Speaker 1: When you say second chances, I tell people I don't
Speaker 1: believe in second chances. And I pause. You don't believe
Speaker 1: in second chances? What you're in this position for it,
Speaker 1: you don't believe in second chances. I come to understand
Speaker 1: that they need better chances. You can give them a second, third, fourth,
Speaker 1: ninety times and they'll keep going to prison. Why because
Speaker 1: some of them never had a first chance.
Speaker 2: Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney,
Speaker 2: I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father,
Speaker 2: I'm an entrepreneur, and I've been a football coach in
Speaker 2: inner city Memphis. And the last part it unintentionally led
Speaker 2: to an oscar for the film about our team called Undefeated. Guys.
Speaker 2: I believe our country's problems will never be solved by
Speaker 2: a bunch of fancy people in nice suits using big
Speaker 2: words that nobody else uses on CNN and Fox, but
Speaker 2: rather an army of normal folks, US just you and
Speaker 2: me deciding, Hey, I can help. That's what Lee Robbins,
Speaker 2: the voice we just heard, has done. This pastor and
Speaker 2: businessman never expected to find himself in prison, and yet
Speaker 2: there he was, And so he decided to dive in
Speaker 2: serving the minds and souls of the men around him,
Speaker 2: and when he got out, he then started a re
Speaker 2: entry program called Vital Signs, which has helped over eighteen
Speaker 2: hundred returning citizens and boast a recidivism rate of only
Speaker 2: two percent. In my favorite part, this model of his
Speaker 2: it's self sustaining. I cannot wait for you to meet
Speaker 2: Pastor Lee right after these brief messages from ours ander sponsors,
Speaker 2: And I'm gonna tell you guys something you know who
Speaker 2: likely won't be a sponsor of an army of normal
Speaker 2: folks is Regius. We rented a space at the office
Speaker 2: rental company to do this very interview, but their employee
Speaker 2: was late and wasn't there to open the office for
Speaker 2: us to do the interview, so we had to move.
Speaker 2: The worst part about not showing up is they also
Speaker 2: refused to refund our reservation that they never made happen.
Speaker 2: The only reason I'm telling you this is when we moved.
Speaker 2: We moved to a hotel across the street, and we
Speaker 2: actually recorded this interview in a public space there, which
Speaker 2: obviously has people in it, so during the interview you
Speaker 2: might hear people walking around to the background. Occasionally it
Speaker 2: doesn't happen too often. But if you hear that, it's
Speaker 2: not Alex the producer adding in some kind of weird
Speaker 2: background noise for effect. It's actually people walking around. But
Speaker 2: thanks to Regis, that's the best opportunity we had to
Speaker 2: complete our interview. And if Regis is still listening, happy
Speaker 2: to take the refund and the rest of us we'll
Speaker 2: get back to the episode. Lee Robbins, what's up?
Speaker 1: What's up? What's up? Is just I'm here with you, man.
Speaker 2: Man, I've were in Atlanta. We'll get to what you're
Speaker 2: doing and what you've been doing for sure. But where'd
Speaker 2: you grow up? Where are you from?
Speaker 1: I'm all the way from Agetown, Houston, Texas.
Speaker 2: Houston, Texas.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the ghettos of Houston, Texas. Tell me about
Speaker 1: the ghettos. What Ward it's actually the South Park is
Speaker 1: next to Third Ward. You've probably known the Astrodome, sure,
Speaker 1: all right, So it's right down the road from the
Speaker 1: astrodown right, And it is a place where it's heavy poverty.
Speaker 1: You know, it's really a ghetto, ghetto place. It's Compton.
Speaker 1: It's kind of.
Speaker 2: The Compton of Houston.
Speaker 1: Yes, siblings, Yeah, I got two brothers and two sisters, five.
Speaker 2: Of us, five of you, and mom and dad at home.
Speaker 1: Actually, Mom raised five kids as a maid. Where dad
Speaker 1: go Dad? They divorced when I was four and Dad
Speaker 1: was doing his thing, you know, and my mom was
Speaker 1: forced to raise the me and my siblings, you.
Speaker 2: Know, and.
Speaker 1: Very tough, very tough time. You know, no transportation for her.
Speaker 1: She had to use the city bus to go from
Speaker 1: job to job, house to house as a maid. She
Speaker 1: was a drunkard herself. I can see my mom coming home.
Speaker 1: She was an alcoholic, alcoholic, drinking a lot, and embarrassed
Speaker 1: about the kids, you know, I mean embarrassed in front
Speaker 1: of the kids, my friends when my mom was drunk
Speaker 1: coming home, staggering from one side of the street to
Speaker 1: the other side.
Speaker 2: So when you were at home, you were embarrassed.
Speaker 1: I was very embarrassed of my mo. Uh what where.
Speaker 2: Were you in the group of kids? What number were.
Speaker 1: You next to? The youngest?
Speaker 2: Uh? You know, did the did the oldest almost help
Speaker 2: raise you guys too?
Speaker 1: Exactly? I'm my sister, she's the oldest. And then I
Speaker 1: had a brother, and then another sister didn me, then
Speaker 1: another brother, you know, so she was pretty much Arma.
Speaker 2: So did you. Uh, I guess no transportation. You went
Speaker 2: to school in the hood wherever school was.
Speaker 1: Three miles walking to school, and uh, you know, I
Speaker 1: can remember walking to school with my my shoes, the
Speaker 1: soles of my shoes out at times, and socks getting wet,
Speaker 1: and you know you're going to school rain sleep, it's
Speaker 1: you're going to be.
