Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 I would take some of my disability money to go buy them shoes and then have to borrow money to pay my phone bill. I wanted them kids to know, man, there's somebody here. I would take them kids home with me, and I had a daughter in a one bedroom apartment. The old man would say, man, don't do that, bro. You got a daughter. And then that kid got killed. So, uh, uh, man, I fought, uh, to keep making right choices.
Speaker 0 00:00:45 When I threw in the towel is when I had the issue with, with, uh, with the, when, when my, my, my friend's son, Dian Steptoe, uh, killed Officer Garrett hub. That was my breaking point. That's when I, that's when I threw in the towel. Uh, I had felt used, abused. Uh, I was a political toy for a lot of people. Uh, and I had to move back home to mama. 33 years old, man. I'm going back home to mama with my kids. And my son know we poor. I've been doing all this great work, man. I meet with the chief every week. I meet with Deputy Chief Dean, deputy Chief Ty household. I'm with, uh, Rick Van Halden with the police officer, man. All these people, man. And I'm walking, but I'm not asking for nothing. I don't know how to ask. I don't know how to ask for a grant. They know I need a grant, so I start going to the community. But a community starts shaming, man, you working with the police, police ass nigga. So now the community rejected me, man. I just became angry, man. Fuck, everybody need a good hug, man. Fuck. So, uh, and that's when I fell from Grace in this city with all political leaders, police department, uh, they never thought about. I was out there by myself for years with threats over my head, working in the community every day,
Speaker 2 00:02:16 And nothing to show for it.
Speaker 0 00:02:18 And nothing the show, other
Speaker 2 00:02:19 Than the progress that you hoped to make by gleaning those messages onto others, right?
Speaker 0 00:02:23 Yeah. The, the progress is when the kids was coming home. Yeah. Uh, I would take some of my disability money to go buy them shoes and then have to borrow money to pay my phone bill. I wanted them kids to know, man, it's somebody here. I would take them kids home with me, and I had a daughter in a one bedroom apartment. The old man would say, man, don't do that, bro. You got a daughter. And then that kid got killed. So, uh, uh, man, I fought, uh, to keep making right choices, man. I fought me, uh, because I wanted to give up. I wanted to quit. I wanted to be hateful. I wanted to be angry. I wanted to be racist.
Speaker 2 00:03:05 And that would be an excuse to go back to who you were, even if you did have the money, that's what you were afraid of, right? Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:03:11 So I said, God, don't let my heart be hardened. Uh, and that's where the character came from.
Speaker 2 00:03:17 Wow. Man, that's an impressive story too. I'm sorry about
Speaker 0 00:03:21 That. Character was my outlet. I didn't have an outlet, so I was gonna be just like the kid who ended up hurting somebody. Yeah. That's why I was saying hurt for things to the police department. I was hurt.
Speaker 2 00:03:31 Well, you know, I, um, <laugh> people can get emotional and sometimes they can justify it. I mean, and like you said, they're just words. You still Yeah. Are demonstrative in the things that you do. You know, when I talked to Pablo Escobar kid Yeah. Uh, he was saying the same thing, <laugh>, he, when they killed his, when his dad was killed, or he maybe not killed when his dad,
Speaker 0 00:03:52 He was killed. <laugh>. We saw it. Yeah. We, he was killed. Well,
Speaker 2 00:03:55 He, he will,
Speaker 0 00:03:55 He wasn't taking to jail.
Speaker 2 00:03:57 No. Well, he will dispute that. But you have to, you have to listen to him. It's very interesting. But
Speaker 0 00:04:03 I gotta listen to it
Speaker 2 00:04:04 Now, Matt. It's, it's fascinating. But he was so pissed off when that happened, though, that he started saying, okay, I'm gonna rain fire on all these people and I'm gonna avenge my father's death. And you can imagine with his reach what that did. He said he called back within hours. So, all right. I I, of course, I'm not gonna do that. I'm not a gangster. I'm not like my dad. I'm, I'm, and it took a lot of time to undo all that, just the words that he said hit the media and hit the papers, everything. Cuz they're thinking mine
Speaker 0 00:04:33 Did too. Oh boy. Boy. Mine did
Speaker 2 00:04:35 Too. Exactly. But the things that he's doing now to change people for the better. Oh my gosh. When you had two gangsters in here that says, yeah, but he killed my brother. Yeah. But then he killed my mother and Maba and we can't stop fighting. I'm like, go watch that. Oh, if, if that dude's dad killed 5,000
Speaker 0 00:04:51 People, a lot of people,
Speaker 2 00:04:52 Good lord, relentless, if they can make amends between he and the other leader, uh, from the Cali cartel, come on. Uh,
Speaker 0 00:05:00 Uh, imagine, imagine if you brought those two individuals and put them on a speaking tour in middle schools and high schools, the depths of that murder and destruction between those two families.
