Speaker 1: Speaking of story, you're an author, you have a new
Speaker 1: book coming out. Can you let my private talk listeners
Speaker 1: what's your books about and where we can find it?
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, it should be released around March seventeenth. Okay,
Speaker 2: so it's not quite ready for release. But it's called
Speaker 2: Triple Jeopardy, and it's about my journey with the federal
Speaker 2: government and indictment. I was indicted and convicted of a
Speaker 2: crime that I did not do, and they convicted me
Speaker 2: three times on the same felony. What they did is
Speaker 2: they just came back a different way and called it
Speaker 2: a superseding indictment. So basically it's just the same charges
Speaker 2: and they did it to me three times. And we
Speaker 2: were a highly political family in Philadelphia, very prominent. I
Speaker 2: was a former commissioner. I served nine years on the
Speaker 2: State Board of Cosmetology under two different governors. My background,
Speaker 2: I did public relations work for I had my own company,
Speaker 2: and I also was a feature stylist for the International
Speaker 2: hairshow I'm old.
Speaker 1: Okay, girl, you you've you're seasoned in a very lovely way.
Speaker 1: And you know what I mean. That means like you
Speaker 1: have so many you know, layers to the onion, the
Speaker 1: peel back of the layers, which makes the most beautiful
Speaker 1: woman that you are. And I appreciate you know you
Speaker 1: coming and sharing you know, those things with us. But
Speaker 1: you know you have so many accolades and you have
Speaker 1: all these you know, big accomplishments. How did it feel like,
Speaker 1: you know, we were speaking earlier, like you'd never been
Speaker 1: in trouble before, and now you're being tried and or
Speaker 1: you're being convicted of something three times basically the same thing,
Speaker 1: which you know that you can't be double deperty, but
Speaker 1: they woanted it made it something different, to make it
Speaker 1: like you were even more wrongful it was exactly. So
Speaker 1: how did that make you feel like it was? I mean,
Speaker 1: did you were you like thinking it was a joke.
Speaker 1: Did you think that it was like where is this
Speaker 1: coming from? Am I being targeted?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: How did that really even affect your life?
Speaker 2: Well? Actually I knew I was being targeted because the
Speaker 2: whole the whole reason that the federal government came after
Speaker 2: me is because my husband was an extremely prominent cleric
Speaker 2: in Philadelpa. And you know how it always comes down
Speaker 2: to the electoral college for wins the national the presidency.
Speaker 2: So if you take Pennsylvania, you pretty much are guaranteed
Speaker 2: if you're a Republican or Democratic, you take Pennsylvania because
Speaker 2: it has a lot of electoral colleges. And so my
Speaker 2: husband was very tied in with unions and clerics, and
Speaker 2: he was actually on the prison board, okay, and so
Speaker 2: he had lots of tie ins with everybody, and it's
Speaker 2: almost like not kissing the ring. But it was like
Speaker 2: if you want to be elected for a local state,
Speaker 2: or you're going.
Speaker 1: To do this for me, and it's not you're going
Speaker 1: to get convicted.
Speaker 2: Right, So what what what? What it was is that
Speaker 2: my husband had a company and the company was doing
Speaker 2: very well, and so he got a contract from the governor,
Speaker 2: I mean not from the governor, from the state and
Speaker 2: from the city, which the federal government said it was
Speaker 2: paid to play, but it was really just something for
Speaker 2: them to use to come at him, because if you
Speaker 2: take Pennsylvania, you can take the presidency, okay. So and
Speaker 2: then it was right after nine to eleven, okay, and
Speaker 2: we're Muslims, so right after nine to eleven, and then
Speaker 2: so who's the prime people to come after when people
Speaker 2: are thinking all Muslims are terrorists and or there's something
Speaker 2: weird about them or whatever. So when they came at us, first,
Speaker 2: they came after him and the mayor, and they were
Speaker 2: after the governor, and they were after other people too,
Speaker 2: And then they came and charged me with a crime
Speaker 2: that was totally unrelated. We had a program at our school.
Speaker 2: I don't want to tell too much about it because
Speaker 2: I want them to read the book. But we had
Speaker 2: a program at our school that was associated with the
Speaker 2: community college in Philadelphia, and I all I did was
Speaker 2: sign the rental agreement. Well, they said it was a
Speaker 2: bogus program, which is not true. The existed, and so
Speaker 2: they came at me with that, and through my lawyer,
Speaker 2: I was offered a chance to do a plea bargain. Well,
Speaker 2: I'm not ghetto. I didn't grow up that way. I
Speaker 2: grew up upper class very well, you know, in the
Speaker 2: best areas of Philadelphia.
Speaker 1: And you knew your rights.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But also I believed in our system of justice.
Speaker 2: And there's no way someone can find me guilty for
Speaker 2: something that I didn't.
Speaker 1: Do, because that's what we were taught to believe, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, like, you know and believe in
Speaker 1: the justice system that you know, that's what it's all taught.
Speaker 1: So it's like, how are you not going to believe
Speaker 1: in someone like yourself has never done anything wrong? Like,
Speaker 1: why are you going to convict me?
Speaker 2: Right, Alexis when I tell you that I didn't even
Speaker 2: have a moving violation, Okay, parking tickets, I didn't get them.
Speaker 2: My son, my husband, they got them, but I made
Speaker 2: sure we always paid them. I dited all the eyes,
Speaker 2: crossed all the t's. And so my book is not
Speaker 2: about a woe is me because I'm not a weak person,
Speaker 2: But you come after someone that lives a laverish life.
Speaker 2: I'm hanging out with and doing work for Don King
Speaker 2: and Muhammad Ali, and well not actually working for Don King,
Speaker 2: but I created a mascot for boxing, and I did
Speaker 2: a lot of different things, you know, associated with Don
Speaker 2: King productions, and I did things associated with Muhammad Ali.
Speaker 2: Actually I brought Muhammad Ali to be honored in city
Speaker 2: Hall in Philadelphia in the early seventies, and they were
Speaker 2: not amazing. They were not taking a lot of particularly
Speaker 2: Muslims into city Hall to be honored. And then I
Speaker 2: also had a radio show that I did health and
Speaker 2: beauty tips. Okay, at one time I thought myself cute
Speaker 2: enough to do some health and beauty tips.
Speaker 1: Okay, girl, you know you're cute. Stop lyinges if I
Speaker 1: was private talkinism and they.
Speaker 2: Know you're cute, Well, I thought I was hot, I'll
Speaker 2: put it that way. To do some health and beauty tips.
Speaker 2: And I was a featured stylist for the International Hair Show,
Speaker 2: so I like basically could write my own ticket in
Speaker 2: Philadelphia like a local celebrity amongst those that knew me,
Speaker 2: and I produced the number one radio show in Philadelphia
Speaker 2: at the time. Amazing.
Speaker 1: Gotta give it up to you. Yeah, I love it.
Speaker 1: You're it's such an inspiration and have you know, such
Speaker 1: a strong woman, And even even those people would try
Speaker 1: to hould you back in the beginning of eve whatever,
Speaker 1: your fight was so much stronger, and you know, you're
Speaker 1: here to tell your story and you know, give people
Speaker 1: like myself hope to like, you know, regardless of what
Speaker 1: downfalls that people try to put in front of you,
Speaker 1: you can still keep going and keep fighting back.
Speaker 2: You know. I think what's really important is that people
Speaker 2: for if they take anything from my book, is that
Speaker 2: they take resilience, because that's what brings you back. You
Speaker 2: have to have a spirit of fight in you because
Speaker 2: you have to reckon. Like you asked me earlier, how
Speaker 2: did I feel about it? Well, first of all, you're
Speaker 2: kind of numb because you can't really believe that this
Speaker 2: is really happening, especially when you're innocent. And I've always
Speaker 2: been the person that if I've done something, you can
Speaker 2: bet your life I'm gonna tell you I did it.
