Joe Rogan Experience #1858 - Josh Dubin & Derrick Hamilton

Josh Dubin 0:02 (drumming) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

Derrick Hamilton 0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience.

Josh Dubin 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (instrumental music) All right, we're rolling. Joshua, my brother. What's- what's up, man? Good to see you, my friend. It's great to see you, always. Please introduce your friend. Man, it's hard to introduce the un-introducible. So, this is Derrick Hamilton, who has been (squeak) regarded by The New Yorker as the most prolific jail house lawyer that ever lived. He is, um, y- single-handedly responsible for freeing probably over 100 people, including himself. Wow. He spent, um, three decades in jail for murders that he didn't commit. He was framed by one of the most horrific corrupt cops in the city of New York's history, someone by the name of Scarcella. Um, but more than that, he's become known as the- one of the- the biggest and most effective criminal justice reform advocates in the country. And, uh, we'll tell you- get into it a little bit more later, but Derrick is- is not a miracle, he's a force of fucking nature. And I'll- I'll tell you a little bit about how we met and how we got involved together. So, probably about nine years ago, Jay-Z wanted to get into boxing, and Roc Nation started a- a promotional company to promote boxers, and Andre Ward was one of them. So, we were on the opposite sides of the negotiating table, um, and it might be less or more than nine years ago. It was right on the heels of the Eric Garner, um, murder when he was, you know, s- put in a chokehold on Staten Island. And Jay-Z was coming to sign the contract, and I was there with J Prince, and we started talking about like what the fuck is wrong with this country, and figured out that we had like a common bond in that regard. So, fast-forward to a few years later, we, um, I find out through working with Roc Nation on just criminal justice reform initiatives that Jay-Z has this foundation that flies under the radar that is just remarkable. It's called the Shawn Carter Foundation. He and his mother started it, and they take inner city youth, uh, mostly from Brooklyn, c- really the five boroughs, and, um, help give them an opportunity to go to college, but they start when they're in high school. They take them on a bus tour, they help them with the application process, and they literally change the trajectory of these people's lives. So, I had this idea that I would have five of their scholars, we would do a scholarship program, come work on social justice cases with me. And Jay-Z's mom loved it, he loved it, Roc Nation, there's someone named Danya Diaz who runs their philanthropy arm and she's on the board of the Shawn Carter Foundation. We made it a reality, it took a couple of years. So, this summer, I had five college students that were coming to work with me on innocence cases. And I said, "You know, I need somebody that can really connect with these people, um, because I have sympathy for the way they grew up, for the conditions that they were born into, for the opportunities that they didn't have, but I can't empathize because I'm white. It's just as simple as that." So, I thought of Derrick, and I had met Derrick about five years ago, after he had been out for only six years, and Derrick was the first person on my mind that could mentor these students. And I asked him if he would join me in helping mentor them through this seven-week program working with me on a case. And over the past seven weeks, we're this close to freeing this man named Bruce Bryant, who they worked on together. Uh, they worked on his case together. And to watch Derrick and to know his story, I- I knew right away that he'd be able to connect with them, but I did not know his power. So, when he picks up the phone and calls the District Attorney of Queens, they take his call right away. He calls the head of a conviction integrity unit that's involved in re-reviewing cases, he's got such deep respect, and people in high places have such admiration for him because of what he was able to overcome in not only helping himself, but helping free others. He had a settlement with the city, uh, and the state, and instead of taking that settlement and resting on his laurels and doing whatever, which would have been understandable, he's dedicated his life to helping get people out of jail. And not only that, to helping reform the criminal justice system, but these are words like "reform the criminal justice system" we kick around. This man is a- he is a- a human tornado of- o- of action that instead of leaving destruction in its wake, leaves hope, and instead of de- you know, d- devastation, leaves opportunity. I mean, so maybe tornado was the wrong analogy, but I have just never witnessed anything like it. So, I'm on the- the verge of starting this new criminal justice reform center, which we're not at liberty to announce...Um, that is being funded by, um, someone that I've talked about quite a bit on this show. And they were asking me to find a deputy director, you know, a lawyer, and I said... I looked at resumes, I interviewed people and I said, "I found him." I found my lawyer. He may not have a law degree, but he knows more about criminal procedure, he's more respected, he's the best strategic thinker I've ever encountered, and he knows human beings better than anyone. And Derrick's gonna be my... I'm the executive director, Derrick is going to be my deputy director and, I mean, I'll let him tell his story. But when you hear what he's been through, and what he's overcome and what he has done since, um, he's, he's not a force of na- there's words aren't adequate to describe who this man is and what he's overcome and what he's been through. I was trying to suck an ounce of his mental, um, energy on the- the ride over here from Houston, j- just trying to understand how he summons the strength, 'cause I'm trying to use it and apply it in my own life. So it's just, uh, it- it... I'm not gonna cry yet-

Joe Rogan 7:19 (laughs)

Josh Dubin 7:19 ... I usually wait till hour two, but it just so-

Joe Rogan 7:21 (laughs)

Josh Dubin 7:22 ... it's ama- it's just amazing to me the way the universe aligned for us to come together and for him to be next to me t- today and for your listeners and you to hear his story is just, uh, an honor.

Joe Rogan 7:33 Well, it's an honor to meet you, Derrick, especially after such high praise. So, t- tell me your story, like how did, uh, what happened to you?

Derrick Hamilton 7:41 Well, thanks for having me and Josh, thanks for the accolades. Um, you know, I was a 17-year-old kid running around Brooklyn at a time when Brooklyn was, uh, terrible, and I was a product of my environment. I was doing little robberies and, you know, little stump stuff that adolescents do, and I got on the radar of the police department. Uh, they used to search me all the time, pat me down, you know, throw me up on the car, regular stuff that happened in that community. Um, one day, uh, a man was killed about 5:00 AM by some older guys in the neighborhood. Uh, the police had an identification of they car, they called the guy in and he somehow told them he rented me the car, and that I was the one that brought the car back and told him that I had committed the crime and that I had shot the guy by accident. Um, and that was my first real experience with the criminal justice system 'cause it was a murder. Um, I'm like, "Murder?" You know, I did a couple of robberies. I, you know, I did some petty stuff, but murder, that's not me. So, um, you know, what was amazing to me is, number one, um, nobody would've gave me they car at 17 years old, right? Any cop would've known that this guy wouldn't have gave me his car. Um, but they arrested me and they charged me with murder, um, and I was convicted, uh, by a jury because they admitted grand jury testimony of a witness who came before the court and said, "I never seen this guy at all." The police made me lie in the grand jury and say that I seen this guy. I'm not testifying. I refuse to testify. I'm not gonna get up there and perjure myself. Uh, the judge told the prosecutor that day that they was dismissing the case, that if they don't get another witness, this case is going out of here. Um, judge's name was Lombardo back then, this was 1983. Um, I went back to Rikers Island that day, we came back the next day and the judge said that he thought about this all night, and he felt that the only person would benefit from this witness not testifying would be me. Therefore, he was gonna allow the prosecutor to admit their grand jury testimony as evidence-in-chief at my trial, and I would forfeit my right to confront the witness and let the jury hear the truth, that she never saw the crime. So that was my first real experience. I was a young knucklehead. The lawyer that I had at the time, Candace Kirtz said, "Look, young man, get your head out your ass and you better read these cases and you better see what's going on, like they're railroading you." She took the stand and told the judge what the witness told her, um, and- and- and I was convicted. I was sentenced to 25 years to life, um, and it was at that moment that I knew that I had to study law, that I had to really dig deep in- in the books and I did it. New York State, uh, thank God, had a law library. They had all the books in the world, only thing you had to do was apply yourself. And I spent the next five and six years working on my case. Uh, in 1987, the appellate division in that case found that the judge had no evidence whatsoever that me or anybody acting on my behalf had threatened this witness, did anything improper, and that the judge was right, there was no evidence that- that can prove that. So they reversed the conviction, uh, and I was

