Sergeant James Booker on Integrity, Prison Politics, and Leading with Character

Speaker 1 You got a guy out there, a young lady out there, that has probably gone through something similar like you have. And because they heard your story, it gives them hope, it gives them direction.

Speaker 1 Because a lot of people don't know which way to go, which way to turn in order to put themselves in a position to even start the fight.

Speaker 2 Welcome to Mick Unplugged, the number one podcast for self-improvement, leadership, and relentless growth.

Speaker 2 No fluff, no filters, just hard-hitting truths, unstoppable strategies, and the mindset shifts that separate the best from the rest. Ready to break limits? Let's go!

Speaker 1 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another exciting episode of Mick Unplugged. And today, we're going deep into a story and a path of legacy.

Speaker 1 We're talking to a former police sergeant who stood alongside my former guest, Mr.

Speaker 1 Raymond Hicks, as a decorated Broward County Sheriff who faced wrongful accusations after exposing internal corruption.

Speaker 1 Together, they navigated the challenges of integrity with law enforcement, shedding light on systemic issues. Their journey underscores the complexities of upholding justice within the justice system.

Speaker 1 Please join me in welcoming the courageous, the steadfast, and the principled, Mr. James Booker.
Sergeant Booker, how are you doing today, sir? I'm fine, sir. How are you?

Speaker 1 I am great. I am honored.
Now, I was selling you offline. Like, you're someone that I look up to and respect.

Speaker 1 I have family. Shout out to my cousin, Detective Torrance Jackson, and the Pickens County law enforcement.

Speaker 1 I have family that's law enforcement, man. So, law enforcement is something that I've always held dear to my heart.
My grandfather was the first black sheriff in our hometown.

Speaker 1 And so, we've always had a tradition within our family of upholding the blue to the highest standard, the highest regard. That also doesn't mean that there aren't issues, right?

Speaker 1 And those issues, we're not pointing them out per se, but just like anything in the school system, there's issues. In the government, there's issues, right?

Speaker 1 Like in people's households, there's issues.

Speaker 1 So this isn't definitely not an attack on anything law enforcement, but I just wanted to tell you face to face, man, just honored to know you, honored to be a part of the legacy that you've created.

Speaker 1 And just would love to hear a little bit about your background.

Speaker 1 And then we're going to go into the things that you've done, go into some specific situations, and just let you shed light where you want to shed light, brother. Okay.
Sounds good. Awesome.
Awesome.

Speaker 1 So let's talk about Sergeant James Booker, man. Like, where did you grow up? Like, where did this yearning to go into law enforcement start? Well, I grew up in Pensacola, Florida.

Speaker 1 I as well come from a law enforcement background. My mother, she was in law enforcement.
She retired as a major with the Escambi County Sheriff's Department.

Speaker 1 My sister, she retired as a lieutenant with the Escambi County Sheriff's Department. And my older brother, he worked for ATF and he also worked

Speaker 1 as an investigator for the state's attorney's office in Pensacola as well.

Speaker 1 So that kind of...

Speaker 1 got my path going because once I left the Marine Corps, you know, I wanted to stay in service. I wanted to do a part in service.
I always liked to serve. That was my whole thing.

Speaker 1 And then coming from that background, seeing it as I was a young child, I said that was something that I felt, you know, I could transition into and that was something I felt I would be good at.

Speaker 1 So when I got out the service,

Speaker 1 I looked for an opportunity to

Speaker 1 get into law enforcement. So I actually kind of a short story, I was didn't know where I was going.

Speaker 1 I was on my way to Miami because I heard a lot of things was progressive for African Americans in Miami. So I said, well, you know what?

Speaker 1 I loaded up my car after three months of being out of the service, didn't know where I was going, didn't have any family. I jumped in my car and I headed south.

Speaker 1 So I actually stopped in Gainesville, Florida, and I was at this restaurant called Wax Wags, and it was a breakfast place. So I'm sitting there and I'm going to age myself for a second.

Speaker 1 I'm reading a newspaper.

Speaker 1 Yeah, so in the newspaper, they said they were hiring for

Speaker 1 correction officers.

Speaker 1 So I'm like, okay, you know what? Let me look into this. Not knowing that the place I applied for was Florida State Prison.

Speaker 1 And when I went and I did the application, they hired me the same day, not knowing that they were quite desperate for staff.

Speaker 1 quite desperate for someone with a background coming from the military that they were looking for. So that started my journey into the correctional process.
And that was back in 1983.

Speaker 1 So that's when I started. So I stayed there, transitioned from

Speaker 1 Florida State Prison into Gainesville Road Prison. And then from Gainesville Road Prison, I then

Speaker 1 transferred into the Broward County Sheriff's Department. And I got to the Broward County Sheriff's Department in 1986, I believe, 1986.

