Breaking the Silence, August 2, 2026
Breaking The Silence with Dr Gregory Williams
Unconquerable: One Trusted Adult Can Change Everything
Dr. Gregory Williams welcomes Chief Matt Antkowiak for a powerful conversation about child-abuse prevention, grooming awareness, survivor shame, institutional accountability, school safety, and the urgent need for trusted adults who are willing to listen, believe, and act.
This week's guest is Chief Matt Antkowiak. Chief Matt is the Co-Founder of Team Unconquerable and the Invictus Foundation. U.S. Army veteran, firefighter, career law enforcement leader. He is the author of, "Unconquerable."
Guest Spotlight: Chief Matt Antkowiak
Chief Matt Antkowiak is the guest on this episode of Breaking the Silence and is introduced as the author of Unconquerable, as well as a police chief, investigator, U.S. Army veteran, firefighter, and child-protection advocate. Drawing from both professional experience and his own survivor story, Matt speaks with unusual directness about childhood sexual abuse, grooming, law enforcement, school accountability, faith, therapy, and the mission of helping other survivors — especially men — understand that the shame belongs to the abuser, not the abused.
Dr. Gregory Williams Opens With Urgency and Purpose
Dr. Gregory Williams opens the episode from Houston, explaining that he has just returned from church and vacation Bible school but is setting aside his planned notes to give Chief Matt Antkowiak the full hour. He frames the conversation as immediate and practical, stressing that the issues being discussed are not distant or outdated but could be happening in communities right now. Gregory urges listeners not to “hit the snooze button” emotionally or intellectually, warning that ignoring abuse, grooming, and trafficking can allow harm to continue. He also gives listeners ways to participate live through Facebook, phone, and text.
Introducing Unconquerable and Matt’s Mission
The conversation turns to Matt’s forthcoming book, Unconquerable, which Gregory shows on screen and describes as a book expected to make a lasting impact. Matt discusses the legal-review process, planned author copies, a hoped-for launch around September 1st, and a future companion workbook titled around “12 conversations” parents need to have with their children. Gregory reads from the book’s back-cover description, identifying Matt as a co-founder of Team Unconquerable and the Invictus Foundation, and as someone dedicated to protecting the vulnerable, exposing darkness, and building protectors. Matt also describes his daily educational posts about grooming, education spaces, trafficking, and child-protection awareness.
Survivor Shame, Silence, and the Call to Be Heard
Matt explains that Unconquerable is rooted not only in his career but also in his own childhood sexual and physical abuse. He speaks directly to survivors, especially men, saying there is no shame or guilt in having been sexually abused and that the abuser owns that burden. Matt says he carried shame in silence for 40 years, and only later began connecting how much of his life, behavior, law-enforcement mission, and trauma response were tied to what happened to him. He describes moments by a pool that became turning points, including a childhood promise to protect another boy and a later realization after a tornado in Oklahoma City that led him toward law enforcement.
Faith, Therapy, Writing, and Healing Through the Story
Matt describes how therapy, journaling, and writing helped him begin to understand the connections between abuse, first-responder trauma, sex-crimes investigations, and his faith. He says the title Unconquerable ultimately points to Jesus, not to himself, because he sees Christ as the unconquerable one who helped him survive and heal. He explains that sharing his story has no personal upside in terms of comfort or ease, but that he wrote the book so other men would not feel alone or ashamed. The discussion also touches on emotional vulnerability, crying, therapy, spiritual groaning, and the hope that the book will help readers face trauma with honesty instead of silence.
Grooming, Trusted Adults, and Predator Propaganda
A central theme of the episode is Matt’s explanation of grooming and the importance of “one trusted adult.” He says a trusted adult is not a superhero but someone willing to listen, see, and act. Matt emphasizes that if a child discloses abuse, adults should believe the child because there is no advantage for a child in making that kind of disclosure. He distinguishes surprises from secrets, saying surprises have expiration dates but secrets do not, and warns that predators often build trust first by becoming beloved, dependable, and valued in the community. He calls this “predator propaganda,” explaining that respected roles such as teacher, coach, pastor, police officer, or firefighter can be used to shield abusers from suspicion.
Institutional Accountability and School Safety
Matt and Gregory then focus heavily on schools, child protection, and institutional responsibility. Matt argues that abuse can happen in districts of every size and says parents must learn what questions to ask, what policies to demand, and what red flags to watch. He recommends asking whether educators are allowed to be one-on-one with students behind closed doors and strongly opposes private one-on-one electronic communication between staff and students through social media, gaming platforms, messaging apps, or even unexpected channels such as Spotify. He also discusses allegations and investigations involving school districts, Title IX, Texas education oversight, the Texas educator inspector general, and his belief that institutions must place children above reputation, convenience, and self-protection.
Acting on Intuition and Refusing to Hit Snooze
In the closing portion, Gregory and Matt urge parents, educators, churches, and communities to act when something feels wrong. Matt explains that adults should ask children better questions, create safety through belief and nonjudgment, and never dismiss intuition when behavior feels off. He says he would rather investigate gray-area concerns early than wait until abuse occurs, and Gregory closes by reinforcing that hope remains possible no matter how long someone has carried trauma. The episode ends with information about Matt’s website and resources, an invitation to continue the interview series in two weeks, and Gregory’s reminder that a troubling feeling may be a “divine alarm” calling someone to protect a child.
Guest, Matt Antkowiak
Biography from Matt's website: www.mattantkowiak.com
I'm Matt Antkowiak.
I am a husband, father, grandfather, survivor, protector, author, speaker, and co-founder of Team Unconquerable. My life has been shaped by a simple belief: darkness thrives when good people remain silent, and lives change when ordinary people choose to stand and protect others.
As a child, I was sexually abused by a trusted family friend. Like many survivors, I carried the weight of that trauma in silence for decades. The abuse stole part of my childhood, shaped how I viewed trust, and left wounds that would follow me into adulthood. For years, I searched for ways to outrun the pain. Instead, God used it to forge a purpose.
I spent the next forty years pursuing the very darkness that wounded me.
My journey of service has taken me from the United States Army, where I served first as a Military Police noncommissioned officer before commissioning as an Infantry Officer serving with the 101st Airborne Division, to the fire service as a firefighter and EMT, and ultimately into law enforcement. Along the way I served as a patrol officer, detective, human trafficking investigator, police chief, and school safety leader. I have worked major criminal investigations, led crisis responses, helped expose institutional failures, and dedicated my career to protecting children and vulnerable communities.
I am also an 8th Degree Black Belt, Krav Maga Grandmaster, and lifelong student of the warrior mindset. Through martial arts, leadership development, and public safety service, I have spent decades teaching others how to prepare for adversity, face fear, and protect those entrusted to their care.
I am the author of Unconquerable, a memoir that tells the story of a sexually abused boy who spent the next forty years hunting the very darkness that wounded him. It is a story about trauma, justice, faith, healing, and redemption. More importantly, it is a call to action.
My story is not ultimately about what happened to me. It is about what God can do with broken things. My abuse became my purpose. My pain became my platform. My story became my mission.
Today, that mission is clear:
Protect the Vulnerable. Expose the Darkness. Build Protectors.
