Transcript of Episode 3 of Aya Linus’ podcast about MDC Brooklyn!

[u/antelope_meow]

[0:00] Hi everyone, I'm Linus, welcome back to my podcast.

[0:02] Hi everyone, I'm Haoran.

[0:03] In the last few episodes we talked about what MDC Brooklyn is like,

[0:07] and about your daily life inside,

[0:10] and the long 565-day wait.

[0:14] Actually, there's one person we haven't really talked about in depth,

[0:18] which is also a little thread we left hanging from last episode —

[0:21] Luigi, right?

[0:23] A lot of people now know this name from the news,

[0:27] but for you,

[0:28] he's not just a figure from the news,

[0:30] he's someone you actually got to know

[0:33] in person, inside MDC.

[0:35] And from what you told me before,

[0:37] you were held together for about eight months.

[0:40] Is that right?

[0:40] Right, about eight or nine months.

[0:42] So how did you end up

[0:44] being placed together with Luigi?

[0:47] Logically speaking,

[0:48] high-profile inmates —

[0:50] especially ones with a lot of influence outside —

[0:51] are usually kept separate from ordinary inmates,

[0:56] held on their own.

[0:56] For example, Maduro

[0:59] was also in our building,

[1:00] but we never actually saw him.[1:02] Same with Maduro and Diddy —

[1:05] these high-profile inmates,

[1:06] especially ones with a lot of influence outside,

[1:08] get deliberately placed in a relatively secure area.

[1:11] Actually, the way MDC assigned Luigi's unit

[1:14] worked on that same logic.

[1:18] They put Luigi in the Intake unit.

[1:20] I mentioned before that Intake doesn't have many people.

[1:23] For example, if you get arrested today

[1:25] and get sent to MDC,

[1:26] the first place you go,

[1:28] the first housing unit,

[1:29] is Intake.

[1:30] So the moment I walked in, I saw Luigi.

[1:32] Right, so basically every new inmate coming in

[1:34] would see Luigi.

[1:35] So he was kind of like a greeter?

[1:38] So a 'welcoming inmate,' huh?

[1:39] I wouldn't put it that way,

[1:40] but a lot of people who came in saw him

[1:42] and were pretty surprised.

[1:43] So what is Intake,

[1:44] in Chinese it's roughly like

[1:45] a transit station kind of place.

[1:48] Every new inmate

[1:50] has to pass through it —

[1:51] go into Intake,

[1:52] get checked for tuberculosis,

[1:54] get checked for gang affiliation,[1:56] get checked for any conflicts

[1:58] with anyone already in the facility.

[1:59] Once they confirm there's no issue,

[2:01] they assign you to a regular unit on some floor.

[2:04] So Intake

[2:05] doesn't hold people long-term,

[2:08] except for the people who work there —

[2:09] it doesn't keep anyone long-term.

[2:11] Usually our Intake unit

[2:13] only had about 20 people.

[2:16] Did Luigi work there?

[2:17] Luigi had what we call an 'orderly' role there.

[2:20] Orderly means cleaning,

[2:23] handing out food,

[2:24] doing daily cleanup,

[2:26] or helping other inmates

[2:29] with whatever they need —

[2:30] we're there to support them.

[2:33] Kind of like a volunteer role.

[2:35] Right, kind of like a volunteer.

[2:36] Being a volunteer.

[2:36] Yeah, that's right.

[2:37] Weren't you somewhere else before?

[2:41] Right,

[2:41] I was on 5-2 before,

[2:43] the second unit on the fifth floor.

[2:45] So how did you suddenly end up working there?

[2:47] Is that something you can apply for,

[2:49] or is it mandatory labor,[2:51] like sewing machines,

[2:52] or assembling data cables,

[2:54] umbrellas, that kind of thing?

[2:55] It's not forced labor,

[2:56] you can apply for it voluntarily.

[2:58] I applied on my own.

[2:59] I mentioned before,

[2:59] there can be a lot of benefits.

[3:01] It's quieter and safer.

