Brandon Vandenburg may have been put behind bars, but he's been very much in touch with the outside world through the phone.
He's made the hundreds of calls from his jail cell either collect or on pre-paid phone cards to family and friends across the country. The conversations gave us a look at his mindset.
All of this came just one week before the former Vanderbilt football player was set to be sentenced for his conviction in the high profile rape trial.
He has not spoken publicly since his conviction.
Vandenburg clearly has played close attention to the situation involving co-defendant Cory Batey, who was also convicted of rape and already sentenced.
In a conversation with his mother he made the following observation:
"Oh, I'm just hanging out. I saw on the news that they said Cory was at Riverbend prison in Nashville. Yeah. I wanted to see. I wanted you to double check that if you could check that online. That's the one that holds death row inmates and stuff."
Vandenburg, in a conversation with a female friend, took note of how Batey was charged with a crime when he initially refused to register on the sex offender registry.
"I need to sign so I wouldn't get in trouble like Cory did."
His friend asked, "It was some type of registration thing? So, it was sexual registration?"
"Yeah," said Vandenburg.
He did not directly talk about plans to appeal his conviction, but he did say the following to his father:
"I'm in my prime here. I'm in my prime here you know."
"Well, that's why we are working so hard to try to fix that," said his father.
And Vandenburg still didn't seem to accept that he committed a crime.
"I don't even understand it. It doesn't even make sense when I think about it. Gosh, I can't believe I'm in this right now. Yup, I have yet to find out the reason. I keep asking myself that."
Next week, at sentencing the judge may explain the reason to Vandenburg who faces between 15 and 25 years in prison.
Cory Batey was already sentenced to the minimum of 15 years in prison. Two other defendants in the rape of an unconscious woman on the Vanderbilt campus were still awaiting trial.
