and effects you as an individual or the you know it or not and whether you know that person or not that's incarcerated. pay and form. you should care. i have a background of film and 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 present system and come up with something for these kids. and then a parent in that camera. and if they can look at them and say and 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 a first step in recovery of any kind anytime is to take responsibility for. but even with them for we this little. gravitas of every minute.

i'm going to go. on to do the best they can to stay out of this blaze. continue to shop for. mr gold. and grab this criticism it's been the way. this was you guys know the numbers so you know we do it's job. message out. from nineteen twenty to one thousand nine hundred seventy is a whole half century of american history the rate of incarceration was roughly level at about one hundred ten four hundred thousand. and this is a broad span of our history this is the ruling twenty's and prohibition to depress . in all the social change the world war two the post-war economic boom the

the fifty's the explosion of suburbia the sixty's and all the social turbulence through this whole period the rate of incarceration is roughly level in the united states at about one hundred ten four hundred dollars and this reflects you know the policies of police departments and prosecutors and judges operating all over the country in the local and state level and then in the one nine hundred seventy. s. so that by now the rate of incarceration issue why just over seven hundred one hundred three courser issue for african-americans is over four thousand four hundred and so you have to wonder how does one cheat why did this half century of stability get ended with this dramatic increase in incarceration in spades from america's public enemy number one in the united states is once the federal

government decided that we're going to have the war on drugs they were able to then take a lot of money from the federal budget and send it out to states. i realized the need for money to deal with this problem. ministration we have increased the amount of money for handling the problem. it will be six hundred 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 you know district attorneys in elected everybody wanted to get in to drug cases and get aggressive about new laws to punish the new agents to arrest the new prosecutors to convict them and new prisons to hold them. we moved the

train when i was very young we moved here we moved you know to malone's we used to always well up and down the hallways of course it was the projects so some time we will sneak up on the roof which was the top floor twelfth floor and you know look out and of course that was very scary as a young child but you know when you live in a projects it's always so much stuff that you can get into my brother was tragically killed when he was ran over by a truck and i remember pacifically going to the corner with a habanera and seeing all the blood because they left all the blood still in the street the traumatic experience of losing my only brother and that truck x. and i know it had done something to me you know drugs from our state that time was hard all the way or because my son was doing drugs my nephews was too much drugs my niece was doing drugs my sisters with doing drugs it was like an epidemic. of drug abuse. and i cannot explain. i cannot explain my

feelings because i had at that time i didn't know how i felt you know i was sad because i felt like they were shunned in their lives but there was not than i could do about it to change their lifestyle. that was it. after my brother passed away a kind of withdrew from a lot of things i didn't talk as much i was very quiet on probably as early as my teenage years. twelve thirteen years old you know i started sneaking a drink in a little bit here and there started smoking marijuana at a very young age i started all selling drugs in you know he came right along with. the family you tend to trust family well when i first saw him there with the. in

the hallway and i used to be a hopeless for monetary and out with station right in front of his locker so when i knew that he was coming to his locker i would put my hands up and like black youth wait. so he would have to say excuse me something in that we started talking we got to know each other you know at the home many times in and out over at our house. you know my home. was a really a home compared to our house margaret grew up with her parents before the parents all the nice decent house great mother great father. something that i didn't have and i started you know just being around her a lot and being around family a lot and next thing you know you know i was pretty much you know once we started going to get i was pretty was never in our house and in fourteen years old i was pretty much stay in there because my mom was on drugs she. knew i was there she

really didn't have a problem with it but my kindness started you know liveness there were more than a very young age. by the time i was sixteen seventeen i was fully engulfed in the drug game and it is only was so big it was only seven point five square miles so a lot of rumors a stylus britain along to the train detectives back then they had to take to that one high school and they kind of got to know me very well and i guess they relayed that information to the trade narcotics and they started watching me and follow me around the stuff like that and i remember the first time that they that they raided my house i wasn't there but my mother was there and i was i think i just turned seventeen and um they locked her up and i got a phone call saying that you know your mother was locked up and they want you to turn yourself in. so i visually i turned myself in a seventeen i let my mother go and i first time we ever going to joe i went to you found because i was. they told i was always those. still in high school

and we missed the part. when i got out i remember the detective telling me that you know as soon as i turn eighteen there's going to come back. and if i don't straighten out my life that first spirit will be none compared to other experiences in jail because then i will be over eighteen and i will be going into a dull facility. most historians look at the origin of the war on drugs as something of president nixon with his speeches and his creation of of the d.n.a. and other agencies in the one nine hundred seventy s. but the war in drugs as we understand it with. nor enormous case loads and and in and filled up prison population is really a feature of the one nine hundred eighty s. under president reagan drugs are menacing our society they're threatening our values and undercutting our institutions they're killing our children under reagan