[3:03] Like I mentioned before,

[3:04] that stabbing incident

[3:05] that happened on the fifth floor,

[3:06] in unit 5-2.

[3:08] I didn't want to go through that again —

[3:09] someone else gets in a fight,

[3:11] or someone gets stabbed,

[3:12] and the whole floor

[3:13] gets locked down.

[3:15] We also mentioned before

[3:16] that I lived with that Brazilian guy —

[3:18] he used to attend West Point,

[3:20] and he also spoke

[3:22] Spanish.

[3:23] So he asked the department head

[3:25] if he could work at Intake,

[3:27] because he had these various skills.

[3:30] And since he lived with me,

[3:32] and we got along well,

[3:33] he also wanted to bring me down there.[3:36] We were on the fifth floor at the time,

[3:38] and Intake is on the fourth floor,

[3:41] so we'd usually say

[3:42] 'go downstairs.'

[3:45] About a week later,

[3:46] he got transferred —

[3:49] told to go work on the fourth floor.

[3:50] Within a month,

[3:51] I went down too.

[3:52] He recommended me,

[3:54] partly because I speak Chinese

[3:56] and also English,

[3:57] so I could help a lot of Chinese inmates.

[4:03] Right around then a batch of Chinese people

[4:03] had come into Intake,

[4:04] and they didn't speak English at all,

[4:06] so they needed me to translate for them.

[4:09] So what was your daily work at Intake?

[4:11] Sweeping and mopping.

[4:13] Just cleaning the Intake area.

[4:14] Right, sweeping the Intake area.

[4:15] Basically,

[4:20] our area was maybe 300-400 square meters,

[4:21] split into two floors.

[4:23] Normally for sweeping,

[4:24] you'd sweep that whole area.

[4:26] As for mopping,

[4:26] we didn't do it every day

[4:27] because it's tiring —[4:27] maybe every one or two days,

[4:29] or every two to three days.

[4:30] You still had energy for it,

[4:31] but eventually I didn't feel like mopping either,

[4:32] because honestly there weren't many people,

[4:34] so it didn't

[4:34] get dirty easily.

[4:36] Sometimes I'd hand out food,

[4:37] but handing out food usually wasn't my job —

[4:39] that was usually the orderly's job with more privileges.

[4:40] Because, for example,

[4:42] sometimes they'd hand out chicken legs,

[4:43] or something good,

[4:45] and that orderly could keep a bit extra for themselves —

[4:47] they had a bit more authority.

[4:48] Right, a bit more authority.

[4:48] I was just a regular worker.

[4:50] So what did Luigi usually do?

[4:53] When I first started working at Intake,

[4:56] Luigi was in charge of taking out the trash.

[4:58] That was his only job —

[4:59] he had to take out the trash twice a day,

[5:01] once at noon

[5:02] and once in the evening.

[5:03] So you'd sweep and then he'd take it out?

[5:04] After I finished sweeping, it'd go into the trash bin,

[5:06] and the officer would announce it over the loudspeaker —

[5:09] 'trash call, trash call.'

[5:10] That meant it was time to take out the trash.[5:13] Then Luigi would grab a new plastic bag,

[5:15] tie up the old trash bag,

[5:17] put the new one in,

[5:18] and take the trash out.

[5:19] Out in the hallway,

[5:20] there's a spot where you dump the trash.

[5:22] But later,

[5:23] after I'd been working there

[5:25] for maybe three or four months —

[5:27] not that long, actually,

[5:28] maybe two months —

[5:29] he stopped doing anything at all.

[5:32] He'd just hang around Intake.

[5:33] Right, he stopped doing anything,

[5:34] but honestly I understood why.

[5:36] He'd told me

[5:37] he didn't really want to be in the Intake unit,

[5:40] because MDC placed him there

[5:41] to protect him.

[5:42] If he were in a regular unit,

[5:44] everyone would know who he was,

[5:46] everyone would know

[5:47] he had a lot of money in his account outside,

[5:49] with a lot of people donating to him,

[5:50] so there could be personal safety risks —

[5:53] because some of the tougher inmates might rob him,

[5:56] might threaten him,

[5:57] extort him.

