Brian Banks

“Behind bars, everyone's an inmate. Everybody has their skeletons; everybody has their story.”

“You can do nothing, or you can take on the challenge of taking on the adversity. You have got to have faith. You have to have faith in whatever you believe in.”

“Football is just one part of me. It's not the be-all, end all.”

“It's not what you go through, but how that experience affects you. For some people, it could be a near car crash that changes your life. For other people, it could take five years of going to prison for them to realize they need change in their life. So it's not really the experience but more how the experience affects you.”

“I've had the opportunity to see both sides of the human spirit. I've seen those who will put you down, demean you, brand you, and have a one-track mind of destruction. But I've also seen people who uplift you. I've been on a journey unlike any others.”

“If I can be some kind of vessel to show people that, no matter the hard time you experienced, you can still succeed, I want to put out that positive energy to never quit and never give up.”

“I set my heart out to prove my innocence by any means necessary.”

“Wrongful convictions need to be addressed in America. There are a lot of Brian Banks behind bars right now.”

“To be stripped of your freedom, to be stripped of your dignity and the respect you once had, to lose it all and then see life pass you by while you're sitting inside a prison cell, to wake up one day and get it all back - it's a very humbling feeling.”

“I studied and grew as a man so that the situation of being wrongly accused wouldn't define me.”

“I have to share my story. Not for me, but for the people who might go through the same thing and for juveniles who have gotten in trouble.”

“Just to be on the sideline and to hear all the veterans tell you, 'Man, when your turn comes, when they call your number, just play.' Just the support and love from everybody is more than I can ask for.”

“After five years in prison, five years on parole, and a total of 10 years of being in hell, I can look back on it all and say I played in four NFL games. It's incredible.”

“From the perspective of everything I went through to have played in four NFL games, it was one of the best experiences of my life.”

“All the negativity that was once around me has turned into all this positivity.”