Speaker 1 Well, I retired recently. I've been retired now 12 years now, this September.
All right. Well, one, appreciate everything you've done.
Two, congratulations on the retirement 12 years, right?

Speaker 1 That's that's powerful in and of itself. I love, man, like, I'm fortunate.
I've never been to prison. Hopefully never go to prison, right? But I've heard stories.

Speaker 1 What's like a prison story that you've witnessed that the average person wouldn't even believe or could even comprehend? Well,

Speaker 1 I love to tell this thing. Most people think in Florida that there's like, you know, multitude of prisons.
It's only one prison in the state of Florida. It's only one,

Speaker 1 and that's Florida State Prison. That is the only building that bears the name prison, which is Florida State Prison.

Speaker 1 Everything else is a correctional facility or as a work camp or something of that nature. Well, I actually worked at the only prison in the state of Florida.
Wow. And at that prison,

Speaker 1 It was like the very, very hardcore. And I'm like, again, I'm going to age myself.
These are guys that, as we say, stood on business. These guys were not,

Speaker 1 yeah, they were not snitches. These guys would kill you at the drop of a hat.
You know, they were meant something.

Speaker 1 They truly lived by code. And their code was serious.

Speaker 1 And being a young man coming out of the military and going into such a place and coming from a disciplined place, believe it or not, that place has real discipline within the prison community.

Speaker 1 And I don't think a lot of people understand that.

Speaker 1 You can't do a lot of things because you're an inmate. You can't do certain things like you want to do unless you get permission.

Speaker 1 If a guy wants to stab a guy, he got to get permission. He just can't go stab this guy.
It doesn't work like that.

Speaker 1 I think people, when they see TV, they think, oh, this guy, you know, you see a movie and a guy stabbed a guy. No, it's not like that.
It's politics. It's big politics.

Speaker 1 And if you're from a certain part of Florida, then you're basically in that bus with those guys from Miami, or you're in part of central Florida, or wherever you are.

Speaker 1 And if you're a guy coming in from another state, you got to pick a bus. And

Speaker 1 it's totally different. And I think people don't really know the dynamics that goes on there.
Because if you think about it, you got some of the most ruthless guys that you would ever know.

Speaker 1 Every guy you see on channel six, seven, and five on the six o'clock news that did a heinous heinous crime, most of them ended up there.

Speaker 1 And they're all in one place. Just think about that for a minute.
You got a lot of predators, a lot of psychopaths, you got a lot of mental health. You got all this in one place.

Speaker 1 So you got to have order. And the order, they basically set the tone for what the order would be.
And I know that may not sound

Speaker 1 right, but honestly, they basically ran the prisons. We just managed it.
They ran it.

Speaker 1 Just 80s, Miami alone. Yes.
Probably populated three-fourths of the prison.

Speaker 1 Absolutely.

Speaker 1 Because the cocaine thing blew up during the early 80s.

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 1 it was like a wildfire. The prisons actually couldn't handle it.
And I tell you another thing, too. Same thing when AIDS came about.
The prison system wasn't ready for it. And it blew up.

Speaker 1 And I mean, it blew up. And that's a dynamic that you don't even think about.

Speaker 1 That guys coming in and they're sick and they get aids and it's like okay how do you deal with this because it was like crack cocaine it took off like a wildfire you know

Speaker 1 but and i tell you um quick little story when i first got there um and in florida state prison i was once again i'm gonna age myself i'm young most of the guys who worked there these guys were bricklayers, they were mechanics, these guys had jobs, they were older men.

Speaker 1 So I'm basically a kid when I walked in there.

Speaker 1 And so

Speaker 1 it was one of those situations where when you're coming in, being a young guy, it was very few of us. You know,

Speaker 1 we were looked down upon because it's like, okay,

Speaker 1 you're here to take our job. No, I'm here to work.

Speaker 1 You know, so a lot of the older guys, they were very threatened by younger guys coming in because we could relate to the inmate population because we weren't much older if we were not the same age than most of the guys who was incarcerated.

Speaker 1 So it wasn't that serial thing where we were in conflict with them because we listened to the same music, we knew the same people.

Speaker 1 Meaning, when I mean knewing the same people, like people who were like in the music industry, that type of thing. We knew,

Speaker 1 so in a lot of the older guys, they were disconnected, and all they knew was pound and ground, you know,

Speaker 1 guys like dogs, treat them like you know, mess, you know, pound on them if they had the opportunity. So, you know, a lot of that went on, you know, because they couldn't relate to these guys.

Speaker 1 It was a different environment.

Speaker 3 Hi, Morgan Freeman here.

Speaker 6 I want to talk to you about a serious rare heart condition called ATTR cardiac amyloidosis, or ATTR-CM.

Speaker 3 Now, I don't have the condition myself, but if you're living with ATTR-CM, it's important to know about treatment options like Atruvi, also known as Acoramidis, because you have the power of choice when it comes to treatment.