MY MISSION
Building a Generation of Protectors
For most of my life, I thought my story was about survival. I was wrong. Survival was only the beginning. The truth is that millions of children, families, educators, churches, and communities are facing the same darkness that shaped my childhood. Predators continue to exploit the vulnerable. Institutions still place reputation above truth. Good people often remain silent because they are afraid, unprepared, or simply don't know what to do.
I know this because I have seen it from every side. I am survivor. I was a police officer and investigator. I was a human trafficking task force member. I have seen it as a school safety leader.
I have seen it in churches, schools, homes, and communities. The faces change. The locations change. The circumstances change.
The darkness does not.
That is why my mission is larger than a book, a speech, a training program, or an organization.
My mission is to help build a generation of protectors. People often ask why I continue to speak publicly about child abuse, exploitation, institutional failures, school safety, and the difficult realities that most people would rather avoid. The answer is simple. Because someone should have spoken for me. Someone should have recognized the warning signs. Someone should have asked the difficult questions.
Someone should have protected the child.
Too often, they did not.
Today, I have the opportunity to be the adult I needed when I was eleven years old.
That responsibility drives everything I do.
Through speaking, writing, training, private investigations, consulting, leadership development, and the Team Unconquerable movement, my goal is to equip ordinary people to do extraordinary things when it matters most. I want parents to recognize grooming behaviors before a child is harmed. I want educators to understand their responsibility as outcry witnesses. I want churches to create environments where abuse cannot hide. I want leaders to choose truth over reputation. I want men and women to develop the courage to confront evil rather than ignore it.
Most importantly, I want people to understand that protection is not someone else's responsibility. It belongs to all of us.
That is my mission. That is our mission. And that is why we fight.
OUR METHOD
My life's work can ultimately be summarized in three commitments.
Protect the Vulnerable.
Every child deserves a safe adult. Every victim deserves a voice. Every vulnerable person deserves someone willing to stand between them and harm.
Expose the Darkness.
Evil survives in secrecy. Predators depend on silence. Institutions fail when they choose reputation over truth. We must be willing to confront difficult realities and shine light into dark places.
Build Protectors.
The future will not be secured by spectators. It will be secured by prepared, courageous men and women who are willing to serve, lead, protect, and act when others cannot or will not.
I cannot change what happened to me.
But I can dedicate the rest of my life to ensuring fewer people have a story like mine to tell.
Today, I speak to schools, churches, law enforcement agencies, parents, educators, and community leaders across the country about child protection, institutional accountability, school safety, crisis leadership, faith, resilience, and the responsibility we all share to defend the vulnerable.
Together with my wife, Stephanie, I co-founded Team Unconquerable. Our mission is simple: to equip people to wage spiritual warfare, win physical battles, and live lives of courage, purpose, and service. Stephanie leads the spiritual development, discipleship, and wellness side of our mission. I lead the protection, preparedness, leadership, and warrior development efforts. Together, we are committed to helping others become unconquerable.
This mission extends beyond physical protection. Together with my wife Stephanie, we believe people must be equipped for both spiritual warfare and physical challenges. While I focus on protection, preparedness, leadership, and developing protectors, Stephanie leads the spiritual formation, discipleship, and faith development side of our mission. We believe lasting transformation happens when people are prepared to fight both the battles they can see and the battles they cannot. That belief became the foundation of Team Unconquerable.
We are building a movement dedicated to helping people live with courage, purpose, faith, resilience, and responsibility. We want to develop strong families, strong communities, strong leaders, and strong protectors. We want to help survivors find healing, equip leaders to lead with integrity, and challenge ordinary people to step forward when others step back.
Breaking the Silence
“Breaking the Silence with Dr. Gregory Williams”
Now is the time for you to step out of your own personal darkness and break the silence that has been hidden and closed up inside of you.
“Breaking the Silence with Dr. Gregory Williams” radio program will offer the listeners a Road Map to Hope each and every week with keys to discover within yourself that ray of light to make your day better and brighter. Dr. Williams will not only discuss his own personal journey of overcoming the darkness of years of horrific sexual child abuse in the hands of his father and his father’s friends, but Dr. Williams will also feature special guests that have their own personal stories of overcoming obstacles in their lives and becoming victors instead of victims.
“Breaking the Silence” will also feature information from the professional and medical field that will dive into the important research involving Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and how to build Resiliency in yourself and in your children. Along with this information will be special guests from greatest minds in the United States to share their expert research and thoughts on this very important subject that each person needs to be aware of.
Now is the time to invest a few minutes each week with some awesome information to give you steps to HOPE and keys to HAPPINESS and PEACE. NOW is the time to Break YOUR Silence and breakout into a NEW and BETTER YOU! Join us each week beginning August 13, 2019 for “Breaking the Silence with Dr. Gregory Williams”. You won’t want to miss a single program. Heard around the world on the best radio network on the airwaves, BSS Radio Network available on iTunes, Google Play, iHeart Radio, Facebook Radio, Spotify and over 100 other high quality digital radio stations.
Speaker Identification
Speaker 1 - Announcer / Program Voice
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams - Host of Breaking the Silence
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak - Guest, author of Unconquerable; police chief, investigator, veteran, firefighter, and child-protection advocate
Speaker 1 - Announcer
Welcome to Breaking the Silence with Dr. Gregory Williams. Dr. Williamss is the author of the acclaimed book, Shattered by the Darkness, putting the pieces back together after child abuse. Dr. Williamss is on the senior leadership team at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. And Dr. Williamss travels the United States speaking and training professionals, parents and victims about the importance of dealing with abuse and personal trauma head on and not being afraid to break the silence of your own personal pain. Feel free to call in to tonight's show at 888-627-6008 and speak with Dr. Williamss and his guests live on air. And now, your host, Dr. Williamss.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
Well, there you are. Good evening and welcome to Breaking the Silence right here from my home in Houston, Texas. You can see the sun going down right behind me. I literally just walked in the door, just turned off the car, coming in from church and vacation Bible school. So I'm all, I probably have confetti and all kinds of stuff in my hair and stick glue on my fingers, but it was just a great night to be with a whole bunch of children. I just love to be in the presence of children and make an impact in their life. But welcome to the program tonight. This is going to be here. Sneak in here. This is going to be one of those nights that you're going to be able to take something, learn something, write something down and then have a resource that you can actually even reach out to find out more information. And I love, matter of fact, this is so good that I have some notes that I was going to go through tonight.
I'm setting those to the side because I want to give this guest the full hour. And I'll tell you a little bit, just a few minutes, but we're going to bring him on here. Normally I go about 10 minutes, but I'm going to bypass that not because I'm tired from VBS, but because of the importance. And we've had him on before and we're going to have him on in two weeks, two weeks from tonight. So the middle of the month, we will make the trifecta. And because he is so good and has so much information and so many years of experience. And you know, I was just thinking about it as I was driving back from church into Houston with the awesome traffic that we have out here tonight. I don't know what's going on. Something must be going on in town. It just bumper to bumper all the way from Pearland. But you know, there's a lot of people that watch TV and I have a huge big screen TV right there. And they get on, oh, Oprah Winfrey's network and they'll watch old Oprah Winfrey shows or an old Dr.
