January 27, 2026 • 38 mins
After mixing antidepressants and alcohol, Christie Luther hit someone with her car and they died. She spent 4.5 years in prison, where she discovered her purpose to create Oklahoma’s first cosmetology school inside a woman’s correctional facility. The R.I.S.E. Program has had 286 students and only 1 of them has ended up back in prison, which is unheard of! And while Christie still lives with extraordinary regret and shame, she will show you how to keep living and transform your worst pain into unstoppable purpose.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Being incarcerated. That's where I found my purpose. So I
was involved in an accident and I struck command that
was standing on the side.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Of the road.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
I didn't see him there, and I.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Was leaving a funeral.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
I was at a friend of mine's mom's funeral. So
you leave a funeral and you create one. I mean,
that's devastating.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney.
I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father,
I'm an entrepreneur, and I'm a football coach in inner
City Memphis. And the last part somehow led to an
oscar for the film about one of my teams.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
It's called Undefeated.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
Guys, I believe our country's problems are never going to
be solved by a bunch of fancy people wearing nice suits,
using big words that nobody ever uses on CNN than Fox,
but rather by an army of normal folks. That's us,
just you and me deciding, Hey, you know what, maybe
I can help. That's what Christi Luther, the voice you
(01:11):
just heard, has done. She took one of the greatest
pains a human being could ever have and transformed it
to make it count.
Speaker 4 (01:19):
For something.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
While in prison, she came up with the idea to
create Oklahoma's first cosmetology and barbering school within a women's
correctional facility, and when she got out, she felt like
crazy to make the RISE program a reality. Nine years later,
they've had two hundred and eighty six graduates and students,
(01:43):
eighty percent of them are employed in the industry post release,
and only one person one.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
Has gone back to prison.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Christy will teach you about transforming your pain into purpose,
following the callings on your heart instead of ignoring them,
and so much more. Right after these brief messages from
our general sponsors, all right, obviously you're going to hear
(02:17):
a different interviews voice. It's producer Alex and you may
be asking why. Well, I've had season tickets to ole
Miss football games since nineteen ninety one. Every year i've donated,
I've given, I've graduated there, kids of mine have gone there.
(02:37):
It's just been something we've always done lifelong fans. I've
been through the Tommy Tuberville days, the Hugh Freeze days,
the Billie Brewer days, and every year I think this
may be the year, well, this may really be the year,
(02:57):
and Unfortunately, we we schedule guests months in advance to
travel to Memphis to do our interviews, and the fest
of all happened to be the same time that Christy
was in town, and unfortunately I had to roll out
on a previous scheduled interview to go to Arizona to
(03:18):
watch my old miss team play Miami. So because of
that unfortunate scheduling debacle and my unwillingness to miss that,
this may actually be the year Alex will be interviewing
Christy and I will be listening to the interview and
(03:39):
adding in my two cents. So that's why Alex is
an interviewer today.
Speaker 5 (03:49):
Christy Luther, it's great to be with you.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
It's great to be here. Thank you for the opportunity.
Speaker 6 (03:53):
Sorry that I'm summing in for Bill Courtney. Our host
has derelicted as duties again, Cassius. He went to see
his old misplay in the Fiesta Bowl, and so everybody's
got a substitute host today.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
That's great.
Speaker 5 (04:05):
Hopefully we don't screw this up.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I'm in good hands.
Speaker 6 (04:07):
So Christy is the founder of an amazing program called Rise,
which we're going to get into a lot. But I
want to first start off with a question that gets
to the heart of the matter. Okay, Christy, why would
you educate a murderer?
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Because I think everyone's life is valuable. I think God
can redeem a life, he can redeem brokenness, and he
can redeem our mistakes.
Speaker 5 (04:28):
And you know a little something about that.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
Too, yes, personally.
Speaker 6 (04:33):
Well, maybe we'll get to that in a minute. You're
actually a Memphis girl, so you you were sharing that
it's been quite a reflective time being back here for
a day, and feel free to share anything about that.
But what was your child like here at Memphis? How
has that impact of your life?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Yeah? So being from Memphis, I just I feel rooted,
I feel connected here. It goes deep and I just
love it.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
You know.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
I always say, you know, Memphis the home of rock
and roll, blues and barbecue.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I mean, what else do you need?
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Right? And so my childhood here, I mean there was
some verbal abuse and some physical abuse growing up and
it impacted me in a way that caused some father
wounds for me. And then especially when I was in
high school and we moved from Memphis and had to
move to Oklahoma City, that really impacted me because I
(05:24):
felt safe secure and at home here in Memphis.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
Yeah, we were talking on the car and the way
over that. You know, if you've gone through some kind
of trauma like that of abuse, and at least I
think you had, you have the stabilization of your grandparents
and some of those relationships and a stable environment that
you knew. But after going through trauma like that and
then having the quarter ripped out and going to another
environment just must make it a lot worse.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
Yes, it was. I mean it was hard.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
You know. I was about to graduate with everyone i'd
gone to elementary school with, and you know, that was
that was my stability. And so to move, you know,
eight hours away to unknown land, you know, and just
a different culture altogether, that was really hard. And so
you know, I just didn't want to connect with anyone,
and and it had some effects even to this day.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
You know, in my adulthood, you.
Speaker 5 (06:15):
Said you became a little bit of a rebel me
and the.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Lot of a rebel. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 6 (06:21):
When you died your hair, I assume that's your hair
has died. That's not natural.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Oh, I know. I actually am a redhead.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Both my grandmothers were red haired, and I just I
was platinum blonde. I was rebellious. You know, I wasn't
going to eat. I was a fighter. I started smoking
and drinking and doing lots of stuff that you know
that people experiment with different things.
Speaker 6 (06:42):
But and yeah, you figured out how to be a
successful salon owner. It sounded like, I mean, take us
to what that was like and then this hole in
your heart that I think you still felt.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Yeah, so to be a salon owner.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Well, you know, I finally made it through high school
and all my rebellion and went to cosmetology.
Speaker 5 (07:00):
You finally, how many years wou'd taken care?
Speaker 2 (07:01):
No?
Speaker 1 (07:02):
No, no, just after we moved to after we moved
to Oklahoma City, there was just still a longing to,
you know, want to be accepted or belong and out
there over there in Oklahoma City. And I just didn't
feel that way. So thankfully, being the oldest daughter and
oldest child, I just have an entrepreneurial heart and a
(07:23):
business mind, and so I just started going to work
after cosmetology school, owned a salon, and you know, just
started building my life on what I wanted it to
look like.
Speaker 6 (07:33):
And if you don't mind talking about, like how many
other people were working in the salon or how are
you guys doing revenue?
Speaker 4 (07:38):
Whise?
Speaker 5 (07:38):
Like, what was your life like before it came crashing down?
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Well, I had a salon with fifteen employees in it,
and really, yeah, and really it was. It was pretty
easy because we do a booth rent situation where they
just sublet their space from me, and I was I
was making quite a bit of money, that's for sure.
And so you know, just having fifteen people paying rent
for hundred and fifty dollars a month times fifteen, you
(08:02):
can do the math on that.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
It was. It was pretty good. And then I, you know,
got married and then was a mom and.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
I've been in this industry for some decades now, a
lot of decades.
Speaker 6 (08:14):
Yeah, yeah, So what felt off to you in that moment?
Despite the a common story, despite the financial success, it
did not solve all the world's problems.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
It did not solve all the problems. You know, when
I did not grow up in church at all. We
didn't go to church while we lived here, and then
when I moved to Oklahoma City, we still didn't go
to church. And so funny, funny thing, I worked in
a Christian salon before I owned my own.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
And it was before Christians.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
Well we have Christian schools now.
Speaker 5 (08:43):
So, but it was did they only take Christian customers?
