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Speaker 1: I'm Tamika d.
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Speaker 2: Mallory and it's your boy my son in general, we are your host of t M I.
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Speaker 3: Tamika and my Son's Information, Truth, Motivation and Inspiration, New.
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Speaker 1: Name, New Energy. How you doing my song, Lennon, I.
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Speaker 4: Am blessed in Holly Favor and I'm still gangster gangsta, be woke as fuck.
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Speaker 1: The bad word bad words, that's a bad word.
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Speaker 4: That's crazy up now.
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Speaker 1: And fu c k k cus. I'm gonna get I'm gonna get a jar for you.
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Speaker 4: So then need to be at a custom job.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I'm gonna put the jar like the kids Skylar used to do it to me. Yandy's daughter and Yandy and DC's daughter. Be like, you said a bad word. You said a bad word. It's like, dang, I sure did say that bad words. Yes, absolutely, So we're gonna be talking about the very very very very tragic and painful death and findings around Nolan Xavier Wells. I don't even know where to begin with that story except to jump into what we generally do, which is to kind of lean into the legal advocacy and to you know, figure out how to support the legal team and what they need and keep the community aware and engage because the news cycle changes so fast. Next week it could be a different thing. You know, there's so many issues that people it's not even that people want to move to the next story. That your brain can only handle so much. We're still trying to wrap our brains around the fact that young Cyrus carmac Belton was killed by the store clerk, the Asian store clerk, and this man did two years in.
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Speaker 1: Jail, and then next thing, you know, somehow.
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Speaker 2: Another he gets out and it has oh more accountability for what he did to to chasing down. I mean, we need to put out the clip of his mom speaking Nicole about what happened that day when she's laying out the way that her son was chased away from the store, down on the ground, falls down, drops his phone, and still it's killed by this clerk and he's not even a threat to the man, and he didn't.
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Speaker 1: Steal anything from the store. But still trying to deal with that. Then you got a new legal.
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Speaker 2: Team that also includes Ben Krump Law, which we'll talk more about that.
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Speaker 5: Who's leading trying to help get Carmelo Anthony out of jail after he was clearly on camera approached by a group, and they said in court.
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Speaker 2: That he was physically that there was physical impact. That's what they call it. They call it physical impact. They don't say you were assaulted, they don't say you would jump, they don't say you a threat, and they say physical impact.
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Speaker 1: When it comes to what white people do, they know how to use the right word.
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Speaker 2: To describing because if they would have been them talking about him in that way, or a group of black children, for Carmelo, they would say assaulted, danger, violence.
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Speaker 1: You know that, you know that.
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Speaker 2: Exactly they're going to use those words. Still trying to wrap your brains around that.
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Speaker 1: Now here you are.
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Speaker 2: You got a one year old baby killed shot in the tour so in Walmart over some campus now and it's probably some stuff I'm lifting we're up to, you know this young man Nolan Wells.
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Speaker 1: It's too much.
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Speaker 2: People can't even stick on one thing because they are constantly being traumatized. And so you know, we will play the role as much as we can of helping to try to bring awareness to these situations and do what we can to speak out about it and to keep the people encouraged. But it's like I'm and wried with the whiplash of America.
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Speaker 3: I mean, for me, it's it's par for the course. I've grown numb and jaded because I'm so used to black men being targeted, black men not receiving justice. You know, it's a repeat cycle. I've been a victim of injustice at the legal system. I know so many of my friends who you know, have served numerous years. You very rare, You very rarely turn on the news and you see that a white man's case has been overturned because he's been thirty and forty years in jail. Not saying they don't none, but.
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Speaker 4: It's very rare. Every time you hear those cases.
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Speaker 1: It's a black it was an unfair conviction, it was an unfair convery.
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Speaker 4: These are just the realities that we have to deal with.
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Speaker 3: So when I hear all of these names and I see all of these situations as much.
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Speaker 2: You can't even realize that I said all black people, all all black either black young people who would have been black men.
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Speaker 1: I didn't realize that even I said that.
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Speaker 4: That's just the reality that we have. Man.
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Speaker 3: So you know, my condoles's goes out to the families. You know, the families are the ones who's incarcerated, the families who've lost someone, family who's got no justice, family who don't even know what happened to their children. It's just so many different scenarios that us as black men are faced with and we deal with on a regular basis, And unfortunately, this is just the latest of numerous situations.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely absolutely, So we'll be talking about that really soon with Attorney Suayne Robinson, who is the director of the South Florida office of Bank Frump Law. She's going to be coming on to talk about not so much the details of the case. They're just kind of getting into it right now. They have recently been retained. But she won't be coming on just to talk about her experience working with, unfortunately, families who are greeding the loss of their loved ones and then also having a fight the system at the same time. So we'll get to that, but I I, you know, I want to talk about something else that's obviously not as morbid and painful, but it's actually a serious conversation, which is, you know, about the cultural responsibilities, if you will, of music and art. You know, I have to say, just as a disclaimer or put this up front, that I led an initiative for many years in my old job at National Action Network, which I haven't been there for over a decade. I don't even know how long it's been at this point, but it wasn't it to me. It feels very recent that I led an initiative called the Decency Initiative, where we were addressing.
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Speaker 1: Our music, the hip hop music particularly.
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Speaker 2: And how it's probably the only genre where you can call black women bitches and holes, and you can use the N word or all day. You can say anything you want, you can be as disrespectful to other black people, but you absolutely cannot fall other racists out of their names or start saying things about the lgbt QI a community because if you do those things we've seen already.
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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I don't. I can't say that Michael Jackson was.
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Speaker 2: A hip hop artist, but he certainly was a black artist that when he said, you know, don't don't don't, what was it, John Hot, don't drew me down?
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Speaker 1: He used some language like that.
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Speaker 2: They repressed up all his albums and put them back and re released it and took that that out because that's just that those communities have been historically protected in these other communities and black folks have not been, and so we didn't go after individual artists.
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Speaker 1: That was never ever the approach.
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Speaker 2: The approach was in fact to bring other artists around to understanding how they are used in propaganda that is very harmful to our communities, and to just make sure that they have that understanding. And I think one of the things that we talked about was the balance, making sure that we do not allow these record labels to pump into our community so much of that and not enough of the other things. That gives a balance for people who who love a little ratchet because I love a little ratchet, love it, love it. Y'all know, Cardi b Is one of my favorite artists. I love to listen to her ratchet stuff. But I also love of Jill Scott. I also love a Queen Latifa. I also love you know, even some of the younger artists today that are not well known to the rest of the world, but we listen to some of their music, right because we know that, you know, we understand the power of words, we understand the power of tunes, but we also understand the power of people being able to have a good time and and and have the duality of what makes up a whole person. And I'm telling me as a whole person, I'm not just a oh God, what do I want to say?
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Speaker 1: I'm not just a change gonna come type of girl.
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Speaker 2: I'm also not just a you know, a safe lullaby or a safe sexy song or just a black power song. I like some stuff that you know, I wouldn't turn it on with my granddaughter sitting right next to me.
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Speaker 1: I'm not gonna pump it for her. But I like some of those things.
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Speaker 2: So I said all of that to stay that the spin that been, that spin, that conversation is one that I don't think shouldn't happen.
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Speaker 1: I think it absolutely should happen.
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Speaker 2: But I don't know that I agree that the problem is one or that that we should be creating a situation where one are it is, feels isolated when there's so many artists that's find that that represent the different dualities of music.
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Speaker 3: I totally agree, you know, being an artist and growing up in hip hop, right, just understanding the phases as an individual as an artist that I went through as a young man that I went through where I come from, you know, understanding the dynamics of our culture, of the streets where we come from with hip hop was actually birthed, you know, and coming into this as a quote unquote gangster rapper, you know, with hard lyrics talking about violence, talking about guns, talking about drugs, and understanding that at that point that was my reality, that was the dynamics of the streets. That's what I had seen, that's what I had experienced, That's what I knew, That's what my friends knew, And that's what made people pay attention to me because I was relatable because I was talking about the things that were going on in the times, were going on in the streets that was actually going on in the poorest communities in which hip hop was birthed out of right. So, knowing that at twenty and twenty one and nineteen that those were lyrics that I was having, I know that, you know, Dolorus Tucker wasn't gonna be happy with my line. I know she wasn't right, you know, But I'm not saying she was wrong, But I'm just trying to say at that point, I didn't see her as wrong, right. I seen it as I was a young boy who this was my opportunity to get out of poverty. Right, I was rapping. I seen other rappers rap. I seen people come for where I come from, and I was rapping about the things that I knew about, and they were relatable and that's why people were like yo, I like him.
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Speaker 4: Right. So fast forward to this situation when I'm looking at to spend that conversation, right, I'm looking at it from two perspectives. Sure, I understand that the subject matter of spend that is something that's toxic. Right.
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Speaker 3: We're talking about you talk about scamming, you're talking about boosting, you talking about thinking negative things that that will be detrimental to our community, and no one can deny that. And those are conversations that definitely should be had, right. But I always say, first, you have to attack the forces of evil, not the individuals doing evil. And that comes from the principles of the Kenya nonviolence that doctor King focused on.
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Speaker 4: Right. And when you focus on attacking the forces of evil, then you don't single out individuals, right, you don't make those individuals I mean, because these are microcosms of what's going on. Right.
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Speaker 3: So I've had this conversation with my brother d one as well, when you single out individual artists and now you have a problem with the individual artists, Whereas those individual artists are part of the makeup of the culture. So when you talk about if you say, hey, these kind of lyrics right here are detrimental to our community, drug lyrics killing people that's actually utilizing those lyrics might agree with you, but they don't know. They haven't figured out anything else or the way to get to the next level. Nobody has embraced them. They haven't figured out how do I continue to be successful. They might agree with you, they might want to join forces with you in trying to figure out how do we we we.
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Speaker 4: Stop these detrimental lyrics.
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Speaker 3: But once you singled out that individual, the probabilities and the capabilities of us you twoe combining and uniting, they diminished. Right, So when you look at this situation, the sister ndii Re had commented on somebody who said something about the song, and she, you know, she made her comment and she and I don't think she was wrong about what she said. She's always been a sister who has had uplifting lyrics.
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Speaker 4: You know, she's more neo soul. She never was one for talking about sexual, you know, talking about street things that was never talk about. I mean, but she's always never wrong.
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Speaker 1: She was never it.
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Speaker 3: Was more sensual than sexual, right, So her lane was always that. So she's been consistent in her lane, you know. And I had a little issue with her anyway, But we'll talk about that a little later.
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Speaker 1: Oh my god, because I do.
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Speaker 3: I want to bring it up because it's kind of it kind of coincides with what I'm saying right now, right, what I say to a lot of artists being for older artists, Right, how many of the artists that are spreading the messages that you believe should be spread the younger artists are you embracing or promoted right, Because it's hard. It's hard for artists to have this positive message, to have positive substance, to have real good music. But it's hard. So I hear a lot of people complaining about spending that, this and that. But the artists who promote them, the artists who who who actually like Young Miami, who respect Young Miami, who she she has relationship with, they're utilizing their platforms to help her.
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Speaker 4: They're going to bat for her, right.
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Speaker 3: I don't see a lot of the artists that are in the different lanes who are complaining, right, because there's a lot of artists who are who have the most positive music in the world, and they still would embrace Young Miami. But from my point of view, I have yet to see India Iri, who is somebody that I always loved as an artist. Right, I don't see her grab young up and coming rap artists who have a positive message and promoter on the page to say, hey, listen to this individual, right, I don't see her promoting these individuals. So it's kind of disheartening to see her utilize her voice to speak against a young girl who's trying to figure out her way. She might not know the best way. She she's trying to figure it out. This is the first probably number one song. She's happy, and it's so many people throwing negativity at her rather than calling her out.
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Speaker 4: No one is calling her in.