Speaker 9 Atruvia is an old medicine used to treat adults with ATTRCM to reduce death and hospitalization due to heart issues.

Speaker 17 Tell your doctor if you're pregnant, plan to become pregnant, or are breastfeeding and about the medications you take.

Speaker 20 The most common side effects were mild and included diarrhea and abdominal pain.

Speaker 14 If you have ATTR-CM, talk to your cardiologist about Atruvia or visit Atruby.com.

Speaker 23 That's AT-T-R-U-B-Y.com to learn more.

Speaker 24 It's time to get busy living.

Speaker 1 So you said something, man, and I want to elaborate on. So you said

Speaker 1 something, again, of movies, right? But like, you said the inmates pretty much ran the prison. Like,

Speaker 1 can you give us an example? Obviously, not naming names or anything like that, but can you give an example of what you mean by the inmates who are running the show?

Speaker 1 Well, like I said, we won't name any names, but like this particular fellow happened to be out of Miami. And this guy was in there.
If I recall, he was in there for like a triple murder.

Speaker 1 And this guy had huge hands, big hands.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 what they did when I was working there is

Speaker 1 guys, if you had a beef with a guy, we would actually have boxing where guys could actually box. Well, this guy was like the champ of the

Speaker 1 right, he was the champ of the prison.

Speaker 1 Yeah, so when this guy went to, when he went to take a shower, he went with an entourage of people to take a shower i mean this guy was like a uh like a kingpin basically in prison where he called he called the shots he was a shot caller you know and if it was food if it was drugs if it was hooch whatever moved through that through that bus it had to go through him in order to move okay and i mean and and us working there we knew who was who but that's actually this question if he can't be there where we where will we we send him?

Speaker 1 That was the worst of the worst. It's not like we can say, okay, we're going to send you to another camp.
No.

Speaker 1 This is it. There's no other place like this place.

Speaker 1 And this is, I mean, that place is an amazing place. And I think you never see any documentaries on it.
You never see people telling stories about it.

Speaker 1 You never see cameras there because the thing is, society really doesn't want to know.

Speaker 1 There's more rapes, more assaults, more murders that happened at that prison than all of Bradford County, which where the prison is located. It was assaults there every single day, every day,

Speaker 1 and but it was never reported, nothing ever got to the newspaper, nobody never knew about the assaults, you know, because basically nobody really wanted to know, right?

Speaker 1 Nobody really wanted to know. I mean, what else are you going to do? They're already there,

Speaker 1 they're already there.

Speaker 1 There was no at that time, there was no reporting system to say, okay, well, we had, you know, uh, 80 assaults this month.

Speaker 1 Somebody reported it, it was just assaults, yeah, you know, and we clean it up and we go on to the next day, you know?

Speaker 1 But it was a serious environment, you know, very serious. Yeah.

Speaker 1 But they ran, like I said, they ran everything. I mean, you know, and the thing was, like certain officers, like if they say, hey, I don't want this guy working here, we couldn't put him down there.

Speaker 1 And it's not because they're telling us what to do. We need to protect this person.

Speaker 1 because we don't want him getting killed because i'll tell you this i'll never forget this story man when i when I was working there, we had this officer. He was coming on shift.

Speaker 1 Prior to him coming on shift, it was visitation day. Where back then, an inmate only got one visit per month.
So

Speaker 1 they had to shave. Well, you know, black men, they suffer from shaving problems.
They get

Speaker 1 their face get swollen. So this guy said, hey, I can't shave.
So if you don't shave, you can't have your visit. Okay.

Speaker 1 So he said, the next officer come down here, I'm going to kill him.

Speaker 1 We changed shifts.

Speaker 1 The officer came down.

Speaker 1 This information wasn't passed on.

Speaker 1 He got killed. He got killed that day.
Wow. He had a wife and two kids.
I'll never forget it. Wow.
I'll never forget it. You know, I'm into some stories, man.
And I'll never forget this story.

Speaker 1 When I first started working there, it was Christmas Eve night. These two inmates had an argument from back in 1978.

Speaker 1 They got a vent system. Now, remind you, I told you I didn't start working there until 83.
Right.

Speaker 1 It was a

Speaker 1 five-year buildup. Yes.
And what they would do is they got this thing where they talk through the vents, where you can be on a whole separate area, but the vents, they travel.

Speaker 1 So I can have a conversation with you and not even know you. And we can get a beef going because there's nothing else to do, but have a beef, right?

Speaker 1 So these two guys ended up getting housed together. Staff didn't know they had a beef.

Speaker 1 And this guy took a homemade knife that looked like a sword

Speaker 1 and he ran it through this guy on Christmas Eve night. That is the first time I ever seen someone get killed in prison.
Blood flew out of him like it was water. I'd never seen anything like that.

