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Nightmare late night car wreck to prison- Lark Hodge · Nightmare Success In and Out

• 0:01
  What happens when your worst fear becomes your reality?
• 0:04
  Hi, I'm Brent Cassidy. Welcome to the Nightmare Success
• 0:07
  In and Out podcast, where we explore how to overcome your
• 0:10
  fears and nightmares and set yourself free.
• 0:13
  We're going to be exploring this topic with guys that was in
• 0:15
  Leavenworth with and others who survived their own nightmare.
• 0:20
  These stories can be inspiring, sometimes.
• 0:22
  Sad. There's some humor, but
• 0:25
  hopefully you can come away with a nugget of something that'll
• 0:27
  help you knock down some of the prisons you built up in your own
• 0:30
  mind. Okay.
• 0:35
  Welcome back. Now my success In and out,
• 0:37
  listeners. It's where you come to hear what
• 0:40
  happens when your worst fear becomes your reality.
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  How do you adapt? Survive.
• 0:44
  Overcome, Set yourself free? I've got a really interesting
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  story here today with my guest Lark Hodge.
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  And she sent me something and it was it was her attorney talking
• 1:02
  about her case and I think all I could think when I was watching
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  this was, Oh my God, wow, I can't believe this.
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  And, you know, it's it's also an interesting story about, you
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  know what when you go to trial, what's admissible, what's not
• 1:22
  admissible and how that can actually change what the jury
• 1:25
  would have done. And and there were, when I
• 1:28
  listen to this, there were jury members that said, Oh my God, if
• 1:31
  we would have known that, there's no way that this would
• 1:34
  have come the way it was. And it's and you really don't
• 1:37
  know that until you actually hear stories like this.
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  But Lark has an incredible story.
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  It's a a painful story, but she survived and her family survived
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  and her kids survived. And so from that standpoint, I'm
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  really excited to her to tell the story because how do you
• 1:54
  handle your worst nightmare and then how do you survive it?
• 1:57
  That's this story. I can't wait to unpack all this.
• 2:01
  Before we do that, I want to recognize our sponsor, the show,
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  Tell them the Brent from nightmare success sent you
• 2:46
  welcome in Lark. How are you doing today?
• 2:48
  Good. How are you?
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  Thank you for having me. Well, I am very honored to have
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  you on the show. I I really been looking forward
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  to this because there's a couple of things that you know about
• 3:02
  your story that just grip you. But the fact that you got the
• 3:08
  outcome that you had, you still went in and you fought through
• 3:13
  and your family made it through and now you're out and you
• 3:18
  haven't been out very long. You were just talking is August
• 3:21
  20th, what's that been like for you to be out August 20th?
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  It's been a whirlwind, definitely, I think, since
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  stepping out of prison. I've been on go.
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  I have two small kids, so I stepped right into motherhood
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  and right into being a wife and right into being a business
• 3:44
  owner and it's just been crazy. That's what it sounded like,
• 3:49
  what you told me. I mean you're on a farm, you've
• 3:51
  got all this stuff going on, you got a nine and eight-year old,
• 3:54
  your husband, everything and you actually have only been on a
• 3:58
  little over a month. And like I said, it feels like
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  you're jumping in a moving car when you get out and that
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  feeling lasts for a while. You you just, you take it all
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  in, but it feels like it's moving really fast.
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  So Lark, let's go back so everybody can get to know you a
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  little bit. What about Lark?
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  Growing up, did you parents, siblings, what was like life,
• 4:25
  life like for you as a kid being lark college?
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  So I was born in New Orleans, LA, and my mom and my dad were
• 4:38
  together until I was about 5:00 and they split up.
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  My mom got remarried to my stepdad and we lived in New
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  Orleans until Hurricane Katrina. We actually stayed during the
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  storm in Memorial Hospital and then was evacuated to the
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  Convention Center and then evacuated out of there.
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  And that had to be scary, right? As a kid, how old were you guys?
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  I was 10. Oh gosh.
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  I mean, I remember that so well cuz it was just, you know,
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  national news night after night after night and the, you know,
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  the destruction and despair and people you know, scattered, you
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  know, from Texas to wherever. I can't imagine as a kid what
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  you would have been thinking. Yeah, it was definitely
• 5:25
  terrible. The storm itself wasn't bad and
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  we were in a hospital. My mom was a nurse there, so we
• 5:31
  stayed there and we watched the storm come in and it busted a
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  couple of windows and then it kind of went away and.
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  It was cool. I have like, one really vivid
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  memory of my dad taking me out onto the top floor and we looked
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  out and all the power in New Orleans is out, so you could see
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  the Milky Way. Well, then the next morning when
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  we're thinking, okay, it's time to, you know, get out of here.
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  That's when the levees broke. But we didn't know what was
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  happening because we don't have. Cell phones, there's no TV,
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  everybody's radio is dead at this point, and all we can see
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  is the water rising rapidly and we have no idea what's going on.
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  Well, eventually someone found out that the levies had been
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  broken and they were going to start doing emergency
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  evacuations of the patient. So my dad was helping.
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  Getting patients life flighted out of the hospital and then we
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  kind of just were stuck there for a while.
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  They didn't really think about like, you know, nurses and their
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  families or doctors and their families.
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  And as a nurse there, you couldn't leave until all your
• 6:41
  patients were gone. So once my mom was able to get
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  all the patients gone, we had heard a rumor that there was
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  going to be airboats to take us out to Chapatula Street and meet
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  be met by charter buses when we got there and there was no
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  charter buses. So eventually we had made our
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  way to the Convention Center and it was crazy.
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  My mom's friend that worked at the hospital, her husband was
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  part of a SWAT team and two parishes over and she had a
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  satellite phone and was able to get in touch with him.
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  And he brought in like 2 school buses and it was all these
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  nurses and we all ran in the middle of the night.
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  So the school buses loaded on the school buses and hauled.
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  But. Sounds like a movie.
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  Psychiatric hospital. Yeah, it was crazy.
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  It was crazy. My dad actually wrote a book
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  about it and it was insane. And at 10 years old, like, you
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  really don't understand the volume of what's going on.
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  But like as I look back on it, I just like.
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  Looking back on life periods like I've gone through so much,
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  but I think like New Orleans is definitely the start of the.
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  Start of a roller coaster. The crazy, Yeah, But we bounced
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  around a lot after the storm and we finally settled in Northeast
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  Florida. And I went to high school there
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  and started having kids. And I was going to college for
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  radiology, but I ended up getting a job at the Omni and
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  Amelia Island. So I stopped going to college
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  cuz I was making money, decent money, good money, and it was in
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  a nice part of the town. And that's kind of when, like my
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  life, I thought my life was going great, right?
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  And God always has other. Seems like that's when it hits,
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  right? It's like, I can't get any
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  better than this. And then boom, you get
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  blindsided. It's.
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  Like living great. I'm like 20 years old and.
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  Making more than my dad's making as a professor like crazy.
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  And so I meet the sommelier and I'm like, oh, I'm really
• 8:51
  interested in this. I love the study of wine.
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  I don't really like, I don't like the feeling of being drunk.
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  But I enjoy the taste and knowing like the varietal or
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  where it's, you know, all the different things that wine
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  entails. So he offers me a job in Dallas,
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  TX. And to apprentice underneath him
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  and eventually try to be a level one song.
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  And I'm like, great, I go to Texas, I do the job, formal job
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  interview. I get the job and I'm supposed
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  to be moving within 11 days to Texas.
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  And I get in a car accident and that's where this whole thing
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  starts. Okay.
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  Well, let's unpack this nightmare, because I've heard
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  it, but I haven't heard it from you on how it all happened.
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  But it was. It sounded like it was.
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  And I don't even know. I can't even remember where you
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  were coming from. But it was a dark road.
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  And can you just walk us through what happened that night?
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  Okay. So I was working.
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  I probably worked like a 16 hour shift that night.
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  I was on my way home like normal, 2:00 in the morning.
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  And I'm driving and it's a super dark Rd. down Heckscher Drive.
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  Like there's no at that time. There was no lights.
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  There was construction everywhere.
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  You can barely pass the car sometimes.
