Off The Hook
Off The Hook
Unplugged Conversations on Law and Life with Jason Smith
What if a district attorney could truly break the mold of political campaigning? Meet Jason Smith, who joins us on Off the Hook, sharing his journey beyond campaign slogans and event appearances like Riverfest. Discover how his genuine approach and personable demeanor set him apart in the political landscape. We even share a few laughs over our mutual love for the music that defined our younger days, offering a refreshing glimpse into the man behind the campaign.
Jason also opens up about his plans for a more efficient justice system, drawing from his 14 years of experience. His strategies for streamlining murder and high-level sex offense cases emphasize the importance of early collaboration between prosecutors and law enforcement. Additionally, we tackle crucial subjects like internet safety, elder exploitation, and the role of legal professionals, providing an insightful look into the complexities of justice and crime prevention. Tune in for a meaningful conversation that blends personal anecdotes with Jason's vision for a connected community.
When people are released from jail, they have the responsibility to appear in court, but some of these people choose to go on the run.
Speaker 2:They go back home to mommy.
Speaker 1:And that is when these guys come into the picture. So sit back and listen to the Off the Hook podcast with Chad and Rob.
Speaker 3:Very fine people on both sides.
Speaker 1:These are real stories, but the names have been changed.
Speaker 2:What's going on?
Speaker 4:guys, I'm Rob and I'm Chad, and we have a special guest.
Speaker 2:Hey, he's back, mr Smith, over here, I'm back. Thanks guys. Hey man, it's good to Smith over here, I'm back. Thanks guys. Hey man, it's good to see you again, sir. Thank you, brother, good to see you. We enjoyed the last time we had you on. We enjoyed it, and I reached back out to you and you were like hell, yeah, I'll do it again. And it was awesome because the first time you're on we had a lot we had to go through, right. So this time I figured you know, having you on a lot of people that watch on the news or on social media or whatever, about voting for people, they don't actually get to know the person, right, and being that, you know we work together and we're against each other, whatever you say, but we have a good working relationship, right, and I see a good sign of professionalism and a good person in you that you know. I want to share that with everybody else.
Speaker 4:Yeah, every day you're riding down the road, you're riding down MLK heading downtown and you see all these signs and you know you're going to see more the closer we get to election. And you see that one Jason Smith sign. Well, you want to know who the guy is, right, so that's why he's here and we're going to get to know him a little better.
Speaker 2:Perfect. Yeah, I can't wait until after the election. Because you know you're scaring my dog. I'm going to pick on you a little bit.
Speaker 3:That's all right. Well, let me. I mean, we were down at Riverfest this weekend and we were obviously handing out cards talking to people. My wife had these stickers made and we're like, hey, you want a sticker, you want a sticker, you want a sticker. And I would. They would say yeah or no, or yeah, we want to vote. And I would jump in and say, hey, I'm Jason Smith, I'm running for district attorney, and they're like what, what, that's you? And I'm like, yeah, that's me. And I'd sit there for a few minutes talking to them and I think a lot of them appreciated that At least to have a conversation.
Speaker 3:Look, I've never had a conversation with anybody running for president, vice president, Senate, anything like that. I've never really had a conversation with those people that we vote for every four years.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's hard to see them out and about, right, right, but okay. So last time you were on I got to do it again. Let's see if. But last time you were on I put some Alice in Chains on you for you. I like Alice in Chains, I know right, they are good. I grew up with that too. How old are you, by the way? 50. Okay, so you're a little bit older than I am, but not much. So yeah, we're about the same. Here you go. Let's see if I can get this to go All right by the way.
Speaker 3:By the way, I've never heard this until you played it for me today.
Speaker 2:Oh, it is awesome, ain't it? I rode my skateboard with this Ladies and gentlemen, if you don't, know who the hell this is. This is Helmet, yeah, unsung.
Speaker 3:If you close your eyes it kind of sounds like Ozzy Osbourne. It does A little bit yeah.
Speaker 2:It does. And you know I met him. He came to Ziggy's when Ziggy's was here, right, because I did security there for a while, and I met him that night. I was like, guys, I'm going to go meet him. I got autographs, he gave me a record and hold on, oh man, I was such a big fan because I remember skateboarding when I was like 10 years old, to him up and down the road, good music.
Speaker 3:Look, my family hates my music, by the way. Oh really, I'm like a 90s grunge. My wife and I grew up. We went to college together. That was you know went. I mean, we went to college together. That was you know. Went to college in 92, graduated in 96. We went to college together. We grew up with grunge music. But now I listen to it and she's like, oh, I don't like that music.
Speaker 2:You loved it back when we were dating, not now.
Speaker 3:And my kids are like dad that music is horrible.
Speaker 2:What? Yes, oh, no way, I'm like just listen to it. Just, oh, no way, just listen to it.
Speaker 3:Just listen to it. Hey my son though. So get to know me. Here I've got four kids, right, right, and you ain't lost your hair yet. No, Well, they keep reminding me. It's a little thin back there Dad.
Speaker 2:So I've got a 21-year-old.
Speaker 3:I've got a 17-year-old oh gosh, a 15-year. So my son, I only have one son, he's 15, and he's driving right. He's got his learner's permit. We've got to do the 60 hours of driving, he'll get in. He's like Dad, we can't leave. Yet he plugs in music Rolling Stones.
