July 13, 2023 • 63 mins
On this episode of Amplified Voices, Amber and Jason speak with C, a woman who has lived through the unimaginable - losing her mother at a young age, getting thrust into the foster system, and grappling with overdiagnosis and overmedication, displacement, and disconnection. We learn about her journey, from her challenging upbringing to her involvement in the sex trade and her initial encounters with the criminal legal system as a young, transgender woman.
C talks about the labels society imposes, and the struggles of being over-stigmatized within an oppressive system. We listen to C's experiences in a men's prison facility, the threats she faced, as well as her fight for proper healthcare. Strikingly, C shares about obtaining academic success amidst this turbulence- reminding us of the strength of the human spirit, and the power of belief and investment.
Finally, we dive into the world of policy sentencing, its implications on individuals like C, and the immense courage it takes to stand against the system. This episode is more than a story; it's a call to thought, a plea for understanding, and a catalyst for change.
She has written for Filter Magazine, Shadowproof, the Appeal, Yes! Magazine and maintains an active presence on Twitter.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Intro (00:00):
Everyone has a voice, a story to tell.
Some are marginalized and muted.
What if there were a way toamplify those stories, to have
conversations with real peoplein real communities, a way to
help them step into the power oftheir lived experience?
Welcome to Amplified Voices, apodcast lifting the experiences
(00:23):
of people and families impactedby the criminal legal system.
Together, we can createpositive change for everyone.
Jason (00:34):
Hello and welcome to another episode of Amplified
Voices.
I'm your host, Jason, here withmy co-host, Amber.
Hello, Amber.
Amber (00:40):
Good morning Jason.
Jason (00:42):
And today, Amber, we have a guest.
Her name is C.
Hello, C.
C (00:47):
Hi there y'all, how y'all doing.
Jason (00:49):
Doing great.
So we're going to ask you thesame question that we've been
asking all our guests, and thatis could you tell us a little
bit about your life before youentered the criminal legal
system and what brought you intoit?
C (01:03):
Wow.
So my life before the criminaljustice system was actually one
that was really fraught withtrauma and just a really trying
life.
From a very young age I watchedmy mother get murdered as a
child about age six.
Jason (01:16):
Oh wow, when did you grow up?
C (01:18):
I was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but I was raised
in and around Maryland.
Jason (01:23):
OK, Six.
So what happened?
C (01:27):
My mother was in a relationship and she was
murdered by him in 1996.
My mom was the type of womanthat was kind of a back sheep of
her family and she was kind ofjust trying to forge her own
path.
Yeah, so when my mom died Iwent into the foster care system
and I spent pretty much theentirety of my youth in
therapeutic environments or onetype of institutional setting or
(01:50):
a foster home.
I've been into a bunch of them.
Jason (01:54):
Were you an only child.
C (01:56):
I actually have a half sister , but we were not raised
together.
We don't actually have nevermet in person since we were very
small children.
Jason (02:04):
Wow, so six years old, your mother's murdered, which,
at six years old, you can't evenprocess that the permanent
concept of death is challenging,and then you're in this foster
system.
That must have been horrible.
C (02:23):
It was extremely terrible.
It was really tough.
I didn't have any type of senseof identity or connectivity
there was.
Most children grow up in homesthat are able to provide,
hopefully, structure, a sense ofidentity and continuity with
what has come before and whatyou were going to contribute to
not just the legacy of yourfamily, but what you're going to
(02:44):
do with your life in society.
I never had any of that.
There was always.
My whole life was an experienceof disconnection and
dislocation.
So when I hear people talkabout buzzwords like
marginalization ordisenfranchisement, I'm like
that's me, that's my picture.
Amber (03:02):
Right, I'm so sorry.
That was sort of the beginning,and when you think about what
that looked like for you interms of a journey, did you find
that there were little rays oflight here and there with people
that you encountered?
Or tell us a little bit aboutwhat that looked like?
C (03:24):
I guess that there was.
But the really sad thing aboutmy childhood is I was on and
this is not, this is prettycommon knowledge the foster care
system and those who are inclinical psychiatry and child
psychiatry what not.
They tend to overdiagnose thesechildren that often have
traumatic backgrounds.
(03:45):
So large swaths of my childhoodand even my younger portion of
adolescence are very opaque tome.
They're really unrecollectablebecause I was so heavily
medicated.
They diagnosed me with all ofthis stuff when what I was I was
a kid that had seen theirmother be murdered and I had
experienced sexual abuse andphysical abuse and things like
(04:07):
that.
So it wasn't that I had all ofthese developmental or
psychological axes, it was thatI needed a safe place to try to
bounce back from something thatno child should ever have to go
through.
Amber (04:23):
Exactly, you were a normal child having normal
reactions to very traumaticsituations.
Jason (04:30):
And you never had that safe place is what you're saying
.
C (04:34):
No, I never have, not once in my life.
The crazy thing about it is theamount of time that I have
spent in institutional settingsactually has drastically been
greater than the amount of timethat I've spent out of
institutional settings.
My life has, truly it's beenshaped by one aspect of the
(04:57):
system or another.
I've never, I've never, knownthat.
Jason (05:03):
So how do you get from six years old and then entering
this foster system, to where youare now?
What comes next?
C (05:13):
OK.
So I guess from about that ageuntil about 15 was a very
unstable period for me.
I jumped around a lot, I was ina lot of different homes, I
went to a bunch of differentschools and one of the things
that breaks my heart when I lookback is I graduated from high
school year early, but it was asympathy graduation and I
graduated with a 1.54 GPA, whichmeans that I was.
(05:36):
I look back and I feel reallyterrible for the person that I
was and I feel really bad forkids that are in similar
positions, because I alwaysloved school and I always
learned to learn.
I loved learning but I foundmyself struggling for any type
of stability whatsoever.
So at a very young age I startedkind of getting high and I
found myself involved in the sextrade at 14.
(05:59):
I was running away and I waskind of surviving on my own.
I just wanted to be away fromthese people.
I wanted to get away from allof the sexual abuse and physical
abuse that I had experiencedbetween my childhood up until
that point and there was kind ofa desire to autonomize my
sexuality.
I grew up with a verytransactionally related life and
(06:23):
I realized that there was goingto be a kind of commerce or
exchange for these things.
I wanted to control them and Iwanted them on my own terms.
But I also had a dream that Iwould turn enough tricks to get
money where I could go, movesomewhere and start over.
Nobody would know me and I havea clean start.
Jason (06:42):
And it's interesting you use the word control, because I
was thinking that, as you weretalking, that you had no control
over your environment or whatyou were living during those
years.
So for you to feel that you hadsome sort of control of what
was happening to you and yourown life and doing things on
your terms must have been veryvaluable to you at that point.
C (07:03):
It was.
I really wanted to get away.
I had this idea that I wasgoing to.
I knew that I was never goingto ever find perfect parents.
I felt like it was too late.
So in my mind I had thisfantasy that I would tell myself
that I would get enough moneythat I would be able to move
away and start over, and I wouldmeet this incredible guy and
all my problems would be fixed.
And he would, you know, doesthat kind of story.
Amber (07:26):
So you had.
You had a lot of dreams thateveryone has.
You were looking for a lifethat made you happy and autonomy
over your body, yoursurroundings.
Like this is what like everyhuman person wants.
Would you, would you agree withthat?
C (07:45):
Yeah, 1000%, absolutely.
I wanted to feel like I wasimportant and I wanted to feel
like I had a place and I wantedto feel safe.
Most importantly.
I think that anybody that knowsme and my personal life will
tell you that, like my kind ofcatchphrase is when, like I talk
about my plans for the futuresof the free assets security,
stability, safety.
Jason (08:04):
So did you ever get there ?
C (08:07):
I'm still working on it.
Jason (08:08):
Still on the journey.
Still working on it All right,so then what happens?
C (08:13):
So, at about 17 years old, I'm working at a job at Towson
Mall in Towson, maryland.
I'm in this independent livingprogram where you have to either
work full time or work parttime.
You have to be doing something,go to school, work, whatever.
So I meet these two girls, onefrom Louisville, kentucky, one
from Panama City of each Florida, and they tell me about this
(08:36):
great job they have.
They get to travel with thewarm weather and they sell
magazines and music and they getto meet people and it sounds
awesome to a 17-year-old thathas really never been anywhere
and these young women are inmany ways what I want to be.
So, like a 17-year-old who'svery impulsive, I go back to my
(08:57):
little independent livingprogram and I pack up a duffel
bag and, without knowing thesepeople, I go jump in a big white
van and I go on the road forseveral months and during this
whole time you know it is alegitimate business and they are
selling magazines and it ismostly like college-age kids,
but it's also like it's kind oflike a sex trade on wheels is
(09:19):
what it is.
Almost everybody is hooking upand posting Craigslist ads and
using MySpace and Facebook.
This is at that juncture wherethere's a transfer going on from
old social media platforms tothe newer ones, and I already
was familiar with that.
So I was like, come on, let'sdo it.
But after a few months it gotfound out that I wasn't 18.
(09:41):
And so the person that ownedthat business he was like well,
I can't keep you here becauseyou're an underage runaway from
your state.
I told him my story.
He's like but I'll send youwherever you want.
Because I told him I was like,if I go back, they're going to
end up hospitalizing me again,because that's what they would
do when you would run awayThey'd hospitalize you.
So I had made a friend on thesales slash prostitution team
(10:04):
who lived in Ellenwood, georgia,and she had gotten fired and
she was like if you ever findyourself wanting for a fresh
start, you can come on down toGeorgia with me.
So that's what I ended up doing.
I was literally on theGreyhound bus.
I was like, hey, girl, how areyou Remember that time?
You told me I could come seeyou in Georgia.
Jason (10:21):
Well, I'm on the way.
C (10:24):
So I found myself down here and it was culture shock.
It was the first time I everhad experienced colorism number
one.
But within a few months I waskind of doing my own thing and
fast forward.
Like a year later I caught myfirst charges and I got charged
with pimping and pandering andsexual exploitation of a minor.
Amber (10:47):
Wow.
So I just sort of heard acouple of things that I wanted
to ask some clarifying questionsabout.
So you referred to experiencingcolor as number one.
Can you explain, for people whomay not know what that means,
what you mean by that?
C (11:04):
Yes.
So colorism is the idea thatinside of the black community
there is kind of racism ordiscrimination from darker skin
people to lighter skin people orfrom lighter skin people to
darker skin people.
I'm Afro Latina, so in a lot ofways I have really curly hair,
(11:25):
but in a lot of ways I'm very,very light skin.
I'm what they call whitepassing sometimes and I had
never experienced colorism upnorth.
I had never been teased for theway I talk.
I had never heard people tellme to stop talking white or stop
trying to act sediti is whatthey call it.
I had never been told.
I had never experienced thatbefore and I had.
(11:48):
I believe I had read about it.
I believe I'd heard about it,but I never realized it was a
real phenomenon that came downsouth and it is definitely real.
Amber (11:57):
Okay, and so you talk about.
You found yourself out of onesituation and you traveled to go
to another situation and atthis point you're still 17 years
old.
Is that right?
C (12:11):
Yeah.
So when I left Maryland I hadjust graduated a handful of
months before.
When I got to Georgia, it wouldhave been probably August or
September, so I would have stillbeen 17.
I would have been almost 18.
Amber (12:23):
Right, and so, again, it sounds like what you were
looking for was were those S'sthat you talked about before?
You're looking for thatstability you?
Know you've been kicked out ofone thing that you know, that
you thought may have been sortof your path out, and then
you're finding yourself in anentirely new place, experiencing
(12:44):
all sorts of different newphenomenon, one of which you
just shared, and so that's wherethe criminal legal system then
comes in.
Tell us a little bit about whatwas that experience you
mentioned?
You know being charged.
C (13:01):
Yeah.
Amber (13:01):
What?
What was that like?
So did you find yourselfimmediately incarcerated?
Was there a period of, you know, being out on bail or staying
in on bail, because it doesn'tsound like you had a lot of
support for somebody to comebail you out or anything like
that?
Let's, let's walk through andunpack that.
Jason (13:21):
And as you're answering that, one thing that's hitting
me is you know you've had youhad all this trauma leading up
to that.
Did this just feel like onemore traumatic event or was it
different at this point, whenyou start getting charged for?
C (13:35):
Well, it was different, but it was.
It was.
It was definitely supertraumatic.
So I should preface and saythat before the pimping and
pandering charges occurred,there was a few months
beforehand, there was anothercharge that occurred into CAB
County from where I and a personwho I was providing sexual
services to.