Derrick Hamilton 10:42 able to get out of prison, uh, after six and a half years. Unbeknownst to me, there was a rogue cop by the name of Louis Scarcella who felt that I didn't do enough time for this conviction. He didn't like the appellate division decision. Eight months later, I was in New Haven, Connecticut at a unisex salon that I had owned at the time, uh, he came in that store and arrested me, told me I was going back to Brooklyn for a murder. Um, and I'm like, "A murder?" Like, this can't be true, like, again? Like, how- how many times this happen? Uh, went to New York, um, I was processed, uh, about a year later I went to trial, I was convicted. They brought a witness in by the name of Jewel Smith, who said that she was present at the murder when her boyfriend was killed, that I was a gun man, I had a gun in my hand and I shot this individual several times with this gun. Um, but her original statement to the police said she wasn't there, that she never saw this crime, she was around the corner at a store, when she came back her boyfriend was dead. The jury never heard that statement. But in any event, um, the ballistics evidence proved that this guy was shot with two different guns, that he wasn't shot in the building where she said he was shot at, but he was shot outside in the street. Uh, despite this evidence, I was convicted. Uh, after I was convicted was when I learned that she had first told the cops at the crime scene she never saw the crime, but she had told it to a different detective. So I made a pro se motion to set aside the verdict-And in the motion, I argued that this detective that never came in that she gave the statement, uh, to, could prove my innocence. And the judge ordered a hearing for a year. He said, "I can't give this guy a day in jail, let alone, uh, 15 years." Which was the minimum. "I want this witness to come back." The prosecutor said, "I'm not calling her." And the judge said, "If you don't call her back, this case is going to a new trial." Right? They called her back and she admitted that she never saw the crime, that the detective, Louis Costello, told her what happened and told her that if she didn't get up here and say that I committed the crime, she was going to jail. She was on parole, her boyfriend was a felon that just got out, she had kids. They said, "You're going to jail." She said, "What was I supposed to do? Here's the system telling me this, that if I don't come in and say this, I'm going to jail. And I came in and said it." Uh, the judge ruled a year later that, again, he felt that I was ... He said there was a common thread of string, that I manipulated this evidence. Again, I called the detective. The detective came in and said exactly what the witness said, that she told him she didn't see the crime, that she was beat up and took to the priest and then told she was going to jail. Now, had that jury heard that, there'd have been different results. At the, at the trial they told the jury that her first statement was the most important statement in this case, and that when the police arrived on the scene, she didn't hesitate. She said Derrick Hamilton, somebody I know my entire life, committed the crime. Which wasn't true. In fact, she said the truth, which she didn't see the crime, that she was somewhere else. Um, I was sentenced to 25 years to life. Uh, I filed numerous post-conviction motions after post-conviction motions. Every time a judge gave me a hearing, every time he said he can throw the case out, every time he said he was troubled by this conviction, uh, the prosecutor would come in and tell him I'm a bad guy, that this is not somebody you want to release, that ... You know, they, they put imagined harms, they'd make a judge thinking I was the most terrible person in the world. And he would deny the motion every single time. Um, you know, I filed numerous motions, numerous post-convictions. I did everything you could imagine, uh, to prove my innocence, but to no avail. Uh, I began going to parole board around 2009. Uh, it was a very traumatic experience for me because at that time, the parole board wanted me to admit guilt and I wasn't gonna do that. I'm not gonna come in and say I killed somebody I didn't kill. I'm not doing that. I don't care what you say. And I had to challenge them and fight them for two years. Uh, and then my family went out in protest, and we got a Daily News article put out that said that I will be free if the court would just basically give me justice. If they just give this guy a fair shot, he'll be home. So it changed the, the mentality of the parole board. They looked at all of my evidence and they said, "You know, based on the evidence that you presented here, um, we believe in

Derrick Hamilton 14:44 your innocence. Like, this evidence speaks for itself. Even the judge said you was innocent. I don't know what you're doing here all these years." And they released me. And at that point, I began a crusade, 'cause when I was in prison there were several guys, we, we built something called an Axial Innocence Team. Guys who I was working with at the law library, so I would read guy's case and, and check them out. So what I had to do was get families together, get people to come together and bring their families and say, "Look, let's send these people to City Hall, let them know there's a lot of us in here. It's not just me. It's white, there's black, there's a bunch of us in here that got the same issue." That they're procedurally barring us. They're not looking at our cases, just kicking it into the garbage. "We don't want to hear it. Get out of here." Right? Because they can. They had the power. So when we started bringing attention to these cases, it changed the whole dynamic. So when I got out, I joined that group, Family and Friends of the Wrongfully Convictions. Uh, we had a PR guy by the name of Lonnie Sory who was helping us keep it together. And we just began blasting the prosecutors. We began protesting outside their offices and getting rid of them. Uh, the first one we was able to get rid of was Charles Hines in Brooklyn, the prosecutor who sent me to prison. We was able to remove him and put a progressive prosecutor in that agreed that he would look at these convictions if he was elected. So he got in, and in two years he exonerated 22 people and he found that there was a systemic racist problem in Brooklyn that was convicting the wrong people. Uh, fortunately for me, uh, the New York Times reporter called me in, I believe it was 2012, and they said, "Why are people afraid of the police?" And I just thought, "Are you kidding me? Why are they afraid of the police?" And I told them names of guys that I knew that was in prison that this cop set up. And a lawyer had contacted me and said that he was working on a case which this cop framed another guy by the name of David Ranta. And he said, "In two weeks, there's gonna be an article in New York Times that exposed this cop." And I told the New York Times reporter that. And I said, "Look, in two weeks, if it comes out, you come back to me and I'll take you to these guys." And she came back, Frances Roebuck, she came back and I took her to these guys. She got the prosecutor to agree to look at 50 of these cops' cases. 50 of them. And, um, you know, 20 was exonerated so far of those guys. And, um, I was exonerated in 2015. In 2014, for the first time in, uh, New York history, the Appellate Division Second Department ruled in my case that a freestanding actual innocence claim can be reco- recognized under post-conviction motion. And they said to anybody that's innocent, the courts could no longer procedurally bar you. They got to reach it, the merits of your contentions. They just can't say, "Well, you should have raised this before," or, "Your lawyer failed to do this before," or, "You should have did..." You gotta reach the merits of it. Get to the bottom line. Is this guy innocent or not? And when they gave me that opinion, it kind of, like, in itself exonerated me, 'cause the prosecutor now had to hear my witnesses. I had alibis. I had police officers who said, "Look, this guy was in New Haven and Connecticut, not Brooklyn when this murder happened. We know 'cause we seen him there." He was at a party with them. I had hotel receipts. I had many witnesses that could verify where I was at on the day Natanya Cast was murdered. The courts were just throwing that evidence in the garbage. We, in fact, proved who committed the crime. The real murderer was present when the cops arrived. He was on parole for manslaughter. They took his name down, but never even investigated who he was. So we had a lot of evidence. We had, uh, a witness who was there who identified who was there, identified why the guy was shot. There was a 911 call that said three male blacks fleeing in a red car. He admitted they was in a red car. So there was just overwhelming evidence of my innocence, but courts was just throwing it in the garbage because of the prosecutor lied to them and said he's a bad guy.So my experiences taught me that, you know, there's a lot of innocent people. I was in prison, man. Look, one thing about prison and I tell people, they say, "Hey, everybody says they're innocent." That's not true. Right? They may tell a lawyer that, but they're not going to tell the guy in the neighborhood with them that, "I know you're guilty. You know, I was with you. You... I know what you did. You told me." Everybody tells... We from the same neighborhoods. So it's a small minority of people that's in the law library every single day. If you go to the yard, guys working out in the weight pal, right? They playing basketball. But the innocent guys is in that law library every single day trying to find a way out. And that was me, um, every single day. And I studied every book in there. I taught law classes. Um, and I became very good at it. I mean, I was surprised at how... I mean, I didn't go to college, right? When the lawyer gave me the first two cases and I read them, I was surprised how well I knew the cases. I was surprised how I comprehended them. And it was because of that, um, that I kept going. And I found a civilian who liked me. Uh, he was working in the local library and the first test I got was a 44. And he said, "Look, man, I'm not gonna waste my time." I came back in '97 with a 44.

Josh Dubin 19:07 You got to explain what that is, what's a 44?

Joe Rogan 19:10 What's a 44?

Derrick Hamilton 19:10 Uh, a 44 was my grade on the test.

Josh Dubin 19:13 (clears throat)

Derrick Hamilton 19:13 Um, I took a test. The first test he gave me was on the Constitution of the United States. I had to learn the 4th, 5th, 6th, 8th, and 14th Amendment. Um, and I, I failed. I was playing. And he said, "Look, you're not gonna waste my time. You're smarter than that." He challenged me. Next time I came back, I got a 97. So from that point on, I just start studying. I start, start, you know, gravitating to the older guys that knew more than me. Uh, because I was young, they was willing to teach me. And I was like a young sponge, and I just... I just loved what I did. I became passionate about it. And that's why I'm here now.

Joe Rogan 19:43 Derrick, what kind of repercussions are there for cops that do things like this?

Derrick Hamilton 19:48 None. I mean, in our case, uh, the statute of limitations had ran out on this cop. And let me just tell you about this cop. He didn't just do it in the police department. He left the police department, went into the DOE, the Department of Education, and he did it there. He framed a guy in, in the DOE. They later found out the guy did nothing wrong. They had to reinstate him. This is just his nature and his character. Um, he was just-

Joe Rogan 20:12 And he just gets away with it?

Derrick Hamilton 20:13 He gets away. He's still-

Joe Rogan 20:14 What's his name?

Derrick Hamilton 20:14 Louis Scarcella.

Joe Rogan 20:15 And he's out there still?

