Nadia Clark
Appearances
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I was almost murdered on duty in 2016. A young man came on my passenger side of my vehicle, holding a Glock, with an extended mag, and started firing at me while I'm stuck in my vehicle. My seatbelt had locked in place during the collision, so I couldn't even feel it. I just know I got hit. I couldn't move. Now there's a gun at my only escape.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
International, but I was in West Oakland. It was San Pablo.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So San Pablo used to be a major Hostro. While the girls of the night would come, or the women of the night would come out and do their thing, pick up the johns, do whatever it is that they do, and return them back. So there was one night...
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I was driving into the office and one of the things that they don't, one of the things that senior ROs are, sorry, senior police officers tell you is don't drive the major thoroughfare, something's gonna pop off. I was on my way in for the night and I decided, I got this.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I drive down San Pablo and there was a bus stop over on 32nd and San Pablo where all the girls used to hang out and it used to be thick. But for whatever reason this night, there was only one standing there and she stood out to me and there was something about the lighting and that it's beyond me.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And I know that was, that had to be divine for me to see her, and especially under the light in the way I saw her, because it illuminated in such a way that I'd never seen before. It was almost like a spotlight was directly on her, and something in my stomach turned. And I was driving the opposite direction, so something told me to turn around.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So I flip a U-turn, I pull up on her, I walk out of the car, and as I'm walking up to her, as I'm approaching her, the closer I get, As her face becomes clear, she gets younger and younger and younger. She's caked with makeup. She's half-dressed. It's cold outside. And she's shivering. As I walk up on her, I ask her.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Well, actually, before I reached her, before I started asking her, I could smell her. I was like, what is this stench? It smells like she hadn't bathed in a while. So I walk up to her and I ask her, I said, how old are you? She says, I'm 12. Wow. And I said, when was the last time you bathed? She said, two weeks. Wow. I said, where are you from? She said, I got snatched out of a group home.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And I said, when's the last time you ate? She said, I don't know. This young baby girl, little caramel complexion, looking like somebody could be in my family, staring at me on the verge of tears. And I said, let's go. Take her to McDonald's, get her her little few favorites, take her down to YSD, which is our youth services division. I check her in, and that was the last time I heard about her.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And it's still, she's still in my heart today because that was my first encounter with this very gross, just depraved activity that goes on in the streets, that goes on just everywhere. I don't know if people care. They talk a big game. But to see this 12-year-old in action, I don't know how much you can really care to allow this kind of thing to go on. I know other people saw her.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And she's been gone two weeks. That means she's been there off and on for two weeks. And no one even thought a thing. And there's grown men taking turns with this young girl. It almost caught me right now talking about it, because that, the smell of her, the look of her, the makeup, the sound of her young voice, it resonates in my brain to this day, in my heart to this day.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So as Paul said, I spent a lot of time in law enforcement, military, and just living life out here as a black woman in America. And so going through some difficult times in my life, I needed to express myself. And one of my outlets, one of my things that brought peace and joy into my life was writing. And what came together from my writing was this book.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I can't even look at a child without that image coming back in my head, you know? And it's just amazing that we have a culture that participates in such depravity. You know, that was just one of many that I encountered after that.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
They actually changed some of the laws. I don't remember when it happened, what the actual change was, but the sentencing change for the males, the pimps. And there was protections. There used to be a lot of protections for the young ladies, the women, and those disappeared as well. Yeah. I'll speak of another incident. There was a 17-year-old girl I used to talk to. She was on the stroll.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
She said her mother started her out young. And one day she just didn't show up. I found out a week later she was found in a nearby park, stripped, raped, and beaten, and left naked in the park, dead. And these are the kind of stories that no one talked about. And these are the kind of things that are happening. You're talking about, you're talking about.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And it's a series of stories that have happened to me that I've witnessed and just parts of my life that I wanted to share with the world that I pray and hope bring impact to whoever reads it.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Right. So it took me a while to figure out how to cope. It was actually after I left. Because when you're in the fire like that, you can't put it out. It's hard to heal in a place that got you sick, period. And this is, I'm going to tell a little bit of this story, the reason why I'm not even a police officer anymore. I was almost murdered on duty in 2016. I was nearly executed.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I was, I guess Paul said it, I was a sergeant at the time. I was responding to a call to help out another sergeant. I got T-boned by a drunk driver on my driver's side. He hit me so hard. I was in an SUV. He was in an SUV. He hit me so hard, he pushed me three lanes onto a light pole, almost into a building right there on the corner in East Oakland. Yeah.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
and as i'm in this car trying to figure out my exact location because i was just completely rattled a young man came on my passenger side passenger side of my vehicle and with a holding a glock who i thought was a glock when an extended mag and started firing at me while i'm stuck in my vehicle and so That was one of my biggest turning points of my life.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And the moment after all that settled, I realized I had not been coping at all. I was drinking. I wasn't sleeping. I was having continuous nightmares. I was trying to go to therapy, but it was reactivating over and over again. You're talking about wrestling with naked men. You're talking about...