They tried to take the moneyback from me and I fought them
(13:59):
and we ended up fighting in theparking lot and I had hit them
with a pole and I had actuallygotten charged and I told the
police.
I showed them text messages andeverything.
They actually tried to chargeme with attempted armed robbery
or trying to take my own moneyback from the guy who was trying
to take it from me again.
So that happened.
I went to jail for that and Idid.
(14:20):
I did get bonded out eventuallybut I sat for several months
and a friend of mine pulled afavor with their mom to get me
bonded out.
So you fast forward like a yearlater and I'm living at that
time in Douglas County, georgia,and the house that I live in is
like the house of ultimate illrepute, which I actually believe
(14:43):
is how my public defender atthe time characterized it, but I
lived not that far outside ofAtlanta and I was kind of
getting well known in theAtlanta club scene because I was
an entertainer.
I would entertain up gay barsand I was at parties a lot and I
was just kind of building aname and that social and
cultural demographic, reallytrying to.
I at that time I was trying to.
(15:03):
I was trying to be mainstreamas what I called it like I was
trying to transition into like apublic figure of some sort.
I was trying to monetize mypresence in the community.
So everybody that was kind of apart of my post inner circle,
we were all just living ourlives.
A lot of us were just infranchise or didn't have good
(15:25):
family backgrounds or maybe hadparents that didn't accept us
and most of us were getting highand a lot of us were having
like sugar daddies are turningtricks to get by.
So when they arrested me I didnot think that what I was doing
was wrong.
Like I understood that therewere laws against it, but to me
it was more of kind of like howthe law says Malam, prohibit
(15:45):
them versus Malam and say likethis was something that somebody
was trying to tell me was wrong.
But it wasn't wrong for me todo these things and it was going
to help me survive or get ahead.
So in that context there, whenI was arrested and I was sitting
in this jail and I realizedthat there was nobody that was
going to be able to come alongand save me, because the news
was making me out to be like Iwas, we know, the killer, pimp
(16:08):
or something like that.
You know, and it was.
It was really extremelyfrightening, it was extremely
embarrassing to and it washeartbreaking because I knew
that I wasn't the best person inthe world, but I wasn't the
type of person they were tryingto make me be on the news and
like, one thing about it isthey're a business, so the more
(16:28):
scandalous they can make itsound.
So, even though I was, by thistime when these charges were
going on the news, I was about19.
So instead of saying you knowthat I was 19 and my victim was
17, they would say, oh, atlanta,drag queen, pimps, children.
They knew how to make it moresensational and that was
crushing.
That was, I felt very I want totake my life.
(16:51):
Honestly, it was terrible.
Amber (16:55):
I'm really sorry to hear how those things are
characterized, and one of thethings that we highlight and
we've talked to a lot ofdifferent individuals on the
podcast is sort of the role thatmedia plays in sensationalizing
a lot of different things.
So, on one hand, you know thereis accountability that happens,
(17:19):
and individuals who have, youknow, done things that they're
not proud of in their life areabsolutely happy to take
accountability for wrongdoingthat they've done.
But there's no nuance in theconversations that you can make.
Exactly as you said, it's thatwhole idea of you know how many
clicks can we get?
How salacious can we make thestory?
(17:41):
So you know, while the storycould have or should have been a
young person trying to surviveafter a lifetime of trauma, it's
dragged.
Queen is pimping children andsort of this idea that you know
at 19, you're like fully formed,your impulsivity is gone, all
(18:06):
of those things.
That's another conversationthat you know we really need to
be having in our country aboutlike what we mean when we're
talking about criminalizationand identities and all of that.
So I really appreciate yousharing all of that.
Jason (18:24):
At any point, when you were in the whole foster care
system, did anybody say to youyou know, how do we, how do we
help you, how do we help youheal?
From you know watching yourmother being murdered?
From you know, from all thatyou've been through, did anybody
just say, hey, come over here,we just need to give you a hug
and give you some warmth andcomfort.
(18:44):
Did that ever happen for you?
C (18:47):
At one point I did have one or two decent social workers, so
I don't want to demonize them,but it's important to understand
that when we are answeringquestions like you just asked me
, you have to understand thatthese people are part of a
bureaucracy and they work insideof that system, and the larger
system itself is worth beingvilified, even if that person is
over all, though, my experienceas a youth that was in the
(19:09):
foster care system was that thiswas pretty much your own lot.
You know, whenever I exhibitedwhat I guess you would call
delinquent or or just poorbehavior as a youth, I was given
more medication or I was movedto different facilities that
were like disciplinaryfacilities.
That is not the approach andthe way the system is set up.
(19:31):
Now, as law professor andadvocate, dr Daniel Hatcher from
University of Baltimore LawSchool can tell you, the system
is set up to be predatory onchildren.
They're more concerned withproviding the lowest level of
care they can and then applyingfor title 4D and title 4E funds
from you.
I found out later on that mysurvivors benefits from my
(19:53):
mother's death were subsumed bythe state.
Jason (19:56):
And so I say all this to say that I feel like the state
took many, many things from meand, in return, provided me
almost nothing and the goal wasbasically to break you and to
make you just, you know, just toconform to societal norms,
without giving you any safetynet or any of the tools that
(20:18):
would help you get there.
C (20:19):
So yeah, and when I started talking about being a woman,
that is when they startedmedicating me more.
Jason (20:27):
How about?
So?
How old were you when I started?
C (20:31):
I started the idea without the knowledge of the terms and
the scientific part of thephenomena began to coalesce
around 10 or 11.
But I became very like.
I advocated very strenuously onmy own behalf.
By the time I was like 13 or 14, which seems to be on point for
most teenagers.
You know, with anything, that'swhen they got complicated.
Jason (20:55):
Yes, what year was it the first time you were
incarcerated?
C (21:01):
In the county jail.
It would have been when I hadthat first charge for the.
What would come to the armedrobbery.
That would have been like 2008because, yes, it would have been
like 2008 because the charges.
So I was arrested in 2010 formy pimp and tandoor charges.
That means I would have beenI'm sorry, no, my crime commit
(21:23):
date is 2010, so I would havebeen 19 years old, but they
didn't take me in custody untillike March of the next year, so
I would have been 20 years oldwhen I went into custody.
Amber (21:33):
Right, and so I heard you say something that I think is
really, really important, andthat was the idea of
villainizing systems, whilethere are people who are working
within systems who reallyhonestly feel that they are
making a difference and doingthe right thing.
Because I think we see that ina lot of different systems.
(21:56):
We see that in the criminallegal system, we see that in the
child welfare system, and thenthe other thing that really sort
of triggered for me when youwere talking was this idea of so
many transitions.
So how can you be provided care, right, any sort of sustained
and effective care when you'reencountering so many transitions
(22:18):
?
And my experience I started mycareer working with abused and
neglected children in anonprofit and what I saw was
these transitions are sodetrimental, and not only that,
like things don't go with youRight, like you say that you
have access to records and thisand that, but it's so fragmented
(22:41):
that the only advocate that youhave is yourself, because you
have all the information.
Is that?
Does that feel right?
C (22:49):
Absolutely 1000%.
And what I would add to that isactually the system is so
pernicious and they're sodetermined to cover up any
wrongdoing on their part thatyears Okay.
So during my criminalprosecution process, my public
defender was able to get somerecords from my state foster
(23:10):
care system to show that Iwasn't abused child and my
mother did, and that I wasinvolved in prostitution from a
young age.
She got some of those recordsbut they didn't answer most of
her records request, despite thefact they were my records.
Years later, when I wasincarcerated, I would actually
request and I would offer totender the money for production
and shipping for my own records.
(23:30):
And I got a letter back fromtheir attorney, which I wrote
him an angry letter in responselike well, hold on, when I was a
child that made you weresupposed to be my attorney,
you're supposed to be protectingmy interest.
But I actually got a letterfrom their attorney saying that
I would have to go seek a courtorder for my own records and
since then I've spoken to inanother community who said that
was that was not the correctroute.
They make it very difficult foryou to be able to hold them
(23:55):
responsible and they make itvery difficult for you to be
able to just look back, likefrom where I am now, the type of
perspective and kind ofemotional and intellectual
heights that I've gained sincemy childhood.
I am ready to, and I want to beable to examine my past and to
have things laid bare, because Ineed to have some type of
(24:16):
connectivity and a large portionof my childhood was stolen from
me, so Is it fair to say thatwhen you were nineteen years old
and engaging in sex work andyou were with a seventeen year
old, that you yourself were notoperating at an adult level?
One thousand percent, and that'ssomething that I told the judge
(24:38):
is like, even though and now Isay that I was wrong because she
was seventeen.
But at that time I, even if Iwould have known that she was
seventeen which I did not, evenif I would have I wouldn't have
thought that what I was doingwas was Because look what I was
doing from thirteen, fourteenyears old to me, we were two
people that had similar stories,were trans, because we're both
(25:00):
trans girls.
She had a not understanding,great conservative and abusive
mother, came from kind of a Notlow economic but low middle
economic kind of situation, andwe just had a lot in common.
So it to me, this was somebodythat we had common themes
(25:20):
running through our stories andwe were sisters and kind of this
enterprise, and we were gettinghigh out of our mind and having
a good time to you know.
So, yeah, no, I definitely wasa child and I wish that the
system, I wish that the systemhad the honesty and the desire
to actually treat problemsrather than symptoms, because
(25:43):
then maybe, instead of getting athirty year sentence, maybe I
would have gotten, you know,something more reasonable.
Amber (25:51):
And also had the tools to be in a different place and
space, and all of that in thefirst place, right, yeah, one
thousand.
C (26:00):
Yes.
Jason (26:00):
I mean, yeah, the system created you the way you are and
then took no responsibility andinstead of saying, hey, things
went really off the rails herewe need to help you.
We need to help you live ahealthy life and be who you are
and help you realize who you are, and all of that, they just say
(26:22):
, no, we're going to lock you up, we have to put you away
because and then they start.
Then they start with all thenames you know, like you said in
the media, and they're callingyou a predator and they're
calling you a groomer now andthere, all those types of things
, when you're a person who'sliving your life the way you
know how and just trying tosurvive.
(26:45):
I mean it's not even like I'mtrying to get ahead, you're just
trying to survive.
C (26:50):
I would stress that's actually like one thousand
percent correct, because thereality is and that's why I
wanted to come on this podcastwith you and Amber so badly is
because I, when I pay attentionto the political rhetoric that's
going on right now, I reallysee strands that run back, like
it seems like this kind of antitrans slash, groomer sentiment
(27:10):
has popped up only within thepast few years.
But I really and I know that'sa little bit egocentric kind of,
but I really see strandsrunning back even to the time
period of my Prosecution because, you know, I didn't have a
press secretary and the mediawas at my plea hearing.
I've never seen a publicdefender put together a
PowerPoint presentation todefend a client at a plea
(27:32):
hearing.
I've never seen that.
So my public defender, shereally did fight for me and she,
you know they weren'tinterested in the fact that this
was kind of in many ways, a covictim hood, in the sense that
we were both victims of ourcircumstances in our past and
just the desperation of themoment, you know.
So I really see that there is adesire to To vilify and to
(27:57):
villainize people who are gendernonconforming or who are queer,
or who are of a certain racialbackground etc.
And I can't help but to feellike I can't help but to feel
like my case is handled the wayit was handled because I was
trans and because this otherperson who was a little bit
(28:20):
younger than me Was being trans,because they even tried to say
in the case that I helped thisperson to be trans.
But you can't help somebody tofeel I've never helped a guy
who's not interested in totranslate into, like you can't
make somebody be somethingthey're not.
I don't believe that.
Jason (28:39):
Right, and so when you were incarcerated, were you put,
you were in a, in a men'sfacility.
C (28:46):
Yes, I was incarcerated with men and when I first got locked
up it was it was really bad,because if you were extremely
feminine looking, if you lookedvery passable which I hate that
phrase because it sounds likegatekeeper but they would
actually segregate you'd be on24 seven lockdown, which we now
know is, of course, akin totorture.
So we fought to be able tointegrate into the population,
(29:11):
but that is, of course,presented its own problems
because the prison system lacksboth the integrity and the
infrastructure to actually makesure that they keep Other of you
know, other incarcerated peoplesafe.
So when you have thisparticularly vulnerable segment,
it's not good right.
Jason (29:31):
So did you feel, where did you feel the least safe?
