Dog the Bounty Hunter Speaks[/size]
06/24/2008

Door Exclusive: The Dog’s First Interview Since He Was Muzzled

We love The Dog. When Dog the Bounty Hunter was kicked off the air by the A&E Network for using the n-word, we thought it was a bad call and said so. We think, in fact, that Dog the Bounty Hunter may be the best reality show in the history of that much maligned genre. When the Door’s own Bob Gersztyn found The Dog around Christmas time, he was at a low point in his life and ready to talk about God, who was in the process of kicking his ass. In fact, we found out in this interview that the nickname Dog is actually derived from God spelled backwards, and was given to him by a gangbanger called the Preacher.

We found out a lot of new things in this interview.

Dog The Bounty Hunter was raised by an abusive father and a Native American mother who was devoutly pentecostal. By the time he was in junior high he had embarked on the path to perdition, becoming a member of the Devil's Disciples outlaw motorcycle club at the age of 15.

At 24 years old he found himself locked up in the Texas state prison for first degree murder.

After he got out, he sold Kirby vacuum cleaners, then started bounty hunting on the side for beer money. After three divorces and countless girlfriends, he ended up, improbably, as a celebrity guest speaker at Tony Robbins seminars, and when he tracked down serial rapist Andrew Luster in Mexico, the resulting news coverage led to his own reality show on the A&E Network.


The Dog and Beth in church (Photo by Bob Gersztyn)

As Joe Bob Briggs described the show in these pages, it is “simultaneously the most conservative law-and-order show this side of Cops, the most liberal social-action show this side of a PBS documentary (‘I am what rehabilitation stands for,’ says The Dog), and a constant fount of entertaining Christian witness, beginning with the bounty hunter prayer circle, in which he prays for the safety of his bounty-hunting family, then asks God to protect various characters with names like ‘The Animal’ who are about to be caught in the pincers of a Da Kine manhunt (Da Kine is his bail bond company in Hawaii.)

But the climax of every episode, and the emotional high point of the show, is the long ride to prison in Dog’s van. The handcuffed perp usually sits in the middle back seat next to Dog, who offers him a cigarette and then says something like ‘How long you gonna let the crack control ya, man?’ And that unleashes some amazing moments . . .”

All of this and much more is documented in Duane "Dog" Chapman's autobiography You Can Run But You Can't Hide, but there was a dramatic coda to the book last fall when one of his many relatives publicized a secretly recorded tape of The Dog saying the n-word several times as he ranted about his son’s black girlfriend. That resulted in the cancellation of the show, followed by a very public series of apologies by The Dog, often before all-black church congregations, and never once did Chapman say “Put me back on TV because I’m popular.”

In every case he said, “I’m asking forgiveness from every brother who felt hurt by what I said.” He had the balls to show up one day at the Congress for Racial Equality (CORE) in New York to apologize in person, and the employees there ended up posing for pictures with him. At the end of his public humiliation, he was finally reinstated (new season starts July 16th). One of the things he reveals in this interview, for the first time, is that his experience with the n-word caused him to stop swearing as well.

The life of Duane Chapman is a combination of the sacred and the profane that’s never boring, but one thing we wondered is why The Dog would talk to us instead of some place with more readership. The answer?

Because our cab-driving blogger, Bob Gersztyn of Salem, Oregon, convinced Chapman that, in his druggie days, Gersztyn had sniffed more tubes of Testors (airplane glue) than Chapman had.



THE WITTENBURG DOOR: When did you first commit your life to Christ?
DUANE LEE “DOG” CHAPMAN: My grandmother was a missionary and of course raised my mother to be a Christian, so from I guess about birth I was brought up in the Assemblies of God.

DOOR: Did you ever make a commitment, come forward, or do anything like that, at some point?
DOG: You mean ask the Lord into my heart?

DOOR: Yeah.
DOG: Probably five, six or seven years old. I used to do it when I was seven every weekend.

DOOR: How many bounty captures do you currently have?
DOG: Well, we have over six thousand.

