, specifically aimed at inmates like laforce. homeless men and women with an extraordinary number of arrests. laforce has left that program as well as other programs, several times now. >> well, i couldn't do the program.
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i had to get out. i was shaking real bad and said i'm going to get a beer now. >> he's a drain on resources, from getting arrested to medical staff talking to him or dealing with him, the courts dealing with him, and he has no intention of stopping. >> welcome back. >> yes, i know it's only been about five days. but, no, rehab didn't work. so i had to come on back. >> you don't try rehab, that's why. >> he comes in, we interview him every single time, even though we know what he's going to say. >> no gang association? >> no, no. >> okay, we're done. court tomorrow at 1:30. >> am i going to go? >> it's up to the judge. >> the judge? which one? >> all of them. thanks for coming back. >> that was the interview?
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get'' er done! yeah! >> he enjoys what he does. he'll tell you he likes it. he does it thing and then i'll see you next week. >> are you getting tired of coming to jail? >> no, i actually love it. >> are you serious? >> yeah, it's home. >> that's home? >> it's where i get my mail. it's been a long, winding road. but it's not winding down anytime soon. >> it gets a little frustrating because the expense is all on the county for whatever he needs. his housing and clothing and feeding and transporting him to and from courts. it's all expenses that are accrued by the county. >> it keeps me warm. it keeps me off the street when it's raining out there. they feed me three meals a day. they're all hot. and the food is not bad. >> we have a narcotics anonymous and alcoholics anonymous class. christopher laforce does not want them. he's perfectly happy where he's
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at. doing what he's doing. but they are offered halfway-type houses that they can go to, if they want those resources. but he goes to the same areas, the same street corners, bumming money and yelling at people. sometimes he's drunk within hours of being out. >> laforce is assigned a cell where a problem soon arises. he repeatedly jiggles the door handle as he waits for a control room officer to unlock it. as soon as laforce steps in, officers on the floor see a problem and rush to the cell. >> he was kind of jiggling the door handle before it opened. when he stepped in, we could observe his cell mate taking a
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fighting stance, no punches thrown. they were just dogging each other but we went up there and squashed it all. >> inmate laforce, he can be overwhelming, especially for somebody who is having a hard time here. nobody is happy about being here. inmate laforce, he likes to live it like he's happy. he likes to enjoy it. there's people who like being -- there's people who don't like being here and they're sad and depressed about it and can cause an issue. >> coming up -- >> 1,100 and how many? >> 1,187. >> that's a lot of wrong choices. >> chris laforce runs into an old friend with a unique distinction of his own. >> when i was locked up here, i was tired. they didn't have no program for me to go to. >> a former revolving-door inmate now helps others to stay out of jail.
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sacramento county's main jail sits in the heart of downtown. 20 miles to the south in the heart of one of the nation's largest and most productive farming areas is the county's correctional center. like the downtown branch, real consumas roughly houses 2,000 men and women. but here, the majority of them are already convicted of crimes and serving sentences. that's due in part to a 2011 law known as the public safety realignment act or ab 10 nine. >> the catalyst for ab 109 was the state's mandate and need to reduce the prison population with haste. they called it realignment.
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the idea being to realign lower-level offenders to a more appropriate custodial setting. what they did was take the responsibility for thousands of inmates that would have been going to the state prison system and now said now they're the county jail's problem. >> the law created new challenges for the county by requiring them to house convicted felons, who, in the past, would have gone to prison. with many sentenced to at least a decade, they could be more likely to cause problems. but the law also came with significant funding for a broad range of job training and rehabilitation programs to help inmates stay out of jail and prison. they're administered for the jail's reentry services department. >> the goal of reentry is to reduce the recidivism rate. that's it. what i call it is, get out, stay out.
