A man held in prison for more than two decades for a crime related to marijuana was set free on Tuesday. People cheered as Jeff Mizanskey, after 21 years behind bars, stepped out of the Jefferson City Correctional Center on Tuesday morning. Members of his family, friends and supporters were there to welcome him, including his great-granddaughter whom he will be seeing for the first time.
Mizanskey is still overwhelmed with how his sentence turned out.
"I've been through courts and thought that everything would change, and nothing's ever happened," he said, according to KRCG TV. "It's all hitting me right now."
Now free, Mizanskey aims to become an advocate of the legalization of marijuana and prison reform. His experience inside jail gave him a first-hand experience with prisoners who are under long sentences for minor offenses. He expressed that he is hoping for better job-training programs so the prisoners will be better equipped once they get out to the real world.
MO man sentenced to life for marijuana-related offenses has been released from prison https://t.co/6XfE2z9GcO pic.twitter.com/0gJEaqBFOk
— WLBT 3 On Your Side (@WLBT) September 2, 2015
"Right now, a lot of what we got going on in here is a training ground, because these guys have no hope," Mizanskey stated. "A lot of them have no hope. No light at the end of the tunnel. And when you don't have any hope, you give up, anything goes, they don't really care."
Mizanskey was charged in 1996, which was the same year California legalized marijuana. Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, Washington and Washington, D.C. have already approved the legalization of medical marijuana, Associated Press reported.
According to the police, Mizanskey conspired with drug cartels in Mexico in selling six pounds of marijuana. In 1996, it was allowed under Missouri law for repeat offenders to be charged with a life-with-no-parole sentence.
Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon agreed to commute the man's sentence since none of his crimes include selling drugs to children, according to NBC News.
There are other states that are assessing the marijuana laws and punishments for crimes of drug possession because of the cost of keeping nonviolent prisoners can get relatively high.
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