Speaker 1 (08:47):
But they played all Christian music and Bible studies.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yes, yes, and I was not. I was not any
of that.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
And I was, yeah, I'm sure that the Holy Spirit
said love, We're going to get her.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
They're trying to save you, that's you know.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
No, they were very sweet about it.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
I actually was a party girl, so I would come
in with the hangover and they were having Bible study
in the back, and all I wanted was coffee and
they were like, hey, good morning, can we pray for you?
I was like, nope, I don't want any of that.
And I just didn't know, you know, And so they
were so loving to me. They never said you're going
to go to Hell on a slipping slide because of
you know, your behavior. They just loved me, you know,
(09:28):
and that resonated with me, and it really, I don't know,
it helped me to begin my relationship with God. And
it was on August eighteenth. I was at lunch, driving
around and doing the Foxhole prayer that says, God, if
you're really real, you know, help me, because I just
felt so lost I just did not have a connection.
(09:49):
And so I got saved and baptized on my lunch
break and drove back to that Christian salon like soaking
wet and ready to do a perm that day. You
were crying no, because I got baptized, the whole body done,
and that was it, you know. And so that started
my life, as you know, as a believer, and you know,
(10:09):
had some ups and downs along the way for sure.
Speaker 6 (10:12):
But yeah, yeah, just because you believe doesn't take away
all the problems.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
That's one hundred percent true. That really is true at least.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
If not, you've not fully surrendered yet at this point.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
Well, and again, you know, if you have never been
to church or never read the Bible, like what does
that look like? How do you even know where to begin?
Speaker 2 (10:30):
You know? So who do you ask? What do you do?
Speaker 1 (10:33):
And I think about that too. We walk, we walk
past people all day long. How many people are lost
or don't feel connected but don't know how to get
to a relationship with God or get you know, restoration
with family or if you don't know.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
How do you what do you do? How do you
go about that?
Speaker 6 (10:49):
So you have a successful business, you came to faith
and yet still there's a hole in your heart. What
did you feel inside of you? And then what did
you do to try to that whole?
Speaker 1 (11:01):
I just I think I've always just felt like an outsider.
I think part of it being redheaded. Kids are mean
and brutal, you know, when you're red headed and you're
one of the few. And just always felt like I
was kind of an outcast. And so then moving to
Oklahoma from here that felt I felt like an outcast.
I didn't feel like I fit in and trying to
(11:23):
find your place, and so as an oldest child or
you know, I've lost my grandmother, one of my grandmothers
when I was young, so not having that relationship, having
some significant dad wounds in my life. Like you just
like you're just trying to make it. You're just trying
to have some sense of normalcy. But what is normal?
(11:43):
You know what is normal? It's it's everybody's own definition.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
I think.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
So, yeah, I tried the best I could with, you know,
with what I had.
Speaker 6 (11:53):
Even something that many Memphians would see as normal. You're
talking about on the drive here that you grew up here,
and yet you're never too the peabody to see the ducks.
A lot of people here are like, yeah, that would
feel normal. But even we've interviewed people guess on the podcasts,
and I'm sure it's the same in Oklahoma City too,
that a lot of people, even in inner city neighborhood
have not gone five miles to downtown to Chicago to
(12:15):
see the lake, right.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
And so.
Speaker 6 (12:18):
Yeah, obviously your normal was different from a lot of people.
So I think you try to fill that hole with
was it drugs?
Speaker 4 (12:24):
Alcohol?
Speaker 5 (12:25):
What did you use to drugs?
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Alcohol? Promiscuity?
Speaker 1 (12:29):
Just you know, I love to travel, so I feel
like sometimes that's an escape for me and just trying
to fill it, you know, trying to fill it in relationships.
And then you know, if you have father wounds.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
You know, what does that look like?
Speaker 1 (12:43):
You're trying to just have a normal conversation with a man,
you know. So it was really trying to navigate some
difficult pathways and I'm pretty stubborn, so I didn't ask
for help, you know in that. So I think, you know,
just trying to find who I really am. And sometimes
(13:05):
I think many of us in life, even up to
our thirties, maybe sometimes even forties, like what's my purpose?
Surely I'm not here just taking up space on this planet,
like there's something more. And I felt like I was
always made for something more, to do something more or bigger,
and I just didn't know what that was until even.
Speaker 6 (13:25):
A lot of people would feel, hey, you got a
successful business. I think you're had a husband and kids
at that point, like yeah, they would feel like that's
your purpose.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Yeah, no, yes, many people would feel that way.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
But I'm very driven.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
I don't usually take no for an answer very often.
I'm an innovative thinker. I'm a problem solver. So if
really it boils down to this, if you see a need,
you had been called. So in certain areas of my life,
I just had this innate need to want to help people,
and I wanted to maybe because I needed help or
(14:02):
I needed rescuing, and so I kind of want to
do the same kind of have the moniker of the
Mama Bear, you know, in Oklahoma City with many of
the ladies that I work with. So women are funny,
like we don't sometimes we don't like men after my man,
my money, my whatever. But it was our own insecurities
in ourselves, you know. So in what I do now,
(14:24):
we just helped fortify a sisterhood that elevates women to
be able to embrace everybody.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
And now a few messages from our general sponsors. But first,
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Speaker 6 (16:13):
So you did find your purpose in a way that
maybe wasn't ideal, but often is the way that people
find their purpose.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
That's right.
Speaker 5 (16:21):
Maybe a little bit more dramatic than most people, though,
that's true.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
And because I feel like, you know, the rebel or
the stubbornness that I that I have, I think it
had to come in in a very firm direct way
that I wasn't anticipating, and it actually came through being incarcerated.
That's where I found my purpose.
Speaker 5 (16:43):
Can you tell us the whole story.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
So I was involved in an accident and I struck
a command that was standing on the side of the road.
I didn't see him there, and I was.
Speaker 5 (16:56):
Remixing narcotics and alcohol was that they.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
And I was leaving a funeral. I was at a
friend of mine's mom's funeral. And so you leave a
funeral and you create one. I mean, that's that's devastating.
And so I did have prescription medication. I was I
had depression.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
I had.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
You know, uppers down or they were all prescribed. None illegal,
lifted drugs or anything like that. That's how I justified it. Actually,
my doctor prescribed everything for me, and so you know,
you multitask, you know, texting and driving and just being
you know, making some grave, grave mistakes. And I struck
(17:45):
him as he was on the side of the road
and I hadn't even seen him there, yea. And the
sun was setting. It blocked part of the road, it
was darkened, and you know, I could go on and on,
but the truth is is that it was my fault.
It was my mistake. And so that sentence carries four
(18:09):
years to life in Oklahoma. And I was very grateful
to have family support during that time. And I ended
up with a five year sentence and I served four years,
four months, four weeks in one day. And it's shameful,
and I ask God sometimes, how is this part of
(18:30):
my story?
Speaker 4 (18:30):
How?
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Why is this part of my story?
Speaker 1 (18:33):
I still wrestle with the shame and the guilt from that,
And so I was determined to do my life differently,
and I wanted it to count and I wanted to
make a difference. And you know, there's no do over.
You can't make up for that, you can never apologize
(18:53):
enough or repent enough.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
It's just.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
I just knew with all certainty, everything in me that
I wanted to do something different in honor of my victim,
to say it in that regard of him and his
family and whatever else. It was total surrendered whatever God
wanted to do at that point. And so I worked
in a beauty shop at the prison and the law library.
(19:19):
So I have a great idea about the Department of Correction,
their operations, procedures, and postconviction relief.
Speaker 5 (19:27):
Maybe before we go, there's.
Speaker 6 (19:31):
Your victim's family seems to have an interesting part in
this story because four years to life is a huge range,
and even though it's accidental, I was still surprised when
you told me that it was, you know, I think
around four and a half years that you ended up doing. Yeah,
you know, And it sounds like they played a pretty
(19:51):
graceful an amazing role in it, if you could talk
about that.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
Well, to not know everything that they were feeling other
than and significant loss and I'm sure anger the family
had to say in the plea agreement, in the you know,
the court hearings and everything, and they knew I had
(20:17):
a thirteen year old daughter at the time, and a
three year old daughter, and they agreed to a lesser
time frame and that was part of the plea agreement
instead of taking it to jury trial.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
There was nothing to debate.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
I mean, there was nothing, no reason to go to
jury trial, and so they were gracious enough to I
don't want to say agree, because I don't want to
speak for them, but it happened in the way that
they had to say in the time that I had
to be incarcerated, and it was less than should have
(20:56):
been probably or less than the mac some sentence.
