After 26 years of crime, Jon ironically found hope in prison and committed his life to helping other returning citizens live at levels that they had never dreamed about. His Hope for Prisoners has had over 4,700 clients and boasts a recidivism rate of only 8%, which is over 8 times better than the national average. Most extraordinary is that they've recruited 135 Las Vegas law enforcement officers to mentor returning citizens, which has never been done at this scale before.
Hey, it's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks. Again, let's continue with part two of our conversation with John Ponder right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. How long of that six and a half years did you spend in that jail?
Oh, it was, it was I did the whole Uh you know, well you got to get eighty five percent of your time, but whatever, whatever, that worked.
Five six years. Well yeah, and so that's that's hard time. Oh, it's federal time. Oh yeah, and so John, I love man. I'm a I like to understand people. It's it's I find it fascinating. I find people fascinating. If I've owned children, fascinating. Actually I have to find my own children and pain of the put most time, but also fascinating. John, you have a whole life of crime. You have a whole life of game banging. You've told me that you were an addict, which makes you, frankly a normal person. And it is an amazing story about how you found your faith and God founds you and your found your father. But you know, almost everybody on their deathbed finds religion. And then when you don't die, the religion tends to wane in these people. And so I'm hearing your story, and my question is, you did six years in the federal penitentiary. And in the federal penitentiary, if any of the stories I've been told by be who've done time are true, the gangs is rampant inside the jails there out, the drugs are is rampant inside the jails out. The crime is his rampant inside the jails out. The abuse is his rampant inside the jails out. And yeah, you've made the deal, but you're still the guy that spent his whole life in this world? How how did you get God led you there? But the real human of this you had to have had the grip. Hadn't turned a loose yet, There's no way. It's just completely You had to have felt pulled at times.
Right, you know, I think that just like anything in life, when people are looking to change, right, the biggest battle that we have is fighting the gravitational pull back into that life that you're trying to get.
What I'm asking you had six years in the.
Pen, absolutely, and listen for me.
When I went to the pen in my mind and I remember even the day that I was pulling up into USB Allenwood in Pennsylvania. Right, the big doors opened up and it was a bust. They had dogs undereath the bus scared when that oh my gosh, I was scared to death. I was one hund percent scared to death.
It's you know, tough street kid, right, and everybody's got this hard.
But I was scared to death.
And when that second door opened up and I looked and I saw that big, gigantic seal that said, uh, you know, maximum Security, United States Federal Penitentiary, Allenwood. That's when the fear really kicked in. But I sat on that bus and I looked up at that sign, and I remember the commitment I made to God, and in my mind, I changed the words on that sign and it said Allenwood, United States Federal Learning Institution.
That's awesome.
It was the Bible College for me. Right in my mind, that bust, you chuck.
Bible College.
And that bus chugged forward and listen, I went in there and in here and in here, I went to school. In your head, in your heart, in my head, in my heart was all the other stupid stuff happened, and stuff I was involved. With before was it happening all around me all day long? But I know I had to stay MANIACI focused on number one, getting to know better this God that I just surrendered my life to. And I'll tell you is this Passes description. I'm in the paraphrase when Paul and Silas in the Book of Acts, they were arrested and they were put in prison, right, and the Philippi and jailer had them housed. They were down in the basement and they were chained, and they said that pauland Silas was was singing and worshiping. And they said they were singing in worshiping in the middle of night. The walls came down.
The chains fell off of them, right, but they kept singing and worshiping.
Right.
So the question is is that they were in prison and that chained and bound in the dungeon of this prison, and the walls fell down, the chains came off, and the Philippi and jailer was about to kill himself and they were like, no, wait, don't do that, We're right here, because he thought they escaped on his watch.
Right.
So the reason why Paul and Silas, that's the question, why didn't they get up and leave. Why didn't get him and run? And they answer lies in the reason why they did not get up and run because Paul and Silas and here was already set.
Free in their heart and their soul. So they had their own liberty inside them.
Right, So many years ago, while I was in prison, you had liberty.
Oh my gosh, I was already set free behind fifty foot walls.
So you had you had that liberty, You had your head.
Absolutely, it didn't matter.