From other folks who wereincarcerated, or from the, from
the officers and the systemitself, I mean?
Or it was just everywhere.
C (29:42):
It was, I would say it was everywhere.
It's like having variousdifferent threats presented to
you.
There's still a threat.
They're still not great, youknow.
It's just they're coming fromdifferent sources.
But overall, if you ask me tochoose who I was treated the
worst by staff or prisoners itwould be a terrible toss up like
(30:03):
I'm not sure who would win that.
Over time, though, I kind ofmanaged to win over a lot of my
fellow prisoners in my state.
I built up a really good namebecause I had one litigation and
I was able to help some peoplewith cases and stuff like that.
So that kind of bought me somewhat you call it street creed
Right system.
Amber (30:23):
But yeah, so I want to, I want to sort of unpack a couple
of things.
So do you feel like you you hadreally talked about sort of
this idea of people are justsort of more realizing words
more prevalent, this languagearound grooming, and you know
(30:43):
the trans population and theLGBTQ population, but that you
saw that in your own case?
Do you think that there is morebrazenness around that in the
current times?
Again, you know people who havebeen following this for a while
and living this.
You know this is their life.
Obviously.
(31:04):
Have you know, seen this sincethe beginning of time, right?
Jason (31:08):
like if.
Amber (31:09):
But it does seem that in the political sphere Right, that
if somebody disagrees withsomebody, they start utilizing
that sort of language toweaponize against an opponent,
really even if the situation hasnothing to do with gender
identity.
C (31:31):
I completely agree.
So, yeah, I see it all the wayback to cases like my own and
other cases of trans people whohave followed, which I'd like to
point out that the number ofpeople charged or convicted who
are trans with charges like myown, is statistically in
substantial.
But I followed the cases ofbiological women who had similar
(31:51):
backgrounds to mine, such asTiffany Simpson from Georgia and
Lisette de Luna from Texas.
These women had backgrounds assex workers from very young ages
, most of the time held in thatfield against their wheel, which
at one point I went throughwith my case.
The person who was charged asmy codifference would actually
(32:13):
beat the shit out of us if wedidn't keep doing what we were
supposed to do, you know.
So I followed their cases and Ican't help but to see some very
stark, striking similarities.
And then I noticed that eveneven the unfavorable press
coverage was nowhere near asscathing and as capricious as
(32:34):
what was in my case, and Icannot help but to feel that
there is both a positive and anegative aspect of that.
It's positive aspect becauseit's like there's this idea that
trans people are inherently badand morally egregious and
therefore they do this thing.
It's monstrous where, as womendo it, then it was just
(32:54):
something that they were doingbecause of circumstances, but
then it's also kind of abackhand compliment because it's
the idea that it's permissiblefor women because it's women.
You know what I'm saying?
Like there's a lot of peoplethat are conservative men.
They feel like they feel liketrans women have surrendered
something precious by giving uptheir kind of male dominion in
(33:18):
the patriarchy.
So it's kind of an insult in away as well there.
So there's a lot of componentsto the kind of collective or
societal psychology that I amnot qualified to address at all.
What I will say is this is, likeit's very evident, and the
quickest way to find out Ialways say the quickest way to
(33:38):
find out what somebody'spolitics are is just to kind of
throw out a little bait outthere about the trans issue,
because I guarantee you veryquickly, if they're conservative
, something to do with.
They love to put the childrenin front, which is so crazy.
Because I'm like I'm sittinghere and I'm looking at the
conviction rates and I'm lookingat the data and I'm like all of
these right wing conservative,I'm scratching my head.
(33:59):
All these right wingconservative types are getting
grossly disproportionateconviction rates over here, for
the same thing that they'reaccusing these people over here,
just because these people allthey want to do is they want
children to grow up in a worldwhere they understand that there
are different types of peopleand it's okay to treat everybody
(34:20):
okay, you know right?
So I that kind of blows my minda little bit, and if I didn't
know any better, I would thinkthat they, the conservative side
, had a monopoly and they justdidn't.
You know, they're worried aboutit being shaken up.
I think that it's really crazythat we live in a world that our
first go to is to call peoplegroomers or to say that you know
(34:42):
, everything they're doing isjust to attack.
I would never, ever, ever, harma child.
That doesn't matter.
What matters is the fact thatthese people they want to.
The first thing they're goingto say is that it's about the
children, about the children,about the children.
But it's not about that.
They're using what they know iskind of a rallying point.
(35:03):
Yes to fear, monger people intothinking that these people who
just want to exist just want toexist, they want to have
protections, they want to.
You know, and in my heart like,yes, I would like to let kids
be kids, like you know.
Maybe an ideal world kids couldlearn about that in high school
, during college.
(35:24):
But the problem is, is you havethese people who?
They will indoctrinate theirkids, so when their kids grow up
, their kids are not decentpeople, they're raging bastards.
So at that point it's too lateto give them a high school or a
college course that says, hey,you can treat all people okay,
like, you don't have to likethem, you don't have to agree
with them, but you should havesome type of, you know,
(35:46):
emotional reciprocity of a firststep.
Amber (35:48):
There should be space for everyone, absolutely.
Jason (35:52):
Yeah, you don't have to understand it If somebody tells
you this is who I am.
That's enough, that's it.
You don't have to understand it.
Amber (36:00):
So I want to, I want to explore you mentioned sort of a
disproportionate sentencing.
Let's talk a little bit aboutyou know what that process
looked like, sort of thecomponents that were used in
this in sentencing, becauseyou're exactly right and that we
see in you know the criminallegal system that gender
(36:23):
identity and gender nonconforming people are
disproportionately seen asdangerous or bad and sentenced
accordingly.
So can you speak a little bitabout that?
C (36:35):
Yeah, I I call it policy sentencing and what I'm so.
I've written about this andI've talked about it before on
other platforms.
Policy sentencing is when ajudge and a prosecutor these
people have political views,that when they sentence this
person who's gender nonconforming or queer, trans, what
have you they're sending themto the extreme possible and
(36:58):
they're trying to stack uprelated charges that allow them
to allow them to run consecutivesentences or multiple long
sentences together.
The reason why is they're notjust punishing that trans or
queer or gay person for thecurrent criminal conduct that
they're before that court for.
They're also trying to removethe likelihood of that person
(37:20):
returning to the political, intothis assault, the social realm.
And so I call it policysentencing, because the whole
point is to remove people likethis for as long as possible
from engagement and interactionwith society at large.
When you do that, youessentially, from the mind of
these people, dispose of aproblem.
Hopefully they die off, but,more importantly, their politics
(37:41):
and their sentiment and theirvisibility is decreased.
Amber (37:46):
Wow, I mean like that, that really gives a lot to think
about, and I don't know thatI've ever heard it sort of like
characterizing that way, and Ijust felt that didn't.
I really like I felt that to mycore because I think that we see
it all the time as it was, butit's not like it's to exactly as
it relates to race, as itrelates to outspoken disability
(38:11):
advocates, as it relates to allsorts of people who are, you
know, saying I'm here, I havethe right to exist just like you
, and you know I should betreated in an equitable manner.
Jason (38:25):
So I really appreciate you explaining that and I would
love to have you know access toyou know, something that you've
written that we could sort ofthrow in the podcast notes if
it's out there, because I wouldlove to have our viewer or our
listeners to share how that isto it as well, and it brings up
some, some questions for me,like you went from being you
(38:51):
know as yourself, as youdescribed not a great student,
right and that doing well inschool, and to someone who is
writing and and has someeducation, and so I would say
you know, tell us a little bitof my doctorate.
Yeah, so tell us like excitingso tell us how you go from that
to you know.
(39:11):
With all the obstacles thatthrown at you, how do you end up
being a doctor?
C (39:20):
God definitely, but for non religious people, just getting
tired of my own excuses andhaving really incredible friends
and networking with people thatbelieved in me and believed in
my vision that I have, for whatI want to do for the rest of my
life and what I want tocontribute to the this, this
world.
But you know, I haven'tachieved the three s's yet for
myself in their final form, touse a Dragon Ball Z phrase there
(39:45):
.
But but, yeah so.
But prison has actuallypresented me, scarily enough,
the most stability that I'veever had over the last few years
.
I've been pretty much stuck inthe same places for long term,
but so, yeah, when I was youngerI was bouncing around a lot and
I didn't have any type ofreally good support system and I
(40:06):
was hurting and I was justbeing a troublesome kid.
So now for like the last eightyears I've been able to kind of
sit still, for the most partI've transferred.
You know I did some facilitytransfers or whatever, but while
I was incarcerated I was ableto get a large bulk of my
academic work done.
I had friends like CastaliaMedrano, who is the editor,
(40:27):
deputy editor of the magazine,sessi Blanchard, who is a well
known harm reduction drug policy.
Journalist Lyra Foster, who isan incredible transgender rights
advocate and attorney, out ofAtlanta, georgia.
Dr Benjamin voice, fromColorado, who is a
communications PhD and educator.
These people, they became mytribe and they, they helped me.
(40:49):
They really invested in me.
So I got my double bachelor'sfrom Jacksonville Baptist
Theological Seminary inhistorical and theological
studies and I got a master'sfrom Amherst Theological
Seminary in theological andhistorical studies and I just
graduated with my doctorate fromthem in theological and
historical studies.
And because I'm an overachiever, I went back to Blackstone
(41:12):
Career Institute and gotcertified as a paralegal.
Jason (41:17):
All right, so so we need to.
We need to stop for a second.
Amber (41:25):
We need to keep up with us.
It's like so amazing.
Jason (41:28):
We need to stop.
We need to absorb what you justtold us.
We need people who arelistening to absorb what you
just said, remembering theearlier part of this
conversation, where you camefrom to where you are right now.
C (41:42):
I can't believe it.
I have imposter syndrome.
I can't believe it.
Jason (41:46):
It is remarkable, it is outstanding, and if nobody has
said they're proud of you, we'resaying it right now and anybody
who's listening to you says weare so happy for you to be at
that point in your life and youshould be so proud of yourself
(42:07):
for what you've done andcelebrate and and take it in.
Amber (42:13):
I have to say see, I was tear something you just said
like, just so you know you'regoing over, like these people
that came alongside you.
I'm sorry, I like I'm tearingup myself.
Yeah, but I heard you just sayis these people invested in me?
C (42:35):
Yeah, like nobody ever had in my whole life, and I got them
one after one.
They came into my life.
That's been like a eight yearwindow and they've been my tribe
.
Amber (42:46):
I'm grateful for them and so what I want our listeners to
really think about andunderstand is when you take the
time to invest in someone elseand see someone right, that
matters.
That makes all the difference.
(43:07):
So if, if nobody learnsanything from listening to you
and your amazing story andseeing you for the amazing
person that you are, if they cantake that nugget away, that
will be something.
So thank you so much forsharing all of that.
I really appreciate y'all.
(43:30):
I mean, I'm really excited tohear because it seems like
you're doing like a lot ofreally amazing work.
You're doing some writing.
You've clearly done a lot asfar as education is concerned.
When you think about mentoringand mentors you've had Talk a
little bit about like what thatlooks like and because we know
(43:53):
that, like, mentors areimportant.
C (43:56):
Yeah.
So I think what you just said amoment ago is like 100% spot on
.
You know what a mentoressentially is somebody that
sees, even if you can't see it.
They see past all the mark,they see the potential, they see
that faint glimmer of what ismost assuredly is gold.
So for me that has beeninvaluable.
(44:19):
I've had people that have reallyput their time and their energy
into me and have coached me tostop being self-destructive and
stop being self-sabotaging, butalso to and my friend, she
always gets on to me right nowabout it because, like I said a
minute ago, I have impostersyndrome but to really just
(44:40):
realize that you get toultimately decide the rules of
engagement for your life, youknow.
That's not to say that thereare not handicaps or limitations
or parameters that you cannotgo beyond, but you ultimately do
get to set the parameters, youknow, for the rules, engagement
for your life.
Mentoring for me has lookedlike people that were willing to
(45:03):
listen to the kind of emotionalsituation of what I was going
through with coming into prisonand being in prison and the
challenges that were present,not just being an incarcerated
person, but being anincarcerated person who, for all
intensive purposes, sticks outlike a neon thumb in a men's
facility.
So that was a big part of ithaving reliable people that I
(45:27):
could emotionally deposit in.
And while you know ideally arelationship should be
equilibrious, I will say that,like my friends, my mentors have
been incredible people becauseI'm not able to return to them
the same accessibility todeposit their stresses and their
(45:47):
heartaches and their worriesand their human incidences into
me, and I fully plan to make upfor all of that.