Phil show. You know, you can, you can listen in all the archives of this program. But the thing I love about radio and the podcast world, because we're alive all the way around the world tonight, Tuesday, you can say, Hey, Siri, play breaking the silence. Oh, there goes my phone because she's answering me now. Play me the most recent Breaking the Silence. I'm going to have to silence you. Okay. All right. All right. I won't say her name anymore. Anyway, and you can listen to all the old stuff. The thing I love about live radio is that we get things that are not from 10, 15 years away, there, a go and things that aren't relevant. What you're going to hear tonight is something that could be happening in your community tonight. It's not something that happened in the 80s or the 90s or the early 2000s or even a couple years ago. This is stuff that is happening and it's taking off like a snowball going downhill and it's just getting bigger and bigger and bigger.
And it's time that we as a community and people that just listening to this program could be millions of people tonight listening to this program to be able to join together and listen to the advice of our guest and change lives, save lives, impact lives that have already been damaged like his and mine and so many of you that listen. It's not just bring on a guest like Tom Cruise and talk about what's going on in the movie world that he's going to do another movie next week. He's going to do that. This is about things that we deal with and we have put our head in the sand for so many years that this is the day and age that I think tonight from our guest, you're going to be able to hear and recognize that the light is flashing, that the siren is going off and that the alarm on the side of our emotional family bedstand is going off. And if you decide to hit the snooze button on this tonight emotionally and intelligently, you're making a great error because you hit snooze, somebody gets hurt.
You hit snooze, somebody's going to get sold. You hit snooze and somebody's going to hurt one of the people that you love and it's going to change their life forever. There's several different ways to get involved in the program this evening. I just love that you can get on Facebook right here, Shattered by the Darkness, Facebook page. We are live right there right now. You can get on there and watch it and you can also comment on there. If you have a question at the bottom of the hour, we will look on those during our commercial break and be able to answer and ask your question or comment. Or what I like to do is you can call in at 888-627-6008. That rings straight to to a free call to the BBS Radio station and the wonderful crew to be there there and tonight the head of that studio dashboard is TJ and TJ will patch you into our guests tonight. This is one of those guests that you may want to ask a question because there's so much vast amount of ray of experience that he's had.
When I introduce you, you're going to understand what I'm talking about. 888-627-6008 or my cell phone number right here. 832-396-6525, just text to comment. By the time I get off the program, I will have dozens if not 50, 80, 100 texts before I get off the program and I always go through those every night and answer those and try to help you out. If you have a question, there's the three ways to get involved. I want to show you, if I can, TJ, go ahead and bring in our awesome guests tonight.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
This is the copy of what's going to be on the streets. That's what's going to be in Barnes & Noble and what's going to be on Books-A-Million. That's what's going to be on Amazon and it is an absolute awesome cover out here. I'll just do it this way. And I don't know, Chief, if you have a hard copy, do you have a proof copy yet?
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
I don't. It's in legal review. It's a legal review. It's a legal review. Oh, we know. That's going to take a long time. It's killing me. I'm like, just send me a copy anyway so I can hold it up, take it with me. It's a strange thing going from this door kicking police chief to this soft author that has to work with editors and legal review. Yeah. I tell you, they don't deal with guns that you carry very easy to do. No, they don't. They want to do everything by the book. I can't bully them and they get it done right. They make me follow their process. And thank you, by the way, you've been such a great friend and mentor to me. We haven't known you until long, but you've made an tremendous impact on my life, especially with the journey of launching Unconquerable.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
Well, when you have that launch part of your whatever, I will drive to Dallas. Come on. We'll work on a book signing event that's going to be at a local Barnes & Noble actually. All right. So we're hoping to get that locked down and of course, yeah, you get. Please let me know and we will come up there and I will do. I'll put on a little vest and I'll do crowd control for you. There you go. And you know, I've got, they're going to say I get 25 original copies and I'm numbering them and you got one. I'm coming, Doc. That'd be great. I'd love to have it. I'll tell you what this is called and welcome our guest Chief Matt, and pronounce your last name for me. I don't want to listen to that. And Koveat, Matt Antkowiak, and you will want to write this name down. A-N-T-K-O-W-I-A-K. Chief Matt, welcome to the program tonight and you're going to be able to be seeing him all over this world soon. This is going to be one of those books that is just going to fly off the shelves and we're hoping to pray that it has that longevity and it leaves a legacy of impact.
Unconquerable.
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
Now, we're going to have, we've already had you on the program, we're going to have you on in a couple of weeks because hopefully that's going to be around the launch date. I'm hoping, yeah. Right now, we're being told that the official launch on Amazon should be no later than September 1st. Oh, okay. Good. Good. So I have the first set of author, they call them author books. I should have first set of author books to me sometime in the next two to three weeks. And then we're doing a really cool thing. I haven't shared with you at Doc's surprise. And this first time I'm talking about this, we're working on a workbook that is already in development right now. It's completed. In fact, I completed before the book. That was when I was originally going to release it. It's 12 conversations you got to have with your kid called Unconquerable. Okay. So it's going to go along with this book. It's going to go along with it.
So Black Friday, I'm going to, it's going to be a Black Friday special. When you buy the book, you get the workbook. I want you, even if it's not, if you're not on the program that night when that comes out, I want to announce it on the program. I want to be on. Then Black Friday sale hits. Yeah, I want to be on that. I'm calling DIBs right now. I want to be on that for the official like ebook launch, audio book, all that. The whole launch should be by Black Friday. Absolutely.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
Let me just read it on the back of the book here. It says, Chief Matt, he's a co-founder of Team Unconquerable and the Invictus Foundation and he's a US Army veteran, a firefighter, a career law-enforcement officer, an investigator and a police chief. And Matt has dedicated his life to protecting the vulnerable, exposing the darkness and building protectors. And if you, I don't do much of this. So, but if you'd like to receive things like in LinkedIn, Matt is awesome at putting out information sheets that's like, whoa, you want to save that because that's going to be something you want to print off and maybe hand out to your class or hand out to your church group or at a rotary club or something. And just jump on, Matt, what's it like LinkedIn? What's up? Yeah, it's Matt Antkowiak. Matt, it's just, it's not, it's Matt with two T's. And Kovac, A-N-T-K-O-W-I-A-K. And my Facebook is, I have a, I don't know what you call it, like an official Facebook with the little check mark on it.
I put them, but I don't know what all it is. My daughter helps me with all that. But we put those lessons out every day at 7 a.m. There's a different lesson on a different topic related to this, this I'm going to call it modern-day slavery. And right now we're in a series specific to education space as we go into the school, we've got a human trafficking one that's going to be coming out in October that's next level. It's actually the Homeland Security investigators who helped me with it that I used to work with. The latest information is going to be that's available is coming out on that lesson series. So we have different series that we put out. That's great. Matter of fact, I went through yours just while I go and I pull something I just want to talk about tonight. Yeah, I'm sure. I have things to talk about, but hey, we're not going to cry out, things to talk about. But tell me, since this is your first official book, why did you name it Unconquerable?
And the, the subtitle is a survivor's journey through abuse, justice and redemption. So when you look at the picture, you think, well, he's just going to be talking about all the things that he experienced as a police officer. And he does. But you was and were one of those victims.