Speaker 2: You know, I wasn't the girl in high school that
Speaker 2: if I said something about you and they told you,
Speaker 2: I wasn't gonna deny it. Almost the one like, yeah,
Speaker 2: I said it, and what okay? Yeah, okay. And I'm
Speaker 2: not like a person that was in a lot of
Speaker 2: fights or anything like that. But if I said it,
Speaker 2: I'll own it. So if I did it, and I'm
Speaker 2: a religious person, Okay, I'm not the most devout Muslim,
Speaker 2: I'm not even trying to say that, but I am
Speaker 2: a believer in a law, and I believe that, you know,
Speaker 2: we have to answer to that higher power. So if
Speaker 2: I offend one of God's creatures, the first thing I
Speaker 2: want to do is ask God's forgiveness, get forgiveness from
Speaker 2: that person, and then forgive myself for doing it, and
Speaker 2: then move on and try to make amends as best
Speaker 2: as I could. So if I did it, I would say,
Speaker 2: like a lot of women that I met in prison
Speaker 2: and that said, hey, look, I knew I was wrong.
Speaker 2: I knew I was selling drugs. I knew I was
Speaker 2: doing this, So I did the crime. I know I
Speaker 2: got to do this time. They own it. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: that's one of the things that I want people to
Speaker 2: also understand too, is that there are some really decent
Speaker 2: women who have been incarcerated when they could have just
Speaker 2: gone into a drug program, okay. And many of them
Speaker 2: are in there because of.
Speaker 1: Men and they didn't have the resources too or you.
Speaker 2: Know, exactly exactly many of them. And the other thing
Speaker 2: that really surprised me is because be an African American,
Speaker 2: you always hear or it's a reality that a lot
Speaker 2: of African Americans go through the justice system and go
Speaker 2: to prison. Well, I went to Danbury Federal Prison, and
Speaker 2: I was surprised that the majority of people were not
Speaker 2: African American. They were white. They were white women, and
Speaker 2: most of them were in there because of some crime
Speaker 2: with a man, a baby daddy or whatever, okay. And
Speaker 2: I wanted to focused to how women are treated so
Speaker 2: different by men. When they are loyal to the men,
Speaker 2: they're right or die, Okay, they take the charge or whatever.
Speaker 2: And if that guy is around like six days, five days,
Speaker 2: three days, they're lucky. Okay. The just the horrific thing
Speaker 2: said women have to go for. There's one woman that
Speaker 2: I meant she was already had already done eighteen years,
Speaker 2: and my first sentence was twenty four months. So I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna go crying about me doing twenty four months
Speaker 2: to somebody who's.
Speaker 1: Got a much a bigger d yeh much bigger.
Speaker 2: But when I found out that it was her first defense, okay,
Speaker 2: she had a thirty year sentence. She's out now, she's
Speaker 2: in her fifties.
Speaker 1: That's crazy.
Speaker 2: She'll never have a baby for a first offense. No violence,
Speaker 2: because you can't be at the camp if there was
Speaker 2: a gun involved, or it's like a violent crime that
Speaker 2: the camp is for basically white collar crimes and stuff
Speaker 2: like that, or if you've done maybe something that had
Speaker 2: to do with not white collar. But you go to
Speaker 2: a higher security prison and then as your points come
Speaker 2: down so you don't get in trouble, they come down,
Speaker 2: your security risk comes down lower and lower until you
Speaker 2: get to a camp, which is the lowest it's like
Speaker 2: minimal security. And so just some of the stories that
Speaker 2: I heard about these women is why I wanted to
Speaker 2: write the book. I wanted to write the book for
Speaker 2: not just for myself, just to tell people, Oh, up
Speaker 2: in the prison, they wrong me, because I don't care
Speaker 2: about that. I'm still here. You know, I bounce back.
Speaker 2: I live well, I'm comfortable. But when they brought my
Speaker 2: children in, when I wouldn't go along because they wanted
Speaker 2: me to say that my husband and the mayor and
Speaker 2: all these people that I knew that it was pay
Speaker 2: to play, which is real strange within itself. It's pay
Speaker 2: to play when my husband gets a contract, but when
Speaker 2: Dick Cheney gets a contract, or the president's family gets
Speaker 2: a contract. And I'm talking about a specific president. I'm
Speaker 2: just talking about they get contracts with the prisons, Okay,
Speaker 2: for all of the commissary, Okay, one of the president's
Speaker 2: family members has a contract with I'm not talking about
Speaker 2: Donald Trump because this is before Donald Trump. So I'm
Speaker 2: not saying a specific president because I'm just saying that's
Speaker 2: the way the system works. So I don't understand how
Speaker 2: it is that even if they thought that my husband
Speaker 2: got the contracts because he did and help people get elected,
Speaker 2: and when elected officials give contracts to people who pay
Speaker 2: and buy into their campaigns. I don't understand the whole
Speaker 2: reason that they came after him anyway, because even if
Speaker 2: that was the reason, it's done all the time. But
Speaker 2: when they want to turn something into a crime, they
Speaker 2: can make something a crime that's not okay, like triple
Speaker 2: jeopardy that's unheard of. Okay. So but anyway, so that's
Speaker 2: why I was writing the book because I want people
Speaker 2: to know the story, but mostly I want to vindicate
Speaker 2: my children, because after I would not go along with
Speaker 2: them and say, okay, my lawyer said to me, he said,
Speaker 2: you know, they'll offer you six months. I can get
Speaker 2: you six months and probation and for sixty thousand dollars
Speaker 2: you could do a plea bargain. Okay. I'm like, no,
Speaker 2: for what because I didn't know anything, and I know
Speaker 2: what Joy's going to find me not guilty, Yeah, because
Speaker 2: I know I.
Speaker 1: Do have faith that it's gonna be your way because
Speaker 1: you didn't do any There are.
Speaker 2: Jury but anybody who thinks that you're going to go
Speaker 2: into a federal court. Okay, up against all their money. Okay,
Speaker 2: how much money you have, go up in a federal
Speaker 2: court and you're going to beat them.
Speaker 1: It's not going to happen.
Speaker 2: Not going to happen.
Speaker 1: And that's the sad part is like you know, when
Speaker 1: they really want you, they're going to make it happen
Speaker 1: in their favor. And that's obviously You're you're a witness
Speaker 1: or an attest to all of this right now. You know,
Speaker 1: triple like you said, triple jeopardy is unheard of. And
Speaker 1: the fact that you know, you you know, lived and
Speaker 1: survived and you know you did your time and all
Speaker 1: that stuff like that and you're still here. You know,
Speaker 1: it's an amazing and make sures you how a strong
Speaker 1: and powerful woman that you really are. But I have
Speaker 1: a question look for you. It's because you know you
Speaker 1: did your time so long ago. Why now, why write
Speaker 1: the book now? When you you know you saw these
Speaker 1: stories or you heard these stories before. Did you just
Speaker 1: feel like it was the right time in your place
Speaker 1: in your life where you just kind of using your
Speaker 1: platform now to speak on it, or you know, why
Speaker 1: did you choose the timing of the book.
Speaker 2: I really wanted to write the book for years, but
Speaker 2: I just got caught up helping the children, and I
Speaker 2: moved to Vegas instead of in Philadelphia, and it just
Speaker 2: got caught up, and you know, tom just gets away
Speaker 2: from you. So looking back, it's been ten years, but
Speaker 2: this is what really did it. I would think about
Speaker 2: it and then I would say, nah, I don't need
Speaker 2: to do it, and then I think about it again
Speaker 2: from time to time, and i'd write a little bit
Speaker 2: and I'm like, nah, I don't. No one cares, Like,
Speaker 2: who cares? It's so old. Nobody cares. My husband. They
Speaker 2: finally convicted him on something else, and he's about to
Speaker 2: get out of prison. So this makes it ten years
Speaker 2: since the time that it started. I'm already out. I've
Speaker 2: been out like four or five years, and he's getting
Speaker 2: ready to get out. The paper that the newspaper organization
Speaker 2: that hounded us and beat us up every day in
Speaker 2: the news did an article ten year anniversary of taking
Speaker 2: down the Alis And that's when I said, Okay, well
Speaker 2: it's to bring it back.
Speaker 1: It's black and white right there for you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you want to, you want to bring it back? Okay,
Speaker 2: So now it's time. It's my mommy dearest moment. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm going.
Speaker 1: To just tell it, okay, But for you again that
Speaker 1: sometimes it's like sometimes I feel like when you when
Speaker 1: you're silent about certain things, it's it almost gives it
Speaker 1: more power, and it's like the wrong thing. So like
Speaker 1: using your platform and speaking on your truths and like
Speaker 1: what you really did in your story, like nobody could
Speaker 1: rewrite that or nobody could live that except for yourself.