Amber (45:56):
Everybody knows that they have free hugs forever you know
, maybe cry yeah so yeah, I justwant to ask you, since, since
you mentioned sort of thestruggles of incarceration in a
space that is not necessarilycreated or has the
(46:19):
infrastructure for you, can you,if and it's okay if you, you
know, don't want to talk aboutit can you talk a little bit
about accessing health carewithin a system?
C (46:33):
yeah.
So, generally speaking, healthcare is abysmal.
But so I actually started alawsuit in 2013 that I settled
June 2nd 2015.
I was the first person who wasincarcerated in Georgia who was
trans to win a legal litigationbattle against the Georgia
Department of Corrections to getaccess to female replacement
(46:57):
hormone therapy.
A year later, the verywell-known Ashley Diamond, who
is a civil rights advocate andtransgender advocate.
She would blow up and get a lotof attention for that, which
I'm not mad about.
Who knows for her.
She did great work and Iappreciate it, but I I was
always a little hurt that nobodyever acknowledged that in the
(47:18):
open letter that they sent tothe GDC, it listed my case.
My case was the legalpresidents that allowed them to
go fight the next step of thebattles.
But we've we've collectivelyabout four of us.
We spent years litigating andthere are still a few people who
are in the system and that isvery difficult place to be in,
(47:39):
but they are advancing the nextstages of essentially fighting
policies that are commensurateto the anti-trans policies out
in the free, non-incarceratedworld.
Sure, that's very important tounderstand is that prison is a
microcosm, kind of a reflection,in a way, of the outside world.
(48:00):
It has its own economy, it hasits own rules of etiquette, it
has its own pecking system and,of course, it has its own social
justice issues.
And so when we were talkingearlier, in the larger framework
of anti-trans rhetoric thatexists definitely inside of this
nation's prison system.
So in Georgia there is still anongoing battle to advance
(48:21):
access to medical care for transpeople.
But overall I wish that moreprisoners would collect device
to try to bring a bigger suit,because the entire medical
system needs to be revamped.
The provision of care needs tobe revamped.
I recently found this out inone of my journalistic
investigations.
Last year the governor gave thecontract for GDC medical care
(48:46):
to a private company called WellPath that had to change its
name from correct care solutionsbecause it has such a bad
reputation of being ex-hying inits care.
But while I cannot prove thatthey were a donor to the
governor's campaign, we do thinkthat it's odd that they won out
of other companies that havecleaner records and who have
actually done more business inthe state of Georgia.
(49:08):
But what's really interestingis they actually got to kick out
a provision of the care theyhad to provide.
They just completely rejected.
They said no, we're not payingfor HIV care.
So the thousands of prisonerswho are incarcerated in Georgia
who need access to literallylife-maintaining HIV care at any
given time?
The state could essentially saythat they don't have to pay for
(49:29):
it because they have a medicalcontractor, but the medical
contractor has been permitted tosay that they won't provide
coverage for it.
So it's messed up right.
Amber (49:38):
So I do want to just call attention to, first of all, you
know, thank you for beingwilling, because you know
there's a huge risk to beinglike a plaintiff in a suit,
right so I just want to like,understate that like that's a
bit of an understatement.
So the courage that it took tosay no, this is not acceptable
(50:02):
and I'm gonna, you know, be partof changing it is amazing.
I want to mention because weare in in Connecticut we
actually have a situation herein our state where there is a
pending case with the ACLU ofConnecticut.
Who is fighting for a client toreceive gender affirming care
(50:25):
within DOC.
It's been going on for such along time and what is so
astounding is we have a we have,you know, elected officials in
our state, including ourattorney general, who is very
pro LGBTQ, you know, goes toevents and rallies and speaks on
(50:47):
the issues, and all of this yetis fiercely and still defending
, based on very anti transarguments, denying this person
care within the DOC.
So your comments around it'ssort of like prison being a
microcosm.
(51:07):
One of the things when we talkabout these cases is people try
to make them cases about transrights, which they are, but
these are human rights.
These are human rights.
People try to make it aboutit's a prison case.
It's not a prison case.
It's not a trans rights case.
(51:28):
It's a human rights case.
It doesn't matter whetheryou're in the community, whether
you're it.
You know, behind the walls,people should have access to
health care, and so thank youfor really explaining and
walking us through that you'rewelcome.
C (51:43):
I think that it was the case of Turner versus safely.
The Supreme Court said thatprison bars do not keep
prisoners from the protectionsof the Constitution, and what we
need to remember when we'retalking about those who are
incarcerated is that the same.
And the reality is it can happento anybody, can happen to our
(52:04):
loved ones, that can happen toourselves.
The reality is what we'rewilling to allow to happen to
another person is what we'reultimately saying we're willing
to allow to happen to ourselvesif our circumstances were
different and the policies thatwe stand by or we acquiesce to,
by our failure to object, thoseactually say a lot more about
(52:27):
who we are as an individual, asa culture and as a nation than
anything else does.
You might think that you defineyourself or sum yourself up by
what you wear, what you drive orwho you voted for, or that you
recycle.
Those things matter.
They are components, but inreality, the structures that we
shape this, policies that westand by, that dictate the
(52:48):
societal structure.
That speaks volumes.
And so, when it comes to theprison issues, those are
particularly important becauseit reflects upon the people that
, if anything, most need us tobe our.
They need us to be our mostmerciful, most compassionate and
most reasonable selves.
The fact that they they may ormay not have committed a wrong
(53:09):
in the past should not removethem from the realm of human
rights and the access toimportant things like medical
care.
Amber (53:18):
I wish people could see me, because I'm like raising the
roof, like you know, likewhatever you call it, you know
every emoji there is, I'mthrowing it out there.
Jason (53:30):
I just picture a amber.
I just picture somebody rightnow like on their treadmill
listening to the podcast, as,like we've, we've covered
everything so far, from yeahraised to early trauma, to
incarceration, to turning thingsaround and getting an education
, to health care in the prisons.
Every oh my god, you know yourstory, see, is is more modern
(53:55):
culture all wrapped in one right.
So I mean it's the hit toucheson every major issue.
Amber, what were you gonna say?
Amber (54:03):
so I think that you know we are coming sort of to the end
of our our conversation and wewant to make sure that if there
is some component of your storythat you feel is like super
important and we haven't coveredyet, that you feel is like
really important to sort of getout into the world, want to just
give you an opportunity to havesome space to just say more.
C (54:30):
I know we kind of talked on it a little bit, but I have
never really had a chance toreally to really address it.
You know, and some of thestories that I've published,
sharing my experiences, I, youknow you, they always say you
don't read the comments, but Ican't help it right, and I've
noticed that and of coursethere's some minds you can never
change.
But I told myself that everyopportunity I get I would kind
(54:53):
of drive this home and it's thatWhenever we hear a new fact or
we hear a new argument, we'realways willing, even if it
resonates with us.
We always create this littlesmidgen of doubt, we always
leave this little room for doubtso that we can be hopefully
corrected or that we can modifyour view to be the most accurate
.
And I would say that when itcomes to the stories of people
(55:15):
who have backgrounds like mineor similar backgrounds, or maybe
have a sex conviction or anytype of conviction, I would
encourage people to create alittle doubt, create a little
doubt to realize that what wasreported to you or what you
heard or your predispositionsmay not be giving the most
accurate or more spare kind ofaccounting of the situation.
(55:37):
Because one of the things that Ifind myself raging against
every day and it sucks because Iknow I can't really change it
is the reality that there'sgoing to always be some people
that feel like I'm a predator orthat I, you know, did this
terrible thing and I can't doanything about that.
But I do wish that, maybe overtime, with my story and with,
(55:58):
you know, just encouragingpeople to think, stop seeing
people as so one dimensional,that they're just this one
moment, this one transaction,because there's a lot more to it
.
There's a lot more to it and wereally need to give people
grace, to come back from theirworst moments as a human being.
Okay, Absolutely.
Jason (56:19):
For sure.
Amber (56:20):
I love that and I think that you are highlighting once
again sort of this idea of thepolarization and the
exceptionalism and thesalaciousness with which media
and not just media there are.
You know, policymakers andmedia and people who have
(56:41):
platforms and power, assignedthis exceptionalism to anything
having to do with sexualoffenses, violent offenses,
certain types of people, andit's our responsibility, when
we're talking about beingresponsible members of society
right to create those questionsin our head to see the humanity.
Jason (57:04):
One thing I thought that was interesting a little bit
different is that when youshowed up on Twitter, you went
from like zero followers tothousands like overnight.
I don't know exactly whathappened, but it seems like you
touched a nerve.
I mean, what are your thoughtson Twitter at this moment?
C (57:30):
First of all, I would like to say that I love Twitter.
I think I have a problem like.
I need an intervention from myspirit animal.
Amber (57:43):
Mine too, me too.
C (57:46):
I have a problem.
But Elon Musk, the sooner hegets out the picture, I feel
like my marriage with Twittercan get over its rocky part.
You know, but I recently told myfriend I was like I don't even
need a man, I have Twitter.
But so yeah.
So I think that what it is is Ido have a very unique story and
I think that it allows a lot ofpeople who have been on the
(58:09):
fence or maybe who are just of amindset that can be persuadable
.
It allows me to kind of wedge inand create space for them to
mentally operate differently,like, see, not first of all, I
don't want to say that any sexvendor is bad, period, but I do
try to get them to see likethere are shades to people's
stories and I think that the waythat I have covered the
(58:33):
experience of people who areincarcerated and I've provided,
you know, amplified narrativesto go on, amplified voices about
these people's experiences, andI'm just trying to get them to
understand that if you want tohold the government responsible
in this area, then why not inthis area?
I think that all of thosethings kind of.
But it's also, I think, that mycontent on Twitter's, like you,
(58:55):
get a little bit of comedy,like I had one tweet that went
viral about like shout out toall the straight guys who follow
me because they think I'm kindof hot and then they realize I'm
trans you know I got posted alittle funny stuff like that and
that gets me followers.
You know, one day I might posttheology and history and the
next day I'll post somethingabout sex workers rights and
(59:15):
criminal justice.
So I think it's a little bit ofeverything.
But also I think that I reallymake the effort to connect with
my followers.
I don't see them as myfollowers, I see them as my
community.
I think that we're co-educatingeach other about issues that
potentially have, I hope, thecapacity and power to be changed
and therefore making more fair,more just, more community
(59:39):
centered society.
And that's ultimately what mywork is about.
Every component about it isreally just about getting people
to see that what happens toanother person, it does have
relation to us.
It all relates back.
So I would like to think thatall of those things that kind of
contributed to it, but Icouldn't give you an exact
recipe.
(01:00:00):
I don't know.
Amber (01:00:01):
Love, love, love, all of that.
So I think that we're we'recoming down to the end of the
podcast.
So it, jason, if you haveanything to say before I ask my
famous last question go ahead,ask your last question, then
I'll have a couple of commentsat the end.
Okay, so, see, I always ask thisquestion at the end of the
(01:00:23):
podcast, because part of whatwe're doing here is creating
space for people to tell theirstories and also providing
content to people who may findthemselves in similar situations
, because what we know and whatwe have felt in our own journeys
is you can feel very isolatedand alone.
(01:00:43):
So if you had the opportunityto give one piece of advice to
someone who was following asimilar journey or in a similar
situation as yours, what wouldthat be.
C (01:01:03):
That's tough.
I guess the one piece would bedon't wait for your
circumstances to get better.
Don't wait for life to get good.
Right now it's as good as it'sgoing to be in this moment.
It's the only moment you have.
Maximize it.
Make it count, no matter whereyou are.
Find ways to grow beyond thepains of your circumstances.
(01:01:25):
Find ways to thrive, becausenobody is going to give you the
high roads.
You have to build it yourself.
Amber (01:01:31):
That's amazing.
I love that so much, Jason.
Jason (01:01:34):
Last thoughts I just want to say thank you so much for
joining us today and we finallygot to speak.
We've been trying to set thisup for a while and just once
again to say your story, fromwhere you've come from to where
you've gone, is just beyondremarkable.
I hope that things just getbetter and better from here on
(01:01:56):
out, because I think you deservegood things in your life.
Thank you so much.
C (01:02:05):
Thank both of you very much for what you guys are doing.
Thank you.
Amber (01:02:09):
Thank you, C.