Speaker 1 Now you're talking about something look like a movie and you want to see how fast blood goes out the human body, hit the right organ and see how much blood come out of it.

Speaker 1 He killed right there on Christmas Eve night. I'll never forget it.
That was my awakening to the prison system.

Speaker 1 And it was something to see because it was like, man, he just killed this guy like it was nothing, you know?

Speaker 1 And he was never getting out anyway. Right.
Where else is he going?

Speaker 1 Where else is he going? Where is he going? You know? So it's a lot of stories, man. I mean, I could load you up with stories that I saw, man, that things happened in that place, man.

Speaker 1 And it was just like business, normal business, you know, like it was nothing. Yeah, I'm going to wait till the documentary comes out.
I don't want to know anymore till your documentary comes out.

Speaker 1 You told the world.

Speaker 1 So you leave there.

Speaker 1 And you go then to Broward County, I'm assuming, right? So what was the decision to leave prison to go to Broward County?

Speaker 1 You know, the main factor was I wanted a better environment because at the time I'm young and up in South Florida, like I said, from what I've gotten was, hey, man, that place is really progressive.

Speaker 1 So coming out of,

Speaker 1 and I don't know if you're familiar with the location of where Florida State Prison is, but it's in Bradford County, which is right outside of Gainesville. Yeah.
Well, it's kind of, it's country.

Speaker 1 And so it's not a lot to do there for a young person. So the sheriff's department, Briar Sheriff's Department, was hiring.
So I made the decision. I said, you know what, let me put an application in.

Speaker 1 And obviously, the pay was a whole lot better.

Speaker 1 And so I put in and I got selected. And I went down.
I took the job. So that's how I ended up down in Broward County.
Awesome. Awesome.

Speaker 1 So, when you said outside of Gainesville, there's a small little college and university there we're not allowed to talk about here.

Speaker 1 Go hills and go dogs, but

Speaker 1 for all my Bulldog fans, you know, the college I'm talking about in Gainesville, we're not allowed to talk about it.

Speaker 1 But so you're at Broward, man. So what is it like there? Obviously, it's a different environment, right? So walk us through a little bit of the first few years of Broward and what that's like.

Speaker 1 Getting there,

Speaker 1 the Broward Sheriff's Office was in a transition where they just

Speaker 1 built a brand new facility. Well, they were in need of a lot of people because,

Speaker 1 like I said, because of cocaine and all those different things, everything was exploding and the facilities were, you know, bigger facilities were needed for, you know, to accommodate, you know, the arrestees.

Speaker 1 So coming in there, I came in with a lot of young people my age.

Speaker 1 And I also was there with some people that was a little bit older, but most of us are pretty much around the same age in diameter.

Speaker 1 But the good part was I had already had experience. So coming in from a prison system, coming into a jail facility was night and day.
It was totally night and day

Speaker 1 where, you know, it was no discipline. It was no,

Speaker 1 because these people were coming off the street. So they weren't like, you know, acclimated to being incarcerated, I should say.
You know, it's not like they were like, okay, you know what?

Speaker 1 I know what to do when I get here. Some of these people were new to the system.

Speaker 1 Some of these people have been previously, obviously, you know, rearrested, but it wasn't the kind of structure that you would have in prison. Everybody know we eat at this time in prison.

Speaker 1 Everybody know we go do this at this time. Things in jail is fluid because people don't stay.
You know, they come and go. It's transit.
They bond out,

Speaker 1 they go to prison or whatever the case may be, you know. So it was always overchanging.
And that's something I had to get used to.

Speaker 1 Because when I was at prison, at the prison system, I knew I had guys that weren't never going home. You know, their people was coming and going.
It was always interchanging, you know.

Speaker 1 But being in the jail system, it was quite different because you had a lot of laws that you had to learn, a lot of different rules you had to learn versus prison was basically set in 33-8, which that was the code that governed the prison at that particular time.

Speaker 1 Amazing. So then you're there.
How did you meet Brother Hicks?

Speaker 1 When was that?

Speaker 1 I met Raymond.

Speaker 1 I was his supervisor. So, and oh, man, I can't do not, I'm trying to think because that's been so long ago.

Speaker 1 Because like I say, we were all young because I was I made supervisor like the first two years I was down

Speaker 1 sergeant. And so Raymond worked under me, and I would say probably

Speaker 1 87, 88. I'm thinking maybe the time frame that he was working for me.

Speaker 1 And Raymond, like a lot of the young guys who worked up under me, and at this particular time, now I'm becoming one of the older guys because I'm five, six years older older than them.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I'm much older now, you know. Um,

Speaker 1 so these guys they will go out, they will party, then they call in sick for work.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 I give them the talking to, okay, they're not getting to talking to me. Now, I got to give them some paperwork.
So, now my thing was say, hey, press down hard, third copy, yours.