My hope didn't come the day did I walked out that back door. That liberty came for me the dyd I surrendered my life to Jesus.
Do you know there's another thing that just popped in my head hearing you, is that Nelson Mandela, when spending twenty seven years in jail in South Africa and never giving up and then becoming president of the country.
Ye, phenomenal.
And what was most phenomenal when he came out is he said, we are not going to punish or penalize those who punished and penalized me. And when asked why he could do that, he said it was because he made his body had always been locked up, but.
He was always free. Yes, yes, he was.
Free in his heart mind right, And I hear you say that that Nelson Mandela story. So you're free and but you but let's be honest. You figured that out. The vast majority of the two million people incarcerated entry, right, don't feel that freedom, right right? So how do you start? Hope for president starts come from right right?
Well, you know, I tell people that hope for prisoners was a vision that God impregnated me with when I was in prison, and I came home to give birth to it. Right, invests in every week and moment of my time while I'm in prison or learning all those things that so you're.
Setting up the infrastructure of it in your mind in prison, you're fundamentally getting the nuts of bolts.
Absolutely, I got zero money. I don't know what I'm doing. I didn't have the background experience and so forth and so on.
All I know that that did you think about robbing a bank? Just started? I'm just kidding, I guess.
Yeah, yeah, no, I just had to wanted to depend on I know that if God gave me this vision, He's going to give me the provoke, the provision.
So yeah, again obvious, So you're here, you got you. You spent six years building it, right, you got your own freedom, you got your own hope, I get all that, but you get to Vegas and you got this great idea, but you're not funded. And frankly, if I'm somebody that that has the authority and or the funds to help you, you know, there's a lot of people that come out of prison that say they're going to do absolutely and so how in the world am I gonna Why am I going to choose to back you versus a thousand other people that have dreamed up ways to live now that the recit division rate says are very unlikely to follow through. How did you get it done? Joe?
You know, I think that I did it.
It got done with a lot of prayer, right, and it was this And this is a saying that I live by in my life.
Right, I'm not going to sit there and.
Tell you what I'm gonna do, because people, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna I'm gonna let my actions speak so loudly that you can barely hear what I'm saying. And even when I was moving forward in the world around me, was slamming doors in my face. I couldn't get in the batter Department of Corrections roll and Probation fund.
Is that is what I'm saying. I can't imagine anybody would even listen exactly.
But what I had to always do when the world around me was telling me no, I had to hold on to that, Yes, God gave me behind fifty foot walls that this is going to happen. You keep digging the trenches and you know, I'll be the provider, and it just you know, two thousand, two thousand into twenty ten, twenty eleven, we hit the ground and never look back.
We'll be right back. Hope for Prisoners has helped nearly thirty five hundred returning citizens reintegrate back into society, and they've done it successfully. As we mentioned earlier, they only have an eight percent recidivism rate. They're rich programming and rich love inspires real hope for folks who really haven't had a lot of hope in their life. The participants first enter what they call a prevocational training program, which includes courses on soft and hard skills for employment readiness and success in life, like public speaking, leadership, emotional intelligence, and things as simple as just how to operate email. They're also matched up with a group of mentors for the long term who walk alongside them throughout life and continually provide reference points for what a healthy and productive life looks like, something that a lot of these folks have never had before. And then there's a third element, the element that I think is the magic to the whole program. And I couldn't really wait to talk to John about it. Law enforcement officers tours, the very people who once locked them up are now leading their training and their mentoring. And get this, the law enforcement officers, the police, the FBI, the people involved in the program are not being ordered to do it. They're not on the clock, they're not getting paid to do it. They actually are volunteering to mentor these folks because they simply care.
Again, everything is birth in prayer.
You know.
I had the vision to be able to do that because the FBI agent that was on my case he is my dear friend to this day, which is insane. Yeah, and he came alongside me when I first came home from prison and we developed this friendship.
Did you call him? I think he reached out to me. The man that arrested you FBI to you. He came back yep, yepol And listen.
When I was at the Federal half as in Vegas, I'm here for like two days and all of a sudden, I get hauled up front and then the FBI agent. I come up front the FBI agents there, and he was like, Hey, John, how you doing.
