It's hard to say what role race really played in my case.

I used to walk around saying that I'm just another black man without a college degree.

I think people can learn from my experience - you know, any young people who are under pressure, whether you work on Wall Street or you work in a factory in Alabama, and young journalists.

When we report stories, we don't just want to talk to people who did the right thing. We want to talk to people who did the wrong thing.

Some people it seems to me would like for me to crawl in a hole and disappear forever. That's just not in my nature.

People in the news media after I got caught said how could you have not caught this guy? He had 50 corrections in four years. That's a lot of corrections. Well what they failed to look at is how many stories there were and out of 700 plus stories, 50 corrections is not a high amount.

I am making amends and seeking forgiveness. My only hope is that some good can come out of my situation.