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
that's an interesting story of a couple of those you're talking about again the homicides the shootings i've had people's brain matter on my boots on my uniform on my skin and i'm just supposed to go home and just be okay and live a normal life and the other thing they don't talk about is men and women hold things very differently so i'm watching my male counterparts
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
be okay for the most part, or at least pretend to.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Appear to.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And I'm trying to uphold that same image while slowly dying inside, and I could feel it. Because I'm witnessing all these just horrors and not being able to do anything except put a little Band-Aid on an arterial wound and not understanding why I can't do anything. Yeah.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And so it wasn't until almost losing my life that it made me sit down and take inventory of what was actually going on and take inventory. And that, excuse me, and that inventory led me to finally realize I had no idea even who I was. So if I don't know who I am, I don't even know how to begin to cope. Hmm. So the beginning of coping for me started with knowledge of self. Who was I in this world?
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Who was I as a woman? Who was I even in that uniform, the military uniform? Who was I outside of all that? And it turns out I wasn't even separated from any of it. All of it bled into one thing, and I was just trying to move through life.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
as my identity as a police officer a military officer and a black woman because that's what everybody's telling me i am everybody's telling me i am and the one person that didn't ever ask was myself like who are you so that was the beginning of the coping is coming to awareness acknowledging and then holding myself accountable for all the things i was doing um with not coping properly
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
It was wild. So... Initially, I got hit by the car. I got T-boned. Yes. So I'm sitting at this corner, and I remember the dispatcher asking me, where are you? I said, I'm at 73rd, and I couldn't remember the name of the street. I was knocked. My head was just knocked around. I went out a little bit, came back, and just trying to figure out where I'm at.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And then looking over to my passenger side and seeing that gun barrel, it was like, is that a gun? Yeah.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I was shocked. I just got the shit knocked out of me from this SUV, and I'm trying to figure out where I'm at, and all of a sudden now my driver's side door is completely smashed in. There's a cage in the back. Airbag, airbag.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I'm stuck. And the other thing was I could not move at the time, and I couldn't figure out why. I had my seatbelt on.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
My seatbelt had locked in place during the collision.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I had my vest on, of course, so I couldn't even feel it. I just know I got hit. I couldn't move. Now there's a gun at my only escape. And there's this man standing there, and he had the drop on me. And we're staring at each other. We're not that far from how we're sitting right now. And I could see his eyes, and it wasn't as if he was angry. happy, sad, it was like just void.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Well, both my parents were Marines, both from the South. I grew up around the Devil Dogs my entire life. I watched them serve and I wanted to play a part. I actually wanted to be a drill sergeant in the Marine Corps with the smoky bear and do all the yelling and the pointing with the knife hand. I saw it and I was just enamored with it. So it was a natural fit for me to go in the military.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Like something just wasn't there. And so I'm trying to piece all this together and put out on the radio where I'm at. Where's my gun? Is he going to be able to get in this car? What do I have to do right now? Like, just so many thoughts just running through my head, and everything actually was kind of wild. Everything almost felt silent.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And there's this man standing there, and we're staring at each other. We're not that far from how we're sitting right now. And I could see his eyes, and it wasn't as if he was angry. Happy? Sad? It was like just void. Like something just wasn't there.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I could hear every single breath, the inhale, the exhale, leaving my nose, exhaling out of my mouth. It was...
