Ep. 397 - My conversation with Michael Thompson after he was freed from prison today after 25 years in prison for selling weed

The Breakdown with Shaun King

The North Star

News, Society & Culture

4.8 • 12.6K Ratings

🗓️ 28 January 2021

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Michael Thompson spent 25 hard years in prison for selling weed to a friend. It's unthinkable and is one of the worst acts on injustice I've ever seen in modern American history. While he was incarcerated, his parents died, his only son died, and he lost almost his entire adult life. Today, after 25 years, he was released - and we had to fight like hell to make that happen. Today Michael and I spoke for the first time with him as a free man.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	In New York you can gaze up at the towering skyscrapers or...
0:05.0	You can sunbathe on top of one.
0:08.0	In LA you can catch a neon lit rollercoaster ride on Landon-Mona-Capear.
0:14.0	Before catching a California catfish off Santa Monica Pier.
0:19.0	Oh!
0:20.0	Virgin Atlantic fly to the world's most iconic destinations
0:24.0	but how you see them is up to you.
0:26.0	Book now with Virgin Atlantic. See the world differently.
0:30.0	Hey everybody, today is one of those days that I would call a good news,
0:35.0	a great news episode of the breakdown.
0:38.0	And I am very, very excited to share a conversation that I just had
0:44.0	with my dear brother who has become almost like an uncle
0:49.0	or a father figure, a grandfather figure to me.
0:52.0	Michael Thompson, who was just released from prison a few hours ago
0:57.0	early this morning after serving 25 years in prison.
1:02.0	Staggering 25 years ago, I was a student in high school.
1:07.0	I mean that's what we're talking about.
1:09.0	All the way back from the 90s until today,
1:13.0	Michael Thompson was in prison for selling weed in Michigan.
1:18.0	I just need to say it was, he was not a kingpin.
1:22.0	He was not running some crazy operation and I don't even think
1:26.0	a kingpin in weed should serve a year in prison.
	...

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