Speaker 6 (21:02):
Have you heard anything like how often does that happen?
Percentage wise? It probably feels pretty rare to me that
maybe five or ten percent of families would respond with
that much forgiveness in the moment.
Speaker 5 (21:13):
It's one thing.
Speaker 6 (21:13):
Maybe one year later, five years later, it's ten years
later as you're wrestling with it as a family. But
for them to respond that way immediately, it is pretty heroic.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
It is. And you know, I.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Pray that I don't want to say there's restorations one day.
I do pray that if they keep up with anything
I do, that they might see that lives are changed
in this tragedy. And that's what I can hope for.
You know, I don't expect there'd be some grandiose meeting
(21:52):
or something like that that would be wonderful, but I
don't need that. Whatever they ever would want to do,
I would be I would be open to that or
welcome to that. But I just have to keep going.
I have to keep going at the momentum that I'm
at because lives depend on it, and it's it's my
(22:15):
need or my want to help people or to make
my life make sense. After that, that's pretty hard to
have on your resume, on your life resume. It's not
anything I would have ever imagined.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
You know.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
I love people. I don't even like it hurting someone's feelings.
So to have that as part of my story, you know,
and I'm not the only one. So there are other
women even in my class that have anywhere from ten
years to life.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
And so how do you reckon that?
Speaker 1 (22:49):
You know, when someone has life and you say I
had five years and I understand what you're going through,
or you know they're in the very class and one
has life and one has eight why, you know, And
it's just the way that the sentencing guidelines are in
Oklahoma that a judge has the liberty to say you
get this and you get that, so there's nothing very
(23:11):
streamline about it.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
That's why the vast range is what it is.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Well, I really appreciate you sharing all that.
Speaker 6 (23:19):
I know it's really hard and not that what I
went through is the same thing. But unfortunately my ex
wife wanted a divorce and our listeners have heard me
talk about this.
Speaker 5 (23:31):
But yeah, I know.
Speaker 6 (23:33):
I mean, as a strong Catholic invented all my life
I single, I used to go to daily Mass like
I was, you know, been super into it and never
imagine that this would be my story, you know, as
you never imagine this would be never your story, and
it's it is hard to wrestle with and but I
do appreciate you sharing it. I was, if you've heard
I'm a big fan of Ddrich Bonhoeffer. Yes I'm basically paraphered.
Speaker 4 (23:54):
If the thing is lying.
Speaker 6 (23:55):
But he has this line that the problem with Christians
that there lonely in their sins, yes or their problem
and whereas the centers at the bar have so much
more fellowship with each other because they share everything. Right,
So I think it's really important for all of us
to share our trials that are going through because people
can learn from it, it also helps them feel us alone. Altherwise,
people just feel like I'm the only one going through this,
and the reality is we all are all carrying some
(24:17):
kind of cross.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Up the right and I did feel like I was
the only one. And it's the shame I think that
I carry with that. It's unimaginable. It's not something I
ever would have imagined for my life, you know. But
I do get the opportunity on occasion to share my
testimony and it's all that we're doing today basically in
(24:38):
a fifteen minute nutshell, you know, if you will, and
I get to share it with thousands and thousands of
people to say, this is part of my story, and
that portion of my life is the hardest portion that
I've had to go through because of the burden, the
weight and the burden that I bear from that.
Speaker 5 (24:58):
Yeah, well, it's a gift to the world.
Speaker 6 (25:00):
You're willing to tell it and tell it over again
because that's hard, and we're.
Speaker 5 (25:05):
Going to get to the amazing work that you're doing.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
At a minute.
Speaker 6 (25:08):
If you mentioned the shame, I was going to plan
on talking about this closer to the end. But you
have an interesting line that like a lot of people
think about stigma and we need to get rid of
the stigma or the shame. Yeah, and you kind of
flip that on its head in an interesting way.
Speaker 5 (25:24):
Can you talk about.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
That well, to bear the shame and the guilt.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
It's not anything I ever wanted to have on my
personal life's resume.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
And in that, I.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Mean I wear that, I carry it. I think about
it every single day, I really every single day. I
know the anniversary date, I know how many years, I
know all those things.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
I know the man's name.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
I mean, it's very personal to me, and there's an
element about it that keeps me humbled. It keeps me grateful,
It keeps me moving forward. It keeps the momentum in
me to want to help other people and see restoration
for them or their families. I'm at sobriety and it
(26:07):
is very important to me, and I preach about that,
you know, to my family members or friends or you know,
about drinking and driving and and being mindful, you know.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
So I use it.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
I speak at the prisons, and that is it's I mean,
you can't have a testimony unless you've been through a
test right, And you can't have a message unless you've
been through a mess, and both of those have been mine.
So if I share it, then hopefully, even if it's
one person, and it changes them or helps them or
encourages them, then that one, that one person is who
(26:39):
it was for hopefully.
Speaker 4 (26:41):
More we'll be right back.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
I'm sure it's many more. Just given the number of
people in your program.
Speaker 6 (27:01):
You taught it to them, then at least I think
you've packed it one hundred and eighty people from the
number I've heard, but I think it's probably far beyond that.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
It is it is now.
Speaker 5 (27:09):
Yes, I love your point. I'm just going to state
it too, that.
Speaker 6 (27:15):
The shame or the sigma shouldn't go away because something
did happen.
Speaker 5 (27:20):
And similarly, one of our guests who lost a.
Speaker 6 (27:23):
Child through a choking accident said like, I don't want
it at the hurt to ever go away. And a
lot of people think you want it to go away,
but she's like, if it goes it fully goes away.
I'm not remembering my child and I always want to
feel my child close to my heart.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
That's exactly right.
Speaker 6 (27:39):
So you get to prison, what's day one, Like, what's
going through your head.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
I mean, you know, never really been in any law enforcement
trouble before or anything like that. And so to be shackled,
you know with and again it's minimal compared to what
the other family went through. So I'm not whining and complaining.
I'm just describing. I just want to make that clear.
(28:09):
But to be shackled, and you have the black box
and the belly chains, and you know, you have the
your you're a number. Now you're a last name and
a number, and you're wearing the same thing as everybody else.
Your identity is gone. You're you know, you look like
everyone else.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
And so there again your status is a business owner.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
It's gone.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
And uh, you know, I served divorce papers shortly after
I got to prison, and I'm a vegan, and so
you're at the time I was a vegetarian. How do
you go to prison be a vegetarian when everybody eats bologny,
you know, bologney sandwiches.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
And so you have to learn yourself.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
You have to adapt to these situations, you know, and
you have to say, okay, how do I survive this?
And I think about Victor Frunkel, you know, not to
liken it to a concentration camp. Please hear me on that.
My heart is for you know, the people that had
to endure the Holocaust. All I mean is you're away
(29:12):
from your family, You're having to adapt to new surroundings
and things you're not familiar with. And so I was
able to read that book Man Search for Significance while
I was there, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book, and I spent
a lot of time reading, and I found out about myself.
You know that I'm a survivor and you can keep going.
(29:32):
And it was terrifying. It was terrifying. I lost my husband,
my house, my business, my children we had. I was
indigent and so that means, you know, you have no
outside help, no outside financing coming in on your books,
(29:53):
and except for your gang pay or state pay, which
was the equivalent of about ten dollars a month. And
so God used that for me to help budget my nonprofit. Now,
so I can budget that nonprofit pretty well and make
it work. But it's like, Okay, I was starting to
find out who I am, But now who am I?
(30:13):
Who am I all over again? And so the beautiful
thing is God turns beauty. He makes beauty out of ashes,
and so that's what he did while I was here.