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  I've gone down that road in the middle of the night and not
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  passed one person until I get to the exit of where I was living
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  at at the time. Well, I don't really have a very
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  I have no recollection of the actual accident happening.
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  All I know is when I woke up that obviously I was in a field
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  of debris and people around, so you don't even remember the
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  crash. Have no recollection whatsoever.
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  I ended up having a traumatic brain injury and a brain bleed,
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  so I like. Even parts of that day are
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  completely spotty. It was a head on collision.
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  Is that correct? Head on 55 mile an hour.
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  Oh man, I'm I'm shocked that you survived.
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  I mean most people don't survive head on collisions.
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  That's amazing that you survived.
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  How long were you so when you woke up, was there a day that
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  went by? How long of a period of time is
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  that from you waking into this days of?
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  So as far as the police report goes, the accident happened
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  around like 3:25 AM, but there is phone calls that happened
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  before that that we ended up finding out about later on down
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  the line. But I had clocked out of work
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  around 1:00, so anywhere between 1:00 and. 3/25 when it was
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  actually reported as when this car accident happened.
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  And like I said, you can drive down that road and sometimes
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  never pass the car. So there's really no telling
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  when the actual accident happened.
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  I could have been sitting there for a while.
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  My husband was a first responder.
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  He was a fire captain with JFRD and.
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  When he arrived on scene, he thought that I was ejected from
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  the vehicle, but they had to use the Jaws of Life to Get Me Out
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  of the car. And by the way, this wasn't your
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  husband at the time. No, it was not my husband.
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  This is, this is the crazy thing about this story is, is that the
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  person who saved you out of this car was a fireman.
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  And this becomes a romance love story after the fact, which I
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  don't wanna jump ahead, but I find that just fascinating that
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  he was at the scene of your accident and saving you from
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  your car. Yes, definitely.
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  But I so he thinks that I was. Thrown from the vehicle.
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  Obviously I have no recollection of that whatsoever, but I was
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  covered in marsh mud. I had twigs and branches in my
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  hair, but my vehicle was literally in the middle of the
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  road. So there is no way that there
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  would have been any dirt or whatever flung into the vehicle.
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  Like there's no dirt on the tires on the car or anything
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  and. What we ended up finding out
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  years later through a 911 call that had been buried in the
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  mess, was that the first person who called 911 actually
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  witnessed my vehicle being hit by another car.
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  So what my attorney and what everyone's kind of like compiled
• 13:52
  is that I probably was ejected from the vehicle.
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  Timed my way back to the car and then when I was hit by that
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  second vehicle, they probably clipped the door in so that way
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  they wouldn't. I couldn't get out.
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  It's just crazy. Like I start having more of a
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  recollection once I'm in the hospital.
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  It's like spotty the whole time. Like I know that there was
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  witness statements that like. I didn't even know whose car I
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  was in. My kids car seats were in the
• 14:26
  back seat and they're like, are your kids here?
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  And I'm like and I don't know what you're talking about.
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  Like, it's just completely, I'm obviously out of my head because
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  I've hit my head so hard in this car accident.
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  My body's in shock because I've gotten all these injuries.
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  I broke my back, my left. So, Lark, were you unconscious
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  or not unconscious when they came to you in your car?
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  Were you out or were you still you had?
• 14:54
  To wake me up out of consciousness, Yeah.
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  I wasn't conscious when the first witnesses came to the
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  scene, so and I woke up like I woke up and I'm like, who are
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  you? There's people ever like two or
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  three people outside the car? Yeah, adrenaline.
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  And especially like, I didn't even think I needed to go to the
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  hospital when my husband came to the scene and he was like.
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  Okay, we're going to put you on this backboard.
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  I'm like, no, I'm calling my mom and she's going to come get me.
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  I'm, I'm terrified of hospital, but I'm not going.
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  And he's like, man, look down at your arm.
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  Please look down at your arm. And it's hanging off of my body.
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  So that's just kind of like where it all started.
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  I remember kind of the hospital ride like.
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  The ambulance rides to the hospital is real, in and out.
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  I keep going back to sleep, waking back up, going back to
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  sleep, waking back up, same thing.
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  Going into the hospital, not really understanding what's
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  going on. They're hitting me with all
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  kinds of different drugs and whatnot.
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  So that's on top of me having a brain injury.
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  I'm getting hit with all these different narcotics as soon as I
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  walk in. I've lost so much blood that
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  they're ordering blood transfusions and it was just
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  crazy. Craziness.
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  But my full memory doesn't come until later on that morning when
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  my mom comes into the hospital room, and by that point, FH P's
• 16:30
  already been in there, JS O's already been in there, and I had
• 16:36
  no idea that someone else had passed away in this car accident
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  until my mom came into the hospital room around like 9:00
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  AM in the morning. And mind you.
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  Everything's happening at like 3:30 in the morning is when the
• 16:51
  car accident, all the craziness of that is happening.
• 16:56
  So your mom tells you that somebody died in the other car.
• 17:00
  How does how do you even register that into your mind?
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  What was your reaction and how do you compute all that with all
• 17:10
  the other things that have happened in the last six hours?
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  I think I just like. I just remember just instantly,
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  like, my whole body was just convulsing.
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  Like I couldn't believe that someone had passed away.
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  I didn't even know that another vehicle was involved because
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  when I had asked on the scene, hey, isn't it like, is everybody
• 17:30
  okay? Is everybody okay?
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  They were like, we don't even know where the other car is.
• 17:34
  There's like, we don't see another vehicle.
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  So my whole time until my mom comes, I'm thinking that.
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  I'm the only person in the car accident, like, I must have hit
• 17:45
  a tree or something. When I've asked my husband, he
• 17:51
  was like, all we're doing is we're worrying about you.
• 17:53
  When I'm being questioned by police, they're not really
• 17:56
  elaborating on what's happening. They're just kind of asking me
• 17:58
  where I came from, what I was doing, was there anything wrong
• 18:02
  with my vehicle? So I had no idea.
• 18:08
  And then once my mom told me, it was like my whole world was
• 18:11
  just. Done.
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  I couldn't believe it. Like, how do you compute a loss
• 18:19
  of life? And then you don't even remember
• 18:22
  anything. Like, so you're in this twilight
• 18:25
  zone where you, like, wake up and you're like, Oh my God,
• 18:28
  someone else died in this car accident.
• 18:31
  That's crazy. And then you have all those
• 18:33
  other thoughts of, well, why am I still here?
• 18:40
  And it was just. It was insane.
• 18:43
  And the hospital room that I was in had a TV in it.
• 18:48
  So, you know, first Morning News, I made the Morning News
• 18:52
  and I'm on the news and I'm like, oh Oh my God, like this is
• 18:56
  this is crazy. I can't believe it.
• 18:58
  I cannot believe it. I have been going in and out of
• 19:01
  surgery while I was in the hospital that day, so I didn't
• 19:04
  get to see all the news articles, which I'm prop.
• 19:07
  I'm grateful for now. Because the media is definitely,
• 19:12
  well they create in there even they go with it and that's you
• 19:15
  know that's one thing about news is they they go down a lane and
• 19:20
  that's their lane and that even if they get more information,
• 19:23
  they decide if they're going to use that information or not.
• 19:26
  When does when does it turn for you lark that this is like
• 19:34
  coming at you in a different way than just having a car accident?
• 19:40
  About 3 days later I'm still in the hospital, another FHP police
• 19:50
  officer comes in and they're telling me that my vehicle is
• 19:58
  going to be impounded and I'll never be able to get it back
• 20:01
  because it's in like heavy forensics for.
• 20:08
  DUI manslaughter. And I'm like DUI manslaughter,
• 20:12
  What are you talking about? That's crazy.
• 20:16
  And they're like, well, we suspect that you were underneath
• 20:20
  the influence. You were on your way home from
• 20:24
  work and you had a wine bottle in your car, and we think that
• 20:29
  you were under the influence. We have an officer that said
• 20:32
  that you had bloodshot, watery eyes in hospital, blah, blah,
• 20:35
  blah, whatever. And I'm like, that's crazy.