Speaker 2: My grandmother and grandfather grew up in the Depression, and
Speaker 2: I had some loafers that i'd worn a I don't
Speaker 2: know about a half dollar size hold just right in
Speaker 2: the in the soul, and they took some cardboard, cut
Speaker 2: out a disk and tucked it in my shoe. And
Speaker 2: I had I had cardboard covering a hole in my
Speaker 2: shoe for about two or three weeks. So I know
Speaker 2: what that's like. And it's all right until it rains.
Speaker 2: Say that cardboard gets siggy, and if he get wet
Speaker 2: and defeat stink.
Speaker 1: Et ter exactly. And everybody don't want to sit next
Speaker 1: to you. They want to sit next to that guy
Speaker 1: with the stinking tea. Absolutely, So you did you?
Speaker 2: Did you stay all the way through high school in
Speaker 2: this area in South south Park, South Park? So you
Speaker 2: graduated high school from the school in South Park.
Speaker 1: Yes, I graduated from high school. You know, I did
Speaker 1: some things as in the litle football good you know,
Speaker 1: play Dad kept me out of play some basketball. I
Speaker 1: don't even know if you remember the five Slammer Jammers
Speaker 1: back in the day.
Speaker 2: Who would not remember a chem olajuon Clyde Dressler and
Speaker 2: who is the third one?
Speaker 1: Uh yeah young?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah right sure? But yeah, but why that's everybody
Speaker 2: in Houston was just set on fire by that.
Speaker 1: Yeah right, I mean that's a that's a rememberable thing
Speaker 1: because all they did was slam Yeah, that's right. Well
Speaker 1: I mentioned them because those are the guys that I
Speaker 1: used to play against. I was all American in high
Speaker 1: school basketball.
Speaker 2: You were all American American high ball?
Speaker 1: Yes?
Speaker 2: And were you really? Yes?
Speaker 1: I used to play against them guys in high school.
Speaker 2: Why didn't you? Did you go? Okay, so you graduated
Speaker 2: and you went to the University of Houston. Did you
Speaker 2: go to Houston to play basketball?
Speaker 1: I went to Houston to play basketball. But then I
Speaker 1: didn't pass the physical and tell me flat feet, they
Speaker 1: didn't even want to deal with me even in America. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then I had then I had of course I
Speaker 1: had an injury too, and then I thought, man, do
Speaker 1: I want to have a surgery, do I want to
Speaker 1: play basketball? Or what would I do with my with
Speaker 1: my life right now? It was a deciding factor. I
Speaker 1: decided at that time that I was going to be
Speaker 1: a preacher. And they's like, what do you want to
Speaker 1: be a preacher for.
Speaker 2: I'm like, come out, You're talking about like your freshman
Speaker 2: year in college. Yes, so the reason you went to
Speaker 2: the University of Houston was basketball. Well that's what I
Speaker 2: was trying to get to is what got you to
Speaker 2: the University of Houston. And now this comes up. Basketball?
Speaker 2: You have to you could hoop?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I had a little something and I still
Speaker 1: think I got something. But you know, the mind is
Speaker 1: you know, it's not the mind is there, but the
Speaker 1: body is not there.
Speaker 2: Right all right? So now basketball is gone and you're
Speaker 2: a freshman at the University of Houston.
Speaker 1: You say, I want to be a preacher, right, So
Speaker 1: what's your major. It's actually business computer information Systems. Because
Speaker 1: I thought that doesn't job, that doesn't jie because I thought, man,
Speaker 1: preachers are poor. I don't want to be no preacher.
Speaker 1: I mean, I have a heart to want to help people,
Speaker 1: but they're poor. They don't have no money, you know.
Speaker 1: So I say, let me get my degree in business
Speaker 1: computer information system in business, and then I can get
Speaker 1: that degree, first start working and then support myself.
Speaker 2: And then I can do what I really like doing.
Speaker 2: I sold, where did the where did the draw to
Speaker 2: faith come from? I mean, despite your mother's alcoholism and
Speaker 2: the poverty. Were y'all always in church on Sundays or not?
Speaker 1: Really? When I saw that much destruction in my life
Speaker 1: and I thought, man, it's got to be a better life.
Speaker 1: It's got to be something better than this. And I
Speaker 1: can remember making a deal with God. I said, God,
Speaker 1: if I can stop smoking dope and get off these
Speaker 1: drugs myself, then I don't need you.
Speaker 2: So where were you smoking weed in high school?
Speaker 1: Or in high school? I started when I was eight
Speaker 1: years old, really eight to fifteen. I was smoking dope,
Speaker 1: you know, and I was going to be a drug dealer. Actually,
Speaker 1: my brother taught me how to sell drugs. I had people.
Speaker 1: That's where I learned most of my business skills from.
Speaker 1: I was franchising, you know, people working for us on
Speaker 1: the streets, you know, doing our business right. And I thought, man,
Speaker 1: this is not a good life for me. And so
Speaker 1: I decided, if I can't stop this myself, then that
Speaker 1: means I don't have the strength to do this, and
Speaker 1: I need to trust something bigger than myself. And I
Speaker 1: made a deal with God. I said, if I can't
Speaker 1: stop it in thirty days, I'm giving my life over
Speaker 1: to you. Well, in twenty nine days, I failed.
Speaker 2: Unbelievable. So the truth is you're a kid born into
Speaker 2: poverty with an absent father and an alcoholic mother, and
Speaker 2: you're doing what the streets bring you. And you happen
Speaker 2: to be talented basketball player, but right you're in the
Speaker 2: streets doing kids stuff. And because of your basketball you're
Speaker 2: able to get to the University of Houston. Absolutely, And
Speaker 2: there you said, well let me try this management information
Speaker 2: computer systems things because maybe I make some money. Yes,
Speaker 2: and that's that. That's that, And you graduate from Houston
Speaker 2: with that degree, with that degree, and you still want
Speaker 2: to be a preacher.