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
And possibly, did that have anything to do with you going into the law? A lot of things. Yeah. Therapy teaches, I've been in therapy. It's been, by the way, anybody that that first off, if you've been abused, hear me clearly, you need to be heard. I don't care about statutes of limitation. I don't care about the nonsense of the justice system. Hear me clearly. You need to be heard. And, you know, we're, there are other survivors out there that will listen to you. I'll sit and hold your hand and talk to you and listen to you and give you advice. Let me be really clear specifically to the men listener. There you go. Men, there is no shame or guilt in you being sexually abused. You don't own that. Your abuser owns that. And, and when you, when you look at what, what I went through as a child, I couldn't put words to it. You know, years, not, not one or two times, not that one time wouldn't be horrific enough, but years of sexual abuse.
Years of physical abuse. And the reality of it is for 40 years, I carried that in silence because of shame and guilt that wasn't mine to carry. And it was, Doc. I mean, I, I, I look back across my life now. And after I dumped, we talked about me dumping my story out to the world by accident in the press conference as a police chief, up until that moment, I had not connected a lot of dots. But what I've come to learn in the last 18 months journey and, and through my therapy is that most of my life is connected to my abuse and the decision I stood at the, at this pool edge, there were two times I stood by a pool. I talked about this in the book. The first time was when my abuse ended, my sexual abuse ended, I was standing there and ready for this. I was sad and disappointed and hurt that my abuser was leaving me for another little boy. And, and everybody in this world that hasn't been abused goes, there's something wrong with you.
Right. What's wrong with you? I felt exactly the same way when my dad walked out of the bedroom. Yeah. And so I stood there. It's like, I stood there. It's the only love I knew. Yeah. I stood at the pool where it all started. And, and I was standing at this pool in this middle of this apartment complex. And I made a promise to myself, I didn't have the courage to speak up to protect Michael was the next boy's name. I made a promise to Michael that it took about 20, about about 25 years from me to really get into it. But about 10 years later, I was a firefighter in Oklahoma City and a tornado devastated the area and I found myself standing at a pool again, but nature, it destroyed the apartment complex, but the pool was untouched. And like a wave of emotion hit me on a stand there and I remembered what I promised. And that's the moment I decided, I'm going to become a cop. I'm going to stop responding to tragedy and try to help people, which is noble.
And I'm going to become a law-enforcement officer and I'm going to start hunting it and putting it away. And so yeah, that's the, the, the abuse drove me to a whole bunch of just bad behavior in the military and bad behavior. And, you know, until I met my, my, my incredible bride Stephanie and I became a cop and then man, it was Katie bar the door. I'm going after it. You know, you don't, there's that story of the little girl and her grandfather walking down the beach with all the starfish and she's told him one at a time and the grandfather was like, you can't possibly make an impact to all these. She says, yeah, but for this one, it holds it up and toss it in, made one for that one. And I come to learn as I was seeking out, ready for this, people that have been in worse situations than me. I was normalizing my views, trying to make it less painful for me without talking about it to anybody through investigations, through putting bad guys in jail.
So I have a strange, unfortunate, unique perspective of trauma from child abuse, trauma from sexual abuse, compounded by trauma for being a first responder, compounded by being in sex crimes for 16 years, putting in some of the worst people in prison you could, you could put away the most prolific human trafficker in US history. I cuffed up September, September 9, September 11 of 2019. And at every time I cuffed him up, Doc, I, I, you would think I was, I was physically high five and guys, but I was, I was broken inside. And it wasn't until I started writing and journaling, which became the book. And I realized, oh my God, it's all connected. And what I, what I come to realize was God was with me all the way when I was 11. And when I, when I was cussing God and, and, and pushing God as far away as I could in my twenties to today where, man, I'm just, I'm loving on Jesus because man, I know for me that's what has healed me.
And, and I'm never going to be whole. You can't give me back my innocence. You can't give me justice. It's past the statute of limitations, but Jesus. And so that's why the name Unconquerable is there because what the, the one that is Unconquerable is Jesus. I'm not Unconquerable, but he is. And there was this mantra that my wife would tell you, I would say going to work, I'm either going to go home or come home, babe. I had this attitude that I was either going to go home to Jesus or I was going to come home to her. And I was okay either way because the work was incredibly important. And, you know, I, I kept two things from my wife that terribly hurt me now and, and, and I've reconciled with her. She, she's such a rock star. But I never, I told her once about being most of the child, but it was very passing. I held her 40 years before I told her the details and she still hasn't heard the details. She doesn't really want to hear all the details and I can't blame her.
But the other thing was I held that I was writing a book for a year. I started really finding healing in my book and then I started realizing that when I started talking to people about it, it was some of the weight I was carrying in this invisible backpack. I was giving it to other people. And I wrote the book for a pretty pure reason. I just felt like I felt that the story I was going to tell was going to make other men not feel shame. Yeah.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
Yeah.
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
And I wanted them to, to understand they weren't alone. And there was a, there was a comment made in one of the press conferences that really kind of it was, it was asinine, excuse the language, but they, this, because it is this reporter says, well, you seem to have it all put together, even though you were sexually abused. I want to reach across the choke. You can't do that. I'm proud of how many are in a police uniform. So I, but I thought, wow, I wonder how many CEOs of four to 500 companies have been sexually abused and they just look like they got it all together. I wonder how many doctors and lawyers just have it all together, but they've been sexually abused. And they just don't, they have it all together. So they can't talk about it. Yeah. They're afraid. No, it's not the fact that we've overcome. It's the fact we've learned how to deal with what we've gone through. Yeah. Because we'll never get over it.
I'll never be whole. You'll never be whole. Never. Only that the love of Jesus Christ can really come in and make that heart hole. But all the broken pieces are still broken. But we just learned how to deal with limping along and making the best of it. And now picking up that starfish and matter, making one difference. And that somehow. Yeah. And when the book, it is, it's, and we had talked about this as I was coming closer to turning it into a publisher to have them, print it and stuff. I really wrestled with what to share, what not to share and how much to share. And you've read bits and pieces of it. You know, it's there's some, there's some tough stuff in there. And you know, the, after it's gone through editorial, or you haven't gotten to read it since it's gone through development and all the corrections in it. And they required me to write more. And I say that in my best interest said, you need to write more on this.
You need to write more on that. And so I had to really go back through some real tough stuff. And there specifically the one chapter in there that was the hardest for me to write was the one called the gun. And it's where I, I stood over top of him with his gun when he was sleeping, intending to take his life. And I didn't want to put that in her first, but I thought. Here's the antidote I would give you. I thought I wonder how many people hold the gun thinking they could end their life and it would end it. And so in a weird way, even though that wasn't, I've never had suicidal tendencies, I empathize with someone that's been through what you and I've been through, where that might be a thought they might have. And so I wanted to share the story that that particular bit of information to say, it doesn't solve it. It wouldn't have taken it away. It's what the devil would want as the outcome. And so I hope Unconquerable is truly when people put it down, I hope they cry through it.