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Speaker 3: None of these individuals who have an issue with Young Miami and saying, hey, she's a young girl. She's not a bad girl. She's not a bad person. She seems like she has a beautiful personality, you know, and she probably would listen. She doesn't seem like she's she's absent of taking advice, like she doesn't want to take advice, she doesn't want to evolve, because that's what life is about. Music is about evolution. I went from my soong lefty gun in the right phone to who I am now?
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Speaker 4: And I also know that a lot.
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Speaker 3: Of these individuals who say, oh, we don't want to hear this, and that they don't they do not lend their platforms or promote the messages that are positive. I hear yas saying what you don't want, but you don't tell us what you want. I could see a million people saying, oh, why are we listening to that record? But I don't on no same page, who have negative things to say about spending that, who are saying negative things about young Miami, who said negative things about wyp and Cardi being on all those same people. I do not see them utilize those platforms to say these are the artists that I want people to pay attention to. Right, I utilize my platform. I see young up and coming dope lyricists right that I know can actually wrap. I post them on my page and say, listen to this young boy, this right here is dope you should get in tune with this individual. I've watched individuals who I've done that for. I've watched them come out and continue to grow, Right, I've done that. So that's why it's just harder for me. It's nothing wrong that you think that the subject matter of Young Miami song is something that's detrimental.
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Speaker 4: I actually agree.
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Speaker 3: But what are we doing to combat it other than demonizing the artists?
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Speaker 4: Right? What are you contributing to BET veteran?
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Speaker 3: Who are you promoting because a lot of artistss, oh yeah, I got positive.
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Speaker 4: Music, they got dope, dope, positive music.
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Speaker 2: I just want to say though, that I listened to what NDI re said, and I don't feel like she was demonizing Young Miami.
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Speaker 1: I don't feel like she was even complaining.
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Speaker 2: I think she was making the point after coming out of the BET Awards where it was probably one of the only times that and I'm not saying it's never happened. I'm saying it's probably one of the only times that the actual saw It wasn't a performance of the artists where everybody is up, but she walked out onto the stage and people started to sing the music, and so it just was a you know, even I and I didn't see it in a negative way. I sat back and said, wow, she really has a banger, like it's the banga of the summer period, because.
00:18:54
Speaker 1: You saw how people gravitated to it.
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Speaker 2: But I think it's also some other things that play into that in terms of people kind of feeling like, for a minute, she was an underdog, you know, young Miami, and now to see her trying of pop back, she back outside, she not crying on the couch about her story, what she'd gone through and what happened to, you know, in her life, and of course the association with.
00:19:20
Speaker 1: Puff and all of that.
00:19:22
Speaker 2: And I think also there and you always say this to me that the right music, the right beat, the right tune can make almost any song go right, Like you could slap the dumbess because we know that it'd be's some songs that the lyrics is the stupidest shit ever, but because it's on the jingle half to tell me, you don't even know what these dudes are talking about. I used to be able to rap the lyrics of every single song the full and I love the way you rap right because I can repeat the words. But these guys uh uh uh, and they whining and something else. But because it has a good track, people gravitate to it. I don't think but I don't think, right, it's sonically good. I don't think that that she was complaining or trying to tear Young Miami down. I think that she was just kind of like me, you know, like but but from a different perspective. It was like, oh wow, like this is this is this is actually what people are really into in this moment. And and she said what she felt, and then people just immediately took it as ind Iri as attacking Young Miami.
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Speaker 4: I don't.
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Speaker 3: I don't. I think that it comes because Indiri has such a big voice, right, and she's always been counter to whatever it is that your Miami represents.
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Speaker 4: That's always been her stance, right right.
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Speaker 3: I think for me, right, it's not the fact that that's how she felt, right, because I can understand why she would feel that way, Like I said, it's the.
00:21:05
Speaker 4: Fact that what are you doing to combat what you hear? Right? What are you doing?
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Speaker 3: And not only what are you doing the comment that you hear? People have always liked that mutic like any of It was the biggest song. Anyip was a robbery song. Any Mop was one of my favorite groups, and that was when that song came off.
00:21:26
Speaker 4: They were snatching your chain and they was robbing you.
00:21:28
Speaker 3: NAS had a song called the Thief's Theme, Play Me a Knight, They won't act right like. This was the name of the song, the Thief's Theme, Like it was a theme for thieves.
00:21:37
Speaker 2: Adena Howard was popping that thing and talking that stuff.
00:21:41
Speaker 1: Who else? Who else?
00:21:42
Speaker 2: A little kim of course. I mean the list goes on and on and on. There's always going to be a part of the culture that is super sexual, super ratchet, super ignorant, super.
00:21:57
Speaker 1: Whatever, and people won't put a little bit.
00:22:02
Speaker 2: When Sojia boy came out talking about Superman, that a ho I guess we say, yeah, Superman that hope.
00:22:11
Speaker 1: That was the people was.
00:22:12
Speaker 2: At the barbecue talking about Superman that and it took you know, you have to tell the elderly people like, oh, just so you know, right like, this is about something that I don't.
00:22:22
Speaker 1: Think you want to be singing. So it always has existed.
00:22:26
Speaker 2: I think to your point, it's important that we as a community also support artists like Corday and you know, artists that are trying to channel different types of energy. I also understand that the scamming and boosting has a particular level of danger because in this particular moment, we're dealing with so many people who are going to jail, going to prison for scamming, PPP or other types of scams that they've participated in the boosting world, the running in the stores and smash and grab and all of that, And I think that that brings on a heightened sense of concern because what you don't want is for a twelve ten, nine, eight seven and below child, or even a twenty five or forty five year old person to think that what's being stated is that this is this is actually you know, if this is something that's going to make you cool, which is why I think it is further important one to help uplift some of the other songs that have been done because they put gospel music on it, they put jazz on it, they put other things on it that to me, gives the song an opportunity for you to kind of shift it from this particular connotation and take it to a place that you can still use the beat, but to have a more positive message.
00:24:07
Speaker 1: So I hope that that's what people do.
00:24:08
Speaker 2: And again I am not suggesting that people should not speak up about how they feel around all of the lyrics on all the music, right, because I didn't, and I know that it's important for us to have a place where the culture can get our reality check and like, just like, let's just all make sure that our simpsons are working, our taste buds and our understanding that we are listening to why Wet Ass and this, and that we listening to all of that. But that's not the end all be all. That's not the beginning and the end of our culture. Our culture is so much more. If you want to fight somebody though about the scamming, you can look at the Donald the Trump administration because they scamming and boosting and doing all that.
00:24:59
Speaker 3: Or he answer that I was going to say, the realityels, Yes.
00:25:04
Speaker 4: They've been scamming.
00:25:05
Speaker 3: This the reality situation is the reason why that song is so big. One of the reasons not only because it sonically, it is because scamming is prevalent in America today from the top to the bottom.
00:25:18
Speaker 4: That is what's going on.
00:25:19
Speaker 3: They're scam Donald Trump has been scamming for the last year and a half. He has scammed the stocks and bonds. He's scamming, he's selling the country. He's all type shit, this is this is this literally scamming, like literally, they are scamming everybody as we speak. So that is what we should be focusing on, right not the fact that young Miami has figured out, how does she benefit off of what is going on in the culture. How do we change what's going on the culture. How do we shift what's going on in this country? How do we get people out of power who have made scamming very popular? Because if people are worried about looking at the young Miami saying, oh, we shouldn't be from we got a president that's on every day that's scamming. He's on a TV literally telling you how to scam. He said, well, you know, I gotta do my taxes. Y'all made the loop posts. I'm gonna show you how to scam. I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna keep telling you where to put your money on in the stocks. I'm gonna make sure the stocks go up and down so me and my people can make money. I'm gonna give them stocks Like these are things that's happening every day. But we'll focus on a microcosm. When we're talking about young Miami, it just doesn't make sense. And and like you said, when they asked me where all my scamming niggas at?
00:26:28
Speaker 4: I said, they in jail? Are they going back twenty again?
00:26:33
Speaker 1: Make sure you say it right. Well all my scamming when they asked you to, I gotta go.
00:26:41
Speaker 3: Like like you said, when they asked me where all my scamming ass niggas at? I say they in jail? Or they going back twenties fifties? Hundreds cash nigga going? I said, no, where all my scamming.
00:26:58
Speaker 4: Ass niggas at? Then jail? Are they going win back twenty fifties? Honey? Cash?
00:27:05
Speaker 3: That lawyer gonna need that bag, So spend that ship, spin that ship, give him that ship or stay in that ship. You spin that ship, you spend that ship, You give him that ship or stay in that ship. And when I ask about the girl, they say, we're all my boosting that Jesus, They in jail trying to.
00:27:22
Speaker 4: Steal that bag. Twenty fifties honeys.
00:27:25
Speaker 3: Cash, girl, Give that lawyer that bag, spend the spending that ship.
00:27:30
Speaker 4: Good night, I'm stay in that ship.
00:27:33
Speaker 1: Let's go to the gas. You have lost it. Good night. Will need to make your own bird.
00:27:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, spen that ship, spend that ship, stay in there.
00:27:46
Speaker 2: I ain't gonna lie with spind that. Come on, I get my two steps. Hold you, I get my two step. Boy right, boycotting the song.
00:27:55
Speaker 3: But I also understand, but also shout out to all young artists who are doing music that has different substance, It has real subject matter that's actually going on. Let's promote those people. Let's not put down young Miami. Let's show somebody another you know, another genre, another form of music that can actually uplift, and that's what it is about.
00:28:16
Speaker 4: Balance.
00:28:17
Speaker 3: Some people want to have fun, like I'm not scamming nobody. When that song come on, I'm gonna do my two step. When my kids ask me about them, I'm telling them, if you scam somebody, your glass is going to jail.
00:28:27
Speaker 4: That's just the facts.
00:28:29
Speaker 2: All right, Well, I guess it's coming up. We got to go to a more serious This was serious. They like a bit, but it is a serious topic and it should be discussed. I think all parties have the right to put this on the line. Because black folks were being influenced in all types of ways, and we have the right to speak up about things that we think may be damaging, farmful, and even the fun things. And how do we place that? Where does it go in our community? But now we have our guests coming up to talk about the unfortunate loss of Nolan Xavier Wells, young man deceased. And unfortunately we met this guest before in dealing with other cases where a person went away with friends and didn't come back the live.
00:29:14
Speaker 1: Okay, So you know, I'm excited to have our friend with us tonight.
00:29:20
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, though, the friend is coming here to talk about something that is completely tragic, just an awful, awful situation, and so it's a bittersweet moment to be together. But I want to introduce to some folks and those of you who know us, y'all know that she is definitely no stranger. Attorney Sue Ann Robinson, who is the director of the South Florida Office of ben Krump Law, the South Florida Office of ben Crump Law and also the founder of Frontline Law, which is her own law firm, and Attorney Robinson Suean, you know, as I said, it's great to have you with us, but you're definitely here to talk about something that is so painful and it is every parent's worst night. There we've worked together on the story of Shanquala Robinson, who was absolutely, as far as we're concerned, beaten to death in Mexico, where she died on a trip with her friends, and now here we are having a conversation tonight about an eighteen year old young man, Nolan Xavier Wells, who went missing while being with a group of friends. Quote end quote for both stories, because they're definitely I don't know if you can consider any of these people to be friends. And Nolan didn't come back home after fourth July, and now it is confirmed that he's deceased, and you all at ben Crump Law have been retained by the family, which tells me a lot about what the family has experienced over the last forty eight hours. And so I guess you know, Suann, I just you are somebody who really gets to the nitty gritty like a lot of people don't like that about you. They can't tell you anything, right, they can't just say anything to Sue and Robinson because you're going to ask the right questions. And so it feels good to know that you all are on this case. But I know you have to be saying to yourself, when does it stop, Like, when does it end that you all don't run out of work? People say, oh, Ben Crump is always on a phase? Oh why is he always the one Ben Crump's phone is ringing.
