But my fears had less to do with the tragedy at the World Trade Center and more to do with the fact that, after 10 years of rampant prescription opioid abuse, my business was failing. I was searching desperately for an out. Meanwhile, the television and radio were blaring with ads for 9/11 FEMA loans administered by the U.S. Small Business Administration.
So, on an especially bad day, I lied.
I said I had an office near ground zero. I received the SBA loan I requested, and immediately paid down the personal credit cards I had run up while waiting for the SBA money. Even so, the loan did little to stop my spiral into drug addiction, mental health issues, marital problems and magical thinking.
In 2002, I resigned my law license and started on the road to recovery. But it all caught up with me about 20 months later, when I was arrested for the misrepresentations on my loan application. I served almost 14 months at a Federal prison for wire fraud and money laundering.
My objective in writing this piece is to offer some insight on what business owners should consider before they take out disaster loans. Certainly, the majority of people requesting these loans are honest and upstanding entrepreneurs who have immense need for the aid, and will use the funds properly. I am very glad there is help for them. That said, history has shown us again and again that when people are in dire need, they’re more prone to make impulsive, ill-advised decisions. My hope is that sharing my experience will help others avoid the consequences I faced. Here are seven takeaways.
1. Desperate people do desperate things.
There were thousands of fraud prosecutions after 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, Superstorm Sandy, and so on. Why? Whether because of overwhelming business issues, poor personal judgment, or just plain bad luck, people were wounded, desperate and willing to do anything, anything, to stop the bleeding. But if the wound is too deep, a Band-aid is not sufficient.
Practice point: In any situation, behaving desperately is unlikely to save your business.
2. Beware of the belief that rules are suspended in times of emergency.
The government is advertising that huge amounts of money are available to save our businesses. I recently sat in on a webinar run by a very reputable business consulting group that recommended that attendees get their SBA disaster loan applications in immediately, regardless of the facts or the actual needs of their business — they said we could always modify our applications prior to taking the money. State unemployment websites are actually giving instructions, in writing, on how to mislead and circumvent the system in order to get approved. Don’t take the bait! If you default two years from now, this “good-meaning advice” won’t matter to prosecutors.
Practice point: Be truthful at all times.
3. Beware of magical thinking.
This is a tough one because entrepreneurs are inherently optimistic. We believe that things will always be better tomorrow than they are today. It drives us, makes us successful, informs our risk-taking. But in times of trauma, that voice can be an entrepreneur’s worst enemy. Does this sound familiar? We have learned the hard way that there is no shortcut, and yet we desperately want there to be one right now.
Practice point: Instead of immediately reaching for a bailout or other quick fix, develop a good solid business plan. Maybe a disaster loan will fit into this plan; maybe it won’t.
4. This paradigm shift will affect all small to mid-size businesses.
We are in the midst of a massive reordering that has already had a huge effect on small and mid-sized businesses. Business owners are being called to closely examine if our business models are still viable, or if we must pivot to new ways of doing things. Example: the Swiss watch industry completely missed the shift to digital watches. Have we waited too long to have a robust online presence? Are our products or services even needed anymore? Have we been holding on by a thread for years, unwilling or unable to look at the hard facts?
Practice point: Get real, now. Don’t borrow money to save a business that can’t be saved.
5. Be cautious when borrowing from the government.
As is the case with any loan, the devil is in the details. The terms and covenants in the loan documents dictate what you can or can’t do with the money once you get it. You can only use the funds for the purposes you stated in your application — that is, to pay operating expenses of the business to keep it afloat until it starts bringing in sufficient revenue again. You (and your spouse) will probably have sign for the loan personally, and will probably have to pledge all available collateral, including a second (or third) mortgage on your house. If you maxed out your personal credit cards while anticipating your disaster relief funding, you can’t use the money to pay off your cards.
Practice point: Read the terms and covenants of the loan closely. Whatever the loan terms say to do, do, and whatever they say don’t do, don’t do. No exceptions.
6. We can’t save our businesses and our lifestyles at the same time.
Here’s the big trap. We have mortgages, car payments, school tuitions, and other personal expenses that have to be paid, and soon. But simply put, SBA loans are meant to save your business, not your lifestyle. Discuss all your options with advisors and friends you trust — ones that will tell you the truth! It’s like going to the doctor. Your diagnosis will only be as accurate as the history you provide. These are trying times, with a triage system designed to be more expeditious than thorough.
Practice point: There is no such thing as a free lunch. Borrowing money comes with responsibility and accountability.
7. Get acquainted with acceptance.
I hope we are all great entrepreneurs who can figure out ways to make our businesses survive and flourish. But let’s face it. Some of our businesses will not make it, even with the infusion of government funds. What should we do? We can pare down, embrace change and do things differently as we start a new chapter. Never forget that there will always be opportunity to start again, and to live a fuller, more abundant life.
Jeff Grant is on a mission. After a hiatus from practicing law, he is once again in private practice and is committed to using his legal expertise and life experience to benefit others.
Jeff provides a broad range of legal services in a highly attentive, personalized manner. These include private general counsel, white collar crisis management, strategy and team building, services to family-owned and closely-held businesses, and support to special situation and pro bono clients. He practices in New York and on authorized Federal matters, and works with local co-counsel and criminal defense counsel to represent clients throughout country.
For more than 20 years, Jeff served as managing attorney of a 20+ employee law firm headquartered in New York City and then Westchester County, New York. The firm’s practice areas included representing family-owned and closely-held businesses and their owners, business and real estate transactions, trusts and estates, and litigation.
Jeff is admitted to practice law in the State of New York, and in the Federal District Courts for the Southern District of New York and the Eastern District of New York. He is a member of the American Bar Association, the New York State Bar Association, the New York City Bar Association, and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
The Philadelphia Inquirer: Steal Money from the Feds? First, Meet Jeff Grant, an Ex-Con who Committed Loan Fraud, by Erin Arvedlund: Link to article here.
Hannah Smolinski YouTube: Thinking About PPP Fraud?: Hannah Interviews Jeff Grant About Going to Prison for SBA Loan Fraud. Link to article and YouTube video here.
Fraud Stories Podcast with Mark Lurie: SBA/PPP Loan Fraud with Guest: Jeff Grant. Link to podcast here.
Forbes: As Law Enforcement Pursues SBA Loan Fraud, Jeff Grant Talks Redemption, by Kelly Phillips Erb. Link to article here.
Taxgirl Podcast: Jeff Grant talks Desperation and Loans in a Time of Crisis with Kelly Phillips Erb on Her Podcast. Link to article and podcast here.
Business Talk with Jim Campbell: Jeff Grant Talks with Jim About Going to Prison for SBA Loan Fraud and What to Know When Taking Coronavirus Relief Money, Biz Talk Radio Network, Broadcast from 1490 AM WGCH Greenwich, CT. Listen on YouTube here.
Babz Rawls Ivy Show: Babz Rawls Ivy & Jeff Grant Talk SBA / PPP Loan Fraud and 7 Things to Know Before You Take Coronavirus Relief Money, WNHH 103.5 FM New Haven. Watch on YouTube here.
Also: White Collar Week with Jeff Grant, Podcast Ep. 09: Small Business Edition, with Guest Kelly Phillips Erb. Link here.
Also, White Collar Week with Jeff Grant, Podcast Ep. 21: All Things SBA, PPP & EIDL, with Guest Hannah Smolinski. Link here.
Michael Neubig is a member of our online White Collar Support Group that meets on Zoom on Monday evenings. I read this important post on his LinkedIn page, and thought he truly captured the spirit of of our group and movement. I reached out to him and in our conversation he said that when he first attended our support group meeting, he “finally felt normal again”. I understand. Thank you Mike for your poignant words and permission to republish your piece. – Jeff
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I am a part of the population of Justice Impacted White Collar individuals. For the last five years I have attempted to overcome poor decisions that broke the trust of and hurt many people close to me. These decisions led to me being fired from my own start up as CEO and an eventual felony conviction. Events like this take one to rock bottom, require self-reflection and personal change that involves a significant amount of work. The goal of personal change is not only to make recompense to those affected by our actions, but also to become a productive member of society. I desire to engage in meaningful work where I can apply positive skills and experience with what is learned from personal growth. Even if that means starting at the bottom of the organization.
Unfortunately, my experience has demonstrated employment as a White-Collar Justice Impacted individual is very difficult to achieve. I have engaged in hundreds of interviews, had offers rescinded, been fired after starting the position and experienced a lot of negative response and silence when revealing my past.
I have found my employment experience to be common for many of the others I have met who attend Jeff Grant’sWhite Collar Support Groupon Monday evenings. Even though we are tremendously remorseful, have been punished for our actions, and have rebuilt our lives in every other way, there is virtually nowhere for us to go professionally.
I would summarize the feedback I/we receive with a general response of, “our other employees don’t trust people like you”, “you were the most deserving candidate, but not after finding this out”, “I am sure someone else will be willing to provide you a 2nd chance, but not us”. The responses are almost always followed by a canned email denial without a specific reason.
There is meaningful work occurring in the U.S. focused on 2nd chance employment. Many are start-ups engaged in connecting those with convictions to employers willing to provide 2nd chance hiring.Honest Jobs, 70 Million Jobsand more. BUT, my experience is that there is a tremendous lack of focus and resources matching the White Collar Justice Impacted to professional jobs where our background, skills and passions can be best used.
Those that committed White Collar Crimes did so for many of the identical reasons as other criminal behavior. Including childhood trauma, physical and emotional neglect/abuse, low self-esteem, high levels of shame, poor communication skills, poor decisions under pressure and more. Therefore, these individuals deserve the same assistance for 2nd chance employment.
I am writing this post in hopes that those likeChan Zuckerberg Initiative, Uptrust, Nucleos, Inc, The Change Companies, Checkr, Inc., FUSE Corpswho are working on reducing incarceration and furthering equality and 2nd chance hiring initiatives, can pull together and provide resources/assistance to the Justice Impacted White Collar Community. – Mike Neubig
Big thanks to Bob Kosch for having me on his New York City radio show and podcast, Greater Good Radio with Bob Kosch. Thank you Bob for your empathy, compassion and friendship. – Jeff
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Greater Good Media, LLC, parent company for “Greater Good Radio with Bob Kosch” is advancing a unique, but controversial economic plan called “RESET” which could save U.S. citizens from the worst recession in over eight decades. The plan also advances a logical position for what we can do to combat hate in order to prevent violence and torment against other groups.
Jeff is an attorney and counselor-at-law providing private general counsel, legal crisis management, and dispute strategy and management services to individuals and families, real estate organizations, family-owned and closely-held businesses, the white collar justice community, and special situation and pro bono clients.
Now again in private practice, for over 20 years Jeff served as managing attorney of a 20+ employee law firm headquartered in New York City, and then Westchester County, NY. Among other practice areas, the firm engaged in representation of family-owned/closely held businesses and their owners, business and real estate transactions, trusts and estates, and litigation. Jeff also served as outside General Counsel to large family-owned real estate equities, management and brokerage organizations, in which role he retained, coordinated and oversaw the work of many specialty law firms, including white collar defense firms.
After an addiction to prescription opioids and serving almost fourteen months in a Federal prison (2006 – 07) for a white-collar crime he committed in 2001, Jeff started his own reentry – earning a Master of Divinity from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York, majoring in Social Ethics. After graduating from divinity school, Jeff was called to serve at an inner city church in Bridgeport, CT as Associate Minister and Director of Prison Ministries. He then co-founded Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc. (Greenwich, CT), the world’s first ministry serving the white collar justice community.
On May 5, 2021, Jeff’s law license was reinstated by the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York.
Entrepreneur’s #4 Most Viewed Article of 2020: I Went to Prison for S.B.A. Loan Fraud: 7 Things to Know When Taking COVID-19 Relief Money: by Jeff Grant, April 2020: https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/350337
White Collar Support Group Website Page: We held our 250th online support group meeting in March 2021. We have had over 310 participants, and average about 25 attendees at each meeting: https://prisonist.org/white-collar-support-group/
Sample Episodes of White Collar Week Podcast (video & audio):
On Friday, June 4, 2021, 9 am ET, Babz Rawls Ivy interviewed Jeff Grant about his reinstatement as a lawyer after serving time in a Federal prison, on Criminal Justice Insider with Babz Rawls Ivy & Jeff Grant – The Voice of CT Criminal Justice. Live on WNHH 103.5 FM New Haven and live-streaming at newhavenindependent.org. Rebroadcast at 5 pm.Criminal Justice Insider is sponsored by the Community Foundation fror Greater New Haven and Progressive Prison Ministries.
Watch on YouTube:
Listen on Apple Podcasts:
Listen on SoundCloud:
Guests on this episode:
Jeffrey D. Grant, Esq.