Derrick Hamilton 20:16 He's out there. He's still getting a pension. The city is still paying this guy. Uh, we still got cases today that we are fighting in court for him. James Jenkins, Nelson Cruz. Uh, they're still active cases that we're litigating.

Joe Rogan 20:28 How many people do you think that guy wrongfully put in prison?

Derrick Hamilton 20:31 You know, I'll tell you something that I didn't even tell you, Josh, about this one, and it's gonna... This guy worked on over 200 cases. My father was killed in 1988. He was the detective on that case. Um, and I'll tell you something about that. Um, he said that one of the guys snatched the confession out of his hand and ate it. I didn't believe that. I said, "As much as I want people who may be responsible for my father's death, I can't trust this guy. I can't take nothing he say to be truth." Right? Just recently, that case was overturned, Samuel Edmonson case, because of his sloppy police work. So I... He says 200 cases he worked on. I would like to believe at least half of those guys, uh, are innocent.

Josh Dubin 21:19 Well, a lot of them have been exonerated. How many Scarcella exonerations have there been?

Derrick Hamilton 21:24 20 to date. 20 to date.

Joe Rogan 21:26 (exhales) How does a guy not just get locked up immediately for that?

Derrick Hamilton 21:31 And when he testifies-

Joe Rogan 21:32 20.

Derrick Hamilton 21:32 And when he testifies, he has two lawyers with him now. Right? I've never seen a witness come to court and have two lawyers standing with him. We object to it all the time. But, I mean, this is how much of a criminal he is. He had two lawyers standing with him all the time, um, to try to protect his rights. And he don't remember anything now. Like, he don't remember, you know, of course he don't recall nothing. Uh, you got to bring the police reports to him and say, "Is that your signature? Did you do this?" But he don't remember anything, of course. Selectively, he don't remember anything.

Josh Dubin 21:59 It just shows you, you know, he, he's been written about a lot. Scarcella, there have been scores of articles out there about him, because he was exposed. And this is not an indictment of all police that, that are amazing cops. Th- there are... But a couple of bad eggs that let the power get to their head, a couple of, of rogue cops, they don't just destroy a life. They destroy... You know, it's a ripple. One, you know, if, if you... Like, Derrick and I were at Sing Sing, um, visiting one of our clients, this guy Bruce Bryant. And, you know, it's the brothers, the sisters, the family, and then you start to multiply that out and the ripple effect of how it affects these families. There's been 20 exonerations. Th- there's been 22, actually, but there's been 20, 22 exonerations connected to this one cop. It only takes, you know, some rogue cops and people to look the other way and... I mean, look at this beautiful man, how articulate and bright and, and he's prolific in what he does. And, and, and he snatched his life from him. You know, we were talking last night about how this is like a second chance to live for him. Some of the best years of his life, he'll never get back. You're never the same, but he's easily the exception to the rule because he's out there and a force of nature and working toward helping to, to solve this problem. But, you know, Scarcella, you know, we were just asked the same question on the way here because... Show you how small the world can get. I haven't talked to Paulie Malignaggi in years. Uh, and he said to me something interesting. Called me the other day to check up, "How you doing?" Uh, you know, "What's been going on?" He said, "You know, I've been following the work you're doing." And for those that don't know, Paulie was a, a, a world champion fighter that l- liked to talk a lot that I managed years ago but go... He's got... He's a good soul. He's got a good heart. Um, and he said, "You know, there's this case you got to look into for me. A guy named Louis Fama, F-A-M-A."... he's-

Derrick Hamilton 24:12 Joey, Joey, Joey-

Josh Dubin 24:13 ... Joey Fama.

Derrick Hamilton 24:14 ... Farmer.

Josh Dubin 24:14 Joey Fama. Um, and he's like, "This guy was railroaded by this cop, Scarcella." And he's like, "Will you look into this case for me? I, I, I write to him every month." So I asked Derek on the drive over here, "You hear about this, this guy Joey Fama?" He goes, "Yeah, I'm working on his case right now." We just filed post-conviction motions on his behalf. So we called Pauly in the car and Pauly was like, "Oh my God, there's a reason why I called you." And he said, you know, he asked the same question you did, "How in the fuck is this guy still out there?" Because whatever crimes he committed, the statute of limitations have run on.

Derrick Hamilton 24:51 Yes.

Josh Dubin 24:52 Number one. Number two, nobody's got the balls to prosecute him because that would be an admission, wouldn't it?

Derrick Hamilton 25:00 Ab- absolutely. And let me tell you how crazy it was, right? Again, the prosecutor was down with him, they was all a part of the same clique, right? And he used a witness by the name of Theresa Gomez. In six murders, for six months in a row, each month she gave him a murder. In one murder, she said she looked through the peephole and saw the guy shoot. There was no peephole on the door. Um, six... Look, just think about it, six murders. Who see one murder, but six in your lifetime, in six months in a row? To today, he swears she was the most credible witness ever, that she was the best witness in the world. Um, and, and they used her. The prosecutor Ross at that time is now a judge in Brooklyn. Um, and on, on a cigar, uh, website he said the first time he smoked a cigar was when that lying crackhead whore got a conviction. He was talking about Theresa Gomez, they knew she was a liar, they knew that she would lie on people.

Josh Dubin 25:58 (laughs)

Derrick Hamilton 25:58 And that was in Robert Hill's case, he was exonerated. His brother, Alvina Jeanette, uh, is exonerated. And Daryl Austin... Three brothers she put in jail, uh, all three of them is exonerated. Daryl Austin dr- died in jail. There's no, you know, repercussions for that. He just lives his life, runs on happy. And he's still, to the day, despite 20 convictions being overturned, said he did nothing wrong. It's bigger than him, it was the system. He said, "I arrest, the prosecutors convict. You know, I give it to them, they decide what to do. It wasn't my decision." And it's just crazy. That's not how the system works, though.

Joe Rogan 26:31 How is there no law that, first of all, eliminates the statute of limitations when someone puts someone in jail for the rest of their fucking life, and, and also treats something like that as organized crime? That's organized crime-

Josh Dubin 26:47 Well, we're gonna-

Joe Rogan 26:47 ... by any definition, isn't it?

Josh Dubin 26:49 Yeah, that's a great question. Here's the, here's the thing that people have to start to understand and get through their, get through their heads and believe it. We have to be careful about who we put in power. This is not a, "Are you a Democrat? Are you a Republican?"

Derrick Hamilton 27:07 Right.

Josh Dubin 27:07 "Are you this or..." We have to be careful, because power is a, is a, is worse than any drug. I'm now convinced of that.

Joe Rogan 27:15 Yeah.

Josh Dubin 27:16 Fame, power, any form of it. And when... if you don't start paying attention to the people that we are putting in positions of power, this... it is, it is human nature that this will keep happening. As m- the mammals that we are, we're hardwired to abuse power. And you ask a great question, which is how do we not suspend the statute of limitations? It takes people that are willing to do the right thing.

Derrick Hamilton 27:44 That's right.

Josh Dubin 27:45 You know, like I have been, I have been excoriated about, "Oh, you went on Rogan and said that, that Kamala Harris was this, but then you voted for her." No, I fucking didn't. I call it like I see it. Now, I'm not a Democrat, I'm not a Republican. We have to be careful about who we put into power. And once you start putting people in power that will do just the right thing, not the popular thing but the right thing, laws like that can get changed. They can get changed. And, and, you know, you, you have said it before, and you're right, we're too... U- until we can get out of this tribal mentality of either us, them, those-

Derrick Hamilton 28:27 Right.

Josh Dubin 28:28 ... w- we're gonna keep on seeing this happen.

Joe Rogan 28:30 That shit is built into our DNA. We have to understand that we evolved as tribal groups.

Josh Dubin 28:35 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 28:36 And because of that, we had to fight off other tribal groups who wanted to steal our resources, who wanted to take our women. That's always been the case with human beings. And we have just moved that into Republicans versus Democrats.

Josh Dubin 28:48 True.

Joe Rogan 28:48 That's what we're doing.

Josh Dubin 28:49 And it's ba-

Joe Rogan 28:50 True.

Josh Dubin 28:50 And, and, and it's dan-

Joe Rogan 28:51 True.

Josh Dubin 28:51 ... it's dangerous. I call it like I see it. The reason I was critical of Kamala Harris is 'cause I called it like I saw it. And I'll tell you what, it was not a popular thing to do. Derek knows some of the fallout that I faced from "the left," quote, unquote. I don't-

Joe Rogan 29:06 Because they wanted to protect her. But it's accurate.

Josh Dubin 29:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:08 The problem is everything you said was accurate. Everything you said is provable. Everything you said is a 100% stone cold, carved-in-steel fact.

Josh Dubin 29:17 Yeah, but, uh, but it happens on both sides. Like, let me give you an example. Here's something that blows my mind, okay? And we just have to be willing to step out of this tribal mentality, all right? If you look at a guy like Ron DeSantis, all right? Everyone's gonna... has their back up already. Ron DeSantis, all right? What he did in Orlando was so fucking mind-blowing. Or Hill- w- was it in Orlando that he did this?