• 20:38
  And at this point, I don't know my rights.
• 20:39
  I've never been in trouble. I've never been pulled over by
• 20:42
  the police. I've nothing I.
• 20:46
  Bloodshot, watery eyes could also mean that you were in a
• 20:48
  head on collision and you just survived.
• 20:51
  Great. And I've been hit with so many
• 20:54
  narcotics in the hospital that they hit me with Narcan twice
• 20:57
  because they overdosed me. So I'm like, this is, this is
• 21:05
  crazy. Well, I then at that moment kind
• 21:12
  of shut down, deleted social media.
• 21:17
  My mom's father is an attorney in Birmingham, AL.
• 21:23
  So he was telling my mom, like, all the things to do, like, make
• 21:28
  sure she's not on social media, make sure she, like, doesn't
• 21:31
  talk to anybody. Feels too late now because I've
• 21:34
  already given my blood for one in the hospital.
• 21:37
  I've made a statement that you know all about me being
• 21:43
  whatever. I didn't know my Miranda rights
• 21:45
  at this point. And you're asking me all these
• 21:46
  questions while I'm completely out of my mind.
• 21:49
  And so at that point I'm like, oh, I'm going to present.
• 21:57
  I have these two small kids. My son's 8 months old at the
• 21:59
  time, my daughter's 2. What is going?
• 22:03
  I'm completely injured. I can't go to.
• 22:05
  But Lark I remember from from what was told and your your
• 22:13
  attorney talked about is that there were two different blood
• 22:17
  alcohol content things that happened and one was different
• 22:22
  than the other. Was did do you, I mean, before
• 22:27
  you left work, do you even remember?
• 22:29
  Did you have a drink or what was going on before you got to where
• 22:33
  you were going? Because your blood alcohol
• 22:35
  content was actually below the level of the legal limit in
• 22:42
  Florida when they. Tested it in the hospital, it
• 22:46
  was different. But then I find out from the
• 22:49
  attorney that those hospital tests as opposed to the other
• 22:52
  tests, those those don't match most times.
• 22:55
  And I don't even understand how that all works, but you had two
• 22:59
  different blood alcohol content takes on one under and I think
• 23:04
  one right at it. So at that point, I mean did you
• 23:09
  have? And had you brought an attorney
• 23:13
  into the situation and I guess it was the attorney that I saw
• 23:17
  that was talking about this case, cuz he said it's the case
• 23:20
  that stayed with him forever. How did you get to him?
• 23:27
  Okay. So my attorney, Luis Fusco, I've
• 23:31
  known him for a long time. He I had a high school boyfriend
• 23:35
  who went to school with him and actually helped with one of his
• 23:39
  cases that he was going through. And Lewis was actually not my
• 23:44
  first pick for an attorney. I went with another attorney
• 23:50
  1st, and his name is Lee Hutton. And there's a there's a back
• 24:00
  story with that too. When I went to go see Lee Hutton
• 24:04
  about three months after the car accident, when I was finally
• 24:06
  released from the hospital and I was able to go and meet with
• 24:09
  these attorneys. When I was telling him the whole
• 24:12
  thing, he told me, hey, your toxicology isn't back yet.
• 24:19
  But if your toxicology is below the legal limit, like you're
• 24:22
  telling me that it's going to be, then they're not going to
• 24:26
  file charges. You're going to be okay because
• 24:30
  at this point, I think, no, Derek's toxicology was not back
• 24:38
  at that point. So I'm like, OK, so my
• 24:42
  toxicology comes out the next week and it's the legal blood,
• 24:47
  which was below the legal limit. It was a .06 and a .058.
• 24:52
  So I take it back to Lee Hutton and I'm like, hey, my blood
• 24:55
  alcohol is below the legal limit.
• 24:57
  What's going on? There's no other drugs in my
• 24:59
  system. And he's like, they're never
• 25:02
  going to charge you with this. You're going to be fine.
• 25:04
  Everything's going to be fine. I'm like, okay cool.
• 25:11
  We're good. Well, I think like November or
• 25:17
  December, Derek's blood alcohol comes back and it's a .15 and it
• 25:25
  has narcotics in his system. So I called we hunting back and
• 25:29
  I'm like, hey, update. Derek's toxicology was just
• 25:36
  uploaded to the FHP report. And it says this.
• 25:39
  And he's like, hey, I just want you to know that I can't
• 25:43
  represent you anymore because now I'm going to be basically
• 25:46
  second in command with the State Attorney's office.
• 25:52
  Well, great. Well, that would have been, you
• 25:53
  know, nice to know whenever that decision happened or whatever.
• 25:58
  Thank you because I've sat here and told you my entire case, and
• 26:02
  now you're going to be sitting with the State Attorney's
• 26:05
  office. That's wonderful.
• 26:07
  Thank you. Lark, when you're saying, I
• 26:10
  think you're saying Derek, is that you're is that the what are
• 26:14
  you referring to the other driver?
• 26:16
  That's the other driver. Okay.
• 26:18
  Wait a minute, okay. I want to make sure because I
• 26:21
  that's why I'm stopping you there.
• 26:23
  That guy who was driving the other car.
• 26:26
  I just want to make sure everybody understands this.
• 26:28
  That guy had a blood alcohol content at .15 and he had
• 26:34
  narcotics in his system. Okay.
• 26:36
  I just want everybody who's listening to understand that was
• 26:39
  had nothing to do with your blood alcohol content.
• 26:41
  Yours is .06 or .58, but his comes back at .15.
• 26:47
  And has narcotics in his system. This is the guy that died okay.
• 26:52
  Just want to clear that up. Yeah.
• 26:57
  So when Mr. Hutton tells me that he can no longer be my attorney,
• 27:02
  I'm like, well, but I need to go find someone else.
• 27:06
  So that's when Lewis popped up. Lewis is a DUI attorney here in
• 27:13
  Jacksonville and because I've had prior engagements with him,
• 27:17
  I was like, perfect, we're going to go with him.
• 27:20
  And so I call Lewis and give him the down low on everything.
• 27:24
  And I still haven't been arrested for this.
• 27:28
  I still haven't heard anything back from FHP.
• 27:30
  I'm finding out these FHP reports on my own by like,
• 27:33
  hounding them every day, calling up at the office.
• 27:38
  And Lewis has never had a DUI manslaughter case.
• 27:43
  So he's very this is this is new to him.
• 27:49
  He's DUI, not. Helping people get out of their
• 27:52
  duis, right? Right.
• 27:55
  And well, at almost the year mark, I get a phone call from
• 28:03
  the corporal Everett while I'm at work and he's like, hey, you
• 28:09
  knew this day was coming. I need you to come in for
• 28:14
  questioning. I'm like, okay.
• 28:18
  Well, let me have my attorney call you, let me get your phone
• 28:20
  number. Whatever.
• 28:21
  And he gives me a wrong phone number with a.
• 28:25
  This is a year after the accident.
• 28:28
  This is a year after the accident, so even my for a whole
• 28:32
  year, we haven't heard anything since day three of me being in
• 28:35
  the hospital. Nothing at all.
• 28:39
  So I'm in a panic. I leave work, I come straight
• 28:43
  home. I'm trying to get my life
• 28:46
  together, like calling a bondsman, making sure my
• 28:49
  attorney knows what's going on. So Lewis is on it and we don't
• 28:56
  really hear anything for like two or three days because Lewis
• 28:58
  can't get in touch with FHP, like no one knows where this
• 29:02
  corporal ever is at. No one knows this extension that
• 29:05
  he gave me. So I'm calling, Lewis is
• 29:11
  calling, Lewis's whole office is calling, the Bondsman's calling.
• 29:14
  There is no bond. There is no warrant issued for
• 29:18
  me yet and. What does the attorney find out?
• 29:25
  Does he find out any information?
• 29:27
  He's like, there's no warrant, there's no, nothing's been put
• 29:31
  to the state attorney. All you have is this phone call.
• 29:34
  Okay. It's just this mystery phone
• 29:36
  call. Okay.
• 29:37
  And so Lewis is like, just calm down.
• 29:41
  You're going to be okay if something happens.