Speaker 1: I I'm a preacher, you know, but I'm one that
Speaker 1: probably unorthodox preacher. I mean, I'm you know in terms
Speaker 1: of I'm not the one with the suit on Sunday
Speaker 1: and preaching, and you know, I don't like the flamboyance
Speaker 1: of a lot of that. I just I just want
Speaker 1: to be a normal dude that has the Lord in
Speaker 1: his heart and his life and love on people.
Speaker 2: Okay, so you go to Tulsa because you want to
Speaker 2: get your degree, your masters, I think from or Robbers.
Speaker 1: Yes, I decided to go to Old Roberts to get
Speaker 1: my master's and in divinity.
Speaker 2: In divinity.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a three year degree. And Tulsa, okahom is
Speaker 1: really like the harbor of Christian schools.
Speaker 2: You're in Tulsa and you start a business, is that?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: What? What? What? What spurred the business?
Speaker 1: Well, you know, in school student, you doing full time classes,
Speaker 1: no money.
Speaker 2: No doubt. I was with you or yeah, broke.
Speaker 1: Broke in poor and I thought, well, I need to
Speaker 1: make some money. So I remember my cousin who's got
Speaker 1: an accounting firm, a tax firm, and I had spent
Speaker 1: a summer or two there learning that business and that
Speaker 1: kind of thing, and I thought, well, maybe I can franchise.
Speaker 2: Like preparing tax like an H and R Block thing,
Speaker 2: tax a tax.
Speaker 1: Deal, a tax preparation company.
Speaker 2: Yeah, do you have to be an accountant? You don't
Speaker 2: have to be an account necessarily to have one of those.
Speaker 1: No. No, he was the CPA over our company, and
Speaker 1: you know, he checked all the documents and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: But I was just doing regular tax returns, bookkeeping.
Speaker 2: Busy, busy, busy during taxis.
Speaker 1: Absolutely absolutely, And then we tapped into an industry of
Speaker 1: barbers and hairstylists who would not prepare their tax returns.
Speaker 1: They wouldn't do their tax returns, but they couldn't get
Speaker 1: cars and houses and stuff that they couldn't prove their records.
Speaker 1: So that was an industry I got into, okay, and
Speaker 1: started getting a bunch of barbers and hairstylists and.
Speaker 2: A lot of people who have a lot of cash, right, yeah,
Speaker 2: all right, So you're doing that while you're going to school. Well,
Speaker 2: I'm going to school, all right. And so basically you're
Speaker 2: preparing taxes for folks, correct, all right and helping them
Speaker 2: hopefully clean up their cash heavy businesses.
Speaker 1: Absolutely absolutely, in a legal way, in a legal way.
Speaker 1: It was a niche in that business.
Speaker 2: I thought, any little money doing it, why are you
Speaker 2: in school?
Speaker 1: Absolutely all right?
Speaker 2: And so do you graduate from or Roberts?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I graduated from L Roberts. The business was doing
Speaker 1: well and making six figures at this point franchising the business.
Speaker 2: How old are you at this time?
Speaker 1: I'm twenty nine.
Speaker 2: Are you married?
Speaker 1: No, I'm not married at this time. I got married.
Speaker 1: I was thirty two. I got it, and so I'm
Speaker 1: just I'm a franchise. I have this entrepreneur background I
Speaker 1: learned back in the drug got it and I saw.
Speaker 1: I was like, I'm a franchise this man, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: start getting I got five offices open. We're doing thousands
Speaker 1: and thousands of dollars worth of tax returns in this
Speaker 1: industry and this niche and everybody loving you know, hey, listen,
Speaker 1: I can still report my taxes. I can do it,
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, I don't have to do stuff
Speaker 1: under the table. Now I can report my financials and
Speaker 1: get me a house. And the people that you're serving,
Speaker 1: yeah right, yeah, they're like, oh man, I love this bit.
Speaker 1: So they bring me on, pay me monthly residual income,
Speaker 1: and this is growing. And so I graduated from Old Roberts,
Speaker 1: you know, and it allowed me to be able to
Speaker 1: go and buy a house in Georgia. So I'm doing
Speaker 1: good in Georgia. I left that office in Tulsa, Oklahoma
Speaker 1: to one of the employees there.
Speaker 2: All right, hang on, okay, so why Georgia.
Speaker 1: Georgia's my wife and I you know, our ministry it
Speaker 1: was a multicultural ministry.
Speaker 2: Well, we're jumping. So during the growing of the business,
Speaker 2: you do meet your wife, I do in Tulsa. In Tulsa,
Speaker 2: all right, and you guys get married. We get married,
Speaker 2: and now your business has grown and you're married, and
Speaker 2: you decide you want to move to Georgia for the ministry,
Speaker 2: not for the business.
Speaker 1: Right for the ministry. And so we thought Georgia was
Speaker 1: a very segregated place. You know, our ministry of multiculturalism
Speaker 1: can can thrive, and so we can explain multicultural was
Speaker 1: most multiculturalism multi racial, you know, multiple races. Culture is
Speaker 1: coming together in one place, you know, looks like one church.
Speaker 1: It didn't matter what color you are, would race, what culture,
Speaker 1: we're bringing it together, right because we want to look
Speaker 1: like Heaven.
Speaker 2: You know, I don't know who said it, but it's
Speaker 2: been said that the most segregated day in the United
Speaker 2: States is Sunday.
Speaker 1: Correct, absolutely, eleven o'clock hour on Sunday.
Speaker 2: And so you're trying to, yeah, to blend.
Speaker 1: That, trying to blend that, because let me.