DOOR: What makes you the world’s greatest bounty hunter?
DOG: You have to read the book to hear that story. That would take an hour. If you want to find out about a bounty hunter, of course, that's what I am first of all, the book is about what made me, and how come I am one, and some of the things we've had to face as a family and as a person, and how did I get through those things by my faith in God.

DOOR: I found the book mind-blowing, to say the least. Especially the way that you go to scriptures you wouldn’t necessarily think of in difficult situations.
DOG: I use the Bible probably every conversation, I constantly think about God all day long, and it is 99.99% of my life.

DOOR: What about all those four-letter expletives you use when you’re arresting somebody? Is that the one per cent that’s not in the Bible?
DOG: Blessings and cursings do not run out of the same mouth, so from now on I will not use those words, or try my hardest not to, because all along that was wrong.

DOOR: For anyone who’s seen your show, that’s kind of hard to believe. You take down every perp with at least the word “mother------.”
DOG: I thought that, you know, in the circumstances I was in, God looks upon the heart, and of course, from the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh, so I was completely wrong and God has proved that to me and took me to the woodshed and believe me, brother, you don't want to go there with him. So I am not going to use those words no matter what circumstance I'm in anymore. I'm going to try not to. I've used them for many, many years so, you know, if I say "F" someone, I don't mean literally that. But because the word is bad I'm not going to use it, because it hurts people’s feelings, and since I stopped swearing a couple of months ago, even someone who swears at me, it kind of, I can feel the, it's different, you know what I mean? So, I quit using it. I quit doing it.

DOOR: Wow, that's incredible.
DOG: That has to be, you know. That has to be. You can't do that.

DOOR: It's hard to quit once you're in the habit.

The Dog in Contemplation (Photo by Bob Gersztyn)

DOG: You can quit, though. You just pretend, I mean, you wouldn't do it around Mother Teresa, Billy Graham, or my father or mother, so I just pretend. Or Jesus. If he was sitting here I wouldn't say pass me the "MF" ketchup, you know what I mean? So, I'm acting like, of course he is always here, but when you put yourself in that realm, that's how I'm beating it.

DOOR: An interesting passage you referred to in the Bible is Matthew 4:19, where Jesus says to the disciples, “I'll make you fishers of men.” It's your scriptural foundation for being a bounty hunter.
DOG: When Jesus died on the cross he was crucified with two thieves, and one, of course, said, if you're God get down off of here, and the other one said, please help me out, brother. Jesus said nothing to the one, I don't think, but he said to the other, “Tonight you'll be sitting down with me and my Dad in heaven.” So, my people are those people on the cross with Jesus, the thieves. That's who I'm responsible for. So, each time I go out and capture a thief or a criminal I have to tell them, you know, I don't try to pound Jesus down their throat but I have to tell them I was once a thief, and that I saw the light, and there is a light for them. That's like my congregation, you know what I mean? My ministry is to the thief. I used to be ashamed of that, and then I read the part where it said, "The first shall be last, and the last shall be first.” My guy could be in the front line so you've got to really be good.

DOOR: What is your favorite part of the Bible?
DOG: My favorite passage is a very small scripture, "Jesus wept." He wept because he loved the rich man so much that he saw a lot of him in that guy, and he just tried to get him, and Jesus just had so much love for people that when the guy turned away Jesus broke down and became human and cried.

DOOR: I think that was Lazarus actually, which brings me to another question, who's your favorite Bible personality?
DOG: I think David is my favorite. I just went through what John the Baptist did. John the Baptist came out of the jungle or the forest, wilderness, eating locusts and swearing, right?

DOOR: I think that he quit swearing when he came back from the wilderness, but go on.

DOG: So I used to tell my mother, "Mom, you know, John the Baptist swore," and she said, "Yes, son, but he got his head handed to him on a platter," and I used to forget that. He was in that cell in jail, and I think Jezebel was the queen that was getting married, and he called her a whore from the cell and she said, "Go bring me his head." And so Dog Chapman went through what poor John went through, not physically, but they handed me my head on a platter, too, for my mouth! So that is one of my most favorite guys. But I love David, as David was a good repenter, and David had a personal relationship, I think, with the Lord, and David was a poet like I am, kind of. David was a human being, and always made mistakes, but God forgave him, and made him a great person, and I just really loved David from childhood, too.