00:31:37
Speaker 1: I've been there, I see it.
00:31:38
Speaker 2: People chase us down, they send us DMS, they call the I mean, we have many cases that we've worked on together, and those people reached out looking for help.
00:31:49
Speaker 1: And so you don't run out of work to do.
00:31:52
Speaker 2: And that has to feel like for your people, your great attorney, and that's what you've committed your life to. But for as a black woman, it has to be exhausting that you keep running into stories like this where people's children are dead and there's not there're no real answers.
00:32:12
Speaker 6: Yes, it is exhausting.
00:32:14
Speaker 7: It's just a situation where you know, of course, our condolences in prayers to the Wells family, because it is something that the English language doesn't have a word to describe. When a parent loses a child. You can become a spouse, if you can become a widow. If you lose a spouse, you become an orphan if you lose your parents. But the English language doesn't actually have a word for what the Wells family is going through right now. So first and foremost, you know, my condolences and prayers are with them, but it is exhausting for them. Of course it's their first experience. For us, it's not, unfortunately, our first rodeo in a situation where a family that is grieving the loss of a loved one immediately and also has to then take up a mantle to beg and plead and have third parties like our firm involved in order to have a transparent investigation. It's too familiar of a situation, and you know that's the exhausting part, Like, why can't whatever has occurred over this last few days for this family have them not necessarily at ease because they're going through a grieving process, but why aren't they left with enough information that they're comfortable to say, Okay, I know this is being handled and you know that's not the case that they're.
00:33:43
Speaker 1: Reaching out, So like I said, don't say like you said.
00:33:49
Speaker 3: So you know we know what we've heard on the news, we know we've heard on social media. Can you give us the verifiable facts from right now. We're not assuming anything else. What can we verify it happened right now?
00:34:01
Speaker 7: Yeah, the on the verified facts at this time are that the boys left to go to Horn Island. It is a about a nine to ten mile long island.
00:34:14
Speaker 6: It's only about a mile across.
00:34:17
Speaker 7: It's about eight or nine miles from actual coasts of Mississippi. There's no amenities, there's no park staff, there's nothing there. It's just a protected kind of wildlife sanctuary. And Nolan did not return with the set of boys that went that he went with essentially, so a lot of the missing pieces are why why did he stay back? And it's also a verified piece of information that you can only access Horn Island via private charter, Like there isn't like a public ferry that you can hop on and just go back and forth. So in order to travel there or to travel back, there would have to be some private charter arrange or private shuttle arrange to pick up or drop off.
00:35:10
Speaker 6: So it's just interesting that he didn't return with them.
00:35:15
Speaker 7: It will remain to be seen if there was some sort of prearranged way that he was expected to return since Horne Island can only be accessed privately.
00:35:28
Speaker 2: But you know, i'd imagine that today it was a topic in the hair salon. We were asking the question, are black people the only group that has the conversation around who you go with? It's who you come back with? And I know for me growing up and even today, we're leaving still together. I don't care if you met the guy or even your other girlfriends. You we're going back to the place, and then you can leave.
00:36:00
Speaker 1: And go with these other people.
00:36:03
Speaker 2: But unless it's your sister, your mama, your man, your cousin, you know, somebody that you are very very very connected to, you're not, which means that everybody now knows the story, right because there's no such thing as we don't know because you left with your sister, you left with your husband, you left with your you know whoever, your family friend or some person that it is verifiable because I know that this is who this person is to you, and you're off with them, which means you're in safe hands. But you are to return with the same people. We want to count the folk because we got to be able to tell Grandma, Mama and them and whoever else that we all went together and we came back together, and I can.
00:36:51
Speaker 1: Say that tell the truth. It was an ass whooping.
00:36:54
Speaker 2: If you ain't come back who you went with, somebody is getting they tell towing up because what I said.
00:37:01
Speaker 1: Was what I said. So I'm just trying to figure out because I know, I know that they're.
00:37:06
Speaker 2: If I can't imagine a scenario, the mere fact that this family has retained. Ben trunk Law tells me that they had the conversation with their child whore you go with, it's how you come back and if anything changes, call me.
00:37:25
Speaker 1: I will swim there. If I don't have a boat, we will be there to get you. Am I crazy?
00:37:33
Speaker 7: No, No, that's that's a safety thing.
00:37:36
Speaker 6: I mean we're big.
00:37:37
Speaker 7: And grown and I'll be like Tnika, you know and texting you when you get to your girl help.
00:37:42
Speaker 6: So so you.
00:37:43
Speaker 7: Definitely know that his black mom was like, listen, who are the people you're going with?
00:37:51
Speaker 6: You know, whose boat is it, what time?
00:37:54
Speaker 1: Where, how long?
00:37:56
Speaker 6: What are you going to be doing there?
00:37:57
Speaker 7: Like the whole you know, degree of interior and then the part where it's like, yeah, okay, you're going with them, then you need to make sure you come back with them, and horn island doesn't have any sort of it has very unreliable, very extremely spotty.
00:38:13
Speaker 6: Self observice, So it's not it's advised.
00:38:16
Speaker 7: That if you're traveling there, you have some alternative means of communication like a satellite phone or walkie talkies or something like that, or obviously whatever communications are on your boat, so it's not a situation where you can just pick up the phone. Yes, and like you said, they would have to swim there because it's only accessible, you know, via a private boat. So you know, I'm sure they definitely went through the one hundred degree you know questions and then gave very specific instructions, which makes it even harder when something like this occurs.
00:38:57
Speaker 4: Why do you think that this keeps happening to black people?
00:39:00
Speaker 3: Like they go to parties, they don't come back, They go on trips, they don't come back even if they would Black people, what is happening? And then there's always and that's very where and I say, oh, is this very really any conclusion? It's just the person just died or we don't know, and it's very it's just very little follow up in real conclusion for the people who lost their lives, Like why does this keep happening to.
00:39:27
Speaker 2: Black people, then before you answer that, sen not that you have an answer to why it happens. It happened to black people. But I definitely understand the sentiments of the question. People may think that we're conflating issues by bringing up Shamfula Robinson as part of this, because those were black people who who were involved in Shamfquala's death, and they came back and said the same thing. They don't remember anything, they don't know. There might have been a little bit facts. There was no fight until there was a video of the fight, so there was somebody there who wanted to tell the truth who leaked a little bit of the video. But if many hours went by without there being a real investigation, and therefore the story changes and people just get to do whatever they want. And so those facts kind of feel reminiscent to me. But also I feel like the subject, like the victim of these situations in a lot of cases are black people. Not that white people don't go on trips with friends and die, but somebody.
00:40:37
Speaker 1: Is held accountable.
00:40:38
Speaker 2: A lot of times, I would love to know the stats on that one day, like what's the difference between us and them.
00:40:46
Speaker 7: Well, I don't have the stats either, but I definitely think that there's systemic issues at play that have a disparent impact on black families in these situations. It's like I would imagine that these boys families immediately picked up the phone and called whoever their family attorneys are and said, get over here. You know, we have a situation, there could be a possible criminal investigation. We want to make sure that our sons are protected, or these young men's futures are protected, and they don't have any issues from this incident and what occurred, so they're in a mode of protecting themselves. They're not necessarily you know, thinking about Nolan at that time, because their family has gone into how can we best preserve, you know, our own sons.
00:41:44
Speaker 6: I don't know if the roles are reverse. I don't know if.
00:41:50
Speaker 7: The black family's natural instinct is to pick up the phone, call an attorney and you know, acting in that manner. I would definitely say in Shanequila's case, there's a lot of concealment of facts that are done as a group, So that means that there's some coordination, right, They're making some decisions as a group not to discuss certain things, Like you said, not to discuss the fight that occurred, well, not the fight, the attack. That attack, Yeah, not to discuss that with Shanequila's mom upon their return. But I think the important part is that a family that's grieving has such a concern for the system that is in place to assist their families that they're they feel the need to have a third party involved. And no one, you know, no American should feel that way, black or white, should feel like, oh, we need to get a third party involved to make sure that this process is done correctly. Nolan's family should not need an attorney, and if whatever happened to him is on the up and up, I'm not going to say that they don't need attorneys right because I think that we also as black people, have got to start realizing that when we walk into a precinct to tell any story, it could be the full truth, you know, all the things in order that it is good to have some type of representation with you to make sure that you are being handled properly.
00:43:40
Speaker 2: I think it's for different reasons. I think one group of people have to have one in case they might have been did something that they shouldn't have done. But black folks sometimes get railroaded, right because you think about like the Central Park five, who they were like, I didn't do isnit you know what I'm saying. I wasn't I old, they're messing with this woman. I didn't have anything to do with a rape, and the next thing you know, they are railroaded and in prison for fourteen and twenty years. So I won't say that people shouldn't have an attorney, but.
00:44:14
Speaker 1: They should be spilling every single thing.
00:44:17
Speaker 2: The attorney should be working with the family, like, yeah, you know, we all going to the precinct together with the families and everybody together to try to express everything that we possibly know, down to we found one piece of hair over here.
00:44:34
Speaker 1: I just don't know. And again, you haven't had time.
00:44:37
Speaker 2: Because you all were just retained to get into all the minutia.
00:44:42
Speaker 1: But or maybe it's not minutia but all the details. But I don't.
00:44:48
Speaker 2: Feel like this family would have retained been Crump law because there's law firms everywhere, and I'm sure Mississippi they can go fine.
00:45:00
Speaker 1: You know in.
00:45:01
Speaker 2: Alabama's next right, Alabama's nearby, and Georgia and all these places they could go, but they specifically retain ben Crump Law. That tells me a lot about what's been going on for the last forty eight hours, and that they do not feel like people are knocking their door down to be like, hey, let me just open up my heart and tell you every single thing that I know and stand with you and walk alongside you.
00:45:28
Speaker 1: On this process to figure it out.
00:45:30
Speaker 2: Because we're just as emotionally grieving for our friend. I would never need to call ben Crump Law if the people was trying to work with me. It just doesn't make sense. There is something there, and I get the sense that within the next forty eight hours of you all being retained, we will probably hear what those issues are and why this family feels that they need this type of support.
00:45:55
Speaker 1: What I get that they got, I'm glad they have you all.
00:45:59
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's it's so tragic, even as you're explaining it to me, and even though I've been in circumstances in cases like this before with other families, just you saying all the steps and the things that they're having to do, It's it's heavy, right because again they are also grieving the loss and finding out just extremely recently that their life is going to change forever, that when these holidays come up soon, these next health days.
00:46:31
Speaker 6: Their baby is not going to be there.
00:46:33
Speaker 7: He's not going to be coming home from school on break, he's not going to be for Thanksgiving.
00:46:37
Speaker 6: That chair is going to be empty. And so while they're.
00:46:40
Speaker 7: Having to deal with all of those emotions around that, they're like, Okay, we need to go and make sure that there's a transparent investigation.
00:46:54
Speaker 6: It's a lot.
00:46:56
Speaker 1: It is a lot.
00:46:57
Speaker 3: It's want to just say it speaking for me, I'm not speaking for anybody else, for god.
00:47:04
Speaker 1: Oh gods, cut the camera off, just.
00:47:08
Speaker 4: Being very transparent.
00:47:10
Speaker 3: You're not going to leave with my son, and y'all come back and nobody gives me any explanation of why he didn't come back with you, and then you go get a lawyer. At that point, I'm gonna need a lawyer because it's just not gonna be okay with me. It's not It doesn't make sense to me that I trust you, that my son trusts you, and he doesn't make it home and you you don't feel the need or have enough respect or anything for me to come say, hey, mister lining, this woul happened to your son. We didn't do anything this and and you just go get lawyers and now y'all can't talk to me. And I got to go through the law and all of this stuff. Nah, because at that point it's passed just the law, it's the principality of it's the principle. You know what the principle means that you now you've turned this. You wasn't my son's friend, because my son's friend would never make me have this level of doubt to where they had to get some lawyers before they came to talk to me, and they weren't. They didn't have the same level of hurting and feeling or just a level of hurt feeling that my son didn't come home.
