Conversation with ed jed ashman, we support the arts and humanities and this event is thanks in part to because of the sponsors and volunteers and we owe them a great debt. A few announcements. I hope youre following the gaithersburg book festival on facebook, twitter and instagram. Please use the hash tag, gbf. Youre feedback is very valuable and just to my left, your right, some surveys available. By submitting a survey you enter into win a 100 series a gift card which i assume you will spend on books. Chris wilson will be signing his books immediately after the presentation and copies are of his book the master plan are on sale in the poll thicks and prose events. Please support politics and pros and the authors who came here to share the talents and grab a get. Signed books make a great gift. Never too early to think but that. Today we hear from one of my favorite sons of d. C. He is a selfdescribed story teller, artist, entrepreneur, author, and a great advocate for social justice. His book the master plan, my downapproximate from life in prison to a life of purpose is inspiring, instructive and triumphant. He used his hard work and haaser plan to turn a life sentence into a Second Chance. Aft 18 he was sentenced to philosophy prison with no hope of patrol but he doesnt rely on the old tropes tropes of boot ss and. The washington, dc of his childhood is beset by generational trauma. You find yourself stressed by the sometimes inevitable feeling of horror with his lifeending incident which resulted in years of prison for wilson. What follows is a gripping narrative of determination and triumph, not just for him but for the community which continues to build and nourish his master plan. This book is as nourishing us a heartbreaking, as sober as inspiring and real as the divide between empathy and action we find ourselves in now. Look forward to the conversation today between our author and the gar theirsburg mayor, judd ashman, join me in working jesus ashman and chris wilson. [applause] thank you so much, hannah, and were so looking forward to the new story the silver springs. So, this is a remarkable book. We have im sure we have all read good inspirational the tales of redemption before. I think this book delivers on that front but also happens to be outstandingly written piece, and so i want to give you all a flavor of this and ask chris to just read from the prologue and then well get into in some questions. How is everybody doing . Great. Thank you for coming out. They came to my cell at 4 00 a. M. But i was already awake. Dressed, and standing by my bunk. It wasnt that i couldnt sleep. Those days i was sleeping better than ever. I was more like my body knew, this is the moment, chris, ten years, four months in the making, lets get it done. You ready, wilson . Im ready. They walk me down the tier, everyone asleep at this hour, nothing but the sound or our shoes on the concrete floor. The doors buzzing, as the guard push them open, then the clinging shut as we left. They put the cuffs on to process me through the last get a, the guard whispering, good luck, wilson. Were rooting for you. As he looks the chain around my waste i waist. When he extend away he was all business as usual. The transfer bus took almost an hour and ten minutes, through the Rolling Fields of howard county, 30 on the interstate, another 15 through the washington, dc suburbs. To the courthouse in upper marginal bro where my original trial has taken place. Still dark. There wasnt much to see past my own reflection, looking bag at mel through the bars, across the bus window. In the basement of the courthouse another set of doors, and metal detectors, another set of procedures. They lock me in a holding cell with five members of ms13 street gang. Skinny, salvadoran with tattoos on their faces because ms13 is no joke. The members are dedicated to the life. I wasnt chained but i was in my prison uniform. I never wore it because i wanted to look on the outside like the man i was inside. But it was required here. This was who the system said i was. The salvadorans watched me with suspicion as also i slid on to the bench. I nodded but nobody nodded back. Eventually they started arguing in spanish whether or not i was snitch it into the cell to eaves drop and gather information. They were in for preliminary hearings but the state had nothing. They said. But dont say anything around him. I spoke fluent spanish, spoke three languages fluently. And sat i was working on mandarin at the time. But i didnt react. I didnt want to spook them. We were in a cell for almost two hours, and for the last hour, nobody said a word. Inmate 26597 5. Wilson, lets go, wilson. I said as i left. Just so they knew. I wrote up in the elevator with a black female bailiff, the grandmotherly type. Her hair set, uniform suppressed, smelled nice. Nothing in prison smells nice. You have good judge, she said. Shes a fair lady. What is your sentence . Life. Oh, she said as her face dropped. For lifers she knew there was no good news. Well, good luck. Oh, judge was on her high seat, studying me as i entered. How many men like me has she seen today . I wondered. How many this week . How many this month . The jury box was empty but the public benches were packed with people, mostly women and children, waiting fir the loved ones to be called and i searched the crowd. But nobody looked back. All these friends and families were here for other prisoners. I knew nobody was coming for me. The only person there for me, my probono lawyer, keith, was laughing and joking with the states attorney. I had known keith for more than seven years and trusts him with my life. For when i sauce him laughing with the stays attorney it threw me off. The old street mistrust kept coming back. Trying to keep me inside forever. Why are you talking to her . Keith put is hand around my shoulder and winked, we got this chris him looked confident but keith always looked confident. He looked confident the day i met him he lawyers room in the institution when i was 21yearold lifer who with the 23yearold bam by law intern with slicked back care and a south boston accent so thick could i barely understand him. It took us six years and five rejections from the judge to get this sentence modification hearing. The only way a lifer like me could get back from under, every three months keying slapped this ratty brief case on the table and smiled like he