DOOR: I didn't know that you wrote poetry.
DOG: Yes, I do. Its private stuff but I rhyme a lot, too.

DOOR: Kind of like rap?
DOG: Well, they call ‘em Dogisms.

DOOR: Can you give me one?
DOG: "With blood in one eye and a tear in the other, he'll hunt you down and call you brother."

DOOR: That's pretty good. How did you get your first television program?
DOG: For fifteen years or so, I have been working on a television thing because I'm a performer, right? For about fifteen, sixteen years we tried to get some kind of television show, or acting job, or something like that. Then we were famous in our own cities, and our own states where we went to and arrested people where everyone knew the Dog. Then in 2002 we started chasing Andrew Luster, who was convicted on eighty-six counts of rape, and my family caught him in Mexico, and once that became international news there was a show starring Ozzy Osbourne, The Osbournes. My wife hooked up with Sharon Osbourne, and Sharon told Beth this would be a great show, and of course we wanted to do this so we took a chance.

DOOR: Do you currently attend church?
DOG: Yes. Probably every other Sunday. We go to church, different ones. Same religion, different ones, is all. I have Pastor Tim Story that I see probably once every two weeks, and then I talk to Reverend Jesse every day. My Aunt Iris is a Christian, she's in her eighties, and I talk to her constantly. So, I believe. My kids are in a religious school, a Catholic school that I like in Hawaii, so all my children are in a private Catholic school so they learn the basic foundation of God, and so I don't have them in public schools. I never have.

DOOR: It says in your book that you want to be seen as a moral man of virtue, yet you are still seen as an ex-con, convicted of first degree murder. How do you deal with the stress of that?

The crowd at Dog's book signing. (Photo by Bob Gersztyn)
DOG: Well, it's been thirty years. I didn't really do it. It's a matter of record, I heard the shot. I was in the car. I think if had I pulled the trigger, or been standing there when it happened, it would have made more of an impression on my mind. What the impression was is of the guy dying, and the prison. So once I got out of there I wasn't like really guilty, it wasn't like a planned execution. It was a drug deal gone bad. I was guilty for being there at the time at that place. I didn't plan it, once I got out I'd done my time, it was a mistake on everybody's part so it wasn't on purpose. Then after going to prison and doing that, and living with that for many years, I couldn't get a job. I became a Kirby salesman, Kirby vacuums, and I couldn't get a job, because you have to tell people about your record. So it's a terrible thing. There's probably no one, I don't know anyone in the whole world that went from the prison gates to television, except for me. I don't know anyone that was ever convicted of a crime like that, so I don't think any other human being unless they had the faith in God that I do could be convicted in this age of murder, and get out and become a success. It's very hard. It's something I recommend not to do. You just can't do it. It's impossible. But, because of my religious background, my faith in God, my trust in God, my sincerity that God knows, I'm molded by God as a soldier in God's army, okay, and because I say the reason I picked A&E is because they let me say, "In Jesus' name, Amen." A lot of other bigger networks didn't want me to say "In Jesus' name" because everybody doesn't believe in Jesus. Well, I was taught that most every time you have to end the prayer with "In Jesus' name" or he doesn't hear it, so that's how I was taught. Whether I believe that or not I still had to stick up for Jesus and say "In Jesus' name, Amen." When you do that, that little word, Jesus, carries a lot of authority, and a lot of power behind it, and me with a dirty mouth, you know, Jesus said, if you're going to say that, I'm going to clean you up. It's whew! I'll tell you brother, you don't want to go through that, either. I'm kind of a guy that went through a lot of stuff. I am very happy, and God has blessed me, and there's no doubt, no doubt, that miracles happened in my life but I would not want my children, my family, my friends, or someone who doesn't know me to have to go through what I went through, at all.