Speaker 2 00:05:13 Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:05:14 Most people a allow that rivalry to go on for hundreds of years. Family of feud.
Speaker 2 00:05:20 Oh my God.
Speaker 0 00:05:20 The Pat Fields and McCoys. That's what it would be. Yep. If that was here in America,
Speaker 2 00:05:25 It's easy to be angry about it. Come on. Understandable too. I mean, I can't
Speaker 0 00:05:28 Really talk, but imagine if they, if people was to hear that and they saying, man, well I'm still mad at him for killing my brother 20 years ago,
Speaker 2 00:05:37 But if I change my mind today, come on, we can all be on a better path and just leave it behind us for heaven sake.
Speaker 0 00:05:44 We can, we can almost make it, make it good. Sure. As bad as it was,
Speaker 2 00:05:51 For sure.
Speaker 0 00:05:52 If, if we can do this, we can turn that bad into something good and it's just not bad and painful anymore. Yeah. That's how the concrete grow from the roads or the roads grow from the concrete making the bad good. Right. In the wrong the path of redemption.
Speaker 2 00:06:11 Yeah. It's the, it's the least traveled path cuz it is also the harder path. Oh. But man, it can be done. And those are demonstrative things, including your story, which I appreciate. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:06:23 Uh, I, I, I understand, uh, that this is bigger than me. So, uh, when, when things happen, uh, I never take the victim approach. I, I look for the lesson and the blessing. That's it. If it ain't no monetary rewards, okay, what's in this shit? <laugh>. It got to be a lesson. Cuz this just didn't happen for no reason. Yeah. I didn't lose this for nothing. Right. This, so I look for the lesson or was this a blessing?
Speaker 2 00:06:59 And the lesson includes the accountability. You know, the times that I've been screwed over the most with the help of my wife, who also keeps my, keeps my mind pretty well focused. We will say, look, maybe two or 3% of this could have been avoided had we done this better. So it's, it's better for us to focus on how do we not allow that part to happen again? Instead of saying, Hey, this is mostly their fault. Yeah. We say, Hey, there are parts of this that we need to be accountable for, even if it's small.
Speaker 0 00:07:34 Yeah. Uh, well, my mother old saying is, uh, you done done wrong before. So when something happens, you have to look and see, okay, have I ever done this to somebody before? Have I ever done this? Have I ever made somebody feel like this? Yeah. And if I have, then I ain't got no right to be mad. That's what I secretly tell myself when I get mad at something, nigga. Yeah. I, man I ride by myself and say, man, nigga, you done done something like this before, man, how you gonna be mad? You done saying how you, so then I gotta process me now. See, that's so I talked to me so I can process the bullshit. I wanna get the bullshit out. T I don't wanna walk around, be full of shit. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 2 00:08:21 And you, you could maybe do something productive with that pile of stones that you keep next to you instead of throwing 'em. Right. Yeah. You make something out of those.
Speaker 0 00:08:29 Come on, man. Build something with it. Yeah. If nothing but igloo, <laugh>, let let somebody come in and seek refuge. Yeah. Get out the cold, have some shelter. Yep. If nothing else, we ain't gotta stone him to death. And so outta my anger and outta my frustration from being a financially struggling community activist who felt like he had been abandoned and rejected and used and misused and taken advantage of and exploited, I started throwing stones. I started spewing hate. And at that moment, I really wanted to be hateful. I stopped talking to God, asking God I wanted to be hateful. And then something happened because I had already been praying to God. God don't let my heart be hateful. He had already heard the prayer. So he wasn't gonna let it be hateful. And then something happened,
Speaker 2 00:09:20 Which
Speaker 0 00:09:21 Was I went into the mental hospital, the police, I say they kidnapped me, but these people had been working with me, had been sitting down and meeting with me. We had been doing trainings together. Uh, deputy chief Ty household used to call me and say, Hey Charles, man, we're gonna put an extra a hundred and something police officers out on the west side. What do you think about that Las Vegas trail area? Well, god damn, uh, uh, deputy chief man, we got all the rookies over here to stop six. Y'all can't leave us with all the rookies. God damn. Give us some veterans. Uh, left. We left with all the rookies. So that's the relationship we had. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, they knew that wasn't Charleston. They knew I'm not hateful.