• 29:44
  I've got you. We're going to get you out.
• 29:45
  You'll be fine. Well, I'm sitting in my kitchen
• 29:48
  four days later after the mysterious phone call, and low
• 29:52
  and behold, FHP cruisers are coming down my driveway.
• 29:57
  And they still don't have a warrant, but they take me
• 30:00
  anyway. So it's the whole thing is just
• 30:08
  crazy. It's insane.
• 30:10
  It's ridiculous but I get down to the State attorney's office.
• 30:16
  I sit in the patrol car for like an hour with no police officer
• 30:20
  in it cuz he's in the State attorney's office I'm guessing
• 30:23
  going and getting the warrant at this point.
• 30:25
  He comes back in and takes me to booking and.
• 30:31
  Seems really loud. They didn't have a warrant
• 30:33
  before they came down your place and to take you out, That's kind
• 30:37
  of backwards. Yeah.
• 30:39
  Yeah, tell me about it. And then left me in a cruiser.
• 30:43
  For about Yeah, in the front seat, shackled in front.
• 30:49
  Yeah, Cruiser still running. What's going through your mind?
• 30:54
  I'm petrified. I have never been in a position
• 30:57
  like this. I've never been in handcuffs.
• 30:59
  I've never been in a police cruiser other than like field
• 31:02
  trips or whatever, you know and you.
• 31:04
  Haven't been able to call anybody that you've been taken
• 31:07
  away. No Okay.
• 31:08
  Nope. So I am petrified and I get down
• 31:14
  to booking. I get my phone call and they're
• 31:19
  on it. I get out immediately.
• 31:23
  At this point, me and my husband still aren't married, but he is.
• 31:27
  Me and him are living together and we're in a fullblown
• 31:29
  relationship while he works for the fire department, so you
• 31:32
  know, he's I got people everywhere, friends everywhere.
• 31:35
  So I'm being looked after and very well taken care of.
• 31:38
  And he was at the scene of your accident, right?
• 31:41
  He's the state's, like main witness.
• 31:43
  Yeah. So I get out and that's when the
• 31:50
  ball starts to roll with my case, right?
• 31:52
  Cuz I'm petrified and I'm I'm an organized mess.
• 31:57
  So I want to have my hands in on everything.
• 32:00
  And knowing that Lewis hasn't had a DUI manslaughter case, I
• 32:04
  want to make sure that nothing's messed.
• 32:07
  No detail goes awry and we start getting discoveries and we're
• 32:13
  diving into this and it's crazy. We're like how the how, why is
• 32:21
  the state even pushing so? Hard right?
• 32:24
  Now, what is really going on? We find out that Derek had a
• 32:34
  lifetime suspension on his driver's license since 1989.
• 32:40
  That's longer than I've been alive.
• 32:43
  He had been pulled over for 75 driving infractions after that
• 32:47
  suspension of his driver's license.
• 32:51
  There's anywhere between 5:00 to 15DUI's.
• 32:56
  We had to get a private investigator to bury out these
• 33:00
  arrests and booking reports because when we were going on to
• 33:05
  our clerk of courts, think everything was redacted.
• 33:09
  Like everything was redacted. It was ridiculous, you know that
• 33:15
  when I was listening to your attorney talk about this case.
• 33:20
  Was he going and asking the other side?
• 33:23
  Like what? Why?
• 33:26
  Knowing the past history of this person that died, why are you
• 33:31
  going after this girl, knowing what you know?
• 33:35
  I mean, what? Was there any conversations that
• 33:37
  were going back and forth that that we're making any sense?
• 33:42
  I'm sure I didn't really dive into like the discussions
• 33:49
  between Lewis and the state and kind of stayed out of that.
• 33:54
  But I know the family was pushing really hard for it.
• 33:56
  And I I understand. I can understand to an extent,
• 34:00
  like, I don't know what it's like to have my dad or my
• 34:07
  brother or what, ripped and torn away from me in a car accident,
• 34:10
  like leaving the house one day and then all of a sudden not
• 34:13
  being able to see that person ever again.
• 34:16
  So I can understand like the hurt and the devastation behind
• 34:19
  it, it's the family was pushing for it very hard, but they were
• 34:34
  also pushing for a civil suit against the hotel that I was
• 34:39
  working for. So ultimately, I believe that
• 34:46
  this was more of a political pool than anything.
• 34:53
  Well, let's Fast forward a little bit because you you get
• 34:56
  into this mess, your attorneys dealing with this is the first
• 35:00
  time deal with the manslaughter. How long does this process take
• 35:06
  for you? Because I feel like when I've
• 35:08
  talked to you, it was a long process.
• 35:12
  Yeah. So the car accident happened May
• 35:14
  29th of 2016. I get arrested May of 2017 and I
• 35:19
  go for pretrial hearings for two years after that and then I'm
• 35:24
  finally found guilty in May of 2019 and remanded in the custody
• 35:30
  then. So we're talking about four
• 35:31
  years, is that 3? Three years, so three years of
• 35:36
  this. As you continue to gather all
• 35:40
  this discovery and all these different things that go on,
• 35:42
  there is another thing that comes in that they took the
• 35:45
  blood from the hospital and so that's what they're running
• 35:47
  with, even though that they've got the the true test of the
• 35:50
  legal test. The legal test was the .06 or
• 35:54
  the .58. When you get to trial, first of
• 35:59
  all, how long does this trial last?
• 36:02
  It was a four day trial. Four day trial did you did you
• 36:07
  feel like? Because I don't get to talk to
• 36:09
  too many people to go to trial because it seems like everybody
• 36:11
  that I talked to ended up plea. They're pleaing out their, their
• 36:15
  situation. You went to trial.
• 36:17
  Did you feel like in that trial that things were going your way
• 36:23
  or did you feel like, Oh my God, this is going to be a disaster
• 36:26
  and and I've got this horrific thing to look forward to?
• 36:30
  What? Like what was the trial like?
• 36:33
  So for the first few days of trial, we felt we didn't feel
• 36:37
  great, but we felt good about the situation.
• 36:40
  Now, mind you, a lot of my evidence was not admissible, so
• 36:49
  I'm going in a trial, kind of like with my hands tied behind
• 36:52
  my back. I want to talk about that.
• 36:54
  I want to talk about that lark because that's the biggest part
• 36:57
  of this whole thing. With your, it comes out.
• 37:02
  That the judge rules that his blood alcoholic content and his
• 37:07
  history of what he had was not admissible in this case, which I
• 37:13
  find absolutely just jaw-dropping because how that
• 37:16
  affects what happened that night is all the difference in the
• 37:21
  world. I I don't know how in the world
• 37:22
  that wasn't admissible. I don't know how all these legal
• 37:25
  things happen, but that not being the situation and them
• 37:30
  running with. Two different blood alcohol
• 37:33
  content. The jury not knowing the other
• 37:36
  side at all. I can't imagine what you were
• 37:38
  thinking walking into this thing with the biggest part of the
• 37:42
  defense for you not to be able to be even discussed.
• 37:48
  Yeah, so pretrial hearings. I have Judge Healy as my judge
• 37:55
  and they call him hang them high.
• 37:57
  Healy, he is like hard court. He was also the judge that did
• 38:02
  the Michael Brown trial here in Florida.
• 38:07
  Maybe that's his name. I've probably.
• 38:09
  Heard that the national story because there was a Michael
• 38:13
  Brown in Saint Louis, too, that that went through.
• 38:15
  Yeah. So my first day walking in the
• 38:21
  court and I see him, I'm like, Oh my gosh.
• 38:24
  And everyone's talking about how terrible it is, whatever.
• 38:27
  So we file these motions to try to get some of the stuff in
• 38:32
  because when you're going to trial, that's what pretrial's
• 38:35
  all about, is getting everything into the trial.
• 38:39
  So first was the medical records.
• 38:43
  So there's two different kinds of blood tests.
• 38:46
  Your your legal blood test is done by whole blood, which means
• 38:50
  they take the into account all of your blood cells that get
• 38:53
  pulled and it's done specifically.
• 38:58
  There is specific wipes that they use.
• 39:00
  There's a specific needle that they use.