We really appreciate you comingon the podcast today and we
really look forward toopportunities to reconnect and
maybe collaborate on some things, Because I know that the only
way there is for all of us atthis point is up right.
C (01:02:26):
I love it, let's do it.
Jason (01:02:29):
Alright, until next time, Amber.
Amber (01:02:32):
We'll see you next time, music.
Exit (01:02:42):
You've been listening to Amplified Voices, a podcast
listening to the experiences ofpeople and families impacted by
the criminal legal system.
For more information, episodesand podcast notes, visit
amplifiedvoicesshow Music.
Everyone has a voice, a story to tell.
Some are marginalized and muted.
What if there were a way toamplify those stories, to have
conversations with real peoplein real communities, a way to
help them step into the power oftheir lived experience?
Welcome to Amplified Voices, apodcast lifting the experiences
(00:23):
of people and families impactedby the criminal legal system.
Together, we can createpositive change for everyone.
Jason (00:34):
Hello and welcome to another episode of Amplified
Voices.
I'm your host, Jason, here withmy co-host, Amber.
Hello, Amber.
Amber (00:40):
Good morning Jason.
Jason (00:42):
And today, Amber, we have a guest.
Her name is C.
Hello, C.
C (00:47):
Hi there y'all, how y'all doing.
Jason (00:49):
Doing great.
So we're going to ask you thesame question that we've been
asking all our guests, and thatis could you tell us a little
bit about your life before youentered the criminal legal
system and what brought you intoit?
C (01:03):
Wow.
So my life before the criminaljustice system was actually one
that was really fraught withtrauma and just a really trying
life.
From a very young age I watchedmy mother get murdered as a
child about age six.
Jason (01:16):
Oh wow, when did you grow up?
C (01:18):
I was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but I was raised
in and around Maryland.
Jason (01:23):
OK, Six.
So what happened?
C (01:27):
My mother was in a relationship and she was
murdered by him in 1996.
My mom was the type of womanthat was kind of a back sheep of
her family and she was kind ofjust trying to forge her own
path.
Yeah, so when my mom died Iwent into the foster care system
and I spent pretty much theentirety of my youth in
therapeutic environments or onetype of institutional setting or
(01:50):
a foster home.
I've been into a bunch of them.
Jason (01:54):
Were you an only child.
C (01:56):
I actually have a half sister , but we were not raised
together.
We don't actually have nevermet in person since we were very
small children.
Jason (02:04):
Wow, so six years old, your mother's murdered, which,
at six years old, you can't evenprocess that the permanent
concept of death is challenging,and then you're in this foster
system.
That must have been horrible.
C (02:23):
It was extremely terrible.
It was really tough.
I didn't have any type of senseof identity or connectivity
there was.
Most children grow up in homesthat are able to provide,
hopefully, structure, a sense ofidentity and continuity with
what has come before and whatyou were going to contribute to
not just the legacy of yourfamily, but what you're going to
(02:44):
do with your life in society.
I never had any of that.
There was always.
My whole life was an experienceof disconnection and
dislocation.
So when I hear people talkabout buzzwords like
marginalization ordisenfranchisement, I'm like
that's me, that's my picture.
Amber (03:02):
Right, I'm so sorry.
That was sort of the beginning,and when you think about what
that looked like for you interms of a journey, did you find
that there were little rays oflight here and there with people
that you encountered?
Or tell us a little bit aboutwhat that looked like?
C (03:24):
I guess that there was.
But the really sad thing aboutmy childhood is I was on and
this is not, this is prettycommon knowledge the foster care
system and those who are inclinical psychiatry and child
psychiatry what not.
They tend to overdiagnose thesechildren that often have
traumatic backgrounds.
(03:45):
So large swaths of my childhoodand even my younger portion of
adolescence are very opaque tome.
They're really unrecollectablebecause I was so heavily
medicated.
They diagnosed me with all ofthis stuff when what I was I was
a kid that had seen theirmother be murdered and I had
experienced sexual abuse andphysical abuse and things like
(04:07):
that.
So it wasn't that I had all ofthese developmental or
psychological axes, it was thatI needed a safe place to try to
bounce back from something thatno child should ever have to go
through.
Amber (04:23):
Exactly, you were a normal child having normal
reactions to very traumaticsituations.
Jason (04:30):
And you never had that safe place is what you're saying
.
C (04:34):
No, I never have, not once in my life.
The crazy thing about it is theamount of time that I have
spent in institutional settingsactually has drastically been
greater than the amount of timethat I've spent out of
institutional settings.
My life has, truly it's beenshaped by one aspect of the
(04:57):
system or another.
I've never, I've never, knownthat.
Jason (05:03):
So how do you get from six years old and then entering
this foster system, to where youare now?
What comes next?
C (05:13):
OK.
So I guess from about that ageuntil about 15 was a very
unstable period for me.
I jumped around a lot, I was ina lot of different homes, I
went to a bunch of differentschools and one of the things
that breaks my heart when I lookback is I graduated from high
school year early, but it was asympathy graduation and I
graduated with a 1.54 GPA, whichmeans that I was.
(05:36):
I look back and I feel reallyterrible for the person that I
was and I feel really bad forkids that are in similar
positions, because I alwaysloved school and I always
learned to learn.
I loved learning but I foundmyself struggling for any type
of stability whatsoever.
So at a very young age I startedkind of getting high and I
found myself involved in the sextrade at 14.
(05:59):
I was running away and I waskind of surviving on my own.
I just wanted to be away fromthese people.
I wanted to get away from allof the sexual abuse and physical
abuse that I had experiencedbetween my childhood up until
that point and there was kind ofa desire to autonomize my
sexuality.
I grew up with a verytransactionally related life and
(06:23):
I realized that there was goingto be a kind of commerce or
exchange for these things.
I wanted to control them and Iwanted them on my own terms.
But I also had a dream that Iwould turn enough tricks to get
money where I could go, movesomewhere and start over.
Nobody would know me and I havea clean start.
Jason (06:42):
And it's interesting you use the word control, because I
was thinking that, as you weretalking, that you had no control
over your environment or whatyou were living during those
years.
So for you to feel that you hadsome sort of control of what
was happening to you and yourown life and doing things on
your terms must have been veryvaluable to you at that point.
C (07:03):
It was.
I really wanted to get away.
I had this idea that I wasgoing to.
I knew that I was never goingto ever find perfect parents.
I felt like it was too late.
So in my mind I had thisfantasy that I would tell myself
that I would get enough moneythat I would be able to move
away and start over, and I wouldmeet this incredible guy and
all my problems would be fixed.
And he would, you know, doesthat kind of story.
Amber (07:26):
So you had.
You had a lot of dreams thateveryone has.
You were looking for a lifethat made you happy and autonomy
over your body, yoursurroundings.
Like this is what like everyhuman person wants.
Would you, would you agree withthat?
C (07:45):
Yeah, 1000%, absolutely.
I wanted to feel like I wasimportant and I wanted to feel
like I had a place and I wantedto feel safe.
Most importantly.
I think that anybody that knowsme and my personal life will
tell you that, like my kind ofcatchphrase is when, like I talk
about my plans for the futuresof the free assets security,
stability, safety.
Jason (08:04):
So did you ever get there ?
C (08:07):
I'm still working on it.
Jason (08:08):
Still on the journey.
Still working on it All right,so then what happens?
C (08:13):
So, at about 17 years old, I'm working at a job at Towson
Mall in Towson, maryland.
I'm in this independent livingprogram where you have to either
work full time or work parttime.
You have to be doing something,go to school, work, whatever.
So I meet these two girls, onefrom Louisville, kentucky, one
from Panama City of each Florida, and they tell me about this
(08:36):
great job they have.
They get to travel with thewarm weather and they sell
magazines and music and they getto meet people and it sounds
awesome to a 17-year-old thathas really never been anywhere
and these young women are inmany ways what I want to be.
So, like a 17-year-old who'svery impulsive, I go back to my
(08:57):
little independent livingprogram and I pack up a duffel
bag and, without knowing thesepeople, I go jump in a big white
van and I go on the road forseveral months and during this
whole time you know it is alegitimate business and they are
selling magazines and it ismostly like college-age kids,
but it's also like it's kind oflike a sex trade on wheels is
(09:19):
what it is.
Almost everybody is hooking upand posting Craigslist ads and
using MySpace and Facebook.
This is at that juncture wherethere's a transfer going on from
old social media platforms tothe newer ones, and I already
was familiar with that.
So I was like, come on, let'sdo it.
But after a few months it gotfound out that I wasn't 18.
(09:41):
And so the person that ownedthat business he was like well,
I can't keep you here becauseyou're an underage runaway from
your state.
I told him my story.
He's like but I'll send youwherever you want.
Because I told him I was like,if I go back, they're going to
end up hospitalizing me again,because that's what they would
do when you would run awayThey'd hospitalize you.
So I had made a friend on thesales slash prostitution team
(10:04):
who lived in Ellenwood, georgia,and she had gotten fired and
she was like if you ever findyourself wanting for a fresh
start, you can come on down toGeorgia with me.
So that's what I ended up doing.
I was literally on theGreyhound bus.
I was like, hey, girl, how areyou Remember that time?
You told me I could come seeyou in Georgia.
Jason (10:21):
Well, I'm on the way.
C (10:24):
So I found myself down here and it was culture shock.
It was the first time I everhad experienced colorism number
one.
But within a few months I waskind of doing my own thing and
fast forward.
Like a year later I caught myfirst charges and I got charged
with pimping and pandering andsexual exploitation of a minor.
Amber (10:47):
Wow.
So I just sort of heard acouple of things that I wanted
to ask some clarifying questionsabout.
So you referred to experiencingcolor as number one.
Can you explain, for people whomay not know what that means,
what you mean by that?
C (11:04):
Yes.
So colorism is the idea thatinside of the black community
there is kind of racism ordiscrimination from darker skin
people to lighter skin people orfrom lighter skin people to
darker skin people.
I'm Afro Latina, so in a lot ofways I have really curly hair,
(11:25):
but in a lot of ways I'm very,very light skin.
I'm what they call whitepassing sometimes and I had
never experienced colorism upnorth.
I had never been teased for theway I talk.
I had never heard people tellme to stop talking white or stop
trying to act sediti is whatthey call it.
I had never been told.
I had never experienced thatbefore and I had.
(11:48):
I believe I had read about it.
I believe I'd heard about it,but I never realized it was a
real phenomenon that came downsouth and it is definitely real.
Amber (11:57):
Okay, and so you talk about.
You found yourself out of onesituation and you traveled to go
to another situation and atthis point you're still 17 years
old.
Is that right?
C (12:11):
Yeah.
So when I left Maryland I hadjust graduated a handful of
months before.
When I got to Georgia, it wouldhave been probably August or
September, so I would have stillbeen 17.
I would have been almost 18.
Amber (12:23):
Right, and so, again, it sounds like what you were
looking for was were those S'sthat you talked about before?
You're looking for thatstability you?
Know you've been kicked out ofone thing that you know, that
you thought may have been sortof your path out, and then
you're finding yourself in anentirely new place, experiencing
(12:44):
all sorts of different newphenomenon, one of which you
just shared, and so that's wherethe criminal legal system then
comes in.
Tell us a little bit about whatwas that experience you
mentioned?
You know being charged.
C (13:01):
Yeah.
Amber (13:01):
What?
What was that like?
So did you find yourselfimmediately incarcerated?
Was there a period of, you know, being out on bail or staying
in on bail, because it doesn'tsound like you had a lot of
support for somebody to comebail you out or anything like
that?
Let's, let's walk through andunpack that.
Jason (13:21):
And as you're answering that, one thing that's hitting
me is you know you've had youhad all this trauma leading up
to that.
Did this just feel like onemore traumatic event or was it
different at this point, whenyou start getting charged for?
C (13:35):
Well, it was different, but it was.
It was.
It was definitely supertraumatic.
So I should preface and saythat before the pimping and
pandering charges occurred,there was a few months
beforehand, there was anothercharge that occurred into CAB
County from where I and a personwho I was providing sexual
services to.
They tried to take the moneyback from me and I fought them
(13:59):
and we ended up fighting in theparking lot and I had hit them
with a pole and I had actuallygotten charged and I told the
police.
I showed them text messages andeverything.
They actually tried to chargeme with attempted armed robbery
or trying to take my own moneyback from the guy who was trying
to take it from me again.
So that happened.
I went to jail for that and Idid.