DOOR: Have your prayers been answered?
DOG: Constantly prayers have been answered on a daily basis. I look for big miracles all the time, like I pray for, I see big miracles a lot, but daily miracles, the small ones, I see constantly. I ask God, "Should I go this way? Should I do that?" When I hunt down a fugitive I find guys that no one else can find, and I kind of get alone with God and say, "Okay, now where is this guy? Point me in the right direction." I remember one time saying a prayer on television. I could not find this girl, and I said, "Lord, I've done everything I can do. Now I need your power to find her. In Jesus' name, Amen." And then I got alone with God and I said, "Now, listen, if we don't find her we just televised that prayer, and God, you're going to look real stupid if I get out there and I can't find her again cause it's your fault, right?" And, lo and behold, that afternoon we were driving down the street and the girl was walking across the crosswalk in front of our car.

So I mean, constantly, I'm always with God appealing, and repenting, and making deals, and asking for help, and it's just, if there's not a God then I guess I'm just light in the mind. But at fifty-five years old, almost, fifty-four, you start, when people get this age, you start, you know there's a God but you wonder, is there really, am I going to die and just die, or am I going to go on to heaven? I really believe I asked God that the other day and he was like, who do you think thinks of all these things, dummy, you? And, kind of laughing with me, you know?
I was kind of like Job, you know--where were you when I created the heavens and the earth? Who do you think you are? So, it's constantly all day, and then I give praises if something good happens, and I tell the Lord thank you, you know, God Bless You, God, and I get all these goose bump feelings that I hadn't gotten. Since I've been older I get those feelings and it takes my breath away, and I like laugh and cry, like shake his hand, and get a hug, and go on to life.

DOOR: You've lost children, and I'm very sorry for that. I have seven myself and I was wondering how has your faith helped you through the crisis?
DOG: Thank you. Number one, you have faith that there is a hereafter, and there is a heaven and a hell, so based on that I hope that I get to see my baby girl again. I hope that we're just not, that we just don't live and then like an animal just die. I hope that I see her again, and I have faith that there is a God, and that there is hereafter, and that's what gets me by. There's a lot of things I've found in life, there's a healing to them. If you quit doing this, or start doing that, or read more of this, or eat more of that, but there's no healing to losing a child. There's none. As a parent, you feel like all your other babies are here and they're eating, and there's one child is left alone, and you feel like David the shepherd, you have to go out after that child that's left alone. I thought when Barbara died that she was fighting demons, and I had to help her get to heaven, and I sacrificed myself a lot, and I didn't wear a bullet-proof vest through the whole third season of my show knowing that if I took a bullet I was heading right for my baby girl to help her out. I realized that I raised her as a Christian, and that I didn't need to be there to help her out. There are some really bad things that you think about being a parent, losing a child, and if it wasn't for God I would've committed bravery suicide, you know what I mean? You know what I mean. So, if it wasn't for God in that part of my life I wouldn't be here, for sure.

DOOR: How did you get the name "Dog"?
DOG: I was in a motorcycle club, a criminal outlaw motorcycle club, criminals, and I was always, like, I wouldn't rob a church. I didn't want to rob a paperboy one time, and I didn't want to do things like rob a grave, right? I didn't want to do things like that, so I would say, "No, I believe in God, I can't go with you on that," and they would be like, "What?" I always said the blessing for food, and in a motorcycle club food is not the best. Sometimes it's old. So I think I'm eating this old pork, right? So I'd better say the blessing, in Jesus' name, and it will be okay. So I would always say the blessing for the Devil’s Disciples, that was the name of the motorcycle club I was in. And we had a guy named Preacher who was not like a preacher but he talked a lot. We had a guy named John the Baptist, he did everything backwards, and so my President of the club said, you know, you talk about God all the time, Duane, and you are very loyal, like man's best friend, so we are going to name you Dog, which is God spelled backwards. So at fifteen years old I inherited the nickname “the Dog.”

DOOR: You’ve met so many types of people, including Muslims. You met Muslims in prison, right? Do you think that our differences can ever be bridged?

