Speaker 1: By Bill Cunningham, the great American. Of course, News Nation
Speaker 1: is the source I use pot often for objective news
Speaker 1: and coverages of one pipe or another. And Natasha Zuvez
Speaker 1: is one of their great reporters. She's a broadcaster. She's
Speaker 1: also three times won Emmy Awards for independent journalism and
Speaker 1: things of that character, et cetera. And of course many
Speaker 1: issues are percolating, including what's happening with the tariffs, and
Speaker 1: what's happening with trent To Ragua, TDA, et cetera. But
Speaker 1: in addition to that, Natasha has a new podcast out
Speaker 1: called Truth of the Matter, and there's a fantastic story
Speaker 1: posted relative to a Golden gate Bridge suicide that resulted
Speaker 1: in the attempted suicide not occurring, and Natasha Zuvez once again,
Speaker 1: welcome to the Bill Cunningham Show. Natasha tell us the
Speaker 1: story because I know San Francisco's Golden gate Bridge is
Speaker 1: this side of just so many suicides, persons that have
Speaker 1: lost any reason to live. So tell the American people
Speaker 1: about this, about this person that jumped off the bridge
Speaker 1: and survived.
Speaker 2: Bill. It's an incredible story. It's great to be on
Speaker 2: with you again, and it's posted right now as you
Speaker 2: said on the All the New podcast The Truth of
Speaker 2: the Matter, This is a man by the name of
Speaker 2: Kevin Hines, and he was nineteen years old when he
Speaker 2: said at the time, he thought he was his family's
Speaker 2: greatest burden. He thought he was youth. Of course, nothing
Speaker 2: could have been further from the truth. He was so loved,
Speaker 2: but he headed to the Golden Gate Bridge, like far
Speaker 2: too many others, with the intention to die by suicide
Speaker 2: that day. And he says, you know, his dad could
Speaker 2: sense something was wrong that morning, but he hit it all.
Speaker 2: He told his daughter he was fine, and you know,
Speaker 2: his dad dropped him off at City College in San Francisco,
Speaker 2: and Kevin says he remembers thinking, as my dad drove
Speaker 2: away us, the last time I'll ever see someone I love,
Speaker 2: and that's the last time anybody I love will ever
Speaker 2: see me. But he truly thought the world and his
Speaker 2: family would be better off without him. He made a
Speaker 2: pact with himself bill which Kevin says he's now an
Speaker 2: advocate who has helped thousands and thousands of people who
Speaker 2: grapple with mental health issues. He says he made a
Speaker 2: pass like people often do who are making these kinds
Speaker 2: of plans, and he said, if one person says, are
Speaker 2: you okay? Is something wrong? Or can I help you?
Speaker 2: I was going to tell them everything and beg them
Speaker 2: to help me. And so he took the bus. He
Speaker 2: withdrew from his classes, took the bus openly crying on
Speaker 2: the way to the bridge. Nineteen year old kid. He
Speaker 2: spends forty minutes on the bridge, tears streaming down his face,
Speaker 2: and then one person finally approaches him, a tourist, he says,
Speaker 2: with curly blonde hair. She smiles at him and says,
Speaker 2: will you take my picture? He takes her photo and
Speaker 2: catapults off the bridge, and that's just where the story
Speaker 2: begins built because he's overcome with overwhelming regrets the moment
Speaker 2: he does this. He follows two hundred and twenty three
Speaker 2: feet likely hits the water at seventy five miles an hour.
Speaker 2: It's like hitting concrete going in a car, a three
Speaker 2: to four second fall. And as he's following, all he's
Speaker 2: thinking is what have I just done? I don't want
Speaker 2: to die. God sees save me and he hits the
Speaker 2: water and Bill what happens next? Even for me, someone
Speaker 2: who's been in the business a while and done some
Speaker 2: grizzly investigations. I couldn't believe it until we found the proof.
Speaker 1: What is well, First of all, before we get to
Speaker 1: the prove, Natasha, give us a little bit of the
Speaker 1: social history of Kevin Hines nineteen years old. So many
Speaker 1: young Americans today appear to be lost, hard to get work,
Speaker 1: hard to find work, difficult to go to college, live
Speaker 1: in their parents' basement, live in their parents' house, difficult era. Well,
Speaker 1: what led him to the point of jumping off the
Speaker 1: Golden Gate Bridge.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he suffered from mental health issues for sure. But
Speaker 2: you know, he talked about something today which I think
Speaker 2: is so important, which is he said, we are so
Speaker 2: disconnected from one another. You know, he was a young
Speaker 2: kid when this happened. Everybody is on their phones now,
Speaker 2: and this happened even before smartphones took over. But he
Speaker 2: was like, we need to just look up at one
Speaker 2: another these days. I mean, you could be on a
Speaker 2: bus going all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge
Speaker 2: and a nineteen year old and I've he photos of
Speaker 2: him at that time. Bill, he looks like a kid,
Speaker 2: he looks like a little boy and openly crying, and
Speaker 2: not a single person would look up from their phone
Speaker 2: these days, and notice that anything is going on. We
Speaker 2: need the social network, the community. The fabric is broken.
