Gen 3 hatch not opening using the button OR from inside. (solved)

I figured out the solution and wanted to share.

My Gen 3 Prius' hatch latch was stuck and I couldn't open it from inside the vehicle by pulling on the silver lever behind the plastic panel in the cargo area. The silver lever itself was stuck and I could not pull it towards me because there's massive resistance. From what I could tell, nothing was stuck in the latch area, maybe it was misaligned. Here's what I did to fix it;

I got a dress shoe shoestring and tied a knot in the middle portion of it. I then tightened the knot around the silver lever. From there I grabbed both ends of the shoestring and pulled hard towards me. That gave me enough leverage to pop the hatch open. From here the latch was stuck in the open position and when you close the hatch the latch would no longer engage. To correct this, I then moved the bottom portion of the hatch lock mechanism (attached to the rear bumper) with my finger so that it was at the halfway point of being opened and locked. I then closed the hatch and it locked into place. From there, everything worked like normal.