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Speaker 1: Top clue.

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Speaker 2: It's top.

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Speaker 1: Gear fortune Yo to the great, enjoy the album. I

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wrote this with the hood and my enemies. Of course

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I'm slack, okay. I give my Martians like that's Dr

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mart Inside, jump on the beat. TH's not rid like

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go porschoues. Hold on like horses for rod beets, like

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engines up rob that ship up fencing. I did the spinding,

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the spin like for spind time. Make that fish this

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seasis two, the one finished sad bitches like my name

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was Tracy. No, I do not save her her loves

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no album. Oh Marba, be at your throwing tenstdangrumps like

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y m c MB top for the food chain. Shee

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ease your fortunes into you.

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Speaker 2: That's my name, y'all.

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Speaker 3: Shirley Strawberry is finally speaking up after that chaotic drama

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involving her husband, Ernest Williams, and it is not looking

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good for her. Shirley came under fire a while ago

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when we found out that not only had Ernest been

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scamming people, but he also got exposed for having a

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whole side chick on Shirley. It got even messier because

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it turned out that he had also been lying to

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Shirley and scamming her as well. That was an entire

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crap show and it almost ruined Shirley's life. Well, it

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has been a little over a year since all that

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went down, and unfortunately, it doesn't look like Shirley has

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been able to recover from that situation. So what happened

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to Ernest and is Shirley still sticking by her man

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through all this? Let's get into it. Shirley and her husband,

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Ernest Williams had been married for a few years and

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for a while it seemed like everything was going smoothly,

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but behind the scenes, things were far from perfect. In fact,

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their relationship wasn't just rocky, it was straight up toxic,

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and when the drama first popped off, folks couldn't help

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but question whether Shirley really knew what she was signing

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up or when she said yes to Ernest. Honestly, their

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relationship had always seemed a little from the beginning, it

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felt like she didn't know him all that well. I mean,

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when he proposed to her live on air during her

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radio show with Steve Harvey, she didn't even recognize his voice.

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That should have been the first red flag. The woman

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that you're about to ask me this question about do

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you love him? Okay, then surely.

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Speaker 4: Yes, dish your man right here. It's a mess. Though,

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Wait a.

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Speaker 3: Minute, there were already conversations floating around about Shirley rushing

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into the marriage just for the sake of being married,

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and honestly, it's starting to look like folks were onto something.

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Turns out there was a lot she didn't know about

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Ernest before he got with her. He had a wild

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pass and more than a few run ins with the law.

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His criminal history goes all the way back to the eighties,

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so he'd been dealing with legal trouble for decades, and

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just when you think he might have changed, he picked

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up a couple of felonies in the early two thousands,

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so clearly that lifestyle wasn't behind him. It's not totally

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clear how he and Steve Harvey even became friends, but

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at some point they did, and Steve thought it'd be

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a good idea to play matchmaker and connect him with Shirley. Now,

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even if Shirley didn't know the full extent of who

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Ernest really was, she did know about his past run

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ins with the law, but she chose to believe in him.

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She truly thought he had left all that behind and

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was ready to turn over a new lead. And for

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a while, it actually looked like he had. He stayed

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out of trouble and opened a high end barbershop in Atlanta.

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It was not your average corner spot, but one that

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catered strictly to the rich and famous. On top of that,

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he launched a company that provided unarmed security for clients.

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So yeah, from the outside looking in, he seemed like

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a man who had toned things around. The money was

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flowing in, his businesses looked legit and no one had

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any reason to question the thing, and Shirley and Ernest

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were really living the life. But all that changed in

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twenty twenty two when Ernest was arrested on fraud charges

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and was exposed for running a million dollar scam team

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along with a woman named Erica King. According to new sources,

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fifty seven year old Ernest Williams and forty six year

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old Erica King convinced people to pay them for their

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business expertise. They would align themselves with their victims with

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promises to be able to grow their brands, their missions,

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their life goals, their social media followings. Turns out that

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Ernest was still the same man, but he had gotten

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smart with time and tried to cover his tracks with

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his side businesses. The wildest part about Ernest getting exposed

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is that he probably would have gotten away with everything

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if he hadn't gotten sloppy. The only reason he got

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caught in the first place was because he ended up

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under investigation for rental fraud, and that's what made the

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authorities start digging into him. He and Erica had rented

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a house literally right next door to the one he

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shared with Shirley, but after a few months they just

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stopped paying rent all together. Four months went by, and

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of course the landlord had had enough and reported them.

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That kicked off the rental fraud investigators. And if you're

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wondering why Ernest would even need a house next door

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to his own, the answer is messy. He was sneaking

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around with Erica ruma Is. She was his side chick,

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and he was bold enough to keep her that close,

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hiding her in plain sight. A scammer and a cheater,

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this man couldn't even pick a struggle any who. Once

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the police started looking into Ernest and Erica over the

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whole rental fraud situation, They decided to take a closer

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look at their finances, and that's when things really started

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to unravel. The numbers weren't adding up a all, so

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investigators kept digging, and that's when they uncovered the real mess.

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The two of them had scammed over a dozen people

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out of nearly one million dollars.

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Speaker 2: Police say their investigation first started at this home on

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Pinegrove Road months ago. Investigators say after Williams and King

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hadn't paid rent for a while, detectives started looking into

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their financial transactions and it led them to their extensive scheme.