After an addiction to prescription opioids and serving almost fourteen months in a Federal prison (2006 – 07) for a white-collar crime he committed in 2001, Jeff started his own reentry – earning a Master of Divinity from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York, majoring in Social Ethics. After graduating from divinity school, Jeff was called to serve at an inner city church in Bridgeport, CT as Associate Minister and Director of Prison Ministries. He then co-founded Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc. (Greenwich, CT), the world’s first ministry serving the white collar justice community.
On May 5, 2021, Jeff’s law license was reinstated by the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York.
Now again in private practice, Jeff is an attorney and counselor-at-law providing private general counsel, legal crisis management, and dispute strategy and management services to individuals and families, real estate organizations, family-owned and closely-held businesses, the white collar justice community, and special situation and pro bono clients.
From 1982 – 2002, Jeff served as managing attorney of a 20+ employee law firm headquartered in New York City, and then Westchester County, NY. Among other practice areas, the firm engaged in representation of family-owned/closely held businesses and their owners, business and real estate transactions, trusts and estates, and litigation. Jeff also served as outside General Counsel to large family-owned real estate equities, management and brokerage organizations, in which role he retained, coordinated and oversaw the work of many specialty law firms, including white collar defense firms.
Criminal Justice Insider with Babz Rawls Ivy and Jeff Grant is broadcast live at 9 am (ET) on the first and third Friday of each month from the WNHH 103.5 FM studios in New Haven, live-streamed everywhere at newhavenindependent.org. It is also on live on Facebook Live (video) at https://www.facebook.com/wnhhradio. It is rebroadcast on WNHH at 5 pm the same day.
The Criminal Justice Insider Podcast with Babz Rawls Ivy and Jeff Grant is broadcast live at 9 am ET on the first and third Friday of each month from the WNHH 103.5 FM studios in New Haven. It is rebroadcast on WNHH at 5 pm ET the same day.
This article imagines a cohesive, integrated system that shepherds people through and beyond their criminal justice issues and incentivizes the community to assist them.
A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats: Progressive Diversion & Reentry, “Problem-to-Pardon” Case Management
On an early turn playing the famous board game The Game of Life, you have a choice to make: go to college or start your career. While this decision sets the tone for the kind of game you’ll play, no matter which option you choose, these distinct paths ultimately merge back together allowing you to spearhead your career, start a family, buy a house, and eventually retire.
In our version of The Game of Life, you have two very different options: You go to prison or you don’t. But the penalties for going to prison are tantamount to playing the rest of the game with both arms tied behind your back.
This article explores ways in which all stakeholders in the criminal justice ecosystem can work together on common goals to help justice-impacted individuals navigate their ways through The Game of Life, provide resources for their incremental success, teach them to avoid and/or elegantly deal with obstacles that formerly resulted in recidivation, and provide a path to exit the game with more joyful, productive, and purposeful lives free of the stigma, shame, and barriers associated with having a felony. This reveals that the underlying purpose is to change The Game of Life into a way of life, one in which all stakeholders, and the community at large, will be lifted up, permanently disrupting the intergenerational cycle of incarceration.
Problem-to-Pardon Case Management
When you are admitted to a hospital, a hospital social worker begins to plan your discharge immediately upon your admission, often before a doctor even meets with you. Why? Because leaving better than you were upon entry is the ultimate goal of a hospital. This is the kind of framework in which legal case management must operate. People entering the criminal justice system are not given the tools and information required to reduce their sentence or prepare for reintegration into the community. Aside from a defense attorney’s guidance from trial to sentencing, justice-impacted people are largely on their own. Abandoning our most vulnerable people in their time of need should not be the standard. Case management should not begin and end in a courtroom or prison; reentry preparation should start immediately after a defendant enters the system and end when the client has completed their pardon application. We have coined the term for this process the “Problem-to-Pardon” case management system.
In our current system, punishment goes way beyond incarceration. American culture normatively accepts prison as a solution to violence and civil disobedience rather than a symptom. What we mean by this is that our collective consciousness and discourse in relation to the purpose of prisons have been limited by our tolerance to the cycle of violence. We must ask ourselves, “on an institutional level, what do prisons do to curb the reproduction of violence?” As it stands now, the answer is, unfortunately, “not much.”
Upon release, justice-impacted people are frequently subjected to visits from their parole officer. Without diving into the functional roles of a case manager versus a parole officer, their presences alone paint a stark contrast. Parole officers are able to show up unannounced, wielding a gun on their hip. They remind their client to find housing and/or a job, terms of their parole, seldom offering any assistance on achieving these requirements. What does this say about how we view justice-impacted people post reentry? A threatening, combative figure cannot be the default for all cases.
When someone is locked away for committing a crime, no matter if the crime is violent or nonviolent, that crime did not happen in an isolation chamber. Until attention is drawn to the root causes rather than the crime itself, rehabilitation and reconciliation remain anomalies. Simply displacing society’s “bad actors” does nothing to combat crime itself; we must engage with justice-impacted people and commit to rehabilitation through hands-on, personalized, evidence-based, and community-oriented casework.
Casework Models
There are several different models for conducting casework. In our opinion, the Transition from Jail to Community (TJC) Initiative launched by the National Institute of Corrections (NIC) in partnership with the Urban Institute in 2007 is the closest representation of a Problem-to-Pardon case management system. This model is based on a significant body of prisoner reentry research and evidence-based practices. The key five elements of the TJC Model are as follows:
Leadership, Vision, and Organizational Culture. Leaders from both the jail and the community must be actively engaged, articulate a clear vision, set expectations, identify important issues, and involve other key constituencies.
Collaborative Structure and Joint Ownership. Effective transition strategies rely on collaboration and information-sharing among jail and community-based partners and joint ownership of the problem and solution.
Data-Driven Understanding of Local Reentry. Regular analysis of objective data, including analysis of the jail population characteristics, informs and drives decision-making and policy formation.
Targeted Intervention Strategies The strategy to improve transition at the individual level involves introducing specific interventions at critical points along the jail-to-community continuum.
Self-Evaluation and Sustainability. Self-evaluation involves the use of objective data to guide operations, monitor progress, and inform decision-making. Sustainability involves planning to maintain initiative progress despite changes in leadership, policy, funding, and staffing. See Kevin Warwick, Hannah Dodd & S. Rebecca Neusteter, Case Management Strategies for Successful Jail Reentry, org (Sept. 2012), https://urbn.is/3sdEI4g.
This model draws on four main principles popularized by Canadians Paul Gendreau and Robert Ross: human service, risk, need, and responsivity.
Principles
The human service principle states that punishment alone cannot change an individual’s behavior or prevent the individual from recidivating. See Michael L. Prendergast et al., The Andrews’ Principles of Risk, Need, and Responsivity as Applied in Drug Abuse Treatment Programs: Meta-analysis of Crime and Drug Use Outcomes, 9 J. Experimental Criminology 275 (2013), https://bit.ly/39Bu1jJ. This not only includes incarceration itself, but also parole and additional post-sentence surveillance. Considerable research has supported this principle. In order to reduce recidivism, interventions such as treatment and supportive programming must be accessible. Clients’ improvements are linked more closely to positive reinforcement rather than negative. Interventions should be intensive; every client should be in case management for at least six months.
The risk principle refers to the importance of risk assessment before allocating treatment and additional resources. Seeid. Many studies have shown that high-risk individuals who receive relevant treatment experience lower rates of recidivism. See Warwick, Dodd & Neusteter, supra. Comparatively low-risk individuals may actually increase their chances of recidivism if treated similarly to high-risk individuals. See Christopher Tyson Lowenkamp, Correctional Program Integrity and Treatment Effectiveness: A Multi-Site, Program-Level Analysis (doctoral dissertation) (on file with University of Cincinnati) (2004), https://bit.ly/39f7PLK. It is important to note that this does not mean that low-risk individuals should not receive any assistance during incarceration and reentry; this means that case management’s focus must be on the individuals who are most likely to benefit from this work. A few examples of relevant areas of risk assessment include age, prior convictions, employment at arrest, and drug use history. Risk also included the type of crime committed; the most recent research has shown that “violent prior offenders were reconvicted at a higher rate (41.3%) than nonviolent offenders (23.3%).” See US Sentencing Comm’n, Recidivism Among Federal Violent Offenders, ussc.gov (Jan. 2019), https://bit.ly/3q7NkYm. Risk should be assessed at multiple points along the case management process and be determined by classification instruments as opposed to clinical judgment. Standardized classification methods would combat rater bias and help support future research.
The need principle is fairly self-explanatory. This principle draws attention to the client’s specific traits, history, and, of course, needs. See Prendergast et al., supra. Research has shown that case management is more effective if the focus is solely or primarily on the client’s criminogenic needs (antisocial personality, pro-criminal attitudes, social supports for crime, substance abuse, family and marital relationships, school and/or work, and prosocial recreational activities). See Warwick, Dodd & Neusteter, supra. Focusing solely or primarily on the client’s non-criminogenic needs, such as stress and self-esteem, has been shown to have no effect or actually increase the client’s likelihood of recidivating. Seeid. It can be argued that many non-criminogenic needs are mere symptoms of more overarching needs. Figuratively speaking, focusing on non-criminogenic interventions would be like placing a bandage on an infected wound. By concentrating intervention strategies at the root of the client’s needs (their criminogenic needs), the client is more likely to experience positive change overall.
Finally, the responsivity principle can be broken down into two subcategories: the learning style of the client and traits that may affect treatment selection and response, such as mental health issues and/or cognitive disabilities. See Prendergast et al., supra. This principle has also proven to be relevant in constructing case management plans for other “special” populations, or populations that are considered a minority in prisons, such as female prisoners, sex offenders, and prisoners convicted of violent crimes. Seeid.
Pardons
According to many experts, the mark of successful reentry is when an individual stays out of prison for three to five years. In our opinion, we feel that five years should be the sole marker of success. After this five-year period, individuals are significantly less likely to recidivate compared to a three- or four-year marker. According to the proposed Problem-to-Pardon case management system, once the individual crosses this five-year threshold, they should have the opportunity to be pardoned for their crime. Adopting this model would actualize the criminal justice system’s original promise to serve justice and foster rehabilitation. (More on this below.) As it stands now, individuals can apply to be pardoned by the state or federal government, but only 17 states “regularly” approve (more than 30%) these applications. See Restoration of Rights Project, 50-State Comparison: Pardon Policy & Practice, ccresourcecenter.org (updated May 2020), https://bit.ly/2MQggWp.
The Problem-to-Pardon case management system looks to make pardons an attainable goal for the justice-impacted community. We believe that by adopting this incentive, individuals would be more likely to cooperate and be more engaged in case management and treatment. Learned helplessness may be an overlooked factor in client responsivity to treatment; if the client perceives their situation as irredeemable, how can we expect them to put in the work to change?
Caseworkers
Beyond shifting policies and framework, the foundation of case management is its caseworkers. Their treatment, pay, work-life balance, and physical and mental health directly influence their impact on their clients. Compared to correctional officers, caseworkers experience higher levels of burnout and, consequently, turnover. See Joseph R. Carlson & George Thomas, Burnout Among Prison Caseworkers and Correctional Officers, 43 J. Offender Rehab. 19 (2006), https://bit.ly/3nBPSfH. The three most common reasons for leaving the profession are inadequate payment, lack of support from management, and stress, also known as burnout. See id. Case managers do not want to be underpaid paper pushers; they want to believe their emotional labor and dedication are not only valuable but viable. Furthermore, these adverse working conditions hinder client progress and make case management, as a whole, unsustainable. Lack of support and stress ultimately obstruct interpersonal connections between clients and case managers. No amount of empirical methodology can substitute for rapport; clients need to trust their caseworkers in order for these methods to be successful.
Caseworkers should be selected with consideration of secondary trauma, interpersonal skills, cooperation, and collaboration. Support should always be available to caseworkers, as this job is highly intensive and emotionally draining. Feelings of isolation and an overwhelming workload can lead caseworkers to experience compassion fatigue, which can negatively impact their clients. Creating a work environment that maintains coworker support and promotes opportunities for personal development will make employment more sustainable. Investing in caseworkers is an investment in reentry success.
One of the ways case managers can receive much-needed support is through community ties. Case management should not solely reside in prisons; it is crucial that community-based organizations that are accessible and familiar with the justice-impacted community cosponsor reentry. Additionally, this unburdens caseworkers and ensures a smooth transition into reentry for the client. Depending on the client’s criminogenic tendencies and needs, caseworkers can connect clients to the relevant support systems. Establishing rapport between clients and the community before release is imperative, especially for high-risk clients who are more likely to recidivate. When community-based organizations collaborate with caseworkers and initiate “in-reach,” the transition from prison to freedom looks less like a leap of faith and more like a continuum of care. See Warwick, Dodd & Neusteter, supra.