Speaker 1 Take that one for yourself. And believe it or not, I wrote Raymond up.

Speaker 1 I disciplined him for calling in sick

Speaker 1 and

Speaker 1 that believe it or not brought us closer together because he came to me and said you know what i'm so glad you wrote me up because you made me realize i have a family and i need this job and that's how he and i became close beyond the job because i looked at him and i saw you know what this guy wants to be here.

Speaker 1 He understands what this means to have this job, you know, because his family was the most important thing, you know, and unfortunately, some of the young fellas that came along, they ended up getting terminated because of the, because they were, because of his sick time.

Speaker 1 And he straightened that part of himself out, you know.

Speaker 3 Hi, Morgan Freeman here.

Speaker 6 I want to talk to you about a serious rare heart condition called ATTR cardiac amyloidosis or ATTR-CM.

Speaker 3 Now, I don't have the condition myself, but if you're living with ATTR-CM, it's important to know about treatment options like Atruvia, also known as Acoramidis, because you have the power of choice when it comes to treatment.

Speaker 8 Atruvia is an old medicine used to treat adults with ATT-R-C-M to reduce death and hospitalization due to heart issues.

Speaker 17 Tell your doctor if you're pregnant, plan to become pregnant, or are breastfeeding, and about the medications you take.

Speaker 9 The most common side effects were mild and included diarrhea and abdominal pain.

Speaker 14 If you have ATTR-CM, talk to your cardiologist about Natrubia or visit Atruby.com.

Speaker 23 That's A-T-T-R-U-B-Y.com to learn more.

Speaker 24 It's time to get busy living.

Speaker 1 And Raymond was, man, let me tell you, Raymond,

Speaker 1 Raymond was the type of guy at the job.

Speaker 1 And you see the size of Raymond, right? Yeah.

Speaker 1 He's a massive guy.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 back then,

Speaker 1 you know

Speaker 1 it was guys in jail were were big guys because we had weights in the jails at the time and these guys work out

Speaker 1 and then now that they've been working out they want to test their strength or they want to test themselves you know because they feel like okay I've been working out I got to see I got to put this to use let me see what I can do with staff so a lot of times Raymond was called in because of his strength and his size and especially when he worked for me uh i won't call any names, but I had this particular inmate.

Speaker 1 He was disrespecting one of the females. And he was saying all kinds of derogatory things to her, saying

Speaker 1 whatever he was saying to her, vulgar, you know, it was really nasty stuff.

Speaker 1 So when I came back to work, she said, hey, Sarge, listen, this guy, he's been disrespecting me, you know, and why you've been off. I said, okay, no problem.
Let me talk to him.

Speaker 1 So I called Raymond down. I said, hey, I need you to come down.
Come down here to the unit. And then, because we always use strength and numbers whenever you work in that environment.

Speaker 1 It's never one-on-one. And it's never a situation where you really don't want to use force.
That's the last thing you want to do.

Speaker 1 But you always want to show a use of force. And most guys will back down when they say that use of force or when they say that use of force.

Speaker 1 So this particular guy, he decided he wanted to go ahead and he wanted to put some work in. Okay, well, you know what? Let's get at it.

Speaker 1 And subsequently, you know, it didn't go well yeah it did not go well for him yeah

Speaker 1 and and and raymond was always that guy that listen man loyal

Speaker 1 first to come in

Speaker 1 always treating these guys fair with respect because he could have hurt a lot of guys he was a big guy yeah but that wasn't his that wasn't his demeanor

Speaker 1 His demeanor was not to come there and be a bully. That wasn't who he was.

Speaker 1 And the thing about it, Raymond was the type of guy, he would help these guys. He would talk to these guys.
Because a lot of these guys he knew because he was from the community.

Speaker 1 I wasn't from the community. So I didn't know any of these guys.
He knew these guys. He grew up with a lot of these guys.
So he had their respect.

Speaker 1 And then a lot of times, I can call Raymond down. He could talk to a guy and kill the situation for me.
I ain't even got to deal with it. He could talk to the guy.
because he had that relationship.

Speaker 1 And that's the thing about working in that environment that most people don't understand. At that particular time, there was no taser, there was no shield, there was no mace, there was no stun gun.

Speaker 1 It was none of that. It was your verbal, and it was hands-on.
And no one really wants to go hands-on because, you know, even if you win the fight, you still can get hurt. And no one wants to get hurt.

Speaker 1 You know? So

Speaker 1 he was very, very, very good at his job, man. The man was good.
You know, in fact, I don't know if he ever shared with you this particular lieutenant. They was finna throw this guy off a top tier.

Speaker 1 Raymond, I don't know if I ever told you the story or not, but Raymond broke his index finger, saving his lieutenant from getting thrown over the rail. Wow.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's the type of guy he was. You know what I mean? He was that type of guy.