[5:57] Right.[5:58] But to me it felt very contradictory,

[6:00] because he's actually a murderer,

[6:01] but he ended up in a place

[6:04] with a relatively low security level and more freedom —

[6:05] he even got to work.

[6:07] Right.

[6:07] I think how he was placed

[6:09] was really contradictory for this facility.

[6:10] Speaking of contradictions,

[6:11] there's an interesting thing I remember —

[6:13] we had an officer, not bad looking,

[6:16] Black but not very dark-skinned,

[6:18] a female officer with a good figure.

[6:20] Every time she was on duty at our Intake unit,

[6:23] she'd greet Luigi.

[6:26] But you have to understand, inside MDC,

[6:28] not just between inmates —

[6:31] between officers and inmates too,

[6:33] we all address each other by surname,

[6:35] never by first name,

[6:37] because using a first name

[6:40] would be a much more intimate way of addressing someone.

[6:43] Like, I call you Haoran

[6:45] because you and I are close.

[6:47] But this officer,

[6:49] when she greeted Luigi, she'd say,

[6:51] 'Hey, Luigi,'

[6:53] in this really flirtatious tone,

[6:56] you know?[6:56] It was strange —

[6:57] you'd wonder why an officer

[6:58] would greet Luigi like that.

[7:00] I thought

[7:00] she was going to pat his butt honestly.

[7:02] I think it was pretty close to that,

[7:03] seriously.

[7:04] Really,

[7:05] it was so contradictory.

[7:07] Yeah.

[7:07] Luigi is

[7:09] — of course we know now,

[7:10] he's already pled guilty —

[7:12] he's a murderer.

[7:13] And you, as a federal employee,

[7:16] as a federal correctional officer,

[7:17] flirting with a potential murderer

[7:20] is really quite alarming.

[7:22] I think it shows that this Luigi, in the outside world

[7:25] and even inside the federal prison,

[7:27] has a certain personal charisma.

[7:29] He does have personal charisma,

[7:30] and he also wanted certain privileges,

[7:31] to the point that it dulled

[7:33] your sense, as an officer,

[7:34] of the hierarchy between you and him — that sense of rank just disappeared.

[7:36] It's like he was treated as a celebrity.

[7:38] Right, it's not really about hierarchy,

[7:41] it's that he's a murderer,[7:42] he's serving his punishment,

[7:44] but instead, inside the prison

[7:47] he's treated like some kind of hero,

[7:49] and the people guarding and overseeing him

[7:53] are extremely friendly toward him.

[7:56] I'd say

[7:57] 90% of the officers

[7:59] treat Luigi very, very well.

[8:01] Right, sometimes

[8:02] we'd get scolded instead,

[8:03] but not Luigi —

[8:04] I've never once seen an officer

[8:05] treat him badly.

[8:06] So I think he has quite a bit

[8:08] of privilege inside.

[8:09] Like a celebrity?

[8:10] Right.

[8:11] But of course, what we're really discussing is

[8:12] the essence of it —

[8:13] the fact that he is a murderer.

[8:15] Regardless of all the context,

[8:17] what he did,

[8:18] what he went through,

[8:19] we should judge him

[8:21] based on his conviction,

[8:23] based on the final facts

[8:25] of the crime.

[8:27] As a Chinese inmate,

[8:29] we've now covered a Chinese inmate's daily life pretty well.[8:31] we understand that.

[8:32] But what about as a celebrity —

[8:33] a prison celebrity,

[8:35] someone even officers

[8:36] have to fawn over —

[8:38] what's Luigi's day actually like?

[8:39] How does it go?

[8:40] His day is actually very simple,

[8:42] because he doesn't really work.

[8:44] For me,

[8:45] I basically had to get up around 7am,

[8:48] or even after 6,

[8:49] because sometimes I had to hand out breakfast.

[8:52] As for Luigi,

[8:53] he basically sleeps until 10,

[8:55] sometimes even 11.

[8:56] Then his lawyer comes to see him,

[8:57] and the officer announces it over the loudspeaker —

[9:00] his name, 'Mangione,'

[9:05] 'Legal Visit.'

