Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. A teen tries to outrun pain, finds cocaine, and goes from a kid coming of age, to a daily user in a matter of weeks. Then come the crimes, the fear, the SWAT arrest, and a sentence so extreme it reshapes his entire identity: 32 years of prison time at 18 years old. In this episode of Amplified Voices, Jason and guest host, Kim are joined by Jesse Crosson, lived-experience advocate, activist and author of The Best Pa...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. On this episode of Amplified Voices, Amber and Jason speak with Bessie Elmore who shares how a single phone call shattered the illusion of normal and sent her family into a world of warrants, headlines, courtrooms, and prisons. Everything seemed to move too fast for the truth to catch up. What followed wasn’t a miracle; it was grit. Across decades, Bessie turned confusion into literacy, fear into strategy, and isola...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. In episode of Amplified Voices, Amber and Jason chat with Joshua Hoe about incarceration, reentry and renewal. During the course of the conversation we get a front-row seat to accountability, reentry built on constraints: registry rules that make simple walks risky, five-hour weekday windows on parole, and landlords who rarely open doors. Josh turns that maze into a practice of workarounds—writing web content with a...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. Justice shouldn’t confuse accountability with exile. That’s the heartbeat of the conversation Amber & Jason had w Dr. Reece, a survivor whose near-fatal domestic violence experience led her from theater stages to forensic psychology & into the powerful world of restorative justice circles inside prisons. Her story begins with a family divided by a decades-old case and moves through the practical realities su...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. What happens when turning 18 transforms a teenage relationship into a serious crime? In this conversation, Jason and Amber speak with Heather who shares her gut-wrenching journey through the criminal legal system. With remarkable vulnerability, Heather reveals how a small-town teen romance led to an arrest warrant, interrogation by police, and eventually a plea deal resulting in four years in prison and ten years o...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. In this powerful episode, Amber and Jason meet Fez, who spent 22 years in prison, and Vern, who has volunteered with the Jericho Circle for 25 years. Together, they share the transformative impact of circle work both inside prison walls and beyond. Fez's story begins with a childhood lacking affection and stability, which paved his path to juvenile detention at 15 and later a 22-29 year sentence. When he first ente...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. What happens when we replace shame and barriers for people in reentry with resources? Kevin Scott of Community Spring shares his story and work with direct cash assistance for justice-impacted people as part of this insightful conversation with Amplified Voices co-hosts, Jason and Amber. Kevin's story begins in the chaos of childhood trauma – a family member struggling with addiction, a kidnapping, and his own earl...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. In this episode of Amplified Voices, Amber and Jason chat with defense attorney, Laurie Jubelirer who walks us through her remarkable 37-year legal journey that began in prosecution and transformed into passionate defense advocacy. Growing up in a family of legal and public service professionals—with a father who served as senator for 32 years and a grandfather who was a judge—Jubelirer entered the legal profession...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. Gus Marks-Hamilton shares his powerful journey from teenage arrest through incarceration to becoming an advocate for criminal justice reform with the ACLU's Smart Justice Campaign. • Growing up in a stable middle-class family with teacher parents before first encountering the legal system at age 16 • Finding structure and purpose through employment at Blockbuster Video after his initial arrest • Experiencing the de...

Send us a text. Please provide contact information if you'd like a response. Discover the story of Joe, a former high school football star, whose life took a dramatic turn, as a young man looking for purpose in unhealthy ways, Amber and Jason speak with Joe about his early influences, the choices he made, his experience with incarceration and his journey to accountability and repair. From the exuberance of youth to the stark reality of prison life, Joe reveals how he grappled with inc...