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
it was chaotic but it was calm all at the same time it's like i couldn't make sense of it is this is this i was watch about to watch myself die in this filthy patrol car and i remember the thought of my because i'm not married no kids i remember the thought of my parents being given an american flag folded up and that was the only thing they would have left of me
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So those were the kind of thoughts that were going through my head at the time.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So what I found out later was, so my incident happened on a Saturday night. It was July 23rd, 2016. It was actually amongst a rash of police shootings in the country. There was, I think, New York, then the five in Texas, and then like the three in Louisiana. Mine happened right after that. And so he did what he did. He left the scene. And he was, I guess he went to Stockton.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
They found him on the following Thursday. Eight-hour standoff. Two kids were held hostage. Wow. Two kids were held hostage, excuse me. Yeah. And they were able to, he came out after, I think I said, I think it was about eight hours. Locked him up, and he's now in prison today.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So it's, that's how they ended up finding him. Everybody told him. Everybody. Everybody. no one even showed up for this man's trial yeah so it was from my understanding the community wasn't happy about what he what he did they thought it was messed up yeah so did did it ever come out the reason like his thought process on why he did it yes but here's the kicker never made never made the media
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Not like that. It hit a couple papers in the Bay. I heard it hit one of the national ones, but it was like one of those brief little run-ins and that was it. So it turns out he had just been released from prison. He had just did a bid for, it was either home invasion or regular robbery. I don't remember that part. He was 29 years old. He had a disdain for police.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
He had been writing on his social media he wanted to kill a cop. Wow. He wanted to be part of the movement that was going on at the time, the BLM movement, and he was very caught up in the extreme portion of that. Right. He saw an opportunity with me, and he took it.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Because apparently, this was in the police report, he was yelling obscenities and, you know, I'm going to kill this cop, F the cops, F police, before he started shooting at me.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
But I actually went into the police first. Wow. I went into the military, went into the army in the reserves as an officer. Wow. So I went through basic training while I was a full-time police officer. Wow. Yeah, at the age of 27.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
That was my last day ever.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
My last day ever was me being in a hospital bed, being stripped of my uniform, my gun belt. So it felt symbolic. Yeah. I never went back. I never cleaned out my locker. I never cleared out my desk. Wow. That was it. I was in a lot of pain, like not only physically, but emotionally and spiritually just destroyed. They talk about the straw that breaks the camel's back. My back was broken. Yeah.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I started at 24.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Oakland. Oakland PD. Oakland, California, baby. Oof.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Facts.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Oh, man. It was... It's hard to encapsulate in just words, especially for this podcast, but it was the most exhilarating, dangerous, vulnerable. Any adjective that you could bring into to describe just fast-paced, unknowing type of activity, that's Oakland.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I dated myself.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Can we say that shit anymore?
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
You only live once, baby.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Yeah, I dated myself. Yeah, it's all good.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Yeah. But I'm sitting here living life like that because... My life almost ended. So I just like, I'm just going to live like that.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
chaos was just life at that point just as fast paced as oakland moves internally internally and externally yeah you have no choice but to adapt because if you don't adapt an environment like that you're going to get swallowed up and eaten alive yeah period so it was incumbent upon whoever put on that uniform to just make adjustments and not only professional but your personal life in order to survive that place wow and what did your parents say when you first joined the police department were they happy were they proud
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
It's funny, I didn't tell them until I was all the way through getting hired. Wow. Yeah, I kept it from them because I wasn't sure what their response was going to be. I felt the call, and I just wanted to go through with it, and I didn't want any other distractions. And I did not want anybody's extracurricular noise in my ear. Right. So I wanted to go in it without any sort of doubt, nothing.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So I didn't want to tell anybody.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
That's facts.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So right after FTO, which is field training, I went right to the beat. I went to one of the craziest beats in West Oakland at the time. OK. cut loose what we call it in oakland by myself working one of the most dangerous parts in oakland yeah mlk west street marcus street just a lot of old school gangs a lot of old school activity um was there a specific name for that part of oakland
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
