After spending much of his young life in and out of detention centers, Jelly Roll is giving back.
While on his Big Ass Stadium Tour with Post Malone, the country star recently stopped by the Adult Detention Center at Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office in Minnesota for a surprise visit. While there, he interacted with the officers and spoke to some of the inmates, sharing with them, “I have no lies to tell.”
Jelly also reflected on his own experiences behind bars, sharing that he was eventually motivated to get his act together so that he could go home and to “be the dad I didn’t have.” “I knew that if I squeaked out of this one, there was no chance with my history that I caught another case,” said the “Son of a Sinner” singer, who completed his GED while in jail. “Even now I’m petrified of it.”
In photos posted by HCSO on Facebook, Jelly shakes hands and poses with the staff and holds up an honorary key to the jail, which Sheriff Dawanna Witt presented to him in front of the detainees. “Jail time shouldn’t be wasted time,” Witt said, according to the post. “Jelly Roll is a great example of how jail programs can change lives.”
Jelly has long been open about his criminal history. At one point, he served over a year with seven months of probation for an aggravated robbery he committed when he was 16, years after which he was incarcerated again for drug dealing at age 23. While he was locked up for the latter charge, he learned from a guard that his now-17-year-old daughter, Bailee, had been born, and the Tennessee native vowed to turn his life around.
“I’ve never had nothing in life that urged me in the moment to know that I had to do something different,” he told Billboard of the epiphany in 2023. “I have to figure this out right now.”
After initially having to work toward a relationship with his daughter after his sentence was up, Jelly and his wife, podcaster Bunnie XO, now share full custody of Bailee. The musician is also Dad to 8-year-old Noah from a prior relationship.
Following stops in Minneapolis and Chicago, Jelly and Posty will next take their trek to Toronto, Miami, San Francisco and more cities. It follows the “Need a Favor” musician’s album Beautifully Broken, which reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in October.