tv Lockup Savannah Extended Stay MSNBC August 22, 2016 1:00am-2:01am PDT
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>> and -- >> he started running down the street screaming, help, help, and he goes, you shot me. >> pregnant and armed. one must turn in a family member to save herself. >> yeah, we were close. people like be snitching not cool, but i have a child to look out for. just five miles from savannah, georgia's historic downtown is the city's jail facility, the chatham county detention center. >> everybody face the wall. >> while most of the 1,500 a inmates here are only accused of crimes and are awaiting trial in resolution of their cases, the job of keeping them safe and secure. >> i'm deputy edwards.
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i have a few questions for you. >> falls first to the jail's classification department, who decides where each inmate should be housed. >> do you feel you have any enemies in here you know of? >> no. >> the classification people are what i would call air traffic controllers. they've got 1,500 bodies flying through this area at any given time. many are members of different gangs. naturally they would want to attack each other. >> are you affiliated with any gangs? >> no, ma'am. >> many are witnesses against others who may be in here. the people that oversee classification have to make sure that none of these bodies get in close concert with each other because then we're going to have problems. >> one of the ways that staff can distinguish different classifications of inmates is by their uniform color. tan or blue are for workers. orange signifies disciplinary or administrative segregation. and general population, most inmates, wear the standard issue green.
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but in the women's general population units, an orange pullover has special meaning. >> the orange tops that you see some of the females have on are to indicate that they're pregnant. >> if anybody was fighting or there was a really big commotion going on, i have orange on so they'll mow she's pregnant and nobody else is pregnant and i guess it's to protect me. >> if there's a fight or anything happens in the wing, you want to easily be able to spot the pregnant females, make sure they're safe. they need to always be housed on the lower level. we don't want them going up and down stairs, you know, for their safety. >> la'quan brown is pregnant with her first child, a girl. >> yes, she's very active. she's really, really active. i think that's the best part of my day. feeling her move, knowing that she's okay, that's the best part of my day.
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>> being pregnant here is stressful with the different hormones and things i'm going through, but i keep it together. >> brown is unlikely to be leaving the jail before her baby is born. she's been charged with two carjacking incidents two with her boyfriend and co-defendant, rashard mosley. they both include armed robbery, aggravated assault, murder, after one of the victims died from the gunshot wound. they have both pled not guilty. brown, however, said she and mosley were present when the man was shot but said they were innocent passengers in the victim's car. she said the victim was a friend of hers who she had called to ask for a ride. >> he was originally supposed to be getting me and my boyfriend and my cousin, when he pulled up on us, that's when everything went haywire. >> brown says without warning her cousin pulled a gun on them. >> my boyfriend was ready to get
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in behind him and my cousin told eli -- he pulled a gun out and tried to rob him. it shocked the hell out of me. he told him to give him his phone and keys. he's like, i'm not giving you my phone, and he jumped out of the car. when he jumped out of the car, i heard the gun go off, he said, you shot me. he started running down the street screaming "help, help! "i saw him collapse in the yard like he fell down the yard. we jumped in the car. i'm not going lie. i didn't want to be there. i didn't call the police because first and foremost that's my cousin and i felt bad because i feel like i should have done something different, i should have turned myself in and maybe i wouldn't be, you know, going through what i'm going through now, but i was scared, like, i was scared. i didn't know what to do. >> the victim, ivory carter,
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died later that evening. brown said she left the scene because she believed that carter had only been wounded in the leg and she didn't find out he had died until a month later, when he was charged with miss murder. >> i'm thinking he died because maybe it hit a main artery or something like that. i mean it may sound stupid but i didn't know you can get shot in your leg and die. >> the case is still under investigation and when we met brown, her cousin had not been charged with the crime. while brown admits to being in the car during her shooting, her co-defendant and boyfriend rashard mosley denies any involvement at all. >> what they try to look at me, i didn't do it. that's all they're doing is thinking. >> i just know the detective came out here and asked to speak to me.