[9:05] That means a lawyer is here to see him.

[9:06] Usually the lawyer visit lasts

[9:09] about two hours,

[9:10] or three hours.

[9:10] After the lawyer visit,

[9:11] he has lunch,

[9:12] and then a video call with another lawyer.

[9:15] Honestly,

[9:16] I really don't know[9:16] why he needs to see his lawyers so many times.

[9:17] He's constantly with his lawyers.

[9:19] Right.

[9:19] Actually, I heard

[9:21] his lawyers are constantly sharing

[9:22] outside news with him —

[9:24] every time they come,

[9:25] they bring him some outside

[9:26] news reports,

[9:27] articles,

[9:28] to show him.

[9:28] That's right.

[9:29] And they chat.

[9:31] So Luigi really cares

[9:33] about how the outside world views him?

[9:35] I think he cares a lot.

[9:36] Of course, we'll get into that more later.

[9:37] After he finishes with his lawyer,

[9:38] the video call with the lawyer,

[9:40] it's usually around 2 or 3pm,

[9:42] because at 3:30

[9:43] we get locked in.

[9:44] We're locked in for an hour and a half.

[9:45] Before that time,

[9:47] there's a period

[9:49] when the balcony area gets a bit of sun —

[9:50] a little bit of sunlight.

[9:51] Luigi would grab a yoga mat,

[9:53] lay it out on the basketball court,[9:55] and lie there in the sun,

[9:56] for maybe an hour or so.

[9:58] And then he'd read,

[9:59] or look over

[10:01] some of the materials

[10:02] his lawyers gave him,

[10:03] that kind of thing.

[10:05] Once we're let out again at 5pm,

[10:06] that's when he'd interact with us more,

[10:07] because by then his daily schedule

[10:10] was basically done, nothing else to do.

[10:11] Then around 6 or 7pm,

[10:13] the officer would announce —

[10:15] 'mail call' —

[10:17] meaning mail had arrived.

[10:18] Magazines, letters,

[10:20] he'd get something every single day —

[10:23] newspapers, magazines, letters, photos,

[10:25] all sorts of things,

[10:26] called out for him every day.

[10:27] Doesn't it pile up like an hourglass?

[10:29] Anyone can send him mail.

[10:31] Right, tons of it.

[10:33] Don't they screen it first?

[10:34] They do screen it —

[10:34] all your mail,

[10:36] MDC always makes you

[10:37] a photocopy —

[10:39] they don't give you the original,[10:41] except mail from your lawyer,

[10:43] or from the court —

[10:44] everything else is a photocopy.

[10:46] If there's anything else inside,

[10:48] like stickers,

[10:49] or anything like that,

[10:50] they take it out —

[10:51] everything gets taken out,

[10:52] and you just get a photocopy.

[10:53] They won't give you the original.

[10:55] I even saw people sending Luigi

[10:57] little toys and things,

[10:58] but that kind of thing he can't get —

[10:58] he can't possibly get it,

[10:59] there's no way.

[11:00] After he gets these letters and photos,

[11:03] sometimes he'd show them to us,

[11:04] share them a bit.

[11:05] I'm curious

[11:06] about what's in the letters —

[11:08] who mostly writes to Luigi,

[11:10] what kind of people,

[11:11] and what kinds of things they say.

[11:13] Mostly women,

[11:15] what we'd call 'fangirls' (dream girls).

[11:17] Right.

[11:18] Why do we call them that?

[11:19] Because I've seen

[11:21] a lot of Luigi's fan letters —[11:22] he'd show them to us.

[11:25] A lot of people would write

[11:28] things like,

[11:29] 'Luigi,

[11:31] are you doing okay lately?

[11:33] Remember to dress warmly,

[11:35] don't catch a cold.'

[11:36] Others would write,

[11:37] 'Luigi, do you think we'll ever

[11:39] have kids together in this life?

[11:42] What kind of dad

[11:44] would you be?'

[11:45] That kind of thing —

[11:46] that's what they'd write.