Speaker 4:Isn't that amazing? My kids too. They're like that time period. They like that. He loves it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I said I saw him twice time period. They like that, he loves it. Yeah, and I said I saw him twice. Uh, and my daughter last night we were talking about the rolling stones. He said you went to see the rolling stones. I said not once, but twice you know they're actually dead.
Speaker 2:Right, you know they're not dead yeah, no they're actually dead. The only thing that's keeping their bodies going is all the drugs that's true, that's true, that is true yeah, my son is wanting to go see metallica oh.
Speaker 3:He's big.
Speaker 4:We get in the car in the mornings to go to school and he puts on Spotify and Metallica Right. I think they're playing in Charlotte, coming up soon or next year? Yeah, they are in May.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, That'd be awesome.
Speaker 4:I forgot who else was with him, but I was like he's like, do you? You ought to take them. I'm thinking about going, do you?
Speaker 3:want to go, I'm down. My wife did see them. Oh yeah, I think in high school she saw Metallica.
Speaker 2:What kind of music is she into now?
Speaker 4:Country music oh yes, she loves country. Yes, country's all right, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:I don't love it but I like it. Well, I don't love it but I like it. Yeah, so I'll listen to it. And then she likes some folk stuff too. I mean just like.
Speaker 2:Like Zac Brown. Yes, zac Brown, I think, is his name, not Zac Brown, zac Brown.
Speaker 3:I don't know. She's got some odd music like groups, and I mean, you tell you what? We've been married for 25 years. Yes, dear, I like your music.
Speaker 1:That's what I do.
Speaker 3:That's how you survive.
Speaker 2:Like me and my girlfriend, we love country music. That's my thing. I grew up on a farm in Wilson, Wayne County line area. It was nothing but tobacco fields and soybeans and wheat and, you know, running around on the farm when I was a kid, you know. So my first experience was I was like 13, 14 years old. I was driving a John Deere tractor and I had tobacco trailers behind me. Oh wow, and this is before we had a harvester and my job was just to drive it like five miles an hour down the road and then turn around and come back while the guys were picking and putting back on. So I had my little radio sit up and I had a little umbrella and the song came on. Now I was on the johnny tractor now and a song came on and it just hit and I became and I stayed a kenny chesney fan since then. She thinks my tractor sexy came on and I was.
Speaker 2:You couldn't tell me shit, man. I I was 13 years old, I was loving it.
Speaker 3:Well, she loves country music. Her and my daughter went to Nashville, for my daughter had a tournament over there and they hit all the establishments that they could hit because she was under 21. So they went in during the day to say, hey, let's just listen to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they like kids. I just got back Saturday from Nashville and I saw that during the day they let the kids in there and it's pretty cool because it's music all the time.
Speaker 3:All the time you have songwriters that are. These famous songwriters are in these different establishments and they're singing their songs that they wrote. They said it was amazing, yeah, but I went down to another tournament. I went to down in Dallas, texas, and I'm thinking are we going to go down see some Cowboys? No, I didn't see one guy with a Cowboy hat on in Dallas, texas. It blew my mind.
Speaker 2:So I bet you saw some Dallas Cowboy jerseys.
Speaker 3:I did see a lot of Dallas Cowboy jerseys.
Speaker 2:I'm not a Cowboys fan, that's for sure, or Cowgirls fan, whatever you want to call it. So, jason, all right. So we had some me and Chad both, you know since the last time you're in here we had some questions, right, uh, you, you hit on it the last time this time, um, we want to know a little bit more details about what you plan on doing as the district attorney here, differently than what's going on now, and kind of get dig into that a little bit, all right?
Speaker 3:so as, as I spoke about before, I've been in this office for 14 years now, right, right, and it'd be 15 in March. So I've seen the evolution of our office and how it's progressed and, look, our office does a good job compared to other places in the state, other counties. I mean they look up to us, they come to us. The other district attorney's offices come to us and say, hey, how can we do things better? But I mean we can't sit on our hands. We always got to try to make whatever we're doing better. Right, I mean that's my personality. I can't just sit and go up it's good. So I always try to. What are ways to make things better? Personally, how do I make things better? And as an office, how do we make things better?
Speaker 1:And right now.
Speaker 3:I mean the efficiency of how we're handling murder cases. And look, there's a plethora of reasons why murder cases don't get resolved, you know, in a timely fashion. It could be us. It could be a continued investigation, because you know investigations don't stop with an arrest, they continue on. It could be defense attorneys. It could be defendants firing their attorneys three times over, Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's another thing I was going to ask you about too.
Speaker 3:Well, we'll get to that one, but. But one of my main focuses will be resolving those high-level cases murder cases, high-level sex offense cases in a timely manner, and when I say timely, within a couple of years. Right now you're getting I mean, we resolve some in a couple of years, but some are three, four, five years old and again, there's a plethora of reasons why, and it's not just our fault, it's not just the defense fault, it's a culmination of things. But I feel like we can get a better grasp on it, on how we assign cases, right, if we have a dedicated unit that handles just the homicides and they can get in it from the beginning. Because here's how, when I was in Pender, here's how I liked handling the cases from the very beginning I'd be at the crime scene for a homicide case, for a homicide case, and my analysis and my closing statement is starting when I'm walking that crime scene on day zero right, it could be a few hours old I'm already starting to think how am I going to prove this to a jury? So then I would ride the case all the way until the time we resolved, either through plea or trial.