00:48:09
Speaker 4: There's just no way. It's just not It wouldn't work out for me.
00:48:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, but this is the thing. I hear you. I hear what you're saying, and I don't disagree with you.
00:48:20
Speaker 2: But I think Shaqaula Robinson's family felt the same way, right, Like I can imagine that multiple family members that they don't even need to worry about lawyers and calling this one and that one because we're gonna go handle it.
00:48:37
Speaker 1: Ourselves to get the information.
00:48:39
Speaker 2: I know for a fact, because I had to be like, please don't tell so when because we're gonna get in trouble. But y'all can't go over there, you know, kicking the door, waving the four flour like, we can't do that. You know what I'm saying, because that's the type of time that most of the families that we know, and they have every right to have that instinct immediately to say, oh, okay, so you playing with me like you think this is my sin my child that a mother and father birth.
00:49:09
Speaker 1: You could get yourself really hurt.
00:49:11
Speaker 2: Doing things to people or not acting like you don't know what happened to people's children. I'm sure the same thing with you know, Tamala I'm Horsford, right is Hosford? Yeah, I'm sure the same thing with Tamla Hosford. She goes to a party with her the school friends of the community people basically mainly you're all white people, mostly women, but some men there as well, and next thing you know, she's over the banister. She fell into the yard and nobody knows how she felt. Nobody knows anything. She was out there by herself.
00:49:44
Speaker 1: They don't know.
00:49:45
Speaker 2: I can imagine that her family members was like, Oh, you gonna know, You're gonna know, right. But the problem with that is it they're gonna put you in prison, right, and then what does that do?
00:49:57
Speaker 6: Right?
00:49:58
Speaker 1: How does the justice that you have to seek?
00:50:01
Speaker 2: And I get it because all of us will say we don't care, like we just got to deal with whatever it is.
00:50:07
Speaker 1: But you begin to quickly have to deal with the realities.
00:50:11
Speaker 2: That you really do not want to put yourself in prison for the next forty years because you're pursuing somebody who you believe.
00:50:21
Speaker 1: Harmed or you know, harmed your child. You know, I can't imagine.
00:50:25
Speaker 2: Can you imagine what Tracy Martin felt when Trayvon was killed down steps away from his house?
00:50:31
Speaker 1: Tracy Martin ain't no pump, you know what I'm saying. But and this is how.
00:50:35
Speaker 2: You end up with a ben Trump law because these people, including Shaanquala's family, quickly found out that nobody's gonna tell us anything, like nobody is going to say anything after she was in another country where we're supposed to have rules and laws about bringing any American citizen back and it's supposed to be all this America first, and this country did absolutely nothing to support Shampualler's family.
00:51:05
Speaker 1: It is, it is. It is very disheartening, and I'm like, what do we fight for?
00:51:10
Speaker 2: I don't even know that we have an answer to that, but what does it look like to fight for there to be some protection?
00:51:17
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm thinking of so many stories.
00:51:19
Speaker 2: I'm thinking of Kendrick Johnson, this young man behind the.
00:51:23
Speaker 1: Bleaches in the map. Nobody knows what happened.
00:51:27
Speaker 2: Like this is not it's not sustainable because my son's point is that eventually people are just don't go like, we gotta take matters into our own hands about our kids.
00:51:39
Speaker 4: I mean, that's it. That's pretty much it for me.
00:51:42
Speaker 3: It's like at this point, like I don't have much faith in the legal system, you know, especially you named four cases where there was no result, nobody knew, nothing just ended up happening. Kendrick just winded up in the mattress.
00:51:57
Speaker 1: You know, the the gym.
00:52:01
Speaker 3: He just he just rolled up in the gym matt just nobody put him there. You know, you know this young man, nobody knows anything. She qu like at some point somebody got to know something.
00:52:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, so when we appreciate you.
00:52:18
Speaker 2: You know, you know, thank God for y'all because in Tamla's situation, you know that you know more better than me. Everybody was connected the family, The people in the house knew the police and that this one was a pre a cop and that one knows it. And in those in these towns Mississippi and other places like that, when these folks lawyer up, they're generally finding people who they know had those types of connections. Right like we watch it in the Mayberry stories. You know, we know, we know what goes on. And thank god you all have made your reputation for being able to break through some of those walls is so important, if for no other cause then to just expose the injustice, to make sure that you can't hide under a white sheet. With this, everybody is going to know your name. And in sham Quala situation, they were black folks, but people had to change their names.
00:53:22
Speaker 1: Because of the work that you did to as that. But they can't hear you on the on the on the version they they.
00:53:31
Speaker 7: They yeah, folks certainly became aka's, but not in the good way formerly known as because trying to kind of escape.
00:53:43
Speaker 6: But that's also the power of community as well.
00:53:47
Speaker 7: You know, we don't act alone or investigate alone. Of course, we don't share unverified information. But we need you, we need my son, we need the community to kind of rally, and even in Nolan's case, right now, the investigators are saying, hey, if you have any information, if you know anything, please come forward, And that's important too.
00:54:12
Speaker 6: We do have to do that.
00:54:13
Speaker 7: We do have to make sure that any information that we're sharing about the cases or the in Nolan's case, is verified and factual information that we're not making it harder for the family by sharing verified information. We're not making it harder for the investigators by you know, sharing wrong tips or information that's not factual because social media versus facts.
00:54:41
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's true.
00:54:43
Speaker 7: And so that's why you know, the community relies so heavily upon you, upon my song to make sure that they have the right information that to the extent that there's a call to action, that they know what that is, that they know what next steps are and know what we can do from wherever we are to push forward the work, the case, whatever issue our community is dealing with, and to give support to the families.
00:55:12
Speaker 6: And that's why your work is so important because.
00:55:16
Speaker 7: Unfortunately, just generally speaking, the public has a short intention and span.
00:55:23
Speaker 1: So you know, we talk.
00:55:26
Speaker 6: About Shane Cloe's case could because we still live it every day.
00:55:29
Speaker 7: Part of the case is on appeal right now, part of the cases in Stakehoret. There's so much going on every day for that particular case and many other cases, so we're still living in every day, but the general public kind of forgets. But there has to be people who are willing to be down the front lines and offer consistent support to the families and make sure that they know that no rock is going to go unturned. There's going to be nothing that we're not extent that we're not willing to go to.
00:56:02
Speaker 6: To get the information that they need.
00:56:05
Speaker 7: There's no official or office that we're not going to say, Hey, we know what your what our client's rates are, and what information needs to be shared, and we're here to get that information.
00:56:19
Speaker 6: So we're we're gonna do everything we can.
00:56:21
Speaker 7: I know Attorney Cruk made a statement earlier and I echoed the statement in the sense that you know, the firm is brought in to make sure that the investigation is fair and transparent there and we're not going to leave the family side until that is the case, until every rock is turned over, any lead, every piece of information is fully investigated.
00:56:48
Speaker 2: Thank you for what you do, and of course we love Ben, you know, and we just I'm confident that no matter what happens, the truth will absolutely be exposed in that when you guys open your mouths, you're going to state the facts.
00:57:04
Speaker 1: And so where that leaves us, I.
00:57:06
Speaker 2: Hope is to clarity and closure for this family so that they can grieve the loss of their child, which is, as you said, it's own set of like pain and things that they have.
00:57:19
Speaker 1: To deal with.
00:57:19
Speaker 2: When you compound that with all the other possibilities, it's probably just too painful to bear. And so having you all there as an extension of their work and you know, their fight is just it's a real good thing. And I'm sure that the lawyers who are on the case or on this, yeah, on this it's going to be a case. In my mind, I didn't say you said that. I said that, But the lawyers who are involved, I'm sure that they are telling the families that this thing has kicked up to another level because Bnkrunk Law is involved and they have a mouthpiece like the world is going to stop and listen to the first big press conference that you all had to lay out the facts and you're finding in this story. And so those lawyers are definitely saying, this isn't an open and shut situation.
00:58:16
Speaker 1: This isn't just some.
00:58:17
Speaker 2: Little black boy from meth Thiphy who you know he ain't got nobody and can't find no the family was able to find the best legal team in the world as far as I'm concerned, and you know, God bless them, and God bless you all for what y'all continue to do.
00:58:36
Speaker 6: Thank you, God less you guys too.
00:58:39
Speaker 2: I wish that I could make I didn't want Suan to be here when I said this part. I was in my right, in my right, wrong mind to go online and say either you remember, or we're gonna be at your house and so we'll just help help you remember. We'll sit outside until you remember. That's really what was in my mind. However, howsoever, I feel like we have there's some progress that maybe may happen here. I don't even know how you call progress having a lawyer have to go find out what happened.
00:59:15
Speaker 3: But maybe, like I said, I don't I don't really have faith in the justice system. I have faith in Ben and Sue and the whole bankrupt law, but I just there's too many instances like this, right, And I think what happens is when people see that situations like this rarely have any findings and outcomes, that someone is held accountable, you know, it becomes like a way like it's.
00:59:42
Speaker 1: Like you're doing comfortable.
00:59:44
Speaker 4: That you started doing research side.
00:59:46
Speaker 3: We if we going to island and we do this with a little black boy, you know, chances are nobody really cares anyway, and we could get away with it, you know, And I think that seems to happen more often than not, you know. So I'm I'm I'm hopeful. You know, I don't know how much faith I have in it, but I'm actually hopeful. Man.
01:00:05
Speaker 4: Just the situation in itself, No young boy should leave with his friends and just come back and not come back home, you know, especially with no nobody having anything to tell or understanding why he didn't come back.
01:00:18
Speaker 1: So you know, it is devastating. It's devastating. It's devastating.
01:00:25
Speaker 2: It's devastating, it's devastating, it's devastating. There is no other way to describe it. It makes you feel sick. You can't imagine what it would be if it happened to your own child. You worry about it all the time. And that's just your child. People you know, gone out going around people, work trips, you know, these things can happen, and it's just it's it's truly devastating. I don't want to be in that club, you know. I don't want to be in that club. And I think what Sue Ane said at the very beginning of the interview was so so painfully powerful that there is no word in the dictionary. Webster didn't come up with a word to describe a parent losing their child. You can be a widow, but what word do you use to describe a mother or father losing their child.
01:01:19
Speaker 1: I don't know.
01:01:20
Speaker 2: So God bless and rest the soul of Nolan Xavia Wells. But God also give his parents peace and their souls to be able to fight a fight that they shouldn't even have to be engaged in.
01:01:35
Speaker 4: Yeah, and with that being said, we've come to the end of another episode of the ta in my show. Thank you Suwayne Robinson for being here with us. All condoss goes out to young Nolan Xavier Wells. You know, hopefully we'll get justice.
01:01:51
Speaker 3: Continue to follow us, let us know who you want us to talk to, let us know what topics you want.
01:01:56
Speaker 4: I'm not gonna always be right, Tamika D.
01:01:58
Speaker 3: Marris, and that can always be wrong when we will both always and I mean always be authentic.
01:02:03
Speaker 2: Base Listen to the TMI podcast on the Black Effect Network, on iHeartRadio, or anywhere podcasts are available
01:02:12
Speaker 3: Or catch the video version on YouTube at TMI Show PC
Speaker 1: I'm Tamika d.
00:00:00
Speaker 2: Mallory and it's your boy my son in general, we are your host of t M I.
00:00:05
Speaker 3: Tamika and my Son's Information, Truth, Motivation and Inspiration, New.
00:00:10
Speaker 1: Name, New Energy. How you doing my song, Lennon, I.
00:00:16
Speaker 4: Am blessed in Holly Favor and I'm still gangster gangsta, be woke as fuck.