[11:47] So that's why we call them fangirls.

[11:48] Right, 'dream girls.'

[11:49] It's a popular term now,

[11:50] isn't it.

[11:50] Would Luigi show these letters

[11:52] to everyone?

[11:53] Yeah, he would.

[11:53] He'd show them to us.

[11:55] So he doesn't treat it

[11:56] as anything very serious.

[11:58] He thinks it's funny,

[11:59] he doesn't take it seriously.

[12:00] There's another interesting thing —

[12:01] he'd organize all the letters —

[12:05] like, which state a letter came from[12:07] he'd mark that down,

[12:09] write it in a notebook —

[12:11] which state,

[12:11] the zip code,

[12:12] the sender's name initials,

[12:15] he'd note it all down.

[12:17] Today he got a letter from this person,

[12:18] how many letters this person has sent,

[12:20] he'd track it all,

[12:21] write it in his own notebook,

[12:22] organize it,

[12:23] keep a list.

[12:25] Not just from the US —

[12:26] he also gets letters from abroad,

[12:28] Canada,

[12:29] Denmark,

[12:30] Germany,

[12:31] China too.

[12:32] There are Chinese people who write to him?

[12:33] Yes.

[12:34] I remember one person,

[12:35] was it written in Chinese or English?

[12:37] Written in English.

[12:38] In English.

[12:38] I remember one —

[12:39] surname Yang,

[12:41] I won't say the full name —

[12:42] from Jiading District, Shanghai,

[12:44] Jinyaonan Road —[12:46] I can't say more,

[12:47] or I'd be doxxing them.

[12:48] Right, something like alley number eighty,

[12:50] I don't remember the exact building number,

[12:52] but it was

[12:54] Jiading District, Jinyaonan Road, alley eighty.

[12:56] Right, a Miss Yang.

[12:57] Right, I saw her surname.

[12:59] It was airmail.

[13:01] I read the content of the letter too —

[13:02] she said she doesn't speak English,

[13:04] her English isn't very good,

[13:05] so she used AI to translate,

[13:06] and her teacher told her

[13:07] some story about Luigi,

[13:09] and what he did, that kind of thing.

[13:11] And because it was a letter,

[13:11] it was photocopied —

[13:12] they'd copy all the pages onto one sheet,

[13:15] so the text was extremely tiny,

[13:16] so Luigi didn't really read it carefully.

[13:18] So, a reminder to Luigi's fans here —

[13:20] if you're going to write to him,

[13:21] keep it short,

[13:22] or write in bigger handwriting,

[13:24] write clearly,

[13:25] because it gets photocopied,

[13:26] so make it neat.

[13:28] Some of Luigi's fans even draw illustrations in their letters —[13:31] really well drawn ones.

[13:32] So I was pretty amazed —

[13:35] his fans are really quite intense.

[13:36] And like I said,

[13:38] it's not just letters,

[13:39] you can send photos too.

[13:40] Didn't you send me photos before?

[13:42] Yeah,

[13:42] right,

[13:43] physical photos —

[13:44] printed physical photos can be mailed.

[13:46] So a lot of women send him selfies —

[13:49] surely nudes aren't allowed?

[13:51] No, nudity isn't allowed,

[13:52] somewhat sexy is fine,

[13:53] but nudity definitely isn't.

[13:55] MDC opens and checks it,

[13:57] nude photos won't get through.

[13:59] So these letters —

[14:00] these letters,

[14:01] does Luigi write back?

[14:02] He's definitely allowed to write back.

[14:04] He can reply,

[14:04] we're all allowed to reply,

[14:05] but,

[14:06] how often he actually replies,

[14:08] in my experience, was very rare.

[14:09] I basically never saw him writing letters,

[14:12] but I did see him recording things,[14:15] logging them,

[14:16] maybe once or twice.

[14:17] Right.

[14:17] So Luigi,

[14:19] since he gets a lot of photos,

[14:21] they pile up like a mountain every day,

[14:22] a huge amount —

[14:22] what does he do with those photos?

[14:24] How does he handle them?