Speaker 3:And when you're not at the scene or you get a call a day later. A lot of times DAs don't get a call the same night, it just happens. But if we had a dedicated unit, maybe they do, or maybe they start to focus in on it. Maybe they go to the crime scene and they're thinking all right, it's easier to work a case together with your law enforcement if you're there that night, right, hey, I need this.
Speaker 3:Or hey, what do you think about this. Or they're coming to you going hey, what do you think about this and could you use this? You're teaming it. There's a police prosecutor team that we're utilizing and that's kind of our approach police prosecutor approach. And it's easier to do it when you're out there that same night. Then maybe a week later or two weeks later, I'm looking at the discovery and going, oh man, we need to do this, we need to do that. Right, and sometimes that happens. But that guess what that does? That just extends the time on the case. Or hey, we need to interview this witness. Or this witness's statement's not as good, let's go back to him. It's better to catch it on the front side than in trial prep mode three years later.
Speaker 3:Because they have time to think and back out and back out, and I mean unfortunately, we've had to either dismiss cases in the middle of a case because witnesses back out or witnesses disappear, witnesses die. The last case I tried, last case I tried last year in Pender. It was that triple homicide out of Pender and one of our witnesses died by natural causes the weekend before our trial, oh wow. And one of our witnesses died by natural causes the weekend before our trial, oh wow. And we were able to work around it. But it took a lot of ingenuity and a lot of thought to how do we work around this.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 3:So it happens. That's why a case really never gets better with age right, better with age right. Your witnesses start to forget things, or your witnesses start to disappear, or they get, you know, cold feet or something else. So if we can try to resolve those in a faster manner, a more efficient manner, that's kind of where I'm at Now. Look, what does it look like? How is it going to look on a daily basis? I'm still trying to work those kinks out, but I think we can do it. And it's not saying anything against our office. Our office is great. It's just I think we could do better at that.
Speaker 2:You know that our specialty me and Chad here is finding people right, I know.
Speaker 3:But we find people. We do find people. But when you find them, that doesn't necessarily mean they're ready to come and testify. True true. Or I mean again, in that same trial last year we had a witness that we had to arrest, number one out of state. We had to bring him here. He gets on the stand and here's his answers to almost everything I don't remember. I don't remember.
Speaker 1:And we knew it was bull crap.
Speaker 3:Right, but it means he has cold feet. Now look again. With some ingenuity and some legalese we were able to work around that too, but that's what happens as time goes on and they start to think about oh crap, I've really got to get on the stand and say it. The more time that clicks off, the more that gives them.
Speaker 2:I've done some research into jury selection. There's so much you can look into that man. That's a whole other ballgame in itself.
Speaker 3:People make a living trying to say hey, here's how you pick a jury.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the murder trial that we did last summer. Man, I was over there going to town, I was going, I was sliding nose back and forth to Dave and going hey bro look at this, look at this, look at this. Yeah, I noticed that.
Speaker 3:I was looking everybody up. It's like get him away from that cable.
Speaker 2:He doesn't need to be at that cable, but it worked out in our favor. It did and I did a lot of. If you go on YouTube, there's a guy named Hampton Law, okay, and I've been watching some of his stuff and it's actually really good stuff. He teaches you about jury selection and, david's, he's taught me a bunch about jury selection. Bill Paragoy.
Speaker 4:I was going to ask about Paragoy.
Speaker 3:Bill Paragoy is one of the best defense attorneys you'll ever go against. I mean just incredible.
Speaker 2:Incredible. He's retired, now he's retired. He don't want nothing to do with this.
Speaker 4:Bill's got stories. Oh yeah, Bill, if you guys at home.
Speaker 2:If you don't know who Bill Paragoy is, is this man talks like this. I'm going to beat you.
Speaker 3:Phenomenal.
Speaker 2:I've never seen a man that can take over a courtroom like he can.
Speaker 4:That was his strategy. He told me he's like I go in, I get, I get the attention, yes, and that's that was his strategy.
Speaker 3:So we I was privileged to try the last. I believe it was his last jury trial. To try the last. I believe it was his last jury trial. If it wasn't his last, it was next to last, but it was a homicide trial last year.
Speaker 1:And yeah, here's how you quiet down, Bill. You have good facts.
Speaker 3:That's it. That's it. I was like we kept him quiet on some things because we had good facts. If he feels like there's a weakness there, he will attack it and it's coming and you better be as a prosecutor. What I tell young prosecutors is this you've got to anticipate the defense. You've got to anticipate a move, two or three moves ahead of where you are or where you're going to be, especially when you have somebody that's trying to dictate that same movement and maybe in a different direction. You've got to anticipate what are you going to do and how is he going to react to it and where are you going to go from there. And with Bill, he keeps you on your toes and it makes me a better prosecutor.
Speaker 2:Well, you know the strategies, the strategies you're telling us right now. The people at home and listening. Take this into account when you go vote.
Speaker 4:His experience and dealing with an attorney. That high level is what you want.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because Bill's known to win, oh yeah. Yep Bill's known to win.
Speaker 3:Well, yes, but we won.
Speaker 4:I will say that.
Speaker 1:Sorry Bill.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to rub this face.
Speaker 4:Well, that's a feather in your cap if you beat Bill. Well, we had good facts.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but you're right when you're talking about experience in life and in a courtroom, the only way to learn that trade is to go in and battle it out. You're going to lose a lot. You're going to lose a lot. You're going to win a lot. But when you're talking about strategy and you're planning out how you're going to do things and the reactions and where you're going to end up, I mean, that's the only way you can learn it.