• 39:03
  There's specific. Everything is completely
• 39:05
  controlled. Your medical blood is not.
• 39:10
  Your medical blood is done by blood plasma which is a higher
• 39:14
  concentration of your blood cells and they wipe you down
• 39:20
  with alcohol wipes. They use a different size
• 39:23
  needles. There is no chain of custody a
• 39:28
  variety of different and variety.
• 39:32
  So my hope, my medical blood was right at the legal limit, right?
• 39:40
  But it's blood plasma. So you actually have to like
• 39:43
  times it, divide it, add, subtract, and then you get the
• 39:49
  results of what the whole blood would be.
• 39:51
  And that's why you need a toxicologist in this whole case,
• 39:54
  because it's complete, the number that it is is completely
• 39:57
  different than what the whole blood number would be.
• 40:02
  And when they did that, it ended up being just below the legal
• 40:06
  limit. Even with the medical blood, I
• 40:08
  think it was like a .079, which is still below the legal limit.
• 40:16
  So we're pushing to get this medical blood dismissed because
• 40:21
  it just, it's prejudicial. When a jury is hearing that
• 40:24
  they're like, oh, well, I mean it does say that it's over the
• 40:27
  legal it or what? It's close and it was an hour
• 40:30
  after the car accident, so she had to be drunk at the time.
• 40:34
  So my attorney is fighting. We are fucking.
• 40:36
  We have probably filed 8 or 9 different motions against this
• 40:40
  medical blood. Because who Listening to a
• 40:44
  toxicologist for four hours in the courtroom.
• 40:47
  A jury's going to get bored listening to that and they're
• 40:49
  going to come up with their own notion, Well, deny everything
• 40:55
  that we filed was denied. Well, our last one that we
• 40:59
  pushed for is for Derek's history.
• 41:05
  His blood alcohol level at the time of the accident and the
• 41:10
  previous the drugs that were in his system to be allowed to be
• 41:16
  told during trial and it was. Denied.
• 41:22
  Denied. Here's the thing that I deny.
• 41:24
  Here's the thing that I think is so interesting about it is let's
• 41:27
  just say that you were at we're at the legal limit of .08, or
• 41:30
  maybe you were a little bit over .08.
• 41:33
  Let's just give that up. The fact that he was at .15, how
• 41:38
  can you assume whose accident caused who caused the accident?
• 41:44
  Because no one was at the scene. You know, I find it just
• 41:47
  absolutely fascinating that a judge could listen to this.
• 41:53
  Yes, somebody died. You could have died.
• 41:56
  But the fact that his blood alcohol content was so much more
• 42:00
  and he had a a history like. Papered history of this, so he
• 42:09
  denies it all. You go into the trial, the jury
• 42:13
  comes out and you are convicted and then you have jury members
• 42:21
  after the. Well, first of all, I want to
• 42:23
  talk about like what? What did you, what were you
• 42:25
  thinking that day when the jury came back out and they said what
• 42:29
  they said? Up until this point, you haven't
• 42:35
  even been ever involved in anything legal.
• 42:38
  You you were in a bad car accident, coming home from work
• 42:41
  at 2:00 in the morning, whatever it was.
• 42:43
  Now you are standing before a jury that is going to say you're
• 42:48
  either innocent or guilty and you're you're going to be
• 42:51
  looking at prison time. What?
• 42:53
  When they came back and they said you were guilty, what?
• 42:57
  How did you react to that news? I was devastated when we got the
• 43:09
  phone call that returned back to court.
• 43:11
  I kind of already had it in my head because the verdict came
• 43:16
  back so quick. Like my attorney was like, hey,
• 43:18
  look, if they take like an hour or two hours, it's probably not
• 43:23
  going to be a good thing, Mark. So when we got the phone call,
• 43:27
  it was, I think, a little bit over an hour.
• 43:28
  I was like, oh, well, my kids were at the attorney's office,
• 43:32
  so I'm telling them, I'm like, hey, look, you guys are all you
• 43:37
  you have like, I need you guys to get along and I need you to
• 43:40
  be strong. And I need you to know that I
• 43:42
  love you no matter what. And I need you to be strong for
• 43:46
  each other. So I leave the office and we
• 43:49
  walk back to the courtroom and I get in the courtroom and my, the
• 43:54
  clerk that's in there, she's so she's so sweet.
• 43:59
  Phenomenal woman. And she obviously knows the
• 44:04
  entire situation because she's been typing, transcribing the
• 44:10
  whole thing from the from three years prior, right.
• 44:14
  So she knows what the jury doesn't know.
• 44:18
  And she's looking at me and I can just see it on her face.
• 44:22
  And I'm like, oh, gosh, oh gosh. Well, the jury comes out and
• 44:29
  they find me guilty. And you can like, the clerk was
• 44:35
  devastated. And she's kept up with me the
• 44:37
  entire time that I've been incarcerated.
• 44:40
  And actually was like, texting my attorney before I was coming
• 44:44
  home. Like, you know, Lark's about to
• 44:45
  be home, like. And you could just like, feel it
• 44:50
  in the courtroom because I had so many people with me.
• 44:54
  Like, everyone's just disappointed.
• 44:57
  But we kind of knew it was going to happen because of the way the
• 45:02
  evidence was set up, Sure. And I can't.
• 45:06
  Get a lot of defeats before we ever got into that courtroom,
• 45:09
  right? And I like, I I really can't
• 45:13
  blame the jury for coming up with the verdict that they did
• 45:17
  with what was presented to them. And I lost it in the courtroom.
• 45:25
  This is like, so the entire time that I'm, I'm being the, the
• 45:29
  good person, right? I go to court every time that
• 45:33
  I'm supposed to. My attorney has signed a waiver
• 45:36
  that I don't even have to appear in court.
• 45:38
  But I'm going, I'm going once a week.
• 45:39
  I'm going in the courtroom. I'm making sure I'm there.
• 45:41
  I'm being, you know, I'm trying to be as perfect as I can be,
• 45:47
  right? And I lost it.
• 45:50
  When are they? I, the judge left, the jury
• 45:54
  left. I looked at the state attorneys
• 45:57
  and I gave him a piece of my mind because at this point I
• 46:01
  haven't talked to you at all. I have been respectful, but I
• 46:05
  feel like you have just taken my whole life away from me.
• 46:09
  And you know what you did because you're the one who
• 46:14
  obviously is on the other side of this chair.
• 46:16
  You know all the evidence in front of you and you still came
• 46:20
  at me the way you did and I lost it.
• 46:25
  Understandably, yeah, definitely.
• 46:29
  But it bit me in the butt later on, so I get in a go.
• 46:34
  Ahead I'm sorry. I they take me that I'm remanded
• 46:38
  in the custody immediately and I'm freaking out, right?
• 46:40
  I've the little bit of time that I spent in booking was nothing
• 46:45
  compared to me walking in here and thinking that I'm gonna be
• 46:49
  in here for at least 10 years cuz that's what the state was
• 46:52
  pushing for and I'm not gonna walk back out.
• 46:56
  What? That's crazy.
• 46:58
  I was freaking out. Yeah, I can't imagine.
• 47:05
  I know it's had to be. I know what it feels like to
• 47:09
  walk into the unknown, and you were walking into the worst
• 47:11
  unknown because. You never planned on this and
• 47:16
  now you're dealing with and you haven't been sentenced yet.
• 47:20
  So how long did you have to wait for the sentencing?
• 47:23
  It was about 3 weeks until sentencing, and during that time
• 47:29
  there was just like a lot of soul searching when when people
• 47:36
  go to prison, you find God or whatever.
• 47:38
  I knew God before I went in there and I was angry with God
• 47:42
  when I got to prison. Like, this is this is crazy.
• 47:46
  I I go to church every Sunday. I go to Bible study every
• 47:50
  Wednesday. I'm in my women's group.
• 47:52
  I go to Panera Bread with all my girls every week.
• 47:55
  I am a devout Christian. I'm doing everything that I'm
• 47:58
  supposed to be doing. Why?
• 48:02
  Why? Why?
• 48:04
  Why am I going through this right now?
• 48:06
  I don't understand what's happening this.