I was kidding around with my, my, my, my team was asking me, hey, how big do you want the book? What's all these things I never knew I'd have to pick. And I'm like, so I said, okay, give me a size that they, they will buy it carried out of plane because I want people to ugly cry out of plane. And the guy's like, well, he says, can I tell you the truth, Chief? And I'm like, well, I would prefer that he goes, I, I cried two or three times reading your manuscript. And he said, I don't even have words to say something to you about it.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
And I said, well, here's what you say. Don't say something to me. Just hand it to somebody else and ask them to read it. And so I hope people, I do want people to be emotionally connected to the, the, the spine of the story of my life. But it isn't about me because my story, unfortunately, is not unique. It's not. And so I, but I want people to realize, and this is what the back half the book is, I want them to have hope because I lost hope for a long time. And I want them to, to, to find emotion and love. I'm, I'm, man, I'll tell you what, I ugly cry and I never did that in my life. And you know what, it doesn't make me less of a man. Yeah, no, no. Because man, that's just some tough stuff. And I'm 50 ish, you're 50 some years old. I'll just put it that way. I'm in my fifties. And I'll tell you that, um, for, for a 50 year old guy, I'm, I should be able to put into words what happened to me as a child.
And there are times in my therapy where my, my therapist at him, shout out to Adam, he's an incredible therapist. Um, I can't even put, I've, I've investigated worse stuff and I can't put my stuff into words. So of course an 11 or 12 year old child can't. And so if that's you out there and you can't put it in words, here's what I'll tell you the Bible says, the Bible says that God will even understand when you grow and when you pray. Yeah. And what, what a, what a special place of healing that we can get in when I don't have, I might have to put words when I'm talking to you to make this intelligible, but when I'm with my daddy in heaven and I'm praying to him and I'm trying to make sense of this insensible thing, the cool thing is he's such a good God that I can just groan at him and cry at him. And he knows exactly what my heart is dealing with in that moment. And man, I wish I would have lived more of my life with the emotions that I'm exploring now, because I just put him aside and buried him.
That's great. Now, if he was getting on the elevator on four one and heading toward, let's say the 12th floor and you had that elevator speech of, oh, what do you do? I'm a writer. Oh, you written a book. What's the book about? How would you explain to somebody that's just watching for the first time tonight? Hey, wait, I know he's been a chief police and he's been a firefighter and all this, but from the front to the end, how would you just say, hey, this is what it's about. This is who it's for. This is who's going to be able to get a lot of wisdom from this, a lot of help and hope.
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
Yeah, that's a great question. So here's what I would say. I would say, look, I'm a 35 year veteran law enforcement investigator of sex-trafficking. And if I could tell you that one trusted adult changes everything, would you want to learn how to be that one trusted adult for someone else? And if so, read Unconquerable because I'm comfortable is going to tell you about grooming in ways that only telling the story of a groomed child could tell. It's going to talk about how trusted adults are groomed by trust and how we all should know what grooming looks like and sexual abuse looks like. And we should learn to ask the right question. And that's what Unconquerables about.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
Okay, great. Because we're getting to grooming after the break. But I want to know what was it take to be the one trusted adult? Because every organization, every business, every school, every church, every family needs somebody, every medical center, somebody that's have one person. What's it take to be that one person, a superhero? Yeah, no, no. In fact, superheroes aren't welcome.
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
The one trusted adult is the person that's willing to listen, see, and most importantly act. You see, there's no what I've learned through my experience. And I've had some people be really ugly with me after that press conference. And when I've announced this book, this real stuff, I mean, it's whatever I'm used to it as a cop anyway. But there is no advantage, no upside to me sharing my sexual abuse story. No, I'm not going to get rich off this book. I'm not going to get rich off of telling my story. It only makes me cry at night and have to be in therapy weekly. I'm not there's no upside. So think about part that for a second. If a child comes to you and shares abuse, you have to believe them. Yeah, because there's no reason, no upside for a child to come to you. They're going to come to you only when they believe they can trust you with what they want to say. And that comes from being the person that I needed, that person that was just willing to be present.
To interact with you, you did it today at VBS, that adult that just wants to know me, just wants to care about me and listen to me and never breaks the rules. There's never a secret between a trusted adult and child. There can be surprises, but never a secret. See, a surprise has an expiration. A secret has no expiration. A surprise is we're going to have a surprise party if you're dad this week. That has an expiration. But a secret, don't tell your dad about our special time together. That has no expiration. And so the trusted adult is the person that understands the rules around being a safe adult and then is willing to open up themselves to criticism. Most people that sexually abuse children, and I don't want to put your story, but I know it. Here's what I'm going to tell you. Often the people that look like they should be trusted, the police officer, the firefighter, the pastor, the teacher, the coach, they are actually often beloved by their community.
They do that intentionally, by the way. The people that are the predator, they get into the community and they groom trust first. They want to become beloved, liked, valued, all those things dependable so that when anyone gets a hint that there's something not right, they can use predator propaganda to protect themselves. In fact, often what I found and found in real ways, in recent investigations that closed out with, by the way, people that everybody said, oh, there's no way Rick Adams did any of this. Well, Rick Adams pled guilty. So apparently he did something wrong. There's no way that this youth pastor, Ruel Barbee, who pled guilty to an inappropriate relationship with a student. He absolutely did. And I talk about those cases in my book and the reality of it is, is talking about some other ones, but these people were, people were coming at me. You're accusing such a wonderful Bible teacher, such a wonderful principle.
No, what I'm doing is I'm calling balls and strikes down the middle of the plate. I don't set the strike zone Congress does. I call balls and strikes. And I tell you what, that could be the reason why your books and legal right now try to get clear. It's why they're they straight up the names being named name and name. It's like, whoa, hey, I dropped, I'll give you a perfect example. I dropped Fort Worth ISD name out there because they covered it up. In fact, I met with the the inspector general of TEA yesterday. And you know, my name is kind of a weird last name. And he's up on the stage, given this presentation to this group of people. And I slipped in there, right? And he saw me and apparently knew me. I never met the guy before. And at one point in there, he's talking about investigators that are kind of pit bulls. I've been called that. And he points over me and says, like Mr. Antkowiak, if you want to find out about how to investigate Mr.
Antkowiak, said my name perfectly, which means one of two things either that's a really good thing or a really bad thing. But I was I was quite taken back by him. Yeah. And because there was a there was a deal that happened last last session with the Texas Senate where they called me down to testify to the oversight committee education. And I didn't go down there with the intention of of carpet bombing Fort Worth ISD. Yeah, I went down there with the intention to say you all get need to pull your heads out of your back sides and start putting legislation together allows people like me doing my job and stop handcuffing me. And that turned into they said, we'll give us some examples. And you know, if you spend much time around me, you know, I'm pretty direct. I said, well, I said, couple of you up sit up on this dias. It's your school districts, those are problems. And I pointed at Tan Parker, Senator from Fort Worth.
And I said Fort Worth ISD, for example, has been covering up the sexual abuse of children and continuing to employ sexual abusers. And then when they let them resign, they let them resign in lieu of criminal investigation. And I would and of course, I was cautious in that moment. Oh, well, you better have some proof that I was whole. How about if I present you a memo that is on Fort Worth ISD letterhead, that's an internal memo from the HR director of the superintendent where they said that. How about I produce that that by the way, I knew what I was looking for before I went there. They didn't cooperate with my investigation. In fact, they denied a subpoena. They denied a subpoena, they denied a request. They denied a subpoena. And then when I brought a district-court criminal search warrant, they denied that initially. But what they didn't know about me was I don't come by myself. I bring friends and so special agent with the FBI Dallas Division, I called her up and said, Hey, would you go with me?