Social Determinants of Health
Social and community context, access to quality health care, and neighborhood and built environment are three key areas of social determinants of health that are often overlooked during casework. See Ctrs for Disease Control & Prevention, What Are Social Determinants of Health, cdc.gov, https://bit.ly/2K5eS1f. As defined by the CDC, social determinants of health “are conditions in the places where people live, learn, work, and play that affect a wide range of health risks and outcomes.” See id. One’s “cohesion within a community, civic participation, [experiences of] discrimination, and conditions in the workplace, and incarceration” as well as their “quality of housing, access to transportation, [. . .] and neighborhood crime and violence” should all be assessed and considered when planning reentry. See id. Access to affordable, quality physical and mental health care, including an individual’s health literacy, is also crucial to a successful reentry.
Community Collaboration
Likely community collaborators would include support groups, 12-step programs, housing programs, job assistance, childcare, affordable therapy, psychoeducation programs, as well as many others. It is important to note that people working within these organizations endure similar challenges as caseworkers; these programs are largely underfunded and overworked. Compounded with finding programs that are within an accessible physical proximity to clients, partnering with quality community programs can be an insurmountable task.
While caseworkers and community advocates can develop a relationship of mutual aid, many of the obstacles they face cannot be overcome without adequate funding. The challenges of funding have haunted casework and community interventions since their inception, and by no means will we pretend to have any solution that has not already been proposed. However, we cannot simply ignore this problem. This is where intervention and activism intersect: No systematic change can occur without the backing of a mass movement.
Identity
This year, the Black Lives Matter movement held a spotlight on the institutional racism deeply embedded in our country and, by extension, our justice system. This hyperawareness and newly widespread discourse around systematic change make fertile soil for reevaluating and reshaping our case management system. Historically, the quality of case management heavily depends on the client’s race, socioeconomic status, and gender identity. Of course, no policy reflects this discrepancy. However, through self-reported data, we know that these systems favor white, affluent, cisgender, heterosexual clients. Interestingly, casework looks vastly different between mothers and fathers, especially when comparing white parents to Black parents. While childcare seems like an obvious procedure in case management for clients who are mothers, fathers are largely overlooked when it comes to discussing childcare. This oversight stems from gendered and racist stereotypes, particularly the myth of the “missing Black father.”
American case management has operated from a colorblind, heteronormative, ableist, and classist standpoint for too long. See Rose M. Brewer & Nancy A. Heitzeg, The Racialization of Crime and Punishment, Criminal Justice, Color-Blind Racism, and the Political Economy of the Prison Industrial Complex, 51 Am. Behav. Scientist 625 (2008), https://bit.ly/3seyEbE. According to the Sentencing Project, over 60% of people in prison are people of color. See The Sentencing Project, Racial Disparity, sentencingproject.org, https://bit.ly/2LkCIGI. Black men are six times more likely to be incarcerated compared to white men, while Hispanic men are just over two times as likely. See id. While women only make up seven percent of the prison population, these racial discrepancies manifest similarly, as well. Seeid. It is difficult to estimate the percentage of transgender, genderfluid, nonbinary, and genderqueer people incarcerated given the binary nature of the prison system and its lack of data collection. However, thanks to the 2015 National Transgender Discrimination Survey, we know that Black transgender women were four and a half times more likely to be incarcerated compared to their white counterparts. See Nat’l Ctr. for Transgender Equality, The Report of the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey, transequality.org (2016), https://bit.ly/2Xv99ov. Additionally, Native American transgender women were three times as likely to experience incarceration compared to white transgender women. Seeid.
While it is seemingly intuitive to treat all of your clients the same, this does nothing to combat systemic racism, sexism, transphobia, ableism, and classism within our justice and case management systems. By adopting an intersectional framework that draws on critical race theory, multiple schools of feminist theory, and disability studies, caseworkers can begin to implement truly individualized casework and actively combat institutionalized bias. See Brewer & Heitzeg, supra. Integrating theory into practice once again highlights the importance of establishing rapport: How can a client trust their case manager and the process if the process is designed to actively erase, undermine, or overlook their identity?
Today, more and more Americans are viewing incarceration as a race and class issue rather than the previously accepted black and white, good versus bad narrative. The topic of incarceration has quickly become a dinner table conversation rather than a shameful taboo. Now more than ever, caseworkers and advocates alike have the opportunity to seize and hold the public’s attention. Case management and community interventions are a major component in the larger movement of dismantling unjust practices. The more engaged and educated the public is on these issues, the more likely they are to support and push for policies that will allocate adequate funding to these life-changing services.
Funding social services often elicits pushback from concerned politicians and citizens alike: How do we pay for this? When it comes to funding preventative services versus treatment services, prevention is almost always significantly cheaper and more effective than treatment. For example, when Vice President-elect Kamala Harris launched Back on Track in 2005, not only did recidivism reduce from 53% to less than 10%, but costs reduced, as well. The program costs “approximately $5,000 per participant, compared with $10,000 to adjudicate a case and nearly $50,000 per year to house a low-level offender in prison or jail.” See Jacquelyn L. Rivers & Lenore Anderson, Back on Track: A Problem-Solving Reentry Court, bja.ojp.gov (Sept. 2009), https://bit.ly/3oyBLcg. When surveying 45 states in 2015, the Vera Institute of Justice found that the United States spent over $42 billion on prison expenditures in a single year. See Vera Inst. of Just., Prison Spending in 2015, vera.org, https://bit.ly/3nDUBxf. When questioning costs, we should begin with this figure rather than picking apart programs that will likely decrease this immense spending.
Another way caseworkers can simultaneously lighten their caseload and connect the client with their community is by involving the client’s family, whether that is chosen family or blood relatives. As it stands now, families are overlooked in the case management process. Before the individual is released from prison, caseworkers or parole officers will assess the individual’s future residence, mainly checking for weapons and drugs. While this process is necessary, this method alone fails to see the client’s environment as both physical and interpersonal. A family’s role in reentry can be helpful or harmful depending on their relationship with the client as well as their own criminogenic tendencies and needs. Therefore, risk assessment should go beyond the client and include family members, as well. Autonomy is another integral component. What role does the client want their family to serve? The community at large? What are their goals? Their concerns? How do we address these notions realistically and prosocially? While caseworkers are experts on reentry, clients are experts on themselves. Without taking the client’s perceived social support network into account, caseworkers cannot see the full picture. We cannot stress this enough: A reciprocal relationship between client and caseworker is necessary to achieve advantageous outcomes.
Mental Health Support
Whether or not the caseworker deems the family fit to take a more active role in reentry, psychoeducation is crucial. Reentry is often overwhelming for justice-impacted people, and it may be easiest to turn to antisocial coping strategies such as alcohol use, drug use, and crime. This is especially important for families of individuals suffering from mental illness. As defined by Len and John Sperry, “psychoeducation is a broad treatment strategy of educating and training individuals experiencing psychological disturbance [and their families] to increase their knowledge, coping capacity, and skills required to solve their presenting problems.” See Len Sperry & Jon Sperry, Psychotherapy and Psychopathology: Cognitive-Behavioral and Adlerian Treatment Strategies and Interventions, in 2 Abnormal Psychology Across the Ages: Disorders and Treatments 191 (Thomas Plante ed., 2013).
Let’s imagine an actively involved mother who is participating in psychoeducation with her justice-impacted son struggling with schizophrenia. Let’s call this person Josh. Josh insists that the government is out to get him and wants to send him back to prison. This is a textbook example of a delusion, one of the major symptoms of schizophrenia. Before enrolling in psychoeducation, Josh’s mother would try to comfort Josh by telling him that the government could not find him in their home. Despite her good intentions, Josh’s mother learns that her response only validated Josh’s delusion and ultimately contributed to its persistent reoccurrence. Through psychoeducation, both Josh and his mother can learn strategies that soothe Josh when he is experiencing adverse symptoms, such as delusions, without affirming them.
Psychoeducation has been proven to be an effective tool in mitigating symptoms of most mental disorders, regardless of severity. However, like most individual interventions, psychoeducation works best in conjunction with other forms of therapy. By nature, psychoeducation is short-termed and goal-oriented. Other forms of therapy, such as group therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy, help with maintenance. Therapeutic needs are highly individualized, which requires caseworkers to be well versed in psychiatric interventions as well as frequently risk assessing and consulting with the relevant mental health professionals.
Drug and Alcohol Support
Drug and alcohol addiction are common risk factors that contribute to recidivism. During risk assessment, it is absolutely crucial to accurately evaluate the type, severity, and history of the affected individual. The client’s immediate family and community may play an important role in risk assessment: Is the support system encouraging addictive behaviors? Are they encouraging sobriety? Are they ambivalent? What does that reaction look like? Is there a history of substance abuse in the client’s family or support system? If so, is that person sober or seeking treatment? Like therapy, treatment for substance abuse is highly individualized. If the treatment does not suit the client, the effects may be unsubstantial or, even worse, regressive. A 12-step, nonresidential program may be ineffective if the individual goes home to an alcoholic spouse. In this scenario, a rehabilitation facility may be the most appropriate intervention.
However, reconnecting with the individual’s immediate community is the ultimate goal of Problem-to-Pardon case management, and any program that requires additional separation must be chosen only out of absolute necessity for the well-being of the client.
A “Culture of Pardons”
Certainly, not every person who applies for a pardon will be granted one. But what if the real goal is not to obtain a pardon for any particular applicant, but for this tide to lift all boats in the entire community? In doing so, it will increase the opportunity to be granted a pardon for all applicants.
“It takes a village to raise a child” is an African proverb that means that an entire community of people must take responsibility for children in order for them to experience and grow in a safe and healthy environment. This phrase and concept were famously used by Hillary Rodham Clinton in writing and titling her book It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us, in which she addresses the impact individuals and their community have on a child’s well-being and calls for a society that strives to meet all of a child’s needs. See Hillary Rodham Clinton, It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us (1996).
The point is, if the entire community subscribes to this endeavor, the benefits will not only inure to the child, but also to the village as a whole. This wider community benefit is exactly what we intend by advocating for a “Culture of Pardons.”
As we mentioned earlier, only 17 states regularly (more than 30%) approve pardon applications from previously incarcerated people. See Restoration of Rights Project, supra. This process looks vastly different state-by-state, with varying degrees of roadblocks. The decision to grant an individual’s request can be decided by the state’s governor, high officials such as the attorney general or chief justice, an independent board, a parole board, or a combination of these powers. Of course, the president also has the ability to grant an individual’s request. The fact that the threshold for deeming a state a “frequent” pardoner is only 30% shows how rare pardoning is. While state legislation is crucial to combatting this anomaly, case management must also educate and prepare their clients for applying.
Case managers should be well versed in federal and state requirements for pardon applications. Eligibility varies state by state, but we recommend waiting five years post-reentry to apply. In the meantime, caseworkers should be tracking the client’s progress. This includes monitoring community engagement, employment status, sobriety (if relevant), and program attendance. Keeping track of progress is also paramount for reentry research. This domain of research is relatively new and has lacked alignment with practitioners. Collaboration with reputable researchers can only advance our understanding and success in reintegrating clients.
Case managers should explain how to apply for a pardon while the client is incarcerated so that they are well prepared upon reentry. We recommend presenting this information as a step-by-step roadmap. Putting together a well-organized and comprehensive application will and should take time. Clients should be encouraged to include as much information as possible, going beyond what is required. The more detailed the application, the better. When in doubt, the best response is “see attached.” Including an up-to-date résumé is always a plus if the client’s state does not already require it. Character letters should be written by reputable and trustworthy peers and family members. It is important to note that many states limit the number of blood relatives when asking for character letters. By including caseworkers in the process of applying for a pardon, the individual is less likely to make mistakes on their application and, therefore, reduces their chance of rejection.
At the writing of this article, we are experiencing a worldwide COVID-19 pandemic of historic proportions. While we are hopeful that a vaccine is soon to be approved, we are reminded that it is not the vaccine that saves lives, but the vaccination that saves lives. One suggestion to overcome public resistance to vaccinations is to create an incentive program. That is, to pay people to be vaccinated. The goal is to have enough people vaccinated so that the entire community benefits from herd immunity.
