Paradise Prison: Chapter 2

[gentle music] Ryan Watson, Brian Hrich, and Tyler Wenrich were in trouble.

The three American tourists had been arrested in the Caribbean archipelago of Turks and Caicos for possessing forgotten ammunition in their luggage.

Ryan had been detained with his wife, Valerie, but after two stressful weeks, she'd been allowed to return home.

Now, the three husbands and fathers faced over a decade in the Grand Turk Prison, a facility that just one year previously had been deemed not fit for human habitation.

If they were going to survive, they needed help from someone who'd already been down that road.

We had come by a phone number of a guy named Michael Grimm, and the way that we came about it is unexplainable.

I mean, I'm confident that it's divine intervention.

As you heard in the last episode, Michael Grimm was the first American to be sentenced to prison for possessing ammunition in his carry-on luggage.

Ryan knew he needed to get in touch with Michael, but he didn't know how.

That's when Ryan's father-in-law sent out a prayer request to his family in Texas, which included one of Valerie's cousins, a guy named Ash.

Ash was training to be a firefighter in North Fort Worth.

He had stopped to take his gear off.

He pulls out his phone, and he reads his phone in disbelief, says, "My cousin and her husband were just arrested in Turks and Caicos because there was ammunition in their luggage.

They're trying to put him in prison." This guy, who he doesn't know, standing behind him in this fire station in North Fort Worth, Texas, like leans over and says, "Are you messing with me?" Ash is like, "Why would I mess with you about this?" And he goes, "I'm from Indiana.

My best friend is a guy named Michael Grimm.

He was the first American to ever get sent to prison for having ammunition in his luggage.

Let me put you in touch with him.

He just got home two weeks ago."

The contingent of Americans who've been arrested in Turks and Caicos is thankfully pretty small.

The odds that the cousin of one of those Americans would be in the same fire station at the same time as the best friend of another are about as close to zero as you can get.

You can see why Ryan thinks he was benefiting from some interdimensional assistance.

But when Ryan finally got a chance to speak with Michael, the former inmate delivered a sobering message.

He said, "Hey, man, I heard about you.

I was praying that you guys would somehow get in touch with me." Um, he said, "You're in, you're in deep, deep shit, man." And I was like, "Crap.

Okay." And I said, "Man, i- is it money?" I said, "Do I need to pay somebody off? Is, is that what this is about?" And he said, "No, man." He said, "This isn't about money." He said, "This is about votes." And I was like, "About votes? Like, what are you talking about?"