DOG: This is gonna freak you out when you ask that question, now. I believe that God is smart enough. He made us different colors. He made us different, like we can eat a cow, a Muslim cannot. We'll always be Christians, Christ-Christians, the Christian group, trying to force Jesus down people's throats. If you don't believe in Jesus you're going to hell. Jewish people sit at that wall, and they cry and they pray for eight hours a day, and a lot of Christians meet the Jewish person and they're like, you know, I really love them but they don't believe in Christ, poor guy is going to hell. I do not, as I get older, believe that is so. I believe that God is a big enough God. God said, "You shall have no other gods before me." So, that must mean that there are other gods.
I believe that God is merciful enough, strong enough, and smart enough to love everyone. Now I, being a Gentile, am bound to believe in Jesus, but I don't think a Muslim has to. I don't think a Jewish man, where my Bible says they are God's chosen people, I'd better not say nothing bad about Jewish people, then why would they be going to hell if they don't believe in Christ? I just think that those of us who do believe in Jesus Christ are going to heaven in our own way, that we should not judge because someone else--I remember coming to Hawaii in the eighties, and I walked by a Buddhist temple. All the Christians were shopping at Wal-Mart and K-Mart on the 24th of December. The Buddhists were sitting in front of their sidewalk going, hom yong, whatever, with their legs crossed and humming and I said, what are you guys doing? They said we're celebrating God's son, the birth of the Christ child. I said, I thought you guys were Buddhists? They said, we are, Brother Dog. I thought, wow, that is amazing.
While we as Christians are out shopping the Buddhists are sitting there praising the Lord, so I think, again, God is smart enough, strong enough, that he has developed all religions according to the race and creed, and absolutely when we, as Christians, Christ-like, believe in that, and can meet other religions head on and say, if you believe in Buddha, or if you believe in whoever, we happen to believe in Christ but there's one goal to all of us, and that's doing good for our God, and I think that's when peace will come. I got along with Muslims in prison where it was life and death. A lot of Christians have never been put in a situation where it's life or death like Daniel in the lion's den. If I didn't get along I was dead in the morning. What I said to them, and I realized that they loved their religion as much as I do mine, and they were as convinced about their religion as I was mine, that there must be something to their religion for them, and once I realized that, me and the Muslims got along perfect. Of course I survived the prison, and I'm here talking to you, but I think that's a huge step for people to take. It's also a huge step for anyone to take, but I think that love conquers all things, and I think once we all stop thinking that everybody's going to hell because they don't believe how we do, I think the world's going to be a better place. I knew that would freak you out, and I'm sorry but that's how I believe.

DOOR: I freak out daily, so it's no big deal. What do you think of TV preachers?
DOG: TV preachers? Well, one televangelist, Rex Humbard, back in the day when I first started bounty hunting, was there saying, "This guy, I see a guy right now who has got to change his whole life, and you've got to change," and I think it was like my fifth or sixth bounty hunt, and I swore that he was talking straight to me. I believe the Bible says that in the last days all men shall hear about God, shall hear the redemption story, and then here comes the Lord. So I think the best way to get it out there is through television, to get the message out there. In anything, cops, robbers, preachers, you're going to have the good, the bad, the guys who are in it just for the money, the guys who are after this and that, but I think over all the television evangelists are doing the right thing.
I mean, if your father owns the cattle on a million hills you ought to own a few, too. If they're every day talking about God, and their whole life is surrounding God, and they're praying for people, and they've got their flock, and all day long from the moment they wake up and they dream about the Lord, they get up and they pray with people all day, all day, all day, I think they ought to be paid accordingly, and they wouldn't have to worry about money. I was watching last night, the Nativity, and it's just amazing that one of the wise men brought Jesus gold, and I thought, oh man, he didn't have to worry about money. He had some money right there, and I never had thought that. Jesus, when he needed money, told, I think it was Peter, go get that dollar out of the fish's mouth. He had a treasurer, who, of course, was Judas. So, to have a treasurer you've got to have a bag, you've got to have money, right?
I think because of the cash flow with the TV evangelists a lot of people get mad, but I think if we people who do get mad want to change shoes with them and do what they do, they'd want to get paid handsomely also. Now, the ones that are like, I don't know his name [Ted Haggard], my son went to his church is why I bring it up, and he really loved the guy a lot. He counseled my son but on the weekends he was doing speed with a homosexual guy, right? Those kinds of guys right there need to be flogged, okay, beaten in the street, and need repentance. Jimmy Swaggart was a great person. He went out with a ho, you know, and everybody broke ties with Swaggart in the eighties, and he said he was sorry, we all forgave him, and then he went out with a ho again. What are you doing, Jimmy? I'd like to slap him in the mouth. Some of those guys do get exposed, but the majority of them are decent guys. I just met Billy Graham's son, and when he walked in the room the hair on your head stood on end. He shook my hand. He talked to me. It was like, oh my God! I could feel the Lord on him, you know what I mean? I think the TV guys, most of them, are trying to do the right thing.