Similarly, creating a Culture of Pardons not only benefits the individual post-reentry but also motivates individuals entering the justice system to immerse themselves in their rehabilitation and reentry. Granting a pardon is a life-changing moment; it opens the doors so that an individual will not be barred from housing or rejected from a job. A Culture of Pardons would set the tone for a new era of criminal justice, one where reintegration prevails over punishment. We know that punishment does not reduce recidivism, so why must we continue to treat the justice-impacted community inhumanly? Our imagination must go beyond intervention and expand upon opportunity. A Culture of Pardons puts healing above all else; it gives people a second chance. It also breaks down the wall between the justice-impacted community and the community at large.
Restoring one’s dignity, autonomy, and sense of belonging should be the ultimate goal of reentry. To put it in one word, the Problem-to-Pardons case management system and a Culture of Pardons strive for reintegration. By adopting these ideas, players in The Game of Life can see the roads merge on the horizon. Our communities and our caseworkers build this intersection, brick by brick. With their help, the justice-impacted community can catch up with those who have never been affected by the justice system. Reintegration isn’t simply leaving prison; it’s walking side by side with the community, weaving a thread between the justice-impacted and the community at large until the two become indistinguishable.
JEFF GRANT, J.D., M.Div. is an ordained minister with over three decades of experience in crisis management, business, law (former), reentry, recovery, and executive and religious leadership. After an addiction to prescription opioids and serving almost 14 months in federal prison for a white-collar crime he committed when he was a lawyer, Jeff started his own reentry, earning a Master of Divinity from Union Theological Seminary and co-founding Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc, the world’s first ministry serving the white collar justice community in Connecticut and nationwide. He may be reached at jgrant@prisonist.org.
CHLOE COPPOLA is an advocate at Progressive Prison Ministries, a liaison and navigator on behalf of our group members, organizes the podcasts White Collar Week and Criminal Justice Insider, and is a dedicated researcher and writer on mental illness, as well as criminal, racial, and women’s justice themes. Chloe can be reached at ccoppola@alumni.scu.edu.
Additional Contributors:
Cathryn Lavery, Ph.D., Consultant, Integrated Justice Solutions, Inc.
John Hart, Ph.D., Senior Research Associate, Restoring Promise, Vera Institute of Justice
Seth Williams, J.D., former District Attorney for the City of Philadelphia, PA
This article imagines a cohesive, integrated system that shepherds people through and beyond their criminal justice issues and incentivizes the community to assist them.
A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats: Progressive Diversion & Reentry, “Problem-to-Pardon” Case Management
On an early turn playing the famous board game The Game of Life, you have a choice to make: go to college or start your career. While this decision sets the tone for the kind of game you’ll play, no matter which option you choose, these distinct paths ultimately merge back together allowing you to spearhead your career, start a family, buy a house, and eventually retire.
In our version of The Game of Life, you have two very different options: You go to prison or you don’t. But the penalties for going to prison are tantamount to playing the rest of the game with both arms tied behind your back.
This article explores ways in which all stakeholders in the criminal justice ecosystem can work together on common goals to help justice-impacted individuals navigate their ways through The Game of Life, provide resources for their incremental success, teach them to avoid and/or elegantly deal with obstacles that formerly resulted in recidivation, and provide a path to exit the game with more joyful, productive, and purposeful lives free of the stigma, shame, and barriers associated with having a felony. This reveals that the underlying purpose is to change The Game of Life into a way of life, one in which all stakeholders, and the community at large, will be lifted up, permanently disrupting the intergenerational cycle of incarceration.
Problem-to-Pardon Case Management
When you are admitted to a hospital, a hospital social worker begins to plan your discharge immediately upon your admission, often before a doctor even meets with you. Why? Because leaving better than you were upon entry is the ultimate goal of a hospital. This is the kind of framework in which legal case management must operate. People entering the criminal justice system are not given the tools and information required to reduce their sentence or prepare for reintegration into the community. Aside from a defense attorney’s guidance from trial to sentencing, justice-impacted people are largely on their own. Abandoning our most vulnerable people in their time of need should not be the standard. Case management should not begin and end in a courtroom or prison; reentry preparation should start immediately after a defendant enters the system and end when the client has completed their pardon application. We have coined the term for this process the “Problem-to-Pardon” case management system.
In our current system, punishment goes way beyond incarceration. American culture normatively accepts prison as a solution to violence and civil disobedience rather than a symptom. What we mean by this is that our collective consciousness and discourse in relation to the purpose of prisons have been limited by our tolerance to the cycle of violence. We must ask ourselves, “on an institutional level, what do prisons do to curb the reproduction of violence?” As it stands now, the answer is, unfortunately, “not much.”
Upon release, justice-impacted people are frequently subjected to visits from their parole officer. Without diving into the functional roles of a case manager versus a parole officer, their presences alone paint a stark contrast. Parole officers are able to show up unannounced, wielding a gun on their hip. They remind their client to find housing and/or a job, terms of their parole, seldom offering any assistance on achieving these requirements. What does this say about how we view justice-impacted people post reentry? A threatening, combative figure cannot be the default for all cases.
When someone is locked away for committing a crime, no matter if the crime is violent or nonviolent, that crime did not happen in an isolation chamber. Until attention is drawn to the root causes rather than the crime itself, rehabilitation and reconciliation remain anomalies. Simply displacing society’s “bad actors” does nothing to combat crime itself; we must engage with justice-impacted people and commit to rehabilitation through hands-on, personalized, evidence-based, and community-oriented casework.
Casework Models
There are several different models for conducting casework. In our opinion, the Transition from Jail to Community (TJC) Initiative launched by the National Institute of Corrections (NIC) in partnership with the Urban Institute in 2007 is the closest representation of a Problem-to-Pardon case management system. This model is based on a significant body of prisoner reentry research and evidence-based practices. The key five elements of the TJC Model are as follows:
Leadership, Vision, and Organizational Culture. Leaders from both the jail and the community must be actively engaged, articulate a clear vision, set expectations, identify important issues, and involve other key constituencies.
Collaborative Structure and Joint Ownership. Effective transition strategies rely on collaboration and information-sharing among jail and community-based partners and joint ownership of the problem and solution.
Data-Driven Understanding of Local Reentry. Regular analysis of objective data, including analysis of the jail population characteristics, informs and drives decision-making and policy formation.
Targeted Intervention Strategies The strategy to improve transition at the individual level involves introducing specific interventions at critical points along the jail-to-community continuum.
Self-Evaluation and Sustainability. Self-evaluation involves the use of objective data to guide operations, monitor progress, and inform decision-making. Sustainability involves planning to maintain initiative progress despite changes in leadership, policy, funding, and staffing. See Kevin Warwick, Hannah Dodd & S. Rebecca Neusteter, Case Management Strategies for Successful Jail Reentry, org (Sept. 2012), https://urbn.is/3sdEI4g.
This model draws on four main principles popularized by Canadians Paul Gendreau and Robert Ross: human service, risk, need, and responsivity.
Principles
The human service principle states that punishment alone cannot change an individual’s behavior or prevent the individual from recidivating. See Michael L. Prendergast et al., The Andrews’ Principles of Risk, Need, and Responsivity as Applied in Drug Abuse Treatment Programs: Meta-analysis of Crime and Drug Use Outcomes, 9 J. Experimental Criminology 275 (2013), https://bit.ly/39Bu1jJ. This not only includes incarceration itself, but also parole and additional post-sentence surveillance. Considerable research has supported this principle. In order to reduce recidivism, interventions such as treatment and supportive programming must be accessible. Clients’ improvements are linked more closely to positive reinforcement rather than negative. Interventions should be intensive; every client should be in case management for at least six months.
The risk principle refers to the importance of risk assessment before allocating treatment and additional resources. Seeid. Many studies have shown that high-risk individuals who receive relevant treatment experience lower rates of recidivism. See Warwick, Dodd & Neusteter, supra. Comparatively low-risk individuals may actually increase their chances of recidivism if treated similarly to high-risk individuals. See Christopher Tyson Lowenkamp, Correctional Program Integrity and Treatment Effectiveness: A Multi-Site, Program-Level Analysis (doctoral dissertation) (on file with University of Cincinnati) (2004), https://bit.ly/39f7PLK. It is important to note that this does not mean that low-risk individuals should not receive any assistance during incarceration and reentry; this means that case management’s focus must be on the individuals who are most likely to benefit from this work. A few examples of relevant areas of risk assessment include age, prior convictions, employment at arrest, and drug use history. Risk also included the type of crime committed; the most recent research has shown that “violent prior offenders were reconvicted at a higher rate (41.3%) than nonviolent offenders (23.3%).” See US Sentencing Comm’n, Recidivism Among Federal Violent Offenders, ussc.gov (Jan. 2019), https://bit.ly/3q7NkYm. Risk should be assessed at multiple points along the case management process and be determined by classification instruments as opposed to clinical judgment. Standardized classification methods would combat rater bias and help support future research.
The need principle is fairly self-explanatory. This principle draws attention to the client’s specific traits, history, and, of course, needs. See Prendergast et al., supra. Research has shown that case management is more effective if the focus is solely or primarily on the client’s criminogenic needs (antisocial personality, pro-criminal attitudes, social supports for crime, substance abuse, family and marital relationships, school and/or work, and prosocial recreational activities). See Warwick, Dodd & Neusteter, supra. Focusing solely or primarily on the client’s non-criminogenic needs, such as stress and self-esteem, has been shown to have no effect or actually increase the client’s likelihood of recidivating. Seeid. It can be argued that many non-criminogenic needs are mere symptoms of more overarching needs. Figuratively speaking, focusing on non-criminogenic interventions would be like placing a bandage on an infected wound. By concentrating intervention strategies at the root of the client’s needs (their criminogenic needs), the client is more likely to experience positive change overall.
Finally, the responsivity principle can be broken down into two subcategories: the learning style of the client and traits that may affect treatment selection and response, such as mental health issues and/or cognitive disabilities. See Prendergast et al., supra. This principle has also proven to be relevant in constructing case management plans for other “special” populations, or populations that are considered a minority in prisons, such as female prisoners, sex offenders, and prisoners convicted of violent crimes. Seeid.
Pardons
According to many experts, the mark of successful reentry is when an individual stays out of prison for three to five years. In our opinion, we feel that five years should be the sole marker of success. After this five-year period, individuals are significantly less likely to recidivate compared to a three- or four-year marker. According to the proposed Problem-to-Pardon case management system, once the individual crosses this five-year threshold, they should have the opportunity to be pardoned for their crime. Adopting this model would actualize the criminal justice system’s original promise to serve justice and foster rehabilitation. (More on this below.) As it stands now, individuals can apply to be pardoned by the state or federal government, but only 17 states “regularly” approve (more than 30%) these applications. See Restoration of Rights Project, 50-State Comparison: Pardon Policy & Practice, ccresourcecenter.org (updated May 2020), https://bit.ly/2MQggWp.
The Problem-to-Pardon case management system looks to make pardons an attainable goal for the justice-impacted community. We believe that by adopting this incentive, individuals would be more likely to cooperate and be more engaged in case management and treatment. Learned helplessness may be an overlooked factor in client responsivity to treatment; if the client perceives their situation as irredeemable, how can we expect them to put in the work to change?
Caseworkers
Beyond shifting policies and framework, the foundation of case management is its caseworkers. Their treatment, pay, work-life balance, and physical and mental health directly influence their impact on their clients. Compared to correctional officers, caseworkers experience higher levels of burnout and, consequently, turnover. See Joseph R. Carlson & George Thomas, Burnout Among Prison Caseworkers and Correctional Officers, 43 J. Offender Rehab. 19 (2006), https://bit.ly/3nBPSfH. The three most common reasons for leaving the profession are inadequate payment, lack of support from management, and stress, also known as burnout. See id. Case managers do not want to be underpaid paper pushers; they want to believe their emotional labor and dedication are not only valuable but viable. Furthermore, these adverse working conditions hinder client progress and make case management, as a whole, unsustainable. Lack of support and stress ultimately obstruct interpersonal connections between clients and case managers. No amount of empirical methodology can substitute for rapport; clients need to trust their caseworkers in order for these methods to be successful.
Caseworkers should be selected with consideration of secondary trauma, interpersonal skills, cooperation, and collaboration. Support should always be available to caseworkers, as this job is highly intensive and emotionally draining. Feelings of isolation and an overwhelming workload can lead caseworkers to experience compassion fatigue, which can negatively impact their clients. Creating a work environment that maintains coworker support and promotes opportunities for personal development will make employment more sustainable. Investing in caseworkers is an investment in reentry success.
One of the ways case managers can receive much-needed support is through community ties. Case management should not solely reside in prisons; it is crucial that community-based organizations that are accessible and familiar with the justice-impacted community cosponsor reentry. Additionally, this unburdens caseworkers and ensures a smooth transition into reentry for the client. Depending on the client’s criminogenic tendencies and needs, caseworkers can connect clients to the relevant support systems. Establishing rapport between clients and the community before release is imperative, especially for high-risk clients who are more likely to recidivate. When community-based organizations collaborate with caseworkers and initiate “in-reach,” the transition from prison to freedom looks less like a leap of faith and more like a continuum of care. See Warwick, Dodd & Neusteter, supra.