Speaker 2:You can't learn it in a textbook.
Speaker 3:Yep Right so.
Speaker 4:I don't even know where we're going with this conversation by the way I'm picking a jury.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm just kind of like, I'm just picking your brain. Yeah, yeah, yeah, experience, I don't even know why I'm telling you guys this?
Speaker 4:because you're going to end up the next trial against me and you're going to be like hey, jason, remember when you told us about this.
Speaker 3:Now I'm going to use it against you.
Speaker 2:Hey, you've got to stay two steps. Man, you want my vote. I want everybody's vote. I'm definitely voting for you and I cannot wait what cases do you see?
Speaker 4:I'm guessing that in New Hanover County. I think we're one of the highest DWI cases in the state.
Speaker 3:We're a destination we're a destination spot and when they come here, people like to drink. We have a college here. Unfortunately, that brings drinking. We have a great bar scene. You come downtown and I heard I don't know if this stat's true but they were like per square block we have the most microbreweries. I don't know if that's true, but you know what. You walk down a street in downtown Wilmington, which is great for downtown because you have a great economy down here, right.
Speaker 3:And it brings people, and that's what I say. People will come here if they A feel safe, right, b, if they have a good time, if there's something for them to do here and there is and it's great.
Speaker 2:But.
Speaker 3:But but here here's the downside is, if you're talking dwis, that's we've got a high number of dwis and dwi related accidents and and injuries and that's scary uh, yeah, wait, you know what?
Speaker 2:if you want to keep people from drinking and driving, just go to a concert over here, you'll pay. Pay $20 for a beer and go. No, I ain't buying anything I did.
Speaker 4:Well, I mean at Uber, I mean, you know just.
Speaker 3:Uber. We have seen it. We have seen it. When I first got here, I started down in district court. I don't know if you guys knew that I was an eight-and-a-half-year attorney. But Ben said, yeah, you've never been in a courtroom, you're going to start down at the bottom. And I did so. I was down in a district courtroom for a year and that's where you see all your DWIs. And back then, oh my, I mean you had these prolific DWI riders from New Hanover County. Safe Unit, highway Patrol, wpd had a traffic unit that did a lot of DWI riding. I mean we would have a ton but we didn't have Uber back then. We didn't have Lyft, we didn't have. We had taxis, but people were like I don't want to do taxi, I'll just drive myself Because they smell.
Speaker 4:I think Uber has improved the situation right.
Speaker 3:Yes, our DWIs have gone down. That doesn't mean we've gotten rid of them, but no, gone down.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, just because it's still. This is a college town, right and a destination town and people don't learn. Man, I'm telling you, people doesn't learn after the come down on vacation, leave on probation, yep yep that's the saying but it's not just alcohol nowadays either, right?
Speaker 3:so what you've seen in the last 15 years is an increase in other impairing substances, where it's fentanyl or cocaine marijuana, now that it's become more prevalent, more socially acceptable. Still illegal, guys, but people are smoking more marijuana now, so you're seeing a lot of DWIs from that, yeah, but again how about use Uber or stay home? Or stay home. I like drinking at the house, but support our businesses down here. It is a great downtown. If y'all were here 15 years ago, do you remember what downtown was like 15?
Speaker 4:years ago.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I do and it wasn't as good. I mean PPD helped bring in their headquarters down here. The apartments and the condos have helped and I know people are like we don't like development. But if you look at downtown, we have a destination downtown.
Speaker 2:Oh absolutely. I'll give you a good spot down here so our listeners and people viewing. There's a place in the Murchison building that's on the ninth floor. It's a private spot but it's really nice. My girlfriend took me there. I was like what the hell am I doing in here? But I met the owner and she has done a great job. It's a small spot. It's called why Not? It's a great little spot. Take your wife there and go up there and have you a drink, get dinner.
Speaker 3:When I was in private practice. My law practice was up on the ninth floor of the Merkison building.
Speaker 2:Really.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there was nobody like that up there when I was there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's changed now, it's totally changed, but we got like great restaurants down here, yeah, and all this stuff that we're talking about. The reason why it's down here is because we have people like jason keeping the crime rate down well that, and new hanover county sheriff's office, uh, wilmington police department, have a downtown task force there.
Speaker 3:You come down here you're going to see heavy, heavy uh law enforcement presence, which is a deterrent right, better reaction time with things if something does happen, but it's a good deterrent.
Speaker 2:People feel safe when they see the horses you know, yeah, I try, I try to get out of here when it gets late, though, yeah, I don't like. I like going down here like floriana. Have you ever down here? Oh man, dude, you gotta take your wife there. Man little balcony out there, it's like a little romantic it was really riverboat landing, guess what?
Speaker 4:What Same place. Yeah, did I tell you I have four kids. That is true, yeah.
Speaker 3:If we get and we're running for office if we get a nice romantic night out.
Speaker 2:I think we're just going to bed, bring your kids to the house, I'll. I'll get a swimming pool there you go. There you go.
Speaker 3:So, uh. So, jason, what else? What else is have you wanted to do different? That one that kind of sets the precedent of of cases, when you talk about your most complex cases getting resolved faster. That kind of flow, that's what everything else just flows from there. Yeah, we have a high amount of drug cases. We've got to just keep plugging. I feel like I gave this analogy to somebody the other day. Somebody pulls up in a dump truck and dumps whatever a load of rock sand, whatever and you take this kid's sand toy that you see on the beach and you just start shoveling from there, and then they come and dump another dump truck and you're still shoveling. That's how I feel with drug cases. That's how it is. Oh, wow, that problem.