Speaker 2 00:10:00 Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:10:01 But they knew something had happened because man, he don't act like this man. This is not him. Uh,
Speaker 0 00:10:08 Uh, man. When you felt, when, when you feel used and you can't understand, man, I've been good, man, why would you? Uh, and and, and not only that, I'm left out here still with the threats. I'm left out here still with the threats. All of you guys done got pat on the backs and, and, and funding and, and, and promotion from being with the work. But man, I'm still out here with the threats. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, what about man, where y'all go? I know. I, okay, I didn't mean that man. Where y'all, man, they turned they backs. Uh, and, and, and, and, and because of that, uh, good officers was punished because they didn't turn they back on me. They know that's not Charleston. And good officers lost. Uh, and they hurt my heart, man. Good officers.
Speaker 2 00:10:59 Yeah. They're in good spots though, man. They, they know. They know where you're at. I know who you're talking about too. I
Speaker 0 00:11:04 Know those cats. Yeah. Nah man. Uh, they're good
Speaker 2 00:11:06 People. And they, they are not, they certainly aren't sweating you for it. They know what the deal is,
Speaker 0 00:11:11 Man. Yeah. Nah, man. So, uh, see, I, I got to meet good police officers in uniform, outta uniform, white, black, Mexican. So I got to see, man, these people are human behind this badge. So me and, and and Rick Van Howton, or he was the president of the Fort Worth Police Officer Association at the time, man, I was taking my own money and I was booking a, a venue. They had the cleat conference there. And man, I, I wanted to do this event with black children and police officers. I had, I had this guy that had this writing workshop at the time. I wanted to do a book that was called Walk of Mile in my Shoes. So I wanted to capture at least a dozen officers, uh, stories. And, and, and they write a small page about what it's like to put on this uniform, kiss your family and walk out this door.
Speaker 0 00:12:03 And you may possibly never come back. Get the black kids from the ghetto. They write what it's like to be in the ghetto. Put that in this book. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> walk a mile in my shoes and let each one read each other's stories. Super. I I, in my mind, that that would've humanized the badge in this city to our kids. It'll bring back the beat cop. So I bought into the procedural justice made perfect sense to me. So I became a spearhead, uh, for the Fort Worth Police Department and the procedural justice push into the community, uh, the, for the, the, the Federal National Initiative. So, man, they gave me all that knowledge and I bought into it, uh, only to be a political toy. And I was sincere. And, and coming from the streets, ma you feel like a motherfucker use you. I can't kill 'em. So how I know how to kill 'em with my words spew hate and venom.
Speaker 2 00:13:02 Especially when you had the platform. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:13:05 So, uh, you know, I had to take a mental reset, uh, one of the most in invaluable thing, in one of the most ingenuous things that they did. Uh, they labeled me as being homicidal and suicidal by ideation and preparation. Cause I go to the gun range. But
Speaker 2 00:13:21 You and they mental ap you for that like a 72 hour hold thing. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:13:24 Uhuh. Yeah. A seven day hold. You didn't say anything. I didn't say nothing. You
Speaker 2 00:13:28 Didn't say anything to anybody? No. They said it was you demonstrating a danger to yourself or others by, at the gun range. And well,
Speaker 0 00:13:35 Sling, uh, well, I was saying a lot of hateful things toward the death of Officer Garrett. Hu He hadn't even been buried yet. Uh, I had called down, uh, I had, I had, I had made a public post that, uh, that I hope I had made a public post that the, like a few days prior to Officer Garrett Hu being killed, that I, I pray in the name of Jesus, that a Fort Worth police officer dies in the line of duty. Ooh. And then I said, I prayed that Gina Bivins have a heart attack or a stroke, and she ended up having a heart attack on a stroke. Oh. After Gregory Hood. And then I called down and, and, and I told, uh, I called down and, and told, uh, the city manager's office cause I personally know these people Yeah. And told David David Cook. Uh, and this is not funny, but, uh, that I hope his daughter grew up and, and marry a well hung black man that kick her in her ass and fuck her.
Speaker 0 00:14:29 Good. Well they twisted that and said, I threatened to rape his daughter. So that's how they, that's how they was able to push it. And they said, I threatened Gina Bivins. They was indirect threats. So what they did, they went and took my Facebook post, but I'm just venting. Yeah. Uh, they, they took all the Facebook posting. So that's what they used. I never seen a, I never seen a real doctor. Uh, I never seen a judge. Uh, you know, they kept me seven days and, you know, gave me a bullshit, uh, diagnosis of, uh, marijuana psychosis. Uh, yeah. Marijuana psychosis. And, uh, a suicidal and homicidal about ideation in preparation when they, when they arrested me, I had like over 400 rounds of 22 bullets, 22 Ruger that I've been going to the gun range shooting in a whole bunch of black, uh, liberation literature in the car that, uh, the legal aid lawyers had gave me to do some research on.