Speaker 2: Ask that, how you gonna how you're gonna blend black
Speaker 2: folks who are used to two and a half hour
Speaker 2: services with white folks who are ready to go in
Speaker 2: one hour? How you do that? What do you have
Speaker 2: an hour and thirty minutes? Is that the compromise? How
Speaker 2: that work?
Speaker 1: There was a lot of compromising with my wife, and
Speaker 1: I met my wife in seminary and so when we uh,
Speaker 1: we were actually act the professor, how do you start
Speaker 1: a multiculture church? Because we haven't seen nothing like that
Speaker 1: out there back.
Speaker 2: Because it's not just black and white. Yeah, it's actually
Speaker 2: there's there's such a difference in the way that black
Speaker 2: and white people worship the same.
Speaker 1: God, absolutely absolutely, So what do you do? Well, the
Speaker 1: professors didn't know. They're like, we ain't never seen he said.
Speaker 1: They said, when you guys go out there and start
Speaker 1: a church, you know, you write the book and we'll
Speaker 1: teach it. That's all I say. Okay. Then I started
Speaker 1: asking the Lord said how do we start a multiculture church?
Speaker 1: And gives he gives me one word from scratch, just
Speaker 1: start over, just do it, field it from scratch, right,
Speaker 1: And I said, what does that look like? He said,
Speaker 1: look at the music that you play, make sure it's multicultural.
Speaker 1: Look at your leadership, make it it it looks multicultural.
Speaker 1: The way your preaching style. You can't be hooping all
Speaker 1: the time. You got to teach something right. And then
Speaker 1: look at the timing. You know, don't spend these hours
Speaker 1: long hours in services. They can want to come back
Speaker 1: next week.
Speaker 2: So I took I took two of them. I'm an
Speaker 2: ass football players one time to church with me. I
Speaker 2: did it a lot. This particular time, I took two clowns. Man,
Speaker 2: I love these kids with clowns, right. They were the
Speaker 2: ones that I got mad at and made run laps
Speaker 2: all the time. But Lord have mercy. When I was
Speaker 2: on the way home, I was dying laughing because they
Speaker 2: were her layers. I couldn't let them know. They got me, man,
Speaker 2: they got me, right. So I take them to church,
Speaker 2: and uh, the offering plate came around, and uh, they
Speaker 2: didn't put none in it. And the first the first kid,
Speaker 2: didn't put nothing in it, and then dre put his
Speaker 2: money in it. And he nudged Chartavius and Chartavius when
Speaker 2: we had and put the money in it. And jar
Speaker 2: Tevis said, man, I ain't got but you know, one dollar,
Speaker 2: and I needed to wait, and Trey goes, don't you know,
Speaker 2: this thing's only coming around one time. They ain't got
Speaker 2: no building fund this place here paid for.
Speaker 1: That's a difference.
Speaker 2: But it taught me a lesson because after church, I said,
Speaker 2: we were all talking about they like coaching. Our church
Speaker 2: offer play comes from three times man, And I said really.
Speaker 2: They said yeah, because you got the regular offering, then
Speaker 2: you got the building funds, then you got the wellness
Speaker 2: check fauns or whatever. And he said you got to
Speaker 2: keep it up money and pocket your every time it
Speaker 2: comes wrath.
Speaker 1: That's true.
Speaker 2: I didn't know that.
Speaker 1: That is so true.
Speaker 2: I didn't know that. Yeah, so I get it. You're
Speaker 2: doing a multicultural church, but there's a lot of different
Speaker 2: stuff to it.
Speaker 1: It is it is, you know, by the way, I'm
Speaker 1: in a multicultural relationship, right, Okay, we got mixed children,
Speaker 1: and so it's it's kind of organic for us, you know, sure, right,
Speaker 1: it's in our life. So when you come to the
Speaker 1: front door, if you're not if you don't have a
Speaker 1: multicultural mindset, you're probably not going to probably join our church.
Speaker 2: And now a few messages from our general sponsors. But first,
Speaker 2: I hope you'll subscribe to the podcast so that you'll
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Speaker 2: be right back. You start this church in I guess
Speaker 2: Atlanta area, is that right? Right?
Speaker 1: Yeah, we start in Atlanta area.
Speaker 2: Okay, and you do it because Atlanta has lots.
Speaker 1: Of culture in it, right, and very segregated.
Speaker 2: All right, and it is very segregated. And so but
Speaker 2: you got this business that you built is still operating
Speaker 2: back in Tulsa, Tulsa and the related area.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Tulsa. And then we did expand here to Georgia
Speaker 1: as well, and four of the offices here in that
Speaker 1: one office in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, so what happened.
Speaker 1: So we're doing well, we're building the church. Hundreds and
Speaker 1: hundreds of members are coming.
Speaker 2: We left that to when you say you're building a church,
Speaker 2: do you have a fixed facility yet?
Speaker 1: Yeah, we have a fourteen thousand square footage building.
Speaker 2: Wow, Then you are building a church, building a church
Speaker 2: physical church.
Speaker 1: Yes, and people and it's just growing and growing and
Speaker 1: we're just having the best time of our lives. My
Speaker 1: wife and I were growing. Everything is happening like we
Speaker 1: thought it would happen. And then Tulsa, the employee there,
Speaker 1: started doing stuff under the table that I knew nothing about.
Speaker 1: You know. He started doing tax returns on the side,
Speaker 1: not within the company now, and so he's using the
Speaker 1: company's name, but he's not reporting it because he's getting
Speaker 1: cash on the side, lovely, but he's using my name
Speaker 1: because because I owned the business, he used my office,
Speaker 1: all our resources, and he's getting this stuff on the side.