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when i walked out there, it was like i don't want to talk to you. i ain't got nothing to talk about. >> because of the severity of their charges, mosley and brown both say they expect to still be in jail when their baby is born. >> knowing that i'm going to be having her here is hard. like at first i kept saying i'm going to be home before i have my child, but now that i see i'm not going to be home it makes me cry when i think about it, because i'm not going to be able to enjoy the most special part of my child's life right now. she didn't ask to be here and i can't do anything about it. i've got to just deal with it. >> i can't do nothing for her. i can pray for her and hope she's over there doing good. i could think about it all day, what is she doing, what's my
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little girl doing. i can't do nothing. at the end of the day, it's up to her. >> it makes me emotional. i never could imagine myself being hering if being here going through this. i have a child in my stomach. it's sad. she didn't ask to be here. i document know what's going to happen to me. she didn't ask to be here. when i sit here and i think, i think more about her. it's close to that time and i won't have a chance to be with her and this is my first child. that's hard. that hurts. that hurts. coming up -- >> he knows what he's done. >> la'quan brown demands question. >> for you to be my first cousin and to let me be in here when you know what you did -- >> and -- >> i like animals. >> the jail uses potential dogs to save them from a potential death sentence.
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for many inmates at the chatham county detention center in savannah, georgia, this stay in jail is not their first. chief deputy roy harris says that after 35 years as a law enforcement officer, the high rate of recidivism among inmates has helped change his philosophy about corrections. >> one of the things that bothers me the most is last year 70% of our inmates had prior felony arrests and had been in this facility. the year before it was 8%. that is way too many. the same people keep coming back over and over. that shows us something is not working. i think as a society we really need to take a hard look at that. yes, many of them need to be locked up. but the bulk of our people here
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made dumb choices. a remedy for that, we run 12 programs at this facility which are geared to help inmates do better when they get out, to help them get off drugs, to get jobs. i think that's a worthwhile program. >> the programs include computer, literacy, ged, and drug and alcohol rehabilitation. >> i hear what you say and i understand what you say. >> but one program aims to reach inmates by fostering and taking responsibility for others. operation new hope uses nonviolent offenders to train dogs that the local humane society considers difficult to adopt. >> this is class number 30, and what we hope to achieve by this is we want to save these dogs' lives. >> lieutenant brooks is one of the jail's training officers. he also founded an overseas operation new hope. >> all these dogs at one point in time had been slated to be euthanized. the reason that they're not euthanized is that you guys have
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agreed to come into this program and obedience train these dogs. >> these two are puppies. that means that they're still in development mode. >> the inmates are coached by the humane society's behavior mod any indication instructor, jennifer messer. >> you can train dogs. everybody is a team. >> we're correcting all the problems that causes a dog to get taken to the humane society. we're going to bring them in. we're going to socialize them. teach them some manners. and then at the end of four weeks, adopt them out to a loving family. >> lieutenant brooks says by helping dogs, the immates end up helping themselves. >> we want the inmate to think i've got to be here for my dog. if i get in trouble and act out, this dog is out. this dog is dependent upon me. we want the inmate to learn that responsibility. >> i love animals. i don't like seeing animals die. i don't like seeing animals hurt. i'm going to try hard to get her
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trained and find her a home. >> we want them to get some discipline, learn some responsibility, and not come back to jail. i want to put productive citizens out there, and that's what's unique about this program. you know, you've seen dog programs that are in prisons, but there may be years before that person hits the street. these guys are going to get out of jail from here. there's no lag time between the time they get out of jail and the time that they implement the skills that they learned. do they get out and stay out because of my program? i have no way of knowing. but what i do know is we've had three guys who have gotten jobs working at the human society, working as a kennel tech, working at a pet store. so i think that's pretty successful. if i can keep one guy from coming back to the jail, i think we've accomplished something. >> inmates in the program are housed in a separate unit in the
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older part of the jail. each inmate shares a single person cell with his dog. >> jail break. got a jail break. >> keith johnson is now training his third dog in the program, a pit bulldog named dude. he says participating in operation new hope is a different experience from when he was in general population. >> being here, it's like being on vacation, a different type of vacation. >> in the general population, trouble tended to find me. i'd get into fights and all kind of stuff like that. being here, i'm more calm. you know what i'm saying? i'm more calm and more peaceful. >> johnson was charged with receiving stolen property which
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at the chatham county detention center in savannah, georgia, la'quan brown is pregnant with her first child. >> so how far along are you? >> eight months. >> you're tiny. >> several weeks ago doctors gave brown an ultrasound and discovered she would be having a girl. >> i didn't know what to say. i wanted to see her, though. i wanted to see what was really inside of me and what was going on in there. it was exciting though.