Social Determinants of Health
Social and community context, access to quality health care, and neighborhood and built environment are three key areas of social determinants of health that are often overlooked during casework. See Ctrs for Disease Control & Prevention, What Are Social Determinants of Health, cdc.gov, https://bit.ly/2K5eS1f. As defined by the CDC, social determinants of health “are conditions in the places where people live, learn, work, and play that affect a wide range of health risks and outcomes.” See id. One’s “cohesion within a community, civic participation, [experiences of] discrimination, and conditions in the workplace, and incarceration” as well as their “quality of housing, access to transportation, [. . .] and neighborhood crime and violence” should all be assessed and considered when planning reentry. See id. Access to affordable, quality physical and mental health care, including an individual’s health literacy, is also crucial to a successful reentry.
Community Collaboration
Likely community collaborators would include support groups, 12-step programs, housing programs, job assistance, childcare, affordable therapy, psychoeducation programs, as well as many others. It is important to note that people working within these organizations endure similar challenges as caseworkers; these programs are largely underfunded and overworked. Compounded with finding programs that are within an accessible physical proximity to clients, partnering with quality community programs can be an insurmountable task.
While caseworkers and community advocates can develop a relationship of mutual aid, many of the obstacles they face cannot be overcome without adequate funding. The challenges of funding have haunted casework and community interventions since their inception, and by no means will we pretend to have any solution that has not already been proposed. However, we cannot simply ignore this problem. This is where intervention and activism intersect: No systematic change can occur without the backing of a mass movement.
Identity
This year, the Black Lives Matter movement held a spotlight on the institutional racism deeply embedded in our country and, by extension, our justice system. This hyperawareness and newly widespread discourse around systematic change make fertile soil for reevaluating and reshaping our case management system. Historically, the quality of case management heavily depends on the client’s race, socioeconomic status, and gender identity. Of course, no policy reflects this discrepancy. However, through self-reported data, we know that these systems favor white, affluent, cisgender, heterosexual clients. Interestingly, casework looks vastly different between mothers and fathers, especially when comparing white parents to Black parents. While childcare seems like an obvious procedure in case management for clients who are mothers, fathers are largely overlooked when it comes to discussing childcare. This oversight stems from gendered and racist stereotypes, particularly the myth of the “missing Black father.”
American case management has operated from a colorblind, heteronormative, ableist, and classist standpoint for too long. See Rose M. Brewer & Nancy A. Heitzeg, The Racialization of Crime and Punishment, Criminal Justice, Color-Blind Racism, and the Political Economy of the Prison Industrial Complex, 51 Am. Behav. Scientist 625 (2008), https://bit.ly/3seyEbE. According to the Sentencing Project, over 60% of people in prison are people of color. See The Sentencing Project, Racial Disparity, sentencingproject.org, https://bit.ly/2LkCIGI. Black men are six times more likely to be incarcerated compared to white men, while Hispanic men are just over two times as likely. See id. While women only make up seven percent of the prison population, these racial discrepancies manifest similarly, as well. Seeid. It is difficult to estimate the percentage of transgender, genderfluid, nonbinary, and genderqueer people incarcerated given the binary nature of the prison system and its lack of data collection. However, thanks to the 2015 National Transgender Discrimination Survey, we know that Black transgender women were four and a half times more likely to be incarcerated compared to their white counterparts. See Nat’l Ctr. for Transgender Equality, The Report of the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey, transequality.org (2016), https://bit.ly/2Xv99ov. Additionally, Native American transgender women were three times as likely to experience incarceration compared to white transgender women. Seeid.
While it is seemingly intuitive to treat all of your clients the same, this does nothing to combat systemic racism, sexism, transphobia, ableism, and classism within our justice and case management systems. By adopting an intersectional framework that draws on critical race theory, multiple schools of feminist theory, and disability studies, caseworkers can begin to implement truly individualized casework and actively combat institutionalized bias. See Brewer & Heitzeg, supra. Integrating theory into practice once again highlights the importance of establishing rapport: How can a client trust their case manager and the process if the process is designed to actively erase, undermine, or overlook their identity?
Today, more and more Americans are viewing incarceration as a race and class issue rather than the previously accepted black and white, good versus bad narrative. The topic of incarceration has quickly become a dinner table conversation rather than a shameful taboo. Now more than ever, caseworkers and advocates alike have the opportunity to seize and hold the public’s attention. Case management and community interventions are a major component in the larger movement of dismantling unjust practices. The more engaged and educated the public is on these issues, the more likely they are to support and push for policies that will allocate adequate funding to these life-changing services.
Funding social services often elicits pushback from concerned politicians and citizens alike: How do we pay for this? When it comes to funding preventative services versus treatment services, prevention is almost always significantly cheaper and more effective than treatment. For example, when Vice President-elect Kamala Harris launched Back on Track in 2005, not only did recidivism reduce from 53% to less than 10%, but costs reduced, as well. The program costs “approximately $5,000 per participant, compared with $10,000 to adjudicate a case and nearly $50,000 per year to house a low-level offender in prison or jail.” See Jacquelyn L. Rivers & Lenore Anderson, Back on Track: A Problem-Solving Reentry Court, bja.ojp.gov (Sept. 2009), https://bit.ly/3oyBLcg. When surveying 45 states in 2015, the Vera Institute of Justice found that the United States spent over $42 billion on prison expenditures in a single year. See Vera Inst. of Just., Prison Spending in 2015, vera.org, https://bit.ly/3nDUBxf. When questioning costs, we should begin with this figure rather than picking apart programs that will likely decrease this immense spending.
Another way caseworkers can simultaneously lighten their caseload and connect the client with their community is by involving the client’s family, whether that is chosen family or blood relatives. As it stands now, families are overlooked in the case management process. Before the individual is released from prison, caseworkers or parole officers will assess the individual’s future residence, mainly checking for weapons and drugs. While this process is necessary, this method alone fails to see the client’s environment as both physical and interpersonal. A family’s role in reentry can be helpful or harmful depending on their relationship with the client as well as their own criminogenic tendencies and needs. Therefore, risk assessment should go beyond the client and include family members, as well. Autonomy is another integral component. What role does the client want their family to serve? The community at large? What are their goals? Their concerns? How do we address these notions realistically and prosocially? While caseworkers are experts on reentry, clients are experts on themselves. Without taking the client’s perceived social support network into account, caseworkers cannot see the full picture. We cannot stress this enough: A reciprocal relationship between client and caseworker is necessary to achieve advantageous outcomes.
Mental Health Support
Whether or not the caseworker deems the family fit to take a more active role in reentry, psychoeducation is crucial. Reentry is often overwhelming for justice-impacted people, and it may be easiest to turn to antisocial coping strategies such as alcohol use, drug use, and crime. This is especially important for families of individuals suffering from mental illness. As defined by Len and John Sperry, “psychoeducation is a broad treatment strategy of educating and training individuals experiencing psychological disturbance [and their families] to increase their knowledge, coping capacity, and skills required to solve their presenting problems.” See Len Sperry & Jon Sperry, Psychotherapy and Psychopathology: Cognitive-Behavioral and Adlerian Treatment Strategies and Interventions, in 2 Abnormal Psychology Across the Ages: Disorders and Treatments 191 (Thomas Plante ed., 2013).
Let’s imagine an actively involved mother who is participating in psychoeducation with her justice-impacted son struggling with schizophrenia. Let’s call this person Josh. Josh insists that the government is out to get him and wants to send him back to prison. This is a textbook example of a delusion, one of the major symptoms of schizophrenia. Before enrolling in psychoeducation, Josh’s mother would try to comfort Josh by telling him that the government could not find him in their home. Despite her good intentions, Josh’s mother learns that her response only validated Josh’s delusion and ultimately contributed to its persistent reoccurrence. Through psychoeducation, both Josh and his mother can learn strategies that soothe Josh when he is experiencing adverse symptoms, such as delusions, without affirming them.
Psychoeducation has been proven to be an effective tool in mitigating symptoms of most mental disorders, regardless of severity. However, like most individual interventions, psychoeducation works best in conjunction with other forms of therapy. By nature, psychoeducation is short-termed and goal-oriented. Other forms of therapy, such as group therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy, help with maintenance. Therapeutic needs are highly individualized, which requires caseworkers to be well versed in psychiatric interventions as well as frequently risk assessing and consulting with the relevant mental health professionals.
Drug and Alcohol Support
Drug and alcohol addiction are common risk factors that contribute to recidivism. During risk assessment, it is absolutely crucial to accurately evaluate the type, severity, and history of the affected individual. The client’s immediate family and community may play an important role in risk assessment: Is the support system encouraging addictive behaviors? Are they encouraging sobriety? Are they ambivalent? What does that reaction look like? Is there a history of substance abuse in the client’s family or support system? If so, is that person sober or seeking treatment? Like therapy, treatment for substance abuse is highly individualized. If the treatment does not suit the client, the effects may be unsubstantial or, even worse, regressive. A 12-step, nonresidential program may be ineffective if the individual goes home to an alcoholic spouse. In this scenario, a rehabilitation facility may be the most appropriate intervention.
However, reconnecting with the individual’s immediate community is the ultimate goal of Problem-to-Pardon case management, and any program that requires additional separation must be chosen only out of absolute necessity for the well-being of the client.
A “Culture of Pardons”
Certainly, not every person who applies for a pardon will be granted one. But what if the real goal is not to obtain a pardon for any particular applicant, but for this tide to lift all boats in the entire community? In doing so, it will increase the opportunity to be granted a pardon for all applicants.
“It takes a village to raise a child” is an African proverb that means that an entire community of people must take responsibility for children in order for them to experience and grow in a safe and healthy environment. This phrase and concept were famously used by Hillary Rodham Clinton in writing and titling her book It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us, in which she addresses the impact individuals and their community have on a child’s well-being and calls for a society that strives to meet all of a child’s needs. See Hillary Rodham Clinton, It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us (1996).
The point is, if the entire community subscribes to this endeavor, the benefits will not only inure to the child, but also to the village as a whole. This wider community benefit is exactly what we intend by advocating for a “Culture of Pardons.”
As we mentioned earlier, only 17 states regularly (more than 30%) approve pardon applications from previously incarcerated people. See Restoration of Rights Project, supra. This process looks vastly different state-by-state, with varying degrees of roadblocks. The decision to grant an individual’s request can be decided by the state’s governor, high officials such as the attorney general or chief justice, an independent board, a parole board, or a combination of these powers. Of course, the president also has the ability to grant an individual’s request. The fact that the threshold for deeming a state a “frequent” pardoner is only 30% shows how rare pardoning is. While state legislation is crucial to combatting this anomaly, case management must also educate and prepare their clients for applying.
Case managers should be well versed in federal and state requirements for pardon applications. Eligibility varies state by state, but we recommend waiting five years post-reentry to apply. In the meantime, caseworkers should be tracking the client’s progress. This includes monitoring community engagement, employment status, sobriety (if relevant), and program attendance. Keeping track of progress is also paramount for reentry research. This domain of research is relatively new and has lacked alignment with practitioners. Collaboration with reputable researchers can only advance our understanding and success in reintegrating clients.
Case managers should explain how to apply for a pardon while the client is incarcerated so that they are well prepared upon reentry. We recommend presenting this information as a step-by-step roadmap. Putting together a well-organized and comprehensive application will and should take time. Clients should be encouraged to include as much information as possible, going beyond what is required. The more detailed the application, the better. When in doubt, the best response is “see attached.” Including an up-to-date résumé is always a plus if the client’s state does not already require it. Character letters should be written by reputable and trustworthy peers and family members. It is important to note that many states limit the number of blood relatives when asking for character letters. By including caseworkers in the process of applying for a pardon, the individual is less likely to make mistakes on their application and, therefore, reduces their chance of rejection.
At the writing of this article, we are experiencing a worldwide COVID-19 pandemic of historic proportions. While we are hopeful that a vaccine is soon to be approved, we are reminded that it is not the vaccine that saves lives, but the vaccination that saves lives. One suggestion to overcome public resistance to vaccinations is to create an incentive program. That is, to pay people to be vaccinated. The goal is to have enough people vaccinated so that the entire community benefits from herd immunity.