Welcome home?
And then he leaned into me and he said to me, Hey, I just want to let you know my wife and I have been praying for you since you and right there in that moment.
John, are you kidding?
I can't make this up.
The man that arrested you absolutely and your buddies.
Now and he's my buddy.
Why did he do that? John?
You know? I I because I think that And I had no idea at the time when he took me into customy custody there he was a Christian.
I had no idea or you wouldn't have cared. Absolutely.
But you know there's another paths of the scripture that in classes one thirteen it says that he plucks you out of the kingdom of darkness and conveys you into the kingdom of the Son of His Love. I believe God used FBI agent Richie Beasley to pluck me out of the kingdom of darkness.
He saved my life.
And put me on this trajectory to who I am today. So again him being a long horseman officer and me but appreciating those friendships. I just was saying, man, how could we do this same thing with other law enforcement?
In other words, the impact he had on your life. Yes, yes, I know what that meant to me as a felon. I need other felons to see that law enforcement is really not bad. Absolutely, and so he helped you with that.
He started some of it, and then we started, you know, getting connected with other law enforcement agents. There was a you know with the Las Vegas metroupon the police department was then a captain named Kevin mcmahill, who's now our income and sheriff. He and I was talking, and this thing has just grown into I mean, we started out with just six police officers. Now we have one hundred and thirty five police officers.
Don't just stop one hundred and thirty five police officers in the Las Vegas metro area.
Yes, never before in the history of reentry nowhere on this planet, to this magnitude has law enforcement gotteness engaged in mentoring and training people coming on from the prison system. So when you have conversations with them, and it's very methodical, right, you just got to get people to change their way of thinking. And if you look across this country, right, especially what happened is summer twenty twenty, you know, disrupts in the community.
People don't trust police. They just don't trust them.
But the reason why they don't trust police is because they're not in a relationship with the police. And what relationship could you ever establish trust unless there's life rubbing up against life and the spirit of complete transparency that we have more in common than we have difference. So big I no, big, I'll use and out of that transparency that comes the relationship. And once that relationship is established, we can start working on trust.
Do you think think there's this is my own and it's just my own feeling. Do you think there's a danger in people not understanding the humanity of the police. In other words, when you think the police, you think of the structure and the institution of the police rather than the human being that just happens to be a policeman.
Right, That's where I think that we need to do a better job at change in that that institution. Right, that it's a cultural change that needs to take place on both sides of the equation. Right, Because you know, if you look at the police officers are there to protect them, to serve, right, could we look at the police offices, they're in full uniform. It's that cognitive shift that I look at that person, but I see behind the badge. Of course you're in full uniform, right, But I see behind the badge to the to the wives and huss and moms and dads, sisters and brothers, and lower league football coaches, and you see the human side of them. And again you get to see the human side of it by what's happening here within an organization is the life rubbing up against life and have stories that people begin to view and their perceptions begin to change.
So how does John ponder the citizen, John ponder just the citizen, just the member of the society. How do you feel what goes on in your heart and head? What you've talked about a lot, what goes on in your heart and head when you know how vital all of the police officers are in your program, that that has has changed lives in this city. What happens in your heart and head when you hear a national narrative that we need to defund these people.
My gosh, my my heartbreaks. It really is heartbreaking.
Right.
And I was on the I was on the radio show one time. It's going back a couple of years ago, and it was right after something happened. It was an office involved shooting, killed in a non black person, whatever the case of b And on this radio show that the host had said to me, you know, how could you support law enforcement?
You're an African avery man And.
It was just right. So it's an African American dude, right. Well, see this is what this is why I'm trying to tie together as you're an African American dude. You grew up in in Brooklyn, which yeah, and and you you you were in and out of jail through thirty six forty years old. You're the grandson of a sharecropper and the great grandson of a slave.
Ye m hm.