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it was really exciting to see. when i found out what i was having, it made me cry, of course, because it was like i wish i could have experienced that with her dad. it made me sad not to have anybody there that i wanted to share that moment with. >> while he couldn't be there with the ultrasound, brown was able to share the photos with the baby's father, rashard mosley. >> that's a picture of the little girl's face and hands or whatever. slees throwing up her hands like the peace sign, throwing both her hands up. i be happy. that's the only thing i can be happy at. at the same time i be looking at like, if i don't get to be with her, that's really going to kill me. >> mosley and brown have pled not guilty to multiple charges including murder during an alleged carjacking. brown says she and mosley were only passengers in the car and it was her cousin who acted alone killing a driver during a botched carjacking attempt. >> they're saying i was other than, other than that, they don't have anything. my baby daddy, he was with me
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and they charged him. with my cousin, i don't know if he got charged. >> brown says she thinks it's unfair that she and mosley are taking the charges for a crime she says her cousin committed. >> nobody's really at fault. for you to be my first cousin and i'm pregnant and you let me be in here on these charges when you know you did it, it's like everybody couldn't have been the murderer, everybody shouldn't have pulled the trigger, so everybody shouldn't sit in here on the same one charge. >> mosley denies any involvement of the crime, but the code of the streets means he wouldn't spich on anybody else even if he had the information. >> if they don't going to find out by themselves, they ain't going to find out from me. >> mosley says he expects brown to follow the same as well. >> she's not doing time, she's going to be all right. right now she has to tough it up
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and ride it on out. >> but brown says her baby changeder. >> people might be like snitching's not cool, but i have a child. i'm most definitely not going to sit in here on something like that. we're first cousins. we grew up together like brother and sister. yeah, we were close. we were close. it's not about me anymore. it's about my child. so when i do go to court or have to do t i'm going to let them know the true story and what happened. i know he be upset, but it is what it is. >> brown isn't the only one in jail focusing her attention on the responsibility of another. >> if your dog is out in front of you, reverse directions and walk the opposite way so that the dog is behind you.
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>> the inmates in the jail's operation new hope program foster and train shelter dogs for four weeks in an effort to make the animals more adoptable. >> when you're given your commands or when you're walking, walk with some decisiveness. lot of these inmates and their dogs come from similar backgrounds. they have a common ground. they come from broken homes. a lot of these guys come from living on the streets, just like the dogs, so they can relate to each other. >> loose leash. now, he just walked him right through you with no problem. >> everything about an inmate is
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it takes your mind away from doing time. i hated the jail population. everybody is a proclaimed gangster. i don't have time. i want to do my time so i can restart my life again. >> conrad is an army veteran with ten years of service. this is his first time in jail. >> i found out i'm a pretty damn good trainer. trained soldiers. now i train dogs. at least they listen better sometimes. this is minion. he's a 1-year-old, a mix. living with him is like living with a grown man. farts, snores, takes up more room than i do. no more sit-ups or pushups in the room anymore as you can tell. there's not a whole lot of room for activities. >> if found guilty, conrad faces up to 15 years in prison for a charge of driving under the influence with serious injury. the charge stems from an
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accident he had earlier in the year shortly after he returned from his last deployment. while conrad has pled not guilty, he admits he was drinking on the night of the accident. >> going out, that's one of the things the military preached. when you go out, you have a plan, have a plan. that was what i was going to do. i was going to call a cab and get home. why i decided to get back in the car, i couldn't even begin to friggin' say why. i ended up crossing the center line and hit someone head on. the individual i ended up hitting, she had a broken leg and multiple injuries thing. the dui, i could have handled that. the wrecking the car, i could have handled that. hurting someone, that's what sucks the worst. >> conrad is negotiating a plea deal that he hopes reduces his prison time to no more than three years plus probation. the deal would include oversight from a veteran's court which will include treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder.