Speaker 1:It is.
Speaker 3:We get. So I mean, that's not a what do we do different? We've just got to. That's one of those caseloads you've got to stay on because our enforcement is our enforcement is a lot better. Likeases don't come to me unless they're being enforced by law enforcement. So obviously we've got to continue to move those cases along. And I talk out on the campaign trail. You talk to people and they say, oh, we want all of them locked up, or hey, you shouldn't be locking up people. Obviously there are certain people that need to be locked up and certain people that should not be locked up long-term for, you know, maybe addiction, unless they make it a career, right. But we got to be able to identify and discern those cases and let's get them moved on.
Speaker 3:There's got to be consequences for your actions. There are, but there's consequences. Look, I told somebody again Riverfest, and they're like what are you going to do about marijuana? And I'm like marijuana is illegal. And they're like, really, and I'm like, yes, marijuana is illegal. And they're like, but it's been decriminalized? It has not.
Speaker 3:But you deal with marijuana for a 17-year-old different than maybe a 60-year-old, right, right, right, why? Because your 17 year old is a the brain still developing. They're probably being a dumb ass. They're probably are they're driving. So there's one of those things. Do you want somebody you know? And they're like well, they can get alcohol. No, you can get marijuana easier than alcohol nowadays. And and, and what's scary is you don't know what it's laced with either, right, so it's, how would you? The way you handle that case is different than a 60 year old or 70 year old who's at woodstock and continues to smoke weed. Right, because you're not going to change his pattern. But there are consequences, you know, for breaking the law. It's just how do you? How to resolve them? So that's on a smaller scale. With marijuana, same thing on, like cocaine, and you know a little bit of cocaine in your pocket.
Speaker 2:Cocaine. You're doing a hundred miles an hour.
Speaker 3:Well, you are, you are you are, one's a felony, one's a misdemeanor. One is a felony, one's a misdemeanor. But we can't lock up everybody who's got cocaine, a small amount of cocaine, because we're taxpayers and we don't want to pay a hundred dollars a day in that local jail to house them. But there's consequences to actions and so we've got to be able to discern that and try to get it moved on faster. And most of the time those guys are addicts and if they want help then we can find them help. You've got plenty of opportunities in drug court or through probation or TASC or Coastal Horizons. There's great programs in the city that that they can take advantage of. But we got to get them there.
Speaker 4:So that's a difficult task. It is a difficult it is.
Speaker 3:It's like herding cats and when you got, when you have this many and we're just talking just drug cases and you've got this. And I'm not even talking about trafficking cases, because those you want to lock up and and those go much slower, much slower, but these other ones, how can we make our system more efficient but safer for our community? That's it. I mean, look, I can, I can make it efficient, I can dismiss everything, but guess what? It's not gonna make it safe for the community so we've got it.
Speaker 3:We've got to balance safety of the community and efficiency. So that only comes with experience. You do these type of cases, you understand how they work, so you've got to that's. You know. That's one thing of efficiency on resolving those cases. Question Yep.
Speaker 2:Will you ever have a spot in the district attorney's office for private investigators?
Speaker 3:We have an investigator and it's on the books as an investigator and I don't know, I don't know if we have an investigator and it's on the books as an investigator and, um, I don't know, I don't know if we have private investigator, cause once you work for the public you're no longer a private investigator, you're just an investigator. Um, I don't know. I don't know what cause.
Speaker 2:I mean I do IDS cases.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Are you trying to get a job? No, no, I'm just trying to get him to work?
Speaker 3:I don't know. I don't know what, look, all our positions are made or created through. You know, the legislature, right, the General Assembly says you can have this many legal assistants, you can have this many in-assistant DAs. You know, and you know we have 53, 54 on a good day employees in our office. One of them we do have an investigator.
Speaker 2:I met one of the prosecutors in your guy's office named Will Yep. I like him.
Speaker 4:Great prosecutor.
Speaker 2:I like him a lot. I won't say at the moment, but I really like him and I hope he does very, very well. I think he will.
Speaker 3:We have. I'm telling you we have one of the best offices in the state, if not the best office. And when you're looking at a Wake County that has hundreds of DAs, or Charlotte that I don't even know how many they have, but you look at how many we have and we have 23, 24 assistant DAs. But for the amount of people here, for the amount or types of crime that we have here, talking about New Hanover and Pender, we have some of the best. I would say we have the best office.
Speaker 2:Well, that's awesome. Everybody you know got to go out and vote Tomorrow. No, excuse me, friday is the last day to register to vote, and then I actually sit down and look at what the people that are running for office, look at what they got. This is why we had him in here again, so you get to know him a little bit better and get more detail, like get into it more, because nobody just wants to hear, oh, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that, see you later. Got to go Experience. You want experience, so I always talk to do this.
Speaker 4:I'm going to do that. See you later. Got to go Experience you want experience.
Speaker 3:So I always talk to juries speaking of jury selection I'm going to bring it back now jury selection and you talk to them and we're always looking at because defendants say whatever the defendant says, right and usually say your actions are different than what you say, right?