I have a feeling I have a problem today. I think they're going to try to tell me that my police department is not big enough. And I really think I'd like to be able to say, well, meet my friend over here. And so she popped out her credentials just like in the movies, man, I've never seen him before in 30 years of being a cop. She literally pulls out and she goes, me away FBI. And then they're like, Oh, and she's like, I think we have the resources to shut this building up. So giving what he wants. And then they reached over and gave me exact they knew exactly what we're looking for. And so when I went down to the Senate and carpet bomb them, it actually was what I've been told that my testimony was the really what was the driving wind behind this new inspector general position that started in January. And by the way, it's already the impacts that we're seeing already is incredible. We went were more than double the amount of people are turning into abuse now, but 16,000 abuse cases have been turned into TEA from last year alone, 16,000.
And that's like 1200 school districts, by the way. So you do the math on that 16,000 abuse cases of which 2800, I believe the number don't hold me to that, but at least 2800 are sexual-abuse cases of students by staff members on school grounds. And so I had this really cool opportunity to sit with Mr. Fuller, Levi Fuller, who's the new IG of Texas. He was so gracious to sit and visit me for a couple of hours and pick my brain. And I got to kind of hear what his priorities are. And I'm very excited for what he's doing. He doesn't care either what people think of it. It takes people to don't care about what you think about. So to kind of wrap it all up with your talking about the one trusted adult, it's placing the child above the reputation of an institution, placing the child above your reputation. It's been willing to stand for a child that nobody else will stand for, and to stand with the child when nobody else will stand with them.
That's what the trusted adult is. And so that's what I hope my book compels people to become is that one trusted adult.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
That's fantastic to you for telling what we're not going to take a break TJ, so just make note of that. But I will just give a good break here of 888-627-6008 if you want to call in. Get ready for a life-changing journey from the best-selling author of Shattered by the Darkness and when the dark clouds come Dr. Gregory Williams is back with his highly anticipated third book embracing your scars, learning how to turn life's pain into life's power and purpose. Have you ever wondered how to transform your struggles and the strength? Do you want to stop hiding behind the pain, the heartache, and instead learn how to turn those scars into the very fuel that propels you towards greatness? If you do, then this book is for you in embracing your scars. Dr. Williams shows you how to take the negative experiences of your past and turn them into the very source of your future success. Don't miss out because your transformation begins here.
The book is available soon on Amazon, phones, and noble, and wherever great books are sold.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
We have with us Chief Matt the author of Unconquerable and this will be coming out shortly. On this last half of the program, I really want to go in because you've kind of went into that with the schools. I know Houston's huge and so has Fort Worth Dallas and all that, but every week at least, if not every day, there's somebody that's on the front page or on the KPRC web blast that says so-and-so teacher, so-and-so coach, superintendent, or whatever, from one of the Houston ISDs or something like that on sexual charges of exposing themselves or having sex with the 14-year-olds. Chief, how do you explain from a parent's point of view, because we're getting ready to go back to school? And to me, this is important because the sports teams are starting up. You know, they may be too hot for football to play, but we're practiced right now, but they're going to be out inside anyway, practicing and things of that order.
What do you look for with red flags with people that are very distinguished? They're not the guy in the long, dark coat that's trying to hand candy out to kids in the park. Those days are over. I mean, I'm sure there still are some of those, but these are people that's been-
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
The lightning strike moment. What you're talking about is the lightning strike moment. You know, people- I will say this about two things before I jump into answering that. Number one, Erin Anderson. Erin Anderson of Texas Scorecard. If you're not following her, you got to follow her. She is doing yeoman's work on putting people out there and just- She doesn't care about getting sued either. She just says her name, puts her picture, drops the charge out there. Follow her on Facebook, social media, her. She's an investigative journalist. Erin Anderson. You need to get her on your show. I'll talk her into it. Yeah, I'd love to. And she will talk about the- It is everywhere. It's the second thing I want you to hear. You know, often when you think about active shooters, right? Somebody that goes into a school to do an active attack with a firearm, you've all day, Santa Fe, Parkland, Columbine, all those ones you've heard of, and actually used in Texas at the University of Houston.
My son went there. They had an active shooter. You know, it's interesting. What you always hear on the press conferences, we never thought it would happen here. Yeah. You hear that all the time. So worst statement to ever stay, by the way, because what that tells me as an investigator is you weren't even doing the stuff you needed you to prepare for. So let me start with, hear me clearly. If you're hearing this, seeing this, it happens everywhere. There's not a school district too small or too big. And in fact, we were looking yesterday, when I was hanging out, we were looking through some of the data, and it was shockingly eerie, how it's almost per capita problem, not a urban problem. Okay. Explain that. Yeah. So the smallest districts are having the same percentage of their student body being abused as the large districts. Now, what that tells you is the larger the district, the more pervasive the problem.
And I think part of that is, is that and I hope someday the governor will actually take my call again, or let me sit down with him again. I won't be as mean. All right. Stop wasting my tax dollars on things that don't matter. And let's start really focusing on what matters. So I mean, here's the idea, we're spending billions of tax dollars on hardening doors, putting ballistic film on windows, keeping these quote active shooters out. And hear me clearly, if you're a victim of that kind of violence, I'm so sorry for you too. And that's horrific too. But let's talk about the real numbers. The reality of it is that here's here's grooming. We're not just having it occur. We're given that person an ID card, an access card, a key. We're inviting them past the front doors. We're putting them in a classroom and we're giving them 20 to 30 kids every hour to have access to. Take your pick. Take your pick. And they're spending day in a day out with those kids, so they can identify the kids that are better targets.
And so we need to start really taking this child sexual abuse and child abuse issue that's occurring in our schools more seriously than we are. And here's how you notice someone's taking a serious doc, where they spend their money is what they care about. The two things that people will spend their time on and money, one of the things that they care about, my time and my money. And the state is not putting time or money into this in a serious way. So that leads it to you, moms and dads. Just like I tell my martial arts students, the police aren't your bodyguard. You got to learn to defend yourself. Moms and dads, you got to learn what questions to ask. You got to learn what to look for. So let me just start with some of the simplest stuff. Go into your school and ask them if they have a policy that allows an educator to be one-on-one with their student. There should never be a situation where an educator is in a closed door with a student, not one time.
No educators should have access. Ready for another one? There should never be a time where an educator is communicating with my child one-on-one at any single electronic medium, whether it's social media, gaming system, which is you need to watch the gaming systems. Spotify, I had a case where Spotify was how the basketball coach was communicating with the basketball girl at the high school through the Spotify messaging that you can attach to a song. And so we dumped into it, to be honest with you.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
Okay, so your rule, if you was the governor of Texas and all the Texas schools could not have the ability to have any school staff to be able to communicate with a student in electronic medium. Period. Period. There's no reason to. There's no reason to. And here's the thing,
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
Period. Period. There's no reason to. There's no reason to. And here's the thing, don't make it an administrative rule, make it a criminal offense. So we have this, we have this grooming. It's now a crime to groom. But nobody wants to do anything about it because they're like, oh, but they didn't quite get there. Well, that's the whole point of the crime was we want to catch them before they get to the abuse. If we if we start prosecuting laws on the books effectively, but we don't have a measure for that. So one way to make a measure for grooming would be to identify in Texas, for example, chapter nine, the Texas Penal Code talks about what is reasonable necessary to defend yourself against somebody else that lists out. Hey, if someone's trying to murder you kidnap you, invade your home, it literally lists out these things as if these things are occurring, you can use deadly force to protect yourself.