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>> nationally, more than 70% of inmates return to jail or prison within three years. ron smith knows it doesn't have to be that way. because ten years ago, he was a revolving door inmate here. >> i know that sounds like wow, how are you here now? well, when i was locked up here, i was tired. they didn't have no program, there was no classes for me to go to. of course i used to play the blame game when i was here. the blame game is still going on, but there's really something to lock into that's real, it's tangible, and it can make a difference. >> smith was in and out of rio cosumnes over a ten-year period for convictions of possession of a controlled substance and possession of a stolen vehicle. he says it was all fuelled by addiction, but he finally found help while out on probation. >> all the drugs, alcohol, cocaine. then i had an epiphany. went to a drug program. once i went there, they had introduced me to a new way of living. and since then, you know, it's just amazing to be able to walk around here where i used to be locked up at with the key, to be able to help someone else. so they, you don't understand,
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you don't understand what i'm going through. i can say, wait a minute, i was here. i sat -- i was in the same colored shirt as you was. and now i know what it takes to live a better life. >> when i was locked up here, there was no counselor for me to communicate with. there was no program in place at that time. but with ab 109, when they get out, they can be a transformed individual. rather than just getting out with no rehabilitation. >> yeah, this is for re-entry. i'm looking to get mr. greggs sent up to gate 8. i'd appreciate it. >> sure. >> all right, thanks. >> rodriguez greggs was convicted a week earlier. for possession of a controlled substance while armed and possession of marijuana for sale. he was sentenced to one year and will serve his time at real consumas. >> this is my first time being here so it's kind of scary being here with people who got all of these type of charges.
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this doesn't even seem like a jail. it seems like a prison. and they lot of people live like this is their home. i can't live like that here. i don't feel like this is my home. >> it's just really scary to me. but i just stay on my bunk and just mind my business. it's like a fish in a tank full of sharks. i've been here a week, and i haven't ate all week. nothing tastes good. when i try to eat it, it comes right back up. i don't want to be in the chow hall and it comes up. that will start a problem, also. just a lot of politics in here. there's just certain stuff that you just can't do. >> so today's session, we're going to talk about the re-entry plan and what that looks like. >> okay. >> so what that means is, we're
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going to take a look at some of the things that you want to accomplish while you're here and some of the things that you want to accomplish after you leave. is that fair? >> yes, sir. >> so we got you started going to classes. we got you going to substance abuse on monday, wednesday, personal development. are there some things you're looking to get out of some of these classes? >> a better -- a better -- a better understanding on my thinking and to become a better man and a better role model for my kids. >> all right. >> because a good parent wouldn't be in here right now. >> we'll put you in parenting every tuesday and thursday. >> overall, his risk to generally come back is high. based on him being caught with drugs and a firearm. so, based on that, it tells us he needs some type of assistance managing his life. >> since greggs has already completed high school, he will start in the second tier of programming. personal development classes, geared toward changing the way inmates think. eventually he'll take vocational
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courses developed under ab 109, such as welding or computer graphics design. he will now transfer to a dormitory-style housing unit with other program participants. on the other side of the jail is a much more restrictive housing unit for inmates who don't qualify for programming either because they've yet to be convicted or have had disciplinary issues. >> broken up with 26 tanks that house from eight to ten or 12 inmates in each tank. there's one sink, one bathroom for 10 or 12 inmates. they make do. >> life in here sucks. you've got a lot more freedom in prison. you know what i mean? you get to walk the yard a lot. >> we hardly get yard, probably one time out of the week, two times if we're lucky. >> this is lockdown. you can't get outside these bars. there's nothing to do in here but read a book.
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and then you don't get any educational books at that. unless you're blessed to have somebody sending in something from outside. >> jason served one year for credit card fraud. six months after his release, he was arrested for possession of credit card making materials and must now serve an additional two years due to his probation violation. he says he's anxious to participate in programming again. >> on the other side of the facility, when you go to ab 109, the classes, it's really good insight on what you want to do with the rest of your life. not this level. most definitely not this level. ♪ hopefully, before my time is up, i'll be able to get back to the programs. >> despite earning several certificates for his class work, whatley said he wasn't ready to apply that knowledge once released. he went back to manufacturing fraudulent credit cards until an unlucky traffic stop had him
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right back to jail. >> i was driving a buddy to his house. instead of slowing down for a speed bump, i went around it. that's exactly how i got busted. i had everything in the vehicle with me. and looked like a real [ muted ] when i got pulled over. >> as an ab 109 inmate, whatley can still get back into the programs, despite being re-arrested. but other factors, including his ongoing affiliation with the crips street gang could get in his way. >> i'm ready for change. being that this is a part of my past, it's hindering me for being a better person in the future. i'm willing to hang it up right now. >> are you saying you're done? >> i'm saying i'm done. >> coming up -- >> i didn't leave the program last time with any intentions of stopping. >> jason whatley pleads his case
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inside the two facilities that make up the sacramento county jail system, 4,000 men and women sleep on steel bunks with thin mattresses. for many of them, that's an improvement compared to the living conditions on the outside. they were, at one time or the other, among the approximately 2,500 sacramento area homeless. >> i pretty much surrender myself here. i wasn't really arrested. i was saved. i was homeless when i got arrested. >> i started living in an abandoned building. i had a couple of blankets and there was a chair up there. i'd fall asleep sitting up in the chair all the time. i was always on foot. my feet were always killing me. my feet would always have blisters. >> i was homeless out there. i didn't really have a spot to be. i was getting high.