Speaker 1 And I mean, in any time that they had an issue with a person that they thought was going to be physical or be a problem, he was one of the guys that they called on.

Speaker 1 Wow. You know, they called on him.

Speaker 1 And the guy was always there, man, you know, and his uniform was always impeccable. He made sure his dress was where it needed to be.

Speaker 1 Because me being his supervisor, listen, that's something I enforced. If your uniform wasn't right, that is a problem for me.
And at the time, we had a scoring system.

Speaker 1 If your uniform was not what it's supposed to be, I'm going to give you the score you deserve. So whatever that score is, if you get a one, you got a one because you didn't maintain your uniform.

Speaker 1 That's why you got a one.

Speaker 1 And And I said the example because I wanted you to see what it's supposed to look like.

Speaker 1 You know, look that way every day when you go to work because people are respect.

Speaker 1 You don't have to know anything, but if you look the part, they'll respect you right off the off the bat because you look professional.

Speaker 1 Sergeant Booker, I appreciate that so much because there's a leadership lesson in that. Like, I tell people all the time, like, there's a standard, and your standard has to be your standard because

Speaker 1 if not,

Speaker 1 you allow other people's opinions to say who you are you allow outside influences to dictate the decisions that you make and what i've heard from you and everything from being able to write people up from setting a standard and not being afraid to tell someone hey you got a one because you don't look appropriate to me right like for everybody that's listening if you're a leader or if you're accepting a leadership role or you're thinking about going into a leadership position, the first thing I'm going to tell you, and you've heard Sergeant Booker talk about it a lot, is you've got to have a standard and you've got to set the tone as a leader.

Speaker 1 So again, I applaud you for that because it's the little things. And I have the saying, how you do small things is how you do all things.
And I think for you, that's what you're saying, right? Like

Speaker 1 if you're willing to come in not appropriate, then are you really going to do the job the right way? Can I trust you

Speaker 1 if you're not going to wear a belt? right

Speaker 1 and if your shoes aren't going to be polished the right way am i going to trust you to make a decision out in the field That's what I hear you saying. Absolutely.

Speaker 1 And it's the other thing, just like doing the legal documents that we had to do when something occurred and we had to write what was called an event report or

Speaker 1 a medical report or something like that. I literally would take a red pen and I would write on the report

Speaker 1 because I needed you to understand. that this report can't go in.

Speaker 1 You cannot, you know, spell words, misspell words, because these documents are going to court these documents are going what people are going to read these and i always should say when you put your name on something you want that document to reflect who you are so when people see me they say man sergeant booker man that guy squared away you know why because his reports reflect that he took the time to write it right he took the time to to make sure the words he used were spelt right you know and that's important especially from a legal standpoint but you want people to identify with you saying hey he takes pride in his job.

Speaker 1 He goes beyond what needs to be done. When most people cut it short, you go beyond that.
Read your policies. Know your policies.
Know how to lead men and women. Because it's important.

Speaker 1 Most people, they don't know how to lead men and women. The first thing they want to say is, hey, is my way or no way? No, that ain't how it go.
I'm going to show you what's wrong.

Speaker 1 I'm going to tell you how to fix it. And together, we both learn from it and we're going to be better for it.

Speaker 1 But if I just, if I don't give you the right direction, guess what we all lose and then when you leave me and go to someone else know what they're going to say hey man sergeant book i had this guy for a whole year man this guy can't write he don't know how to do reports he don't know who to call that's important that's a reflection of who i am i can't let that be a reflection on me that's negative i can't yes sir

Speaker 1 yes sir i can't do that you know absolutely so you just gave me a bunch of accolades for Raymond. Obviously, at this time, you hold him in, I'm going to say, the highest regard.
Absolutely.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 1 And then all of a sudden, you assist supervisor, the person he reports to.

Speaker 1 Now you start getting, and I don't know how this works, so I'm going to totally give you the floor.

Speaker 1 But I can assume that before he knows something is going down, his supervisor probably knows something is going down, or there's some accusations, or maybe there's some things going on.

Speaker 1 What is it for you when you hear? or you see, hey, the Raymond that you think you know isn't the Raymond that we are seeing out here or that we know.

Speaker 1 Well, the thing is, I don't

Speaker 1 really know

Speaker 1 what all led to Raymond's

Speaker 1 accusations.

Speaker 1 But I tell you this, because all that's in a whole separate,

Speaker 1 a whole separate department

Speaker 1 where they do the internal affairs investigations and then they bring charges or they or whatever they do. So

Speaker 1 you really don't know what's going on until it happens. So it's not like you hear anything because it's all in a separate building and it's all internal with inside of that organization.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 when the situation happened with Raymond, you know, like myself and many of us, totally shocked. Because I know his character.
I know the man. I know the person, you know, and Raymond became...