• 48:08
  I'm angry. I'm very angry with God at this
• 48:11
  point and but he was definitely showing me a lot of grace while
• 48:19
  I was in that three-week stretch.
• 48:21
  Me and the children of my father, my father of my children
• 48:26
  were going through it just horribly.
• 48:29
  He was sitting with the victim's family like it was really bad.
• 48:32
  Feeding the state attorney. It was so bad.
• 48:35
  But he was trying to get custody of my kids and we have been
• 48:38
  going through custody battles since before I had to.
• 48:43
  Get all that going on also, right?
• 48:46
  Well, during that three weeks of me getting sentenced, my judge
• 48:50
  ended up exnaing his custody and all he got was weekend
• 48:55
  visitations and my mom was granted guardian at Lydham.
• 48:59
  So I still had primary custody, but my mom was able to make like
• 49:02
  medical decisions. So definitely God was still
• 49:06
  working and I wasn't seeing it at the time.
• 49:09
  But now I do. Looking back, well, when I go in
• 49:13
  for sentencing, my husband is my rock, right?
• 49:21
  He has gotten all of these letters from all of my friends,
• 49:26
  family, community members, the fire department, the Police
• 49:31
  Department, and has all my family flying because mind you,
• 49:38
  I'm from New Orleans, so not not a lot of my family lives here in
• 49:43
  Florida. So we've got my my aunt from
• 49:46
  Texas is flying in, everyone's there.
• 49:50
  So when I walked in the room and I see this group of people that
• 49:54
  haven't been in the same room since I was little was amazing.
• 49:59
  And I have all these letters of recommendation, all these people
• 50:02
  are getting up and saying wonderful things.
• 50:06
  And I had one my downward departure.
• 50:10
  So I knew walking in that I was probably not going to look at
• 50:16
  the whole dime, but the state was still pushing for maximum.
• 50:23
  But even after hearing all of that and I got up and you know,
• 50:30
  I don't want to say this and make it seem like I'm an evil
• 50:34
  person because I'm not. And I've met some wonderful
• 50:38
  ladies in prison that are DUI manslaughter as well who have
• 50:43
  the exact same feelings as I do. I do not feel responsible for my
• 50:48
  car accident. There is a level of remorse that
• 50:52
  I have for Derek, right? Because it's the loss of life
• 50:56
  and I am devastated that someone lost their life in this car
• 51:01
  accident, but I can't say that I'm the one who caused it.
• 51:06
  So getting up and speaking to the family and letting them know
• 51:11
  like, God, I'm devastated that Derek no longer here and I don't
• 51:17
  know how that feels. To have somebody like that taken
• 51:19
  away from me and I'm expressing this to the family and crying
• 51:26
  and just it was bad. Well, I got sentenced and I was
• 51:33
  graced five years in, six years out.
• 51:36
  Two of those six years I'm on house arrest and I'm almost up
• 51:45
  in. I mean, I'm done with my five
• 51:47
  year bid. So let's let's talk about this
• 51:51
  because I mean five years is five years sentences is you
• 51:54
  know, you going into prison because you know that that is
• 52:00
  you were entering that world that you knew you were going to
• 52:03
  have to live in for a while. How did you, how did you handle
• 52:08
  it? So in the beginning, it's rough,
• 52:14
  I think. I mean, anytime that you go into
• 52:16
  a situation like that, especially not being never went
• 52:22
  to juvenile or dealt with anything like that.
• 52:25
  So it's a different world. Behind those gates you have
• 52:31
  hierarchy. You have you're uncomfortable
• 52:36
  because yeah you're uncomfortable.
• 52:39
  You are surrounded by all kinds of different walks of life.
• 52:44
  You are having to do do things that you've never done before
• 52:50
  like taking showers with groups of people or using the bathroom
• 52:53
  in front of other people like that's terrifying when you first
• 52:57
  walk in and and I was young. I was young.
• 53:02
  So I'm growing up in the system at this point.
• 53:06
  And yeah, first, when you're in your RNO camp, which is like
• 53:12
  your orientation camp, you're there for three months and it's
• 53:18
  terrible because you're there with people who have short
• 53:22
  sentences or people who are going in for life.
• 53:27
  But it's all brand new to prison people, so it's gross.
• 53:31
  It's disgusting. People are in high, high
• 53:36
  emotions there and we're all women so.
• 53:40
  At the end of the day, like you, right?
• 53:43
  It's terrible. Like my second night there, I
• 53:46
  saw some stuff that no one should ever see.
• 53:52
  But once I got to the camp that I was permanently placed at, I
• 53:58
  flourished. And I know that God had me there
• 54:08
  at that time at that season for a reason.
• 54:12
  I was in a vocation, so I did horticulture and I graduated
• 54:19
  with a nursery management degree and I worked in the greenhouse.
• 54:23
  And then being in the greenhouse, our warden was
• 54:26
  outside all the time. And he saw me and we were able
• 54:29
  to like small chat or whatever. And one of his cooks was ending
• 54:36
  her sentence. So he was like, hey, have you
• 54:38
  ever cooked or, you know, done anything culinary wise?
• 54:41
  And was like, yeah, I cook at home all the time.
• 54:43
  So I started cooking. I started cooking in the cafe.
• 54:47
  And that's like the top of the food chain in prison when you're
• 54:50
  able to eat what you want. And political wise, like I'm in
• 54:57
  there with the warden, I'm in there with, you know, all I know
• 55:01
  the right people in order to make my time go easily.
• 55:06
  Yeah. And it and it helps to eat up
• 55:08
  your time, too, when you have something that you're focused
• 55:11
  on, like a job, a prison job that you feel like you're
• 55:14
  getting, like you're working in the garden, you're cooking lark.
• 55:20
  How did you handle hard days in prison?
• 55:25
  What was your escape? We have tablets here in Florida,
• 55:32
  so like getting underneath the blanket and kind of like
• 55:36
  plugging into a podcast or a movie.
• 55:39
  And by the way, you'll probably like that you are will be
• 55:43
  plugged into that tablet because it's on the Adova platform that
• 55:47
  goes into 275 prison. So we get thousands of listens a
• 55:51
  month on. Stories just like yours.
• 55:54
  Oh wow. That's amazing.
• 55:56
  Yeah, I love it because it's full.
• 55:58
  You know, it's full circle for me.
• 55:59
  You know, I I was always, you know, looking at, you know, what
• 56:05
  could I listen to? We only had, I was in a federal
• 56:07
  prison, so they didn't have tablets.
• 56:09
  But you know, it was like, what can I listen to?
• 56:11
  What can I, you know, what can I read?
• 56:12
  Whatever. But what I like about this is
• 56:15
  that these people who are listening to this.
• 56:18
  That are in prison, they're seeing that people survive and
• 56:21
  that they they're making it, they're breaking the narrative.
• 56:25
  And so anyway, I didn't mean to throw you off track there, but
• 56:28
  when you said that about the tablets, that's one of the
• 56:30
  things that I really enjoy about doing the podcast cuz your
• 56:34
  story's going to be in there and that's that's amazing.
• 56:37
  Cuz when we got to listen to some podcast while we were in
• 56:40
  there that you know, the real Veta podcast and all those other
• 56:45
  ones, but that was like Florida is just now starting to get into
• 56:51
  podcasts. So every month we get like a new
• 56:54
  little one on there. So that was definitely.
• 56:57
  So that was an escape for you to kind of get away.
• 57:00
  Yeah, definitely. Or being in the garden.
• 57:03
  Yeah, being a garden girl at Gadsden, you were able to get
• 57:07
  out of the dorm anytime that you wanted.
• 57:09
  All you had to do was say, hey, I'm about to go back to the I'm
• 57:11
  about to go back to the garden, so when the dorm was unruly, you
• 57:15
  were able to. Get out, able to get out.
• 57:16
  And that's that's a big deal because it's it's hard to feel
• 57:19
  like you have your own personal time in prison because it's.
• 57:24
  I've had so many people tell me, like it's the loneliest, crowded
• 57:27
  place I've ever been. Because you, you, you do make
• 57:31
  connections, but you don't for the most part.