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he said while he's never sought treatment or received ptsd he believes it contributed to his drinking that let to the accident. >> i see the pattern. every time i came back, it was partying more, partying harder, drinking more. the more i deployed, the more i got in excess. >> how much combat did you see? >> shoot. i've got four combat tours and a
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total of 50 months in combat, quite a bit. definitely a lot of close calls. a lot of explosions. we took a lot of ieds, a lot of mortar fire, a lot of rocketfire. a couple of good friends of mine got killed. one was a suicide bomber. and then, shoot, that was a really bad tour. >> you don't want to deal with the emotions? is that what it is? >> i just don't want to relive the events. i guess ultimately that's what i'm scared about. i think that's kind of what escalated with my drinking issues and all that was combat stress and not really knowing how to deal with it. coming up -- >> i'll pick up the slack for him. >> curtis could be rad must take on another dog when keith johnson is kicked out of the program. be smart, know what's right and what's wrong. >> on days before her birth she gives a special message to her baby. >> don't want you to ever end up in place like this because it's not place to be.
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mosley says he is innocent and that his experience on the streets and in jail have left him asking questions about the meaning of his life. >> i wonder why we're put out here in this world. really, this world is hell. there ain't nothing -- ain't nobody perfect. ain't nobody right. we're put out here just to go through some of the things i went through, just to go through some of these things, they say god say everything, he know before it happen, why he put me out here knowing i was going to get into some of the stuff i got into. >> mosley has put some of those questions to music. ♪ that when we die ♪ i just want to be know why he put on this earth to be succeeded away from the dirt ♪ ♪ i was stuck in my grind with murder on my mind ♪ ♪ my mother i apologized for the hurt i caused inside ♪ ♪ when i'm gone, don't mourn, mama ♪
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♪ i should have told the right instead i did no nothing ♪ ♪ mama remember your little boy ♪ ♪ he needs to answer this question up on his mind ♪ ♪ what we wanna die, what we wanda die ♪ >> in a few days mosley's girlfriend la'quan brown will give birth to couple's child. brown said its we her cousin who committed the murder. we were permitted to give her a camera to record the private times before the come of her daughter. >> i'm nine months and nine days so she can come any day. yes, i'm way bigger. you can see my belly. i want to give a message to my child. i just want you to know that no matter what happens in life, i love you and your dad loves you
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and life is not going to be a box of chocolate. you're not going to be perfect. because nobody's perfect. you're going to make mistakes because everybody makes mistakes. i made a mistake and it caused me to be where i am. it's a lesson that mommy has to learn. i'm in here for something that -- not that i done but -- i don't know. i know i'm in here for a reason, whatever the reason is. i know that i'm in here for a reason, and i just want to you always keep your head up. you have to know what's right and what's wrong. i don't want you to end up in place like this because it's not place for anybody to be. >> when brown goes into labor, she will leave the jail to give birth in the hospital. she will be allowed to stay with the baby for up to three days, after which she must return to the jail alone. brown says her family will take care of her child. >> i feel like i'm going to flip leaving the hospital because who wants to leave their child?
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i think i'm going to be real depressed. i think i'm going to take it hard. >> brown is not the only inmate in the jail who will soon have to leave someone behind. curtis conrand and the other inmates in the dog training program, operation hope, have all formed relationships with their animals, but in two more weeks, they need to let them go. >> let the little ones run and burn off their energy. >> when their training is complete, the dogs will need to pass some tests which could increase their chances of landing in a permanent home. after that the dogs will return to the human society and be put back up for adoption. >> the test, it goes through the basics of people approaching your dog, the people approaching you, the dog doesn't jump on them, doesn't react to them. walk on a loose leash.
