In the spring of 2017, after preliminary injunction hearing, a federal judge ordered

Ruthford County to stop using the filter system, their policy for illegally detaining kids.

The impact of that decision was massive.

The number of county kids sent to jail dropped by almost 80% over the next year, which was

good for the kids of Ruthford County, and that injunction was also good for Wes and his

legal team, who were still pursuing a lawsuit against the county.

Like we thought, great, we've got the injunction, and then, you know, they're going to have

to sell this thing or face a trial, and we have all these good arguments, and we're going

to get these experts, and we would have a really great shot at convincing a jury of the

value of these claims.

So Wes and the two other lawyers on the case, Mark and Kyle, started gearing up for the

trial of their careers.

They did more top positions of jail and court staff, and hired an expert witness to testify

on the trauma and impact of jailing kids so young.

And in preparation to wow a jury, they hired a photographer to take specialized photos

of the jail.

Their plan was to put VR headsets on jurors, so they could feel what the kids did, being

locked up in a tiny cell.

But there's a problem with gathering all that evidence.

That's a ton of damn money.

Here's Mark.

I remember getting the expert witness bills, and being like, oh my god, you know, and

...