Speaker 1: So like, you know, there's similarities and a lot of
Speaker 1: you know people and obviously that you like hear to
Speaker 1: your heart of why you wanted to tell these women's
Speaker 1: stories and tell you know what that really like what
Speaker 1: they endured. So I can you know, I congratulate you
Speaker 1: on your journey and writing your book. I'm excited. I
Speaker 1: want to read it and know more you know about
Speaker 1: it because I feel like I don't know not of
Speaker 1: other people talk about the tough subjects. You know, it's
Speaker 1: about the all fluffy and like these and sometimes we
Speaker 1: have to get down to the nitty gritty and it's
Speaker 1: uncomfortable sometimes, but again it's about educating people and really
Speaker 1: like letting people know all sides of it. Like you said,
Speaker 1: just because you've been in prison doesn't mean you're a
Speaker 1: bad person. It doesn't mean that you don't have a story,
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that you maybe not be in there for
Speaker 1: the right reasons. Maybe it's because, like you said, if
Speaker 1: you needed, you know, to have a rehab and there
Speaker 1: wasn't those resources for you. And now you've thrown away
Speaker 1: your whole life because of the system and you get
Speaker 1: fall between the tracks because you didn't have a good
Speaker 1: you know, representation. There's all community, you know, horror stories
Speaker 1: that you hear that you never know and really put
Speaker 1: in per perspective until it's your own. So you know,
Speaker 1: I can only imagine you know, the fear and the
Speaker 1: hopelessness of when the not the first time, but the
Speaker 1: second time, the third time, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: And now they're targeting you again saying this is a
Speaker 1: ten year niversary. So it gives you more like fuel
Speaker 1: to your fire. Been like, okay, what else can you
Speaker 1: take from me? You know, you did your husband, you know,
Speaker 1: your kids now and you know that's like, you know,
Speaker 1: that's your family and you know and number one is
Speaker 1: your family. Yeah, you know that's when yeah, and.
Speaker 2: Your mama, yeah, mama.
Speaker 1: Bear, Yeah, that's exactly how it is. So when you
Speaker 1: were going through all this process. You know, your husband,
Speaker 1: you know, they convicted time on something. How did your
Speaker 1: relationships within the community and you know, friends, did you
Speaker 1: see who was really there for you? Did you see
Speaker 1: people turn an eye because they didn't want anything to
Speaker 1: do with you. Did they believe that you actually really
Speaker 1: did these crimes?
Speaker 2: If they did, I think to them it didn't matter
Speaker 2: the ones that did.
Speaker 1: I can't say crimes, I apologize crime.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, that's okay. One of the things that
Speaker 2: was very interesting and to me was very fulfilling, is
Speaker 2: that every day in the courtroom, I had so many
Speaker 2: people there until they were lined up in the carters.
Speaker 1: That's amazing.
Speaker 2: And the judge even said at one of my sentencing
Speaker 2: he said to the this is the second sentence. He
Speaker 2: said to the prosecution, he said, I know what we're
Speaker 2: here to do today, but I just have to ask
Speaker 2: this question. I'm paraphrasing, but I'm pretty close to it.
Speaker 2: Is it fundamentally he said, I have to ask this
Speaker 2: question of the prosecution. Is it fundamentally fair to sentence
Speaker 2: this woman again on something that she's already been sentenced
Speaker 2: and convicted of. Yes, the judge said it of course
Speaker 2: he said, yeah, so good by now I amount of
Speaker 2: money because if people have any idea, it is extremely
Speaker 2: expensive and we were well off.
Speaker 1: And that's how I feel like they did it on purpose.
Speaker 1: They bleed you dry until you have no more money.
Speaker 1: So you like, that's that fight if you like depleted.
Speaker 1: But it's like, yeah, no, now I still got it inside.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we lost everything. We lost everything, and not everybody
Speaker 2: was honorable. I remember packing up that house and I
Speaker 2: had a lot of people come over, and I had
Speaker 2: furs and jewelry, and you know, I kept a little
Speaker 2: bit of my jewelry because I had my sister take it.
Speaker 2: And when I got out, I had like about four
Speaker 2: fur coats that are missing, and I have an idea
Speaker 2: who did it, but if they're that foul whatever. And
Speaker 2: I brought that up because you think everybody's with you,
Speaker 2: but people have motives. And then when you go into
Speaker 2: prison and it's a high profile case like mine was.
Speaker 2: I mean, every day on the news on TV so
Speaker 2: much so Lexus until I swear they had theme music
Speaker 2: like letting you know, after this commercial, here we come there,
Speaker 2: Ali's are coming after this. We're you know, every day
Speaker 2: all day, so you're just being beat down, beat down,
Speaker 2: beat down, and the whole time you want to speak out,
Speaker 2: and the press everywhere you go, outside of our house,
Speaker 2: outside of our school, outside of the business, everywhere, and
Speaker 2: I'm talking about crowded around you like to knock you over,
Speaker 2: you know, like your major star. So now I know
Speaker 2: what it can life. Yeah, yeah, I know what like celebrities,
Speaker 2: why they could annoyed, you know, because you're getting knocked
Speaker 2: and banged or whatever. But it was what they never
Speaker 2: could break was the hole and the regard that Philadelphians
Speaker 2: had for me. When I go back home and Frenchy
Speaker 2: that's my adopted son, he can tell you there are
Speaker 2: thirty forty fifty people in my suite. Okay, just come
Speaker 2: in to see doctor Love. Yeah, Philly Loved. It's it's
Speaker 2: really the it's real. They say brotherly love, but it's
Speaker 2: really the city of sisterly affection too. Now, we got
Speaker 2: some low lives there too, but you know, whoever stole
Speaker 2: my furs, you know and probably re probably redid them
Speaker 2: and you know, cut them up and all that type
Speaker 2: of stuff. But anyway, so they got that.
Speaker 1: But if you're watching our private talk podcasts and those.
Speaker 2: Was a silver fox, another one was a black fox,
Speaker 2: and then there was another one.
Speaker 1: Okay, but it just shows character, like how classless it is,
Speaker 1: like in a time of need, like some one that
Speaker 1: you would think of in your close circle that would
Speaker 1: just like, you know, have access to your home and
Speaker 1: your goods or whatever, and then you like come out
Speaker 1: and you're just like, yeah, that's foul.
Speaker 2: You know. The other thing that that stands out is
Speaker 2: that I remember knowing that I was going to go
Speaker 2: back to prison for a second time, and so I'm
Speaker 2: getting rid of everything in the house and most of
Speaker 2: them giving stuff away. And I remember one of the
Speaker 2: sisters she had a channel bag, one of my chel bags,
Speaker 2: and she said, sister Farida, are you so? Farida is
Speaker 2: my Muslim name? She said, are you sure you want
Speaker 2: to part with this? And I said yeah. And then
Speaker 2: I had a lot of Muslim garbs and k mars
Speaker 2: and stuff like that, and it's like take everything. And
Speaker 2: another sister came up, she said, stop giving all your
Speaker 2: stuff away. You act like you're never coming back. But
Speaker 2: you know what, I knew I was never coming back
Speaker 2: to that life again. I knew that I knew I
Speaker 2: was transitioning into something else.
Speaker 1: That's truthful, that's real.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I knew. I was like it was like the
Speaker 2: spirit prepared me for it. And I just want to
Speaker 2: share something else with you. So I've always been on
Speaker 2: this mission to look like you like, to lose the
Speaker 2: weight and get you know, back in shape like I
Speaker 2: was when I was younger, to look really hot. And
Speaker 2: so I had decided that I'm going to go to
Speaker 2: this I call them fat farms, where you know, they
Speaker 2: go and your exercise and they monitor your food and
Speaker 2: all that. And the school was a private school, but
Speaker 2: it was religious school, and it was always costly every time.
