New video has emerged of Rayshard Brooks speaking in his own words about his struggles with the criminal justice system. The experience of being locked up in prison, he says, left him deep in debt and struggling to pay court fees and restitution — even as employers turned him away due to his criminal record. Brooks spoke in February with the group Reconnect.

Rayshard Brooks: “I just feel like some of the system could look at us as individuals — we do have lives, you know, where it’s just a mistake we made — and, you know, not just do us as if we are animals.”