Speaker 3:So I always talk to juries and say, hey, how important is it for you to? You know to, or hold on let me, how do? How would I phrase it? Have you ever heard the term action speak louder than words, right? And they're like yes, well, how important is that to you? They're like oh, it's very important. You know, people can say anything, ding, ding, ding. I've already now I'm educating them on about what, about what your clients are about to say? But we talk about actions speak louder than words. And when you're talking about actions an election for whatever office you, I think you need to look at the person and say, all right, they say one thing, what are their actions? Show and look and some would say, well, you've handled thousands of cases and you let this one go. Well, there's many reasons why we we we dismiss a case, plead a case down. Don't look at just one or a handful Cause when you deal with a thousand plus cases. Over my career, I mean, I don't even know how many cases I've handled.
Speaker 2:Well, once you look at a discovery, and the only people that see a discovery is him or someone like me, and the public can't see it. No, so I mean, that's what we have to go off of.
Speaker 3:And we don't. We, first of all, we have ethical rules that we can and we don't. We, first of all, we have ethical rules that we can't try this case in the public, right, that's why we don't talk about cases pending cases publicly. We can't. We have ethical rules, but it's not right. And so we're not sitting here explaining, hey, well, we're doing this because of this, or hey, take a look at this. Because you can't, because you also have victim rights. That's right. And there may be your case may not be as strong as you thought it would be well, why did you arrest him? Well, because we still think it's strong, but it's not as strong. So how do we?
Speaker 2:well, you can also get to educate people. The elements of each charge right, you, you get to make sure that the evidence proves the elements of each charge Right, because you got to, you got to, you got to look at it as in, you got to convince a jury to agree.
Speaker 3:Twelve jurors to, or twelve jurors to agree.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah, there's that one last summer we had one to do everybody off yeah we did.
Speaker 3:That's right, that's right. I knew that Honestly, I knew I went up to David after and said hey look, this did you were. That's right, that's right. I knew that, honestly. I knew I went up to David after and said hey look, this is the same exact thing I offered you. This is what I thought was going to happen.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Well, on our defense, Kempton himself. We told him that, yeah, but he said I want to try.
Speaker 3:And that you know what. I don't hold it against him because that's his constitutional right. You have a constitutional right to a jury of your peers and that's fine. But we're talking about experience. So you look at a case and you're like here's what I think a jury is going to do or a judge is going to do, and I make an offer based upon that. Sometimes I make it on hey, what's this guy going? You know, not in a homicide trial, but maybe a drug case. What is he going through? And you know what are the mitigating factors, while we should come off of this punishment or this crime. So I've handled I don't know how many homicide cases and I looked at that one and I said I've done I've probably tried more self-defense cases than most people in my office. So, and what happened in that case is exactly what I thought was going to happen and that's why I made the offer and he has a right to it. But it was good.
Speaker 2:It was good experience, it was great. It was actually really good to go against him, because you're trying to figure every day. When you get out of there, you're just drained, exhausted, you're exhausted. You people at home don't just have no idea. It's like going to war, but mentally.
Speaker 3:And in front of people.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Because you have to be on. You start court at 930. You end at 5 generally and you take a lunch break and you have to be on. You're on the whole time, especially as the as the prosecution, because it's the burden is on you to prove your case. So you're on the whole time and you've got jurors looking at you, you got audience members looking at you, you got family looking at you and you're on and you get out of a day and you're just exhausted and even at lunch, like at lunch, I was like I don't want to still working over.
Speaker 2:I can't see nobody, I can't, I can't be around nobody, and you're like so just me. I bumped into judge jones. I was like done any duck hunting? Lately he was like oh, no, man, we talked about duck hunting, yeah, because I had like. I had to like get out that.
Speaker 3:I would invite anybody who has time to go watch a serious trial, a homicide, a sex assault case. Come and watch a trial from beginning to end, because that will educate a lot of people on our criminal justice system. Is it fair or not fair? Is it better than any other criminal justice system in the world? And I would argue it is. And we talk to jurors like, oh, I don't like our system. Well, have you ever been to another country? And it reminds me of the young woman who was charged with murder I don't know how many times in Italy Remember that when she had a trial in front of the three judges, I mean I don't know how many trials, and overturned cases that
Speaker 4:was a rape case Right, yes, and a murder? Rape and murder.
Speaker 3:I remember that. But we have one of the best systems. So people gripe and complain about our system. Come and watch a trial where a defendant has the absolute right to a jury trial and the burden rests on the state to prove their case. And I mean, that's my job is to prove the case and to enforce our constitution. I mean, that's what I like doing.
Speaker 2:I can tell you he was tough. He was tough.
Speaker 3:And he's tough day in and day out.
Speaker 2:That's what you want in a district attorney. You don't want somebody in there that's going to think with their feelings in their heart.
Speaker 3:You got to think somebody's going to be in there with their mind Look, I deal with a lot of bad things. A lot of bad things Homicides, homicide victims, sexual assault victims, sexual assault cases. I mean they're bad. We deal with a lot of bad things. You have to take the emotion out of it.
Speaker 3:That doesn't mean you have to be a robot, but while you're doing your job, you have to it will eat you alive You've got to go in there and you've got to treat it as this is my job and this is the business at hand, and take the emotions out. That doesn't mean there won't be. You'll go home at night and you'll lay awake at night. That's where your emotions come out, and there's many sleepless nights during a trial. But while you're in there, you've got to say how do I best support my victim or the victim's family in this case, and that's that's when it's time to get to business. Yeah, and you owe it to them to do the best job that you can. And if you owe it to them, if you don't think you can do the best job, you need to find somebody else that can do it.
Speaker 2:So can you tell everybody, like where, where you'll be coming?