Speaker 2: And you are right. We are in a situation today.
Speaker 2: We're increasing. I mean, mental health has never been worse
Speaker 2: among our young people. They are sucked into their phones early.
Speaker 2: There are so many social issues, you know, the microplastics
Speaker 2: in their brain. Honestly, the list goes on. It's a
Speaker 2: hard time to be a young person in this country.
Speaker 2: And we all should be worried about the mental health
Speaker 2: of our children.
Speaker 1: No question. And I can't tell you how many stories
Speaker 1: they hear about parents and their children that go to college,
Speaker 1: they drop out. They go to college, they get out,
Speaker 1: they don't can't find jobs commensurate what they perceive to
Speaker 1: be their skills. And we have fentanel. We have marijuana
Speaker 1: use as ubiquito as so many young men, especially or
Speaker 1: on their phone for porn. They live in some fantasy
Speaker 1: world without developing relationships with girls and women. They also
Speaker 1: have gambling problems. You can bet on the next play.
Speaker 1: You can bet on ping pong in Ecuador. I saw
Speaker 1: this one story. You can bet on ping pong in Ecuador.
Speaker 1: Who's going to win? The next point and you live
Speaker 1: in some fantasy land and it's completely unaddressed. We don't
Speaker 1: have a system to help mental health, especially young men
Speaker 1: and young women and girls. And when you say that
Speaker 1: when he was falling, he had consciousness, Oh my god,
Speaker 1: what have I done? It relates back to me when
Speaker 1: I had a distant family member who sadly committed a suicide,
Speaker 1: shot himself in the head, and then his significant other
Speaker 1: wasn't his wife is significant other looked in his eyes
Speaker 1: and would he could hear him almost say what have
Speaker 1: I done? And he did this to punish her, and
Speaker 1: he's dying and he wants to live the same thing
Speaker 1: as Kevin Hines. All right, so he's falling seventy five
Speaker 1: miles an hour, it's two hundred and twenty two story building.
Speaker 1: Is what he fell into the cold, swirling waters of
Speaker 1: the Pacific Ocean. What happened as he was falling, what
Speaker 1: happened as.
Speaker 2: He hit Yeah? Wow, what a poignant story. I thank
Speaker 2: you for sharing that. What is incredible about him is
Speaker 2: how many people do not survive an attempt like this,
Speaker 2: especially jumping off of the Golden Gate Bridge. How many
Speaker 2: of them? Bill had thoughts like this? Overwhelming regret. I
Speaker 2: don't want to die. God, please safe me. What have
Speaker 2: I done? And Kevin is actually able to tell us
Speaker 2: this tale, but he hits the water. His back is broken.
Speaker 2: He's an excruciating pain. He starts to think because he's
Speaker 2: wearing heavy boots, heavy jacket. He says, three miracles saved
Speaker 2: him that day. We go into all three of them.
Speaker 2: They're extraordinary. On the podcast I'm going to tell you
Speaker 2: about just one of them today. For time. He says,
Speaker 2: something below him starts circling in the water and nudging
Speaker 2: him upwards because he was thinking, and finally it supported
Speaker 2: him like a table under the water for a minute.
Speaker 2: I stayed with him until the coast guard got there.
Speaker 2: When I first heard this tale, I met Kevin as
Speaker 2: a journalist in San Francisco eight years ago. Actually was
Speaker 2: the first time I met him. I was like, we
Speaker 2: need proof. Now we found it. There was a man
Speaker 2: who was on the bridge that day who watched this happen.
Speaker 2: And you know, Kevin expresses regret today for all of
Speaker 2: the people he traumatized who were on the bridge that day,
Speaker 2: who watched this kid vault over the railing and fall
Speaker 2: into the water. A man who was standing on the bridge.
Speaker 2: He was in another state now confirmed to me that
Speaker 2: he watched what happened and saw a sea lion saved
Speaker 2: Kevin in the water. And then I spoke to the
Speaker 2: coast Guard and they said a separate individual came to
Speaker 2: the station later that day and logged an account inquiring
Speaker 2: after the young man they saw jump off the bridge, saying,
Speaker 2: the most extraordinary thing happened as sea lion circled this
Speaker 2: boy and stayed with him and wouldn't let him sink.