Speaker 1 you know, some,

Speaker 1 he became a friend just as well as a coworker and someone I supervised Because, like I told you earlier, I saw a lot in Raymond.

Speaker 1 Because Woman is the type of person, and anybody who knows Raymond and will speak the truth on Raymond if they know him personally and they know Raymond to give you the shirt off his back.

Speaker 1 That's the type of person Raymond is. Women has a big heart.

Speaker 1 Raymond is a God-fearing man. A lot of people don't even know that, that the man is very spiritually bound.
He is.

Speaker 1 And when he went through that situation, it was, like I say, alarm bells went off because I'm like, no, this ain't, this ain't, that ain't my guy.

Speaker 1 You know, and it was, it was like, no, that's not him. That's not him.
You know, and so it was, it was quite shocking, you know, when it, when it came down.

Speaker 1 But no, no one, like I said, I didn't hear any whispers. And like I say, 99% of investigations like that, they're going, no one knows anything.
You don't know anything until.

Speaker 1 Did you face any backlash post-arrest?

Speaker 1 No.

Speaker 1 None? No. Good stuff.
Good stuff. So you said, you know, you saw it.
That's not the Raymond you know.

Speaker 1 Talk about, you know, as Raymond and the family are going through it, right? Like, what's on Sergeant Booker's heart at that time?

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Speaker 23 If you have attr cm talk to your cardiologist about natruvia or visit atruby.com that's at ruby.com to learn more it's time to get busy living i'll tell you my wife and i we um

Speaker 1 when raymond had when raymond had came home um

Speaker 1 and got an opportunity to sit down with his wife and his kids and everything and actually the man was destitute i mean he you know his two years that he was away and i guess whatever legal expenses that he had, it just chewed up whatever finances that they may have had.

Speaker 1 And obviously, with that being said, you know, that puts you in a financial bind with credit cards and everything else. And the man pretty much was destitute.

Speaker 1 So my wife and I, you know, we said, listen, let's do what we can do to help them.

Speaker 1 So we were able financially to bless them. and try to help them somewhat from where we could do to help them as a family.

Speaker 1 Because, you know, I could only imagine, I know if I was going through something like that, someone who knows me as an employee first, someone who will supervise me cycling, and someone that I call a friend would be there for me.

Speaker 1 Because as we know, most times,

Speaker 1 when it's time for someone to help you row that boat, they ain't there. You're riding in the boat as long as the motor running.
Right. If you got to get out and row,

Speaker 1 I don't know if I can help you.

Speaker 1 You know,

Speaker 1 oh, I'm afraid to deal with you because, you know, I don't want something blowing back on me like you asked me earlier.

Speaker 1 Well, I know I'm an upstanding guy, and I know I've always did everything to the best of my ability with the Sheriff's Department. And I don't see where it's a conflict for me helping a friend.

Speaker 1 This is a friend. This is not an enemy.
This is not someone, you know, that I don't know.

Speaker 1 And let's be clear. He went to court.
He was exonerated. So

Speaker 1 why wouldn't I help a friend? Correct.

Speaker 1 Why wouldn't I help his family if I can? Why wouldn't I do that? Why wouldn't all of his friends help him?

Speaker 1 Why wouldn't they all, because he helped so many? See, that's the thing. You know, if people

Speaker 1 would totally be honest, and this is why I always tell Raymond,

Speaker 1 I don't associate myself with only a few people. And I learned this in life.
I learned this in life. And

Speaker 1 I always say if I took my jacket off and you could see my back, you'd see knives, lyes, spoons, forks, bricks, shelves, trucks, you name it. It's all been in my back.

Speaker 1 So I've learned, and like I share with Raymond, learn to separate yourself and only feel yourself with people who can feel you.

Speaker 1 You can't give yourself to the world because the world don't appreciate you. If you're a person that's always giving, a person know a giver, they'll use you up.
They'll take advantage of that.

Speaker 1 So you got to protect yourself by saying, you know what i'm only going to be around people i know if i pick up the phone and i call you and if you if i need a thousand dollars there's no question why i need it i know the money coming i know it's coming and there's no question and there's no question hey when you gonna pay me back no you get it back to me when you need to

Speaker 1 so i mean that's the world that i try to let raymond share in the fact that look at my life you see why i don't deal with a lot of people and that was

Speaker 1 i did that on purpose to

Speaker 1 get you in a place with your story that you're dealing with and what you're going through. Everybody don't need to be a part of your journey because everybody don't know what you're going through.

Speaker 1 And like I tell him all the time, I said, Raymond, a lot of people try to attach themselves to you. Your story is only unique to you.
And I said, people cannot help you.