Speaker 2: And it got to the point because I started this
Speaker 2: initiation program where I would take students that didn't have
Speaker 2: any money and we would pay their tuition and then
Speaker 2: I would ask to parents like, Okay, look how much
Speaker 2: can you really afford? Okay? And I started that. Once
Speaker 2: I started, I became assistant director of education, and I
Speaker 2: started a program that really helped kids. And we took
Speaker 2: them from bad neighborhoods or whatever. And ninety nine, i'd
Speaker 2: say point nine percent of them who are going to
Speaker 2: the best colleges in the world Oxford, Yale, Princeton. And
Speaker 2: these are kids from the hood. Okay, not all of them,
Speaker 2: but a lot of them, and a lot of them
Speaker 2: were on their way to reform school. We took them
Speaker 2: and you know, transform them and transform their lives. So
Speaker 2: we had a very good program at the school. So,
Speaker 2: but there was always something going wrong. So because of
Speaker 2: the tuition support program that I started, when I would
Speaker 2: interview them, well, they would say, okay, well I can
Speaker 2: actually forward three hundred a month or whatever. Every year
Speaker 2: it went down because the word got out, if you
Speaker 2: tell miss I'll leave, you won't have nothing. You don't
Speaker 2: have to pay anything. So my husband and I were
Speaker 2: supporting the school, okay, And so I had saved up
Speaker 2: this money. I think it was like about twenty five
Speaker 2: thousand dollars and I was gonna go there for like
Speaker 2: about four weeks. I can't remember exactly the amount, but
Speaker 2: I know it's up in the twenty five thousand, and
Speaker 2: I said, you know this, I'm gonna do something for me.
Speaker 2: I've been neglecting me. I haven't brought anything. I'm gonna
Speaker 2: do this. That day, I get a call from a
Speaker 2: brother Faruke. I get a call from him and he says, uh,
Speaker 2: Sister Farida, I need to talk to you. And I'm
Speaker 2: like what and he says, well, we got a problem.
Speaker 2: The boiler went out, and this and that, and I
Speaker 2: said okay. And I don't remember how much it was,
Speaker 2: but I said, okay, well let's just say twenty five thousand.
Speaker 2: And he said, so what's going to cost? I said,
Speaker 2: let me guess. I said twenty five. He said to me,
Speaker 2: and again I'm not sure they are now he said
Speaker 2: to me, how'd you guess? I just knew. Okay, So
Speaker 2: I get off the phone with him. I said, I'm
Speaker 2: going to go to the bank and get you a
Speaker 2: check or a cash. I think I went to get
Speaker 2: cash and I said meet me because I was at home,
Speaker 2: so I have a his see his see bitch fit.
Speaker 2: I'm like, no, snotty, see god, that's not right. I
Speaker 2: know I'm not the best musclem. I know I'm not
Speaker 2: this or that. But all I want it it's just
Speaker 2: to go somewhere where they keep food food away from
Speaker 2: me and when I could just walk and lose this weight.
Speaker 2: But the Danbury I went to because that's what they say,
Speaker 2: you know, the control your portions. And they talked about
Speaker 2: these rolling hills and it was in a place called
Speaker 2: Hunter in New York. I remember that. And they talked
Speaker 2: about these hills that you can walk and you can
Speaker 2: go to the gym and they have yoga classes and
Speaker 2: all this stuff. And that's what I was crying, like,
Speaker 2: oh I would I didn't realize that that was a prayer.
Speaker 2: It was a demanding prayer. I was demanded that God
Speaker 2: put my fat ass in prison.
Speaker 1: He said, oh, okay, I don't know, but I get
Speaker 1: what you're having.
Speaker 2: So when they when they when they when they found
Speaker 2: me guilty, and the reporters wrote, oh, farrita ali arrogant
Speaker 2: even when she found it, because I just looked up
Speaker 2: and said that God, Oh I get it, I get it.
Speaker 2: But I know, you know, that's not exactly where I
Speaker 2: wanted to go to lose the weight. But that's what
Speaker 2: dan or it's five miles from police. Now. If that's
Speaker 2: not a.
Speaker 1: Big signs though, I'm a big believer, and the energy
Speaker 1: and signs and sometimes whatever the you know what I mean. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that that's that's that's a tough one to like. Kind
Speaker 1: of like the grass, it's the same thing.
Speaker 2: Damberry had the rolling heels and had a path that
Speaker 2: you could walk, Okay, how ironic it was the same
Speaker 2: disc and they monitor your portions.
Speaker 1: I like the way that you think again because of
Speaker 1: you know, such a strong one that you are. You know,
Speaker 1: you get to keep a good like a head on
Speaker 1: your shoulder. You're positive, you're funny. You have this like
Speaker 1: a you know, eccentric thing about you that you just like,
Speaker 1: you know you you just have like this glow about you.
Speaker 1: So I love your energy. It's super fun So having
Speaker 1: going through all of those things, you still have this
Speaker 1: like positive energy going in. How how is your time?
Speaker 1: Like you know, the first time you're going in like
Speaker 1: it was orre you scared? Were you just opening up
Speaker 1: to women? Is it like the whole typical thing like
Speaker 1: Orange of the New Black or Eon? Just like women
Speaker 1: going around being like superly openly like highly sexual, so
Speaker 1: not have girlfriends? Like how did that whole story fit
Speaker 1: for you?
Speaker 2: Well? See, I'm not like a person that judges anybody.
Speaker 2: I'm not. I'm not the sex police. I'm not the
Speaker 2: the alcohol police or the drug police. That's people's choices.
Speaker 2: I'm not. I'm not. You know, I think that's the
Speaker 2: worst thing you can do is judge somebody else and
Speaker 2: you're not in their shoes. Okay, you may not agree
Speaker 2: necessarily agree with what someone does, but I'm not like
Speaker 2: that person that, oh, I'm going to have a heart
Speaker 2: attack or something because of something you're doing. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: one way or the other. And I take people on
Speaker 2: their merit on how they respond to me. Going into
Speaker 2: the federal prison system. It was about as dignified as
Speaker 2: it could be because the judge he he authorized for
Speaker 2: me to self surrender, which meant that I did not
Speaker 2: have to turn myself into and then he also gave
Speaker 2: me like thirty days or how he would have given
Speaker 2: me ninety. But I just wanted to get it over with. Yeah,
Speaker 2: just get it over with. But so it wasn't like
Speaker 2: I was like really afraid because I had a wonderful
Speaker 2: probation officer. Well, they you're on supervised release even before
Speaker 2: you go to prison with the fence. I don't understand
Speaker 2: how that works, but even before you get convicted. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: So he told me, he said, you're gonna be okay
Speaker 2: in there. He said, because the most things that cause
Speaker 2: problem for women in prison, and I don't know if
Speaker 2: that's true for men, but he said, are gambling, sexual,
Speaker 2: you know, lover's quarrels, and it was another one, oh
Speaker 2: bigging up, like lying, you know whatever, because everybody can
Speaker 2: see through. Yeah. Yeah, So I learned a lot, Like
Speaker 2: I learned gay for the stay. I had never heard that.
Speaker 2: I could figure it out because some women that are
Speaker 2: really gay resent women who come and there. They're just
Speaker 2: gay for the stay, so to speak. So when they
Speaker 2: come out, they act like they were never happened. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so they really resent that. That's like, that's like a negative.
Speaker 1: You know, because you're shunning basically the community. You're not
Speaker 1: really respecting it.
Speaker 2: Right exactly, but you're doing it because maybe the person
Speaker 2: that you're involved with can get you some money from
Speaker 2: on their I mean, can get you stuff on their
Speaker 2: commissary or whatever, or maybe you really are attracted to them,
Speaker 2: but yet you're ashamed or maybe you're whatever. So I
Speaker 2: learned about things like that. But going into prison, I
Speaker 2: remember that day. My brother and my couple of sisters
Speaker 2: and my biological sister who's no longer with us, drove
Speaker 2: me up there and it was a real rainy day,
Speaker 2: and they wanted to stay, and because I wanted them
Speaker 2: to go, because I just wanted to get in I
Speaker 2: got to do this, and I don't want.
Speaker 1: To procres ego not ego. But like you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's not a good moment. You know. It's not like
Speaker 1: a vacation, no, you know, so it's like you just
Speaker 1: like you just want to peel the band aid off
Speaker 1: and like this, go home, let me do my thing. Yep,
Speaker 1: I got this.
Speaker 2: Get the fast pain. Well, I'll tell you it didn't.