Speaker 6 (30:22):
I've heard you talk about that you did surrender to
God in prison, but that didn't necessarily change everything for you.
That you still felt a loss, which is I found
interesting is when most people talk about surrendering the idea
as well, you have this incredible piece and your life
is radically transformed. And I think that's probably true for
(30:43):
a lot of people. So I thought talked to how
you did not feel that way.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Yeah, No, mine was probably gradually because I think I
stated it right now just a few minutes ago, that
I am stubborn. I'm very much driven in whatever I do.
Somehow I think I'm the manager of everything. And it's
really laying it down. It's really surrendering saying God, I
(31:06):
won't pick it back up again. You have it because
I don't know what to do. Clearly, I've made a
mess of everything. So you teach me now. And so
that's that's what that that's what that looks like to me,
to literally lay it down and say your way, not
my way.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
And I when I interview my.
Speaker 1 (31:24):
New students, I asked them that I asked them one thing,
I say, are you teachable?
Speaker 2 (31:28):
And I think for me it was that.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
And I really don't take mostly direction from you know,
just from anybody. I'm pretty particular. But I needed to
take direction from the Lord. And he's the one that said,
you know, walk this way, here's the way, walk in
it left right, here we go, and.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
And that was it.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
It was just me surrendering to whatever he wanted to do.
And you know, there was a lot of blood, sweat, tears, crying,
a lot of anguish, a lot of loss. And I
liken it to a pruning season, but I'm reminded that
there's a beginning and and end to the pruning season.
You just moved to another prunting season. And so there
was a lot of old me that needed to go,
(32:12):
like where he says, you know, if there's anything in me,
you know that you don't like, Lord, lay it on
the altar and burn it up, you know, put me
on the Potter's wheel.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
You do what you need to do in my life.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
And so it's that that was hard to surrender that
because I had to surrender loss and brokenness from my childhood.
Some family members wrote me off, cut me off, and
then getting served divorce papers while you're in prison, and
it's like you come to the end of yourself, and
just when you think you come to the end of yourself,
you have not There's still more ending. So it's that
(32:47):
when I couldn't rely on all the money that I
made because it wasn't there anymore. I couldn't rely on
family members always bringing my children to see me because
sometimes they weren't. I couldn't rely on a husband, and
all I had was like you know when God said,
he talks about it in Isaiah fifty four, he says,
I will be your husband, And so that's kind of
(33:08):
what I had to take his lead. He showed me
what a father's love was, which I was not familiar with.
He showed me what surrender was, being obedient and humble
and you take your eyes off yourself. There's a big
world out there that needs help. And so I feel
like he called me to go to the next step.
Speaker 6 (33:30):
Surrendering, to the point where you say, you're not even
asking God to get me the hell out of here,
like a lot of her.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Well, that's interesting, right, And I did, and I had
a year review. Actually, so after I was there a year,
I still had not surrendered. So in that year I
had one year to go back to court, and they
were the judge was going to say, well, you know,
well done, good and faithful servant, go home early or not.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
And so I.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Thought, if you get a year review, that's a that's
a shoe, and I'm going home. So I took all
these Bible studies and did all this. I had one
hundred certificates and I went back to court and the
judge said on record, he said it was an unfortunate accident,
but no, you got to go back and finish this time.
And I was gutted, and I thought I did all
this work, so it was performance based. It wasn't a
(34:18):
true surrender. So at that point, like I didn't want
to live. I was like, I'm done. What else is there?
The four years left seems like a lifetime. You know,
who couldn't wait on your wife for four years, or
who couldn't wait on a family member for four years?
It might feel like a lifetime. But anyway, it didn't
(34:38):
work out that way, so I had to go back
and that's when it happened. I was like, I have
nothing else. I barely even have hope, but I'm writing
this thing out with you God, so let's go. And
it was that when I began working in the beauty
shop and the law library and everything at that point.
Speaker 5 (34:53):
So all right, let's get into the fun stuff. Take
us there.
Speaker 6 (34:56):
I didn't even think ever before in my whole life
that there was a beauty shop in Britain. I know,
it makes sense, yeah, it just never. It's probably never
cross most people's minds.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
No Orange, just New Black.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
I don't know if they show the beauty shop in there,
but you know, there's a barbershop in a beauty shop,
and especially in Oklahoma, it's kind of part of the
operation procedure. You have to have a means to be
able to have some grooming, and so there was that,
and sometimes it's a little makeshift closet and anyway, so
I worked in the beauty shop, and i'd been a
salon owner, so they kind of let me be a
(35:27):
little bit of a super have a supervisory position. So
the girls that didn't want to work in the kitchen,
that could braid hair thought that they were, you know,
due to work in the beauty shop. So they would
come and do interviews and I'd ask them to do
a haircut, and they're terrible and I said, I thought
you went to beauty school and they said I didn't
get finished. And I kept hearing that over and over.
(35:47):
I didn't finish. I didn't finish.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
And I said, if you.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Do anything, what would you do. I said, I would
finish beauty school. M So, one day I was doing
a shampoo and I always say I met God at
the shampoo bowl. I fell like he spoke to my
heart and said, one day you're going to come back
and start a school. And I said, it says inmate
on the back of my shirt.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Are you kidding me?
Speaker 1 (36:08):
And I really felt that way, and no, it's I
just pursued it. I knew he said it. I could
count on him to be faithful and truthful with me,
and I couldn't see it any other way. So I
began speaking speaking to other people about it and talking
about it to the case managers and they're like, okay,
crazy lady, Sure that's never happened before. And I just
(36:31):
kept saying, one of these days, hey, when I come back,
that's what I'm going to do when I come back.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
And they said, okay, okay, sure.
Speaker 6 (36:38):
I think they've heard that kind of crazy stuff from
a lot of pony for sure.
Speaker 1 (36:41):
I wanted to call it color corrections, and I didn't.
They didn't think that was funny, you know.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (36:45):
And I worked in the law library as well, and
I helped the ladies with their year review or their
you know, all their paperwork to go back to court.
So I learned a lot about the court system and
justice impacted individuals, and the ops for Department of Corrections,
which I use every day now, the tool cage and
what that looks like, and the log books and all
(37:07):
the things that are necessary. I didn't know it at
the time, and yeah, so I just began talking about it, saying,
matter of factly, this is what God said, and this
is what I'm going to do. And I had one beautiful,
wonderful lady, doctor Pittman, and she was up top worked
in administration, very close to the director, and I would
(37:30):
see her occasionally. They moved me to another facility, I
would see her. I said, hey, to remember me, I'm
coming back to start a school.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
She's like, okay, yeah, I do. I do.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
And then she said, okay, fine, come and see me
when you get out.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
The next day.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
When I got out, I went to see her and
she said, oh, my gosh, you're not kidding, I said.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
So, when are we going to do this?
Speaker 1 (37:48):
So it went on a couple more years, and I
just kept saying I opened up a bank account by faith.
I went to Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California and said,
in front of four thousand people.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
I've started a beauty school.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
And I didn't have a dollar to my name or
a bank account at the time. And I was just like,
I said, boy Lord, you really better come through on this.
Speaker 3 (38:10):
And that concludes Part one of our conversation with Christy Luther,
and you don't want to miss part two that's now
available to listen to. Together, guys, we can change this country,
and it starts with you.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
I'll see in part two.
Being incarcerated. That's where I found my purpose. So I
was involved in an accident and I struck command that
was standing on the side.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Of the road.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
I didn't see him there, and I.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Was leaving a funeral.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
I was at a friend of mine's mom's funeral. So
you leave a funeral and you create one. I mean,
that's devastating.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney.
I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father,
I'm an entrepreneur, and I'm a football coach in inner
City Memphis. And the last part somehow led to an
oscar for the film about one of my teams.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
It's called Undefeated.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
Guys, I believe our country's problems are never going to
be solved by a bunch of fancy people wearing nice suits,
using big words that nobody ever uses on CNN than Fox,
but rather by an army of normal folks. That's us,
just you and me deciding, Hey, you know what, maybe
I can help. That's what Christi Luther, the voice you
(01:11):
just heard, has done. She took one of the greatest
pains a human being could ever have and transformed it
to make it count.