Joe Rogan 29:45 Tampa.

Josh Dubin 29:45 No, in Hillsborough Canning in, uh, uh, Hillsborough County in Tampa. He goes and removes this really terrific guy, right? Who, whether you like him or not, let's, let's not call him a terrific guy. He goes and removes a prosecutor, an elected official, on the hypothetical that if a state law passes that this guy won't enforce it. All right. Now-

Joe Rogan 30:09 Hypothetical. This, is this from a statement?

Josh Dubin 30:12 This is a hypothetical, because the guy signed a letter along with a bunch of other state and district attorneys saying, "If you pass an abortion law, uh-I don't think it's a good use of our resources to prosecute people that might be the victims of rape, you know, who were, um, doctors who were trying to help the victims of rape. I don't th-... I think it clogs up the system and they had their rationale for it. But there had never been a case brought before him yet. Now, why did Ron DeSantis do that, in my opinion? He did that because he knows abortion is a hot button issue, and if he goes down there and removes this guy, he becomes a hero for it. Here's the hypocrisy in that. This has nothing to do with politics. This has to do with the right thing. Flo-... Watch this. This, this should fucking freak everybody out.

Joe Rogan 31:03 Hm.

Josh Dubin 31:04 Imagine this, in Florida, marijuana is still legal. It's... I wanna get it right so I don't... I'll tell you what statute it's in. In the Florida Statutes, if you want to go-

Joe Rogan 31:16 It's very illegal, but-

Josh Dubin 31:18 It's, it's... Uh, the statute criminalizing weed in Florida is Section 893.03. It's a controlled substance in Florida. There are a lot of states where it's still a controlled substance, but it's been decriminalized. Florida's not one of them. In Hills... In, in, in Orlando, Orlando said, "You know what? We're gonna decriminalize it. Here's how we're gonna do it. We're gonna make it like a traffic ticket." There's a sticky problem there though, because there's a state law, Section 893.03 that makes it illegal. So they passed a county ordinance. They got the city council together, and they passed a county ordinance, and they said by a f-... what was it? A four to three vote?

Joe Rogan 32:03 Four to three.

Josh Dubin 32:04 "We are not going to prosecute according to state law. We're gonna prosecute according to this county ordinance." If Ron DeSantis gave a shit about state attorneys not prosecuting crimes, don't you think he would have been right there and said, "What the fuck is this? You're not prosecuting according to state law? You're not fit to be a state attorney. I'm pulling you out of office." That's the first thing he would have done. He didn't do that. They, they actually created a way to circumvent state law and did it. This is not a hypothetical. Why did he do that? Why didn't he do that? Because he doesn't give a fuck about... This is not about the issue.

Joe Rogan 32:47 Well, also probably because it's politically popular.

Josh Dubin 32:50 It's a-... Uh, abo- abortion is politically popular.

Joe Rogan 32:52 Yeah.

Josh Dubin 32:52 So he knows he's gonna make himself... So whether you're a, a quote unquote Republican, a Democrat, a, a Libertarian, if you don't look at that fact and say, "There's something really wrong there. Something wrong. I don't care about anything else involving this man. That, in and of itself, smacks of fascism, when you go grab an elected official by the scruff of their neck and yank them out of an elected position, that doesn't horrify you?" I mean, and, but when it comes to weed, you know, uh, it's illegal in the state of Florida. You, you sort of did an end around here to get around the law, but I'm gonna leave that state attorney alone. There's no answer to that. I have met this man before. He threw a hissy fit over the fact that I was wearing a mask b- at the height of the pandemic, because my son has type 1 diabetes, and I... it wasn't known yet whether I could get it, pass it to him. And, and, and instead of meeting with me, turned his back on me and walked out. He cancels clemency routinely in Florida. That should bother, that should bother people, that people like Derek, who just want a hearing, just hear me. You cancel the fucking clemency? You cancel the entire hearing so people's cases can't get heard. And until we're willing to step out of this-

Joe Rogan 34:15 Why do you, why do you think he does that?

Josh Dubin 34:16 You would ha-... Uh, because he's, he's... Uh, you would have to ask him. But the question is, why are we tolerating it? Why are we putting up with it? Why are we saying that that's okay? Because... Why? Because it's a tribal mentality, and until people are willing to sort of step away and say, "You know what? I don't like what this individual does. I'm not gonna vote for him. I'm not gonna vote that person into power." There, there are judges that get elected in the state of Florida, some that have ruined the lives of my clients. Um, you know, and they continually get elected because we vote along party lines instead of using our minds. And, you know, Derek and I were talking about it on the way here, like, what is it that prevents people from saying, "You know what? I'm gonna do something." Instead of talk about it on Instagram or post about it or bitch about it at a cocktail party, what prevents people from saying, "You know what? Maybe I'll run for office." Or, "Maybe I will write a letter," or, "Maybe I will go protest and maybe I will take up this cause." I, I don't know what it is. It's... Something stops in people and they say, "That's just something for other people." If you wanna make change happen and be about the change, you can do it. If you actually... This guy is, is, uh, uh, the best example of the power of one and how the power of one can sort of light a fire under the power of others. I'm inspired by him. I feel like there's a not, not enough time in the day to get things done, and you start to see the fruits of your labor when you get the wind at your back and you start making change happen. And I just think people feel like, well, politicians, that's for someone else, or being a leader, that's for someone else. A lot of it is just sort of getting out there and making it happen, or else we're just gonna be in this echo chamber with each other talking about, "Oh, power corrupts and what are we gonna do about it?" We have to do something about it.

Joe Rogan 36:10 Derek, it's amazing when some people get their back up against the wall, they become, like, a different person. Like, you, you, you literally changed the course of your education. You, you learned law. Like, that is so inspiring to me that someone who gets put in a terrible situation, instead of woe is me and, and complaining, you, you went out and you changed the course of the history of your life. You really did. You did it yourself. That's, that's so incredible.I mean, I've, I've heard similar stories of people becoming jailhouse lawyers, but I'm always inspired by that, and I'm always inspired by the human spirit that someone can, i- despite the odds, despite the way it feels, despite the, the, the inclination to lean towards despair, that you figured it out, man. I mean, it's really amazing.

Derrick Hamilton 37:00 Well, you know, for me, uh, one of the most telling things, I c- I could never understand how, you know, I'll give you example. In, in, in Rikers Island, you wake up 5:00 in the morning, you go to court. So from 5:00 AM to probably 10:00 at night, you're in the bullpen. You're stressed out and guys fighting each other, cutting each other. It's, it's a zoo house, right? And I used to be cursing these guys out because you're tough with each other, but when you go before the judge, you're a pussy. Excuse the vernacular. I just couldn't understand that. Like, your most important thing in your life, you don't stand up and fight. And I know that didn't want to be me. I wanted to be the smartest guy in that courtroom. If they was gonna railroad me, I was gonna have objection. I was gonna say, "Your Honor, may I address the court?" And I was gonna state the law and why what you was doing was wrong. So I thanks Candace Kerst, that attorney that gave me, uh, the advice. "Study law, man. You gotta fight for your life. Nobody's gonna fight for it for you." Um, and I grew up a fighter. I grew up in Bevis Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. Um, and I couldn't fight physically, so I knew I had to arm myself mentally with enough intelligence to be able to take on a judge, to take on a prosecutor, to take on my defense attorney if they was wrong. And that was my thing. When I went in that courtroom, I wanted to make sure even though you was railroading me, that record, and that's what got me out of prison, the record. Um, all of my objections got me out. The judge had to admit that there was evidence to prove I'm innocent 'cause I wouldn't let 'em have it any other way. I wasn't leaving that courtroom with them making a record like I was guilty. Whenever the prosecutor said that I shot somebody and killed them, I objected. I called them on the phone. I wrote letters. I used to call the judge chambers and act like I was somebody in the mayor's office and say, "Why are you doing this to me?" Uh, they would be like, "Yeah, tell your client don't call me no more." But to me, um, the most important thing I had was my life. And if I didn't stand up and fight for it, nobody else would. Nobody else could. Nobody else knew I was innocent. Um, and they always believe that you're guilty because, uh, the prosecutor, lawyers, judges, lot of them in the same Democratic party in New York City. Uh, they all amongst party lines, they all hang out together. They're friends. I was the only outsider in that. And I knew for a fact that if I didn't stand up and throw punches back the only way that I could through the law, that I would've stayed in prison the rest of my life.

Joe Rogan 39:12 What was the process like of learning law? Like, did someone guide you through it? Did you just pick up books? How did, how did that work?