Speaker 1: And so he started helping his friends out a little
Speaker 1: bit on the tax returns. Because everything we do is
Speaker 1: very conservative. We're watching everything that comes through is check
Speaker 1: two or three times. We got CPA looking at it,
Speaker 1: making sure everything's good. He didn't send it through that
Speaker 1: process because he's getting money on the side, you know.
Speaker 1: So and then he gets in trouble. He gets in
Speaker 1: to the point where he gets indicted. Then it's my
Speaker 1: company and he tells me he's getting indicted, and then
Speaker 1: I come down to try to save him. You know,
Speaker 1: this is I can't believe this guy's doing tax returns correctly.
Speaker 1: I'm thinking, well, because they thinking I'm the big fish
Speaker 1: of the whole company, let's indict him too. So I
Speaker 1: get indicted and and so now we're in a we're
Speaker 1: going to go to trial. A lot of times people
Speaker 1: take please when you're getting indicted by the face, I
Speaker 1: wasn't gonna take the plea. And even the prosecutor said
Speaker 1: he's not going to take a plea because he's not
Speaker 1: going to allow on himself. He's a preacher. So she
Speaker 1: was right exactly. And so I told my lawyer at
Speaker 1: the best lawyer that you could ever have went to trial,
Speaker 1: and uh and second day, first day, second day, third
Speaker 1: day in trial, we're winning. When I say we're winning,
Speaker 1: I'm saying that it's obvious to the judge and the jury.
Speaker 2: They can't put a case on you if you didn't
Speaker 2: have anything to do with it.
Speaker 1: And every time I go in other than I.
Speaker 2: Mean, and I'll candor own a business and you are
Speaker 2: responsible for the people to work for you, exactly names
Speaker 2: on it.
Speaker 1: That's exactly.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: The crown's heavy, the crown is heavy.
Speaker 2: And so so you did have responsibility that you didn't
Speaker 2: properly oversee your employee exactly. I mean, that's what I
Speaker 2: from a business from a business owner's perspective, right, I
Speaker 2: guess if I'm putting myself in your shoe, my my
Speaker 2: sin and this and my problem in this is allowed
Speaker 2: a little bit of a lack of control inside the institution.
Speaker 2: But still that can that's not necessarily criminal. I don't think.
Speaker 1: No, well, it's not criminal. It's not. It's not righteous,
Speaker 1: but it's not criminal either. It's not it's it's it's
Speaker 1: it could be. You know, like I said before, it
Speaker 1: goes all the way back for hiring this particular person.
Speaker 2: This is that's a mistake.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. This person, Uh, the reason
Speaker 1: why I hired him is because he lost the job.
Speaker 1: He was going to my church. He lost the job
Speaker 1: in Tulsa, and he has a wife and four kids,
Speaker 1: and I I knew why he lost that job, but
Speaker 1: that didn't pay much attention to it.
Speaker 2: So he had some shady pass.
Speaker 1: He had some He took a company truck out of
Speaker 1: town and wasn't supposed to and got fired. And this
Speaker 1: guy's working. I brought him on board because I wanted
Speaker 1: him to make some money and take care of his family.
Speaker 1: There's something to be learned about that is that doing
Speaker 1: good things versus doing god things. Right, I did. A
Speaker 1: good thing is bringing somebody on in spite of their
Speaker 1: past and giving them an opportunity. Right the god thing
Speaker 1: that God said do that. And when I look back hindsight,
Speaker 1: God never said told me to do that.
Speaker 2: I had a mentor when I grew up, and he
Speaker 2: used to say that your heart's ego gets in the
Speaker 2: way of your mind too often. And he said, and
Speaker 2: you want to know how I can prove that to you.
Speaker 2: I said sure. He said, have you ever felt when
Speaker 2: something goes wrong and thought to yourself, I knew I
Speaker 2: shouldn't have done that. And I said, everybody's felt that.
Speaker 2: And he said, well, win, something blows up and your
Speaker 2: first response is I knew I shouldn't have done that.
Speaker 2: That means your brain gave you the right answer to
Speaker 2: that quandary, but you chose to ignore your brain because
Speaker 2: your ego thought you knew better.
Speaker 1: Oh, that is that is the truth.
Speaker 2: That is what in my mentor told me. He said,
Speaker 2: when your brain's telling you not to do something and
Speaker 2: your ego is telling you to do something, take a
Speaker 2: deep breath and listen, because your brain will give you
Speaker 2: the answer to any question you ask it, if you'll
Speaker 2: just shut yourself down long enough.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, And if you got a wife right there that
Speaker 1: was like close this office down. You don't need his office.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: I'm like, no, but he's going to lose his job.
Speaker 1: He's gonna lose he can't take care of his family.
Speaker 2: Three days into the court over all of this, despite
Speaker 2: the mistake that you made with the guy, and again
Speaker 2: not hammering you, but I get it out of business.
Speaker 2: You know, you you you pay for those fakes. But
Speaker 2: still you may be held accountable to some losses or whatever,
Speaker 2: but you're not losing a criminal case because they're not
Speaker 2: able to because they can't rightly connect dots that aren't there.
Speaker 2: And you didn't know this was going on, right, I
Speaker 2: did not know this. So you feel like three days
Speaker 2: you're at least winning the criminal portion.
Speaker 1: Of this, still coming to court. Can you point out
Speaker 1: mister robb is in the courtroom, never seen my face.
Speaker 1: Did he do your taxes?
Speaker 2: No? Yeah? So? Oh so the people that they were
Speaker 2: that he was doing the work for, they were testifying.
Speaker 2: I never met this guy, never met this guy. There
Speaker 2: was this other guy who I was with.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this guy is the one that did my taxes.
Speaker 1: I know him, right, So they never met me before, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I'm you know. Third day, fourth we went in
Speaker 1: the case, and then all of a sudden something changed
Speaker 1: in the trial. They put a tax return up. It
Speaker 1: had a company stamp on it, my company stamp. But
Speaker 1: the one that we had as evidence against us didn't
Speaker 1: have a company stamp on it.
