Mannie Thomas and Hugo Gonzalez were both featured in the documentary “the feminst on Cell Block Y” when they were still incarcerated and leaders/facilitators of the Success Stories program. They were sentenced to over 100 years to life combined. Today's show is not only about their roles in Success Stories, but about hope. We’ve never had any two guests on the show sentenced to that amount of time. Let me introduce them formerly...Mannie Thomas is the Coach and Growth Coordinator for Success Stories. He was sentenced to 32 Years to Life as a youth. While in prison he earned 5 associate degrees in multiple disciplines. Nearly two years ago Governor Brown took note of his transformation and his hard work and commuted Mannie’s sentence to 14 Years to Life. Mannie was found suitable for parole and upon his release in October of 2019, he was hired as a Success Stories Coach and Growth Coordinator. Today he focuses on identifying and securing new sites to deliver the Success Stories Program.

Hugo Gonzalez is the Success Stories Alumni Coordinator and a Coach. After serving 18 and a half years in prison, his sentence was also commuted by Governor Jerry Brown. He was 16 years old when he was sentenced to 3 consecutive 25 Years to Life sentences in prison. Hugo is a phenomenal artist, advocate, and storyteller. Hugo goes to public forums, conferences, and schools to speak about Patriarchy, toxic masculinity, gang intervention, rehabilitation, and re-entry. In a little over a month Hugo will be going to law school at Loyola Marymount University. We feature parts of their reentry stories and their work with Success Stories. #theprisonpost #theprisonpostpodcast #SuccessStories #workingtogethertorestorelives #CROPOrganization