• 57:33
  You're with those people all the time and if you have a way to
• 57:36
  get away, that does kind of give you a chance.
• 57:38
  I used to walk a lot and. You know, that was just kind of
• 57:41
  a way to just kind of feel like me.
• 57:45
  But your your kids and your husband, your mom, whatever the
• 57:50
  case was, I know you had support in that.
• 57:53
  How did your how did your kids or what did your kids know and
• 57:59
  how did how did you guys work through that?
• 58:02
  Cuz they were young. Definitely they were young when
• 58:06
  the car accident happened again, Isaiah was eight months since
• 58:08
  guy was about two years old. So I have always been completely
• 58:15
  open and honest with my kids in this day and age, social media,
• 58:21
  the Internet, like I come home and my kids have laptops for
• 58:25
  school. So I always knew that I didn't
• 58:29
  want to lie to them and say, oh, Mommy's going to go to work for
• 58:32
  a while because at the end of the day they're going to get on
• 58:34
  this Internet and they're going to look it up.
• 58:36
  All you have to do is type in Marcodge and my mugshot comes
• 58:39
  up. So they, they've always known
• 58:44
  mommy was in a car accident. It was an accident at the end of
• 58:48
  the day, and mommy has to go away for a little bit.
• 58:54
  But I'm. I'm here.
• 58:55
  I'm still your mom. I'm still dealing with school
• 58:58
  work or dealing with behavior problems that we're having
• 59:02
  doctors visits and whatnot. Just through the phone.
• 59:07
  Yeah. Now, in the beginning of my
• 59:09
  prison sentence, I called home all day, every day, right?
• 59:14
  I I feel like I want to be home all day.
• 59:16
  But it was really debilitating to my mental health and to
• 59:20
  theirs once I started realizing, like, they would get on the
• 59:25
  phone, but they wouldn't say anything.
• 59:27
  I'm like, okay. I'm going to call like once a
• 59:29
  week so that they're able to, like, be able to tell me all the
• 59:32
  fun things that they've done this week.
• 59:33
  Because when I call them, I'm interrupting their play time.
• 59:36
  They don't want anything to do with mom on that note, but I was
• 59:39
  in prison during COVID, so our visits were null and void for
• 59:45
  like a year and a half. And when we finally started
• 59:48
  getting visits back, they were behind a plastic screen and it
• 59:54
  was terrible. So I went a while without my
• 59:56
  kids coming, but they're at the end.
• 59:59
  They were coming like 2 * a month and Gadsden's pretty good
• 1:00:03
  about their like. Mother child bonding.
• 1:00:07
  They have a playroom, they have a playground outside, they have
• 1:00:11
  board games in there. The officers are a different
• 1:00:15
  demeanor than they are behind the gates as they are in VP and
• 1:00:22
  we had a Sesame Street event right before I left and my kids
• 1:00:28
  were able to like interact with the girls that I'm in prison
• 1:00:31
  with with face paintings and they got their nails done and
• 1:00:36
  play DoH. And it was just, it was, it was
• 1:00:40
  a really wonderful experience and I think it was it was a good
• 1:00:43
  thing for my kids to see that at the end of my.
• 1:00:47
  You were there for 4 1/2 years and you know, yeah, I.
• 1:00:51
  Really proud of you, Lark, on how you handled it because you
• 1:00:54
  could have, I talked about this a lot.
• 1:00:57
  You could have become the victim mentality that this shouldn't
• 1:01:03
  have happened to me. And I think when you take that
• 1:01:06
  mentality, you kind of, it takes away all your strength and you,
• 1:01:10
  you know, crawl up in a fetal position and and kind of give
• 1:01:12
  up. You didn't do that at all.
• 1:01:15
  You you went the other way. You you said I'm going to
• 1:01:18
  survive this. Your family stayed together.
• 1:01:20
  You you found yourself away in prison with people and jobs and
• 1:01:25
  keeping yourself focused. And I think that helps so much
• 1:01:29
  for your, you know, your mental capacity.
• 1:01:31
  But I also think it helps when you get out because you haven't
• 1:01:34
  wasted time, You've used time to get through your time and it
• 1:01:40
  gives you, I think, a sense of confidence that.
• 1:01:43
  I'm going to if I can survive this, I can survive anything.
• 1:01:47
  And you know, there's only two people on, you know, that's the
• 1:01:50
  greatest, you know, Lion and Shawshank Redemption.
• 1:01:52
  You get busy living or get busy dying.
• 1:01:54
  That's kind of prison. You.
• 1:01:56
  You have two types of people in prison, the ones that have given
• 1:01:58
  up and you see them, they've given up and you see the other
• 1:02:01
  ones trying to make whatever work, work and adapt to it.
• 1:02:05
  And I think that's what you did. And I think it's so interesting
• 1:02:08
  because your story is. Totally unplanned.
• 1:02:13
  I mean, this how? Who knows what's going to happen
• 1:02:16
  in the middle of the night? You get hit by a car and all of
• 1:02:21
  a sudden your your world spirals into a world you never thought.
• 1:02:24
  And then you're in prison for 4 1/2 years.
• 1:02:27
  But your attitude of that, and I think your kids will see that,
• 1:02:31
  that, hey mom, she stood strong. Yeah, definitely.
• 1:02:37
  And I'm not saying that there wasn't like, times that I was
• 1:02:41
  ready to jump the Cliff. Everybody has that.
• 1:02:47
  There were definitely those times, but I tried to maintain
• 1:02:52
  positive attitude because at the end of the day if you have an
• 1:02:55
  EOS state, you're getting out and you're going home and the
• 1:03:01
  world is is crazy and it's chaotic, but you have to make
• 1:03:06
  the best out of it and. And I think you almost have to
• 1:03:11
  do mine hacks to keep yourself out of the, you know, I when
• 1:03:15
  you're talking there, you're reminding me of my world when I
• 1:03:18
  had a calendar that my youngest daughter made every year.
• 1:03:22
  And I would write every night in that calendar at box of that
• 1:03:26
  day. And I would try to find my win
• 1:03:28
  for the day and people would say, Brent, how do you find a
• 1:03:30
  win in prison? But you can and you might.
• 1:03:33
  I might have had a good conversation with my girls.
• 1:03:35
  You know something might have happened good I got forklift
• 1:03:38
  certified or something at the food where whatever it was.
• 1:03:41
  But I also knew that if I had a bad day, I actually let myself
• 1:03:45
  go all the way down bad, like I'm having a no good, very bad
• 1:03:49
  day. But I my mind hack was I
• 1:03:51
  wouldn't allow myself to fill in, fill in two boxes of bad.
• 1:03:55
  Because I felt like if I did that, that that's the slippery
• 1:03:59
  slope if I can't bring myself back up.
• 1:04:01
  That next day I'm in an environment that I could
• 1:04:04
  actually slide down a path that it's a bad week, a bad month, a
• 1:04:07
  bad year. And then you are on the other
• 1:04:09
  side of not the one that's surviving and and adapting and
• 1:04:13
  and getting through. So I think that that's the other
• 1:04:17
  part of surviving lark is that you have to kind of figure it
• 1:04:20
  out as you go along. And it's good, bad, ugly, but
• 1:04:25
  one way or the other you figure it out.
• 1:04:29
  And you made it. As you were getting close to the
• 1:04:32
  door, what were you thinking? Because I mean, 4 1/2 years is
• 1:04:37
  is a decent amount of time. What was going through your
• 1:04:40
  minds? Like I'm getting ready to get.
• 1:04:42
  Once you see your name up there that you're going to be
• 1:04:44
  released, what were you thinking?
• 1:04:49
  I was so ready to go. My last year was my last nine
• 1:04:55
  months was terrible. I feel like I had been taken out
• 1:04:58
  of the garden and had been put in those drug rehab program
• 1:05:02
  because with DUI manslaughter you you're mandated to do that.