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Speaker 3: Oh it's still unclear whether Shirley knew what Ernest was

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up to with his scammy little business, but she made

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a move that made people suspicious. Just a couple of

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weeks before he got caught, she suddenly took his name

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off the d to her house in California. That way,

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if he ended up getting arrested and the authorities came

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after his assets, her house would be protected. Now, whether

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she did that because she had a feeling something was

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about to go down or simply because she didn't fully

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trust him, nobody knows for sure, but either way, it

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ended up being a smart move on her part, Unus

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got booked on five counts of conspiracy to commit a felony.

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He had two of the charges dismissed and his bond

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was set for fifteen thousand dollars. But that's not all,

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because he was also booked on three a day charges

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of theft by taking operation of credit repair services and

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theft by deception. But his scamming activities went beyond scamming

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people into paying for his services alone, because he would

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also go to businesses make purchases and not hay Now,

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according to court documents, he was charged deception and with

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intent to avoid payment knowingly obtained car repair services of

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a value of more than one thousand, five hundred dollars

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but less than five thousand dollars, which were available only

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for compensation for which the accused failed to pay. But

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if you thought things were messy up to this point,

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buckle up, because it only gets darker from here. You

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already know how the police operate. Once they uncover one thing,

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they don't stop digging, and that's exactly what happened with Ernest.

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After they found out about his scamming, they launched a

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full blown investigation and started digging deep, and what they

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uncovered wasn't just shady, it was downright disturbing. The more

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they looked into him, the uglier it got. What investigators

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found next was beyond disturbing. Ernest was caught with highly

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inappropriate and explicit material involving children, if you catch my drift.

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But as horrifying as that was, it didn't stop there.

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He was also accused of essaying at least eleven miners,

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and a court has since ordered him to stay far

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away from all of his alleged victums, their families, and

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anyone connected to them. And just when you think it

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couldn't possibly get any worse, it does. Among the victims

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was Shirley's own daughter, her only child, but the nightmare

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didn't stop there. Ernest also reportedly essayed the daughter's to

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young children. And it's even creepier because he has also

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been ordered to stay away from any and all animals,

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and this kind of suggests that either he was being

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stiff to animals or he was doing some improper things

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with the animals, which is just creepy. But then, as

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some fans have pointed out, being cruel to animals is

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unlikely to get him a lifetime ban from animals, so

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you can imagine what he did, because I ain't gonna

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spell it out now. You think that Ernest saying her

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daughter and granddaughters would be more than enough reason for

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Shirley to dump him, right, well wrong, because at the

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time she was determined to stick by her man. In fact,

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not only did she stick with him, but she also

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begged the courts to release him to come home to her.

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According to court documents, Shirley said, I have been told

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that in one or more of the cases pending before

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or the court, I have been identified as either a

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victim of his or witness to a purported criminal act

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of his, to which I respond that I am neither.

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It is my intention that the court know that I

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wish for him to be released with no conditions as

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regards me, that I wish for him to be able

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to reside with me or wherever he elects to reside,

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and that his release be effectuated immediately. But it gets

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even worse because, according to one of the prosecutors on

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the case, he heard Shirley begging Ernest to let her

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help him escape to Dubai and he can stay in

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Steve Harvey's house.

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Speaker 2: There.

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Speaker 1: The prosecutor overheard surely telling him, you could go to

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Steve's place in Dubai where his son's Witton lives in

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a lay low.

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Speaker 4: And I'm almost sure that she just didn't invite her

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husband to go over there without Steve's permissions.

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Speaker 3: So it looks like not only was she defending him,

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but she was trying to help him run away. For contexts,

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Dubai doesn't have an extradition treaty with the US, so

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if Ernest had gone away, he would have gotten away

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with his crimes. Fans d surely for filth and called

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her out for being a bird, but after a while,

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she eventually came out to reveal that she was divorcing Ernest.

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She also claimed that the letter she wrote to the

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judge was actually from before she knew the full scope

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of what Ernest had done. At the time, it was

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only a fraud case and that's why she was standing

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by him and asking for his release. She truly believed

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it was just about his scammy behavior. But once the

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truth came out and she learned about the disturbing accusations

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involving her daughter, grandkids, and animals, everything changed. She wasted

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no time and claimed that she was going to divorce him.

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Speaker 4: Steve, I'm gonna just start by saying that my estranged

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husband is in jail. He's been in jail for over

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a year since about the right after the fourth of

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July of twenty twenty two.

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Speaker 3: For obvious reasons. Fans didn't buy her claims, and it

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sounded like she was only fronting to save face because

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she was getting dragged for bilth. Well, the case died

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down after that and we all moved on from that. Well,

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she finally came out a couple of days ago to

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an update, and unfortunately things aren't as good as we'd hope.

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On the bright side, she did divorce Ernest and the

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divorce was finalized last year. However, things got really bad

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for her and she struggled financially, even though Steve kept

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her on as a co host of the Steve Harvey

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Morning Show. According to multiple reports, the radio personality is

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said to be struggling financially due to her incarcerated estranged husband,

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ERNESTO Williams, legal issues, fraudulent activities, and debts that she's

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paying off. Surely became homeless in twenty twenty two until

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she was taken in by friends. According to the report,

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it looks like she's slowly starting to recover financially and emotionally,

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but she still has a long way to go. It's

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hard to watch her struggle over this, but hey, at

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least she seems to be on the up and up

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and the only way left to go is up. But y'all,

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let me know what you think, then check out this

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next