And have dealt with all of the institutional racism that this country has offered. And that's for another show. But I think there's I think we could talk a lot about that but clearly the path that your life has taken and your heritage, you're supposed to not like the police. John, That's what the society tells us, that you're supposed to be not liking the police. So as that man to hear you say, it breaks your heart hearing about the defund of the police movement. But then there are unarmed people that get killed by the police. How do we John, help me, really help me and help our listeners. How do we balance it? John? Because we know we need the police. We don't want people to be unmercifully shot or treated bad. We've seen the videos that get sensationalized on TV. I think in our mind we know that ninety nine point nine per some of the people who were bad are good people. But how do we balance it all? John? And from your perspective, how do you balance and do you get called a sellout being a black dude and speaking out against it? I mean, how do you balance at all? It's just it's the one question I couldn't wait to get to is how do we balance it? Because it's killing us right now as a society.
I think that.
The way that I approach it is this, right, have you ever thought about how close the word enemy comes to the inner me. And I spent the lifetime fighting enemies on the outside until I took a look at the enemies that will land dormant on the inner me. And once I conquered the enemies on the enner me, the enemies on the outside, disappearing police officers are not my enemies. As an Africa averyman, I love and respect and appreciative of being out in the community. Do some people do some things? You got some maybe not so good people out there. Absolutely right. This reporter that was interviewed one time, and he tried to push me out there on that and how can I support and everything like that, and he was just going on this little tangent. And what I said to him. I asked him if he was married, and he said he was married. And I asked him that, you know, do you consider yourself a good husband? And he said, yeah, I'm a good husband. And I said that, you know, I'm married to and I like to consider myself a good husband. And I know a lot of men that are married and they good husbands and loved their wives and they honored them and respect them. Then I said that there are some men out there who are not good husbands, who beat their wives and don't give them the love, the honor respect that they need to give them, right. But I said to him, do not lump me in with those bad husbands, right.
Don't lump me in there, right, because I'm a good husband. But you cannot lump the rest.
Of the good cops are out there putting their life on the line for some people that made, you know, made a bad call, bad judgment call of you, they messed up, or whatever case it be.
But you can't lump everybody up.
In there, right. And you see that absolutely, We'll be right back. And so I came to visit you today in your offices, which is very cool. And before we got to sit down and have our discussion today, I was in a room that had fifty or sixty people in it and along the wall of one half of the room were parole officers. It looked like Las Vegas Metro cops and maybe sheriffs. Looked like an undercover guy or two. Looked like there was a rabbi in there that had a badge on, which was something foreign to me, but he was awesome. And then the other half the room was a whole bunch of guys, ladies, men and women who were on parole, work release, or were fresh out of jail. Yes, And I watched them all hug and I watched them all eat, and I watched people who'd been arrested by people in those uniforms hugging them. And frankly, those people in those uniforms have to deal with some pretty nasty people every day, and those people represent the nasty people they have to deal with, some of which I have tried to hurt them in the past. And I watched them hug them back. And I'm watching this room full of people that you've assembled, yes, that are supporting one another. And it was this weird, beautiful, odd arrangement. So tell me what that meeting was, Tell me what was happening.
And sure, So, as we're working with the formerly incarcerated people that are helping them come home and help them successfully reintegrate back in their home, the workplace, in the community, we want to wrap services around them. So not only the leadership training and invocational training, we want to make sure that we can set them up to be successful as they reintegrate back into the community.
So in this partners which a lot of people do in this country, right, But the law enforcement part is what's so unique.
Man.
It is critical, and I wish the people would be able to get that because if you think about it, let me tell you why that's so important. If we're going to get men and women to return back to the community and be successful members of the community, we want to get them to a place where they will never reoffend again. In order for us to be able to do that, we have to instill in them a love of respect or appreciation for the rules and regulations out in the land.
Right.
We found that something incredible happened when we bought them in relationship with those who are upholding the law, they respect it more. They have a tendency to not you know, swave. It's not knowing us against them, right, you're in relationship, right, and it was very powerful. But think about this, if you flip the coin around the other side. The thing that makes me smile is that this level of partnership is forcing law enforcement to do do things that they talked about for years.
Sermunity engagement and serving serve.
You don't know how many instances we had here where there's an officer who sixteen seventeen years ago, he was the gang Task Force, hooking and booking people.
Right, but they've been on the force, you know, seventeen eighteen years now.
And that means they've seen it all.