(14:20):
I did get bonded out eventuallybut I sat for several months
and a friend of mine pulled afavor with their mom to get me
bonded out.
So you fast forward like a yearlater and I'm living at that
time in Douglas County, georgia,and the house that I live in is
like the house of ultimate illrepute, which I actually believe
(14:43):
is how my public defender atthe time characterized it, but I
lived not that far outside ofAtlanta and I was kind of
getting well known in theAtlanta club scene because I was
an entertainer.
I would entertain up gay barsand I was at parties a lot and I
was just kind of building aname and that social and
cultural demographic, reallytrying to.
I at that time I was trying to.
(15:03):
I was trying to be mainstreamas what I called it like I was
trying to transition into like apublic figure of some sort.
I was trying to monetize mypresence in the community.
So everybody that was kind of apart of my post inner circle,
we were all just living ourlives.
A lot of us were just infranchise or didn't have good
(15:25):
family backgrounds or maybe hadparents that didn't accept us
and most of us were getting highand a lot of us were having
like sugar daddies are turningtricks to get by.
So when they arrested me I didnot think that what I was doing
was wrong.
Like I understood that therewere laws against it, but to me
it was more of kind of like howthe law says Malam, prohibit
(15:45):
them versus Malam and say likethis was something that somebody
was trying to tell me was wrong.
But it wasn't wrong for me todo these things and it was going
to help me survive or get ahead.
So in that context there, whenI was arrested and I was sitting
in this jail and I realizedthat there was nobody that was
going to be able to come alongand save me, because the news
was making me out to be like Iwas, we know, the killer, pimp
(16:08):
or something like that.
You know, and it was.
It was really extremelyfrightening, it was extremely
embarrassing to and it washeartbreaking because I knew
that I wasn't the best person inthe world, but I wasn't the
type of person they were tryingto make me be on the news and
like, one thing about it isthey're a business, so the more
(16:28):
scandalous they can make itsound.
So, even though I was, by thistime when these charges were
going on the news, I was about19.
So instead of saying you knowthat I was 19 and my victim was
17, they would say, oh, atlanta,drag queen, pimps, children.
They knew how to make it moresensational and that was
crushing.
That was, I felt very I want totake my life.
(16:51):
Honestly, it was terrible.
Amber (16:55):
I'm really sorry to hear how those things are
characterized, and one of thethings that we highlight and
we've talked to a lot ofdifferent individuals on the
podcast is sort of the role thatmedia plays in sensationalizing
a lot of different things.
So, on one hand, you know thereis accountability that happens,
(17:19):
and individuals who have, youknow, done things that they're
not proud of in their life areabsolutely happy to take
accountability for wrongdoingthat they've done.
But there's no nuance in theconversations that you can make.
Exactly as you said, it's thatwhole idea of you know how many
clicks can we get?
How salacious can we make thestory?
(17:41):
So you know, while the storycould have or should have been a
young person trying to surviveafter a lifetime of trauma, it's
dragged.
Queen is pimping children andsort of this idea that you know
at 19, you're like fully formed,your impulsivity is gone, all
(18:06):
of those things.
That's another conversationthat you know we really need to
be having in our country aboutlike what we mean when we're
talking about criminalizationand identities and all of that.
So I really appreciate yousharing all of that.
Jason (18:24):
At any point, when you were in the whole foster care
system, did anybody say to youyou know, how do we, how do we
help you, how do we help youheal?
From you know watching yourmother being murdered?
From you know, from all thatyou've been through, did anybody
just say, hey, come over here,we just need to give you a hug
and give you some warmth andcomfort.
(18:44):
Did that ever happen for you?
C (18:47):
At one point I did have one or two decent social workers, so
I don't want to demonize them,but it's important to understand
that when we are answeringquestions like you just asked me
, you have to understand thatthese people are part of a
bureaucracy and they work insideof that system, and the larger
system itself is worth beingvilified, even if that person is
over all, though, my experienceas a youth that was in the
(19:09):
foster care system was that thiswas pretty much your own lot.
You know, whenever I exhibitedwhat I guess you would call
delinquent or or just poorbehavior as a youth, I was given
more medication or I was movedto different facilities that
were like disciplinaryfacilities.
That is not the approach andthe way the system is set up.
(19:31):
Now, as law professor andadvocate, dr Daniel Hatcher from
University of Baltimore LawSchool can tell you, the system
is set up to be predatory onchildren.
They're more concerned withproviding the lowest level of
care they can and then applyingfor title 4D and title 4E funds
from you.
I found out later on that mysurvivors benefits from my
(19:53):
mother's death were subsumed bythe state.
Jason (19:56):
And so I say all this to say that I feel like the state
took many, many things from meand, in return, provided me
almost nothing and the goal wasbasically to break you and to
make you just, you know, just toconform to societal norms,
without giving you any safetynet or any of the tools that
(20:18):
would help you get there.
C (20:19):
So yeah, and when I started talking about being a woman,
that is when they startedmedicating me more.
Jason (20:27):
How about?
So?
How old were you when I started?
C (20:31):
I started the idea without the knowledge of the terms and
the scientific part of thephenomena began to coalesce
around 10 or 11.
But I became very like.
I advocated very strenuously onmy own behalf.
By the time I was like 13 or 14, which seems to be on point for
most teenagers.
You know, with anything, that'swhen they got complicated.
Jason (20:55):
Yes, what year was it the first time you were
incarcerated?
C (21:01):
In the county jail.
It would have been when I hadthat first charge for the.
What would come to the armedrobbery.
That would have been like 2008because, yes, it would have been
like 2008 because the charges.
So I was arrested in 2010 formy pimp and tandoor charges.
That means I would have beenI'm sorry, no, my crime commit
(21:23):
date is 2010, so I would havebeen 19 years old, but they
didn't take me in custody untillike March of the next year, so
I would have been 20 years oldwhen I went into custody.
Amber (21:33):
Right, and so I heard you say something that I think is
really, really important, andthat was the idea of
villainizing systems, whilethere are people who are working
within systems who reallyhonestly feel that they are
making a difference and doingthe right thing.
Because I think we see that ina lot of different systems.
(21:56):
We see that in the criminallegal system, we see that in the
child welfare system, and thenthe other thing that really sort
of triggered for me when youwere talking was this idea of so
many transitions.
So how can you be provided care, right, any sort of sustained
and effective care when you'reencountering so many transitions
(22:18):
?
And my experience I started mycareer working with abused and
neglected children in anonprofit and what I saw was
these transitions are sodetrimental, and not only that,
like things don't go with youRight, like you say that you
have access to records and thisand that, but it's so fragmented
(22:41):
that the only advocate that youhave is yourself, because you
have all the information.
Is that?
Does that feel right?
C (22:49):
Absolutely 1000%.
And what I would add to that isactually the system is so
pernicious and they're sodetermined to cover up any
wrongdoing on their part thatyears Okay.
So during my criminalprosecution process, my public
defender was able to get somerecords from my state foster
(23:10):
care system to show that Iwasn't abused child and my
mother did, and that I wasinvolved in prostitution from a
young age.
She got some of those recordsbut they didn't answer most of
her records request, despite thefact they were my records.
Years later, when I wasincarcerated, I would actually
request and I would offer totender the money for production
and shipping for my own records.
(23:30):
And I got a letter back fromtheir attorney, which I wrote
him an angry letter in responselike well, hold on, when I was a
child that made you weresupposed to be my attorney,
you're supposed to be protectingmy interest.
But I actually got a letterfrom their attorney saying that
I would have to go seek a courtorder for my own records and
since then I've spoken to inanother community who said that
was that was not the correctroute.
They make it very difficult foryou to be able to hold them
(23:55):
responsible and they make itvery difficult for you to be
able to just look back, likefrom where I am now, the type of
perspective and kind ofemotional and intellectual
heights that I've gained sincemy childhood.
I am ready to, and I want to beable to examine my past and to
have things laid bare, because Ineed to have some type of
(24:16):
connectivity and a large portionof my childhood was stolen from
me, so Is it fair to say thatwhen you were nineteen years old
and engaging in sex work andyou were with a seventeen year
old, that you yourself were notoperating at an adult level?
One thousand percent, and that'ssomething that I told the judge
(24:38):
is like, even though and now Isay that I was wrong because she
was seventeen.
But at that time I, even if Iwould have known that she was
seventeen which I did not, evenif I would have I wouldn't have
thought that what I was doingwas was Because look what I was
doing from thirteen, fourteenyears old to me, we were two
people that had similar stories,were trans, because we're both
(25:00):
trans girls.
She had a not understanding,great conservative and abusive
mother, came from kind of a Notlow economic but low middle
economic kind of situation, andwe just had a lot in common.
So it to me, this was somebodythat we had common themes
(25:20):
running through our stories andwe were sisters and kind of this
enterprise, and we were gettinghigh out of our mind and having
a good time to you know.
So, yeah, no, I definitely wasa child and I wish that the
system, I wish that the systemhad the honesty and the desire
to actually treat problemsrather than symptoms, because
(25:43):
then maybe, instead of getting athirty year sentence, maybe I
would have gotten, you know,something more reasonable.
Amber (25:51):
And also had the tools to be in a different place and
space, and all of that in thefirst place, right, yeah, one
thousand.
C (26:00):
Yes.
Jason (26:00):
I mean, yeah, the system created you the way you are and
then took no responsibility andinstead of saying, hey, things
went really off the rails herewe need to help you.
We need to help you live ahealthy life and be who you are
and help you realize who you are, and all of that, they just say
(26:22):
, no, we're going to lock you up, we have to put you away
because and then they start.
Then they start with all thenames you know, like you said in
the media, and they're callingyou a predator and they're
calling you a groomer now andthere, all those types of things
, when you're a person who'sliving your life the way you
know how and just trying tosurvive.
(26:45):
I mean it's not even like I'mtrying to get ahead, you're just
trying to survive.
C (26:50):
I would stress that's actually like one thousand
percent correct, because thereality is and that's why I
wanted to come on this podcastwith you and Amber so badly is
because I, when I pay attentionto the political rhetoric that's
going on right now, I reallysee strands that run back, like
it seems like this kind of antitrans slash, groomer sentiment
(27:10):
has popped up only within thepast few years.
But I really and I know that'sa little bit egocentric kind of,
but I really see strandsrunning back even to the time
period of my Prosecution because, you know, I didn't have a
press secretary and the mediawas at my plea hearing.
I've never seen a publicdefender put together a
PowerPoint presentation todefend a client at a plea
(27:32):
hearing.
I've never seen that.
So my public defender, shereally did fight for me and she,
you know they weren'tinterested in the fact that this
was kind of in many ways, a covictim hood, in the sense that
we were both victims of ourcircumstances in our past and
just the desperation of themoment, you know.
So I really see that there is adesire to To vilify and to
(27:57):
villainize people who are gendernonconforming or who are queer,
or who are of a certain racialbackground etc.
And I can't help but to feellike I can't help but to feel
like my case is handled the wayit was handled because I was
trans and because this otherperson who was a little bit
(28:20):
younger than me Was being trans,because they even tried to say
in the case that I helped thisperson to be trans.
But you can't help somebody tofeel I've never helped a guy
who's not interested in totranslate into, like you can't
make somebody be somethingthey're not.
I don't believe that.
Jason (28:39):
Right, and so when you were incarcerated, were you put,
you were in a, in a men'sfacility.
C (28:46):
Yes, I was incarcerated with men and when I first got locked
up it was it was really bad,because if you were extremely
feminine looking, if you lookedvery passable which I hate that
phrase because it sounds likegatekeeper but they would
actually segregate you'd be on24 seven lockdown, which we now
know is, of course, akin totorture.
So we fought to be able tointegrate into the population,
(29:11):
but that is, of course,presented its own problems
because the prison system lacksboth the integrity and the
infrastructure to actually makesure that they keep Other of you
know, other incarcerated peoplesafe.
So when you have thisparticularly vulnerable segment,
it's not good right.
Jason (29:31):
So did you feel, where did you feel the least safe?
From other folks who wereincarcerated, or from the, from
the officers and the systemitself, I mean?
Or it was just everywhere.
C (29:42):
It was, I would say it was everywhere.
It's like having variousdifferent threats presented to
you.
There's still a threat.
They're still not great, youknow.
It's just they're coming fromdifferent sources.
But overall, if you ask me tochoose who I was treated the
worst by staff or prisoners itwould be a terrible toss up like
(30:03):
I'm not sure who would win that.
Over time, though, I kind ofmanaged to win over a lot of my
fellow prisoners in my state.