Speaker 2: You think they stamped it, Yeah, I think they You
Speaker 2: think they forged evidence? Yes, the prosecutor forged a yes
Speaker 2: for real? Now, yes, I mean does that really happen nowadays?
Speaker 1: Really happened then and still happening today. They forced these documists,
Speaker 1: and I'm gon tell you how I know it's really happened.
Speaker 1: My lawyer cross examined the same document. And as he
Speaker 1: was crossing examined with the same witness that they had
Speaker 1: on the stand, he was bringing up this difference, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, six prosecutors go down in their chair,
Speaker 1: sliding down in their chair, and the proceedings stopped. The
Speaker 1: whole proceeding stop. This is the middle of the day,
Speaker 1: this is a busy court. The whole proceeding stop and
Speaker 1: it's going to now start over the next day.
Speaker 2: Why so that can regroup.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And so when the next morning my lawyer all
Speaker 1: of a sudden tells me he's got five years of
Speaker 1: tax returns. He has not done your own attorney, my
Speaker 1: own attorney after a year's preparation.
Speaker 2: Good lord.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, why are you telling me this? Now,
Speaker 1: this is a conflict of interest. But no, we got
Speaker 1: you man, We're gonna win this case. You remember they
Speaker 1: they tried to change those documents on you. So he
Speaker 1: wants to keep me in the trial. I'm saying, I
Speaker 1: didn't figure all this out. And then until they finished
Speaker 1: their trial. They the prosecutors finished their part of the trial.
Speaker 1: Now it's our time. I never had a trial put up.
Speaker 1: I never had a case put up. He never recalled
Speaker 1: any witnesses, he never went back we examined the documents.
Speaker 1: He's never done. He had some character witnesses come up
Speaker 1: at the end.
Speaker 2: So is he getting out of his five years of
Speaker 2: mess by railroad in the whole deal?
Speaker 1: Yeah? So his closing arguments is this, you know the
Speaker 1: prosecutors the state really won this trial? Is how overt
Speaker 1: this was they really won this trial my client. They
Speaker 1: closed my client's office down and look at your tax
Speaker 1: dollars being used. Very well, that's his closing argument.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: And I got thrown under the bus, you know. So
Speaker 1: I'm like, can you before that? And these back up?
Speaker 1: Before that, I said, can you put me on the stand,
Speaker 1: because they put the co defendant on the stand with
Speaker 1: a new lawyer, which was an ex prosecutor, to say
Speaker 1: he never did any tax returns.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, he.
Speaker 1: Did no tax returns and this is his office there.
Speaker 1: And then it was my time. I said, well, you
Speaker 1: need to put me up there so I can say
Speaker 1: I didn't do the tax returns because it's his word
Speaker 1: against my word. I liked, say, I don't have any
Speaker 1: questions for you.
Speaker 2: Wow, I have.
Speaker 1: No questions for you. I said, you have to have
Speaker 1: some questions for me. You can't, we can't. And I'm thinking,
Speaker 1: I've never been in trouble. I never not like this before.
Speaker 1: If I say anything, they're going to hold me contempt
Speaker 1: at court. Da dah dah. I need to talk to
Speaker 1: my lawyer. And so by time it was over. Long
Speaker 1: story short, I got found guilty of false tax returns
Speaker 1: and was acquitted of conspiracy. My co defendant, which is
Speaker 1: the employee, got acquitted of both.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: And it was because I was not able to speak
Speaker 1: for myself on that. They had him for sixty five
Speaker 1: counts they had me for fifteen or the same sixty
Speaker 1: five counts because there's this conspiracy there. If they would
Speaker 1: have found me guilty of all him and me guilty,
Speaker 1: I could have done fifteen years. So if there were
Speaker 1: was a blessing that came out of this when they
Speaker 1: didn't find him guilty, they only gave me three and
Speaker 1: a half years of false tax attorneys.
Speaker 2: But now you've got to do three and a half years. Yeah,
Speaker 2: we'll be right back. So you are how many children
Speaker 2: do you have at this point? I have three children
Speaker 2: at this point. You have all three of the children.
Speaker 1: So no, no, no, excuse me, no, not at this point.
Speaker 1: I think we had two at this point. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: the third one came in two thousand and three.
Speaker 2: So you have you have come from the projects and
Speaker 2: the ghetto of Houston. You have a degree, an undergraduate degree,
Speaker 2: a graduate degree. You built a business, and now you've
Speaker 2: built a multicultural church in Georgia and you're fiking to
Speaker 2: go to jail.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I can remember my and married and married
Speaker 1: with children, and you're going to jail. I'm going to
Speaker 1: turn myself in, and that.
Speaker 2: Does feel like well, forget forget that, I mean absent
Speaker 2: the fact that you had to have felt railroaded. That
Speaker 2: would be anger and frustration everything, And I get that.
Speaker 2: What I'm talking about is, I mean, I know where
Speaker 2: I came from, and I know I didn't have much
Speaker 2: nothing coming up, and I know I've reached a point
Speaker 2: in my life where at least I've been able to
Speaker 2: provide for my family and myself and have some level
Speaker 2: of success in my life. And for to all be
Speaker 2: stripped away, I think I would feel desperate. I mean,
Speaker 2: what did you feel?
Speaker 1: Empty?
Speaker 2: Empty?
Speaker 1: I felt like I was forsaken by God, forsaken by man.
Speaker 1: And I was disappointed with myself. Yeah, I was very
Speaker 1: disappointed because I made some decisions.