It was something that I always wanted to do. And something caused me to pause pulling the trigger after high school because I almost went into the Air Force after high school. Same thing when I graduated college. I was going to go in the Army. I wanted to go and be an officer. It was the height of the invasion of Baghdad, actually.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And my parents, like I said, they were both Marines and they both still live near one of the bases. So they were working on base as well. I don't know what they were seeing. And they never really tell me don't do something. But for whatever reason, whatever they were witnessing, they actually asked me not to go. Wow.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And so I was like, well, I'm just going to join the Oakland Police Department then. Close enough. Close enough. I'm not going to tell anybody about it either. I'm just going to go do my thing. And so around the time I went, it was I signed my paperwork in September 29, 2010. So it was about three and a half, four years in because I started in 2006 in Oakland.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And at that time, it was economically not doing well. Right. That was the, what was that collapse called in 2008? The housing crisis of 2008. The housing crisis. The trickle-down effect was, I'd never seen anything like that. You were talking about people losing jobs off the ride, cops losing homes. Right. Homes abandoned all over Oakland, boarded up and just homeless.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And then the violence picked up. It was like the wild, wild west at the time. And so for me, I was kind of sitting on the cusp of getting let go. And there was 85 that eventually were let go. And we weren't sure how far deep they were going to go into my class. So I wanted a backup plan. And it was something I always wanted to do. So I was like, why not? You know, I wanted to keep serving.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I wanted to do it the highest capacity I felt at the time. And so I was like, I'm going to sign this paperwork. I have my college degree. I'm going to go be an officer in the United States Army.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Yes.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I remember there was one drill sergeant. She's like, Clark, you're not no spring chicken anymore. So I'm kind of running. And I remember that like, dang, she's so right. Because I'm surrounded by 17-year-olds, 18-year-olds, 19-year-olds. And I'm in here in my late 20s with a full-time career. I've been to college. I've lived life already. I was playing college hoop. Making money. All the things.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And I put it on hold to go serve my nation. It took a lot to hold my composure because there's a lot of mind games when you go to boot camp. Of course. Because they're trying to retrain you how to be. We're training you how to be a soldier. We're training you how to take orders, take directions, be very clear in your mission. And so I was already there.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I grew up, again, my parents are black and southern, so I had that plan.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
that going for me they were both marines and i was with the oakland police department so i was already structured and ready to go so for me it wasn't as difficult as i was witnessing some of the 17 18 19 year olds i remember my first our first day of boot because there's zero days what they call it it's when you get off the bus and you start going into your actual boot camp and they they do something called smoking so they smoke you whether they they bring you into whatever area or unit you're a part of
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
carrying your duffel bag full of your crap, your shoes, all your gear, and they have you put it over your head and start exercising with it. So you're running a place with this big duffel bag over your head. And we're just going between that and dropping down, doing push-ups, doing sit-ups, doing all kind of calisthenics.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I remember there was a 17-year-old kid, I think he was on the verge of turning 18, or he just turned eight, something like that. And he starts breaking down crying. And I'm just like, oh. Yeah.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
they're not ready for this right you know and it it dawned on me like i'm like i'm gonna be all right yeah i've i've cried my tears over this kind of harsh hardship yeah you know this is it's nothing new it's nothing new nothing new under the sun i'm here to just do a job and get the skill set that i plan to get from the military yeah
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Facts. You know?
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Yeah, that makes sense It becomes evident really fast. Yeah.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Military. Eleven years.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So 2010 to 2021. Wow. Wow.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Quite a while. I actually left as a captain.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
I have to say I was completely, completely naive into the way the world worked. I grew up a bit sheltered. I grew up in the desert out by Joshua Tree. My dad was gone a lot because he was always serving, always overseas, back and forth. I don't know what he was doing over there, but he was doing stuff. You know what I mean? And so it was just me, my mom, and my sister.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
So we had our little unit, and like I said, they were very strict. So I did not have a lot of experience being anything outside of my little bubble in the desert. So going out into the world, especially a place like Oakland, I'm now exposed to an urban environment that is ripe with history, ripe with violence, ripe with culture.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
It's just beautiful architecture, paintings, and also a lot of sadness.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
You're talking... I don't know what I can say or not say to get... You can say whatever you want. Okay. I mean, you're talking about maiming, raping, the amount of shootings, burglaries, robberies, home invasions, the homicides. I could not believe this is how we're out here doing each other. Yeah. We're treating each other. And it was mind-blowing. And then to see the politics that are involved.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
And then... Wanting and feeling this desire and pull to want to help and save and finally realizing that you can't. You can't. There's nothing, nothing you can do. And it's almost feels by design.
The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
She Protected Lives—Now She’s Changing Them with Business: Special Interview w/ Nadia Clark
Can I touch on a couple things? Yeah, of course. So my first... I'll tell it like this. My first interaction with human trafficking, I encountered a 12-year-old girl. We had something called the Hostro out in Oakland. I don't know if that's still the same term when you came through.