We're really good about defining that in Texas. Why don't we get that good about defining grooming and say this, if you're caught, one-on-one with a student behind a closed, locked door, then that's criminal offense, of grooming. If you are communicating one time with a student on a social-media messaging app, DM gaming system, that's a criminal offense, make it a misdemeanor, a put them in jail, take the city have this. No, I'm actually trying to get ahold of Linda McMahon, the U.S. Secretary of Education, I've been reaching out to her, she's stonewalling me right now. I think I've got a little bit of a reputation of speaking my mind. And so I've, here's the thing, I take care of a lot of these problems that I want to address. I'll give you one example of so coaches will leverage if your child is in high school and working towards playing Division I sports and looking for a scholarship, you better lean in a little closer with those coaches doing with your child.
Because here's the thing, a child feels so much pressure to get the scholarship to perform that they will do nearly anything they've got to do. And these coaches have this unfettered access to them. So coaches and trainers should not be touching a student one-on-one to treat them for an injury. Michigan State wishes they had that rule. Nasser, remember him? Yes. You know, there should never be a time where a teacher by themselves enters a shower area. I bet Penn State wishes they had that rule. Yeah. And at those institutions, these are huge institutions. By the way, Title IX also tells us what we should do after it happens. Once a child makes an allegation, now hear me clearly, I'm a Title IX certified investigator. I've actually exonerated more educators than I have sustained complaints on in Title IX. And if an allegation is made, we have to fully investigate it, period. And that means you inconvenience the person that is the suspect, not the victim in complaint.
So that means you remove them. And hear me clearly, I know that's inconvenient. And that's tough and that's hard, but who cares? We're talking about children. And so I've been called out for my behavior towards grooming is being one of vendetta. Because I'm tenacious on this. There is really clear bright lines to me. And here's my response to the comments of anybody that's the hater out there. If you think I'm going to vendetta for children, you're right. And if you're not, you're the problem.
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
Yeah. And so moms and dads, you can't trust these educators. God, I love them. We got some great one. My wife, my mother, well, educated. I love them. But you cannot trust your educator. I'm not trusting anybody with my child. Oh, my God. Absolutely. If you if you sense something's not right, trust your intuition. Something's not right. My mom asked me in my, it was, I think it was 12 when when she finally, I don't have a clue what she was thinking, but she finally decided to pull me aside and ask me something going on between you and Pappy. And I put this in the book. And God bless her. I mean, who knows whether she knew about it, didn't know about it, whatever. She said something was what she asked the question. Is there anything going on between you and Pappy? So let's break that question down. Is there anything going on between you and Pappy? Well, the answer is, of course, yes. Because there's a there's a there's weird stuff going on.
Why is this 20 year old hanging out with a 10 year old at playing GI Joe's in his room? Why I see when he spends the night sleeping in the 10 year olds room rather than the older brothers room or the couch? So like, yes, there were things going on, mom. And so the question really should have been, hey, I love you. I care about you. You know, you could tell me anything. I'm going to believe you and not judge you. So because when my mom asked me, is there anything going on? You know what I said? I said right away, I was like, no, no, nothing's going on because I was afraid that they wouldn't believe me. I was afraid that they would think I was gay because he had told me that's what people would say. I was afraid that he was going to hurt my parents because he told me he was going to kill him if they ever found out and then kill me. I was afraid that everybody at school would know because he said he would make sure everybody knew.
So when you say is anything going on, that's not the right question. But if moms or dads have this weird feeling that something's not right, then something's not right. It's kind of like your body. I mean, if your body feels weird, go to the doctor. If you're if there's a behavior that's not right, go to the place here. When I was patrolling my doc, we used to, I people would call they're like, my door's open or this light someone and they would call us to come to their house to walk their house. And I remember this, this one woman, bless her heart, this is a more local home when I was a cop up there. She had called two or three times in the same week. And her light was, I finally figured out the third time her life was on a timer. So it was turning on at night. She put the timer and forgot she put the timer on her light. So she would leave the light was off. The light was the one she'd called place.
And then I told her, I said, look, I would rather come here every night of the week and make sure no one's in your home, then not come and somebody being your home. I would rather investigate an educator for something that is on the slippery slope of gray before they fall into the trap of abuse. Because not, I don't believe educators wake up one day and say, I'm going to go sexually assault the child in my school. Some do because they've been doing it so long. But the first time they don't do that, usually it's something going on in their world. And oh, by the way, every abuser has been abused 100% of them. I have never interrogated someone who's committed sexual abuse is okay. So so that's really your your on your tombstone. You're 100% every abuser has been abused. 100% of every abuse. I call it. By the way, this is a manicoviac term. Investigators don't judge me for this. I call it, I call it sourcing.
I want to source abuse. And so when I spent a lot of time with my suspects, I know them well, because I was intimate with one for three and a half years. I know the behaviors, I know what they do, another thing. So I always spent a lot of time with them. And the majority of my my interview, 90% of it was about them, not the abuse. And I would spend time talking with them about their life. I would start with, tell me your earliest memory. And I would just walk them through their life. And every time I knew I had them, I would get towards the end of the interview and I'd lean over that and I'd give that that reinforcing touch and I'd lean in. And I would say, tell me what, whether it was her uncle, aunt, father, whoever, because they would say something in that conversation. I was like, that's who it is. And I'd put I parked in the back of my brain and I come to the end and I said, and when they did that to you, that made what you did to this young person seem okay.
And they would you can't you can't hide that in an interrogation. When I'm remember, I have this unique perspective. I can hold the hand of a victim because I have been a victim. Yeah, I can hold the hand of a parent because I know what it's like to be a parent of someone who's abused. I know what it's like to be to, I know that that predator because I've been with him. So I have been the investigator. So I know it's what it's like to look at all these pieces of this puzzle, trying to make sense of it and put it together. So I have this, I have this really unique perspective when I'm in the interrogation box to be to say, Hey, bro, I know what you did, but I don't go that route. I go the route of what's been done to you. Because monsters, they don't look like the monsters on TV. They don't look like Freddy Krueger and Jason. Monsters look like you and me. Yeah. And and here's what I know is we are we're not born looking like a monster or acting like a monster to learn behavior.
100% of people that abuse have been abused. And hear me clearly, this is I can everything for that. I'm gonna I'm gonna park that because two weeks from tonight, we're gonna I want to start the program off with that.
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
Yeah, that's huge. I want the last couple minutes to be that that's why folks, if you don't start put this down to buy, this is why you need this man's book. Okay, because this kind of stuff, it's just believable. But I want to ask you one last question, which you take as far as you can in the few minutes that we have, what is these two initials, the IG?