Speaker 2: Because I had got you, you partnered up with this
Speaker 2: guy that you wasn't any good anyway.
Speaker 1: I didn't. At first, I was. I was bitter. I
Speaker 1: was very bitter about that, and I had to I
Speaker 1: had to come to this understanding that that I was
Speaker 1: I was flawed, you know, because when I was in prison.
Speaker 1: I was angry with everybody, the judge, the prosecutors, everybody,
Speaker 1: you know, the co defendant. Myself, I'm just madd that's
Speaker 1: fair enough. Yeah, I'm there, and then you go and
Speaker 1: you get in prison. My wife dropped me off. First
Speaker 1: of all, I'm looking at my children. I'm thinking, I'm
Speaker 1: not going to ever see them in this context, at
Speaker 1: least for another three and a half years. Right, drop
Speaker 1: them off at the daycare, and then they kissing me
Speaker 1: just like normal. They don't have a they don't have
Speaker 1: to like, they don't know. So here I am. I'm
Speaker 1: getting dropped off at prison. I'm saying, these these prison,
Speaker 1: these these uh these bars, and I'm looking at these
Speaker 1: these wired barb bar fence and they talk to you,
Speaker 1: they literally talk to you, and they say you're going
Speaker 1: nowhere for three years, for thirty years, for fifty years,
Speaker 1: and you get this sickness. Everybody feels this sickness. I
Speaker 1: found out it's just this pit. It's just you don't
Speaker 1: know what to do with all this. You're angry, you're upset.
Speaker 2: You know, some people no longer have control over anything.
Speaker 2: Their light. You're told when the shower shave.
Speaker 1: There's no big eyes, no little us in prison. I
Speaker 1: don't care who it was. You could have been a
Speaker 1: multi million there, or you can be just a person,
Speaker 1: a poor person off the street. Doesn't matter. Everybody get
Speaker 1: treated the same, which is like crap, like crap, you
Speaker 1: get nothing, they tell you it gets nothing coming here.
Speaker 1: You have no divine I can remember I said, I'm
Speaker 1: divinely favored. You know, they say no, you're not in here.
Speaker 2: So how this felt? Was just empty and desperate.
Speaker 1: Just empty and desperate.
Speaker 2: And your lard must be breaking as you're saying goodbye
Speaker 2: to your family.
Speaker 1: And this happens on a regular basis when they come
Speaker 1: to visitation. But we'll talk about that.
Speaker 2: But what I'm thinking is that first day. And then
Speaker 2: also I'm sitting here as i'm thinking through talking to
Speaker 2: you about this. You also you're losing everything. I mean,
Speaker 2: how can you run a church when you're not there
Speaker 2: and your business is gone? Yeah, so you've come from nowhere,
Speaker 2: built up the shirts and this business and it's over.
Speaker 1: It's over.
Speaker 2: And how are you going to take care of your
Speaker 2: wife and kids?
Speaker 1: But she never worked outside the house. I don't know
Speaker 1: how they're gonna make it now. I don't know we're
Speaker 1: gonna So you got to be desperate, just desperate, depressed,
Speaker 1: down and out, don't know what to do, didn't want
Speaker 1: to pray, couldn't pray because I'm mad at God. Just
Speaker 1: think about it. You just you're at a state where
Speaker 1: you're like, hout in the world. I got here in
Speaker 1: the first place. I'm blaming everybody else but myself. Right then,
Speaker 1: I then there was something that happened while I was
Speaker 1: in prison going through all these emotions. After I did
Speaker 1: my appeal, I lost the appeal, losing it meaning that
Speaker 1: they're not going to answer it, never answered it to
Speaker 1: this day. So I'm like, Okay, then God shows me
Speaker 1: as I'm.
Speaker 2: Important for the listeners, losing appill does. And they reviewed
Speaker 2: your case and found you guilty again. They just said, no, no,
Speaker 2: we ain't revisiting. That's what we're calling this closed. That's right,
Speaker 2: so quick, rightness, good rightness. So you didn't really lose
Speaker 2: an appeal. You're just never gonna get an appeal hurt right, Okay, exactly,
Speaker 2: But yeah, you cling to a little hope of an appeal, right,
Speaker 2: and when that's over, you lose all that.
Speaker 1: Hope to go into another spiral.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I get it a depressent. Yeah. I've spoken with
Speaker 2: people who have explained that the appeal only like one
Speaker 2: tenth of one percent of appeals actually go anywhere. But
Speaker 2: the reason so many people send them out is they
Speaker 2: many of them don't even think they have a chance,
Speaker 2: but it just offers them some shred of hope that
Speaker 2: is non existent.
Speaker 1: Exactly exactly. So I'm in I'm in the prison, in
Speaker 1: the courtyards of the prison. This is when things really
Speaker 1: started shifting and turning around in my mindset. I'm watching
Speaker 1: these guys stealing out of the kitchen right bread. I'm like,
Speaker 1: what you locked up? I mean, you're still still and
Speaker 1: they got you already, what you're doing. They got cameras
Speaker 1: around here, you know, and uh. And then all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, this familiar voice in my mind start speaking,
Speaker 1: do you think these bones can live right here? And
Speaker 1: I'm like, this familiar voice is how God talks to
Speaker 1: me in my mind. I said, you know why you're
Speaker 1: talking to me. I don't want to talk to you.
Speaker 1: And he said, I want you to speak life to
Speaker 1: those dry bones right there. I want you to speak
Speaker 1: likely speak life to them. Yes, I want you to
Speaker 1: speak life to them. And then he said, I want
Speaker 1: you to look at the four winds and I want
Speaker 1: you to speak life to the four winds, to speak
Speaker 1: life to them. And what that meant to me was
Speaker 1: that I was supposed to in spite of my situation.