Derrick Hamilton 39:20 Uh, I'll tell you, it was different processes at different time. When I first began, you know, the, the, the fortunate thing for guys in New York, they would have something called unofficial reporters. So they would give us books when we can cross-reference through something called digest. So let's say I got a, a criminal law topic. I can take that topic and run it through a digest and get 20 cases the same way. Uh, but for me, what I used to do was read a lot of briefs, um, read a lot of judges' decisions to try and like get the concept. And the more you read, the more you learn. One of the things I did was I read the criminal procedure law from front to back, from one all the way to the end. And it gives you the procedures of what happened from the moment you're arrested, to you're convicted, to your appeal and everything else. I had to master that. There was a guy by the name of Joe Diaz, they used to call him The Colonel. He was an old miserable guy in prison, didn't like anybody. But he took me up under his wing because he seen that I was very adamant, I wasn't going anywhere. And, um, he just told me, "You gotta know procedure. That prosecutors beat you on procedure. That they don't want to go through the merits of your claim. If they can get the judge to get you outta here without hearing the merits, they're gonna do that." So I had to master procedure, and I only did that by reading. I did 10 years in special housing unit, and all I did was study in special housing unit. Amongst the banging and the craziness, I just read books every single day. They would bring you two books from the law library, and I would read them from front to back.

Josh Dubin 40:44 Well, wait. Can you explain for the listeners and for, I think Joe knows now, but what that means to be in the special housing unit?

Derrick Hamilton 40:52 Uh, special housing unit is, some call it the hole, some call it punitive segregation. But you are in a very small box of a cell for 23 and sometimes 24 hours a day. Uh, you're around a bunch of mentally ill prisoners who throw feces and urine on you. They just burn themselves. It's a madhouse. Um, you know, they bang loud, it sound like bombs being dropped. I mean, it's a, it's a very, very toxic environment, uh, for the prison guards and prisoners alike. Um, and it's a, it's a punitive, uh, tool that they use, uh, against people that they feel, uh, have too much power in the prison or they don't like you. Um, for me, I was writing lawsuits, I was litigating against the, the conditions in prison, so they targeted me. And they always single you out and say, "You know what? You think you're tough. You think... You gonna be in The Box." And I did 10 years in there. I did 10 years in there, and it was the most, uh, horrific experience in the world, but I made it work. Um, I would roll my mattress up and I would put all of the law stuff on the bed and I would sit there and I would work all day. I would put earplugs in my ear and I would just block the noise out and work and work and work. And I did some of my best work in the in special housing unit.

Joe Rogan 42:04 That's incredible. It- it's incredible that you had this, this determination and will and drive and then it never let go.

Derrick Hamilton 42:12 Definitely. I mean, I had no choice. I mean, sometimes you're put in positions, uh, that you don't even know your strength until you're in 'em.

Joe Rogan 42:18 Yeah.

Derrick Hamilton 42:19 Um, and for me, I, I just didn't know that I had it in me. Uh, but, you know, when I got out, you know, when I left, um, I left with a group of guys that I pledged that I was coming back to get. I mean, these are guys that were innocent, I knew it. There were some Scarsella victims and, uh, Chibaka Shukur was one that we got out. Richard Rosario was a part of that team.Um, and there was many more, man, that I just knew that I just couldn't get out and walk away from these guys. Uh, Nelson Cruz, we still fighting for this brother. I mean, here's a case where Scarcella framed this guy. There was a cop who witnessed the real murderer. The cop caught this guy with a gun in his hand, shooting, locked him up, threw him in jail, gave him to Scarcella. The gun, the murder weapon. Scarcella let this guy tell him, he didn't do it, that the killer was Nelson Cruz.

Joe Rogan 43:09 But why would he do that?

Derrick Hamilton 43:10 You know, one of the things I learned is that informants, right? Cops protect their informants. They protect the informants that commit murder. Um, and then they have to blame it on somebody to close the case, and that happens a lot, right? In this case, this guy was an informant for them. They didn't want to get him off the street, so what do they do? They substitute him for Nelson Cruz despite the fact that a fellow officer says, "Listen, I know who I saw shooting. I witnessed this. I saw it with my own eyes." They let the guy go and locked up Nelson Cruz. He's still in prison today. His unfortunate is that we went through a hearing, we won, and you won't believe this. The judge caught dementia.

Joe Rogan 43:51 What?

Derrick Hamilton 43:51 The judge caught dementia, Shondalia Simpson, and she resigned under dementia. She had dementia when she was hearing this case and we still fighting. So, I mean, the criminal justice system is broken. Um, we gotta fix it, as you said, even to, to, to waive the statute of limitations, to hold people accountable, to hold prosecutors accountable, to change the 11th Amendment. I mean, everybody ... Look, if you can go after Donald Trump, right? Then you can go after prosecutors and cops. You can't tell me that you can go after Trump today for things that you said he did as a president, but you can let Scarcella get away, you can let the prosecutors get away, and you want me to say that that's okay? It's not okay.

Joe Rogan 44:31 It's just incredible to me that they'd be willing ... Just because they want to keep this guy as a snitch, that they will go out and convict an innocent person. I mean, what, w- how does a person get so jaded that they're willing and don't care about putting innocent people behind bars? I mean, is their idea that everybody's guilty of something, so it's okay? Like, what is, what's the mindset that allows a cop to do something like that?

Derrick Hamilton 44:58 The way the system is designed, right? Cops get accolades based on arrests, prosecutors based on convictions, judgens on- judges on based on how fast the case moved through the system. So if you're gonna pat me on my back as a cop and say, "Good job. Done," and there's nobody investigating to see whether or not you did a great job ... Prosecutors are supposed to investigate any case that cops bring before them. That's broken. They just accept the case and move on.

Joe Rogan 45:23 So it's like a game-

Derrick Hamilton 45:25 Yes.

Joe Rogan 45:25 ... and they're just trying to score points, and if they can cheat to score points, they'll score points by cheating.

Derrick Hamilton 45:30 Absolutely.

Joe Rogan 45:30 You see-

Derrick Hamilton 45:31 If there's political pressure, forget about it. Forget about it.

Josh Dubin 45:34 You, you, you ... This, this is like, um ... The questions that you ask are, are so, um ... They're rhetorical, but they're the same questions that I hear from people that hear these stories. And it's almost like your defense mechanism as a human being doesn't want to let you believe-

Joe Rogan 45:55 Right.

Josh Dubin 45:55 ... right? That that could be.

Joe Rogan 45:57 Right.

Josh Dubin 45:57 Because you're taught as a kid, cops are here to serve and protect you. Prosecutors are here to get the bad guys. What's woven in here and that we're not really ... We're, we're addressing it without addressing it, is, is that, is, is the racism that runs rampant in our system, is that it is, is a very big part of this. A lot of white cops, whether subconsciously or consciously, think the Black guy or the Brown guy, the Latin guy did it. Um, there is a hu- that's one ... You know, it's a messy stew. There's one part of it, a large part of it I'm sure, is what you just said, is you do not see the human cost that you, that a prosecution of a human being leaves in its wake. And these prosecutors get accolades for convictions, and it is a game. It's about wins and losses. For cops, it's about arrests. And yes, it, it, it taps into something primal that, w- you know, winning is good, losing is bad. Um, and it's a messy stew. And I used to think that sometimes cops were out to frame people. I don't think it's always that. I think that they think that their hunch is better than evidence and they make those me- the, the ends justify the means. But you can't ignore any one of these factors. Look, you and I had had a discussion, um, not on the podcast about Brittney Griner, right? (smacks lips) And, you know, I think w- we all agree as human beings that she ... It's, it's insane. It's not ... The word doesn't give it justice. It's, it's horrific. It's, you know, every adjective that you can pull, it's a nightmare for her. Um, and you asked me a, a question that, um, I think you asked it ... You, you articulated it on the podcast and you and I were texting about it, which is that, you know, does ... Th- this happens here. And yes, she's getting attention because she's in Russia, it's a political thing, it's en vogue. And I want her to get out, of course, more than anyone, but there are way worse situations here in this country.

Joe Rogan 48:16 Everyday.

Josh Dubin 48:17 I, I sent you some of these cases.

Joe Rogan 48:19 Yeah. They're insane.