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
Ah, that's the inspector general. And so the military has these and you'll you'll hear like government has these in different areas. And so I went down to Austin and was talking to the Senate and they made the mistake of asking me, I was supposed to only have two minutes to talk. I was there for 30 minutes. You can find that. I'll get you a link, Doc. She can watch that testimony is amazing. And one of the things I said is that they asked me, what, how do we solve this problem, chief? What can we do to solve this problem? I said, well, they'll create an independent, inspector general over Texas education specific to child abuse and sexual assault of children and by educators. And everyone's like, wow, that's kind of why would we do that? Because because here's the thing, a police chief who reports to a superintendent that's not elected is a problem. I've been that police chief. A superintendent is an appointed individual by a school board, unlike a mayor who's elected.
If the police chief is reporting to an appointed person, that's a problem, because that appointed person now has leverage over them. And so there's really no way to go outside of your chain of command. And by the way, in major cases, you are required to brief your civilian oversight when asked. And what are they getting out? Hey, props to Dr. Sheba George at Newman. She never got in the way of my investigations, not one time. In fact, the first real big case I worked there was this guy, De La Cruz, he was the athletic director, he was like her spiritual son. And I was like, when I was walking there, I was like nervous, because I'm like, what's my boss going to? She's going to try to interfere with this. And then I'm going to be out of a job in a week, but I'm going to do it. I'm like, I'm going to do it. I'm going to drop the bomb. I walked to sat down. I told her, she cried. And I looked, I said, you know, you need to understand, she goes stop for a second.
And I was like, oh, okay, she never did that before. She's you do what's right. You need to put his butt in jail, you put him in jail. And I was like, this isn't going to let fellas going to go. But that's rare. I could tell you story after story of institutional abuse, where hear me, there is this case right now where there is some 10-year-old girls that a federal district judge just said an attorney for a school district gets to depose them on a civil on a civil hearing insanity. They're going to re-victimize those girls. And so you got to really protect, you got to protect the sanctity of the investigation and the IG is going to do that. And he's compared, he doesn't have a lot of criminal authority yet, but there's some big news coming in two weeks. I'm going to be going to tell you how the US Department of Education, the Department of Justice, U.S. Department of Justice, TEA, the Attorney General's Office here in Texas are going to work together to help solve some of this problem in Texas.
It's going to be incredible what's getting ready to get done. It's going to be shattering, earth shattering. And they're that started with the appointment of this. Now, I'm not happy. He's not independent. He actually reports the Commissioner of Education. But here's what I'll tell you. I hey, I've asked the hard questions face to face with this guy and leave eye. I trust your brother. I know you were being honest with me when you said that the Commissioner of Education in Texas is letting you do what you need to do. He's giving you the resource you need. So as long as the Commissioner of Education toes that line, I'll stay off of him. But as soon as that happens, man, you want to find out a pit bull advocate now, let that Commissioner of Education start getting involved in this. But as it stands right now, this this IG is going after people's licenses, superintendents licenses. He's going after educator licenses.
We're not not like I'm going to suspend them. He's lifetime-banning putting them on the national Do Not Hire list. He is going after them to where he's removing the access to our schools. Now, there's so much more than he's yet done. I wish we had hours to talk about all of it. But it starts with putting people in positions that have authority to actually take action. And for all the faults of the state of Texas, the establishment of the Texas educator IG was a brilliant move by the legislature. Thank you, Governor Abbott for signing it. Now, cut this man loose, let him do his job. Resource him, make sure he has the staff, the expertise around him. He's a lawyer. God bless him. But let's make sure this guy has the money because it comes down to money. And we have a whole lot of money sitting in a Rainy Day Fund. Let's let's this is a rainy day. Oh, it's this flood. It's flooding; the tears are flooding. And so I'm excited about the IG.
It was a great meeting with him, Doc. I'm a guy that's very skeptical. View teachers are that. But I sat with this guy face to face inches apart from him. And and I'm an investigator. I'm an interrogator. I know what I'm dealing with when I'm dealing with a human being face to face. And he was being honest with me. And I'm a big fan of his. I wasn't going into it, but I am now. He won me over in that period of time we spent together. That's great. Well, to you, I'm a big fan of your,
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
period of time we spent together. That's great. Well, to you, I'm a big fan of your, Chief. This is the book. It'll be coming out soon. And we're looking at what let's say Labor Day by Labor Day. We can do every weekend. We're hoping it comes out Labor Day weekend. That sounds like a winner to me. I want to know about when the book signing is going to be in two weeks from tonight. Eight o'clock live you'll be here again to do a kickoff or whatever. We're just going to continue on and go and what's the next point and just keep on going. We'll go and we'll go and moms and dads. If you need that resource, please ask. You're not going to be faulted for what happens. You're not going to be in the leader. Same thing. You're never it's never your fault for what happens unless you did it. No, it is your fault for how you react. You're going to be judged for what you did after it happened, not before, but you can get resource.
The information is out there. Reach out to me. Anytime you want my my websites, www.mattantkowiak.com. Connect with me. I'll be happy to resource you send you tons of free stuff information. Go to my Facebook page. The lessons are on there specific about grooming right now and information for educators. Yeah. And so there's a lot of stuff out there. And I tell you what school's out there. If you want the chief to walk into your school for that pre-school-year education, it's not too late to get a hold of him. You'll want to get especially someplace in Texas where you can just drive over and and do a couple hours with you all and just let some of this pour out on your teachers. We got about a minute, but
Speaker 3 - Chief Matt Antkowiak
with you all and just let some of this pour out on your teachers. We got about a minute, but we got to go. But thank you chief. Thank you. I want to work and drink a day at Starbucks and have a cup of coffee with you to where we're not limited on time. I got to spend the day together. Close it too. Yeah. God bless everybody. Thank you for the time. Thank you. We'll see you in two weeks. Yes, sir. Looking forward to it and watching and be ready for this because this is going to come
Speaker 2 - Dr. Gregory Williams
out and it's going to change the world. Thank you so much as we do each and every week. I always like to end the program like this in the 30 seconds that I have left. No matter what's going on with you, no matter what's happened to you, if even if it was like chiefs 40 years ago, I want to let you know there's always hope. There's always hope and we'll let you know that if you have that going on inside of you about something's Unconquerable with me. I don't feel good about this. I that's divine. That is not just intuition. That's a divine alarm. If something feels funny, do you act on it? Never just push it aside and hit the snooze button. Act on it because that's God trying to get your attention. Hey, do something. Don't let your kid go there. Don't turn that side down that streak. Whatever it is. Take care of yourself because God's trying to lead you in the right direction. Thank you so much. Be with us next week and make sure in two weeks that you're here to finish up this trifecta of interviews with Chief Matt.
Have an awesome week. God bless you. We'll see you next week live from Houston, Texas. Good night now.
Speaker 1 - Announcer
Thank you for listening to Breaking the Silence with Dr. Gregory Williams. To contact Dr. Williamss, dial 832-396-6525 or email him at shatteredbythedarkness@gmail.com. And don't forget to join us each Sunday night at 8 p.m. Central Time, 6 p.m. Pacific on BBS Radio Station One for the next episode of Breaking the Silence.