DOOR: How has your Native American heritage affected your life?
DOG: The Native Americans believe in the Great Spirit, right? I chant a lot, like when the moon is full. I just say [makes chanting sound] "I love you, Lord." I use that part about God a lot, and I get along with him, and raise my hands in the air and dance around [makes chanting sound]. I just talk to the Lord so I think it plays a big part in my life and with God.

DOOR: You also talk a lot about forgiveness.

DOG: Well, the Bible says that if you do not have forgiveness your bones can become brittle, which I interpret to be arthritis. It also said it affects your diet, so the Bible said in order to be forgiven for things, you must forgive. In my life forgiveness comes along with this word vengeance, as does hope and faith. I remember, you probably read this, but I remember going to get vengeance of someone who had done me wrong, and my mother said, well, I'll see you later after you rob God. I'm like, Mom, what? Mom said, listen, God gives us everything. His house. His children. His car. His blessings. One thing God says he will not give you, son, is vengeance. So, if you take vengeance from God, you're robbing God Almighty. And from that day on until now I have not taken vengeance, and sometimes my enemies know me very well. You get to know your predator, right?
They know that I'm not a "get even" guy, and sometimes that affects me, I mean, they keep doing what they do to me over and over, but then when God does take his vengeance I literally, I don't care how bad I didn't like the person, I've never been through like where I didn't go, oh no, don't do that to them. Don't do that, Lord. Oh, that's too strong, Lord, please. So, I'm like, whoa. The vengeance God takes out are super superior to whatever I could. I'd beat him up and burn his house, right? God does things that, oh, my God, I think, let the guy make it. Right? He wasn't that bad to me. So, forgiveness is a huge part of my life. I must forgive a lot of people for things once in a while, but mostly I'm in the business of telling people that they have to be able to forgive.

DOOR: I was wondering how you view the subject of evolution because you talked about that a little bit in your book.
DOG: I do not believe in evolution. I believe that, yes, some things evolve, but not man. I know a very intelligent man who is a scientist for the United States of America in cloning of other humans, and he told me there has got to be a God, and that the DNA between us and animals has something missing that nothing could have developed into, or would still be developing.

DOG: I would pretend that God was not watching. I knew that there would be a payday, but I thought that, you know, God's busy in Vietnam. He's not watching me do this right now. But I knew, kind of knew, that God was. Vengeance is mine. I will repay. God says he will do it, for whatever a man soweth that also shall he reap. So, I'm like, he wasn't talking to me as I was young. As I got older and started reaping, I'm like, Oh my God! Why do I deserve this? Why am I here right now? Why am I in trouble about my big mouth? Why, because every creature, every Christian, my mother, right before she died she said, son, if you would just watch your mouth. So, as a young man I thought God isn't watching. It's not that important to God that I'm not going to be some guy on television. People aren't going to watch me pray in Jesus' name, and chase bad guys. I'm not going to be that, you know what I mean? God, if I only would have known, right?



DOOR: II Corinthians 6:14 says, "Be ye not unequally yoked" and you use it as the basis for divorce. I've never heard it applied that way.
DOG: People that are prejudiced use that scripture that a white man should not marry a person of color or vice versa, woman, vice versa. As I was raised up through life the Christians would say that. You know, you can't date that girl. She's black, you're white, Duane. The Bible says be thou not unequally yoked. My mother then got me to the side and said, son, you're a half-breed. The Bible says, son, be ye not unequally yoked with sinners. So, mom would say if the girl doesn't believe in God and doesn't have any of the basics, the Ten Commandments, so on and so forth, God says for you not to be with her. I would be like, oh, really, it doesn't mean don't be with other colors? No, son, it doesn't mean that. I have seen people struggle, mostly women, with marrying guys that do not have the Lord in their heart, and it is a very hard relationship, and I've never yet today seen a relationship make it, or like the guy is an atheist basically and doesn't believe in nothing, and the woman is a Bible-thumper and believes everything she does God is watching and blah, blah, blah. The relationship doesn't go not only far, but not very long.

