Bryan Stevenson

And so the first time I met him, I couldn't even be in the same room with him

because they didn't allow him to touch another human being.

And so his poetry comes out of a kind of isolation, a kind of anguish that is heartbreaking.

And what was really frustrating was the person who he robbed and shot was absolutely appalled that he was being treated that way.

And she was actually advocating for him to be released or to have a different sentence.

And we worked on his case for a very long time.

ultimately won his release.

I'm so proud that now he's living in New York, he's doing poetry, he's speaking to young people, he's doing things.

But yes, we've done horrific things to children in this country, and we've allowed that mindset of fear and anger to cause us to do some really destructive things.

And I do believe that

When you allow yourself to be governed by fear and anger, when you root your decisions in fear and anger, you're going to make bad decisions.

You're not going to do the things you should be doing.

Until the 1970s, we had a relatively small number of people in jails and prisons.

It was fewer than 300,000 people in jails and prisons in this country.

And then that shifted radically in the 1970s when elected officials from all political parties began arguing that

that people who are drug addicted or drug dependent are criminals who should be punished for their addiction and dependency.

And we were angry and we were afraid.

And so we put hundreds of thousands of people in jails and prisons for addiction and dependency.

Now, if we weren't being governed by fear and anger, we would have said, oh no, those people suffering from addiction and dependency, they have a health problem.

And we need a healthcare response, not a punitive response.