Speaker 3:up. You're going to be anywhere special or I've got a. We've got some private. I've got two speaking engagements tonight. They're both private. Um, it's coming. Next week starts early voting this october 17th. Okay, I can tell you where I'll be october 17th through through. Probably November 2nd is at the polls, just working the polls. So my speaking engagements are coming close to an end. Here's where I will be next. Give me just a second. I'll tell you what day my day's run.
Speaker 2:So Jason, here he is, he has been, he's been running hard and he's also working at the same time. Yeah, so I mean I'm sure he's getting no sleep, little sleep, little sleep, but he's used to it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's right, all right. So next Monday I believe it's the 14th I've been asked to come to speak at Wilmington Christian Academy. And here's what I do is yes, we're in the middle of politicking, but a lot of places don't allow you to politic. But what I've done over the years, even before I decided to run for DA I've gone out and part of what we do is crime prevention right, and I go out and I talk to different types of groups about different things that we're seeing and obviously one of them is internet safety for kids.
Speaker 3:So I've gone out over the years I've talked to middle schoolers, high schoolers, parents, elementary kids about the dangers of internet and how to be safe on the internet. And I didn't know I don't know if you know this I had two homicides based, you know, from internet relationships either being fake relationships or beefs online, and I had two homicides so I take this to heart of you don't know who you're talking to on the other side of that. So I go, you don't know, and you don't know the repercussions from that. Like one, one individual got robbed and killed. The other got killed because he was in an online beef with somebody that he didn't really know, and that's not counting all the sex cases that we see.
Speaker 3:So next Monday I've been asked to go speak at Wilmington Christian Academy, along with Amy Long, who's a captain in the sheriff's office. So we're going out and we're going to speak about internet safety and you know what correlates with internet safety, because that's usually internet safety. You're talking about young kids or young people and maybe their parents on how to best approach it. But on the other side of internet safety and what we're seeing a trend in is elder exploitation, and a lot of that comes from where Online right you hear about oh, they've got this online sweetheart and they've sent them thousands of dollars.
Speaker 4:I've heard those stories, yeah, so we see a lot of those.
Speaker 3:And so I go talk to both elders at times and young, about the dangers of the internet. And it's almost the same talk, except for one's more sexually explicit type stuff, when you're talking about kids and sending photographs. The other is don't send your personal, private stuff over line, like your bank accounts, and understand who you're talking to. You're not really in love. If they're not willing to come and see you in person, then you need to be skeptical. So next Monday at WCA, we're going to bunch the two. We're going to talk to parents, and this is focused towards parents. So that's why I'm saying come out and hear me. You can hear what I have to say, you can see me, you can meet me. I'll talk. We can talk afterwards. Come out. As many people as we can fill up in that auditorium will do. But we're going to talk about internet safety with parents and kids. We're going to talk about elder exploitation, especially online elder exploitation, with either the elders that come or their older kids that see it happening and they try to educate their parents on on what's happening. So that's what we're doing monday, I believe it's at uh, five o'clock. Um, that's this coming monday, yep, the 14th. Oh, I'm gonna try to be there. Yeah, um, and it should last about an hour. Um, I say it should.
Speaker 3:There's many times we'll get into these and there's questions and answers and we stay a lot longer. But that goes towards our crime prevention efforts. And really, how do you do that? You've got to see it and you've got to be able to understand the trends. That comes with experience, right. And then what do you do with that? You can either sit at home and not do anything with it, or you can go out and try to educate the public. So we're preventing crime. I mean, look, look, I'd love to be out of a job but prevent all crime, which is unrealistic. But if I can prevent kids from being hurt or elders from being exploited, those are two of our vulnerable populations.
Speaker 2:Well, I, I, I admire you, chad, chad admires you. We could sit here and go on and on forever and we could talk for hours on end with Jason, and I'm proud to say that we're supporting him. Thank you, absolutely. I'm proud that he's going to be doing it. I've got a lot of faith in him.
Speaker 4:I believe he'll be our next DA. Thank you, yeah, I do too. I hope so. I pull up in Hampstead when I'm going home. There's a corner and there's some signs, and one there's Jason Smith, the next one's Mark Robinson and the last one's Donald Trump, and I said I just need those three to happen. I just need those three to happen.
Speaker 2:I just need those three to happen. Every time I go, my dog's going Hold on.
Speaker 3:I'm going to try to get for your audience the exact time on Monday and if I can pull it up, here we go.
Speaker 2:So, women in Christian Academy, it's on your right when you're coming into Wilmington, it's at 630.
Speaker 3:630, okay 630 to 730. You come when 40 dumps onto college. It's right on your right it's Grace Baptist Church, wilmington Christian Academy. They have an auditorium in there, seats I don't know, 400 and something.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's a good size.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a good size.
Speaker 3:Hopefully we'll get people that are interested. Now look, sometimes when you talk internet safety, parents are like I don't want to talk about it. I want to just stick my head in the sand and not talk about it.
Speaker 2:Well, that's the problem, though People don't talk about it with their kids. We have to Got to.
Speaker 1:Because if not, somebody's going to try to take advantage of it.
Speaker 2:Let me tell you somebody's talking to them, yeah.
Speaker 3:And some will say, oh, my kids don't have access to the Internet, or I watch their phones.