Josh Dubin 48:19 So I, I went down, I went down a, a bit of a rabbit hole and I said, you know, there's gotta be some, um ... (smacks lips) There has to be someone that has studied the disparity between the sentences that Black men and women get for marijuana possession-... or marijuana, um, you know, marijuana convictions versus White people. And Derek found a study that I have with me, and when I read it, I, you know, I kept on saying, "This can't... Is this... This, this is unbelievable." It was commissioned by the ACLU from 2010 to 2018, and they examined this from every angle. They took the, the crystal b- ball and they turned it around and then they turned it over and then they looked at the inside of it. They looked at it from every angle, okay? Does, did the decriminalization of marijuana reduce the number of arrests overall? Yes, slightly. Did it reduce the number, the ratio of arrests when you look at Black people that are arrested for marijuana possession as opposed to White people? And the resounding answer is no. If you are a Black person in this country and you are caught possessing marijuana, you are three and a half times more likely to, A, get arrested, and B, get a disproportionate sentence. And if anybody's interested in the report, it's called the ACLU, ACLU Research Report: A Tale of Two Countries: Racially Targeted Arrests in the Era of Marijuana Reform. It will blow your fucking mind. It is... It went, they went down to a level of granularity that you would expect from a rigorous research study. They said, "Okay, well, do White people possess weed more than Black people, or do Black people?" Because if you think that if Black folks, uh, possessed more marijuana they would get arrested at a higher rate, the answer is no. White people do. You know, and you cannot look at these statistics and not be in outrage and say, "Okay, we have a problem here in this country." This... Our criminal justice system is infected by racism. It doesn't just stay in one segment of society. They looked at the arrest rate, right? The Black-White ratio in Table 6 of this report. From 2010 to 2018, the arrests per 100,000 may go down, but Black people get arrested in this country for marijuana possession in the same scenario 3.6 times more than White people. They broke it down state by state. I brought it because I wanted to leave it with you and, you know, they went down to states with the highest Black arrest rates for marijuana possession, states with the largest increases in racial disparities. I mean, a lot of this shit is happening in the South. It's happening to Black people. They're being brutalized by our criminal justice system. And unless people are willing to wake up to that fact, I mean, we're in 2022-

51:37 Yes.

51:37 ... where marijuana is legal in many states, decriminalized in many others. And, so getting back to DeSantis, I'm not beating up on him. If you really cared about removing a state attorney and you wanna, you know, do something right, you know, decriminalize it in the entire state. How many people... You know, well, imagine this. This is who this guy is, and I'm just calling it like I see him. I've met him. I've met with him. He is the jerk at work. You know, everybody has that person that is just an asshole at work and is always telling on people and causing a fucking problem and, and looking to be difficult. That's who this guy is. He, he has a bad temperament. He doesn't have patience. I, I mean, I was there meeting with him as a favor to one of, from one of his biggest donors. He had no patience with me. And why was I there? I was there because I wanted him to simply give me a clemency hearing. I wasn't asking for anything. I wasn't saying, "Please commute the sentence of this innocent man, James Daly, who I know is innocent." I was just there to say, "Just hold the hearing and let me show you," as Derek said, "the merits. Let me just show you the merits of the case." The only person that would meet with me on the clemency board and hear me out is a woman that's running for governor in Florida named Nikki Fried. She's the fucking Commissioner of Agriculture. She didn't need to meet with me. She met with me for three and a half hours, with her general counsel, with other members of her clemency team. I'm supporting her, because I'm, uh, you know, something that I'm interested in, she paid attention to. And she said, "There's a problem here. We have to hear people out." This is before she had intentions to run for governor, and now, you know, she's neck and neck with Charlie Crist in Florida. People want to make change happen, you know, take a look at her. She's an interesting alternative. She was a, she was a, a public defender. I think she then became a prosecutor. She gets it from all angles. She's the Commissioner of Agriculture and she's not a politician. The thing that bothers me is that when you look at racial disparities in marijuana possession arrests, you know, what's happening in the South in this country, Pickens County, Georgia, the arrest rate for Black people caught possessing marijuana, you're 97 times more likely to get arrested if you're Black possessing marijuana. The face that you just made is what happened in my fucking heart when I read it. You know, in, in Illinois people wonder, th- you know, like, it's like a popular thing for White people to say, is like, when they're in social circles where they don't think anyone's listening, "Fucking Black people are killing each other in Chicago," right? Well, you know, in, in Tazewell County, Illinois, you're 43 times more likely to be arrested if you're Black and caught with weed than if you're White.There's, I mean, we have a broken system and if people aren't willing to step up and recognize that, this report confirmed what I already thought and knew, but if people aren't willing to recognize and say, "Okay, well how do we go about fixing it?" You know, the legislatures pass laws that are made by people and are, and are conjured up by people. They get in a room and they sit there with a pen and paper and they come up with a law and then we try to get them passed. You're absolutely right, there should be no statue of limitations for a cop like Louis Scarcella who has fucking ruined the lives of a generation of people.

Derrick Hamilton 55:20 And, and I would like to just add that, that those stats just don't apply to marijuana. If you go to the Almanac, those stats apply to all crimes around the board, that Black people were being arrested, uh, and in some in- instances when you look in the Almanac, white people were being arrested more but convicted less of the same crimes. So it's just, it's just systemic, it's systemic racism, um, as you said, it's tribal, right? People tend to go with their tribe more than others, right? And then if you're poor, that plays another role, whether you're white or Black, right? If you're poor you can't get the money to defend yourselves so you're d- you're relying on who? A public defender or somebody who a judge has to sign off on their, their money to get paid. Right? So you, you still stuck. I had a 18B lawyer, which is a county lawyer, one time come to me on a motion that I made pro se and say, "The judge told me that he's going to deny your motion no matter what we do." She was scared to death. He was signing her voucher. She was scared. What did I do? Went right in the court and said it, "Judge, this lawyer just told me that you're gonna deny the motion no matter what we do." And she says, "I never said that Judge." And I says, "Well, she's a liar and that's the reason why I don't want her on my case." I'm asking that she be removed, there's a conflict. But she was so afraid, she was so scared that this judge had already told her what the disposition, she didn't know what to do. And this happens every day and if you're poor, you don't have a chance.

Joe Rogan 56:50 And there's also racial disparity that's clearly written in the law when it comes to the difference between the way they recognize crack cocaine versus regular cocaine. There's a far greater sentence for crack cocaine.

Derrick Hamilton 57:02 Yes.

Joe Rogan 57:02 But if you talk to a, an actual person who understands the effects of the drug-

Derrick Hamilton 57:07 Yes.

Joe Rogan 57:08 ... like Dr. Carl Hart-

Derrick Hamilton 57:09 Yes.

Joe Rogan 57:09 ... he will tell you it is exactly the same drug.

Derrick Hamilton 57:12 Yes.

Joe Rogan 57:12 It's the same drug, but the conviction, what you get if you get convicted for crack cocaine, like you would probably know this better than I-

Derrick Hamilton 57:20 Yes.

Joe Rogan 57:20 ... it's far-

Derrick Hamilton 57:22 Yes.

Josh Dubin 57:22 ... greater sentence, far more likely to be convicted, far greater sentence, and it directly impacts impoverished communities.

Derrick Hamilton 57:30 Yes.

Josh Dubin 57:31 And w- thank you Bill Clinton and Joe Biden-

Joe Rogan 57:34 Yeah.

Josh Dubin 57:34 ... and, and a whole score of other Democrats that wait-

Joe Rogan 57:37 The '94 Crime bill.

Josh Dubin 57:38 Yeah, the '94 Crime Bill was a fucking disaster. So that's why it enrages me, well, it doesn't enrage me, let's say it frustrates me to know and-

Derrick Hamilton 57:48 It enrages me, it enrages me.

Josh Dubin 57:50 You know, because-

Derrick Hamilton 57:50 You should be enraged. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 57:52 (laughs) I'm enraged.

Josh Dubin 57:52 Yeah.

Derrick Hamilton 57:52 You should be enraged.

Joe Rogan 57:52 Very enraged. Very enraged.

Josh Dubin 57:53 Yeah.

Derrick Hamilton 57:53 Yeah.

Josh Dubin 57:54 We had this talk last night, I said, "If I was a Black man in this country, I don't know how he holds it together." But I, I was, you know, what, what ends up, what ends up, um, always blowing me away is what I think you touched on earlier, because it's like this, y- how do you find a silver lining? You know, I don't think there's any silver lining to a life that has been damaged the way Derek's life has been damaged, and as tough as he is, somewhere under there he, he hurts in a way that we'll never understand. But I, I was watching these students, we got five college students who would never have got this opportunity, just wouldn't have got this opportunity to sit there if they weren't part of Jay-Z's scholarship and his mom, Gloria Carter, who's just a wonderful woman, and this woman Danya Diaz, and said, "Let's see what happens when we give people an opportunity." And I watched five college juniors that are going into their senior year of college, some of them shy and timid, um, some of them who were in- int- intimidated by the notion that they would be working on a legal case, start to realize like this, this guy Bruce Bryant, and if people that are interested should go to the, just go to Free Bruce Bryant, there's a clemency petition for him. I can't too, talk too much about his innocence case, but he, he has been called by the press the poster child for clemency in New York. There's stunning evidence of his innocence, they quickly got to the main facts of the case and were able to start solving it. These are college juniors and they said, "You know, who brings..." He was accused of being a shooter in a murder in which he's alleged to have brought his girlfriend in a cab where he was exchanging a Halloween costume for his niece. And the first question from the shyest kid in this group said, "Who in the world would bring their girlfriend to a pre-planned shoot out-"

Derrick Hamilton 59:55 Right.