Speaker 2: It didn't hit me at first. It hit me when
Speaker 2: they left because they're going that way and I'm going
Speaker 2: to it's real, yeah, and it's real. But the CEO said, okay,
Speaker 2: they can stay with you for a while until you
Speaker 2: know we're ready to take you. And they wanted to
Speaker 2: stay till the last minute, but I wanted them to
Speaker 2: go because I turned my back as they left. I
Speaker 2: didn't want to see them go. So they left and
Speaker 2: then I'm sitting there and shortly after I'm seeing and
Speaker 2: sitting there, the CEO comes and gets me, and I'm
Speaker 2: thinking they're going to handcuff me, but they didn't, and
Speaker 2: she takes me back. Now, the worst thing for me
Speaker 2: was having a non professional do a cavity search on me.
Speaker 2: You know, I thought it was bad enough when you
Speaker 2: reach all around in my mouth and win in my
Speaker 2: hair to see if there was weave, as if some
Speaker 2: women can and achieved without weave, like everybody has to
Speaker 2: have a weave in because they want to take your
Speaker 2: braids out or whatever you have, Like yeah so that yeah,
Speaker 2: so yeah. And then to strip down in front of
Speaker 2: other women, which I had never had to do experience, yeah,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: And again not having a parking violation, not having any
Speaker 1: of these things, and it's like, why.
Speaker 2: Me exactly exactly, So I knew that I was there,
Speaker 2: but it was still kind of like outer body experience,
Speaker 2: like it was really happening with.
Speaker 1: So you're going through the motions.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah. So then they give you a bag with
Speaker 2: these dingy pillow case with dingy looks disgusting, an army
Speaker 2: blanket and tell you to head up the hill. I
Speaker 2: didn't know where the hell I was going. I get there,
Speaker 2: and I go up to the hill and then I
Speaker 2: get inside and the women are so nice, the inmates,
Speaker 2: they tell me where to go. Okay, but when I
Speaker 2: got there, they already knew who I was. High profile people,
Speaker 2: they knew when I was coming in. There was a
Speaker 2: woman she said I couldn't see because she was standing
Speaker 2: in front of a window that had light and she
Speaker 2: was up on a platform. So I'm coming in and
Speaker 2: she said to me, Hey, for Rita Ali, I'm looking.
Speaker 2: I can't make out and on like you know me?
Speaker 2: She said, no, everybody knows who you are. You've been
Speaker 2: waiting on you. I'm thinking, like, waiting on me for what?
Speaker 2: Like shoot, yeah, yeah, what the hell, y'all? What you
Speaker 2: wait on me for? But you know, later you find out.
Speaker 2: And so then you gotta there's a line for everything.
Speaker 2: You gotta line up to go to the councilor and
Speaker 2: line up to go to whatever. So you're going through
Speaker 2: all that. So that whole day you're getting processed in
Speaker 2: and you're getting your garments, you know, your prison stuff,
Speaker 2: and so by the end of the day you're pretty
Speaker 2: much exhausted. That first day, you know, when it hit me.
Speaker 2: You're in a dorm. They turned the lights out, but
Speaker 2: the whole lights are on, and the dorm is like
Speaker 2: a fish bowl like they call it, because it's all glass,
Speaker 2: so that you could see inside, and the light was
Speaker 2: shining in and I'm on the bottom bunk and there's
Speaker 2: another woman on top of me, and two women in
Speaker 2: the bunk here and two women there, so there's six
Speaker 2: women all together. Alexis. When it hit me was when
Speaker 2: the lights went out, and all of a sudden, I said,
Speaker 2: oh my god, I'm really in prison. I felt my heart,
Speaker 2: my chest, I felt the weight of knowing that this
Speaker 2: is real. I got to be here. Yeah, I'm away
Speaker 2: from everyone that loves me and everyone that I love,
Speaker 2: and I have to be here in this place. And
Speaker 2: I know that I was looking at probably less than
Speaker 2: twenty four months. But to think that I would have
Speaker 2: to endure this for all this time, that was like
Speaker 2: the absolute.
Speaker 1: That's heavy, heavy for me.
Speaker 2: So I didn't want to be weak. But my eyes
Speaker 2: start dwelling, and then you know, my nose start. So
Speaker 2: I turned and I faced the wall and I let
Speaker 2: the tears, just crying, you know. And I'm like kind
Speaker 2: of feeling sorry for myself and feeling like bad and
Speaker 2: like this is so wrong. Why they do this to me?
Speaker 2: I'm a good person. And then all of a sudden
Speaker 2: something in my head said, Nope, don't do it. Don't
Speaker 2: give them not another tear. The only thing that you've
Speaker 2: got to give these mother e fis is time give
Speaker 2: them their time, But how you give it, that's your power.
Speaker 2: And I took my power for that that day and
Speaker 2: I never gave them another tear.
Speaker 1: I love that. That's real. That's like, that's the really
Speaker 1: honest answer. And that's a you know, you know, you
Speaker 1: give you show your weakness on other things and not
Speaker 1: weakness because it makes you weak to cry. But in
Speaker 1: those environments, it's like, you know, it's fight or flight.
Speaker 1: You know, you have to like figure out how to
Speaker 1: you know, survive and yeah, you know, put your head
Speaker 1: down to your time and let's just you know what
Speaker 1: it is. Yeah, So again I think that your journey is,
Speaker 1: you know, definitely a powerful thing. I look forward to
Speaker 1: your book. I think all my listeners out there are
Speaker 1: going to enjoy it as well. You you also are
Speaker 1: doing a podcast. Can we talk about that? Yeah?
Speaker 2: The podcast is it's based off of We Two Matter,
Speaker 2: which is an organization and nonprofit that I found it
Speaker 2: for to help women reacclement into society who have been incarcerated.
Speaker 2: And it's not just only for women, because when you
Speaker 2: help women, they have families, so their sons are impacted
Speaker 2: by their mothers going to prison. There's a story about
Speaker 2: one person he's married to my granddaughter, and his mother
Speaker 2: went to prison and for a long time now he
Speaker 2: became a doctor. But there are other stories where other
Speaker 2: people their mother went to prison because she's the hub.
Speaker 2: She's the hub, she keeps that family together, and they
Speaker 2: go the opposite way. So when you help women reacclement
Speaker 2: into society, you help society at large. And that the
Speaker 2: realization of being incarcerated with women and seeing women shackled
Speaker 2: and having babies and have to be changed to beds
Speaker 2: and stuff while they're in labor, and just hearing stories
Speaker 2: like I didn't see anybody in the hospital because you
Speaker 2: don't you don't go, but you hear stories, horror stories,
Speaker 2: and knowing that male CEOs rape women and you know,
Speaker 2: and just knowing those horrific things that happen to them.
Speaker 2: And then they come out. And when you give someone
Speaker 2: a fellon record, you give them a life sentence. It's
Speaker 2: a social life sentence. They're sentenced to that degradation, that
Speaker 2: stigma of being a low life. They're not worthy of anything.
Speaker 2: So now you're going to take everything from them, especially
Speaker 2: the FEDS. They take everything like we lost our house,
Speaker 2: we lost ever because what they don't take if they
Speaker 2: don't have the power to take it, they make sure
Speaker 2: you have no funds to keep it okay, and you
Speaker 2: have to pay an enormous amount to a lawyer for
Speaker 2: a federal thing. So when the women come out and
Speaker 2: there's some are we smart, skilled women, And I look
Speaker 2: at all of the things that you know, lots of
Speaker 2: people that are doing for criminal justice. But for me,
Speaker 2: as a senior citizen, it just seems like everything is
Speaker 2: geared towards younger people the focus. I'm not saying that
Speaker 2: there are not people that are elderly that are in help,
Speaker 2: but I know myself, like I'm healthy, but I was
Speaker 2: in there. I saw a woman die in prison for
Speaker 2: no reason other than that they didn't want to give
Speaker 2: her her proper medicine. And she told me, she said,
Speaker 2: I'm going to die in here. They're not giving me.
Speaker 2: I'm a nurse and I know that they're not. And
Speaker 2: she was only in there because she kept her husband's
Speaker 2: social Security checks after he died for six months. So
Speaker 2: you put someone at seventy some years old in prison
Speaker 2: for that, I mean, come on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, doesn't make sense. Yeah, it doesn't make sense. It
Speaker 1: doesn't justify the crimes and.