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sit, stay, come when called. stuff like that. it's pretty much the basics of dog obedience. i've had two dogs graduate. this will be my third. it's sad to have them go back but at the same time you made them a better animal, so that's always good. >> keith johnson's dog dude has also been making progress. >> i kind of know what he's going to do as soon as i let him go. he's going to roll straight in the dirt. there you go. good boy. >> but johnson won't be there to see dude graduate from the program. >> hi, johnson. johnson! >> yes? >> hey, i need you to pack up all your stuff. i'll tell you why when you get out, pack up your stuff. bring everything out. you all take control of his dog, all right? inmate keith john was just recently indicted on a murder charge. that means he'll lose his blue suitor status. he can't go outside the
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building. he can't go outside the secure perimeter of the jail. in order to be in the program, you cannot have any violent charges. when mr. johnson was initially pulled in to the program, he was not charged with murder and we did not know that this was coming, but since it's here now, we have to deal with it now. >> johnson will face charges including murder, aggravated assault, and carjacking together
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with his co-defendants rashard mosley and johnson's cousin, la'quan brown. brown said she was reluctant to talk to the police but decided to tell them about her cousin's role in the murder. according to brown, she, mosley, and johnson had asked a friend for a ride and johnson surprised them all by pulling a gun and robbing the driver. she says when the victim tried to flee the car, johnson shot him in the leg, and he later died. >> i think it was his intentions to kill him. he don't have no remorse. i'm sitting here now and he ruined everything. i feel like it's my fault. i do feel like it's my fault because i brought him with me, but i didn't think that was something that he was going to do.
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>> johnson will be relocated to general population. his dog dude will have to stay behind. >> it's major blow, you know, to have graduated two dogs. this would be my third dog. this will be something i miss. but i mean conrad still in the program. conrad a real good dude. i know he'll pick up the slack and take over and make sure dude get graduated and adopted and everything. coming up -- >> this morning inmate brown was in labor. >> as la'quan brown leaves the jail to have her baby, keith johnson suspects she may have
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visitations is tuesdays and wednesdays and commissary is on thursdays. >> all right. >> keith has recently plead not guilty to new charges including murder and carjacking. he's been removed from the detention center's dog program and moved back into general population. curtis conrad says he and the other inmates in operation new hope will have to take over training johnson's dog who's been allowed to remain in the program. >> pretty much what's going to happen is i will pick up the slack for him or someone else does, and we'll keep training him coinciding with other dogs until we get a handle and go back and back-brief them on what's going on. i'm glad you moved in, i really
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am. maybe i should stack their cages. >> johnson, his first cousin la'quan brown and her boyfriend rah shored mosley have always been indicted on multiple charges including assault and murder related to an alleged carjacking. johnson had not originally been charged in the case although the police had already been investigating their involvement. brown said she originally didn't want to talk to the police about her cousin but eventually decided to tell them that he was the shooter? >> when you speak to the detectives, do you worry about keith finding out? >> i don't care. it's my life, you know. i've got too much to live for. i don't care. once i done it, i felt a little bit better to get it off me. they're not going to make me plead guilty to something i didn't do. >> johnson says he suspects his cousin spoke to police but he has no way of knowing for sure. he said he was not involved and that his cousin is looking for someone to blame because of an argument they had had in the past. >> me and her had some words, so she figure if i go down with her and her boyfriend, she'll at least be content with that.