I built up a really good namebecause I had one litigation and
I was able to help some peoplewith cases and stuff like that.
So that kind of bought me somewhat you call it street creed
Right system.
Amber (30:23):
But yeah, so I want to, I want to sort of unpack a couple
of things.
So do you feel like you you hadreally talked about sort of
this idea of people are justsort of more realizing words
more prevalent, this languagearound grooming, and you know
(30:43):
the trans population and theLGBTQ population, but that you
saw that in your own case?
Do you think that there is morebrazenness around that in the
current times?
Again, you know people who havebeen following this for a while
and living this.
You know this is their life.
Obviously.
(31:04):
Have you know, seen this sincethe beginning of time, right?
Jason (31:08):
like if.
Amber (31:09):
But it does seem that in the political sphere Right, that
if somebody disagrees withsomebody, they start utilizing
that sort of language toweaponize against an opponent,
really even if the situation hasnothing to do with gender
identity.
C (31:31):
I completely agree.
So, yeah, I see it all the wayback to cases like my own and
other cases of trans people whohave followed, which I'd like to
point out that the number ofpeople charged or convicted who
are trans with charges like myown, is statistically in
substantial.
But I followed the cases ofbiological women who had similar
(31:51):
backgrounds to mine, such asTiffany Simpson from Georgia and
Lisette de Luna from Texas.
These women had backgrounds assex workers from very young ages
, most of the time held in thatfield against their wheel, which
at one point I went throughwith my case.
The person who was charged asmy codifference would actually
(32:13):
beat the shit out of us if wedidn't keep doing what we were
supposed to do, you know.
So I followed their cases and Ican't help but to see some very
stark, striking similarities.
And then I noticed that eveneven the unfavorable press
coverage was nowhere near asscathing and as capricious as
(32:34):
what was in my case, and Icannot help but to feel that
there is both a positive and anegative aspect of that.
It's positive aspect becauseit's like there's this idea that
trans people are inherently badand morally egregious and
therefore they do this thing.
It's monstrous where, as womendo it, then it was just
(32:54):
something that they were doingbecause of circumstances, but
then it's also kind of abackhand compliment because it's
the idea that it's permissiblefor women because it's women.
You know what I'm saying?
Like there's a lot of peoplethat are conservative men.
They feel like they feel liketrans women have surrendered
something precious by giving uptheir kind of male dominion in
(33:18):
the patriarchy.
So it's kind of an insult in away as well there.
So there's a lot of componentsto the kind of collective or
societal psychology that I amnot qualified to address at all.
What I will say is this is, likeit's very evident, and the
quickest way to find out Ialways say the quickest way to
(33:38):
find out what somebody'spolitics are is just to kind of
throw out a little bait outthere about the trans issue,
because I guarantee you veryquickly, if they're conservative
, something to do with.
They love to put the childrenin front, which is so crazy.
Because I'm like I'm sittinghere and I'm looking at the
conviction rates and I'm lookingat the data and I'm like all of
these right wing conservative,I'm scratching my head.
(33:59):
All these right wingconservative types are getting
grossly disproportionateconviction rates over here, for
the same thing that they'reaccusing these people over here,
just because these people allthey want to do is they want
children to grow up in a worldwhere they understand that there
are different types of peopleand it's okay to treat everybody
(34:20):
okay, you know right?
So I that kind of blows my minda little bit, and if I didn't
know any better, I would thinkthat they, the conservative side
, had a monopoly and they justdidn't.
You know, they're worried aboutit being shaken up.
I think that it's really crazythat we live in a world that our
first go to is to call peoplegroomers or to say that you know
(34:42):
, everything they're doing isjust to attack.
I would never, ever, ever, harma child.
That doesn't matter.
What matters is the fact thatthese people they want to.
The first thing they're goingto say is that it's about the
children, about the children,about the children.
But it's not about that.
They're using what they know iskind of a rallying point.
(35:03):
Yes to fear, monger people intothinking that these people who
just want to exist just want toexist, they want to have
protections, they want to.
You know, and in my heart like,yes, I would like to let kids
be kids, like you know.
Maybe an ideal world kids couldlearn about that in high school
, during college.
(35:24):
But the problem is, is you havethese people who?
They will indoctrinate theirkids, so when their kids grow up
, their kids are not decentpeople, they're raging bastards.
So at that point it's too lateto give them a high school or a
college course that says, hey,you can treat all people okay,
like, you don't have to likethem, you don't have to agree
with them, but you should havesome type of, you know,
(35:46):
emotional reciprocity of a firststep.
Amber (35:48):
There should be space for everyone, absolutely.
Jason (35:52):
Yeah, you don't have to understand it If somebody tells
you this is who I am.
That's enough, that's it.
You don't have to understand it.
Amber (36:00):
So I want to, I want to explore you mentioned sort of a
disproportionate sentencing.
Let's talk a little bit aboutyou know what that process
looked like, sort of thecomponents that were used in
this in sentencing, becauseyou're exactly right and that we
see in you know the criminallegal system that gender
(36:23):
identity and gender nonconforming people are
disproportionately seen asdangerous or bad and sentenced
accordingly.
So can you speak a little bitabout that?
C (36:35):
Yeah, I I call it policy sentencing and what I'm so.
I've written about this andI've talked about it before on
other platforms.
Policy sentencing is when ajudge and a prosecutor these
people have political views,that when they sentence this
person who's gender nonconforming or queer, trans, what
have you they're sending themto the extreme possible and
(36:58):
they're trying to stack uprelated charges that allow them
to allow them to run consecutivesentences or multiple long
sentences together.
The reason why is they're notjust punishing that trans or
queer or gay person for thecurrent criminal conduct that
they're before that court for.
They're also trying to removethe likelihood of that person
(37:20):
returning to the political, intothis assault, the social realm.
And so I call it policysentencing, because the whole
point is to remove people likethis for as long as possible
from engagement and interactionwith society at large.
When you do that, youessentially, from the mind of
these people, dispose of aproblem.
Hopefully they die off, but,more importantly, their politics
(37:41):
and their sentiment and theirvisibility is decreased.
Amber (37:46):
Wow, I mean like that, that really gives a lot to think
about, and I don't know thatI've ever heard it sort of like
characterizing that way, and Ijust felt that didn't.
I really like I felt that to mycore because I think that we see
it all the time as it was, butit's not like it's to exactly as
it relates to race, as itrelates to outspoken disability
(38:11):
advocates, as it relates to allsorts of people who are, you
know, saying I'm here, I havethe right to exist just like you
, and you know I should betreated in an equitable manner.
Jason (38:25):
So I really appreciate you explaining that and I would
love to have you know access toyou know, something that you've
written that we could sort ofthrow in the podcast notes if
it's out there, because I wouldlove to have our viewer or our
listeners to share how that isto it as well, and it brings up
some, some questions for me,like you went from being you
(38:51):
know as yourself, as youdescribed not a great student,
right and that doing well inschool, and to someone who is
writing and and has someeducation, and so I would say
you know, tell us a little bitof my doctorate.
Yeah, so tell us like excitingso tell us how you go from that
to you know.
(39:11):
With all the obstacles thatthrown at you, how do you end up
being a doctor?
C (39:20):
God definitely, but for non religious people, just getting
tired of my own excuses andhaving really incredible friends
and networking with people thatbelieved in me and believed in
my vision that I have, for whatI want to do for the rest of my
life and what I want tocontribute to the this, this
world.
But you know, I haven'tachieved the three s's yet for
myself in their final form, touse a Dragon Ball Z phrase there
(39:45):
.
But but, yeah so.
But prison has actuallypresented me, scarily enough,
the most stability that I'veever had over the last few years
.
I've been pretty much stuck inthe same places for long term,
but so, yeah, when I was youngerI was bouncing around a lot and
I didn't have any type ofreally good support system and I
(40:06):
was hurting and I was justbeing a troublesome kid.
So now for like the last eightyears I've been able to kind of
sit still, for the most partI've transferred.
You know I did some facilitytransfers or whatever, but while
I was incarcerated I was ableto get a large bulk of my
academic work done.
I had friends like CastaliaMedrano, who is the editor,
(40:27):
deputy editor of the magazine,sessi Blanchard, who is a well
known harm reduction drug policy.
Journalist Lyra Foster, who isan incredible transgender rights
advocate and attorney, out ofAtlanta, georgia.
Dr Benjamin voice, fromColorado, who is a
communications PhD and educator.
These people, they became mytribe and they, they helped me.
(40:49):
They really invested in me.
So I got my double bachelor'sfrom Jacksonville Baptist
Theological Seminary inhistorical and theological
studies and I got a master'sfrom Amherst Theological
Seminary in theological andhistorical studies and I just
graduated with my doctorate fromthem in theological and
historical studies.
And because I'm an overachiever, I went back to Blackstone
(41:12):
Career Institute and gotcertified as a paralegal.
Jason (41:17):
All right, so so we need to.
We need to stop for a second.
Amber (41:25):
We need to keep up with us.
It's like so amazing.
Jason (41:28):
We need to stop.
We need to absorb what you justtold us.
We need people who arelistening to absorb what you
just said, remembering theearlier part of this
conversation, where you camefrom to where you are right now.
C (41:42):
I can't believe it.
I have imposter syndrome.
I can't believe it.
Jason (41:46):
It is remarkable, it is outstanding, and if nobody has
said they're proud of you, we'resaying it right now and anybody
who's listening to you says weare so happy for you to be at
that point in your life and youshould be so proud of yourself
(42:07):
for what you've done andcelebrate and and take it in.
Amber (42:13):
I have to say see, I was tear something you just said
like, just so you know you'regoing over, like these people
that came alongside you.
I'm sorry, I like I'm tearingup myself.
Yeah, but I heard you just sayis these people invested in me?
C (42:35):
Yeah, like nobody ever had in my whole life, and I got them
one after one.
They came into my life.
That's been like a eight yearwindow and they've been my tribe
.
Amber (42:46):
I'm grateful for them and so what I want our listeners to
really think about andunderstand is when you take the
time to invest in someone elseand see someone right, that
matters.
That makes all the difference.
(43:07):
So if, if nobody learnsanything from listening to you
and your amazing story andseeing you for the amazing
person that you are, if they cantake that nugget away, that
will be something.
So thank you so much forsharing all of that.
I really appreciate y'all.
(43:30):
I mean, I'm really excited tohear because it seems like
you're doing like a lot ofreally amazing work.
You're doing some writing.
You've clearly done a lot asfar as education is concerned.
When you think about mentoringand mentors you've had Talk a
little bit about like what thatlooks like and because we know
(43:53):
that, like, mentors areimportant.
C (43:56):
Yeah.
So I think what you just said amoment ago is like 100% spot on
.
You know what a mentoressentially is somebody that
sees, even if you can't see it.
They see past all the mark,they see the potential, they see
that faint glimmer of what ismost assuredly is gold.
So for me that has beeninvaluable.
(44:19):
I've had people that have reallyput their time and their energy
into me and have coached me tostop being self-destructive and
stop being self-sabotaging, butalso to and my friend, she
always gets on to me right nowabout it because, like I said a
minute ago, I have impostersyndrome but to really just
(44:40):
realize that you get toultimately decide the rules of
engagement for your life, youknow.
That's not to say that thereare not handicaps or limitations
or parameters that you cannotgo beyond, but you ultimately do
get to set the parameters, youknow, for the rules, engagement
for your life.
Mentoring for me has lookedlike people that were willing to
(45:03):
listen to the kind of emotionalsituation of what I was going
through with coming into prisonand being in prison and the
challenges that were present,not just being an incarcerated
person, but being anincarcerated person who, for all
intensive purposes, sticks outlike a neon thumb in a men's
facility.
So that was a big part of ithaving reliable people that I
(45:27):
could emotionally deposit in.
And while you know ideally arelationship should be
equilibrious, I will say that,like my friends, my mentors have
been incredible people becauseI'm not able to return to them
the same accessibility todeposit their stresses and their
(45:47):
heartaches and their worriesand their human incidences into
me, and I fully plan to make upfor all of that.
Amber (45:56):
Everybody knows that they have free hugs forever you know
, maybe cry yeah so yeah, I justwant to ask you, since, since
you mentioned sort of thestruggles of incarceration in a
space that is not necessarilycreated or has the
(46:19):
infrastructure for you, can you,if and it's okay if you, you
know, don't want to talk aboutit can you talk a little bit
about accessing health carewithin a system?
C (46:33):
yeah.