Speaker 0 00:15:21 So, uh, so yeah. Yeah. Nah man. It, it was, uh, I just, you know, first thing one of the officers told me is, and I won't say his name, uh, cause I fuck with him and I love him, uh, white guy. He said, Charleston, you must have pissed off the wrong people. I said, yeah, I know. That was my intention. I wanted to, uh, I had been dealing with top bras, uh, for them to let me get away with that. Uh, yeah, me, me, me and Deputy Chief Dean was meeting at the Southwest Cafe house every week. Uh, just chopping it up. They really became like father figures to me. So imagine a kid who's never had a father. All of a sudden I got a white dad, I got a black dad, and, and we bonded for real. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> in my mind. Yeah. And all of a sudden they gone. That's what they got. That's, man, I that's that rejection. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:16:12 And it was political basically.
Speaker 0 00:16:14 So was Well because, because because this one I realized it was political. All the deputy chief used to say, Hey Charleston, call me man. Don't tell Fitzgerald nothing. You know, but I don't know this <laugh>, I don't know Rick Van Howden is into it with Fitzgerald. I don't know. Rick Van Howden is, all the black leaders don't like Rick Vanhouse. So all the black leaders turn against me. Cuz every time they look up, I'm hugging on Rick Vanhouse, <laugh>, big, old, tall, racist looking white boy. This is my buddy at the time. Yeah. Great ape. Yeah man. So, uh, so the black people looking at me like, I'm, I, they done bought me, but they ain't gimme no money. I ain't taking no money. I don't even want, I just want to help wherever I can help. Right. So in, in my mind now, I got all these father figures, but no one is showing me how to get the funding where I'm not all over the place.
Speaker 0 00:17:05 So I'm at, I'm at this country club, I'm at this meeting, I'm at this training, but I was just a face for him, Hey, me and Charleston is doing all this great work now in stop six. And they come down there, they bring the big police, Winne, Vego and Vans. And I'm at the Turkey giveaways. I was just a political tool and I didn't know that the police department was so divided with Fitzgerald. So when I started meeting with Fitzgerald and man, that's when everything, that's when it hit the fan. I said, yeah. So I'm in the middle of this shit. I'm, yeah,
Speaker 2 00:17:38 It's divided quite often,
Speaker 0 00:17:40 But I don't know this. I'm a guy, I'm a, I'm a guy in the community thinking. Yeah. Because my black politicians, I sat there with Gina Bivins and she told me, Charleston, the help that you're looking for in the community with what you're trying to do, you have to go to the police department. All the funding that helps black people in our community as far as afterschool program, boys and girls club, man, most of that come through the police department. C C P D funding. Hmm. I never asked for it. I started finding out that this is the relationship between our black community leaders, the police department and the, and the, and the government leaders. Everybody fighting over where this money goes. It's not really to help the people. I'm coming saying, Hey y'all, I can help without the money and the black people saying shit up. Boy, get your motherfucking ass outta here. Yeah. I'm saying, Hey, I know how to help without the money. Come boy, get on. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:18:30 And you're talking to, you're talking to the wrong cops. What you talking dividing out there
Speaker 0 00:18:34 Too? Yeah. Yeah. So, man, I can see that. And so, so when the gar hall situation happened, uh, man, this is my son, this is my homeboy's son. So when I get the news of what happened and how it all transpired, well y'all done trained me in procedural justice. And I'm saying to the Mayor David Cook and everybody that had y'all been following procedural justice officer Gavin Hu will still be alive. Dion Step told they wasn't supposed to never be able to go off into that bar. They'd already had enough evidence that they had been doing these robberies. They shouldn't have never had been a soul. I'm saying, man, y'all fed me bullshit and I bought it. My mama address is online cuz I bought this shit my whole family, man. So man, I went off, but I needed it. I needed that seven day reset to say, man, get this anger outta your heart. Everything you been praying for, you about to become it. Everything you've been praying, man. So I needed themself baby. And then I came out a resurrected man with a new heart
Speaker 3 00:19:44 And
Speaker 0 00:19:44 A new mind.
Speaker 3 00:19:46 What, what you do, what do success second grade rules, a to make you do what they want?
Speaker 1 00:20:02 What they want
Speaker 3 00:20:09 Is the one to see you
Speaker 1 00:20:10 Through.
Speaker 3 00:20:12 Don't let those biggest take you just a let lose. Sit the
Speaker 1 00:20:17 Seat baby.
Speaker 3 00:20:20 Ain't that. Dig a little honey from the, but don't
Speaker 1 00:20:24 The
Speaker 3 00:20:41 Lies between glory.