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that's what she told the folks. he made us do it or he had something to do it, i don't know. i really don't know what the case may be. >> were you guys close? >> she's my first cousin. she got a weak mind and other stuff bothering her like that, that's messed up, this situation right here. it's family. ain't [ bleep ]. sad to say, but that's how it is. >> i haven't talked to keith
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since we been in here but i will write him because he's still my cousin, you know. i'll write him. if he decides to write back, that's what he does. but if he don't -- >> even if brown is not convicted of murder, she still faces charges for two other unrelated car jackedings, one of which involves her boyfriend rashard mosley, who's also the father of her unborn child, but for now brown says she's only concerned with the birth of her baby. >> three days later, brown leaves for the hospital. >> this morning inmate brown went to medical because she was in labor. depending on what happens, if she has normal delivery, she'll be out there for probably about 48 hours. once she has the baby, a relative will come get a the baby and she'll come back here and be housed in medical until she's well enough to come back up to the unit. >> it makes me cry because i'm not going to be able to enjoy the most special part of my child's life. i won't be able to hold her, i won't be able to hear her cry. i won't be able to get up in the middle of the night when she needs me. somebody else is doing something i should be doing. that hurts. that hurts.
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from the hospital. a few hours later she gave birth by caesarean section to a healthy baby girl. brown's mother contacted the baby's father, rashard mosely, and gave him the news. >> are you excited? >> a little bit. >> just a little bit? it's your first child. >> there's a lot of stuff going on. i'm trying to make it home. i'm happy, but i'm still here at the end of the day, man. >> brown is now in the jail's medical unit continuing her recovery. she says she was able to spend three days with her baby but then had to turn her over to her mother so she could return to jail. >> i tried to prepare myself for it. it's different from trying to prepare yourself and then actually leaving, but -- that was hard. i didn't like that at all. they came in and told me i was being discharged. it was probably three or four hours before i actually left, and i cried, like the whole time
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i cried and i just held her, because i knew that i would have to leave. i've never been hurt before compared to that hurt. that was real hurt. >> the inmates in the jail's dog program operation new hope will also soon be saying good-bye. for the past four weeks they have been living with and training dogs who were in danger of being euthanized because their past behavior made them difficult to adopt. the dogs have now reached the end of their training period. >> today is test day so last day of the cycle. kind of a somber day. i mean, you work with them for 30 days and they get to leave. >> graduation day is not a happy day. it's actually sad. i've seen them cry. it's real emotional for them. that's what we want. we want them to build that bond, that relationship. if they can bond with an animal, then they can bond with their children, their wife, their parents, their employers, you know. that's transferable. >> curtis conrad has split his time between several dogs. he started out with a dog named minion and assisted with the training of duke after his handler keith johnson was removed from the program. for the past week he has been assigned a dog named folgers.
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>> all of these guys have been working each and every dog. it's not just his dog, his dog and his dog. it's the whole community. so they all have been working with these dogs, not just one person, which is good because that means when we pass everything over to the new adopter, then that's going to be an easy transition for the dog. >> today the dogs must pass a ten-point behavioral test in order to graduate from the program and earn the canine good citizen certificate. >> the test is going to consist of walking on the leash correctly, sit down, heel, come, and also being able to walk through a crowd without jumping on people in the crowd. >> i'm always a little on edge because you really don't know how the dogs are going to react. i have complete faith as long as she doesn't go off chasing random objects or people or god knows what. >> you're going to come to the station. yep, sit right beside you.
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loose leash walking and i'm going to call out some turns to you. right turn. very good. >> stay. stay. stay. >> back. beautiful. okay. now, if you will weave your dog when you leave, don't come back. we want you to go out and we'll do all we can to help you have a productive life once you get out of here. >> at this time i'd like to call them up one at a time. alvin daryl and his dog truvy. james hodges and trish. curtis conrad and his dog folgers.
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shaun quilty and minion. congratulations. thank you, everyone, for coming out. >> after the ceremony, the dogs head back to the humane society shelter. with their training completed and their certification, they stand a much better chance of being adopted. >> the hard thing about it is getting attached to the dog and them going back to the shelter, you know. it's been a good experience for both of us, i think. >> minion leaves today too. hopefully he gets adopted. he's been a good dog. i wish i was out so i could adopt him. maybe next time. >> are we ready to go home? yes, we are. we're ready to go. let's go home.
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in recent days, across this country, i've asked the african-american community to honor me with their vote. i fully recognize the outreach to the african-american community is in an area where the republican party must do better. and it will do better. >> upping his outreach to minority voters, donald trump takes a what
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