there was a tremendous increase in federal spending for anti drug activity cabinet level efforts and congress creating bre powerful new laws on day two of a new campaign against drugs the president backed up a tough talk with action for getting tough on drugs and we mean business it's almost like overnight we had discrete idea what we go after the users. and that's what we did we started going after the users in a prison populations who are those obviously are far more users than her operations major operations and. we started treating sick people people who were did drugs when a member talked to my grandmother and having that conversation with her about my wife and how far i had fallen she said to me you know trace it will always pray for you and i'm going to pray that you change your life around. the one of the days that she said that stuck with me. you know god is going to far in your door his

hour and only there when you realize who you truly your and i heard her but i really didn't hear her. and i left her house that they skip and then it went right back out into the streets. i remember going to new york on the cob 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 core. and i remember being stopped at a light and get now the switching drivers i got around to the passenger side and she took the pharmacy and not knowing that it was a cop car right behind us so once again i didn't want to go to court i was going to trial i told my laura that you know we just have to try to get all charges pushed together give me one so does the big old too much time and hopefully street not my life but i remember pacifically the judge sits in joe's told me. no limit to tom losing. and he said tracy you could bring to the one nine hundred eighty you know

you can begin again in one thousand nine hundred eighty he said come back before me for the third time in the third term is going to be a chore. for people feed the economy because they buy scratch tickets scratch off lottery tickets they live in the ghetto in new york you know the red apple grocery store uptown have the highest prices in town right and the liquor stores are open any buy . more expensive in the ghetto and that's how you build an economy it's always felt on the backs of the poor america was built on the slave market america was built on prison labor to give them a look that they the good times of america the ne'er do wells it's all very well that's over we got to go back to basics. i had a great education a good job. in

a family that loved me. i never had to worry about how i would eat somewhere i would sleep. i'm facing christmas alone out on the streets of london. well you know nothing. of the lorry load of those you know to slaughter those still give up food for the harvest. because you don't really feel like a human being in that. and then. the guy just came over to me saw me and gave me on change of his pocket. with gold make this manufactured consensus instead of public wealth. when the

ruling classes protect themselves. when the financial merry go round lifts and be the one percent. that's not going the whole middle of the room signals. to the ground the real news is really. what politicians do something. they put themselves on the line and they get accepted or rejected. so when you want to be president i'm sure. more someone wanted us. to write the book for us it's like a four three in the morning can't be good that i'm interested always in the waters of my house. or sit.

yeah. i am. the direction too would judge to sentence can be done in two ways a judge. hears a crime and for this crime you can impose a sentence anywhere in this range from probation to some term of years in prison and 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 this is a sentence where no matter how minor the role of the offender no matter how insignificant a violation of this crime it is a minimum term must be imposed mandatory minimum sentences are not new they've been on the books in this country for two hundred years and there are about one hundred ninety of them or something and if you look at them they read like the crimes issue or so you can see what the public was concerned about and then congress took that concern and translated it into law intellect sensing legislation. in like seventeen ninety's a life without parole robbing banks and crossing state lines in one nine hundred thirty four was you know ten years of prison skyjacking in the seventy's for ten or twenty years in prison and so you can see the you know what was the what the headlines were the headlines were translated into a mandatory seven. and so in the eighty's when drugs became

a big deal and lots of concern about drugs it was in the top three of public concern reacted by creating new mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes what congress sent to president bush was five years me to twenty minimum five grams of crack cocaine grams like this we go. again years minimum is fifty grand of crack cocaine that's like the weight of a kid or these are tiny quantities it's all based on one factor your sense you know how what was a 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 a person sentence when the crime carries a mandatory minimum when president reagan signed the mandatory minimums in one thirty six the federal prison population was thirty six dollars. now it's well over two hundred thou so this is

a growth that no one could have imagined mass incarceration in the u.s. is really unique in human history there is no democratic nation that's ever tried to have such a massive social experiment as we've done in incarceration and we've got more prisoners than any other country in the room and over. and numbers i mean i find it a bit disturbing that we have more prisoners from china and they have a billion more people than we do i don't think it gives people an eye when they hear that we have twenty five percent of the world's prison population and only five percent of the world's population in other words we are way over incarcerating compared to any other country in the world. had allowed. somebody who is a star in your line and police found it and they came after me i ended up literally holding the bag. i knew nothing about. the criminal justice system you

know here i was this. career never even a parking ticket and it was quite a surprise when we went to court and i had that kind of time marijuana. and i was charged with possession of marijuana with the intent to distribute money going to conspiracy to murder i received a total of fifty five year prison sentence the judge suspended all but six i was fortunate enough. to do make the first parole and i actually served in prison fourteen months and. is the cards that we've put in with the messages and asked the families to respond so we've gotten some really good responses and this one was three fam up three members of the family viewed it . and we ask what were the ages of the children who saw it she quit just one

a. she says extremely meaningful for the daughter of the mother who was 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 of these children want to know that their families i mean their mom or dad so ok. there's just soul shoulders they know it's been three years since either of you see. mr jones looms going to grieve for sure is that you don't read. those unsure fall just very good enough to join the phone do you want to listen to friend with. me fool you to fold has been me. rolled a lot of. news wish through four years going to. go. swimming say the. my. very first.

