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

County to stop using the filter system, their policy for legally 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 Rutherford 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 settle 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 depositions 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 so we get the bill and then there'd be another one like a month later

for another ten or fifteen thousand dollars so like that fifteen thousand dollars was just a

kick in the balls.

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