So, generally speaking, healthcare is abysmal.
But so I actually started alawsuit in 2013 that I settled
June 2nd 2015.
I was the first person who wasincarcerated in Georgia who was
trans to win a legal litigationbattle against the Georgia
Department of Corrections to getaccess to female replacement
(46:57):
hormone therapy.
A year later, the verywell-known Ashley Diamond, who
is a civil rights advocate andtransgender advocate.
She would blow up and get a lotof attention for that, which
I'm not mad about.
Who knows for her.
She did great work and Iappreciate it, but I I was
always a little hurt that nobodyever acknowledged that in the
(47:18):
open letter that they sent tothe GDC, it listed my case.
My case was the legalpresidents that allowed them to
go fight the next step of thebattles.
But we've we've collectivelyabout four of us.
We spent years litigating andthere are still a few people who
are in the system and that isvery difficult place to be in,
(47:39):
but they are advancing the nextstages of essentially fighting
policies that are commensurateto the anti-trans policies out
in the free, non-incarceratedworld.
Sure, that's very important tounderstand is that prison is a
microcosm, kind of a reflection,in a way, of the outside world.
(48:00):
It has its own economy, it hasits own rules of etiquette, it
has its own pecking system and,of course, it has its own social
justice issues.
And so when we were talkingearlier, in the larger framework
of anti-trans rhetoric thatexists definitely inside of this
nation's prison system.
So in Georgia there is still anongoing battle to advance
(48:21):
access to medical care for transpeople.
But overall I wish that moreprisoners would collect device
to try to bring a bigger suit,because the entire medical
system needs to be revamped.
The provision of care needs tobe revamped.
I recently found this out inone of my journalistic
investigations.
Last year the governor gave thecontract for GDC medical care
(48:46):
to a private company called WellPath that had to change its
name from correct care solutionsbecause it has such a bad
reputation of being ex-hying inits care.
But while I cannot prove thatthey were a donor to the
governor's campaign, we do thinkthat it's odd that they won out
of other companies that havecleaner records and who have
actually done more business inthe state of Georgia.
(49:08):
But what's really interestingis they actually got to kick out
a provision of the care theyhad to provide.
They just completely rejected.
They said no, we're not payingfor HIV care.
So the thousands of prisonerswho are incarcerated in Georgia
who need access to literallylife-maintaining HIV care at any
given time?
The state could essentially saythat they don't have to pay for
(49:29):
it because they have a medicalcontractor, but the medical
contractor has been permitted tosay that they won't provide
coverage for it.
So it's messed up right.
Amber (49:38):
So I do want to just call attention to, first of all, you
know, thank you for beingwilling, because you know
there's a huge risk to beinglike a plaintiff in a suit,
right so I just want to like,understate that like that's a
bit of an understatement.
So the courage that it took tosay no, this is not acceptable
(50:02):
and I'm gonna, you know, be partof changing it is amazing.
I want to mention because weare in in Connecticut we
actually have a situation herein our state where there is a
pending case with the ACLU ofConnecticut.
Who is fighting for a client toreceive gender affirming care
(50:25):
within DOC.
It's been going on for such along time and what is so
astounding is we have a we have,you know, elected officials in
our state, including ourattorney general, who is very
pro LGBTQ, you know, goes toevents and rallies and speaks on
(50:47):
the issues, and all of this yetis fiercely and still defending
, based on very anti transarguments, denying this person
care within the DOC.
So your comments around it'ssort of like prison being a
microcosm.
(51:07):
One of the things when we talkabout these cases is people try
to make them cases about transrights, which they are, but
these are human rights.
These are human rights.
People try to make it aboutit's a prison case.
It's not a prison case.
It's not a trans rights case.
(51:28):
It's a human rights case.
It doesn't matter whetheryou're in the community, whether
you're it.
You know, behind the walls,people should have access to
health care, and so thank youfor really explaining and
walking us through that you'rewelcome.
C (51:43):
I think that it was the case of Turner versus safely.
The Supreme Court said thatprison bars do not keep
prisoners from the protectionsof the Constitution, and what we
need to remember when we'retalking about those who are
incarcerated is that the same.
And the reality is it can happento anybody, can happen to our
(52:04):
loved ones, that can happen toourselves.
The reality is what we'rewilling to allow to happen to
another person is what we'reultimately saying we're willing
to allow to happen to ourselvesif our circumstances were
different and the policies thatwe stand by or we acquiesce to,
by our failure to object, thoseactually say a lot more about
(52:27):
who we are as an individual, asa culture and as a nation than
anything else does.
You might think that you defineyourself or sum yourself up by
what you wear, what you drive orwho you voted for, or that you
recycle.
Those things matter.
They are components, but inreality, the structures that we
shape this, policies that westand by, that dictate the
(52:48):
societal structure.
That speaks volumes.
And so, when it comes to theprison issues, those are
particularly important becauseit reflects upon the people that
, if anything, most need us tobe our.
They need us to be our mostmerciful, most compassionate and
most reasonable selves.
The fact that they they may ormay not have committed a wrong
(53:09):
in the past should not removethem from the realm of human
rights and the access toimportant things like medical
care.
Amber (53:18):
I wish people could see me, because I'm like raising the
roof, like you know, likewhatever you call it, you know
every emoji there is, I'mthrowing it out there.
Jason (53:30):
I just picture a amber.
I just picture somebody rightnow like on their treadmill
listening to the podcast, as,like we've, we've covered
everything so far, from yeahraised to early trauma, to
incarceration, to turning thingsaround and getting an education
, to health care in the prisons.
Every oh my god, you know yourstory, see, is is more modern
(53:55):
culture all wrapped in one right.
So I mean it's the hit toucheson every major issue.
Amber, what were you gonna say?
Amber (54:03):
so I think that you know we are coming sort of to the end
of our our conversation and wewant to make sure that if there
is some component of your storythat you feel is like super
important and we haven't coveredyet, that you feel is like
really important to sort of getout into the world, want to just
give you an opportunity to havesome space to just say more.
C (54:30):
I know we kind of talked on it a little bit, but I have
never really had a chance toreally to really address it.
You know, and some of thestories that I've published,
sharing my experiences, I, youknow you, they always say you
don't read the comments, but Ican't help it right, and I've
noticed that and of coursethere's some minds you can never
change.
But I told myself that everyopportunity I get I would kind
(54:53):
of drive this home and it's thatWhenever we hear a new fact or
we hear a new argument, we'realways willing, even if it
resonates with us.
We always create this littlesmidgen of doubt, we always
leave this little room for doubtso that we can be hopefully
corrected or that we can modifyour view to be the most accurate
.
And I would say that when itcomes to the stories of people
(55:15):
who have backgrounds like mineor similar backgrounds, or maybe
have a sex conviction or anytype of conviction, I would
encourage people to create alittle doubt, create a little
doubt to realize that what wasreported to you or what you
heard or your predispositionsmay not be giving the most
accurate or more spare kind ofaccounting of the situation.
(55:37):
Because one of the things that Ifind myself raging against
every day and it sucks because Iknow I can't really change it
is the reality that there'sgoing to always be some people
that feel like I'm a predator orthat I, you know, did this
terrible thing and I can't doanything about that.
But I do wish that, maybe overtime, with my story and with,
(55:58):
you know, just encouragingpeople to think, stop seeing
people as so one dimensional,that they're just this one
moment, this one transaction,because there's a lot more to it
.
There's a lot more to it and wereally need to give people
grace, to come back from theirworst moments as a human being.
Okay, Absolutely.
Jason (56:19):
For sure.
Amber (56:20):
I love that and I think that you are highlighting once
again sort of this idea of thepolarization and the
exceptionalism and thesalaciousness with which media
and not just media there are.
You know, policymakers andmedia and people who have
(56:41):
platforms and power, assignedthis exceptionalism to anything
having to do with sexualoffenses, violent offenses,
certain types of people, andit's our responsibility, when
we're talking about beingresponsible members of society
right to create those questionsin our head to see the humanity.
Jason (57:04):
One thing I thought that was interesting a little bit
different is that when youshowed up on Twitter, you went
from like zero followers tothousands like overnight.
I don't know exactly whathappened, but it seems like you
touched a nerve.
I mean, what are your thoughtson Twitter at this moment?
C (57:30):
First of all, I would like to say that I love Twitter.
I think I have a problem like.
I need an intervention from myspirit animal.
Amber (57:43):
Mine too, me too.
C (57:46):
I have a problem.
But Elon Musk, the sooner hegets out the picture, I feel
like my marriage with Twittercan get over its rocky part.
You know, but I recently told myfriend I was like I don't even
need a man, I have Twitter.
But so yeah.
So I think that what it is is Ido have a very unique story and
I think that it allows a lot ofpeople who have been on the
(58:09):
fence or maybe who are just of amindset that can be persuadable
.
It allows me to kind of wedge inand create space for them to
mentally operate differently,like, see, not first of all, I
don't want to say that any sexvendor is bad, period, but I do
try to get them to see likethere are shades to people's
stories and I think that the waythat I have covered the
(58:33):
experience of people who areincarcerated and I've provided,
you know, amplified narrativesto go on, amplified voices about
these people's experiences, andI'm just trying to get them to
understand that if you want tohold the government responsible
in this area, then why not inthis area?
I think that all of thosethings kind of.
But it's also, I think, that mycontent on Twitter's, like you,
(58:55):
get a little bit of comedy,like I had one tweet that went
viral about like shout out toall the straight guys who follow
me because they think I'm kindof hot and then they realize I'm
trans you know I got posted alittle funny stuff like that and
that gets me followers.
You know, one day I might posttheology and history and the
next day I'll post somethingabout sex workers rights and
(59:15):
criminal justice.
So I think it's a little bit ofeverything.
But also I think that I reallymake the effort to connect with
my followers.
I don't see them as myfollowers, I see them as my
community.
I think that we're co-educatingeach other about issues that
potentially have, I hope, thecapacity and power to be changed
and therefore making more fair,more just, more community
(59:39):
centered society.
And that's ultimately what mywork is about.
Every component about it isreally just about getting people
to see that what happens toanother person, it does have
relation to us.
It all relates back.
So I would like to think thatall of those things that kind of
contributed to it, but Icouldn't give you an exact
recipe.
(01:00:00):
I don't know.
Amber (01:00:01):
Love, love, love, all of that.
So I think that we're we'recoming down to the end of the
podcast.
So it, jason, if you haveanything to say before I ask my
famous last question go ahead,ask your last question, then
I'll have a couple of commentsat the end.
Okay, so, see, I always ask thisquestion at the end of the
(01:00:23):
podcast, because part of whatwe're doing here is creating
space for people to tell theirstories and also providing
content to people who may findthemselves in similar situations
, because what we know and whatwe have felt in our own journeys
is you can feel very isolatedand alone.
(01:00:43):
So if you had the opportunityto give one piece of advice to
someone who was following asimilar journey or in a similar
situation as yours, what wouldthat be.
C (01:01:03):
That's tough.
I guess the one piece would bedon't wait for your
circumstances to get better.
Don't wait for life to get good.
Right now it's as good as it'sgoing to be in this moment.
It's the only moment you have.
Maximize it.
Make it count, no matter whereyou are.
Find ways to grow beyond thepains of your circumstances.
(01:01:25):
Find ways to thrive, becausenobody is going to give you the
high roads.
You have to build it yourself.
Amber (01:01:31):
That's amazing.
I love that so much, Jason.
Jason (01:01:34):
Last thoughts I just want to say thank you so much for
joining us today and we finallygot to speak.
We've been trying to set thisup for a while and just once
again to say your story, fromwhere you've come from to where
you've gone, is just beyondremarkable.
I hope that things just getbetter and better from here on
(01:01:56):
out, because I think you deservegood things in your life.
Thank you so much.
C (01:02:05):
Thank both of you very much for what you guys are doing.
Thank you.
Amber (01:02:09):
Thank you, C.
We really appreciate you comingon the podcast today and we
really look forward toopportunities to reconnect and
maybe collaborate on some things, Because I know that the only
way there is for all of us atthis point is up right.
C (01:02:26):
I love it, let's do it.
Jason (01:02:29):
Alright, until next time, Amber.
Amber (01:02:32):
We'll see you next time, music.
Exit (01:02:42):
You've been listening to Amplified Voices, a podcast
listening to the experiences ofpeople and families impacted by
the criminal legal system.
For more information, episodesand podcast notes, visit
amplifiedvoicesshow Music.
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