Speaker 2: And finally I found and spoke with the coast Guard
Speaker 2: officer who pulled him from the water that day, an
Speaker 2: incredible man by the name of Marcus Butler, and in
Speaker 2: his four years serving as a US Coast Guard at
Speaker 2: Station Golden Gate out there, he pulled fifty seven bodies
Speaker 2: from the water bill and just one live man. You
Speaker 2: can imagine. As soon as I said, do you remember Kevin,
Speaker 2: he said, yeah, he's the only man I pulled live
Speaker 2: from the water. And he said that what many people
Speaker 2: don't realize is that people often do not die on
Speaker 2: impacts when they fall off the bridge, because it's an
Speaker 2: agonizing way to go. And he has not been able
Speaker 2: to shake these body recovery missions. He still has nightmares
Speaker 2: about it. He says it's the stuff from horror movies
Speaker 2: that you see out there on the water. But he
Speaker 2: says he arrived, he was like he's swimming. He's swimming
Speaker 2: and the lights which went off in his mind. He's
Speaker 2: not a body with free This is a rescue that
Speaker 2: was a miracle. And he says that animals were always
Speaker 2: scared off by the sound the boat's make, so he
Speaker 2: didn't see the sea lion by the time he'd pulled
Speaker 2: right alongside this boy. But he said, it makes total
Speaker 2: sense to me because I remember thinking, how on earth
Speaker 2: is this? Is this young man lying on the surface
Speaker 2: of the water like a table. He's wearing long sleeves,
Speaker 2: close pants, heavy boots. He can't swim through stuff like that.
Speaker 2: He's injured. Why is he lying like this? Why is
Speaker 2: he lying perfectly still on the surface of the water
Speaker 2: and waiting for me to get there. That is Kevin
Speaker 2: Hines's story, at least part of it. The rest of it,
Speaker 2: as I said, on the truth of the matter, because
Speaker 2: it's the gifts to be here every day, and he
Speaker 2: still lives with these chronic thoughts that dog him it's
Speaker 2: not over. There has been no cure, but he says
Speaker 2: he will never die by suicide today and he has
Speaker 2: dedicated his whole life to sharing his story so that
Speaker 2: others know. It's overwhelming regrets on the other side, and
Speaker 2: help is available. People can as I know you definitely
Speaker 2: want to get out there, text to call nine eight eight.
Speaker 2: Help is always available though.
Speaker 1: All right, so this story's incredible, it's unbelievable, but your
Speaker 1: credibility as a journalist is unimpeachable, So you're saying. Natasha
Speaker 1: Zuvez of Truth of the Matter also News Nation that
Speaker 1: a sea lion bob underneath them to hold his body
Speaker 1: up below the Golden Gate bridge before help arrived. That's
Speaker 1: what actually occurred.
Speaker 2: That's what actually occurred, according to two separate witnesses who
Speaker 2: saw it that day. They believe in animal, likely a
Speaker 2: sea lion. Is possible that it was a dolphin because
Speaker 2: I also go to a Marina expert and from that
Speaker 2: far up she says they look identical. But two separate
Speaker 2: people said of sea lion circled him, stayed with him,
Speaker 2: held him aloft, held him like a table under the
Speaker 2: water for minutes until the coast guard got there. He
Speaker 2: would not have survived without it.
Speaker 1: Uh, one might ask how is he doing his relationship
Speaker 1: with his family, relationship with his dad. Did the underlying
Speaker 1: problems that caused this attempt at suicide? Have they been solved?
Speaker 1: Are they better? Are they definitely is getting help?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 1: How did think?
Speaker 2: That's a good question. Yeah, it's that's a good question.
Speaker 2: And this is so important, Bill. No, the underlying problems
Speaker 2: have not been solved, and that's important. He will live
Speaker 2: with mental health struggles for the rest of his life,
Speaker 2: but he is determined to live with them. And I
Speaker 2: think that's really important because so many of us, and
Speaker 2: far too many of our youth struggle. The issue is
Speaker 2: not the struggle that he is resourced now and he
Speaker 2: knows what to do. His relationship with his father has
Speaker 2: completely bloomed after this. In the podcast, he doesn't see
Speaker 2: an incredible account as his father seeing his father, his
Speaker 2: strong dad, who rarely shows emotion, breaks down and cry
Speaker 2: in the hospital as he approached his bed after this attempt,
Speaker 2: and Kevin says he never could have seen the life
Speaker 2: that was waiting for him, his dad being the best
Speaker 2: man at his wedding, the incredible speech that he gave,
Speaker 2: he has met the love of his life who is
Speaker 2: his biggest support. And now they go all around the country.