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now, this is what i call better-than-homemade, too. >> i feel like i'm a bum. but a lot of people like helping me out, the homeless guy out, and seeing people looking passed me and shaking their head and going, no, not today. you're just going to go drink it up with it. >> chris laforce says he has been chronically homeless for the past 20 years. >> and there's a lot of people that drive by and say jesus loves you, chris. and the kids are all waving to me, and that's kind of cool. it makes me feel good. i like that part. just talking to them or having a pretty girl smile at you is better than getting any money, you know. >> laforce is now back in jail for probation violation under his conviction, arson. he hopes sobriety will help him re-connect with his mother who he hasn't seen in 16 years. >> i found out she's in reno. i talked to her a couple of times, but not too much. >> if i knew, i would get on the
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bus, go see my mom right away, no stops in between anywhere. i'm going to be on the streets for a few days before i go see my mom. >> you can't be on the streets without drinking? >> not at all. i'm an alcoholic. straight up. full blown, full blooded alcoholic. >> get her done, yeah! >> when laforce first arrived, he nearly got into a fight with his assigned cellmate. >> going to do another lap. >> now he's housed with an old friend from the street who knows all about laforce and his many arrests. >> my little buddy right there. 1 1,100 how many? >> 1,187. >> that's a lot of wrong choices, but he's still not a bad dude. >> laforce's friend has a distinction of his own. he only goes by his last name, clayton, because his first name is an unpronounceable string of capital letters.
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>> my first name is an acronym, it's the first initial of all my brothers and sisters. d is for dwayne, a is for adrienne, c is for clayton, j is for joyce, r is for -- and d is for deanna. a lot of times people try to make it a name. they say, how do you pronounce it? you can't pronounce it. it's not a name. >> clayton is serving a 90 day sentence for violating his parole on an earlier conviction for possession of methamphetamine. he he recalls the time he returned even before leaving this premises. >> the quickest is when you sat in front of that door. he said he didn't want to leave. >> he talks real bad. >> he didn't want to leave. and he needed help. and he didn't know where to go get the help from. >> so i went and i sat in front of the jail. i had nowhere to go. it was raining. i said take me back to jail! >> he sat out in front of the
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door where the officers take you for booking until they came and arrested him. and he was back within three hours, four hours, something like that. he's like, i'm back. yeah, you are, your bunk's still open. i've known him 15, 20 years. >> a good 15 years. >> i've run into him on the street a lot. >> gives me shoes when i ain't got shoes. always gives me something to eat. >> caught him one day, i went shopping for me and my nephew, got him some brand-new shoes. he jumped on the light rail, no shoes, no coat. he's not a bad guy. he needs a little help just like all of us. >> like laforce, clayton has also experienced many years of homelessness in sacramento. >> for ten years, i was downtown. i loved it. it was a choice i made. i didn't have no overhead.
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i didn't have no bills. i didn't have to pay no insurance. i had a tent. i had food. i had friends. and if society looks at me and says it's not right, i apologize to you, society. sacramento, you know i don't mean no harm. but so what. i'm still going to be me. that's like what i mean. chris going to do him. >> thank you, clayton. >> of course. >> my partner. no judging. society, you know, is wrong. you're just out there, you know. taking up space. but he's not. he's not taking up space, he is out there because he chose to be out there. our community is just like any other community. it's just the homeless. our community stretches further
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than any other community i know. we go from california to new york. any town you go to there's homeless. that's still part of my community. coming up -- >> i got stabbed in the lungs, in the throat and in the jaw. >> the night clayton decided he had enough of homelessness. and rodriguez greggs says no thanks to an offer to go home. >> i think in here, they pay more attention to you and get to know you as a person, instead of just, oh, that's a convict. e economy is growing, with creative new business incentives, the lowest taxes in decades, and new infrastructure for a new generation attracting the talent and companies of tomorrow. like in rochester, with world-class botox. and in buffalo, where medicine meets the future. let us help grow your company's tomorrow - today - at business.ny.gov
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show show me more like this.ns. show me "previously watched." what's recommended for me. x1 makes it easy to find what blows you away. call or go onliand switch to x1. only with xfinity. hi, i'm richard lui with your hour's top stories. violence erupting at a donald trump rally when a supporter was caught on camera kicking and punching a protesters. the attacker was arrested and several other protesters were removed from the rally. in indiana a bus carrying a high school basketball team rolled over after being sideswiped by a driver. one person was airlifted and others were transported to nearby hospitals. none of the injuries are life-threatening. now back to "lockup."