00:00:22
Speaker 1: The bad word bad words, that's a bad word.
00:00:25
Speaker 4: That's crazy up now.
00:00:29
Speaker 1: And fu c k k cus. I'm gonna get I'm gonna get a jar for you.
00:00:35
Speaker 4: So then need to be at a custom job.
00:00:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I'm gonna put the jar like the kids Skylar used to do it to me. Yandy's daughter and Yandy and DC's daughter. Be like, you said a bad word. You said a bad word. It's like, dang, I sure did say that bad words. Yes, absolutely, So we're gonna be talking about the very very very very tragic and painful death and findings around Nolan Xavier Wells. I don't even know where to begin with that story except to jump into what we generally do, which is to kind of lean into the legal advocacy and to you know, figure out how to support the legal team and what they need and keep the community aware and engage because the news cycle changes so fast. Next week it could be a different thing. You know, there's so many issues that people it's not even that people want to move to the next story. That your brain can only handle so much. We're still trying to wrap our brains around the fact that young Cyrus carmac Belton was killed by the store clerk, the Asian store clerk, and this man did two years in.
00:01:53
Speaker 1: Jail, and then next thing, you know, somehow.
00:01:57
Speaker 2: Another he gets out and it has oh more accountability for what he did to to chasing down. I mean, we need to put out the clip of his mom speaking Nicole about what happened that day when she's laying out the way that her son was chased away from the store, down on the ground, falls down, drops his phone, and still it's killed by this clerk and he's not even a threat to the man, and he didn't.
00:02:28
Speaker 1: Steal anything from the store. But still trying to deal with that. Then you got a new legal.
00:02:33
Speaker 2: Team that also includes Ben Krump Law, which we'll talk more about that.
00:02:37
Speaker 5: Who's leading trying to help get Carmelo Anthony out of jail after he was clearly on camera approached by a group, and they said in court.
00:02:48
Speaker 2: That he was physically that there was physical impact. That's what they call it. They call it physical impact. They don't say you were assaulted, they don't say you would jump, they don't say you a threat, and they say physical impact.
00:03:00
Speaker 1: When it comes to what white people do, they know how to use the right word.
00:03:04
Speaker 2: To describing because if they would have been them talking about him in that way, or a group of black children, for Carmelo, they would say assaulted, danger, violence.
00:03:16
Speaker 1: You know that, you know that.
00:03:20
Speaker 2: Exactly they're going to use those words. Still trying to wrap your brains around that.
00:03:24
Speaker 1: Now here you are.
00:03:25
Speaker 2: You got a one year old baby killed shot in the tour so in Walmart over some campus now and it's probably some stuff I'm lifting we're up to, you know this young man Nolan Wells.
00:03:39
Speaker 1: It's too much.
00:03:40
Speaker 2: People can't even stick on one thing because they are constantly being traumatized. And so you know, we will play the role as much as we can of helping to try to bring awareness to these situations and do what we can to speak out about it and to keep the people encouraged. But it's like I'm and wried with the whiplash of America.
00:04:06
Speaker 3: I mean, for me, it's it's par for the course. I've grown numb and jaded because I'm so used to black men being targeted, black men not receiving justice. You know, it's a repeat cycle. I've been a victim of injustice at the legal system. I know so many of my friends who you know, have served numerous years. You very rare, You very rarely turn on the news and you see that a white man's case has been overturned because he's been thirty and forty years in jail. Not saying they don't none, but.
00:04:43
Speaker 4: It's very rare. Every time you hear those cases.
00:04:45
Speaker 1: It's a black it was an unfair conviction, it was an unfair convery.
00:04:50
Speaker 4: These are just the realities that we have to deal with.
00:04:52
Speaker 3: So when I hear all of these names and I see all of these situations as much.
00:04:57
Speaker 2: You can't even realize that I said all black people, all all black either black young people who would have been black men.
00:05:04
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that even I said that.
00:05:06
Speaker 4: That's just the reality that we have. Man.
00:05:08
Speaker 3: So you know, my condoles's goes out to the families. You know, the families are the ones who's incarcerated, the families who've lost someone, family who's got no justice, family who don't even know what happened to their children. It's just so many different scenarios that us as black men are faced with and we deal with on a regular basis, And unfortunately, this is just the latest of numerous situations.
00:05:31
Speaker 2: Absolutely absolutely, So we'll be talking about that really soon with Attorney Suayne Robinson, who is the director of the South Florida office of Bank Frump Law. She's going to be coming on to talk about not so much the details of the case. They're just kind of getting into it right now. They have recently been retained. But she won't be coming on just to talk about her experience working with, unfortunately, families who are greeding the loss of their loved ones and then also having a fight the system at the same time. So we'll get to that, but I I, you know, I want to talk about something else that's obviously not as morbid and painful, but it's actually a serious conversation, which is, you know, about the cultural responsibilities, if you will, of music and art. You know, I have to say, just as a disclaimer or put this up front, that I led an initiative for many years in my old job at National Action Network, which I haven't been there for over a decade. I don't even know how long it's been at this point, but it wasn't it to me. It feels very recent that I led an initiative called the Decency Initiative, where we were addressing.
00:06:48
Speaker 1: Our music, the hip hop music particularly.
00:06:52
Speaker 2: And how it's probably the only genre where you can call black women bitches and holes, and you can use the N word or all day. You can say anything you want, you can be as disrespectful to other black people, but you absolutely cannot fall other racists out of their names or start saying things about the lgbt QI a community because if you do those things we've seen already.
00:07:19
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I don't. I can't say that Michael Jackson was.
00:07:23
Speaker 2: A hip hop artist, but he certainly was a black artist that when he said, you know, don't don't don't, what was it, John Hot, don't drew me down?
00:07:33
Speaker 1: He used some language like that.
00:07:35
Speaker 2: They repressed up all his albums and put them back and re released it and took that that out because that's just that those communities have been historically protected in these other communities and black folks have not been, and so we didn't go after individual artists.
00:07:55
Speaker 1: That was never ever the approach.
00:07:58
Speaker 2: The approach was in fact to bring other artists around to understanding how they are used in propaganda that is very harmful to our communities, and to just make sure that they have that understanding. And I think one of the things that we talked about was the balance, making sure that we do not allow these record labels to pump into our community so much of that and not enough of the other things. That gives a balance for people who who love a little ratchet because I love a little ratchet, love it, love it. Y'all know, Cardi b Is one of my favorite artists. I love to listen to her ratchet stuff. But I also love of Jill Scott. I also love a Queen Latifa. I also love you know, even some of the younger artists today that are not well known to the rest of the world, but we listen to some of their music, right because we know that, you know, we understand the power of words, we understand the power of tunes, but we also understand the power of people being able to have a good time and and and have the duality of what makes up a whole person. And I'm telling me as a whole person, I'm not just a oh God, what do I want to say?
00:09:17
Speaker 1: I'm not just a change gonna come type of girl.
00:09:20
Speaker 2: I'm also not just a you know, a safe lullaby or a safe sexy song or just a black power song. I like some stuff that you know, I wouldn't turn it on with my granddaughter sitting right next to me.
00:09:35
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna pump it for her. But I like some of those things.
00:09:38
Speaker 2: So I said all of that to stay that the spin that been, that spin, that conversation is one that I don't think shouldn't happen.
00:09:48
Speaker 1: I think it absolutely should happen.
00:09:51
Speaker 2: But I don't know that I agree that the problem is one or that that we should be creating a situation where one are it is, feels isolated when there's so many artists that's find that that represent the different dualities of music.
00:10:10
Speaker 3: I totally agree, you know, being an artist and growing up in hip hop, right, just understanding the phases as an individual as an artist that I went through as a young man that I went through where I come from, you know, understanding the dynamics of our culture, of the streets where we come from with hip hop was actually birthed, you know, and coming into this as a quote unquote gangster rapper, you know, with hard lyrics talking about violence, talking about guns, talking about drugs, and understanding that at that point that was my reality, that was the dynamics of the streets. That's what I had seen, that's what I had experienced, That's what I knew, That's what my friends knew, And that's what made people pay attention to me because I was relatable because I was talking about the things that were going on in the times, were going on in the streets that was actually going on in the poorest communities in which hip hop was birthed out of right. So, knowing that at twenty and twenty one and nineteen that those were lyrics that I was having, I know that, you know, Dolorus Tucker wasn't gonna be happy with my line. I know she wasn't right, you know, But I'm not saying she was wrong, But I'm just trying to say at that point, I didn't see her as wrong, right. I seen it as I was a young boy who this was my opportunity to get out of poverty. Right, I was rapping. I seen other rappers rap. I seen people come for where I come from, and I was rapping about the things that I knew about, and they were relatable and that's why people were like yo, I like him.
00:11:43
Speaker 4: Right. So fast forward to this situation when I'm looking at to spend that conversation, right, I'm looking at it from two perspectives. Sure, I understand that the subject matter of spend that is something that's toxic. Right.
00:11:58
Speaker 3: We're talking about you talk about scamming, you're talking about boosting, you talking about thinking negative things that that will be detrimental to our community, and no one can deny that. And those are conversations that definitely should be had, right. But I always say, first, you have to attack the forces of evil, not the individuals doing evil. And that comes from the principles of the Kenya nonviolence that doctor King focused on.
00:12:24
Speaker 4: Right. And when you focus on attacking the forces of evil, then you don't single out individuals, right, you don't make those individuals I mean, because these are microcosms of what's going on. Right.
00:12:37
Speaker 3: So I've had this conversation with my brother d one as well, when you single out individual artists and now you have a problem with the individual artists, Whereas those individual artists are part of the makeup of the culture. So when you talk about if you say, hey, these kind of lyrics right here are detrimental to our community, drug lyrics killing people that's actually utilizing those lyrics might agree with you, but they don't know. They haven't figured out anything else or the way to get to the next level. Nobody has embraced them. They haven't figured out how do I continue to be successful. They might agree with you, they might want to join forces with you in trying to figure out how do we we we.
00:13:21
Speaker 4: Stop these detrimental lyrics.
00:13:23
Speaker 3: But once you singled out that individual, the probabilities and the capabilities of us you twoe combining and uniting, they diminished. Right, So when you look at this situation, the sister ndii Re had commented on somebody who said something about the song, and she, you know, she made her comment and she and I don't think she was wrong about what she said. She's always been a sister who has had uplifting lyrics.
00:13:49
Speaker 4: You know, she's more neo soul. She never was one for talking about sexual, you know, talking about street things that was never talk about. I mean, but she's always never wrong.
00:14:00
Speaker 1: She was never it.
00:14:04
Speaker 3: Was more sensual than sexual, right, So her lane was always that. So she's been consistent in her lane, you know. And I had a little issue with her anyway, But we'll talk about that a little later.
00:14:15
Speaker 1: Oh my god, because I do.
00:14:20
Speaker 3: I want to bring it up because it's kind of it kind of coincides with what I'm saying right now, right, what I say to a lot of artists being for older artists, Right, how many of the artists that are spreading the messages that you believe should be spread the younger artists are you embracing or promoted right, Because it's hard. It's hard for artists to have this positive message, to have positive substance, to have real good music. But it's hard. So I hear a lot of people complaining about spending that, this and that. But the artists who promote them, the artists who who who actually like Young Miami, who respect Young Miami, who she she has relationship with, they're utilizing their platforms to help her.
00:15:15
Speaker 4: They're going to bat for her, right.
00:15:17
Speaker 3: I don't see a lot of the artists that are in the different lanes who are complaining, right, because there's a lot of artists who are who have the most positive music in the world, and they still would embrace Young Miami. But from my point of view, I have yet to see India Iri, who is somebody that I always loved as an artist. Right, I don't see her grab young up and coming rap artists who have a positive message and promoter on the page to say, hey, listen to this individual, right, I don't see her promoting these individuals. So it's kind of disheartening to see her utilize her voice to speak against a young girl who's trying to figure out her way. She might not know the best way. She she's trying to figure it out. This is the first probably number one song. She's happy, and it's so many people throwing negativity at her rather than calling her out.