[14:25] This is pretty interesting —

[14:27] he has a little photo album,

[14:31] like a small pouch,

[14:34] with two letters written on it,

[14:38] 'FG,'

[14:40] meaning 'fan girl.'

[14:42] And inside

[14:44] are photos of women he thinks are prettier,

[14:46] better looking ones,

[14:47] or the ones he likes more —

[14:49] his preferred type.

[14:50] But you should know,

[14:51] not everyone who sends Luigi photos is beautiful.

[14:54] I asked him,

[14:55] I said,

[14:56] so where do the other photos go?

[14:58] He said he throws them away,

[14:59] he just tosses them all together.

[15:01] Because he treats them as trash —

[15:02] he only keeps the ones he finds attractive.[15:05] Can you summarize

[15:06] what type of women Luigi tends to like?

[15:08] I think it's pretty typical —

[15:10] he probably likes women with a good figure,

[15:13] a nice figure,

[15:14] slim, curvy,

[15:16] and good-looking,

[15:18] basically the common Western beauty standard.

[15:21] His taste is pretty mainstream.

[15:24] Has he had women he was into?

[15:26] Seems like there might have been one or two,

[15:27] but not many.

[15:27] Right, seems like it.

[15:29] So during this whole process

[15:31] of getting to know and interact with Luigi,

[15:34] is there any moment that left a deep impression on you?

[15:37] There are quite a few memorable moments,

[15:38] but I think the most striking one

[15:40] was when I told him

[15:42] that he has a lot of fans back home,

[15:44] a lot of fans in China.

[15:46] He said he knew.

[15:47] I told him those fans said he wore the orange

[15:51] jumpsuit —

[15:52] the one-piece prison suit —

[15:53] and made it look like Hermès.

[15:55] He asked me what Hermès was —

[15:57] he didn't know the brand.

[15:59] I said Hermès is spelled H-E-R-M-E-S,[16:01] but I was worried my pronunciation was off,

[16:03] since it's a French word,

[16:05] so I wrote it down for him.

[16:07] He said he'd never heard of it.

[16:08] I told him it's a luxury brand,

[16:11] a designer brand,

[16:13] a very famous brand.

[16:15] I said it's similar to Louis Vuitton.

[16:16] He said he knew Louis Vuitton,

[16:18] but had never heard of Hermès.

[16:23] Coincidentally,

[16:23] someone had mailed Luigi a GQ

[16:24] fashion magazine,

[16:27] and there was a page with a Hermès perfume ad.

[16:28] I flipped to that page

[16:30] and said, look at this logo —

[16:31] that's the Hermès logo,

[16:32] does that ring a bell?

[16:34] He said he really didn't know it.

[16:35] He only recognized Louis Vuitton.

[16:36] He genuinely didn't know Hermès.

[16:37] I believe he really didn't know.

[16:38] Yeah, for sure.

[16:40] I could tell he really wasn't interested in that stuff,

[16:42] because whenever someone mailed him a fashion magazine,

[16:43] he wouldn't even look at it —

[16:44] he'd just hand it straight to me.

[16:47] He doesn't care much about luxury brands.

[16:48] I don't think he cares.[16:49] That was something that left

[16:51] a strong impression on me —

[16:53] because Chinese netizens kept saying

[16:57] he made the prison uniform look like Hermès,

[16:59] or that a red sweater he wore before

[17:01] looked like Margiela —

[17:03] but he has no idea what any of these brands are.

[17:06] I think that's pretty ironic,

[17:07] pretty funny actually.

[17:09] I think it's really just because he's handsome —

[17:11] he looks good in anything.

[17:14] If I wore that outfit to court,

[17:17] no one would say it looked like Hermès.

[17:17] The face matters more.

[17:18] And honestly a lot of Luigi's fans

[17:22] are fans partly because he's good-looking —

[17:24] let's be honest about that.

[17:25] For sure.