Oh, and they're at all and the captains of the gang unit. And now all of a sudden, it walks through the door. The person they locked up seventeen years ago comes to the door and listen today they're best friends.
Just like you and the FBI, just.
Like the FBI agent, and they're best friends to this day. They do not go back.
To jail, as media would say. Praise God, that's right, that's right. You have some hollowlujas that everything else, my brother is that is hope for Christeners. Yes, it is an amazing story. Now it works, but there's only one John Ponder. How can we mimic this? How does this country do this elsewhere? And if there's people listen John, one of the things that this podcast is for is we talk about a lot of different different stuff that people do, from holding babies to you're doing. And our hope is that they see that John Ponder is just a normal guy who's got into a little trouble who's done something extraordinary, just like all the people we talked to, right, and you're just a normal guy who's done extraordinary things. And my goal is to create an army of normal folks that do extraordinary things across our country. If someone is listening to us and says, man, I identify with that, how how do we start? How how do we do a hope for prisoners in Birmingham? Yes, Milwaukee, Denver, Phoenix, Right, how's it work? Love it?
Love it?
Love it.
I get excited at the opportunity.
We did export our model to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Have a conversation with how we did it, got all the stakeholders on board. But then what we have to identify. We have to identify John Ponder in that area right right there are and I say this very humbly, They're there are John Ponders all over this country.
That's because it's folks, right, So you identify those people, pour your DNA into them and and just work with them and training equipment and lawns.
We stood Milwaukee up. This is doing phenomenal.
So we can launch this anywhere absolutely, And.
I think that as we're going across the country right again. The idea is to change the landscape reentry. Somebody asked me a long time ago, when we've first stopped putting the whole for prison together, and they say, well, why are you calling it a Hope for prisoners when the people that you work with they've gotten you gotten out a prison. They said, you don't want to put the word prisoners in there because it's got this negative right and people don't want to give you money and things like that.
And they said, well, why do you want to name it Hold for prisons?
This is what I said to him, was that the number one reason why I'm naming it over prison beces God told me to a.
Period, right, got it, Pennsylvania?
Absolute, absolutely right?
And I said, the other reason why I'm naming it Hope for Prison is because the mission of our organization is to help to create a massive amount of people who come home from the prison system, and not only do they never re offend again, that they begin to live levels of life that most people want to dream of. When we do that, then they become the Hope four prisoners.
That's a beautiful thing. Brother. Last thing, if somebody wants to talk to you and say Hey, I want to try to do this in my town. What is the website? How do they reach out? How how do people reach into John Ponder's Las Vegas World and find out more? Right?
They can visit our website at Hope for is Flrprisoners dot org. Or you can certainly call out office at seven zero two five eight six one three seven to one. But if you want to shoot me an email, you can certainly email me at j O NP. So It's John p at Hope for Flrprisoners dot org. Love to be able to have a conversation with you.
John Ponder. I haven't done this yet, but I think I'm going to make you an officer in their Army of Normal Folks.
Oh my goodness, I'm in so find me up.
So far we've done privates and corporals, but my friend, you're a cap. It has truly been an honor and a pleasure to spend time with you today.
Well awesome, it is my honors. Thank you guys so much for the opportunity.
Okay, buddy, yeah, thank you guys to join the Army of normal folks. Go to normal Folks dot us. That's right, Normal Folks dot us and sign up to become a member of the movement. I genuinely hope you'll join us. It only takes committing to doing one new thing this year to help another person. And there will be ton of awesome ideas on this podcast. When the folks were featuring, some of them may resonate with you deeply and others may not at all, And that's okay because we're all called to do different things with the different talents we've been blessed with. But together with each of us doing what we can, we genuinely can change this country. We'd love to hear what you do. And if there's stories you've heard of that you think we must tell, write me anytime at Bill at normalfolks dot us. As you've heard, everyone we're featuring and myself included, are sharing our direct contact information. We're genuinely hoping to build a real community. It's not just a show. We want to build a community that's unlike anything America's ever seen. And if you enjoyed this episode, rate it and review it and share it with friends on social all these things that will help us grow an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney can't wait to see you next week.