knew everything secret in the book and said, they turn your request down again, chris, but dont worry, easy for you to say when you get to drive home. Your honor, were prepared if the court is ready. The states attorney hammered my crime like i knew she would. A man was shot six times, your honor, she said, in the middle of the chest, shot in the lower right side of the chest, shot in the right but tox. And right elbow. Shot in the hand. Your honor, as he was running. Murder. Your honor, while returning away. Hell never be able to better himself, she said. Hell never be able to say, im proud of myself. I got an associates degree. He will never know his children. Never know his grandchildren. He was shot down at 31 years of age. That defendant, pointing at me, without any thought of what his life was like, took it away. The states attorney sat down, and i could feel the spectators leaping forward because this was more than a crime. It was murder. And i was more than a prisoner. I had been sentenced to natural life in a prison system in the state of maryland at the age of 17 and had only one shot, this shot. As ever walking out of my cell alive. So everyone in the courtroom wanted to know what i had to say. Was i innocent . Was i falsely accused . Was there extenuating circumstances like selfdefense . The judge turned to me like, well, curious, i hoped. I took a deep breath. This was it. My life in a moment. My fate in astrangers hands. My last chance or i would die in prison and a prison cell, 30, 40 years in the future, an old man, slurping watery food out of plastic bowl of but yet i felt calm. Knew what i had to. Do your honor, i said, i want to tell you the truth. [applause] my first question is for all of you. Who having listened to that isnt interested to raved this book . Seriously. And spoil iralert, kris is here so something good must have hand. Want to backtrack in your life. You group in northeast d. C. In temple hills. What was it like particularly on division avenue . I grew up in washington, dc, in the late 80s, early 90s and unfortunately around this time washington, dc was the murder capital of the united states. So there was a lot of gun violence. A lot of drug activity at a time when the crack epidemic was sweeping through the communities and just changed very rapidly like that. And part of your time was also in Prince Georges County, where your mom lived. Yes. So, my weekends were different. Kind of describe myself as a hybrid. Spent monday through friday in the neighborhood in washington, dc, and then i was staying in Prince Georges County of the weekend with my mom and it was very different. We had a swimming pool. my mom hadly latest cars and work harold it and was a different experience, mixed race neighborhood, white people and all kinds of people and we all were cool it and was very different. Great, actually. So in the book, you talk about growing up in the inare city and use this fantastic metaphor of platos al gory of the cave. Want to talk about that . Sure. I still get tease for this but im not into sports. Odont watch a lot of tv. Im a rather. Youre at home today. Clearly. So growing up, i would get in trouble by my grandmother because i would cross the four lane highway just to go to the library and had a childrens section in this library where the librarians would just read to us and i read this childrens friendly version of platos al gory to cave and its about prisoners who were chained up and the spend their lives in these caves but they imagine a reality looking into the shadows cast on the wall and one prisoner managed to escape the cave and leaves and the discovers this beautiful world outside of the cave and its vibrant colors and magnificent light and its the world we know today. And so different versions, the version i read, this person is captured and return back to the cave and he feels horrible because he knows what is outside of the cave and everybody else inside the cave, theyre getting on him like, you try to leave, thought you were better than us, and this story stuck with me because it reminds me of my community i was growing up in at the time where people would be killed for tennis shoes or anything. So all throughout my leave i weved this through the book i thought about the perspective of believing in a world that was different from your everyday reality of, forsays, what is happen on your block. So, you continually use this throughout the book to talk about people who are enlightened and people who arent. People who understand theres something more and people who dont. Right. I feel like we have a responsibility. Once you understand what is possible in the world and what you can do with your life, i feel like we have responsibility to go back, whether its in figuratively, go back into the cave or into the communities and help people understand what is possible in the world. Thats why i continue to tell the story. So, lets talk about what sort of led to the incident that got you locked up. Right. So, again, around this time it was lot of gun violence and my family, my cousin had been shot 17 times in front of the house mitchell brother was shot also. And my mom, who was dating a Police Officer, and he was kind of like the Denzel Washington on training day. A Police Officer but not like good Police Officer, and he attacked us one day, and i started carrying a gun after this. He started stalking our family and all my siblings, we all started carrying guns, even my sister. So, one night when i left the house, some man started following me and i had my gun on me, but i didnt want to use it, and so i walked towards a gas station in the 7eleven and i thought they wont do anything to me here issue hope. There wasrot of people and men came up to me, they were in 30s and i was 17 and i to surround meds ask thenned me and they said we know where you live at and where your family is, well get all ol youve guys and one guy tried to get behind me and i just panicked and startedded shooting and a took a persons life. How long after that did they catch you . , i i would was arrested two weeks later and i was confused because when i found my weapon, they both ran off in a different direction, and i didnt know i had hit anyone so i didnt even believe what i had done. So, once you are locked up, they initially take you to county jail, and i would say, having read this book, one of the most affecting chapters is when chris