Speaker 4 (01:19):
For something.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
While in prison, she came up with the idea to
create Oklahoma's first cosmetology and barbering school within a women's
correctional facility, and when she got out, she felt like
crazy to make the RISE program a reality. Nine years later,
they've had two hundred and eighty six graduates and students,
(01:43):
eighty percent of them are employed in the industry post release,
and only one person one.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
Has gone back to prison.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Christy will teach you about transforming your pain into purpose,
following the callings on your heart instead of ignoring them,
and so much more. Right after these brief messages from
our general sponsors, all right, obviously you're going to hear
(02:17):
a different interviews voice. It's producer Alex and you may
be asking why. Well, I've had season tickets to ole
Miss football games since nineteen ninety one. Every year i've donated,
I've given, I've graduated there, kids of mine have gone there.
(02:37):
It's just been something we've always done lifelong fans. I've
been through the Tommy Tuberville days, the Hugh Freeze days,
the Billie Brewer days, and every year I think this
may be the year, well, this may really be the year,
(02:57):
and Unfortunately, we we schedule guests months in advance to
travel to Memphis to do our interviews, and the fest
of all happened to be the same time that Christy
was in town, and unfortunately I had to roll out
on a previous scheduled interview to go to Arizona to
(03:18):
watch my old miss team play Miami. So because of
that unfortunate scheduling debacle and my unwillingness to miss that,
this may actually be the year Alex will be interviewing
Christy and I will be listening to the interview and
(03:39):
adding in my two cents. So that's why Alex is
an interviewer today.
Speaker 5 (03:49):
Christy Luther, it's great to be with you.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
It's great to be here. Thank you for the opportunity.
Speaker 6 (03:53):
Sorry that I'm summing in for Bill Courtney. Our host
has derelicted as duties again, Cassius. He went to see
his old misplay in the Fiesta Bowl, and so everybody's
got a substitute host today.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
That's great.
Speaker 5 (04:05):
Hopefully we don't screw this up.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I'm in good hands.
Speaker 6 (04:07):
So Christy is the founder of an amazing program called Rise,
which we're going to get into a lot. But I
want to first start off with a question that gets
to the heart of the matter. Okay, Christy, why would
you educate a murderer?
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Because I think everyone's life is valuable. I think God
can redeem a life, he can redeem brokenness, and he
can redeem our mistakes.
Speaker 5 (04:28):
And you know a little something about that.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
Too, yes, personally.
Speaker 6 (04:33):
Well, maybe we'll get to that in a minute. You're
actually a Memphis girl, so you you were sharing that
it's been quite a reflective time being back here for
a day, and feel free to share anything about that.
But what was your child like here at Memphis? How
has that impact of your life?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Yeah? So being from Memphis, I just I feel rooted,
I feel connected here. It goes deep and I just
love it.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
You know.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
I always say, you know, Memphis the home of rock
and roll, blues and barbecue.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I mean, what else do you need?
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Right? And so my childhood here, I mean there was
some verbal abuse and some physical abuse growing up and
it impacted me in a way that caused some father
wounds for me. And then especially when I was in
high school and we moved from Memphis and had to
move to Oklahoma City, that really impacted me because I
(05:24):
felt safe secure and at home here in Memphis.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
Yeah, we were talking on the car and the way
over that. You know, if you've gone through some kind
of trauma like that of abuse, and at least I
think you had, you have the stabilization of your grandparents
and some of those relationships and a stable environment that
you knew. But after going through trauma like that and
then having the quarter ripped out and going to another
environment just must make it a lot worse.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
Yes, it was. I mean it was hard.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
You know. I was about to graduate with everyone i'd
gone to elementary school with, and you know, that was
that was my stability. And so to move, you know,
eight hours away to unknown land, you know, and just
a different culture altogether, that was really hard. And so
you know, I just didn't want to connect with anyone,
and and it had some effects even to this day.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
You know, in my adulthood, you.
Speaker 5 (06:15):
Said you became a little bit of a rebel me
and the.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Lot of a rebel. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 6 (06:21):
When you died your hair, I assume that's your hair
has died. That's not natural.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Oh, I know. I actually am a redhead.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Both my grandmothers were red haired, and I just I
was platinum blonde. I was rebellious. You know, I wasn't
going to eat. I was a fighter. I started smoking
and drinking and doing lots of stuff that you know
that people experiment with different things.
Speaker 6 (06:42):
But and yeah, you figured out how to be a
successful salon owner. It sounded like, I mean, take us
to what that was like and then this hole in
your heart that I think you still felt.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Yeah, so to be a salon owner.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Well, you know, I finally made it through high school
and all my rebellion and went to cosmetology.
Speaker 5 (07:00):
You finally, how many years wou'd taken care?
Speaker 2 (07:01):
No?
Speaker 1 (07:02):
No, no, just after we moved to after we moved
to Oklahoma City, there was just still a longing to,
you know, want to be accepted or belong and out
there over there in Oklahoma City. And I just didn't
feel that way. So thankfully, being the oldest daughter and
oldest child, I just have an entrepreneurial heart and a
(07:23):
business mind, and so I just started going to work
after cosmetology school, owned a salon, and you know, just
started building my life on what I wanted it to
look like.
Speaker 6 (07:33):
And if you don't mind talking about, like how many
other people were working in the salon or how are
you guys doing revenue?
Speaker 4 (07:38):
Whise?
Speaker 5 (07:38):
Like, what was your life like before it came crashing down?
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Well, I had a salon with fifteen employees in it,
and really, yeah, and really it was. It was pretty
easy because we do a booth rent situation where they
just sublet their space from me, and I was I
was making quite a bit of money, that's for sure.
And so you know, just having fifteen people paying rent
for hundred and fifty dollars a month times fifteen, you
(08:02):
can do the math on that.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
It was. It was pretty good. And then I, you know,
got married and then was a mom and.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
I've been in this industry for some decades now, a
lot of decades.
Speaker 6 (08:14):
Yeah, yeah, So what felt off to you in that moment?
Despite the a common story, despite the financial success, it
did not solve all the world's problems.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
It did not solve all the problems. You know, when
I did not grow up in church at all. We
didn't go to church while we lived here, and then
when I moved to Oklahoma City, we still didn't go
to church. And so funny, funny thing, I worked in
a Christian salon before I owned my own.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
And it was before Christians.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
Well we have Christian schools now.
Speaker 5 (08:43):
So, but it was did they only take Christian customers?
Speaker 1 (08:47):
But they played all Christian music and Bible studies.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yes, yes, and I was not. I was not any
of that.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
And I was, yeah, I'm sure that the Holy Spirit
said love, We're going to get her.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
They're trying to save you, that's you know.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
No, they were very sweet about it.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
I actually was a party girl, so I would come
in with the hangover and they were having Bible study
in the back, and all I wanted was coffee and
they were like, hey, good morning, can we pray for you?
I was like, nope, I don't want any of that.
And I just didn't know, you know, And so they
were so loving to me. They never said you're going
to go to Hell on a slipping slide because of
you know, your behavior. They just loved me, you know,
(09:28):
and that resonated with me, and it really, I don't know,
it helped me to begin my relationship with God. And
it was on August eighteenth. I was at lunch, driving
around and doing the Foxhole prayer that says, God, if
you're really real, you know, help me, because I just
felt so lost I just did not have a connection.
(09:49):
And so I got saved and baptized on my lunch
break and drove back to that Christian salon like soaking
wet and ready to do a perm that day. You
were crying no, because I got baptized, the whole body done,
and that was it, you know. And so that started
my life, as you know, as a believer, and you know,
(10:09):
had some ups and downs along the way for sure.