00:16:10
Speaker 4: No one is calling her in.
00:16:11
Speaker 3: None of these individuals who have an issue with Young Miami and saying, hey, she's a young girl. She's not a bad girl. She's not a bad person. She seems like she has a beautiful personality, you know, and she probably would listen. She doesn't seem like she's she's absent of taking advice, like she doesn't want to take advice, she doesn't want to evolve, because that's what life is about. Music is about evolution. I went from my soong lefty gun in the right phone to who I am now?
00:16:39
Speaker 4: And I also know that a lot.
00:16:40
Speaker 3: Of these individuals who say, oh, we don't want to hear this, and that they don't they do not lend their platforms or promote the messages that are positive. I hear yas saying what you don't want, but you don't tell us what you want. I could see a million people saying, oh, why are we listening to that record? But I don't on no same page, who have negative things to say about spending that, who are saying negative things about young Miami, who said negative things about wyp and Cardi being on all those same people. I do not see them utilize those platforms to say these are the artists that I want people to pay attention to. Right, I utilize my platform. I see young up and coming dope lyricists right that I know can actually wrap. I post them on my page and say, listen to this young boy, this right here is dope you should get in tune with this individual. I've watched individuals who I've done that for. I've watched them come out and continue to grow, Right, I've done that. So that's why it's just harder for me. It's nothing wrong that you think that the subject matter of Young Miami song is something that's detrimental.
00:17:48
Speaker 4: I actually agree.
00:17:50
Speaker 3: But what are we doing to combat it other than demonizing the artists?
00:17:56
Speaker 4: Right? What are you contributing to BET veteran?
00:18:00
Speaker 3: Who are you promoting because a lot of artistss, oh yeah, I got positive.
00:18:04
Speaker 4: Music, they got dope, dope, positive music.
00:18:08
Speaker 2: I just want to say though, that I listened to what NDI re said, and I don't feel like she was demonizing Young Miami.
00:18:17
Speaker 1: I don't feel like she was even complaining.
00:18:20
Speaker 2: I think she was making the point after coming out of the BET Awards where it was probably one of the only times that and I'm not saying it's never happened. I'm saying it's probably one of the only times that the actual saw It wasn't a performance of the artists where everybody is up, but she walked out onto the stage and people started to sing the music, and so it just was a you know, even I and I didn't see it in a negative way. I sat back and said, wow, she really has a banger, like it's the banga of the summer period, because.
00:18:54
Speaker 1: You saw how people gravitated to it.
00:18:57
Speaker 2: But I think it's also some other things that play into that in terms of people kind of feeling like, for a minute, she was an underdog, you know, young Miami, and now to see her trying of pop back, she back outside, she not crying on the couch about her story, what she'd gone through and what happened to, you know, in her life, and of course the association with.
00:19:20
Speaker 1: Puff and all of that.
00:19:22
Speaker 2: And I think also there and you always say this to me that the right music, the right beat, the right tune can make almost any song go right, Like you could slap the dumbess because we know that it'd be's some songs that the lyrics is the stupidest shit ever, but because it's on the jingle half to tell me, you don't even know what these dudes are talking about. I used to be able to rap the lyrics of every single song the full and I love the way you rap right because I can repeat the words. But these guys uh uh uh, and they whining and something else. But because it has a good track, people gravitate to it. I don't think but I don't think, right, it's sonically good. I don't think that that she was complaining or trying to tear Young Miami down. I think that she was just kind of like me, you know, like but but from a different perspective. It was like, oh wow, like this is this is this is actually what people are really into in this moment. And and she said what she felt, and then people just immediately took it as ind Iri as attacking Young Miami.
00:20:42
Speaker 4: I don't.
00:20:43
Speaker 3: I don't. I think that it comes because Indiri has such a big voice, right, and she's always been counter to whatever it is that your Miami represents.
00:20:54
Speaker 4: That's always been her stance, right right.
00:20:57
Speaker 3: I think for me, right, it's not the fact that that's how she felt, right, because I can understand why she would feel that way, Like I said, it's the.
00:21:05
Speaker 4: Fact that what are you doing to combat what you hear? Right? What are you doing?
00:21:12
Speaker 3: And not only what are you doing the comment that you hear? People have always liked that mutic like any of It was the biggest song. Anyip was a robbery song. Any Mop was one of my favorite groups, and that was when that song came off.
00:21:26
Speaker 4: They were snatching your chain and they was robbing you.
00:21:28
Speaker 3: NAS had a song called the Thief's Theme, Play Me a Knight, They won't act right like. This was the name of the song, the Thief's Theme, Like it was a theme for thieves.
00:21:37
Speaker 2: Adena Howard was popping that thing and talking that stuff.
00:21:41
Speaker 1: Who else? Who else?
00:21:42
Speaker 2: A little kim of course. I mean the list goes on and on and on. There's always going to be a part of the culture that is super sexual, super ratchet, super ignorant, super.
00:21:57
Speaker 1: Whatever, and people won't put a little bit.
00:22:02
Speaker 2: When Sojia boy came out talking about Superman, that a ho I guess we say, yeah, Superman that hope.
00:22:11
Speaker 1: That was the people was.
00:22:12
Speaker 2: At the barbecue talking about Superman that and it took you know, you have to tell the elderly people like, oh, just so you know, right like, this is about something that I don't.
00:22:22
Speaker 1: Think you want to be singing. So it always has existed.
00:22:26
Speaker 2: I think to your point, it's important that we as a community also support artists like Corday and you know, artists that are trying to channel different types of energy. I also understand that the scamming and boosting has a particular level of danger because in this particular moment, we're dealing with so many people who are going to jail, going to prison for scamming, PPP or other types of scams that they've participated in the boosting world, the running in the stores and smash and grab and all of that, And I think that that brings on a heightened sense of concern because what you don't want is for a twelve ten, nine, eight seven and below child, or even a twenty five or forty five year old person to think that what's being stated is that this is this is actually you know, if this is something that's going to make you cool, which is why I think it is further important one to help uplift some of the other songs that have been done because they put gospel music on it, they put jazz on it, they put other things on it that to me, gives the song an opportunity for you to kind of shift it from this particular connotation and take it to a place that you can still use the beat, but to have a more positive message.
00:24:07
Speaker 1: So I hope that that's what people do.
00:24:08
Speaker 2: And again I am not suggesting that people should not speak up about how they feel around all of the lyrics on all the music, right, because I didn't, and I know that it's important for us to have a place where the culture can get our reality check and like, just like, let's just all make sure that our simpsons are working, our taste buds and our understanding that we are listening to why Wet Ass and this, and that we listening to all of that. But that's not the end all be all. That's not the beginning and the end of our culture. Our culture is so much more. If you want to fight somebody though about the scamming, you can look at the Donald the Trump administration because they scamming and boosting and doing all that.
00:24:59
Speaker 3: Or he answer that I was going to say, the realityels, Yes.
00:25:04
Speaker 4: They've been scamming.
00:25:05
Speaker 3: This the reality situation is the reason why that song is so big. One of the reasons not only because it sonically, it is because scamming is prevalent in America today from the top to the bottom.
00:25:18
Speaker 4: That is what's going on.
00:25:19
Speaker 3: They're scam Donald Trump has been scamming for the last year and a half. He has scammed the stocks and bonds. He's scamming, he's selling the country. He's all type shit, this is this is this literally scamming, like literally, they are scamming everybody as we speak. So that is what we should be focusing on, right not the fact that young Miami has figured out, how does she benefit off of what is going on in the culture. How do we change what's going on the culture. How do we shift what's going on in this country? How do we get people out of power who have made scamming very popular? Because if people are worried about looking at the young Miami saying, oh, we shouldn't be from we got a president that's on every day that's scamming. He's on a TV literally telling you how to scam. He said, well, you know, I gotta do my taxes. Y'all made the loop posts. I'm gonna show you how to scam. I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna keep telling you where to put your money on in the stocks. I'm gonna make sure the stocks go up and down so me and my people can make money. I'm gonna give them stocks Like these are things that's happening every day. But we'll focus on a microcosm. When we're talking about young Miami, it just doesn't make sense. And and like you said, when they asked me where all my scamming niggas at?
00:26:28
Speaker 4: I said, they in jail? Are they going back twenty again?
00:26:33
Speaker 1: Make sure you say it right. Well all my scamming when they asked you to, I gotta go.
00:26:41
Speaker 3: Like like you said, when they asked me where all my scamming ass niggas at? I say they in jail? Or they going back twenties fifties? Hundreds cash nigga going? I said, no, where all my scamming.
00:26:58
Speaker 4: Ass niggas at? Then jail? Are they going win back twenty fifties? Honey? Cash?
00:27:05
Speaker 3: That lawyer gonna need that bag, So spend that ship, spin that ship, give him that ship or stay in that ship. You spin that ship, you spend that ship, You give him that ship or stay in that ship. And when I ask about the girl, they say, we're all my boosting that Jesus, They in jail trying to.
00:27:22
Speaker 4: Steal that bag. Twenty fifties honeys.
00:27:25
Speaker 3: Cash, girl, Give that lawyer that bag, spend the spending that ship.
00:27:30
Speaker 4: Good night, I'm stay in that ship.
00:27:33
Speaker 1: Let's go to the gas. You have lost it. Good night. Will need to make your own bird.
00:27:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, spen that ship, spend that ship, stay in there.
00:27:46
Speaker 2: I ain't gonna lie with spind that. Come on, I get my two steps. Hold you, I get my two step. Boy right, boycotting the song.
00:27:55
Speaker 3: But I also understand, but also shout out to all young artists who are doing music that has different substance, It has real subject matter that's actually going on. Let's promote those people. Let's not put down young Miami. Let's show somebody another you know, another genre, another form of music that can actually uplift, and that's what it is about.
00:28:16
Speaker 4: Balance.
00:28:17
Speaker 3: Some people want to have fun, like I'm not scamming nobody. When that song come on, I'm gonna do my two step. When my kids ask me about them, I'm telling them, if you scam somebody, your glass is going to jail.
00:28:27
Speaker 4: That's just the facts.
00:28:29
Speaker 2: All right, Well, I guess it's coming up. We got to go to a more serious This was serious. They like a bit, but it is a serious topic and it should be discussed. I think all parties have the right to put this on the line. Because black folks were being influenced in all types of ways, and we have the right to speak up about things that we think may be damaging, farmful, and even the fun things. And how do we place that? Where does it go in our community? But now we have our guests coming up to talk about the unfortunate loss of Nolan Xavier Wells, young man deceased. And unfortunately we met this guest before in dealing with other cases where a person went away with friends and didn't come back the live.
00:29:14
Speaker 1: Okay, So you know, I'm excited to have our friend with us tonight.
00:29:20
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, though, the friend is coming here to talk about something that is completely tragic, just an awful, awful situation, and so it's a bittersweet moment to be together. But I want to introduce to some folks and those of you who know us, y'all know that she is definitely no stranger. Attorney Sue Ann Robinson, who is the director of the South Florida Office of ben Krump Law, the South Florida Office of ben Crump Law and also the founder of Frontline Law, which is her own law firm, and Attorney Robinson Suean, you know, as I said, it's great to have you with us, but you're definitely here to talk about something that is so painful and it is every parent's worst night. There we've worked together on the story of Shanquala Robinson, who was absolutely, as far as we're concerned, beaten to death in Mexico, where she died on a trip with her friends, and now here we are having a conversation tonight about an eighteen year old young man, Nolan Xavier Wells, who went missing while being with a group of friends. Quote end quote for both stories, because they're definitely I don't know if you can consider any of these people to be friends. And Nolan didn't come back home after fourth July, and now it is confirmed that he's deceased, and you all at ben Crump Law have been retained by the family, which tells me a lot about what the family has experienced over the last forty eight hours. And so I guess you know, Suann, I just you are somebody who really gets to the nitty gritty like a lot of people don't like that about you. They can't tell you anything, right, they can't just say anything to Sue and Robinson because you're going to ask the right questions. And so it feels good to know that you all are on this case. But I know you have to be saying to yourself, when does it stop, Like, when does it end that you all don't run out of work? People say, oh, Ben Crump is always on a phase? Oh why is he always the one Ben Crump's phone is ringing.