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>> due to mature subject matter, viewer discretion is advised. ♪ ♪ morning in the sacramento county real consumas correctional center brings inmates to the outdoor rec yards. ♪ once a world war ii army base, it's a hodge podge of buildings, fences, and razor wire. ♪ the compound looks and feels more like a state prison than a county jail. now it functions as such, thanks to a recent law that diverts
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thousands of convicts here all -- from overcrowded state prisons. ♪ money make the world go round ♪ ♪ my ego got the girl going down ♪ >> all these inmates will someday be released to the streets of sacramento. so the new law brings significant funding for job training and re-entry programs in hopes of providing them the help they need to not return. >> when i was locked up, i had no motivation. now i see inmates with motivation, that something it out there to help them and do something different. >> ten years ago, ron sees the problem he hopes to fix. he was a revolving door inmate here. >> ron smith, over in re-entry. >> since then, he's gotten off drugs, received a college education, and now is the jail's re-entry specialist. >> everyone deserves a second chance. i received a second chance.
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sometimes they deserve a third, fourth, fifth chance. i don't believe as human beings, we can give up on another human beings. >> we must plan for our sobriety because it has so many negative consequences. >> rodriguez greggs is serving for possession of miles per hour for sale. he's three weeks into the classes. smith has selected for him. >> if you make a temporary decision that you're not going to come back, guess what? it's only temporary. you'll be back. >> greggs says he was recently given the possibility to leave the facility on home detention but decided to stay. >> after i started participating in classes, it made me gain a lot of knowledge. it changed my perspective. they've got the classes out there but i think in here, they pay more attention to you and get to know you as a person, instead of oh, that's just a convict. >> so if you don't have the mind-set to plan for sobriety, then you don't know where you're going. your mind is like the map.
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>> greggs said there's been another development since he first arrived. >> when i first came here, i wasn't eating because i thought the food was nasty. but i got used to programming here and doing what i got to do in order to survive. so i eat everything every day, breakfast, lunch and dinner. >> tastes better? >> yeah, it tastes better now. >> what i see from greggs, he's optimistic. i can ask him that question because there's no concrete evidence that says, yes, he's going to make it and here's the reason why. he went to four classes here and parenting classes and got his certificate and everything like that, and based on that he's going to be successful. i wish it were that easy. >> inmates who go through the re-entry programs can still reach out to case workers for questions and support up to one year after their release. but jason whatley is proof that it doesn't work for everyone. >> you heard the saying in one ear, out the other.
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it's hard to stop what you're doing wrong, especially when you've doing it for so long. >> whatley did a one-year stay here for credit card fraud. six months after his release, he violated his parole and was found with credit card-making materials. and is now back for two more years. >> at that time, i wasn't prepared to come home and change. i never said leaving that program i was going to change and do something better. >> whatley has been assigned an inmate job passing out meals. it doesn't pay anything, but it has other benefits. >> i get to be out all day. i'm not locked up. do a little work here and there, makes things easier, makes time go by much faster. tonight i have to clean showers after everybody's done. but other than that, it's pretty chill. >> whatley said he would gladly give up his job to participate in re-entry classes again. >> he was in the program before, went out and got re-arrested. >> i get a lot of requests to go into the program. i go and assess the inmate, see
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where they are today, and what's brought them into custody this time, it's different. we try to assess whether or not they're ready to change. >> yes, sir. >> based on their responses, based on my experience and the environment they're in, all kind of tells a story. and that story we can interpret to try to help them. >> let's talk about what you learned from the program last time you were here. >> i gathered a lot of knowledge from the program, i just didn't apply it. i didn't leave the problem any time with any intentions of stopping what i was doing. >> how did that work for you? >> it didn't work. nothing worked. my own -- taking my own steps and not following the steps that were provided for me, i chose to shortcut and not use the steps that were provided. >> you finished the parenting class? >> yes, i did. right when i finished, it was close to my exiting date.