Speaker 6 (10:12):
But yeah, yeah, just because you believe doesn't take away
all the problems.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
That's one hundred percent true. That really is true at least.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
If not, you've not fully surrendered yet at this point.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
Well, and again, you know, if you have never been
to church or never read the Bible, like what does
that look like? How do you even know where to begin?
Speaker 2 (10:30):
You know? So who do you ask? What do you do?
Speaker 1 (10:33):
And I think about that too. We walk, we walk
past people all day long. How many people are lost
or don't feel connected but don't know how to get
to a relationship with God or get you know, restoration
with family or if you don't know.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
How do you what do you do? How do you
go about that?
Speaker 6 (10:49):
So you have a successful business, you came to faith
and yet still there's a hole in your heart. What
did you feel inside of you? And then what did
you do to try to that whole?
Speaker 1 (11:01):
I just I think I've always just felt like an outsider.
I think part of it being redheaded. Kids are mean
and brutal, you know, when you're red headed and you're
one of the few. And just always felt like I
was kind of an outcast. And so then moving to
Oklahoma from here that felt I felt like an outcast.
I didn't feel like I fit in and trying to
(11:23):
find your place, and so as an oldest child or
you know, I've lost my grandmother, one of my grandmothers
when I was young, so not having that relationship, having
some significant dad wounds in my life. Like you just
like you're just trying to make it. You're just trying
to have some sense of normalcy. But what is normal?
(11:43):
You know what is normal? It's it's everybody's own definition.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
I think.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
So, yeah, I tried the best I could with, you know,
with what I had.
Speaker 6 (11:53):
Even something that many Memphians would see as normal. You're
talking about on the drive here that you grew up here,
and yet you're never too the peabody to see the ducks.
A lot of people here are like, yeah, that would
feel normal. But even we've interviewed people guess on the podcasts,
and I'm sure it's the same in Oklahoma City too,
that a lot of people, even in inner city neighborhood
have not gone five miles to downtown to Chicago to
(12:15):
see the lake, right.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
And so.
Speaker 6 (12:18):
Yeah, obviously your normal was different from a lot of people.
So I think you try to fill that hole with
was it drugs?
Speaker 4 (12:24):
Alcohol?
Speaker 5 (12:25):
What did you use to drugs?
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Alcohol? Promiscuity?
Speaker 1 (12:29):
Just you know, I love to travel, so I feel
like sometimes that's an escape for me and just trying
to fill it, you know, trying to fill it in relationships.
And then you know, if you have father wounds.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
You know, what does that look like?
Speaker 1 (12:43):
You're trying to just have a normal conversation with a man,
you know. So it was really trying to navigate some
difficult pathways and I'm pretty stubborn, so I didn't ask
for help, you know in that. So I think, you know,
just trying to find who I really am. And sometimes
(13:05):
I think many of us in life, even up to
our thirties, maybe sometimes even forties, like what's my purpose?
Surely I'm not here just taking up space on this planet,
like there's something more. And I felt like I was
always made for something more, to do something more or bigger,
and I just didn't know what that was until even.
Speaker 6 (13:25):
A lot of people would feel, hey, you got a
successful business. I think you're had a husband and kids
at that point, like yeah, they would feel like that's
your purpose.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Yeah, no, yes, many people would feel that way.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
But I'm very driven.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
I don't usually take no for an answer very often.
I'm an innovative thinker. I'm a problem solver. So if
really it boils down to this, if you see a need,
you had been called. So in certain areas of my life,
I just had this innate need to want to help people,
and I wanted to maybe because I needed help or
(14:02):
I needed rescuing, and so I kind of want to
do the same kind of have the moniker of the
Mama Bear, you know, in Oklahoma City with many of
the ladies that I work with. So women are funny,
like we don't sometimes we don't like men after my man,
my money, my whatever. But it was our own insecurities
in ourselves, you know. So in what I do now,
(14:24):
we just helped fortify a sisterhood that elevates women to
be able to embrace everybody.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
And now a few messages from our general sponsors. But first,
we've launched our first sex local service clubs around the
country and a time when only thirty three percent of
Americans are contributing in their community at the level that
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(14:57):
in my hometown Memphis, alex is hometown Oxford, then Wichita, Atlanta,
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If you live in one of these areas, visit the
service club section of our site normal Folks dot us
(15:18):
and get plugged in. And if you don't live there
and you want a service club in your area, email
Alex Because these are the first six. These are the pilots,
but we're going to be doing more like other Army
members that are launching clubs in their communities later this year,
including San Antonio, Lincoln, Nebraska, Huntsville, Alabama, Lincoln County, Ohio,
(15:44):
Lorraine County, Ohio. If you happen to live in one
of these following areas and are interested, email Alex at
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connected to them. This is going to be fun. We'll
be right back.
Speaker 6 (16:13):
So you did find your purpose in a way that
maybe wasn't ideal, but often is the way that people
find their purpose.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
That's right.
Speaker 5 (16:21):
Maybe a little bit more dramatic than most people, though,
that's true.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
And because I feel like, you know, the rebel or
the stubbornness that I that I have, I think it
had to come in in a very firm direct way
that I wasn't anticipating, and it actually came through being incarcerated.
That's where I found my purpose.
Speaker 5 (16:43):
Can you tell us the whole story.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
So I was involved in an accident and I struck
a command that was standing on the side of the road.
I didn't see him there, and I was.
Speaker 5 (16:56):
Remixing narcotics and alcohol was that they.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
And I was leaving a funeral. I was at a
friend of mine's mom's funeral. And so you leave a
funeral and you create one. I mean, that's that's devastating.
And so I did have prescription medication. I was I
had depression.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
I had.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
You know, uppers down or they were all prescribed. None illegal,
lifted drugs or anything like that. That's how I justified it. Actually,
my doctor prescribed everything for me, and so you know,
you multitask, you know, texting and driving and just being
you know, making some grave, grave mistakes. And I struck
(17:45):
him as he was on the side of the road
and I hadn't even seen him there, yea. And the
sun was setting. It blocked part of the road, it
was darkened, and you know, I could go on and on,
but the truth is is that it was my fault.
It was my mistake. And so that sentence carries four
(18:09):
years to life in Oklahoma. And I was very grateful
to have family support during that time. And I ended
up with a five year sentence and I served four years,
four months, four weeks in one day. And it's shameful,
and I ask God sometimes, how is this part of
(18:30):
my story?
Speaker 4 (18:30):
How?
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Why is this part of my story?
Speaker 1 (18:33):
I still wrestle with the shame and the guilt from that,
And so I was determined to do my life differently,
and I wanted it to count and I wanted to
make a difference. And you know, there's no do over.
You can't make up for that, you can never apologize
(18:53):
enough or repent enough.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
It's just.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
I just knew with all certainty, everything in me that
I wanted to do something different in honor of my victim,
to say it in that regard of him and his
family and whatever else. It was total surrendered whatever God
wanted to do at that point. And so I worked
in a beauty shop at the prison and the law library.
(19:19):
So I have a great idea about the Department of Correction,
their operations, procedures, and postconviction relief.
Speaker 5 (19:27):
Maybe before we go, there's.
Speaker 6 (19:31):
Your victim's family seems to have an interesting part in
this story because four years to life is a huge range,
and even though it's accidental, I was still surprised when
you told me that it was, you know, I think
around four and a half years that you ended up doing. Yeah,
you know, And it sounds like they played a pretty
(19:51):
graceful an amazing role in it, if you could talk
about that.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
Well, to not know everything that they were feeling other
than and significant loss and I'm sure anger the family
had to say in the plea agreement, in the you know,
the court hearings and everything, and they knew I had
(20:17):
a thirteen year old daughter at the time, and a
three year old daughter, and they agreed to a lesser
time frame and that was part of the plea agreement
instead of taking it to jury trial.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
There was nothing to debate.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
I mean, there was nothing, no reason to go to
jury trial, and so they were gracious enough to I
don't want to say agree, because I don't want to
speak for them, but it happened in the way that
they had to say in the time that I had
to be incarcerated, and it was less than should have
(20:56):
been probably or less than the mac some sentence.