Speaker 2:Well systems. Are you watching? I'll go. Uh, so let me. I said this before uh, there's a school bus driver in penrith county that was arrested I'm not gonna say his name, uh for touching a kid and he was reaching out on the xbox and snapchat and he reached out to my kid. My kid was like, oh, this is weird, you're weird. All right, block, and that's all that happened. But he had really closed home because he targeted my son for a second there and did that make me want to go out and rip his face off? Yes, probably, yes.
Speaker 3:No kid is immune.
Speaker 1:It doesn't matter.
Speaker 3:Look the Internet safety. It goes across all socioeconomic boundaries, all it doesn't matter. Rich, poor, black, white, it does not matter. It goes across all socioeconomic boundaries, all it doesn't matter. Rich, poor, black, white, it does not matter. English speaking, not English speaking, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 4:Well, it's not. People aren't looking at the kids. They're objects, they're right.
Speaker 2:And it's mental health too. Yes, Mental health is a big issue.
Speaker 3:Well, I keep saying, here's the analogy or here's the saying. I say is, back when we grew up, obviously we didn't have the internet, right, right, and our playground was a physical location, whether it was a playground as we normally think of it, a ball field right, a basketball court, a skating rink, a mall, somewhere like that.
Speaker 2:Oh man, you used a skate rink.
Speaker 3:I know that's what you were going to do.
Speaker 4:Skate park the woods. For me, there you go, woods and a motorcycle the woods.
Speaker 3:But you are outside doing, yeah, but nowadays kids are like, no, they're on their devices, more, they're on their gaming systems, more you can't make them go outside. No, it's hard. No, and there's where the playground is now yeah, and the problem is when we are out on the playground we can see who approaches our kid on the playground. You don't see who's approaching your kid on a gaming system or on on line.
Speaker 2:You know through Snapchat Education, education To your children, and Mr Smith is out doing it, yeah. And you know, I just I really hope you get, I really hope you get it. I really hope you get it. Thank you, Because I would like to say, you know, my good friend is the DA now. Even though I go against you even though we go against each other.
Speaker 3:I'm going to remove you from that defendant's table next time.
Speaker 2:No more pushing paper for jurors.
Speaker 3:You ain't going to do that. I like the challenge, I like the challenge, I like the challenge.
Speaker 2:Hey, you make me a better private investigator.
Speaker 3:Well, I think that when we go against, when we have not warfare, but when we have cases or battles back and forth, it makes each person better. And when I tell young attorneys, get in there and go into court and battle it out in court, trust me, it's going to make you a better attorney. And they're like oh you know, it's easier. Sometimes it's easier to reduce a case or to dismiss a case or to plead a case, but it doesn't make you a better, necessarily a better litigator, and our job is ultimately to litigate right, right and our job is ultimately to litigate right Right, and you can't.
Speaker 3:It's hard to analyze a case if you've never, you know, dealt with it in court. What's a jury going to do? What's a judge going to do? That's experience. And let me do a shameless plug for myself who do you want as your DA? You want somebody who's got close to 15 years experience doing that In the same spot, In the same spot, In the same spot. And that's not even talking about my other. We didn't even get into my other life experiences. You know, I was in the military.
Speaker 2:Yeah, VMI.
Speaker 3:VMI, I was in the Army, I was in Iraq. There's many. That's where your leadership attributes come you know, are molded and come about from. Attributes come you know or molded and come about from. And you take those attributes and you bring them to an office where you're in charge of 50-something people. I mean, I've been in charge of 50-something people before. I mean, for me that's easy. You know I've had to manage and herd cats and if you do it it's easier you bleed.
Speaker 2:Red, white and blue baby. I do, I do, I love it. You have to. Well, guys, that's, that's about it. Chad, you got anything, we got 48 minutes.
Speaker 4:We're like 20 minutes over. Sorry about that. It's all good, it's all good we we, we appreciate your time.
Speaker 2:Stepping up to the plate and doing this. I appreciate it. Chad, you got anything else you want to ask the man before we leave out of here?
Speaker 4:No, not at the moment. I know something will hit me later, but I'll ask him when I see him, but that's all right.
Speaker 2:Once he becomes DA everybody, we're going to have him back in here.
Speaker 3:There you go.
Speaker 2:And we're going to congratulate him and we're going to start lighting a fire up underneath them and getting them going. Okay, that's our job, right? That's our job as voters.
Speaker 3:Look, the DA works for one group and one group only, and that's the citizens of their counties, Citizens of Pender and New Hanover County, and that's who they work for. They expect you to light fires and they expect you. With this job comes great responsibility, and people need to understand that If you're not willing to work for it, don't run for it, and we'll keep you on your toes, there you go.
Speaker 4:And you want experience. This is your man. This is the man right here, all right.
Speaker 2:All right, everybody. We love you. I appreciate it. If you want to see this fine young gentleman right here, you can go to YouTube. Check out our YouTube channel Off the Hook Podcast. We're streaming on all streaming platforms Spotify, apple Podcast, the whole nine, so until then I'm Rob, I'm. Chad. And this is our man, mr Smith, thank you again for coming. We love you. We mean it. Go out and vote. Jason Smith, get there early. See you later, buddy.
Speaker 1:You've been listening to Off the Hook with Chad and Rob. We hope you've enjoyed the show. Make sure to like, rate and review, and be sure to follow us for notifications for another exciting episode.
Speaker 3:But in the meantime, you can go to our website at wwwoffthehookbillcom to see more, so until next time.
Speaker 1:Stay out of trouble, or it'll be you that needs to get off the hook. See you soon.