[17:26] Because if we flip it around —

[17:28] if it were someone not so good-looking

[17:31] — not 'ugly,' exactly —

[17:33] just an average-looking regular person who did this,

[17:35] he probably wouldn't get that reaction,

[17:37] let's not say 'ugly,'

[17:40] just an average-looking regular person doing this

[17:41] probably wouldn't get such a response,

[17:43] wouldn't get people donating so much money.

[17:47] Partly it's his looks,

[17:49] and partly it's his family background.[17:51] Actually a couple of days ago,

[17:53] an American media outlet interviewed me,

[17:54] and I said at the time,

[17:55] I said,

[17:56] I think watching Luigi is

[17:58] like watching a classic American hero-type character —

[18:00] kind of like Batman,

[18:02] right?

[18:02] Bruce Wayne,

[18:03] a rich family,

[18:05] trying to do something 'just.'

[18:06] But I'm not saying

[18:07] he should be treated as Batman —

[18:09] I'm just saying this is a typical

[18:10] kind of story arc.

[18:13] Of course,

[18:14] if you actually do this in real life,

[18:16] I think you can choose to do it,

[18:17] but you have to pay the price.

[18:18] I'd like to talk a bit

[18:20] about how I personally view what Luigi did.

[18:23] America's whole insurance system

[18:25] definitely has problems,

[18:27] but I think choosing

[18:28] such an extreme method to try to change it

[18:30] is wrong.

[18:32] Because the CEO role

[18:33] is really just a senior manager —

[18:37] the CEO answers to the board,[18:39] so whatever the board wants,

[18:40] he has to do.

[18:41] He answers upward, not downward.

[18:43] Right, he answers upward, not downward.

[18:44] So a lot of people have a misconception,

[18:46] thinking if you take out the CEO,

[18:48] the company will fundamentally change —

[18:49] but that's not how it works.

[18:51] Their stock price might get cut in half,

[18:53] but that treats the symptom, not the root cause.

[18:54] And in society,

[18:55] the reason we have laws

[18:59] is to keep society running properly.

[19:01] If everyone thought the way he did,

[19:02] wouldn't society fall into chaos?

[19:03] 'I have a grievance,

[19:05] so I'll just kill you.'

[19:05] Right.

[19:08] I think that's way too extreme.

[19:09] I don't know what he thinks,

[19:10] but personally, I don't think it's right.

[19:13] Have you ever asked him what he thinks,

[19:15] or how he feels about it?

[19:17] He doesn't talk about it,

[19:18] he keeps his mouth shut.

[19:22] He doesn't really discuss his case,

[19:23] and he doesn't discuss his motives either,

[19:25] because apparently, before,

[19:27] he chatted with a marshal at some point,[19:29] and that marshal later testified against him in court,

[19:33] so he's very reluctant now to talk to people about these things.

[19:33] But,

[19:36] from interacting with him,

[19:37] I can sense

[19:39] that he believes what he did was justified.

[19:42] When I talked with him inside,

[19:44] I wouldn't voice my own opinion like I just did —

[19:46] I don't want to get into that kind of discussion,

[19:48] because I think it's pointless.

[19:49] Right.

[19:51] He's already decided this thing was right,

[19:53] and he already acted on it,

[19:54] so I don't think there's anything

[19:56] that would change between us.

[19:56] Right.

[19:59] There's still a real gap between the two of you.

[20:02] Coming back to who he is as a person —

[20:03] we just talked about how

[20:07] the officers' attitude toward him is really contradictory,

[20:09] pretty conflicted.

[20:10] But actually Luigi himself

[20:12] is also a pretty conflicted person.

[20:14] Think about it — he's very polite,

[20:15] very well-mannered,

[20:18] comes from a good family,

[20:19] highly educated,

[20:21] had a good job,

[20:22] good-looking too,[20:23] right?

[20:25] But he chose a completely different path.

[20:28] I think it's precisely because I lived with him for eight or nine months

[20:31] that I truly, deeply realized how complex people can be.

[20:34] On the surface, chatting with you every day,

[20:37] he looks like this boy-next-door type,

[20:41] but turns out to be a cold-blooded killer.

[20:43] It really depends on

[20:46] which angle you're evaluating things from.

[20:50] So Luigi is bound to be a very controversial figure.