Josh Dubin 59:56 "... and exchange a Halloween costume in the meantime?" And they started to find inconsistencies in the testimony of people that claimed they saw him, didn't see him, and you know, really it was like a, a, a, a stunning reminder to me that if we just give people the opportunity, Derek was forced into the opportunity, I told him I did a day in jail. I was a fucking puddle. I was a mess. And I don't know how he was able to summon the strength, you know, to survive, let alone have the discipline to plug... He was telling me about when he was in The Hole, about how there was a guy in the cell next to him, you know, it was, it was a, a fascinating analogy he gave me, he said, "It's like social media."... is that there's some voice in the darkness that you'll never meet them, you'll never see them, but they can criticize you and get under your skin and call you names and say nasty shit about you, looking for a reaction. And they sometimes get it and that emboldens them more. He said, "It was the same thing when I was in the hole. You'd have someone next to me yelling terrible shit, 'I'm going to fuck your wife, I'm going to do this to your daughter.' You know, and taunting you." And being able to distinguish between anger and the, the recognition or the realization, "I'll never be able to confront this person. It's just a voice out there that is sick in the head obviously, and is trying to get a reaction out of me." And Derek was telling me how it forced him into patience, and it forced him to be able to develop the skill at drowning out the background noise. And because I'm, he... To me, I, I'm... It must be annoying because I'm always asking him questions like, "How did you do it?" It's the same thing you were getting at, how do you summon the strength to be able to overcome? And if people like him can overcome, people that were born into the worst circumstances, born into a, a poor background, a system built against them. You know, if we just start changing that paradigm, you know, don't we want everyone around us to succeed and have the same chance that we have? You know, it's just... It's, it's hard to, to not sound corny about it, but, like, I-I always tell people that... Like, I've heard criticisms of you, Joe, before and I say to people, "You have no fucking clue who this man is." You know how rare it is to come across a human being that wants other people to do well? We're almost hardwired to want to tear each other down 'cause of our insecurities; you genuinely want to see people do well. And it's like, I was telling Derek that about you, it's like, he genuinely wants to see people do well and it comes from the heart. And, you know, if he's not an inspiring example of what we can all aspire to and, and overcome and, and doesn't open some eyes to say, "You know, if I just give someone a chance, they can do it." You know, whatever the it is. Right?

Joe Rogan 1:03:12 Well, people don't understand what that means. They think that wanting someone to do well in somehow or another takes away from you, but it doesn't. It boosts you. It helps you. The more people do well, the better you'll do. But that's a competitor's understanding of the, the nature of the circle that you surround yourself in. You should always be around people that are killing it.

Josh Dubin 1:03:33 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:03:33 'Cause then you wanna kill it.

Josh Dubin 1:03:35 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:03:35 You, you should always be around people that are kind and people that are generous. 'Cause you know that feeling you get when you go, "Goddamn, what a fucking great guy."

Josh Dubin 1:03:42 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:03:42 "I want to be a great guy." It's, it's good for you, it's good for everybody.

Josh Dubin 1:03:46 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:03:46 The, the person that only wants to be the man and wants everything for themselves and wants to be selfish and cut everybody down, that's a lonely, sad fucking person.

Josh Dubin 1:03:55 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:03:56 That's a, that's a terrible place to be. It's terrible for yourself. It's a selfish thing to be kind. It's a selfish thing to be generous. It's great for you. It's great for everyone else too, though. It's like there's a, there's a selfishness in it because, like, I genuinely love the feeling when I can help people. I genuinely love the feeling of whether it's, uh, helping people express themselves on a podcast or elevate a comedian's career or, or just help someone out that I know needs some help. That is a... It's a great feeling.

Josh Dubin 1:04:28 But why is it so rare then?

Joe Rogan 1:04:30 'Cause they don't understand what it is. People have been taught that there's a scarcity. They've been taught this famine mentality. It's wrong. It's, we're a community. We're a community as a country and we're a community as a world. And if we don't look at it that way, we're always going to be stuck in this lonely, sad position where you think of the world as your enemy. The world's not your enemy. The world's filled with potential best friends.

Josh Dubin 1:04:52 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:04:53 The world's filled with your brothers and sisters. The world's filled with people who, when they do great, it'll make you feel fantastic.

Josh Dubin 1:05:00 Yeah. And I don't... Look, I have to say that I think that it comes with, with security too. Like I know that times when I have fallen victim to like hoping someone doesn't do great, it's because of your... My own insecurities-

Joe Rogan 1:05:15 Yeah.

Josh Dubin 1:05:15 ... will lead me there.

Joe Rogan 1:05:16 True.

Josh Dubin 1:05:16 And, and like Derek and I are like brothers. And, and it wasn't like... It hasn't been like a l- When I first met Derek, I was like, "Fucking guy seems angry."

Derrick Hamilton 1:05:25 (laughs)

Josh Dubin 1:05:25 "He seems angry."

Joe Rogan 1:05:26 How could he not be?

Derrick Hamilton 1:05:27 How could I not be, right?

Joe Rogan 1:05:28 How could he not be? 30 fucking years in jail for shit he didn't do. It's amazing how not angry he is. That's the, the true testament to your character, is that you've been able to overcome that and become this person who you are now.

Derrick Hamilton 1:05:41 Absolutely.

Joe Rogan 1:05:42 That's a, that's a lesson for everyone. And again, that's for all the people that if you can get ahold of this, if you're in prison and you're hearing this, you can be like Derek. Everyone can figure there's a path that you can be a better person. There's a path that you can be more educated, more understanding, more compassionate. There's a, there's a path for everybody to be a better person.

Josh Dubin 1:06:04 How did you get over the anger though? That's what I don't understand, like how you're not-

Derrick Hamilton 1:06:09 I never said I got over the anger. What I did-

Josh Dubin 1:06:11 (laughs)

Derrick Hamilton 1:06:11 ... was challenge the anger somewhere else.

Josh Dubin 1:06:13 Fueled it.

Derrick Hamilton 1:06:13 Yeah, yeah. I didn't, I didn't get over the anger. I mean, I do what I do. My passion is, is a direct, uh, line of that anger. Um, you know, one of the things we know, and I'm gonna say we, and I'm talking about as Black people, right? We believe that the system was designed the way that it is, that it didn't happen by happenstance, right? So when you know that, you work to change the system. I work to change the system so that my kids will get a better opportunity, their kids will get a better opportunity. And that we can together gel as human beings. If I don't do the work, what good is me criticizing it, right? If I be angry and upset and grab a gun and become some animal, that doesn't help the society, it doesn't help the criminal justice system. So again, I had to really, really think about it. Let me tell you, I'm the first person to tell you that I had fantasies-... of killing a cop. I had fallacies of killing a prosecutor. I went and spoke to mental health people and said, "Listen, I can't sleep at night. All I think about is killing these guys when I get out of here." Oh, and you know what, you know what they, they, the social worker told me in Attica Correctional Facility? "I looked at your record and this is what guys like you do." Right? And this is why till today, right, I got a, a trauma about speaking to mental health people, because this is somebody I went to say, "Look, I can't sleep at night." I had fantasies about killing Scarcella. You think I didn't? Fantasies, right? I had a whole list of people that I was gonna kill. But it was a program that I went to when I was in prison called Challenge The Chains, I went to the program solely for the purpose to see if they can change that in my mind, and they did.

Joe Rogan 1:07:44 Hmm.

Derrick Hamilton 1:07:45 And you know how they did it? They had me put the people that I love, my kids, up on the board. They said, "Put down the people that you love up there and think about how it would affect them. What would happen? You already did these many years." And I had a daughter that's, that's 30 years old now, and I was telling her for 21 years I was coming home.

Joe Rogan 1:08:03 (exhales)

Derrick Hamilton 1:08:04 Every year, I'm thinking, "I'm coming home." I'm filing these motions, they're great motions. It's impossible for the judge to deny it, right? And at some point she said, "You's a liar. You been telling me for 21 years you coming home."

Joe Rogan 1:08:16 Hmm.

Derrick Hamilton 1:08:17 "That you are a liar." How do you deal with that?

Joe Rogan 1:08:22 Ooh.

Derrick Hamilton 1:08:24 You're trapped.

Joe Rogan 1:08:24 What was it, what was it like the day you got out?

Derrick Hamilton 1:08:27 You know, it was the most rewarding experience ever. Um, it was, it was, you know-

Joe Rogan 1:08:34 What's the first thing you did?

Derrick Hamilton 1:08:36 You know, there was bells. I tell you, psychologically, you know, there was bells ringing. Uh, it was the church bells that used to ring in Auburn Corrections Facility. And I used to say, "Well, you know what? When the bells ring, I'm gonna pray. And hopefully there's a God out there who hear my prayer." Right? That was my spiritual analysis. And the first thing I did when I went out was found that church and went over there and said a prayer. My wife picked me up. We went down to see my kids in Albany on the way down to the city, had dinner with my son who I haven't had dinner with in 21 years.