first gets into county jail, i believe its rights after you get sentenced, they put you in solitary because they separate the lifers from the rest of the general population, i guess, and it is the experience of what was its, 30 days. A month of solitary. Is literally horrifying, and you describe it in never actually seen it described heard about this but never signed described like that before. So, one, without sort of reliving it and horrifying everybody here, maybe talk about that, but then since you have been out, have you been involved in any sort of efforts to change how we do that. Right. So, yeah, i write vivid live about my experience in solitary confinement and like that incident it was about a little over 30 days but i actually did 117 days prior to that in solitary confinement, and lets be honest, the most horrific experience that you can imagine, and i its strange because i wasnt allowed to have any human contact, and so i would do things like lay on the floor in my cell, try to catch a breeze that would blow down the hallway. I would yell in hopes of someone yelling back. Just wanted to hear or see another human being. And i just wasnt allowed to do it. And you were at the time 17 or 18. I was 17 well, just turned 18. Okay. And so it was terrifying for me just tactile sensation, were rub the walls, count stuff, think but everything that i could remember from my childhood. But i survived that. But like eventually fast forward and like today, most of of this didnt make into it the book but two years ago i became a painter and started making art and one of my first paintings i did was titled solitary confinement is torture, and so part of being an artist, it forced me to research and defend what im painting about, and what i researched and found out that in united states, 80,000 men, women and children, on the state level, are subjected to solitary confinement. And solitary confinement has been deemed by the international community, around the world, as torture. So we torture our people. Regardless if theyve been already being punished but how do you expect people to. Come home and be productive in society if were torturing them. So thats very important to mention that. There are efforts elsewhere, period quickly will see in maryland, too, for to legislate away this particular practice. Right. As also seen that there are psychological studies on the impact, particularly on minors, of that longterm solitary. Right. So, eventually youre moved over to the institution and thats different. Talk about how thats different. It was different in the sense that what you think prison is. In the youth program, you had to go to therapy, and i was probably like two or three teams a week, mandatory you had to work a job. And you had to stay out of trouble and it was a program if you stayed out of trouble you moved much levels. That being said, it was a marx security prison and everything on the streets, except guns, was inside of prison. We even had women inside of the prison. You can imagine how bizarre pressen was live. Babies being made and People Killed and weird stuff at the same time, this the point where something snaps and you develop the master plan and turned your life around. Right. So, growing up, my mom always instilled in me i write about how she instilled in me entrepreneurship and being a good person, and its important to say thissisms know i was convicted of a terrible crime, which im remorseful for. I didnt start this. Didnt want to do this. And i felt like my life was in danger so when im in prison a lot of anymore prison who just some of them belongs in there. All kinds of stuff was happening and i knew in my heart i was good person. And so i wanted to prove it. Nip can tell you im good and ive changed and everything, but i figured i want to show people how intelligent i am and how im a good person and why my life is redeemable and thats when decided to lock myself in my cell and write out what i call my master plan, which was embracing education, and checking off a few thing is always wanted to do. But most importantly, was going back into the same communities i grew up in and help lead people out of that figurative cave and help convince some people to lay their guns down and embrace a beautiful life. While this was happening the Political Climate in maryland wasnt so promising for lifers. Parole was at the time the governor had said no more parole for lifers, right. Right. And so that was i called it a positive delusion. Know what the governor same life means life you grow old and die in prison and a lot of anymore the prison who had been there 30, 40 years it and was like, look, chris, get comfortable because you not getting out. And ive always stubborn growing up, neighbor a bad way, but i chose not to believe it. I believed i could get out. So how would you describe the master plan, what it actually is. The master plan is essentially like a philosophy of how we should live our lives. And so at the back of the book i have 32, 33 things to remember when creating your own master plan. Think about the master plan as first you think about what is your end game. We only have one life to live. How do you want to live it. What are people going to say about you when youre not commute keis kind of like bucket list. We should reward ourselves, travel, learn different cultures, but also its not just about us. We should give back. And help other people. Right . And so i created this list about two pages, all the things wanted to do all my educational accomplishments i wanted to achieve, place is wanted to visit, and i sent a copy to the judge, i sent a copy to my grandmother because everyone listens to grandmas and thats the important thing about the master plan you need to share itself with sun and allow them to hold you accountantable and did that and taped a copy on the wall and went to school, went to therapy and i exercised every day for about a decade. Literally every single day. That story in the prologue is after how many years you had been in there. Ten and a half years. Ten1 2 years and then you get this reconsideration hearing. And obviously it works out well for you. Yeah, and then some. So, quick question. Just a little to the side. You talk about how throughout your life books have meant a gravity deal you, you started a book club with the best name for any book club, in prison, the book crushers. Its like a book club and also tra