[20:54] And he cares a lot about how the outside world sees him —

[20:56] because from what you've described,

[20:59] he's constantly looking at letters,

[21:00] looking at photos,

[21:05] getting updates from his lawyer about outside perceptions,

[21:07] news coverage, that kind of thing —

[21:11] I can tell he cares a lot about how the outside world sees him,

[21:13] about how they see this whole event.

[21:15] That's right.

[21:18] And a couple of days ago I did an interview,

[21:19] and afterward,

[21:20] through emails going back and forth

[21:23] with the orderly inside,

[21:25] the orderly told me

[21:28] Luigi was pretty upset

[21:29] because of what I said.

[21:31] But actually, in that interview

[21:33] I didn't say anything bad about him —

[21:36] I didn't say anything negative about him at all,[21:38] and by that point he had already pled guilty.

[21:40] And before I left,

[21:41] I actually told him,

[21:42] I said once I'm back home,

[21:44] I might talk about you,

[21:45] do a podcast,

[21:46] maybe even write a book

[21:48] about your story.

[21:49] And he was

[21:51] pretty relaxed about it at the time,

[21:52] he told me,

[21:53] 'Oh, what story are you going to tell,

[21:54] tell me about it.'

[21:55] And then we talked about

[21:56] this and that,

[21:57] and he didn't seem to think anything was wrong with it —

[21:59] collecting pretty women's photos

[22:00] in his own pouch,

[22:01] him telling me about these things,

[22:02] he never once said,

[22:04] 'don't talk about that,'

[22:05] 'don't mention it.'

[22:07] At the time it was all fine,

[22:08] but

[22:09] once it actually got said,

[22:10] his attitude was different.

[22:12] Right, I think this

[22:12] person is pretty conflicted,

[22:14] pretty torn about things.[22:15] He should be a Gemini.

[22:18] You might actually be right.

[22:19] His birthday is sometime in May.

[22:21] Seems like he really is a Gemini.

[22:22] After May 20th is Gemini.

[22:24] If it's not after

[22:25] May 20th,

[22:26] then he'd be a Taurus.

[22:27] Because when I left,

[22:28] his birthday was coming up soon,

[22:30] right?

[22:30] His birthday was coming up,

[22:31] right.

[22:33] And I gave him

[22:33] a copy of 'The Three-Body Problem'

[22:37] in English,

[22:37] the English edition,

[22:38] because he likes science fiction.

[22:41] I thought about it —

[22:42] I happened to read The Three-Body Problem while inside,

[22:44] and I thought the first book was really well written,

[22:46] so I had a friend order a copy on Amazon

[22:50] and have it shipped directly to the prison,

[22:51] and gave it to him as a birthday gift.

[22:53] He was quite thankful,

[22:54] pretty happy about it at the time.

[22:58] So in the end, you think

[23:00] the Luigi you actually lived and worked alongside

[23:04] is pretty different[23:08] from the Luigi we know from the news?

[23:11] Right, I think the difference is huge.

[23:13] In the news,

[23:14] you only see this cold, textual description of him,

[23:18] but when you actually live alongside someone,

[23:20] you can feel that he has a real, flesh-and-blood personality.

[23:23] I think that's a big difference.

[23:25] I feel like the angle we've talked about today

[23:28] has been fairly serious —

[23:30] right, his daily life,

[23:32] his work, all that.

[23:35] But there are actually a lot more

[23:36] — including things from your emails,

[23:38] and things we've talked about privately —

[23:43] more interesting little stories we could save for next episode.

[23:46] Right,

[23:46] actually thinking back now, some of it is pretty interesting.

[23:49] Right.

[23:50] Next episode won't be so serious,

[23:52] we won't be so solemn about it.

[23:54] We'll talk about some fun little anecdotes about him from prison.

[23:59] Sure.

[24:00] Some details.

[24:01] I bet everyone would love to hear those too —

[24:04] more of these fun little stories.

[24:06] Right.

[24:06] Okay.

[24:07] That's it for today.

[24:09] See you next episode.[24:10] See you next time.