Speaker 6 (21:02):
Have you heard anything like how often does that happen?
Percentage wise? It probably feels pretty rare to me that
maybe five or ten percent of families would respond with
that much forgiveness in the moment.
Speaker 5 (21:13):
It's one thing.
Speaker 6 (21:13):
Maybe one year later, five years later, it's ten years
later as you're wrestling with it as a family. But
for them to respond that way immediately, it is pretty heroic.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
It is. And you know, I.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Pray that I don't want to say there's restorations one day.
I do pray that if they keep up with anything
I do, that they might see that lives are changed
in this tragedy. And that's what I can hope for.
You know, I don't expect there'd be some grandiose meeting
(21:52):
or something like that that would be wonderful, but I
don't need that. Whatever they ever would want to do,
I would be I would be open to that or
welcome to that. But I just have to keep going.
I have to keep going at the momentum that I'm
at because lives depend on it, and it's it's my
(22:15):
need or my want to help people or to make
my life make sense. After that, that's pretty hard to
have on your resume, on your life resume. It's not
anything I would have ever imagined.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
You know.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
I love people. I don't even like it hurting someone's feelings.
So to have that as part of my story, you know,
and I'm not the only one. So there are other
women even in my class that have anywhere from ten
years to life.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
And so how do you reckon that?
Speaker 1 (22:49):
You know, when someone has life and you say I
had five years and I understand what you're going through,
or you know they're in the very class and one
has life and one has eight why, you know, And
it's just the way that the sentencing guidelines are in
Oklahoma that a judge has the liberty to say you
get this and you get that, so there's nothing very
(23:11):
streamline about it.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
That's why the vast range is what it is.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Well, I really appreciate you sharing all that.
Speaker 6 (23:19):
I know it's really hard and not that what I
went through is the same thing. But unfortunately my ex
wife wanted a divorce and our listeners have heard me
talk about this.
Speaker 5 (23:31):
But yeah, I know.
Speaker 6 (23:33):
I mean, as a strong Catholic invented all my life
I single, I used to go to daily Mass like
I was, you know, been super into it and never
imagine that this would be my story, you know, as
you never imagine this would be never your story, and
it's it is hard to wrestle with and but I
do appreciate you sharing it. I was, if you've heard
I'm a big fan of Ddrich Bonhoeffer. Yes I'm basically paraphered.
Speaker 4 (23:54):
If the thing is lying.
Speaker 6 (23:55):
But he has this line that the problem with Christians
that there lonely in their sins, yes or their problem
and whereas the centers at the bar have so much
more fellowship with each other because they share everything. Right,
So I think it's really important for all of us
to share our trials that are going through because people
can learn from it, it also helps them feel us alone. Altherwise,
people just feel like I'm the only one going through this,
and the reality is we all are all carrying some
(24:17):
kind of cross.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Up the right and I did feel like I was
the only one. And it's the shame I think that
I carry with that. It's unimaginable. It's not something I
ever would have imagined for my life, you know. But
I do get the opportunity on occasion to share my
testimony and it's all that we're doing today basically in
(24:38):
a fifteen minute nutshell, you know, if you will, and
I get to share it with thousands and thousands of
people to say, this is part of my story, and
that portion of my life is the hardest portion that
I've had to go through because of the burden, the
weight and the burden that I bear from that.
Speaker 5 (24:58):
Yeah, well, it's a gift to the world.
Speaker 6 (25:00):
You're willing to tell it and tell it over again
because that's hard, and we're.
Speaker 5 (25:05):
Going to get to the amazing work that you're doing.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
At a minute.
Speaker 6 (25:08):
If you mentioned the shame, I was going to plan
on talking about this closer to the end. But you
have an interesting line that like a lot of people
think about stigma and we need to get rid of
the stigma or the shame. Yeah, and you kind of
flip that on its head in an interesting way.
Speaker 5 (25:24):
Can you talk about.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
That well, to bear the shame and the guilt.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
It's not anything I ever wanted to have on my
personal life's resume.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
And in that, I.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Mean I wear that, I carry it. I think about
it every single day, I really every single day. I
know the anniversary date, I know how many years, I
know all those things.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
I know the man's name.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
I mean, it's very personal to me, and there's an
element about it that keeps me humbled. It keeps me grateful,
It keeps me moving forward. It keeps the momentum in
me to want to help other people and see restoration
for them or their families. I'm at sobriety and it
(26:07):
is very important to me, and I preach about that,
you know, to my family members or friends or you know,
about drinking and driving and and being mindful, you know.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
So I use it.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
I speak at the prisons, and that is it's I mean,
you can't have a testimony unless you've been through a
test right, And you can't have a message unless you've
been through a mess, and both of those have been mine.
So if I share it, then hopefully, even if it's
one person, and it changes them or helps them or
encourages them, then that one, that one person is who
(26:39):
it was for hopefully.
Speaker 4 (26:41):
More we'll be right back.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
I'm sure it's many more. Just given the number of
people in your program.
Speaker 6 (27:01):
You taught it to them, then at least I think
you've packed it one hundred and eighty people from the
number I've heard, but I think it's probably far beyond that.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
It is it is now.
Speaker 5 (27:09):
Yes, I love your point. I'm just going to state
it too, that.
Speaker 6 (27:15):
The shame or the sigma shouldn't go away because something
did happen.
Speaker 5 (27:20):
And similarly, one of our guests who lost a.
Speaker 6 (27:23):
Child through a choking accident said like, I don't want
it at the hurt to ever go away. And a
lot of people think you want it to go away,
but she's like, if it goes it fully goes away.
I'm not remembering my child and I always want to
feel my child close to my heart.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
That's exactly right.
Speaker 6 (27:39):
So you get to prison, what's day one, Like, what's
going through your head.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
I mean, you know, never really been in any law enforcement
trouble before or anything like that. And so to be shackled,
you know with and again it's minimal compared to what
the other family went through. So I'm not whining and complaining.
I'm just describing. I just want to make that clear.
(28:09):
But to be shackled, and you have the black box
and the belly chains, and you know, you have the
your you're a number. Now you're a last name and
a number, and you're wearing the same thing as everybody else.
Your identity is gone. You're you know, you look like
everyone else.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
And so there again your status is a business owner.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
It's gone.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
And uh, you know, I served divorce papers shortly after
I got to prison, and I'm a vegan, and so
you're at the time I was a vegetarian. How do
you go to prison be a vegetarian when everybody eats bologny,
you know, bologney sandwiches.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
And so you have to learn yourself.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
You have to adapt to these situations, you know, and
you have to say, okay, how do I survive this?
And I think about Victor Frunkel, you know, not to
liken it to a concentration camp. Please hear me on that.
My heart is for you know, the people that had
to endure the Holocaust. All I mean is you're away
(29:12):
from your family, You're having to adapt to new surroundings
and things you're not familiar with. And so I was
able to read that book Man Search for Significance while
I was there, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book, and I spent
a lot of time reading, and I found out about myself.
You know that I'm a survivor and you can keep going.
(29:32):
And it was terrifying. It was terrifying. I lost my husband,
my house, my business, my children we had. I was
indigent and so that means, you know, you have no
outside help, no outside financing coming in on your books,
(29:53):
and except for your gang pay or state pay, which
was the equivalent of about ten dollars a month. And
so God used that for me to help budget my nonprofit. Now,
so I can budget that nonprofit pretty well and make
it work. But it's like, Okay, I was starting to
find out who I am, But now who am I?
(30:13):
Who am I all over again? And so the beautiful
thing is God turns beauty. He makes beauty out of ashes,
and so that's what he did while I was here.
Speaker 6 (30:22):
I've heard you talk about that you did surrender to
God in prison, but that didn't necessarily change everything for you.