00:31:37
Speaker 1: I've been there, I see it.
00:31:38
Speaker 2: People chase us down, they send us DMS, they call the I mean, we have many cases that we've worked on together, and those people reached out looking for help.
00:31:49
Speaker 1: And so you don't run out of work to do.
00:31:52
Speaker 2: And that has to feel like for your people, your great attorney, and that's what you've committed your life to. But for as a black woman, it has to be exhausting that you keep running into stories like this where people's children are dead and there's not there're no real answers.
00:32:12
Speaker 6: Yes, it is exhausting.
00:32:14
Speaker 7: It's just a situation where you know, of course, our condolences in prayers to the Wells family, because it is something that the English language doesn't have a word to describe. When a parent loses a child. You can become a spouse, if you can become a widow. If you lose a spouse, you become an orphan if you lose your parents. But the English language doesn't actually have a word for what the Wells family is going through right now. So first and foremost, you know, my condolences and prayers are with them, but it is exhausting for them. Of course it's their first experience. For us, it's not, unfortunately, our first rodeo in a situation where a family that is grieving the loss of a loved one immediately and also has to then take up a mantle to beg and plead and have third parties like our firm involved in order to have a transparent investigation. It's too familiar of a situation, and you know that's the exhausting part, Like, why can't whatever has occurred over this last few days for this family have them not necessarily at ease because they're going through a grieving process, but why aren't they left with enough information that they're comfortable to say, Okay, I know this is being handled and you know that's not the case that they're.
00:33:43
Speaker 1: Reaching out, So like I said, don't say like you said.
00:33:49
Speaker 3: So you know we know what we've heard on the news, we know we've heard on social media. Can you give us the verifiable facts from right now. We're not assuming anything else. What can we verify it happened right now?
00:34:01
Speaker 7: Yeah, the on the verified facts at this time are that the boys left to go to Horn Island. It is a about a nine to ten mile long island.
00:34:14
Speaker 6: It's only about a mile across.
00:34:17
Speaker 7: It's about eight or nine miles from actual coasts of Mississippi. There's no amenities, there's no park staff, there's nothing there. It's just a protected kind of wildlife sanctuary. And Nolan did not return with the set of boys that went that he went with essentially, so a lot of the missing pieces are why why did he stay back? And it's also a verified piece of information that you can only access Horn Island via private charter, Like there isn't like a public ferry that you can hop on and just go back and forth. So in order to travel there or to travel back, there would have to be some private charter arrange or private shuttle arrange to pick up or drop off.
00:35:10
Speaker 6: So it's just interesting that he didn't return with them.
00:35:15
Speaker 7: It will remain to be seen if there was some sort of prearranged way that he was expected to return since Horne Island can only be accessed privately.
00:35:28
Speaker 2: But you know, i'd imagine that today it was a topic in the hair salon. We were asking the question, are black people the only group that has the conversation around who you go with? It's who you come back with? And I know for me growing up and even today, we're leaving still together. I don't care if you met the guy or even your other girlfriends. You we're going back to the place, and then you can leave.
00:36:00
Speaker 1: And go with these other people.
00:36:03
Speaker 2: But unless it's your sister, your mama, your man, your cousin, you know, somebody that you are very very very connected to, you're not, which means that everybody now knows the story, right because there's no such thing as we don't know because you left with your sister, you left with your husband, you left with your you know whoever, your family friend or some person that it is verifiable because I know that this is who this person is to you, and you're off with them, which means you're in safe hands. But you are to return with the same people. We want to count the folk because we got to be able to tell Grandma, Mama and them and whoever else that we all went together and we came back together, and I can.
00:36:51
Speaker 1: Say that tell the truth. It was an ass whooping.
00:36:54
Speaker 2: If you ain't come back who you went with, somebody is getting they tell towing up because what I said.
00:37:01
Speaker 1: Was what I said. So I'm just trying to figure out because I know, I know that they're.
00:37:06
Speaker 2: If I can't imagine a scenario, the mere fact that this family has retained. Ben trunk Law tells me that they had the conversation with their child whore you go with, it's how you come back and if anything changes, call me.
00:37:25
Speaker 1: I will swim there. If I don't have a boat, we will be there to get you. Am I crazy?
00:37:33
Speaker 7: No, No, that's that's a safety thing.
00:37:36
Speaker 6: I mean we're big.
00:37:37
Speaker 7: And grown and I'll be like Tnika, you know and texting you when you get to your girl help.
00:37:42
Speaker 6: So so you.
00:37:43
Speaker 7: Definitely know that his black mom was like, listen, who are the people you're going with?
00:37:51
Speaker 6: You know, whose boat is it, what time?
00:37:54
Speaker 1: Where, how long?
00:37:56
Speaker 6: What are you going to be doing there?
00:37:57
Speaker 7: Like the whole you know, degree of interior and then the part where it's like, yeah, okay, you're going with them, then you need to make sure you come back with them, and horn island doesn't have any sort of it has very unreliable, very extremely spotty.
00:38:13
Speaker 6: Self observice, So it's not it's advised.
00:38:16
Speaker 7: That if you're traveling there, you have some alternative means of communication like a satellite phone or walkie talkies or something like that, or obviously whatever communications are on your boat, so it's not a situation where you can just pick up the phone. Yes, and like you said, they would have to swim there because it's only accessible, you know, via a private boat. So you know, I'm sure they definitely went through the one hundred degree you know questions and then gave very specific instructions, which makes it even harder when something like this occurs.
00:38:57
Speaker 4: Why do you think that this keeps happening to black people?
00:39:00
Speaker 3: Like they go to parties, they don't come back, They go on trips, they don't come back even if they would Black people, what is happening? And then there's always and that's very where and I say, oh, is this very really any conclusion? It's just the person just died or we don't know, and it's very it's just very little follow up in real conclusion for the people who lost their lives, Like why does this keep happening to.
00:39:27
Speaker 2: Black people, then before you answer that, sen not that you have an answer to why it happens. It happened to black people. But I definitely understand the sentiments of the question. People may think that we're conflating issues by bringing up Shamfula Robinson as part of this, because those were black people who who were involved in Shamfquala's death, and they came back and said the same thing. They don't remember anything, they don't know. There might have been a little bit facts. There was no fight until there was a video of the fight, so there was somebody there who wanted to tell the truth who leaked a little bit of the video. But if many hours went by without there being a real investigation, and therefore the story changes and people just get to do whatever they want. And so those facts kind of feel reminiscent to me. But also I feel like the subject, like the victim of these situations in a lot of cases are black people. Not that white people don't go on trips with friends and die, but somebody.
00:40:37
Speaker 1: Is held accountable.
00:40:38
Speaker 2: A lot of times, I would love to know the stats on that one day, like what's the difference between us and them.
00:40:46
Speaker 7: Well, I don't have the stats either, but I definitely think that there's systemic issues at play that have a disparent impact on black families in these situations. It's like I would imagine that these boys families immediately picked up the phone and called whoever their family attorneys are and said, get over here. You know, we have a situation, there could be a possible criminal investigation. We want to make sure that our sons are protected, or these young men's futures are protected, and they don't have any issues from this incident and what occurred, so they're in a mode of protecting themselves. They're not necessarily you know, thinking about Nolan at that time, because their family has gone into how can we best preserve, you know, our own sons.
00:41:44
Speaker 6: I don't know if the roles are reverse. I don't know if.
00:41:50
Speaker 7: The black family's natural instinct is to pick up the phone, call an attorney and you know, acting in that manner. I would definitely say in Shanequila's case, there's a lot of concealment of facts that are done as a group, So that means that there's some coordination, right, They're making some decisions as a group not to discuss certain things, Like you said, not to discuss the fight that occurred, well, not the fight, the attack. That attack, Yeah, not to discuss that with Shanequila's mom upon their return. But I think the important part is that a family that's grieving has such a concern for the system that is in place to assist their families that they're they feel the need to have a third party involved. And no one, you know, no American should feel that way, black or white, should feel like, oh, we need to get a third party involved to make sure that this process is done correctly. Nolan's family should not need an attorney, and if whatever happened to him is on the up and up, I'm not going to say that they don't need attorneys right because I think that we also as black people, have got to start realizing that when we walk into a precinct to tell any story, it could be the full truth, you know, all the things in order that it is good to have some type of representation with you to make sure that you are being handled properly.
00:43:40
Speaker 2: I think it's for different reasons. I think one group of people have to have one in case they might have been did something that they shouldn't have done. But black folks sometimes get railroaded, right because you think about like the Central Park five, who they were like, I didn't do isnit you know what I'm saying. I wasn't I old, they're messing with this woman. I didn't have anything to do with a rape, and the next thing you know, they are railroaded and in prison for fourteen and twenty years. So I won't say that people shouldn't have an attorney, but.
00:44:14
Speaker 1: They should be spilling every single thing.
00:44:17
Speaker 2: The attorney should be working with the family, like, yeah, you know, we all going to the precinct together with the families and everybody together to try to express everything that we possibly know, down to we found one piece of hair over here.
00:44:34
Speaker 1: I just don't know. And again, you haven't had time.
00:44:37
Speaker 2: Because you all were just retained to get into all the minutia.
00:44:42
Speaker 1: But or maybe it's not minutia but all the details. But I don't.
00:44:48
Speaker 2: Feel like this family would have retained been Crump law because there's law firms everywhere, and I'm sure Mississippi they can go fine.
00:45:00
Speaker 1: You know in.
00:45:01
Speaker 2: Alabama's next right, Alabama's nearby, and Georgia and all these places they could go, but they specifically retain ben Crump Law. That tells me a lot about what's been going on for the last forty eight hours, and that they do not feel like people are knocking their door down to be like, hey, let me just open up my heart and tell you every single thing that I know and stand with you and walk alongside you.
00:45:28
Speaker 1: On this process to figure it out.
00:45:30
Speaker 2: Because we're just as emotionally grieving for our friend. I would never need to call ben Crump Law if the people was trying to work with me. It just doesn't make sense. There is something there, and I get the sense that within the next forty eight hours of you all being retained, we will probably hear what those issues are and why this family feels that they need this type of support.
00:45:55
Speaker 1: What I get that they got, I'm glad they have you all.
00:45:59
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's it's so tragic, even as you're explaining it to me, and even though I've been in circumstances in cases like this before with other families, just you saying all the steps and the things that they're having to do, It's it's heavy, right because again they are also grieving the loss and finding out just extremely recently that their life is going to change forever, that when these holidays come up soon, these next health days.
00:46:31
Speaker 6: Their baby is not going to be there.
00:46:33
Speaker 7: He's not going to be coming home from school on break, he's not going to be for Thanksgiving.
00:46:37
Speaker 6: That chair is going to be empty. And so while they're.
00:46:40
Speaker 7: Having to deal with all of those emotions around that, they're like, Okay, we need to go and make sure that there's a transparent investigation.
00:46:54
Speaker 6: It's a lot.
00:46:56
Speaker 1: It is a lot.
00:46:57
Speaker 3: It's want to just say it speaking for me, I'm not speaking for anybody else, for god.
00:47:04
Speaker 1: Oh gods, cut the camera off, just.
00:47:08
Speaker 4: Being very transparent.