Similarly, creating a Culture of Pardons not only benefits the individual post-reentry but also motivates individuals entering the justice system to immerse themselves in their rehabilitation and reentry. Granting a pardon is a life-changing moment; it opens the doors so that an individual will not be barred from housing or rejected from a job. A Culture of Pardons would set the tone for a new era of criminal justice, one where reintegration prevails over punishment. We know that punishment does not reduce recidivism, so why must we continue to treat the justice-impacted community inhumanly? Our imagination must go beyond intervention and expand upon opportunity. A Culture of Pardons puts healing above all else; it gives people a second chance. It also breaks down the wall between the justice-impacted community and the community at large.
Restoring one’s dignity, autonomy, and sense of belonging should be the ultimate goal of reentry. To put it in one word, the Problem-to-Pardons case management system and a Culture of Pardons strive for reintegration. By adopting these ideas, players in The Game of Life can see the roads merge on the horizon. Our communities and our caseworkers build this intersection, brick by brick. With their help, the justice-impacted community can catch up with those who have never been affected by the justice system. Reintegration isn’t simply leaving prison; it’s walking side by side with the community, weaving a thread between the justice-impacted and the community at large until the two become indistinguishable.
JEFF GRANT, J.D., M.Div. is an ordained minister with over three decades of experience in crisis management, business, law (former), reentry, recovery, and executive and religious leadership. After an addiction to prescription opioids and serving almost 14 months in federal prison for a white-collar crime he committed when he was a lawyer, Jeff started his own reentry, earning a Master of Divinity from Union Theological Seminary and co-founding Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc, the world’s first ministry serving the white collar justice community in Connecticut and nationwide. He may be reached at jgrant@prisonist.org.
CHLOE COPPOLA is an advocate at Progressive Prison Ministries, a liaison and navigator on behalf of our group members, organizes the podcasts White Collar Week and Criminal Justice Insider, and is a dedicated researcher and writer on mental illness, as well as criminal, racial, and women’s justice themes. Chloe can be reached at ccoppola@alumni.scu.edu.
Additional Contributors:
Cathryn Lavery, Ph.D., Consultant, Integrated Justice Solutions, Inc.
John Hart, Ph.D., Senior Research Associate, Restoring Promise, Vera Institute of Justice
Seth Williams, J.D., former District Attorney for the City of Philadelphia, PA
“Ugly confessions from beautiful people… It’s like a car wash for our shame and secrets.”– Nadia Bolz-Weber
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Huge thanks to Nadia Bolz-Weber for having me on her podcast, The Confessional. We got into some deeply personal stuff, and Nadia’s blessing at the end is the most beautiful and poignant prayer I’ve ever heard – it brought Lynn and me to tears. I am so deeply grateful. – Jeff
Link to the podcast on The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weberhere.
Listen on PRX:
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Show Notes:
Co-Founder of Progressive Prison Ministries
“I was dressed up looking the part, but deep inside, I was just vacant. I just was not someone I was proud of anymore.” – Jeff Grant
She writes and speaks about personal failings, recovery, grace, faith, and really whatever the hell else she wants to. She always sits in the corner with the other weirdoes.
Transcript:
Nadia Bolz-Weber: My name is Nadia Bolz-Weber and you have stepped into The Confessional. Joining me today is Reverend Jeff Grant. I’m delighted to have him with me in The Confessional. I can’t wait to hear your story. Welcome, Jeff.
Reverend Jeff Grant: Thanks for having me here, Nadia.
NBW: Set the scene for me, tell me what was going on in your life that led up to the moment you want to describe.
JG: I think the word that comes to mind is grandiosity. My family and I went on vacation, probably five times a year. It was always the same. There was no backpacking or skiing for us, we went shopping. We would fly out to Los Angeles and stay in the Chateau Marmont and to rub elbows with the stars that were staying there. I remember, once we were at this store that’s pretty well known. We were just spending a ton of money. and at the time, I was probably high on three or four tabs of Demerol.
The young women who worked there were just paying me with scotch. My ex wife and my kids were just picking out whatever they wanted and they just piled it up on my lap. I fell asleep in the chair and when I woke up from passing out, the clothes on my lap were over the top of my head. I was just a prop. I pulled out my black American Express card because that’s what I thought people were supposed to do, and paid for everything. We left with shopping bags worth of clothes, This was our life. There was never a day that there weren’t shopping bags and new acquisitions. It was a sickness. It was something that we took pride in, in this sick way.
NBW: Were you raised in a wealthy family, or was there a novelty to it for you?
JG: We were raised in a Jewish ghetto, on Long Island. This was the swinging ’50s, and swinging ’60s and my parents were into all kinds of crazy stuff that people were into back then.
Mostly what they were into was ignoring their children. I lived in a neighborhood of parents that were absent. We raised ourselves and we did a pretty bad job of it in a lot of ways. We didn’t really grow up with any character or ethics. We were alone, so we created rules, and we learned rules, and we developed this arrogance that didn’t serve us, certainly didn’t serve me later in life. This contempt for authority was pervasive all through my childhood and then when I went to school, and ultimately when I became a lawyer
NBW: What was your law practice like?
I had a good practice, successful.. I had about 20 people working for me. and I owned a bistro that was in the neighborhood.
NBW: What kind?
JG: It was a new American restaurant, a bistro, it had 36 seats.
and the reason I opened the restaurant was to meet clients, and I met them.
I was a backslapping, good old boy kind of guy, who people liked, I think, but everybody likes to know the owner of a restaurant. I would go over to their table and schmooze with them.
And I became the general counsel to some major real estate companies. and the money was flowing and the spending was flowing.
NBW: When I hear you describing being this successful owning businesses, being an important fixture in the community, the money’s flowing, the spending’s flowing. That sounds like you were living the dream , but what was the reality?
JG: I think it was living the dream but the problem is that it had its dark side and that was the anxiety of having to always have more and to grow way beyond my comfort zone. My payroll was about $125,000 a month, which means I had to make $1.5 million a year just to pay the over-head. The weight of that was just crushing. I thought I could solve problems by becoming bigger. It never even dawned on me that the way I could solve personal problems or business problems was to become smaller, to simplify life.
The more things ramped up and the more complicated they became, the more I turned to drugs.
I had doctor friends who kept prescribing and I kept manipulating them into it.
NBW: Can you describe that manipulation?
JG: Sure. Mostly, it was because I was the lawyer in this group of people and I held all their secrets. Everybody wanted my time, but not to pay for it if they could avoid it. What I did was I traded my time for drugs. I lived this double life where I was a great dad and family man and I own restaurants and real estate and parts of health clubs and things like that. Every night, I was stoned out of my mind.
I had a client who had broken his neck and so he had an unlimited supply of Oxycontin. He walked into my office one day, I guess he knew that I was taking prescription opioids at the time. He just opened up his hand and he dropped the pile of Oxycontin on my desk.
He said, “I think you might like this.” Once I started the Oxycontin, there was no turning back. In fact, I couldn’t even go to work. I spent afternoons sitting in his house, watching the golf channel with him.
NBW: So What happened?
JG: What happened was I stopped being able to show up to work regularly. I was just too out of it, I was too stoned.
The day came when we ran out of money in the law firm.
You just can’t not show up at your business for a year or so and expect it to be healthy
my office manager had come into my office and told me that we weren’t going to be able to make payroll. That I had to come up with some money. I remember just feeling desperate. What was I going to do?
I said to her, “How much money is in the escrow account?” She looked at me like, “What are you doing?” I said, “We’re going to borrow some money from the escrow account.”
At any given time, we had several million dollars in escrow sitting there that was client’s money, that was meant to be transferred to clients for the sales of their houses, or sales of their building, or sales of their businesses.
I had no money in my operating account and to transfer the money from the escrow account to the operating account was just two pushes of a button on a computer. I thought that I would borrow it and pay it right back, which is I guess, the great lie of everybody who gets involved in these things.
She checked me and she said, “Are you sure this is what you want to do?” I said, “Yes,” and I felt nauseated. I knew that it was wrong but on some level underneath I also knew that it was absolute and utter destruction. And that I didn’t have the character to do what really needed to get done.
I could’ve called my banker, that would’ve been sane. I could’ve called a friend,
I was just not able to do it because I was just so full of shame. instead what I did was I invaded the client escrow account and I took my client’s money. `
NBW: What did that voice of shame– What was it saying?
JG: It was telling me that I was that fat kid from first grade who got picked on. I was the kid who would sit in my room and cry when my parents were screaming at each other.
There I was all alone. There was nothing I had. I had an empty well. I had nothing in reserve. Nothing.
NBW: You made this choice to take money out of the escrow account … and it made you sick to do it, but then did it keep feeling that way every other time you did it?
JG: I think the answer to that is yes, but I became increasingly numb. Less guilty, but more shamed, was feeling shame in everything. I was dressed up looking the part, but deep inside, I was just vacant. I just was not someone I was proud of anymore. The reasons I had become a lawyer, the initial goal to help people, I wasn’t helping anyone anymore. I was just trying to make enough money to survive.
It wasn’t long after that, that there was an investigation into my finances by the grievance committee of the bar…and we fought it for over two years.
Once the investigation started and I was compounding the lying that were depositions and I was lying through the depositions, because what choice did I have? I was living a lie and I probably believed the lie in a lot of ways
During those two years was 9/11. That really threw me for a loop. It’s like it is right now in COVID. The world was spinning out of control. There were advertisements on TV and on the radio for businesses that were in economic distress to borrow money from the Small Business Administration, just like there are now. I applied for an SBA loan but I lied on the application and said I had an office about a block from ground zero.
They lent me the money, $247,000 but it didn’t do anything to save my firm because my firm was heading down.
I took most of the money and I repaid personal credit cards that I had run up trying to save the business. That was money laundering. That was a violation of the terms of the loan. I think a lot of people are probably doing that right now. The lesson I learned was that you can’t save your business and your lifestyle at the time.
One day in July of 2002, I couldn’t handle it anymore. The news was just not good in terms of trying to save my business. I called up my ethics attorney and told him to resign my law license for me. I’ve got one last prescription from a doctor friend. AndI went home that night. After my wife and kids went to bed, I took 40 tabs of Demerol and tried to kill myself.
NBW: It’s amazing, you’re alive. It’s astounding.
JG: It didn’t kill me—
I wound up going through detox and then seven weeks in rehab.
When I came out of rehab, I went to my first recovery meeting. That was eighteen and a half years ago. After 9,000 meetings, I’ve never touched another drug or drink since.
I was sober for about 20 months, and I was going to three meetings a day to recover. I got a phone call from a federal agent, who told me that there was a warrant out for my arrest in connection with the misrepresentations I’d made on that loan. I knew that I was cornered.
Two weeks later, I appeared at the US courthouse in Downtown Manhattan and turned myself into the US marshals. Downtown Manhattan then was still like a war zone, post 9/11. There were checkpoints and barricades and military outside of buildings with machine guns. I felt like the biggest criminal in the world. I knew that I had taken advantage of a national emergency and had profited from it by borrowing this money.
NBW: Jeff, it strikes me that at the beginning you talked about how it never dawned on you that you could solve your problems by getting smaller, or asking for help – that like, the grandiosity you inhabited in this life you built drove you to keep going in the same direction that was destroying you.
But you also started out by telling me about your wife and kids – what happened there?
JG: My wife had had it with me already. When the time came that I got arrested, I guess that was the last straw. She threw me out. Any money I had, I dedicated to paying for her and my kids’ rent and overhead. I couch-surfed for two years waiting to go to prison.
NBW: You went from high-end retail vacation, having all the luxury goods piled up and paying for them, to you covering their basic expenses and sleeping on people’s sofas.
JG: Yes. That was pretty much the case right up to when I went to prison in 2006.
NBW: Wow. Tell me about going to prison.
JG: On Easter Sunday of 2006, I reported to Allenwood low-security correctional institution in White Deer, Pennsylvania.
On that compound of 1,500 men. There were five former stockbrokers. There was one former lawyer that was me and there were two former doctors and basically 1,500 drug dealers. For the next 13 and a half months, I learned how to navigate life in a prison of people who– the type of person I had never really met in my life.
I learned incredible life lessons while I was in prison about respect and dignity and humility and character. I met some of the most fascinating, interesting, intelligent people I’d ever met in my life.
NBW: You know what just kind of dawns on me is when you were describing your childhood, you were like, “We had to parent ourselves and we weren’t good at it. There was no one there to teach us about character and responsibility.” You literally just described that you finally learned those things from drug dealers in prison.
JG: Yes. I’m getting the chills. You just telling me that, but that’s true. I knew nothing about how to treat other people. I knew nothing about how to treat myself. When I came out of prison I was different. My motivations were different, the things I cared about were different, I was broken, I was softer, I was gentler, I started to volunteer.
I volunteered in drug rehabs and in residential criminal justice organizations until the day came when I didn’t really know what I was going to do and I went to the pastor of the church that I had been going to and I tried to describe to him that I want to live a life of service, but I don’t know what that means. He said to me I think you should consider going to seminary.