Speaker 1: I was to bring hope in a dark place because
Speaker 1: I had the goods to do that.
Speaker 2: I had the that you have one. You have the pedigree,
Speaker 2: right because you've actually got a master's in divinity and
Speaker 2: you built church, so you had the chops. Yeah, you
Speaker 2: had the elect You had to know how, just had
Speaker 2: to have to want to. I guess. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The one two was not there until God started showing me.
Speaker 2: Myself, now you're going to start a well, that was
Speaker 2: the first thing that went outreaching well.
Speaker 1: It was the first thing to start changing my heart,
Speaker 1: you know. And then he showed me another thing. He said,
Speaker 1: you remember when I told you to close that office
Speaker 1: and then I confirmed that with my wife. Yeah, with
Speaker 1: your wife, Yeah, which is my second holy spirit, which
Speaker 1: you did what I did, and I'm like, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: do a good thing. Yeah, he said, remember I told
Speaker 1: you to close that. You didn't do it. He said,
Speaker 1: that is sinn to me. He said, with no more,
Speaker 1: no more or less sin than Adam.
Speaker 2: So was it greed or you go?
Speaker 1: I think it was both. Be honest with you. See,
Speaker 1: I've made mistakes.
Speaker 2: I made mistakes for my business, and I've justified it
Speaker 2: with I'm doing this good thing. What the truth is,
Speaker 2: it was my own greed and ego. And so I
Speaker 2: hear your story and I feel what you're saying, like
Speaker 2: you want to help out this guy even though you
Speaker 2: know this guy is not a good dude. You think
Speaker 2: about his family and everything else. But in the back
Speaker 2: of my mind, I'm hearing that, and I'm thinking, but
Speaker 2: he was also making some money this too.
Speaker 1: Probably I wouldn't do it if I wasn't making any money.
Speaker 2: That's that.
Speaker 1: Is real, right, that's real. That's what you find out
Speaker 1: in places like that.
Speaker 2: And I feel it. I mean, I haven't been in prison,
Speaker 2: but I know I made I've made mistakes justified him
Speaker 2: as in I'm doing being the good guy and doing things.
Speaker 2: But if you know the real truth, come on, I
Speaker 2: was getting something out of to get you.
Speaker 1: Probably wouldn't do it, if you know, to be honest,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't, you know, because I'm a business person like man.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, we need to get something,
Speaker 1: and so I got something, why not do something good
Speaker 1: while you I.
Speaker 2: Don't know what's got money.
Speaker 1: I don't know which came first, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Good may have been initial thing, but hey, I can
Speaker 1: also make some money doing this. I don't know which
Speaker 1: one came first.
Speaker 2: Yeah, those kind of messes oftentimes don't have a beginning
Speaker 2: or end.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's right.
Speaker 2: So yeah, they're just a circle of mess. So now
Speaker 2: you're in prison and you feel like the Lord's put
Speaker 2: on your heart to try to spread some hope and
Speaker 2: use the talents hees giving the inside prison.
Speaker 1: I'm ready to go.
Speaker 2: Now you do it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I started a program in there, that's you know.
Speaker 1: I started a program called the Path program purpose achieved
Speaker 1: through Him. And I thought, okay, what is the first
Speaker 1: thing that Jesus did. Jesus went around and recruited people.
Speaker 1: And I looked at all of this this educational capital
Speaker 1: in here. You got XCPA, psych colleges, you got ex preachers,
Speaker 1: business people, congressmen, all these because there was its federal
Speaker 1: prison camp, right, very educated people. I said, oh, this
Speaker 1: is capital here. Let me go around and recruit you
Speaker 1: know coaches in here, and I had this mind of
Speaker 1: fresh life right. This fresh life is an acronym studies
Speaker 1: for financial relationship, education, spiritual health, legal investments, fitness, and entrepreneurship.
Speaker 2: So it's because it's federal prison camp. You've got some
Speaker 2: white collar criminals and that have a lot to offer
Speaker 2: in terms of their experience and know how. Yeah, so
Speaker 2: you're going out and finding guys that do financial stuffs,
Speaker 2: psychologists or whatever. They've made missteps to get themselves in prison,
Speaker 2: but they still have that core competency after the school
Speaker 2: of thought that they.
Speaker 1: Know and they're just like me and we want to
Speaker 1: do the right thing. And so we got a lot
Speaker 1: of younger guys in there that are misdirected, don't have
Speaker 1: any direction, They just just just out there lost. I thought,
Speaker 1: let me start. Let me get these very educated guys
Speaker 1: that have a heart that want to help these younger community.
Speaker 1: And every week we started to path program. Hundreds and
Speaker 1: hundreds of people you show up after work because they
Speaker 1: love this program. We have a coach a week, fresh
Speaker 1: Life coach and.
Speaker 2: Start a mentoring program basically yeap.
Speaker 1: And so after the prison in prison and so these
Speaker 1: mentoring is what they would do after the class. They
Speaker 1: would hoddle up around the trees and the coach will
Speaker 1: be teaching the students. Yeah, and they had the time
Speaker 1: to do it, and so they would come out.
Speaker 2: At that point, right right, And.
Speaker 1: So they would come out with life plans, business plans,
Speaker 1: ministry plans, and a lot of them came out and
Speaker 1: started churches, businesses, got jobs, with their lives, reunited with
Speaker 1: their families. So that was probably the best thing I
Speaker 1: ever done in my life, really in a prison set.
Speaker 2: And that concludes Part one of my conversation with aster
Speaker 2: Lee Robbins, and Part two is now available, which dives
Speaker 2: into an extraordinary re entry program called Vital Signs. I
Speaker 2: hope you'll listen in. It's interesting stuff. I'll see you
Speaker 2: in Part two.