PG Sittenfeld grew up in Ohio in a good family, went to Princeton, worked in nonprofits, and eventually built a three term career on Cincinnati City Council before an unexpected FBI indictment for bribery and extortion — built around an undercover operation he argues never should have produced charges — derailed everything he had spent his career building at the exact moment he was running for mayor. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, he shares what the FBI indictment actually looked like, what going to trial and losing some counts actually felt like, what the 16 month sentence and the four months he served inside federal prison actually required of him, and what eventually getting out for appeal, losing that appeal, receiving a pardon from Donald Trump, and then having the Supreme Court rule in his favor actually produced in terms of what he now understands about the federal justice system and the people who run it.

Bill Courtney grew up the son of an NYPD cop, followed his father's footsteps onto the force in the mid-1980s, and spent his career working DEA task forces taking down cartel traffickers in New York City before the rise of rap and the specific world where organized crime and the music industry collided became the defining chapter of everything he did behind the badge. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, he shares what working DEA cartel cases in New York City really looked like, what the rise of rap in the 1980s and 1990s produced in terms of street violence and organized crime, what investigating the 50 Cent shooting actually involved, and what the investigation that eventually took down Kenneth Supreme McGriff — one of the most feared and most connected figures in New York street and hip hop history — actually required of the detectives who built it. He also opens up about flipping informants, making deals, the Murder Inc investigation, and the complete truth about corruption inside the music industry that most people who followed those stories from the outside never heard described honestly from the detective who worked them.

Leo Silva grew up in Texas, was recruited into the DEA at just 22 years old, and spent the next 28 years on the front lines of America's war on drugs — starting with undercover operations in Texas before being stationed in Monterrey Mexico as Resident Agent in Charge where he built cases against the Gulf Cartel and the infamous Los Zetas and eventually rose to Special Agent in Charge. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, he shares what hunting cartels from the inside of Mexico really looked like — the undercover buys the high stakes operations the cartel violence and the bureaucracy that most people on the outside never hear about. He also breaks down how cartels have evolved over nearly three decades how Los Zetas changed everything about cartel violence and what the real truth about the war on drugs looks like from the person who lived it on the front lines for 28 years.

Diaz Aguilar grew up in Compton California raised by a single mother who struggled with addiction — and when the streets filled the gap the Vice Lords became his family. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, he shares how a trip to Chicago pulled him into the Vice Lords, how a trip to Mississippi ended with a manslaughter charge for something he says he did not do, and what losing at trial and being sentenced to 20 years in Mississippi's most brutal maximum security prison actually felt like for a Vice Lord from Compton who knew he was innocent. He opens up about the prison politics inside Mississippi's worst facility, what life as a Vice Lord inside those walls actually required of him, and what 22 years of wrongful incarceration really does to a person before they find a way to keep going.

Tamara Cook grew up poor in a small Texas town with eight siblings, a mother struggling to hold everything together, and a biological father who was never in the picture — and when her babysitter started abusing her at just seven years old the life she deserved was already being taken from her before she was old enough to understand what was happening. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, she shares how her mother fell into addiction and began pimping her out, how her parents splitting sent everything into further chaos, how she eventually started selling drugs herself and ultimately became a pimp — the exact monster she had always been afraid of and never wanted to become. She opens up about her own addiction the relationships the multiple children she was raising in the middle of everything, and what a seven year sentence in the Texas Department of Corrections finally did to give her back the life that started being taken from her when she was seven years old.