NBW: It’s a sucker punch.
JG: Yes. I had no idea what that meant.
NBW: That’s probably the only reason you agreed to go.
JG: I thought a seminary was where monks walked around in robes.
NBW: Sure.
JG: I didn’t know. He explained to me that a progressive seminary was really a place to learn about social justice. I applied to Union Theological Seminary in New York City.
It was the first time I’d ever told my story anywhere. I had to write it in my application
NBW: What’d that feel like?
JG: It was horrifying. It was the most frightening thing I could imagine. It probably felt more frightening than going to prison because I had to tell the truth.
NBW: Yikes
JG: I was as surprised as I could be when I got the letter in the mail that I was accepted to seminary and it wasn’t easy.
It was also a time when all the students were involved in Occupy Wall Street, and they were down fighting against the one-percenters and I had been a one-percenter., They didn’t know what to make of me, but I learned about the underground economy, and I learned about showing up for people because it was the right thing to do not because they could afford my services, for example.
NBW: Can you tell me who and what did you harm through the crimes that you committed?
JG: It took me probably 10 years or more to recognize that I hurt anybody. It was only when working with other men who had been through similar circumstances and counseling them that I was able to talk to them about the wreckage that they had caused and then finally recognize in me that I did that too. That I’d hurt my ex wife, I hurt my children, I hurt my community, I hurt all the people who were dependent upon me, I hurt my clients. I hurt the fabric of the profession that I made my living in that I hurt people’s ability to trust lawyers.
NBW: Jeff, can you name what it is that prevented you from seeing that? You just had a long list there, what kept you from seeing the fact that you had caused that kind of harm?
JG: I think that primarily, it was self pity, and also, it was the only way I knew how to cope. I had to compartmentalize. It was unbearable to look backwards.
NBW: It’s amazing to me how often our coping mechanisms involve some sort of mental gymnastics we have to perform in order to justify our behavior – where we basically just cant let in competing information about ourselves
JG: Later on, I asked friends, “You must’ve seen I was crazy, that I was acting crazy, that I was on drugs. Why didn’t you ever say anything?” They all said, “We did say things. We all told you that you needed help. You just couldn’t hear us.”
NBW: How many of us have those people in our friends and family groups, who we see them spinning out and we’re totally powerless. We do the brave thing of confronting them or saying something or going like, “This isn’t okay, and you need help.” They have a million justifications for why they’re actually fine and you’re wrong.
JG: Exactly.
NBW: The guilt that so many people carry because they can’t help this person in their life.
NBW: Jeff, Before we go, I’d love to hear about the work you do now.
JG: I met a woman in recovery who later became my wife and We decided to start a ministry to support white collar criminals and their families. No one had ever done it. There’s so much stigma and shame and schadenfreude for these people who – their families have been destroyed and they can’t get jobs and they’re facing prison sentences or they’ve come home from prison.
JG: And If I sit down with someone who has been prosecuted for a white collar crime and we meet in a diner, for example, and we sit down, and he doesn’t know that I’m gauging him from the minute that we shake hands.If he’s wearing a $50,000 watch, I already know that that’s what he’s using to hide behind. There is so much shame there. There’s so much that he can’t talk about. There he is, with his arms folded in front of him and using that watch as a shield.
NBW: That’s extraordinary. I love that this is the work that you do. It’s just incredible.. where are you at with self-forgiveness?
JG: I would love to be able to tell you that I’ve forgiven myself but it’s so different than feeling like I’ve been forgiven. Because in my heart, I really do feel like I’ve been forgiven. Whether that’s Jesus or God or just the universe has opened up again so that it’s allowed me to feel like a whole person maybe for the first time in my life. I honestly do feel forgiven. Do I forgive myself? Maybe on a good day. It’s fleeting but I do get to experience it every once in a while.
NBW: I guess sometimes for myself when I don’t feel that self-forgiveness, I just have to rely on redemption. I feel redeemed. A lot of my mistakes or my f ailings have gone through some fucking spiritual dishwasher and are to be useful for other people. It wasn’t all for naught. The end sum is more than just the harm that was caused, that there has been good that’s come out of it, and sometimes I just have to lean on that.
Well, I’m really grateful for you sharing your story and I just absolutely love the work that you do in the world. It just feels subversive in the most spiritual sense of the word. You know? [chuckling]
JG: Yeah.
NBW: Well, keep doing it, friend. Glad you’re out in the world.
It’s the Isolation that Destroys Us. The Solution is in Community.
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Podcast Ep. 30, Guest: Barry Bekkedam Sets the Record Straight
Today on the podcast we have Barry Bekkedam. This is Barry’s first interview since returning from Federal prison last year.
What I like most about Barry was his openness and candor as he painstakingly takes us through his remarkable story from immigrant, to the Villanova basketball team (he’s 6’10” tall!), to real estate investor, to multi-billion dollar Main Line investment manager – and then to his problems when some of his clients lost money in the Rothstein Ponzi scheme and then as former Chairman of a bank accused of TARP fraud.
Barry took his case to trial and was partially vindicated, but ultimately was sentenced to serve 11 months in a Federal prison camp. Barry’s is an incredible story of resilience through over a decade of issues.
So, coming up, Barry Bekkedam sets the record straight. On White Collar Week. I hope you will join us. – Jeff
Listen on Apple Podcasts:
Listen on Spotify:
Listen on SoundCloud:
Watch on YouTube:
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If you have a friend, family member, colleague or client with a white collar justice issue, please forward this post; they can reach us anytime – day or night! Our contact info:http://prisonist.org/contact-us.
You can find all episodes of our podcast “White Collar Week with Jeff Grant” on our websiteprisonist.org,our Facebook page, Podbean, YouTube (video), SoundCloud, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, LinkedIn, Instagram and Twitter.
Entrepreneur’s #4 Most Viewed Article of 2020: I Went to Prison for SBA Loan Fraud – 7 Things to Know When Taking COVID-19 Relief Money: by Jeff Grant, J.D., M.Div.. Link to article here.
The Philadelphia Inquirer: Steal Money from the Feds? First, Meet Jeff Grant, an Ex-Con who Committed Loan Fraud, by Erin Arvedlund: Link to article here.
Clara CFO Smolinski YouTube: Thinking About PPP Fraud?: Hannah Smolinski Interviews Jeff Grant About Going to Prison for SBA Loan Fraud. Sponsored by Upside Financial. Link to article and YouTube video here.
CFO Dive: After Serving Time, Fraudster Cautions Against PPP, Other Emergency Loans, by Robert Freedman. Link to article here.
Fraud Stories Podcast with Mark Lurie: SBA/PPP Loan Fraud with Guest: Jeff Grant. Link to podcast here.
Forbes: As Law Enforcement Pursues SBA Loan Fraud, Jeff Grant Talks Redemption, by Kelly Phillips Erb. Link to article here.
Taxgirl Podcast: Jeff Grant talks Desperation and Loans in a Time of Crisis with Kelly Phillips Erb on Her Podcast. Link to article and podcast here.
Business Talk with Jim Campbell: Jeff Grant Talks with Jim About Going to Prison for SBA Loan Fraud and What to Know When Taking Coronavirus Relief Money, Biz Talk Radio Network, Broadcast from 1490 AM WGCH Greenwich, CT. Listen on YouTube here.
Babz Rawls Ivy Show: Babz Rawls Ivy & Jeff Grant Talk SBA / PPP Loan Fraud and 7 Things to Know Before You Take Coronavirus Relief Money, WNHH 103.5 FM New Haven. Watch on YouTube here.
White Collar Week with Jeff Grant, Podcast Ep. 21: All Things SBA, PPP & EIDL, with Guest: Hannah Smolinski, CPA, Virtual CFO: Link here.
White Collar Week with Jeff Grant, Podcast Episode 09: Small Business Edition, with Guest Kelly Phillips Erb. Link here.
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Louis Reed/Babz Rawls Ivy PSA:
Some very kind words from my dear friends Louis L. Reed and Babz Rawls Ivy in this brief PSA. Thank you Louis and Babz! – Jeff
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All Episodes:
Link here to Podcast Ep. 30, Guests: Barry Bekkedam Sets the Record Straight
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 29, Guests: The Entrepreneurs, David Israel & Spencer Oberg
Link here to Podcast Ep. 28, Guests: The Investigators, Kelly Paxton & Brian Willingham
Link here to Podcast Ep. 27, The Addicted Lawyer, Guest: Brian Cuban
Link here to Podcast Ep. 26, Oppression & Identity, Guests: Jaco & Leslie Theron
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 25, Ex-Philadelphia D.A., Seth Williams, Part Two
Link here to Podcast Ep. 24, Ex-Philadelphia D.A., Seth Williams, Part One
Link here to Podcast Ep. 23, The Vanishing Trial, Robert Katzberg
Link here to Podcast Ep. 22: The Goddess, with Guest: Babz Rawls Ivy
Link here to Podcast Ep. 21: All Things SBA, PPP & EIDL, with Guest: Hannah Smolinski, CPA, Virtual CFO
Link here to Podcast Ep. 20: Reinventing Yourself After Prison, with Guests: Glenn E. Martin & Richard Bronson
Link here to Podcast Ep. 19: Insider Trading Charges Dismissed, with Guest: Richard Lee
Link here to Podcast Ep. 18: Is Your Life a Movie? The Producers, with Guests: Lydia B. Smith, Bethany Jones & Will Nix
Link here to Podcast Ep. 17: #TruthHeals, Systemic Abuse & Institutional Reform with Guest: Vanessa Osage, feat. Guest Co-Host Chloe Coppola
Link here to Podcast Ep. 16: Politicians, Prison & Penitence, with Guest: Bridgeport, CT Mayor Joseph Ganim
Link here to Podcast Ep. 15: A Brave Talk About Suicide, with Guests Bob Flanagan, Elizabeth Kelley, & Meredith Atwood
Link here to Podcast Ep. 14: Recovery & Neighborhood, with Guest: TNP’s Tom Scott
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 13: Everything but Bridgegate, with Guest: Bill Baroni
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 12: The Truth Tellers, with Guests: Holli Coulman & Larry Levine
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 11: Blank Canvas, with Guest: Craig Stanland
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 10: The Ministers, with Guests: Father Joe Ciccone & Father Rix Thorsell
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 09: Small Business Edition, with Guest: Taxgirl Kelly Phillips Erb
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 08: The Academics, with Guests: Cathryn Lavery, Jessica Henry, Jay Kennedy & Erin Harbinson
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 07: White Collar Wives. with Guests: Lynn Springer, Cassie Monaco & Julie Bennett. Special Guest: Skylar Cluett
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 06: Madoff Talks, with Guest: Jim Campbell
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 05: Trauma and Healing when Mom goes to Prison, with Guests: Jacqueline Polverari and Her Daughters, Alexa & Maria
Link here to Podcast Ep. 04: One-on-One with Tipper X, with Guest: Tom Hardin
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 03: Compassionate Lawyering, with Guests: Chris Poulos, Corey Brinson, Bob Herbst & George Hritz
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 02: Substance Abuse & Recovery During COVID-19, with Guests: Trevor Shevin & Joshua Cagney
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 01: An Evening with Our White Collar Support Group, with Guests: 16 Members of Our White Collar Support Group
Linkhereto Podcast Ep. 00: White Collar Week with Jeff Grant: What is White Collar Week?
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Jeff Grant
What is the White Collar Justice Community?
Welcome to White Collar Week with Jeff Grant, a podcast serving the white collar justice community. It’s the isolation that destroys us. The solution is in community.
If you are interested in this podcast, then you are probably already a member of the white collar justice community – even if you don’t quite know it yet. Our community is certainly made up of people being prosecuted, or who have already been prosecuted, for white collar crimes. But it is also made up of the spouses, children and families of those prosecuted for white collar crimes – these are the first victims of white collar crime. And the community also consists of the other victims, both direct and indirect, and those in the wider white collar ecosystem like friends, colleagues, prosecutors, defense attorneys, judges, law enforcement, academics, researchers. Investigators, mitigation experts, corrections officers, parole & probation officers, reentry professionals, mental health care professionals, drug and alcohol counselors – and ministers, chaplains and advocates for criminal and social justice reform. The list goes on and on…
Our mission is to introduce you to other members of the white collar justice community, to hear their very personal stories, and hopefully gain a broader perspective of what this is really all about. Maybe this will inspire some deeper thoughts and introspection? Maybe it will inspire some empathy and compassion for people you might otherwise resent or dismiss? And maybe it will help lift us all out of our own isolation and into community, so we can learn to live again in the sunshine of the spirit.
