00:00This is the shirt I wore when I voted for the first time the greatest moment in my life first in line
00:09It took me 44 years to get here
00:20I cried I did
00:31I
00:41My home when my honor doctor me it was very
00:45abusive physically and emotionally and
00:50It was she was you know, she was an alcoholic. She did the best she could with nine kids the projects are new projects
00:58But when I where I grew up at they were two stories, but they were white
01:04So I remember growing up and we stayed
01:09In this apartment right here
01:13Where I grew up in they have changed a lot
01:17but I moved over here at the age of
01:2112 and
01:24And we I grew up here I became a mother at 15 here I moved out of here when I was
01:3217 came back was in and out of my aunt's house in
01:411984 I was introduced to drugs and the primary drug was crack cocaine in 84 and
01:49I
01:50Caught up in that vicious cycle for 22 years
01:54I
02:01Grew up with him. I'll say about it under here alcoholism drug addicts are selling drugs
02:15I was watching
02:17Older people come to prison people in wheelchairs people with one legs blind people people can't talk
02:23And I've seen my life growing old in prison. I seen it. It was a vision. I always listen to this church
02:31That preaches a lot and this this preacher was preaching and he he says something that to me. He said God doesn't change
02:38Who you are he changed what you have become and that was the day that my whole life changed forever. I
02:46Was one of those people that say oh when I get out of prison, I'm gonna do this
02:49I'm gonna do that
02:50but when I get out I went back to using drugs and selling drugs and I knew at this time I had to set a
02:56Foundation inside prison to take with me outside and that's what I did
03:20My job is a communication assistant what I do I interact with everyone that comes over from court
03:26Miss Serena felonies doesn't matter the court sends them over here
03:31Office of public defenders my compassion goes out to them because I know they struggle as an as an addict, you know
03:37And I also know they struggles with family members when they turn it back on them and they become homeless
03:43I always let the clients know that
03:45First young especially young generation that comes in and they make a bad mistake. I tell them this charge doesn't define who you are
03:53You still can be anybody you want to be
03:56You just have to learn from your mistake
03:58And this is a mistake that you made and you just have to suffer the consequences once I
04:04Got my life together and went to college and got my degree like nurse
04:09I saved my money and I bought my first home never owned a home bought my first house
04:14Never owned a home bought my first new car. I never owned a new car
04:19Build up my own bank account on my own woman. I pay all my bills
04:25And it feels good because I was a very cold
04:27I decode I depended on men all my life to make it through life. I never thought that I can do it on my own
04:34With my background and coming up in my struggles
04:38But I was determined to do so with my life
04:45You
04:50When you go to prison upon your release
04:53They tell you you have lost your rights to vote. You could never vote
04:58Because you convicted felon so I went through life
05:03Knowing that I couldn't vote so voting was not a part of my life
05:07That was not a thing that I thought about every four years
05:14I
05:35Was the first one to walk in there and I was like, okay, what do I do now?
05:39And they told me, you know go get this here and go to the machine and push you is gonna work and
05:44When I push that machine, I was like a kid at Christmas. I was clapping. I was crying. I was praising God
05:51I was like, oh first time voted 44 years first time
05:56Betty
06:04Betty in many ways is an extraordinary case because she has an as an individual taking it upon herself
06:14To be part of society and
06:16And that's part of the reason why I think amendment 4 was so important because somebody like that
06:21Deserves the right to vote those who have paid their debts
06:26Should be able to be reintegrated into society and become part of it and part of that means being able to participate in a democracy
06:33So that's why Betty isn't in some ways. She's extraordinary in other ways
06:39She's a very ordinary person and that's and I want to treat everyone as an ordinary person who deserves that, right?
06:55You
07:25I'm sitting here in the court saying can't people see this big elephant sitting here
07:32What about all the other people that owe court costs and fines
07:38What about them it's never about the court costs and fines it's all about poll tactics they keep us from voting
07:55I
07:58Cried I
08:00did
08:01Because I walk by faith and I believe that though people was gonna see that what they was doing to us was wrong
08:08But I was wrong. They did not see it. Like I saw it all the rest of us seen it. I
08:13Cried I was disappointed. I was angry
08:17But mostly I was really
08:20so
08:22Lost I was like right back where I was at where I'm gonna get this money to pay this how I'm gonna get this money
08:28I
08:29Live paycheck to paycheck. It discouraged me for at least 24 hours after 24 hours when I woke up. I had a new attitude
08:52You
08:57Some of them racial profile us some of us always see us as criminals and never see us no other way as convicted felons
09:04They will always see us like a convicted felon that we we we don't deserve
09:08to vote
09:10But that's the opinion. That's all it is. But for me and for all other former felons out there
09:17We have earned our rights to vote. We follow a hell of a fight with our attorneys
09:22And I feel good about that because I knew it wasn't so much as the win
09:26It was the fight and that's why I have this this this fire in me to continue to fight
09:34Because we deserve a second chance we earned our second chance
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