Speaker 1 because they don't know what you're going through. A lot of people, they criticize me, oh, you've been going through this for so long.
And I always told him, I said, Raymond

Speaker 1 it's your life and you have to fight for your life and what you feel you was wronged and you feel like you need to get yourself vindicated in your family then you fight for your life it doesn't matter what the next person say and I said think about this Raymond think about the journey that God has put you on you became an author of a book you ran for public office you got your degree You became a part of fraternity.

Speaker 1 You've been on all different types of podcasts.

Speaker 1 You do a backpack drive every year in the community i said look at all the things because of what happened to you look at all the great things that god continuously blessing you with amen and i said and as long as you understand that it's all a blessing and because your story is so unique you're able to share that story with so many and i told him this just the other day when i spoke to him i said raymond i said think about this you got a guy out there a young lady out there that has probably gone through something similar like you have and because they heard your story it gives them hope it gives them direction because a lot of people don't know which way to go which way to turn in order to put themselves in a position to even start the fight that's right so think about the reason you went through what you went through And maybe God said that reason, it really wasn't for you.

Speaker 1 It was for you to help someone else, a lot of someone else's. Because I'm going to take care of you.
I'm going to make sure you're fine.

Speaker 1 But I need you to go through this so you can help a lot of people. Because a lot of people go through a lot of things in law enforcement.
Law enforcement

Speaker 1 is a job that

Speaker 1 you can go to work today on top of the world and by three o'clock this afternoon, the world can be on top of you. And it probably has nothing to do with anything you did.

Speaker 1 You just could have been present. You could have just been in the area.
And now you're fighting for your job.

Speaker 1 You know what I mean? And that's what happens. That can happen, you know.

Speaker 1 and just like with raymond you know this man basically was fighting for his life and so as a friend you know and somebody who tried to be a person that he could you know come to for for for for i don't even use the word comfort but come to somebody for guidance and some correction and understanding because let me tell you something i tell raymond a lot of things he don't want to hear because i consider myself a big brother to him That's it.

Speaker 1 I consider myself a friend. I'm not a yes man.
I've never been that.

Speaker 1 So, and I've always lived my life, man. I'm going to tell you what's on my mind.
And sometimes I shouldn't. But for me,

Speaker 1 if I'm your brother, man, it's all gas, no break. I'm going to tell you just what I'm thinking.
Yes, sir. You're going to get it.
You know, and even if it hurts.

Speaker 1 And even if you don't speak to me for a week, you know what? I'm still okay because you're going to come back to me. That's all.

Speaker 1 I told you what was right. That's all.

Speaker 1 Sergeant Booker, man, you're giving us all the leadership lessons right here, man. Like, we've been talking for 30 plus minutes and it it feels like 10 because I'm learning from you.

Speaker 1 Like, you're speaking to me in a lot of this, you know, like leadership is my thing and business growth is my thing. And so, you know, I want to, I want to ask you this on the way out.
Like,

Speaker 1 for the listeners and viewers, what's one tip, what's one piece of advice that you want people to know or to follow from the words of the master himself, Sergeant James Book?

Speaker 1 I would tell anybody,

Speaker 1 never change who you are. Never compromise your values.
And if something is wrong, just know it's wrong. Nobody can tell you it's right when you know it's wrong.

Speaker 1 And don't fall into what is wrong when you know what is right. You know, I would tell any person that because it all starts with your character.

Speaker 1 Because at the end of the day, that's all people can judge you on is your character. Nothing else.
It's your character. I love that.
I totally love that. I love that, brother.
I love you.

Speaker 1 I know that you have, even though you're retired, you've got this busy schedule.

Speaker 1 So the fact that you were able to take some time out of your day and spend time with us on Make Unplug Podcast, I truly appreciate it, man.

Speaker 1 And anytime you want to be back on and just drop wisdom from you, I would love to have you on, man. Like, I learned a lot.
from

Speaker 1 this conversation from a leadership perspective.

Speaker 1 The insights that you have, the standards that you created, and the straightforwardness that's about you, I totally appreciate that, respect that, and love you, brother. Yes, same here.

Speaker 1 And thank you for the opportunity. And, you know, like I told you earlier off mic, I really appreciate the work that you do.

Speaker 1 The podcast is something that I think will reach many.

Speaker 1 And I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity to speak. Thank you.
All the time. All the time.
Anytime you want to be back on, I promise I got you. I promise I got you.

Speaker 1 All right. For all the viewers and listeners, remember, you're because is your superpower.
Go unleash it.

Speaker 1 Thank you.

Speaker 2 Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Mick Unplugged. If today hits you hard, then imagine what's next.
Be sure to subscribe, rate, and share this with someone who needs it.

Speaker 2 And most of all, make a plan and take action because the next level is already waiting for you. Have a question or insight to share? Send us an email to hello at mickunplugged.com.

Speaker 2 Until next time, ask yourself how you can step up.