they said just me to one year administrative segregation and administrative segregation is twenty three hour long going to the locked up twenty three hours each day you come out for half hour shower and a half hour break i know a bit of olive person. at that time i was you know i wanted more phone person than the world i remember going into the cell i believe maybe if i buy a cell. i was dead or close i knew i was going to be there for the next year is just an experience that it is going to make your break you are going to come out a better person are you going to come out of worship person than you were before you went to. being in a hole is mirrors and i mean i wouldn't wish on anybody. but you locked up for twenty three hours i think you can do is beyond my words oh my grandmother just

kept playing over and over again in my mind and those words was the guy i was going to farm in my darkest hour knowing that what i realize who are actually was and when i kept hearing that because sand i am at my door that i am at my lowest point . and. i think right there and i realized i had reached my lowest point to life and that the only on the way for me to go from here is. another crime another criminal in a country that already have fed up with both religious rights politicians focus on often a simple crackdown the reason the criminal justice system isn't working is that we're not sending enough people to jail and keeping there long enough the people are saying in a very general way that they all of to block these rascals up and keep them there for a long time but during the one nine hundred eighty s. there was a major shift in the congress in. in state legislatures of doubt how long sentences

should be the public was a long term by increasing rates of crime from the one nine hundred seventy s. and early eighty's and they wanted longer sentences they wanted cracking down and that's what happened across the board for all kinds of crimes not only the mandatory minimum drug sentences the effect of all those sensing 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 away from judges and juries and shifted over to prosecutors it didn't limit it 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 that discretion it was eliminated from the system it just put the prosecutors in charge

. amy was born in one thousand nine hundred sixty eight and she was very very shy but by the task that in high school people can cite it in or she played basketball she made good grades high school that we went to a seven hundred twelve grade i was kind of the little tagalong sister and me and my brother were friends and i mean my sister were friends just kind of watch sure she was. always really friendly always really nice this is a small town. everybody knows everybody should get in trouble we'd know about it she says i had what i consider an ideal a child. at some point when i'm in college i mean 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 to go out and take some modeling photos we went to like several locations

. and he instilled in me that i really ought to pursue a modeling career consider my mother says to me ralston move to dallas my gosh no you know. what she's thinking what's she going to do and so i think she's going to model so i created a little portfolio before i went to dallas that i could show to the modeling agencies fandy it was well read well traveled well educated graduated stanford law school and had gone to princeton theology school so it was 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 it was at that point seemed like a dream come true. there were red flags before we got married there were there were frankly there were red flags all along the way sandy has what i consider to be

a dual personality and that this other character would emerge whenever i don't 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 i'd leave all my friends behind and completely. move to a different city. sandy. that he wouldn't leave her i just kept saying you know let's be friends let's be friends he wanted to be more so cute told me that he was going to europe and then i never heard anything for a while though word got back to me that he'd been arrested. i hadn't been in dallas in over a year so of the only thing i knew to do was to book a flight to dallas to see if i could go through the house listen to the answering machine and try to piece this thing together and enjoy the thing you're going to find out more and for. nation and while i was in the dallas house the phone rang

and it was sandy's german legal counsel 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 that he wanted to redeem 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 retained an attorney to go over and meet with germany. seven months after sandy has been arrested and i pull into the garage of my car is rushed by law enforcement people who are screaming and have a gun out and they're pointing at my face i'm being told you know 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

just tell us what you know and i wasn't going to say anything because i'm literally watching these people destroying my mom's isn't somebody that i really want to confide in so i add 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 employ a other people people she didn't even know and. she what she refused to do it she said i don't only speak on that i'm not going to do this and this prosecutor said you either. paraphrasing you now cooperate or will ruin your life. so what we've got to do is identify the threats that we have the. crazy

confrontation let it be an arms race is on often spearing dramatic development only loosely i'm going to resist i don't see how that strategy will be successful very critical time time to sit down and talk. a. little. words that come to call russia no one's ever known one has ever heard of a country never even heard about most schools.

and. well i think it certainly makes sense for for moscow to think both strong in its context with the united states i just fear that the dominant view in this city is that it isn't nearly impossible until the united states kind of settle this domestic divide the environment and in d.c. he's you know i hate to see these laws work toxic but that's exactly what it is and then i think it's in a way you know you're damned if you do it you're damned if you don't.

the russian military conducts a public test run of a new hypersonic strategic missile lottie obtains unique footage of the launch. of the times interview fighting against anti-government forces in each keep trying he says that there are members of islamic state in israel. the standoff develops around northern syria government forces are amassing there amid fears of a turkish offensive against local.