00:47:10
Speaker 3: You're not going to leave with my son, and y'all come back and nobody gives me any explanation of why he didn't come back with you, and then you go get a lawyer. At that point, I'm gonna need a lawyer because it's just not gonna be okay with me. It's not It doesn't make sense to me that I trust you, that my son trusts you, and he doesn't make it home and you you don't feel the need or have enough respect or anything for me to come say, hey, mister lining, this woul happened to your son. We didn't do anything this and and you just go get lawyers and now y'all can't talk to me. And I got to go through the law and all of this stuff. Nah, because at that point it's passed just the law, it's the principality of it's the principle. You know what the principle means that you now you've turned this. You wasn't my son's friend, because my son's friend would never make me have this level of doubt to where they had to get some lawyers before they came to talk to me, and they weren't. They didn't have the same level of hurting and feeling or just a level of hurt feeling that my son didn't come home.
00:48:09
Speaker 4: There's just no way. It's just not It wouldn't work out for me.
00:48:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, but this is the thing. I hear you. I hear what you're saying, and I don't disagree with you.
00:48:20
Speaker 2: But I think Shaqaula Robinson's family felt the same way, right, Like I can imagine that multiple family members that they don't even need to worry about lawyers and calling this one and that one because we're gonna go handle it.
00:48:37
Speaker 1: Ourselves to get the information.
00:48:39
Speaker 2: I know for a fact, because I had to be like, please don't tell so when because we're gonna get in trouble. But y'all can't go over there, you know, kicking the door, waving the four flour like, we can't do that. You know what I'm saying, because that's the type of time that most of the families that we know, and they have every right to have that instinct immediately to say, oh, okay, so you playing with me like you think this is my sin my child that a mother and father birth.
00:49:09
Speaker 1: You could get yourself really hurt.
00:49:11
Speaker 2: Doing things to people or not acting like you don't know what happened to people's children. I'm sure the same thing with you know, Tamala I'm Horsford, right is Hosford? Yeah, I'm sure the same thing with Tamla Hosford. She goes to a party with her the school friends of the community people basically mainly you're all white people, mostly women, but some men there as well, and next thing you know, she's over the banister. She fell into the yard and nobody knows how she felt. Nobody knows anything. She was out there by herself.
00:49:44
Speaker 1: They don't know.
00:49:45
Speaker 2: I can imagine that her family members was like, Oh, you gonna know, You're gonna know, right. But the problem with that is it they're gonna put you in prison, right, and then what does that do?
00:49:57
Speaker 6: Right?
00:49:58
Speaker 1: How does the justice that you have to seek?
00:50:01
Speaker 2: And I get it because all of us will say we don't care, like we just got to deal with whatever it is.
00:50:07
Speaker 1: But you begin to quickly have to deal with the realities.
00:50:11
Speaker 2: That you really do not want to put yourself in prison for the next forty years because you're pursuing somebody who you believe.
00:50:21
Speaker 1: Harmed or you know, harmed your child. You know, I can't imagine.
00:50:25
Speaker 2: Can you imagine what Tracy Martin felt when Trayvon was killed down steps away from his house?
00:50:31
Speaker 1: Tracy Martin ain't no pump, you know what I'm saying. But and this is how.
00:50:35
Speaker 2: You end up with a ben Trump law because these people, including Shaanquala's family, quickly found out that nobody's gonna tell us anything, like nobody is going to say anything after she was in another country where we're supposed to have rules and laws about bringing any American citizen back and it's supposed to be all this America first, and this country did absolutely nothing to support Shampualler's family.
00:51:05
Speaker 1: It is, it is. It is very disheartening, and I'm like, what do we fight for?
00:51:10
Speaker 2: I don't even know that we have an answer to that, but what does it look like to fight for there to be some protection?
00:51:17
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm thinking of so many stories.
00:51:19
Speaker 2: I'm thinking of Kendrick Johnson, this young man behind the.
00:51:23
Speaker 1: Bleaches in the map. Nobody knows what happened.
00:51:27
Speaker 2: Like this is not it's not sustainable because my son's point is that eventually people are just don't go like, we gotta take matters into our own hands about our kids.
00:51:39
Speaker 4: I mean, that's it. That's pretty much it for me.
00:51:42
Speaker 3: It's like at this point, like I don't have much faith in the legal system, you know, especially you named four cases where there was no result, nobody knew, nothing just ended up happening. Kendrick just winded up in the mattress.
00:51:57
Speaker 1: You know, the the gym.
00:52:01
Speaker 3: He just he just rolled up in the gym matt just nobody put him there. You know, you know this young man, nobody knows anything. She qu like at some point somebody got to know something.
00:52:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, so when we appreciate you.
00:52:18
Speaker 2: You know, you know, thank God for y'all because in Tamla's situation, you know that you know more better than me. Everybody was connected the family, The people in the house knew the police and that this one was a pre a cop and that one knows it. And in those in these towns Mississippi and other places like that, when these folks lawyer up, they're generally finding people who they know had those types of connections. Right like we watch it in the Mayberry stories. You know, we know, we know what goes on. And thank god you all have made your reputation for being able to break through some of those walls is so important, if for no other cause then to just expose the injustice, to make sure that you can't hide under a white sheet. With this, everybody is going to know your name. And in sham Quala situation, they were black folks, but people had to change their names.
00:53:22
Speaker 1: Because of the work that you did to as that. But they can't hear you on the on the on the version they they.
00:53:31
Speaker 7: They yeah, folks certainly became aka's, but not in the good way formerly known as because trying to kind of escape.
00:53:43
Speaker 6: But that's also the power of community as well.
00:53:47
Speaker 7: You know, we don't act alone or investigate alone. Of course, we don't share unverified information. But we need you, we need my son, we need the community to kind of rally, and even in Nolan's case, right now, the investigators are saying, hey, if you have any information, if you know anything, please come forward, And that's important too.
00:54:12
Speaker 6: We do have to do that.
00:54:13
Speaker 7: We do have to make sure that any information that we're sharing about the cases or the in Nolan's case, is verified and factual information that we're not making it harder for the family by sharing verified information. We're not making it harder for the investigators by you know, sharing wrong tips or information that's not factual because social media versus facts.
00:54:41
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's true.
00:54:43
Speaker 7: And so that's why you know, the community relies so heavily upon you, upon my song to make sure that they have the right information that to the extent that there's a call to action, that they know what that is, that they know what next steps are and know what we can do from wherever we are to push forward the work, the case, whatever issue our community is dealing with, and to give support to the families.
00:55:12
Speaker 6: And that's why your work is so important because.
00:55:16
Speaker 7: Unfortunately, just generally speaking, the public has a short intention and span.
00:55:23
Speaker 1: So you know, we talk.
00:55:26
Speaker 6: About Shane Cloe's case could because we still live it every day.
00:55:29
Speaker 7: Part of the case is on appeal right now, part of the cases in Stakehoret. There's so much going on every day for that particular case and many other cases, so we're still living in every day, but the general public kind of forgets. But there has to be people who are willing to be down the front lines and offer consistent support to the families and make sure that they know that no rock is going to go unturned. There's going to be nothing that we're not extent that we're not willing to go to.
00:56:02
Speaker 6: To get the information that they need.
00:56:05
Speaker 7: There's no official or office that we're not going to say, Hey, we know what your what our client's rates are, and what information needs to be shared, and we're here to get that information.
00:56:19
Speaker 6: So we're we're gonna do everything we can.
00:56:21
Speaker 7: I know Attorney Cruk made a statement earlier and I echoed the statement in the sense that you know, the firm is brought in to make sure that the investigation is fair and transparent there and we're not going to leave the family side until that is the case, until every rock is turned over, any lead, every piece of information is fully investigated.
00:56:48
Speaker 2: Thank you for what you do, and of course we love Ben, you know, and we just I'm confident that no matter what happens, the truth will absolutely be exposed in that when you guys open your mouths, you're going to state the facts.
00:57:04
Speaker 1: And so where that leaves us, I.
00:57:06
Speaker 2: Hope is to clarity and closure for this family so that they can grieve the loss of their child, which is, as you said, it's own set of like pain and things that they have.
00:57:19
Speaker 1: To deal with.
00:57:19
Speaker 2: When you compound that with all the other possibilities, it's probably just too painful to bear. And so having you all there as an extension of their work and you know, their fight is just it's a real good thing. And I'm sure that the lawyers who are on the case or on this, yeah, on this it's going to be a case. In my mind, I didn't say you said that. I said that, But the lawyers who are involved, I'm sure that they are telling the families that this thing has kicked up to another level because Bnkrunk Law is involved and they have a mouthpiece like the world is going to stop and listen to the first big press conference that you all had to lay out the facts and you're finding in this story. And so those lawyers are definitely saying, this isn't an open and shut situation.
00:58:16
Speaker 1: This isn't just some.
00:58:17
Speaker 2: Little black boy from meth Thiphy who you know he ain't got nobody and can't find no the family was able to find the best legal team in the world as far as I'm concerned, and you know, God bless them, and God bless you all for what y'all continue to do.
00:58:36
Speaker 6: Thank you, God less you guys too.
00:58:39
Speaker 2: I wish that I could make I didn't want Suan to be here when I said this part. I was in my right, in my right, wrong mind to go online and say either you remember, or we're gonna be at your house and so we'll just help help you remember. We'll sit outside until you remember. That's really what was in my mind. However, howsoever, I feel like we have there's some progress that maybe may happen here. I don't even know how you call progress having a lawyer have to go find out what happened.
00:59:15
Speaker 3: But maybe, like I said, I don't I don't really have faith in the justice system. I have faith in Ben and Sue and the whole bankrupt law, but I just there's too many instances like this, right, And I think what happens is when people see that situations like this rarely have any findings and outcomes, that someone is held accountable, you know, it becomes like a way like it's.
00:59:42
Speaker 1: Like you're doing comfortable.
00:59:44
Speaker 4: That you started doing research side.
00:59:46
Speaker 3: We if we going to island and we do this with a little black boy, you know, chances are nobody really cares anyway, and we could get away with it, you know, And I think that seems to happen more often than not, you know. So I'm I'm I'm hopeful. You know, I don't know how much faith I have in it, but I'm actually hopeful. Man.
01:00:05
Speaker 4: Just the situation in itself, No young boy should leave with his friends and just come back and not come back home, you know, especially with no nobody having anything to tell or understanding why he didn't come back.
01:00:18
Speaker 1: So you know, it is devastating. It's devastating. It's devastating.
01:00:25
Speaker 2: It's devastating, it's devastating, it's devastating. There is no other way to describe it. It makes you feel sick. You can't imagine what it would be if it happened to your own child. You worry about it all the time. And that's just your child. People you know, gone out going around people, work trips, you know, these things can happen, and it's just it's it's truly devastating. I don't want to be in that club, you know. I don't want to be in that club. And I think what Sue Ane said at the very beginning of the interview was so so painfully powerful that there is no word in the dictionary. Webster didn't come up with a word to describe a parent losing their child. You can be a widow, but what word do you use to describe a mother or father losing their child.
01:01:19
Speaker 1: I don't know.
01:01:20
Speaker 2: So God bless and rest the soul of Nolan Xavia Wells. But God also give his parents peace and their souls to be able to fight a fight that they shouldn't even have to be engaged in.
01:01:35
Speaker 4: Yeah, and with that being said, we've come to the end of another episode of the ta in my show. Thank you Suwayne Robinson for being here with us. All condoss goes out to young Nolan Xavier Wells. You know, hopefully we'll get justice.
01:01:51
Speaker 3: Continue to follow us, let us know who you want us to talk to, let us know what topics you want.
01:01:56
Speaker 4: I'm not gonna always be right, Tamika D.
01:01:58
Speaker 3: Marris, and that can always be wrong when we will both always and I mean always be authentic.
01:02:03
Speaker 2: Base Listen to the TMI podcast on the Black Effect Network, on iHeartRadio, or anywhere podcasts are available
01:02:12
Speaker 3: Or catch the video version on YouTube at TMI Show PC