That you still felt a loss, which is I found
interesting is when most people talk about surrendering the idea
as well, you have this incredible piece and your life
is radically transformed. And I think that's probably true for
(30:43):
a lot of people. So I thought talked to how
you did not feel that way.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Yeah, No, mine was probably gradually because I think I
stated it right now just a few minutes ago, that
I am stubborn. I'm very much driven in whatever I do.
Somehow I think I'm the manager of everything. And it's
really laying it down. It's really surrendering saying God, I
(31:06):
won't pick it back up again. You have it because
I don't know what to do. Clearly, I've made a
mess of everything. So you teach me now. And so
that's that's what that that's what that looks like to me,
to literally lay it down and say your way, not
my way.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
And I when I interview my.
Speaker 1 (31:24):
New students, I asked them that I asked them one thing,
I say, are you teachable?
Speaker 2 (31:28):
And I think for me it was that.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
And I really don't take mostly direction from you know,
just from anybody. I'm pretty particular. But I needed to
take direction from the Lord. And he's the one that said,
you know, walk this way, here's the way, walk in
it left right, here we go, and.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
And that was it.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
It was just me surrendering to whatever he wanted to do.
And you know, there was a lot of blood, sweat, tears, crying,
a lot of anguish, a lot of loss. And I
liken it to a pruning season, but I'm reminded that
there's a beginning and and end to the pruning season.
You just moved to another prunting season. And so there
was a lot of old me that needed to go,
(32:12):
like where he says, you know, if there's anything in me,
you know that you don't like, Lord, lay it on
the altar and burn it up, you know, put me
on the Potter's wheel.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
You do what you need to do in my life.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
And so it's that that was hard to surrender that
because I had to surrender loss and brokenness from my childhood.
Some family members wrote me off, cut me off, and
then getting served divorce papers while you're in prison, and
it's like you come to the end of yourself, and
just when you think you come to the end of yourself,
you have not There's still more ending. So it's that
(32:47):
when I couldn't rely on all the money that I
made because it wasn't there anymore. I couldn't rely on
family members always bringing my children to see me because
sometimes they weren't. I couldn't rely on a husband, and
all I had was like you know when God said,
he talks about it in Isaiah fifty four, he says,
I will be your husband, And so that's kind of
(33:08):
what I had to take his lead. He showed me
what a father's love was, which I was not familiar with.
He showed me what surrender was, being obedient and humble
and you take your eyes off yourself. There's a big
world out there that needs help. And so I feel
like he called me to go to the next step.
Speaker 6 (33:30):
Surrendering, to the point where you say, you're not even
asking God to get me the hell out of here,
like a lot of her.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Well, that's interesting, right, And I did, and I had
a year review. Actually, so after I was there a year,
I still had not surrendered. So in that year I
had one year to go back to court, and they
were the judge was going to say, well, you know,
well done, good and faithful servant, go home early or not.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
And so I.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Thought, if you get a year review, that's a that's
a shoe, and I'm going home. So I took all
these Bible studies and did all this. I had one
hundred certificates and I went back to court and the
judge said on record, he said it was an unfortunate accident,
but no, you got to go back and finish this time.
And I was gutted, and I thought I did all
this work, so it was performance based. It wasn't a
(34:18):
true surrender. So at that point, like I didn't want
to live. I was like, I'm done. What else is there?
The four years left seems like a lifetime. You know,
who couldn't wait on your wife for four years, or
who couldn't wait on a family member for four years?
It might feel like a lifetime. But anyway, it didn't
(34:38):
work out that way, so I had to go back
and that's when it happened. I was like, I have
nothing else. I barely even have hope, but I'm writing
this thing out with you God, so let's go. And
it was that when I began working in the beauty
shop and the law library and everything at that point.
Speaker 5 (34:53):
So all right, let's get into the fun stuff. Take
us there.
Speaker 6 (34:56):
I didn't even think ever before in my whole life
that there was a beauty shop in Britain. I know,
it makes sense, yeah, it just never. It's probably never
cross most people's minds.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
No Orange, just New Black.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
I don't know if they show the beauty shop in there,
but you know, there's a barbershop in a beauty shop,
and especially in Oklahoma, it's kind of part of the
operation procedure. You have to have a means to be
able to have some grooming, and so there was that,
and sometimes it's a little makeshift closet and anyway, so
I worked in the beauty shop, and i'd been a
salon owner, so they kind of let me be a
(35:27):
little bit of a super have a supervisory position. So
the girls that didn't want to work in the kitchen,
that could braid hair thought that they were, you know,
due to work in the beauty shop. So they would
come and do interviews and I'd ask them to do
a haircut, and they're terrible and I said, I thought
you went to beauty school and they said I didn't
get finished. And I kept hearing that over and over.
(35:47):
I didn't finish. I didn't finish.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
And I said, if you.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Do anything, what would you do. I said, I would
finish beauty school. M So, one day I was doing
a shampoo and I always say I met God at
the shampoo bowl. I fell like he spoke to my
heart and said, one day you're going to come back
and start a school. And I said, it says inmate
on the back of my shirt.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Are you kidding me?
Speaker 1 (36:08):
And I really felt that way, and no, it's I
just pursued it. I knew he said it. I could
count on him to be faithful and truthful with me,
and I couldn't see it any other way. So I
began speaking speaking to other people about it and talking
about it to the case managers and they're like, okay,
crazy lady, Sure that's never happened before. And I just
(36:31):
kept saying, one of these days, hey, when I come back,
that's what I'm going to do when I come back.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
And they said, okay, okay, sure.
Speaker 6 (36:38):
I think they've heard that kind of crazy stuff from
a lot of pony for sure.
Speaker 1 (36:41):
I wanted to call it color corrections, and I didn't.
They didn't think that was funny, you know.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (36:45):
And I worked in the law library as well, and
I helped the ladies with their year review or their
you know, all their paperwork to go back to court.
So I learned a lot about the court system and
justice impacted individuals, and the ops for Department of Corrections,
which I use every day now, the tool cage and
what that looks like, and the log books and all
(37:07):
the things that are necessary. I didn't know it at
the time, and yeah, so I just began talking about it, saying,
matter of factly, this is what God said, and this
is what I'm going to do. And I had one beautiful,
wonderful lady, doctor Pittman, and she was up top worked
in administration, very close to the director, and I would
(37:30):
see her occasionally. They moved me to another facility, I
would see her. I said, hey, to remember me, I'm
coming back to start a school.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
She's like, okay, yeah, I do. I do.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
And then she said, okay, fine, come and see me
when you get out.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
The next day.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
When I got out, I went to see her and
she said, oh, my gosh, you're not kidding, I said.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
So, when are we going to do this?
Speaker 1 (37:48):
So it went on a couple more years, and I
just kept saying I opened up a bank account by faith.
I went to Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California and said,
in front of four thousand people.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
I've started a beauty school.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
And I didn't have a dollar to my name or
a bank account at the time. And I was just like,
I said, boy Lord, you really better come through on this.
Speaker 3 (38:10):
And that concludes Part one of our conversation with Christy Luther,
and you don't want to miss part two that's now
available to listen to. Together, guys, we can change this country,
and it starts with you.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
I'll see in part two.
Host
Bill Courtney
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Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by Audiochuck Media Company.
Betrayal Season 5
Saskia Inwood woke up one morning, knowing her life would never be the same. The night before, she learned the unimaginable – that the husband she knew in the light of day was a different person after dark. This season unpacks Saskia’s discovery of her husband’s secret life and her fight to bring him to justice. Along the way, we expose a crime that is just coming to light. This is also a story about the myth of the “perfect victim:” who gets believed, who gets doubted, and why. We follow Saskia as she works to reclaim her body, her voice, and her life. If you would like to reach out to the Betrayal Team, email us at betrayalpod@gmail.com. Follow us on Instagram @betrayalpod and @glasspodcasts. Please join our Substack for additional exclusive content, curated book recommendations, and community discussions. Sign up FREE by clicking this link Beyond Betrayal Substack. Join our community dedicated to truth, resilience, and healing. Your voice matters! Be a part of our Betrayal journey on Substack.