DOOR: Are you working on a case right now?
DOG: Oh, yeah, several. We're getting them right now. We got one the other day. Yeah, we still have to keep doing our thing. I have to keep arresting guys. I have to do that.

DOOR: You used to average two arrests a day. Is that still what you're doing?
DOG: No, I was doing two to five a day. My record is six. That's when I was young. I probably only do about one to two a week right now, and that's steady. Anybody who’s a major criminal that robs a bank, or hurts a woman or child, ends up on FOX news, CNN, he's got a problem because here comes the Dog and they all know it, too. The criminals nowadays know that if you're going to be high profile, and you're going to do really wicked, bad things, for instance, Andrew Luster, eighty-six counts of rape, the Dog is coming. Do de doo, doo de de do. The D is in the sky, I'm after him. I just get excited just talking about it. Right?

DOOR: Is the extradition thing with Mexico resolved?
DOG: Correct. The whole extradition thing is over. Viva Mexico. Please put that. Mexico dropped all charges against me, my son, and my brother. Thank God. Five years ago, almost, is when that happened.
DOOR: How come you admire the original Jesse James, the Western outlaw, so much?

DOG: I've read his story, and he was a bounty hunter, basically, and he was a guy that was kind of a Robin Hood, and I think that any underdog like that, I've learned, that I just am for them. If they're an underdog, I'm in line. I don't know. I'm just like that. I think if they've got a little bit of good in them I want to draw that out. You know, you talk about Billy the Kid and Jesse James, they were outlaws, but were they really? At the end, of course they were, but in the beginning, according to the history, they were not, and I think that I would never stand next to Jeffery Dahmer, right? He's caca. The day after he got saved he got killed--you see, God is not mocked. I think it's the underdog sort of thing with a little bit of goodness, and I'm always for that person. I guess that person might be me.

DOOR: In your book you talk about the difference between being Duane and being Dog. Why is it necessary for you to have those two differentiations?
DOG: It’s my wife, Beth, who tells me that. Are you Duane or Dog today? I'm Dog, I think. You know, your wife gets to know you better than anybody, right? So, I think that Dog is the relentless hunter, and I mean, you have to be, it's life or death, you never know, you have to be on key, in tune, and relentless. After I hear chhh, chhh, chhh, the sound of the cuffs, and I get one look at the guy, I think I turn into Duane, who is then, okay, this guy needs to be fixed, this girl needs help. There's got to be one good thing inside of them, and it could be their mother, their baby, their family, their children, they're named after someone who was a success, and they're a failure. I pull that out, and I expand on it, or I use that for Duane's foundation for redemption for that person.

DOOR: Well, I appreciate you talking to us.
DOG: This is the first interview I've given, as you know, after this incident, okay? Besides the television "I'm sorry" kind of thing, and telling the world, look out, here comes the new Dog, this is the first one I've given so I was very, very frank. When you're caught using a word like that, or you're caught doing things, the next time you're searched you pull your pockets inside out,and go here, copper, look, I've got nothing. I'll always be that way. So I'm not cursing, I'm going to let it loose, and I'm going to be like, I appreciate you very, very much, brother, for saying that. Please, please, if my opinion on Jesus being the only religion would offend any Christian, I don't want that printed, but if you think maybe the Christians can hang with that, then it's okay. I don't want to offend someone or make little kids not go to Jesus' church. I don't want to do that. I very much appreciate you giving me this chance to talk.

DOG: Tell your seven kids I said hi, and please forgive me, and watch my show, and tell them Uncle Dog is learning that a moment on the lips is a lifetime in the heart, and they will see that Uncle Dog has changed his words. Now listen, you know how much that is testing me? Listen to me! You see how I walk with God, brother? I face the death chamber. You see how I am with the Lord? I tell you, I thought I could get away with it because I love him so much, but I can't. You see that, that the Christians won?

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