Joe Rogan 1:09:13 (exhales)

Derrick Hamilton 1:09:13 Um, and, and my other son came to visit me. And I just sat there and had the first ... We went to, uh, uh, seafood joint, what's the name but I forget it, this popular one. We went there and, and had a seafood dinner. And, you know, I, I tell you as a video of me getting out, and I'm moving so fast I almost got hit by a fucking car (laughs) -

Joe Rogan 1:09:33 (laughs)

Derrick Hamilton 1:09:33 ... coming across the street. But even that was, was a blessing to be able to almost get hit by a car, and just to spend time with my wife and my kids. I mean, it was the most rewarding experience ever. And, and, you know, from that moment, like I said, I knew what I wanted to do. Uh, I just went and had f- uh, look, just the fact that I can stop in Albany and, and rekindle with my son, uh, and just have a moment with my kids, man, that was the most rewarding experience ever for me. It was, it was everything.

Joe Rogan 1:10:01 What's the bottleneck, Josh, in terms of resources to, to g- to elevate this, to get more people out, to get more funds to do? What can we do where we can amplify this, get more people involved?

Josh Dubin 1:10:19 Yeah. Well, I think one big step is ... I always thank you, and I don't, I don't think that there's, there should be a limit to my gratitude. Being on, on this podcast is, is the best example, because I don't think we would've got the two exonerations in Kansas without the attention, and I think we need to keep the drumbeat going. So, I'm forever and, and continually grateful to you for giving me a platform. But I think that in addition to that, more people need to understand that they can help make the change happen. So, I ... Again, we can't announce the name, we have been sworn to secrecy, but Derek and I, um, are on the precipice of starting a very major legal justice center at a major law school together, where I'll be the executive director and he'll be the deputy director. And it was funded by someone who had this experience where they were wrongfully accused of a crime and had the resources to fight it, and has now funded it. Um, and we need ... You know, donations always help, because the more resources you have, the more attorneys you can hire. Um, but it needs the, the public awareness, and then it needs to, um, keep the drumbeat of pressure going, because we know that works. Derek mentioned the Daily News article that got the parole board's attention. Getting these stories out there work. There are guys that we have talked about, and we might as well do it because we're here, okay? And we're here to try to get the word out. There are stories of cases that are out there now, "You said this can't be true," and then I sent you the, the, uh, the Joe Shilling case, right? Where Joe Shilling is serving life in prison, right? After being convicted of having an ounce and a half of weed, and had his appeal denied. And you wrote to me, "Is this true?" And then I sent you the opinion. And, you know, Joe Shilling is like an example, this happened in Mississippi, this is what happens to, to Black men in the South. And Joe Shilling is, is, is an example of a case where if enough people write to the clemency board, write to the governor, somebody will pay attention at some point. And here's a guy where they look at, you know, things that he has done in the past, and they say, "Well, it wasn't just this marijuana conviction, he was also involved in an armed robbery." Right? Well, he wasn't involved in an armed robbery. When you say involved, you picture stick 'em up, here's a gun or a knife. You know, there are different levels of involvement, and people make mistakes. So you don't use those past mistakes as a way to shoehorn them in to throwing their life away.... right? So, I think-

Joe Rogan 1:13:10 Especially for something so fucking innocuous.

Josh Dubin 1:13:12 It's, it, I mean-

Joe Rogan 1:13:12 It should be legal anyway.

Josh Dubin 1:13:14 Well, think about it this way: How m- if you really wanna do something to change the h- the, the rate of deaths in this country, the rate of, uh, violence in this country, and you really are not a hypocrite, you'll ban alcohol. All right? Because alcohol causes a lot more accidental deaths because of drunk driving, it rav- there's not a lot of people that are sitting there smoking weed, getting in their car, and blowing up another car and a family. There's, you know, the biggest, uh, the biggest victims of marijuana smoking are fucking potato chips and chocolate.

Joe Rogan 1:13:55 (laughs)

Josh Dubin 1:13:55 You know? I mean, it's like-

Joe Rogan 1:13:57 (laughs)

Josh Dubin 1:13:57 ... what, what the fuck are we talking about here?

Joe Rogan 1:14:00 Right.

Josh Dubin 1:14:00 So, here you're throwing away a life and saying, "Oh, well, this is because of what you did before." He's wa- Joe Schilling's case should be advertised, it should be, there should be letters flowing in by the hundreds of thousands. So, the bottleneck is, I think, and maybe I sound, um, a little bit arrogant in saying this, but you'll correct me and be my reality check, both of you. The bottleneck is not having the fucking balls to stand up and say, "I am gonna speak truth to power."

Joe Rogan 1:14:35 Hm.

Josh Dubin 1:14:36 "And I am gonna tell you this is not okay. And I've had my life threatened, I have had my, uh, family threatened because I will speak truth to power. And I look, I wear it like a badge of honor." And, you know, Derek told these students, because they said, "Well, what if we get emotional?" He said, "If, this, this business is not for the faint of heart. You can get emotional and you can be sympathetic, but it just takes more caring and more doing."

Joe Rogan 1:15:04 Mm-hmm.

Josh Dubin 1:15:05 So the more people that can write to clemency boards, the more people that can say, "I'm not gonna vote in a tribal way," the more people that say, "You know what? I can do better as a leader by running for off- by running for office," do it. We all, we all feel like it's for someone else, you know, but, like, this happened to you, right? Did you ever think you would reach this many people? I don't know if you did or not.

Joe Rogan 1:15:34 No.

Josh Dubin 1:15:34 All right.

Joe Rogan 1:15:35 Not at n- this is accidental.

Josh Dubin 1:15:37 All right. Well-

Joe Rogan 1:15:38 Purely.

Josh Dubin 1:15:39 ... purely accidental, but there was a point in which you, me, Derek, we have all said to ourselves, "How did this happen to me?"

Joe Rogan 1:15:47 Right.

Josh Dubin 1:15:48 Right? And I s- and I have come to the realization, "Well, if not me, then who? If not now, then when? It happened to me, now I'm gonna use my voice to try to empower other people." And, you know, I think that we get caught up in mediocrity, and I think that we settle for mediocrity as human beings. Right? That's what sort of, like, keeps the classes in check. You know, you don't have to be great or powerful or omniscient to make change happen.

Joe Rogan 1:16:15 True.

Josh Dubin 1:16:15 You just have to b- break from what's expected. You know, like, I broke from some of my parents' expectations, and as a result of that, they evolved.

Joe Rogan 1:16:29 Mm-hmm.

Josh Dubin 1:16:29 You know, sometimes you're afraid of the backlash. You know, I remember, like, there were, there were certain things about marrying within your religious faith. And I remember the first time I dated a Cuban girl, my mom had a reaction and said, you know, "Aren't you gonna marry someone that's Jewish?" And I said, "I have, I abandoned organized religion when I was 13. It's the most hypocritical thing imaginable to me." And I remember going to her, to my girlfriend's house in college, and they were roasting a pig. And I remember my mom, you remember, like this-

Joe Rogan 1:17:12 (laughs)

Josh Dubin 1:17:12 ... Jewish lady from Long Island. "Oh my God, there's a pig in the ground. What kind of people do this?" And I said-

Joe Rogan 1:17:20 (laughs) People who want delicious food. (laughs)

Josh Dubin 1:17:23 I said, I said, "Let me ask you a question." She's like, "Are you gonna get married to someone that..." I said-

Joe Rogan 1:17:28 Oh my God.

Josh Dubin 1:17:28 ... "I'm, I'm, I'm more Catholic than I am Jewish at this point." And, and my, credit to my mom, because what she did was she evolved. She said, "You know, you're, you're right. I haven't been to temple in 30 years."

Joe Rogan 1:17:44 Wow.

Josh Dubin 1:17:45 "I don't know even why I think this, other than that this is how I was raised." And I watched her evolve to the point where when I finally got married to my wife, the fact that she was Christian and that a judge married us in a non-denominational ceremony that was more human than it was religious, it wasn't even an issue. So, if we're willing to, like, break from what's expected of us and the norm, you know... And I had a dad, my dad recently passed, you know, that he was a complicated dude, but I, uh, you know, like, we, we, we draw off of things that happen to us. I remember in college, I was home for Thanksgiving, and my mom sent my dad off to Home Depot to get light bulbs because the light bulbs in the living room burned out. And, uh, he comes back from Home Depot with these two young Black guys that were selling, that were selling these key- they were, like, keyboards with a flip-up screen that could connect to the internet at the time.

Joe Rogan 1:18:53 Mm-hmm.

Josh Dubin 1:18:53 And it was like, he felt bad for them because he's like, "These guys were out here in the h- in the fucking Florida heat in November." And he's like, "They had nowhere to go for Thanksgiving." And it was like, my mom was like, "What the fuck are you doing? You just take home two strangers?" And he's like,