• 1:05:05
  So from going and being able to be in the kitchen and being out
• 1:05:10
  in the garden all day to being in this drug rehab program was
• 1:05:15
  terrible. But when I tell you that Jackson
• 1:05:19
  is where they spend most of the UI manslaughter cases here in
• 1:05:22
  Florida, and I was able to form such a network of women that
• 1:05:29
  were going through the exact same emotions that I've been
• 1:05:33
  going through. And I heard one woman say like
• 1:05:39
  she was like, I have thought that I was a monster for so long
• 1:05:45
  until I met other women who were DUI manslaughter.
• 1:05:51
  And if I can't look at them like a monster, then I can't look at
• 1:05:56
  myself like that anymore. And that resonated so deeply.
• 1:06:04
  And I think when you have a charge that has an accidental
• 1:06:07
  death involved in it, you need to have that network of people
• 1:06:11
  that have the same exact emotions that you have.
• 1:06:14
  Because at the end of the day, no one is going to know what DUI
• 1:06:19
  manslaughter feels like except for someone else who has been
• 1:06:22
  through that exact same thing. And I'm not saying all of our
• 1:06:25
  cases are the same. If you have women that were like
• 1:06:29
  quadrupled the legal limit and ran into a school bus with six
• 1:06:32
  kids in the back. And then you have people like me
• 1:06:35
  where there was another woman in there that was below the legal
• 1:06:38
  limit and she was in a head on collision with a motorcycle
• 1:06:44
  couple. And it she is so broken from it.
• 1:06:47
  And I pray that one day that she'll like, find her purpose
• 1:06:52
  and be able to, like live with herself on that.
• 1:06:56
  But it's people like that, like, I want to be able to lift her up
• 1:07:01
  and let her know that at the end of the road it's going to be
• 1:07:04
  okay and you're going to be able to live for your kids and your
• 1:07:08
  husband and and everything else that is available to you out
• 1:07:13
  here in this real world. So even though that nine months
• 1:07:17
  and that drug rehab program was like the worst thing that I've
• 1:07:21
  ever went through in my life, I can definitely pick pieces out
• 1:07:24
  of it that I know that I was supposed to be there at that
• 1:07:29
  time. Because I couldn't imagine going
• 1:07:32
  the rest of my life without knowing that there is that
• 1:07:35
  network of women that I can always reach back out to and be
• 1:07:39
  like, hey, are you feeling okay today?
• 1:07:41
  Like your. OWN support network, definitely.
• 1:07:45
  And that fan girl who was in that motorcycle accident, we had
• 1:07:50
  a Gaston, a motorcycle event, right?
• 1:07:52
  And they brought out big motorcycles and put them out on
• 1:07:55
  the yard. And when she went there, like
• 1:07:59
  all of the DUI manslaughter girls surrounded her and were
• 1:08:01
  like, are you okay? Because look, these motorcycles
• 1:08:05
  like are you doing okay mentally?
• 1:08:07
  Are you able to handle this? And it was just so beautiful to
• 1:08:10
  be able to see people surround someone that she thinks she's a
• 1:08:15
  monster still, and she doesn't think that people should love
• 1:08:19
  her because of what she's done. And that's not it.
• 1:08:25
  At the end of the day, it's it's an accident.
• 1:08:27
  Yeah, that's right. So you got out August 20th.
• 1:08:34
  What's life been like for you in the last month and week or so?
• 1:08:40
  Olly? So I came like head first into
• 1:08:44
  being mom because I got out on Sunday.
• 1:08:47
  My kids were in school on Monday, so I woke up 5:30 in the
• 1:08:51
  morning getting them ready for school, taking them to school,
• 1:08:56
  and then I had a sign in with probation and meet my probation
• 1:09:00
  officer and I'm on health arrest so I have to fill out forms
• 1:09:04
  every week. I have to completely let him
• 1:09:06
  know what I'm doing hour by hour.
• 1:09:08
  It has to be approved. I am trying to figure out this
• 1:09:14
  whole license situation because in the state of Florida, our
• 1:09:17
  laws are so like the word or is in there so many times that
• 1:09:22
  statutes are so messed up because with DUI manslaughter,
• 1:09:27
  you can apply for your hardship if you have had your license
• 1:09:31
  revoked for five years or from your last date of incarceration.
• 1:09:36
  So we're trying to juggle this because my license has been
• 1:09:40
  revoked for five years now. I'm ready for a hardship, so
• 1:09:46
  dealing with that and I live out in the middle of nowhere, so not
• 1:09:50
  having a vehicle is really just. You're really on house arrest,
• 1:09:55
  right? And my husband, he retired from
• 1:09:58
  the fire department in 2019. So after I went in and he ended
• 1:10:06
  up going out and working on an oil rig as a paramedic.
• 1:10:11
  So he's going to go out on his first boat trip while I've been
• 1:10:16
  home and so that's going to be interesting in a couple of
• 1:10:20
  weeks. But I'm just trying to get this
• 1:10:24
  business off the ground with this farming and it's exciting
• 1:10:30
  to see. Like when I went in, people
• 1:10:31
  weren't really all that into the whole like home gardening thing.
• 1:10:35
  And I guess since COVID and the grocery stores not really have
• 1:10:38
  anything, it's it's booming. And so we have two cows that are
• 1:10:45
  being pinned right now out of our eleven that are going to be
• 1:10:47
  processed soon. So we'll be able to sell that.
• 1:10:52
  And then when the fall garden starts, I'll start selling the
• 1:10:55
  vegetables and canning and everything.
• 1:10:57
  And we're really interested in getting into this microgreens
• 1:11:01
  thing because it's like that's a booming industry.
• 1:11:07
  So, and it's something that I love and it's something that I
• 1:11:09
  was able to accomplish while I was in prison.
• 1:11:12
  Like. You got to practice up in there
• 1:11:16
  on that. Yeah.
• 1:11:17
  I love it. What do you think?
• 1:11:20
  What do you think, Lark? After you've gone through all
• 1:11:22
  this and and survived, what do you think's your biggest take
• 1:11:27
  away through all of it? I just think that we all have a
• 1:11:33
  purpose. And even when we go through the
• 1:11:38
  worst and you think that you're just, there is nothing that can
• 1:11:45
  happen out of what you're going through.
• 1:11:48
  I promise you that there's something good, there's
• 1:11:53
  something good that's going to come out of the bad and it might
• 1:11:57
  take five, 7-10 years down the line for you to figure out what
• 1:12:04
  it was. But I promise you that out of
• 1:12:07
  that bad, don't. There is something good.
• 1:12:10
  I love that. I think that's a great way to
• 1:12:12
  end it, because that is such a great answer, because so many
• 1:12:15
  people are looking for that. People who are stuck thinking
• 1:12:17
  that they can't get to the next step, but that they've dealt
• 1:12:20
  with this nightmare. How can I ever survive?
• 1:12:22
  And you're saying you can, and there's some good things that
• 1:12:25
  come from it and they can blossom into other opportunities
• 1:12:29
  like you're doing with the farming.
• 1:12:31
  I love it, Lark. I love how you've handled
• 1:12:34
  things. I love your attitude.
• 1:12:38
  I just, I hope you know nothing but great things for your
• 1:12:41
  husband, your kids and you and you've you've earned your way
• 1:12:45
  through surviving this nightmare.
• 1:12:47
  And I so great to see you on the other side of it and talking
• 1:12:53
  about if anybody got anything out of this today.
• 1:12:57
  And I know you did, because it's a great story of of how to get
• 1:13:01
  through things. Leave a review on Apple.
• 1:13:05
  That'd be great. I know it's a hassle, but it
• 1:13:08
  really puts the show on steroids.
• 1:13:11
  Follow the show. It's easy on Spotify, hit the
• 1:13:14
  Bell, and on Apple you just hit the three, three bars up there,
• 1:13:20
  it drops down. Follow.
• 1:13:22
  If you want to know anymore about what's going on with me,
• 1:13:24
  go to brentcassidy.com. It's with a Ty not a DY and.
• 1:13:30
  As I used to say when I was writing my emails back and forth
• 1:13:33
  from prison, stay strong and I'll do the same.
• 1:13:35
  Lark. Thanks so much for being with us
• 1:13:37
  today. Appreciate it.
• 1:13:39
  Thank you. Thank you for having me.
• 1:13:41
  Nightmare. Success in and out.