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i was told that i was going to receive my certificate. but i knew i didn't have enough time because it was going to be mailed to me and i didn't have a mailing address at that time. so i don't know how to go about getting that back. >> focusing on certificates and we're having a conversation in jail. and that's what we're trying to eliminate. >> it's not about the certification. and you kind of proved it, it's about transformation. >> what brought him here, it goes back to criminal mind-set and the cognitive skills and making poor choices. but if he's gang, that's a huge component, who you're hanging with, your peers. have you talked to the officer about the request program? >> i have not. >> according to mr. whatley, he's a crip, so it's a gang diversion program. we'll have the officer who runs the quest program go and talk to him and see if he's a good fit, a good candidate for her program. >> i've pretty much heard enough. >> i think so, too. we're going to go back and talk your case over, okay. and then i'll probably have the officer come out and speak to
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you. >> i see some inkling to want to change, to do something different. of course when they get in this environment, they all want to change. and they have that spiel, if you will, to do something different. but when the rubber meets the road is when they get out. >> thank you. coming up, jason whatley's future comes into focus. and -- >> somebody new come in, put on their bed, they wake up to it. that's for the newbies. >> one inmate's eight-legged infestation. so i'm dabbling in new ventures. it was board-game night with the dalai lama. great guy. terrible player. ♪ go paperless ♪ don't stress, girl ♪ i got the discounts that you need ♪ it's a balancing act, but i got to give the people what they want -- more box. any words for the critics? what can i say? critties gonna neg. [ applause ] the what?! [ laughs ] the wolf was huffing and puffing.
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♪ ♪ the intelligent, all-new audi a4 is here. ♪ ♪ ain't got time to make no apologies...♪ sacramento county jail inmate earl herzog, serving 90 days for domestic violence, doesn't qualify for any of the jail's re-entry programs due to his short sentence. though he's used his time here to develop a new interest.
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it's a spider, they all call me spider-man, spider, whatever. this is a wolf spider, he hasn't eaten for a day or two. guaranteed he'd attack. >> he's best known for a different kind of spider. >> these are toilet paper spiders. i use thread, toilet paper, and hairnets and some people like them colored. some people like them real-looking. prefer, i guess color. it's a little more exotic, i would say. >> these do look real. once you sleep and you wake up and somebody new come in, put it on their bed, they wake up to it, it's a riot. that's for the newbies, though. >> i'll show you right here, the first process, we start out on the legs.
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all right, get it down as low as i can. rub a piece of hairnet off. got it all set up. ready to go. then i'll wrap it with the thread, get as tight as i can. the thread comes out of the underwear. this is the part that takes the longest right here. i'll do four and tie them all together. if you look on these real closely, you can see that it's actually four instead of eight and they're all just bent and it gives it that real look. the next part is the butt and the body all in one. i use coffee to color it, or colored pencils, if they want it colored. now i tie the body onto the legs. i try to go criss-cross, across, i'll just do a bit of everything, as long as they stay on tight, that's what i'm shooting for. there's your toilet paper slider. >> chris laforce has been caught in a web of his own making,
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it's comprised of alcoholism, homelessness and endless stays at the jail for the past 20 years. he's also abused meth, which has all but destroyed his teeth. >> i smoke it and eat it and snort it and my teeth just kind of erodes away. sucking on one of those rocks destroys my teeth real bad and puts holes in my gums and stuff like that. it really is terrible, you know. i'm going to be 43 next month. and i really want to stop this highway to hell before i end up in hell. if you looked at all my mug shots, you would see how i progressed from being a kid, you know, a done fiend, became a real bad drunk. >> inmate laforce on the surface may seem like he's happy and funny and laughing and joking, but it is sad that he's been here so many times, and he feels that this is his friends and family.
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he's just unable to be rehabilitated here and we're just kind of hoping that one day he'll learn. but in 1,087 times that he's been here, he hasn't learned. >> laforce is currently housed with a friend from the streets. clayton has also spent years combatting homelessness and addiction. >> i used to live right in front of the porno shop in a tent right there, selling drugs, and coming back and forth to jail for it. first i used to sell marijuana. then i went up to selling crack cocaine. then i started selling crystal meth. then, you know, i started doing the drugs, and they have the saying. first the man takes the drug, then the drug takes the man. don't be your best customer. yeah, i was that. i was my best customer. >> did you ever sell to chris? >> no, he has too many issues for me to give him another issue. he's a partner, he's a friend.
