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Two images of the same incarcerated man, one from 1979, the other from 2015.

The Case That Made Texas the Death Penalty Capital

In an excerpt from his new book, ‘Let the Lord Sort Them,’ Maurice Chammah explains where a 1970s legal team fighting the death penalty went wrong.
A noose hanging in front of the Capitol.

Why America Loves the Death Penalty

A new book frames this country’s tendency toward state-sanctioned murder as a unique cultural inheritance.
Map of D.C showing where the murder took place

Where Is Dorsey Foultz?

When the D.C. Metropolitan Police failed to catch a murder suspect, white residents criticized and mocked. Black residents worried.
Man walks through the U.S. Capitol holding a confederate flag on Jan 6, 2021.
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1871 Provides A Road Map for Addressing the Pro-Trump Attempted Insurrection

Commitment to racial justice, not conciliation, is needed to save democracy.
A courtroom in Milwaukee, 1930.

How Did We End Up With Our Current Public Defender System?

Without a more fundamental transformation of criminal law, public defenders often provide only a limited form of equality and fairness before the law.
A television news reporter in a segment from the 1990s on juvenile crime

Superpredator

The media myth that demonized a generation of Black youth.
A man sitting at a table

Aaron Sorkin’s Inane, Liberal History Lesson

Why his reformist retelling of the Chicago Seven fails to tell the real story of the leftists on trial.
Cover of "Little Lindy is Kidnapped"

We Had Witnessed an Exhibition

A new book about the Lindbergh baby kidnapping focuses on the role played by the media.

We Should Still Defund the Police

Cuts to public services that might mitigate poverty and promote social mobility have become a perpetual excuse for more policing.
Lithograph of a New York City street in 1830, bustling with pedestrians and horse-drawn carriages.

The Black New Yorker Who Led the Charge Against Police Violence in the 1830s

David Ruggles' fight against the "kidnapping club" in the 1830s shows that police violence has been part of America's DNA from its earliest days.
A lie-in in the road outside of a Pittsburgh jail. Many activists lay in both lanes of the road, some holding signs.
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Bail Funds Are Having a Moment in 2020

But today’s activism reflects longstanding commitments to freedom.
A wanted poster that reads "Wanted by the people: murder, aggravated assault and battery, denying civil rights, perjury. Brinley Evans, Thomas Lyons."

Wanted: An End to Police Terror

The pursuit of justice has been defined by a rote binary of punished in a cage versus unpunished and free.
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The Police Chief Who Inspired Trump’s Tweet Glorifying Violence

Trump echoed a former Miami police chief’s anti-black words and animus.
Prison security guard wearing a mask.
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The Policy Mistakes From the 1990s That Have Made Covid-19 Worse

Being tough on crime and cutting benefits from the poor left millions more susceptible to disease.

Everything You Know About Mass Incarceration Is Wrong

The US carceral state is a monstrosity with few parallels in history. But most accounts fail to understand how it was created, and how we can dismantle it.

Birmingham’s ‘Fifth Girl’

Sarah Collins Rudolph survived the 1963 church bombing that killed her sister and three other girls. She's still waiting on restitution and an apology.

Did Medgar Evers’ Killer Go Free Because of Jury Tampering?

Jerry Mitchell revisits a dark episode in the struggle for civil rights.

In 1930s New York, the Mayor Took on the Mafia by Banning Artichokes

Gangs and mafiosos have a long history with food crime.
Demonstrators at a Black Lives Matter rally.

Five Years Later, Do Black Lives Matter?

Five years since its inception, a look at what the Black Lives Matter movement accomplished and the important work it left unfinished.

Jimmy Hoffa and 'The Irishman': A True Crime Story?

Martin Scorsese's new film is premised on a confession that is not credible.

“A Most Damnable Fraud?” Public (Mis)conceptions and the Insanity Defense

An upcoming Supreme Court case will test the "not guilty by reason of insanity" plea.

Joe Biden Pushed Ronald Reagan to Ramp Up Incarceration – Not the Other Way Around

Biden convinced small-government Republicans to increase spending in the War on Crime.
Prison cells

The Economic Origins of Mass Incarceration

Everything you knew about mass incarceration is wrong.
Harper Lee

On the Beat with Harper Lee

A review of Casey Cep's new book on Harper Lee's never written true crime book, "The Reverend."

Before the Central Park Five, There Was the Trenton Six

In both cases, false confessions were used against a group of black men with only precarious links to one another.

The Socialist Origins of Public Defense

The right to public defense wasn’t granted by elites. It was won by socialist-led mass movements.

The ‘Death Penalty’s Dred Scott’ Lives On

In 1987, the Supreme Court came within one vote of eliminating capital punishment in Georgia because of of racial disparities.
Prosecutor Linda Fairstein, left, during a news conference in New York on March 26, 1988. Seated at the table next to her are District Attorney Robert Morgenthau and Ellen Levin, mother of Jennifer Levin, who was murdered in 1986. (Charles Wenzelberg/AP)
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Linda Fairstein is Under Fire for the Central Park Five. But Another Part of Her Career Deserves Greater Scrutiny

By targeting sex workers, she enacted policies that harmed the most vulnerable women.

How the ‘Central Park Five’ Changed the History of American Law

Ava DuVernay’s miniseries shows why more children had to stand trial as adults than at any other time before this 1989 case.
Police car.
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What the Loss of the New York Police Museum Means for Criminal-Justice Reform

Without historical records, we lose key insights into how law enforcement works — and how it fails.

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