Speaker 2: They have to die in prison, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's kind of a point where I feel like, again,
Speaker 1: I think, you know, our education is key about by
Speaker 1: communicating and telling stories and all these things like because
Speaker 1: people don't people see it on TV and movies and
Speaker 1: like that. But until it happens to someone who's personally
Speaker 1: in your family that you can touch or you can
Speaker 1: have it, like, it really makes something that you pulls
Speaker 1: on your heart strings and if you know that person
Speaker 1: or not, but it just like that's when it like
Speaker 1: takes an effect and like it makes it real exact,
Speaker 1: and it makes it like, oh damn, this could happen
Speaker 1: to anybody, you know what I mean. And that's the
Speaker 1: sad truth. And and it's unfortunate that you know that
Speaker 1: the system has been the you know, taking advantage I
Speaker 1: feel like, of our taxpayers moneies and things like that,
Speaker 1: and not really putting it and implementing it, implementing it
Speaker 1: into the right places. Because again, if you are going
Speaker 1: to try somebody for a crime and maybe they did it,
Speaker 1: and maybe they didn't or doesn't you know the magnitude
Speaker 1: of what the years or whatever, they still should be
Speaker 1: able to have their medication still be able to have,
Speaker 1: you know, certain things that are just normal human human,
Speaker 1: humane things, you know, So it's it's it's a shame.
Speaker 1: So I'm happy that you're you know, bringing light to
Speaker 1: something a subject that needs to be you know, talked
Speaker 1: about more and have more people behind that movement, because
Speaker 1: that's the only way that make a change, is right,
Speaker 1: you know, having people push it. So using your platform
Speaker 1: and again you know doing that stuff is really an
Speaker 1: awesome thing.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, not to cut you off, but that's why,
Speaker 2: I mean, I am just so odd odd that you,
Speaker 2: you know, a person of your stature, you know, have
Speaker 2: a humongous following, that you would take this on and
Speaker 2: interview me, because this is going to reach a lot
Speaker 2: more people than just I could have reached on my own,
Speaker 2: because there are a lot of people who wouldn't want
Speaker 2: to touch this because it didn't happen to them for sure.
Speaker 2: And for you, like you don't need this, Okay.
Speaker 1: Yes I do, well, yes I do read because you care,
Speaker 1: Yes I do.
Speaker 2: You care, But I'm saying it's not going to do
Speaker 2: anything to build your platform. You know, you're helping me
Speaker 2: and these women and the seniors. You're bringing a voice
Speaker 2: to it. You know, and this is a big deal.
Speaker 2: It's a big deal. Like you're modest, but this is
Speaker 2: a big deal. You're like a really good person. And
Speaker 2: I got a chance to see you up close, and
Speaker 2: I got a chance to touch you and feel your energy,
Speaker 2: you know, and I watched your interviews. I mean you're
Speaker 2: a real person. Thank you you are. I mean, you're real.
Speaker 2: You have an orr about you that it's what they
Speaker 2: call personal magnitude. Some people have it, some people have
Speaker 2: a lot, but you you zube it. I mean, you
Speaker 2: just it just flows. So I can't thank you enough
Speaker 2: for helping me bring light to it. And when you
Speaker 2: ask me about the podcast, that's what it's foul because
Speaker 2: I want to put a face to these people. Telling
Speaker 2: the story is one thing, but you saw those women, Yeah,
Speaker 2: telling the story and seeing them these.
Speaker 1: Are real it makes an impact way more. Yes, it
Speaker 1: definitely puts, you know, a face to a name you know,
Speaker 1: or a name to a face that way. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that you know, I you know, appreciate the
Speaker 1: kind of words. I think that you know, it's really
Speaker 1: humbling to hear that from such a you know, amazing
Speaker 1: woman like yourself. I think that you know, women you
Speaker 1: need to help women with anything that we do in
Speaker 1: using our platform, So I think that we equally help
Speaker 1: each other because I like to educate people in my
Speaker 1: private you know, private talk is about learning more about
Speaker 1: you know, our guests and myself and just kind of
Speaker 1: like opening the platform of knowing things. So as much
Speaker 1: as I feel like it may not matter to me
Speaker 1: to a point, it does still matter to me and
Speaker 1: my listeners. So I think that I think that it'll
Speaker 1: have a message across and like kind of bring light
Speaker 1: to such a big problem that we have. So I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's because I think, like I said, I may not
Speaker 1: I didn't really know it as much as in detail,
Speaker 1: and when I was asked, you know, if to have
Speaker 1: you come on the show, I didn't really know what
Speaker 1: we would talk about our things like that. But again,
Speaker 1: I like to educate myself and I don't like to
Speaker 1: pigeonhole myself in one facet of life. And that's why
Speaker 1: I kind of I toasted this podcast as well as
Speaker 1: you know, I've never had a chance to get my voice,
Speaker 1: you know, across in a way where it's like opinionated
Speaker 1: things where that really matter on big topics such as this,
Speaker 1: You know. So I think that it helps me just
Speaker 1: as much as it helps you to talk to people
Speaker 1: like yourself with such big goals and then you're out
Speaker 1: here and not just having those goals, you're delivering them
Speaker 1: and doing them. So I think it gives such a
Speaker 1: bigger meaning to all these women out there that look
Speaker 1: up to you. Do you have? Who are people that
Speaker 1: you you know inspired you to meet? You know you
Speaker 1: as strong as you are and have done all these
Speaker 1: accolades that you've done well.
Speaker 2: My mother, for one thing, I get my kindness for
Speaker 2: my mother. My mother was a nice lady on the block,
Speaker 2: baking cookies for everybody. I hated it because there were
Speaker 2: never enough cookies left for me, but I did I
Speaker 2: hate it. You'd always give them the popsicles and everything everybody.
Speaker 2: And now I've become mom, Like I've got all these Yeah,
Speaker 2: I don't bake on my bio, but get them some
Speaker 2: kind of way. But but I've become her in that respect.
Speaker 2: But I've got my father's zill Like I've never been
Speaker 2: a chump. Okay, like I'm just too big for somebody
Speaker 2: think they're gonna be slack in me taking my lunch money.
Speaker 2: It just ain't gonna happen, okay. And I come from
Speaker 2: an area of Germantown where they call them the Germantown
Speaker 2: like brights. They mean it as a derogatory uh thing.
Speaker 2: People who say that it's like light complexed women with
Speaker 2: long hair or girls as we were. And like some
Speaker 2: of the bullies, girls that were bullies, they wouldn't. They
Speaker 2: had this thing when we were younger. They want to
Speaker 2: cut your hair, but they would say not her. You know,
Speaker 2: you ain't cutting my hair. You're not touching me. Because
Speaker 2: it's not about how well you can fight, because I'm
Speaker 2: not a fighter, but it's also whether we're not. You will,
Speaker 2: and that's what the bullies understand, is what you will.
Speaker 2: And there's like a funny story about prison. When I
Speaker 2: went to prison, I didn't know what to expect, and
Speaker 2: they had some young ones in there that were a
Speaker 2: little wild and stuff like that, and I said, you know,
Speaker 2: nobody's gonna be going around talking about they willed miss
Speaker 2: Ali's ass. That's just not gonna happen. Now they might
Speaker 2: say it, but you're would see a knot on their
Speaker 2: head or something. So the first thing I did, no
Speaker 2: one told me, I took a pair of socks, and
Speaker 2: I went outside and they had these little rocks, so
Speaker 2: little stones, and I put them so that was my weapon.
Speaker 2: But then, you know, prison makes you wise. I got
Speaker 2: real slick. I brought several locks, combination locks, and I
Speaker 2: had about six of them. And I said, anybody that
Speaker 2: think they're going to hit miss Allie? And I was
Speaker 2: like fifty five years old when I went to prison,
Speaker 2: and they think that I'm gonna tear their ass up
Speaker 2: with this sock.
Speaker 1: So did you ever have to use those those locks?
Speaker 2: Almost did? Almost did. I almost did. I almost did,
Speaker 2: but the girl got away. She got away. She called
Speaker 2: me an old bitch and threw my shoes back in
Speaker 2: the door. And then I was accused of being a
Speaker 2: lesbian because I loaned through these shoes she didn't have anything,
Speaker 2: and then she was going to check them with her,
Speaker 2: and then I said, no, you can't take them with you.