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>> while addiction is still a part of clayton's life, he said homelessness is now in his past. >> i get help, and i pay my rent. i have a big brother who looks out for me, you know. about three years ago, i had a bad incident happen that made me out for me, you know. about three years ago, i had a bad incident happen that made me have to get off the streets. i got stabbed three times. i got stabbed in the lung, in the throat, and in the jaw. >> clayton says he was walking through a part of town where the homeless congregate when a stranger approached him. >> he just stepped out from behind me. so, you know, just like another person walking down the street. he's just walking behind me. and i didn't pay him no mind. and it was like i felt a pinch. then i felt a pull. and i was falling. and he hit me in the jaw. and i was able to fight back. and a lot of people were sitting
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there like, oh, oh, gee, oh we seen that you were fighting, looked like you were fighting for your life. i was, stupid, why don't you help me? and that was it for me. i knew i can't keep doing this we deal with people, so many different people, that a lot of times you think this person might be coming to help you, and they're not. it happens. they prey on the homeless. >> la force will soon be back on those same streets. due to his current jail stay he has 42 days of sobriety and will be released in another week. >> got to get my head shaved. i'm going to feel like a new man. >> as he has upon prior releases, la force holds out hope of visiting his mother. >> hey, sport, looking like almost a real human being, not part of the bushes. >> he says he has only spoken to her a few times in the past 16
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years and that she lives about 100 miles away in nevada. >> it's going to be a real big emotional cry right there to see my mom. and i really love her a lot. and hopefully she'll take me back in, which i'm sure she will. she'll help me out with just about everything she can. i want to get out and see if my money will get me a lawnmower so i can start mowing lawns again, feeling good about myself, not feeling like i'm a bum or nothing like that. feel good. feel like a new me. i'm going to get out. maybe i'll just get a lawnmower. try to be a different person. not too bad, gentlemen, i kind of like it. coming up, chris la force returns to the streets. [burke] at farmers, we've seen almost everything,
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jason watley has been given another chance to turn his life around. >> i'm going to back down. i'm going to back down from everything that's wrong. keep myself from coming here. at one point in time, you know, coming to jail was nothing. you know, we'd laugh at -- i'd laugh at it. [ bleep ] just go through the time and come back home. >> watley says he has decided to end his affiliation with the crips and has been accepted into quest, the jail's gang diversion program, cofounded by deputy gillock. >> they are busy all day in class listening to curriculum that directly addresses gang membership, how their lives have been affected by gang violence. it also has a gang component in their curriculum. >> i don't want my daughter to come home, daddy, this is my boyfriend. and i look at him and the first thing to my mouth is this mother [ bleep ] is just like i used to be, or i am, if i don't change. >> this is watley's second time through the jail's re-entry program.
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after he was released and rearrested six months later. >> in jail, being involved in gangs. then in the class i was just kind of cocky, arrogant. yeah i can get this on the street. >> then i would like to ask, where's the payoff? what's going to be the payoff? what are the end results? >> leaving his gang could make watley a target for violence. but he says he is sincere about wanting real change. even so, he can't completely forget his past. >> being in a gang, it's not something that i choose to run behind. it's a choice that i made. you know, once you join the military, you're going to be a vet for the rest of your life. although you're not in the services anymore. so cripping is going to be something that is a part of my life. i'll just -- i still love my people, but i can't -- i can't -- i can't push that anymore, i can't push behind the movement anymore. and i see, i see the path in front of me. before it was dark. i understand what my responsibilities are as a man.
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definitely not gang banging. but i wish all my buddies and friends luck. >> 20 miles to the north at the county's main jail in downtown sacramento, chris la force is about to make a transition as well. one he has made a thousand times before. >> once i start being a kind of person god wants me to be, it's going to change my life a little better. >> the day has arrived for his release. surveillance cameras capture la force in his changeout cell. and later making his way off the grounds of the jail. la force says his goal is to reconnect with his mother. but 36 hours later, he was back in jail. >> home again. 36 whole hours. >> you were gone 36 hours? >> maybe that long. >> what happened? >> i got drunk and i -- you know. >> so you were using too? >> yeah.
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>> christopher la force was brought back into custody last night for being drunk in public. >> what number arrest this time? >> 1,088. like [ bleep ] yeah. >> you're proud of that? >> [ bleep ]. i mean, like me, i'm mentally ill a little bit, you know. heck yeah, i'm proud of that. nobody else has ever done it. i just want to stay in jail forever. >> la force. >> yes? >> roll everything up. >> la force's latest violation will result in another 180 days in jail. a new chance to sober up. and perhaps someday to see his mother. ♪
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