Along the way, I’ll share with you some of the things I’ve learned in my own journey from successful lawyer, to prescription opioid addict, white collar crime, suicide attempt, disbarment, destruction of my marriage, and the almost 14 months I served in a Federal prison. And also my recovery, love story I share with my wife Lynn Springer, after prison earning a Master of Divinity from Union Theological Seminary in NYC, pastoring in an inner city church in Bridgeport CT, and then co-founding with Lynn in Greenwich CT, Progressive Prison Ministries, the world’s first ministry serving the white collar justice community. It’s been quite a ride, but I firmly believe that the best is yet to come.
So I invite you to come along with me as we experience something new, and bold, and different – a podcast that serves the entire white collar justice community. I hope you will join me.
It’s the Isolation that Destroys Us. The Solution is in Community.
Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc. is the world’s first ministry supporting the white collar justice community. Founded by husband and wife,Jeff Grantand Lynn Springerin Greenwich CT in 2012, we incorporated as a nonprofit in Connecticut in 2014, and received 501(c)(3) status in 2015. Jeff has over three decades of experience in crisis management, business, law (former), reentry, recovery (clean & sober 17+ years), and executive and religious leadership. As Jeff was incarcerated for a white-collar crime he committed in 2001, he and Lynn have a first-hand perspective on the trials and tribulations that white-collar families have to endure as they navigate the criminal justice system and life beyond.
Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc. is nonsectarian, serving those of all faiths, or no faith whatsoever. To date we have helped over three hundred fifty (350) individuals, and their families, to accept responsibility for their actions and to acknowledge the pain they have caused to others. In accordance with our commitment to restorative justice, we counsel our members to make amends as a first step in changing their lives and moving towards a new spiritual way of living centered on hope, care, compassion, tolerance, empathy and service to others. Our team has grown to over ten people, most with advanced degrees, all of whom are currently volunteering their time and resources.
Progressive Prison Ministries’ goal is to provide spiritual solutions and emotional support to those who are feeling alone, isolated, and hopeless. We have found that these individuals are suffering from a void but are stuck, and don’t know what to do about it. Our objective is to help them find a path to a healthy, spirit-filled place on the other side of what may seem like insurmountable problems. Many of those we counsel are in a place where their previous lives have come to an end due to their transgressions. In many cases their legal problems have led to divorce, estrangement from their children, families, friends and support communities, and loss of a career. The toll this takes on individuals and families is emotionally devastating. White-collar crimes are often precipitated by other issues in the offenders’ lives such as alcohol or drug abuse, and/or a physical or mental illness that lead to financial issues that overwhelms their ability to be present for themselves and their families and cause poor decision making. We recognize that life often presents us with such circumstances, sometimes which lead us to make mistakes in violation of the law.
All conversations and communications between our ordained ministry, and licensed clinical relationships, and those we serve fall under state privilege laws. This is one reason that attorneys often allow and encourage their clients to maintain relationships with us while in active prosecution or litigation situations.
If you, a friend, family member, colleague or client are suffering from a white collar criminal justice issue or are experiencing some other traumatic or life-altering event, and would like to find a path to a healthy, spirit-filled place on the other side of what seems like insurmountable problems, please contact us to schedule an initial call or appointment.
Copyright 2021, All Rights Reserved, Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc.,
Jim Campbell has been an incredible friend to the white collar justice community, bringing unbiased and non-sensationalized truth and light to complicated subject matter. He has brought compassion and empathy to people going through the most difficult times of their lives – without ever compromising his journalistic integrity. I have had the grace and good fortune of being interviewed by Jim for his nationally syndicated business radio shows, and on his local newscasts at WGCH, his home radio station in Greenwich, CT. Jim has also been a guest on our White Collar Week podcast, links to YouTube (video) and podcast below.
I have read a review copy of his new book, Madoff Talks: Uncovering the Untold Story Behind the Most Notorious Ponzi Scheme in History (available for pre-order now) and it is an absolute must-read for those of us in the white collar justice community – and for everyone else who wants to truly understand not only Bernie Madoff the man, his crimes and his pathology, but also the systematic breakdown of every safeguard the government and Wall Street were supposed to have in place to protect us. Five stars! – Jeff
In the twelve years from gaining the most extensive media access to Bernie, Ruth and Andrew Madoff, in “Madoff Talks,” I uncovered a seeming endless stream of often shocking, little-known, revelations in the largely untold story behind the most notorious Ponzi scheme in history. “Madoff Talks” for the first time reveals whether Ruth, Andrew, or Mark Madoff were complicit in any way in the Ponzi scheme. It delves into: why Bernie got on the path to Ponzi; how Bernie did it for so long; how his crimes were uncovered; and includes the systemic failure on Wall Street and among the regulators. It puts Bernie on the couch and examines how he could be have built legitimate and criminal businesses side-by-side; and how he was more complex than just a sociopath. – Jim Campbell
Jim, this certainly sounds strange coming from me, but I was a constant critic of Wall Street. I was a product of the corrupt culture of Wall Street.” – Bernie Madoff, in an email to Jim Campbell
Longtime Wall Street sales maven Frank Casey, blessed with an Irish flair for anecdotes, coupled with an ability to reduce financial complexities to simple common sense, was the first to uncover that Bernard L. Madoff was not who he seemed to be. It was November of 1999, a full decade before the fall of Madoff. Frank was making a sales call to gather assets for a hedge fund at the New York City office of the aristocratic French money manager René-Thierry Magon de La Villehuchet. René was an old-style gentleman. His word was his bond. Trust was his currency. He invested that trust with Bernie Madoff.
Rene’s mellifluous name and bearing was only outdone by the upper-crust and royal families of Europe he counted among his trusting customers. René ran what was to become known as one of the first Madoff “feeder funds,” money managers who would funnel investors’ assets into the hands of Bernie Madoff and his secretive hedge fund. At the time, it was still largely unknown that Madoff was even in the hedge fund business, much less that he was running one of the biggest operations in the world behind locked doors on the seventeenth floor of the distinctive, oval-shaped “Lipstick Building” in midtown Manhattan, home to Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities. The secrecy and security on the seventeenth floor was so extensive that even Madoff ’s sons, Mark and Andrew, who ran the big market making and proprietary trading operation up on the nineteenth floor – where Madoff made his name as a market maker executing trades for the likes of Charles Schwab & Company—lacked electronic key-card access.
Frank Casey’s Boston-based hedge fund, Rampart Investment Management, was, without his knowledge, a competitor of Madoff ’s invisible investment advisory business. The Frenchman demurred to Casey’s sales pitch. He wasn’t interested in working with a different fund manager, as he had found one with a seemingly uniquely reliable performance record. He had already put all his clients’ assets into just that one fund, an unusual risk for a fund of funds manager, as it left his investors undiversified. Unusually, René was not allowed to reveal the identity of the fund manager, or he would be thrown out of the fund, along with his investors’ money.
There was a compelling reason René found it unnecessary to diversify funds, though it was not related to the benefit of his investors. Inexplicably in the world of hedge funds, the secretive hedge fund manager had opted to forgo taking any of the lucrative management fees that made “hedgies” some of the richest guys on earth. Rather, he passed them on to the feeder funds. This decision was an unimaginably good deal for René. Hedge funds normally charged exorbitant fees, referred to as “2 and 20”—meaning 2 percent of assets under management, plus 20 percent of the gains (while suffering none of the losses).
Passing all that on to the feeders was tantamount to kickbacks. This book tells the full story of the feeder fund corruption for the first time. After listening to René describe the strategy and investment performance of the hidden fund, to Frank, it immediately reeked of “too good to be true.” Frank smelled a financial rat. He intuitively sensed implausible results. René remained adamant. He implicitly trusted this apparent Wizard of Wall Street operating behind a curtain of anonymity.
Then, as fate would have it, René was distracted by a phone call a few minutes later. Frank surreptitiously turned over one of the papers on a clerk’s desk revealing a financial statement with the name “Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities.” Frank hadn’t heard of Bernard L. Madoff at the time. All Frank sensed was that this guy’s investment returns could “not be market-driven.” That’s Wall Street speak for fraud.
Casey proceeded to share his findings with his boss, Harry Markopolos, the quant savant who managed the fund at Rampart and would go on to notoriety as the whistleblower whom the SEC chose not to listen to. Harry did a deep dive into the statistical likelihood whether Madoff ’s strategy could produce the returns René was convinced he could trust.
The chase for Madoff and the truth was on. For Harry, it would become an obsession. For René, the results would be tragic. Less than two weeks after Madoff ’s arrest, he would commit suicide in his New York office. It was a matter of honor after his investors lost $1.8 billion with his “trusted friend.” Readers will be surprised just how much they don’t know about the complete Madoff story…
New York, New York – April 2021. “Jim, this certainly sounds strange coming from me, but I was a constant critic of Wall Street. I was a product of the corrupt culture of Wall Street.”– Bernie Madoff, in an email to Jim Campbell
No name is more synonymous with the evil side of Wall Street than Bernie Madoff. Arrested for fraud in 2008—during the depths of the financial crisis—the 70-year old market maker, investment advisor and former chairman of the NASDAQ had
orchestrated the largest Ponzi scheme in world history, fleecing thousands of investors across the globe to the tune of $65 billion. To this day, questions remain: Why did he do it? How did he get away with it for so long? What did his family know? Who is the elusive Bernie Madoff?
For the first time, Madoff has gone on the record to explain why and how he orchestrated the biggest Ponzi scheme in history. In over 400 pages of handwritten letters and emails between him and author Jim Campbell, Madoff shares never-before-heard details about his business and family and how he got away with committing fraud for so long.
Also, for the first time, Ruth Madoff, Andrew Madoff and Madoff’s lawyer, Ira Sorkin, reveal what they knew and if they were complicit.
“The question behind every fraud is why? For all the coverage of Bernie Madoff, the question still hangs in the air. Read Jim Campbell’s wonderfully reported book and you’ll finally get some answers.” – Bethany McLean, author of the best seller The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron.
Even though we know how the story ends, Madoff Talks’ fast-paced, suspenseful narrative shows Madoff at his manipulative best: explaining, justifying and rationalizing his actions and behaviors. All the while, Campbell’s investigative work challenges and refutes Madoff’s claims. From his exhaustive research, Campbell offers more than 30 recommendations to individual investors to be smart with their money and to the SEC, SIPC, FINRA and feeder funds.
About the Author
Jim Campbell is the host of the nationally syndicated radio show Business Talk with Jim Campbell and his crime show Forensic Talk with Jim Campbell. He is known for his hard-hitting interviews of leading figures from the worlds of business, politics and sports. Known for “firsts,” Campbell snagged the first extensive interview with former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer after his resignation; the first interview with former Tyco CEO Denis Kozlowski after his release from prison; and the first broadcast interview with former stock analyst Roomy Kahn, a government informant in one of the biggest insider trading busts in American history.
Campbell’s extensive corporate, consulting and entrepreneurial business background includes roles at KPMG Consulting, Dean Witter Financial Services (now Morgan Stanley) and IBM. He is founder and president at JC Ventures, Inc., a management consulting business.
Best of White Collar Week with Jeff Grant: From July 2020
Podcast Ep. 06: Madoff Talks, with Guest: Jim Campbell
Today on the podcast we have Jim Campbell, a radio host and journalist based in Greenwich, Connecticut, who hosts a nationally syndicated business affairs show, Business Talk with Jim Campbell. He also hosts another show, Forensic Talk, that dives into the world of financial crimes. It’s probably not surprising that Jim and I are friends, and that he has interviewed me on both of his shows.
Today we turn the tables and Jim the interviewer becomes Jim the guest, as we talk about his upcoming book, Madoff Talks: Uncovering the Untold Story Behind the Most Notorious Ponzi Scheme in History. Jim’s book will be published April 2021 (McGraw Hill). He is now putting the finishing touches on his multi-year dialogue with Bernie Madoff in prison, Bernie’s wife Ruth Madoff, and Bernie’s late son Andrew Madoff, as well as government investigators, lawyers, witnesses, and most importantly, the victims. While Jim has culled over 400 pages of actual emails with Bernie Madoff – and presents Madoff’s words verbatim – he never accepts any of it at face value. Jim investigates the truth behind the man, the family, the fraud, and the systemic breakdown of the SEC, big banks, and every watchdog that had the obligation and opportunity to stop the fraud before more people got hurt. But failed.
The Bernie Madoff story was, and remains, one of the biggest tales of grandiosity and greed that Wall Street has ever known, and certainly the largest Ponzi scheme in history. And we have an inside, up-close look on today’s podcast.
So, coming up, Madoff Talks, with our guest Jim Campbell. On White Collar Week. I hope you will join us. – Jeff
