When I first met JJ Velasquez in 2002, he'd been in prison for three years, serving 25

to life. That meant he wouldn't be eligible for parole until he was 48, and getting parole

is never a guarantee. It was possible JJ could spend the rest of his life behind bars.

I saw how JJ lived, locked away in his seven by nine-foot cell. He told me when he was

first sent up state, he fell into the routine of prison life, sleeping in his cell, hanging

out in the prison yard.

I was going through a lot of pain for a long time. I was private about my matters, but after

a while I realized I can't always say, man, I'll let this go. When individuals started

to find out that I was innocent, they said, yo, what are you doing in your own plane?

It's basketball or softball.

You need to be in a law library. Nobody's going to get you out of prison. You need to learn

the law. You need to tell the lawyers what needs to happen in your case. No one cares about

you. You're not a concern. The only way you're going to get out is if you get yourself out.

So JJ told me he started to take matters into his own hands. He'd been assigned new court

appointed attorneys to help with his appeal, but he said he had trouble getting their

attention.

No attorney ever came to see me. Any time I wrote them about my case file, they said they

hadn't received it yet. I was getting nowhere. And meanwhile, I'm sitting up state. So I

had to tell the appellate division that I wanted to proceed pro-say, which means that

I was going to handle my own case just to get my case file. The truth of the matter is

that I realized that the only person who was going to advocate for me the way that I

needed was me. I got my case file September 2000 and it was a big box probably coming

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