Speaker 2: Their mine. You gave them to I said, no, I
Speaker 2: loan them to you. So she's like, no, you gave
Speaker 2: them to me. I'm like, okay, just leave them. Because
Speaker 2: she was leaving the next day, going to another prison,
Speaker 2: and so she leaves and she's young. I guess am
Speaker 2: about like in her thirties. And so she leaves out,
Speaker 2: and she slams the door and she goes out and
Speaker 2: go whoa, she's mad. Then she swings the door back
Speaker 2: open and tosses the sneakers back in the room. Well, sneakers,
Speaker 2: you can tell I'm old. I guess y'all call something
Speaker 2: else's tennis shoes whatever. So she throws them back and said,
Speaker 2: keep your sneakers, your old bitch that ham kissed me off.
Speaker 2: I didn't even go for the sock. I didn't even
Speaker 2: go for my right. I jumped up. I went after her,
Speaker 2: and they grabbed me, and I says, old bitch, maybe
Speaker 2: you gotta bring your young ass back here, and I'm
Speaker 2: gonna tear it up when you get back here. Wat. Yeah.
Speaker 2: But anyway, I didn't get written up because the COO
Speaker 2: knew me and she liked me. She was like, she
Speaker 2: knew I'd never caused any problem. So the next day
Speaker 2: she brings the captain or the lieutenant and this guy, really,
Speaker 2: I swear he was a Caucasian with red hair. He
Speaker 2: looked like the lepardhunkkn in the hood behind the desk.
Speaker 2: I thought he was so short. I thought he was sitting,
Speaker 2: but he was actually standing, and so I come in.
Speaker 2: He says, all right, all right, let's let's let's just
Speaker 2: cut to the chase. I know what happened here. You
Speaker 2: guys had a lover's quarrel. You're a lesbian, and she
Speaker 2: took off with somebody young. You gave her those sneakers.
Speaker 1: I could not you clutched those pearls girls.
Speaker 2: I couldn't believe it. I was like, a lesbian, I'm
Speaker 2: not a lesbian. Yeah you are, Yeah you are. You're
Speaker 2: must be. No, he said, I see this all the time,
Speaker 2: the old ones you've been here. That was the first time.
Speaker 2: I'm like, well I am old. I didn't because I'm
Speaker 2: still thinking, okay, I'm flying. Yeah yeah. And so I
Speaker 2: was so mad at him, like not for accusing me
Speaker 2: of being a lesbian, which I wasn't, but just the
Speaker 2: fact that that's the only reason that someone could have.
Speaker 1: A quarrel or all about it. That's how you did
Speaker 1: you have any female its like, hey give advances towards
Speaker 1: you because you know you're such a know did they
Speaker 1: just know? Again? Like from being on the blocks you
Speaker 1: like being a kid goes back like, no, I was.
Speaker 2: The mom Okay, yeah, because most of them were younger.
Speaker 2: There were I think about maybe five women in there
Speaker 2: that were about my age or older. I was like
Speaker 2: fifty five fifty seven something like that, and there was
Speaker 2: one woman in there that was my age, and then
Speaker 2: the couple of other ones that were like in their seventies. Basically,
Speaker 2: I have to say that I was treated with respect,
Speaker 2: and the girl who threw the sneakers, the next day
Speaker 2: she came and apologized, you know, and I let it
Speaker 2: go because a lot of the women had come from
Speaker 2: d C, and some of them had AIDS, not because
Speaker 2: they came from d C. But d C doesn't have
Speaker 2: a federal prison. I mean, well, DC has a their prison.
Speaker 2: Is they go to federal prison because it's a district
Speaker 2: of Yeah, it's acause they don't go to the state. They
Speaker 2: go to federal prison. And a lot of them were
Speaker 2: just on drugs, you know. And again a lot of
Speaker 2: women are in there because of men. Okay, And I'm
Speaker 2: not I love men. I'm not casting disparity against them,
Speaker 2: but I just think, you know, baby daddies, y'all need
Speaker 2: to stick with the women, okay, or you know, guys
Speaker 2: just go ghosts on women. So quick, and women are riding. Yeah,
Speaker 2: women are ride or die. Okay, most women, Okay, they're
Speaker 2: gonna wait, they're coming, They're putting money on your commissary,
Speaker 2: They're bringing your kids to see you. Women visiting rooms
Speaker 2: are not packed like men. Okay, maybe some maybe smaller
Speaker 2: venues and whatever. But to hear the women, the moans
Speaker 2: or cries, the stories, I mean, what more are you
Speaker 2: gonna do to them? And then they come out of life,
Speaker 2: they come out of prison, they do their time, and
Speaker 2: they can't be made whole again because the federal government
Speaker 2: or the state has this stigma on them that you're
Speaker 2: a convicted felon, which is like you might as well
Speaker 2: wear it on your head worthless.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So that's what the We Two Matter is all about.
Speaker 2: And that's what I hope that the book helps to
Speaker 2: generate some more interest in my story. But my story
Speaker 2: pales compared to some of the things that these women
Speaker 2: have gone through. One of the women that I told
Speaker 2: you about that was the first woman that said to me, Hey,
Speaker 2: for Rita Ali. She had been in there and she
Speaker 2: was doing like twenty she was like eighteen to twenty
Speaker 2: years in when I was just coming in to do
Speaker 2: like two years and she's out now, but she did
Speaker 2: like thirty years. She'll never have a baby. And it
Speaker 2: was a first offense.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it was a.
Speaker 2: First offense, So how can you do that? Also, like
Speaker 2: the visiting room when I would go to the visiting
Speaker 2: room and see the few women who I have never seen,
Speaker 2: but one man that brought an inmate's children to see them.
Speaker 2: And that was one of the girls that was in
Speaker 2: my in my dorm, her boys. She was young, pretty,
Speaker 2: and her husband brought her two daughters. But to see
Speaker 2: those babies, the little hands being pride off of their mothers,
Speaker 2: and I you know, oh.
Speaker 1: That yeah, I just only imagine that's that's a tough fun.
Speaker 2: You know. It just has to be a better way.
Speaker 2: You know, it has to be a better way. And
Speaker 2: you know, like uh fan John Jones and Donald Trump
Speaker 2: and jaredt they're not doing everything with that first act.
Speaker 2: It doesn't cover everything. But you got to give credit
Speaker 2: where credit is due. I mean, that helped a lot
Speaker 2: of people. I think it's like more than seven thousand
Speaker 2: people got released early. Okay, so it maybe baby steps.
Speaker 1: But it steps, but it's doing forward right, and that's
Speaker 1: the right most we can start doing this again why
Speaker 1: I pray or I pray the whole podcast on like
Speaker 1: educating people and knowledge just power. You know, the more
Speaker 1: knowledge that we have, the more that we can make
Speaker 1: a difference, the more that we may be, you know,
Speaker 1: touching somebody out there that will you know, either tune
Speaker 1: in watch your book or listen to your book and
Speaker 1: do you know and make a difference and maybe it,
Speaker 1: you know, speaks to them in a way that we
Speaker 1: don't know or wouldn't know that it wouldn't if you
Speaker 1: could never spoke to speak about it. So you know,
Speaker 1: I appreciate your honesty, your truth. I feel like it's
Speaker 1: a heavy message, but it definitely needs to be spoken
Speaker 1: about and a lot of things because again knowledge is power,
Speaker 1: and I feel like it's it's a big it's a
Speaker 1: big thing that we need to talk about it. With relationships,
Speaker 1: how did you know after being incarcerated and coming out,
Speaker 1: how did your relationship with your husband did it? Do
Speaker 1: you feel like the incarceration kind of had an effect
Speaker 1: on you guys not being together or how do you
Speaker 1: how did that happen? And with like the relationship, we.