Speaker 2: They are asked to speak to large groups both law enforcement, government,
Speaker 2: you know, senators, congressman, as well as young people to
Speaker 2: share this story and share this account. This struggle will
Speaker 2: never be over for him. But he says he will
Speaker 2: never die by suicide.
Speaker 1: Well, and the story that I had years ago of
Speaker 1: this guy who shot himself in the head to punish
Speaker 1: his significant other for X and then he's dying and
Speaker 1: is looking his eye was what have I done? I
Speaker 1: love you, I'm sorry and so and he had the time,
Speaker 1: and I guess Kevin Hines had the time. They live,
Speaker 1: one live, one didn't live. But that is some aspect
Speaker 1: of suicide which is so final that just before consciousness
Speaker 1: is lost that many times the individual who's committing suicide
Speaker 1: is very sorry they did it. So you're saying, in
Speaker 1: Kevin Hines's case, as his body is falling and flailing
Speaker 1: from two hundred and twenty three feet of twenty two
Speaker 1: story building and he hits splat, hitting water is like
Speaker 1: hitting concrete, And in those moments of consciousness, he had
Speaker 1: such regret a three or.
Speaker 2: Four seconds and it's feared in his brain the most
Speaker 2: cogent of thoughts, what have I done? I don't want
Speaker 2: to die? God, please save me? And he hits the water.
Speaker 2: It's incredible that he's able, almost from the other side,
Speaker 2: to be able to tell us that so many people cannot.
Speaker 1: Natasha, is this a Religon moment? Is this proof of
Speaker 1: God's existence or simply evidence thereof or simply a serendipitous
Speaker 1: event where a passing sea lion decided to save somebody?
Speaker 2: What is it? Who can answer that question? I can
Speaker 2: tell you this episode just went live yesterday and all
Speaker 2: of the comments say God sent that sea lion, and
Speaker 2: I who am I to disabuse anyone of that notion?
Speaker 2: I believe it all right.
Speaker 1: More of the stories that truth of the matter. Of
Speaker 1: the podcast, Natasha and Zouvez, we had planned to talk
Speaker 1: about all the big issues today, about the tariffs and
Speaker 1: about more illegals committing acts of Mayhem, and the fact
Speaker 1: that TDA is split into two groups. But when we
Speaker 1: started down this path doesn't give us enough time to
Speaker 1: deal with the other ones. But I guess I wish
Speaker 1: Kevin Hines, I do. I wish Kevin Hines and his
Speaker 1: family well he's one in a million, one in several thousand.
Speaker 1: No human being can survive the fall he did for
Speaker 1: a particular reason. Hopefully his life will be led differently. Now,
Speaker 1: have you maybe in five or ten years check with
Speaker 1: him and see how has he how's he doing, what
Speaker 1: has he done with with with the time given to him.
Speaker 2: He's already done so much. And absolutely I will, Bill,
Speaker 2: thank you. I hope people check it out, the truth
Speaker 2: of the matter. And of course you know I'll see
Speaker 2: everyone on these nations for on weekend starting at seven eastern. Bill.
Speaker 2: It's always a pleasure. Thank you so much, thank you.
Speaker 1: And for those who need help, you hit nine eight eight.
Speaker 1: Explain how that came about, because that's why we have
Speaker 1: to hit area codes now. But nine eight eight, how
Speaker 1: how much time? How many lives?
Speaker 2: It's so important, I mean so yeah. Before it was
Speaker 2: a cumbersome process and you know, siloed by different areas.
Speaker 2: It's so simple now literally call or text nine eight
Speaker 2: eight from your phone. Help is always available mental health
Speaker 2: and suicide lifeline. That is the message today. It is
Speaker 2: a permanent solution to a temporary problem. And Kevin him,
Speaker 2: you know, attests to that absolutely all.
Speaker 1: Right, Natasha, thank you very much, great work and thanks
Speaker 1: for coming on the Bill Cunningham Show. Thank you, Natasha,
Speaker 1: thank you. All right, let's continue with more Wow nine
Speaker 1: eight eight. Help is always available, and in moments just
Speaker 1: before your eyes shut, men who commit suicide have that
Speaker 1: look saying what have I done to myself? What have
Speaker 1: done to my family? All right, let's continue. Bill Cunningham
Speaker 1: News Radio seven hundred WLW