Speaker 2: Were just separated between space, but I truly loved him,
Speaker 2: and he truly loved me, and there's no time or
Speaker 2: space or distance that changed that. Because I guess too,
Speaker 2: I was already mature and he was mature. So my
Speaker 2: husband's his strength, like he strengthened me. Like I remember
Speaker 2: once I was at a picnic or something with him,
Speaker 2: and I'm like the person that goes to the barbecue
Speaker 2: to cooker. I have to have everything, so I may
Speaker 2: not need the whole hot dog, but I got to
Speaker 2: have half of them. Bit. Yeah. So I had just
Speaker 2: loaded myself with food this day, and the potatoes, salad
Speaker 2: and the hot dogs and the hamburger and everything, but
Speaker 2: like I said, I only take parts of it. I
Speaker 2: was so full. But then it kept it got dark,
Speaker 2: and it kept feeling like something was biting me and
Speaker 2: all over me just kept going. So all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: I started feeling really really sick, and I said to
Speaker 2: my husband, I said, I'm feeling really bad. And a
Speaker 2: few minutes went by and I said, no, I really
Speaker 2: feel sick, like I need to go to hospital. He said,
Speaker 2: you feel that bad all of a sudden, Like see,
Speaker 2: it felt like my legs were like lead and I
Speaker 2: only had to walk the distance which i'd say maybe
Speaker 2: about thirty feet down the driveway through the car. By
Speaker 2: the time I got in a car, I said to
Speaker 2: my husband, I'm dying. He said, you feel that, pad
Speaker 2: and I must have passed out because then I remember
Speaker 2: waking up. I hear because he stopped in front of
Speaker 2: my daughter in law's house and I could hear her
Speaker 2: voice saying mo Ma. They sounded like she was way
Speaker 2: far away, and then it got closer because I was,
Speaker 2: I guess I was coming more conscious, and he had
Speaker 2: me sitting out of the side of the car, slumped
Speaker 2: over like that and vomiting. When vomit was just coming out.
Speaker 2: So when I get to the hospital, the doctor's I
Speaker 2: was going into anthrophylactic shop. Something bit me multiple times,
Speaker 2: or more than one insect bit me, and the doctor said,
Speaker 2: what saved my life was that I threw it up
Speaker 2: so the poison stopped. But I remember when I said
Speaker 2: to my husband, I'm dying, and I remember this, he said,
Speaker 2: just surrender, surrender your will to God. You'll be okay.
Speaker 2: And from that only on I was able to process
Speaker 2: trial trials and tribulations in a tool let go yeah,
Speaker 2: in a totally different way. It's like with the FEDS.
Speaker 2: What was I gonna do? Okay, the only thing that
Speaker 2: I knew that I had power over, which is a
Speaker 2: great power. And that's what people have to understand. I
Speaker 2: couldn't impact them or what they thought or what they felt,
Speaker 2: and I couldn't do anything about the sentence. I mean,
Speaker 2: I could have went on the run, but that would
Speaker 2: have been stupid. I had to do the time. But
Speaker 2: how I did the time, that was my And if
Speaker 2: I can give that message to anyone to let them
Speaker 2: know that you control how you allow something to impact you. Okay.
Speaker 2: Now I didn't suffer in prison. It was humiliating. Okay,
Speaker 2: it was hurtful. It was me, but I got through
Speaker 2: it because I was determined that I'm going to control
Speaker 2: my message to my sorrows, my soul in my heart.
Speaker 2: I have the power to not allow this to destroy me,
Speaker 2: because it's almost like, not almost, some of the evil
Speaker 2: people in law enforcement, and not all of them. I'm
Speaker 2: meant a lot of good people in law enforcement, but
Speaker 2: some of the evil people don't belong there because they're
Speaker 2: not just about a prosecution. They're about a persecute execution. Okay.
Speaker 2: They want to break everything about a person and leave
Speaker 2: you with nothing, okay, and that doesn't help society. Do
Speaker 2: you want to just strip a person.
Speaker 1: Of everything makes it worse?
Speaker 2: Yeah, And what I would like to see and hope
Speaker 2: that the President, the Congress and the Senate and all
Speaker 2: of them, they need to wipe away these fellon records.
Speaker 2: They need to expunge people's records once they've done their time.
Speaker 2: That's doing more time, you know. And it's just not fair.
Speaker 2: You're going to arrest somebody, you put them in prison,
Speaker 2: you make them pay restitution, and then you still give
Speaker 2: them a fellon record for the rest their life.
Speaker 1: That's right, private talk. I hope you're liking subscribing and
Speaker 1: comment on this episode. I hope you have been educated
Speaker 1: like I have been. I love your message. I love
Speaker 1: your powerful like you just have a powerful presence about you.
Speaker 1: So I really feel like your message is going to
Speaker 1: get across to a lot of people, and I think
Speaker 1: that it'll help a lot of people as well. So
Speaker 1: we're going to take a little bit of a break, guys.
Speaker 1: All right, we're back and we're about to put miss
Speaker 1: taxes on the hot seats. So do you have any
Speaker 1: questions for me, Doctor Rita?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd like to know where you draw your strength
Speaker 2: from being the profession that you were in, and how
Speaker 2: certain people who are much more righteous than us have
Speaker 2: their opinions about you and people who do you know
Speaker 2: things that they feel are whatever. Where did you draw
Speaker 2: your strength from so that you would be able to
Speaker 2: let people know it's our right to be who you are,
Speaker 2: and you know people with that because people are suffering,
Speaker 2: whether they're gay, whether they're whatever, poor people have issues.
Speaker 2: So where did you draw and where do you draw
Speaker 2: your strength from? And how were you able to come
Speaker 2: to terms with that? You wanted to share this and
Speaker 2: put the kind of knowledge out there that would be
Speaker 2: so helpful as it has been to other people.
Speaker 1: Good question. I feel like I can really only attest
Speaker 1: to like the way I was raised and like the
Speaker 1: support system of like how the structure of my family is,
Speaker 1: and being like I've just been. We were always very
Speaker 1: open and honest and you know, I'm kind of like
Speaker 1: a straight shooter. I just tell it how it is,
Speaker 1: and that's kind of like how I was raised as well.
Speaker 1: So for me, it's like I, you know, like we
Speaker 1: were talking about earlier, I'm like, you can't do something
Speaker 1: wrong when it's your own niche or your own thing.
Speaker 1: So it's like I just kind of like, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes I may stumble, sometimes I may fall, but I
Speaker 1: also come back and try it again and do it
Speaker 1: ten times harder the next time. So I feel like
Speaker 1: my mom was really inspiring and showed me that, you know,
Speaker 1: never to give up, never to rely on someone else
Speaker 1: to do something for you a man or a woman,
Speaker 1: and just to really, like, you know, live in your
Speaker 1: own truth. So I kind of feel like I abide
Speaker 1: by those rules, and you know, I kind of stuck
Speaker 1: with that, and you know, it hasn't always been easy.
Speaker 1: I've gotten a lot of ridicule from, you know, decisions
Speaker 1: that I've chosen to make, you know, when I was
Speaker 1: in the adult entertainment business. But I feel like all
Speaker 1: of those choices that I made made me who I
Speaker 1: am today, and it doesn't define me. It's just a
Speaker 1: part of who I am and a part of my journey.
Speaker 1: So I feel like, you know, with all those things
Speaker 1: I've I've always been very confident as a woman and
Speaker 1: in my own skin. I've never been the skinniest girl.
Speaker 1: I've never been you know, the prettiest or this or that.
Speaker 1: But you know, I've always just been me, and I
Speaker 1: feel like, you know, I found truth in that, and
Speaker 1: I feel like I've just I'm just comfortable in my
Speaker 1: own skin. So I feel like a lot of that
Speaker 1: I can really only attest to my parents and the
Speaker 1: upbringing that I kind of was around my whole life.
Speaker 2: And the other question is what message would you give
Speaker 2: two young women who are struggling with accepting who they are,
Speaker 2: whether it be that they're gay, or whether it be
Speaker 2: that they don't feel comfortable with their body, their shapes,
Speaker 2: or they don't like their hair, or what what message
Speaker 2: do you have for women who just struggle with their
Speaker 2: physical self identity.
Speaker 1: I think the biggest message that I could give is
Speaker 1: that I live is to each his oone. What works
Speaker 1: for me doesn't work for everybody else. And so it's like,
Speaker 1: as long as you are comfortable and you can sleep
Speaker 1: every day, you know, at night, and lay your head
Speaker 1: down and go to sleep, then that's completely fine. I
Speaker 1: feel like, you know, you have to work, like, you
Speaker 1: have to live in your own truth. You have to
Speaker 1: do what works for you, and you know, even with
Speaker 1: you know this with my brand, and it's something completely
Speaker 1: different that I haven't done before. But it's still on
Speaker 1: brand with what I'm doing because it ties in, you know,
Speaker 1: with everyday conversations with all like walks of life with people.
Speaker 1: So I feel like, stick with what you know, what
Speaker 1: you really want, set your goals high, and you know,
Speaker 1: keep striving to be the best.
Speaker 2: Yeah,