‘Like a Bad Dream’: In New Orleans, Witnesses Are Going to Jail Instead of Perpetrators
In the spring of 1983, Donald Mairena witnessed a shooting at New Orleans’ Latin American Club. He chased after the shooter and later told law enforcement what he’d seen. Mairena gave them his address in case they needed any more information from him. He heard nothing about the case until almost two years later, when […]
The Hidden Police Violence Epidemic Behind a ‘Swatting’ Death
On December 28, 2017, 28-year-old Andrew Finch of Wichita, Kansas, opened his front door to a horde of shouting police officers. Ten seconds later, he was fatally shot in the head — yet the officer who pulled the trigger isn’t the one being charged with his death. The events of that tragic late December day were set […]
DA’s Loss in Texas Primary Pinned to Prosecutorial Misconduct in Biker Shootout Case
Half the challengers to Texas’s sitting district attorneys were successful earlier this month in what criminal justice reformers are calling a promising sign that their message is working. Seven out of 13 incumbent DAs, a mix of Democrats and Republicans, lost their primaries. The Texas District and County Attorneys Association (TDCAA) argues this turnover reflects typical political fluctuations rather than […]
Louisiana Denies Parole to Man Behind a Supreme Court Ruling Limiting Life Sentences for Children
By all accounts, 71-year-old Henry Montgomery is not the same man he was when he was 17. In 1963, Montgomery skipped school and encountered Charles H. Hurt, a plainclothes sheriff’s deputy, in the woods. In a panic, he shot and killed Hurt with his grandfather’s gun.
Louisiana Denies Parole to Man Behind a Supreme Court Ruling Limiting Life Sentences for Children
By all accounts, 71-year-old Henry Montgomery is not the same man he was when he was 17. In 1963, Montgomery skipped school and encountered Charles H. Hurt, a plainclothes sheriff’s deputy, in the woods. In a panic, he shot and killed Hurt with his grandfather’s gun. A Baton Rouge, Louisiana jury convicted Montgomery of murder […]
Jury For White Man Who Killed Black NFL Player Has One Black Person
The Louisiana jury that will decide whether a white man shot a black former NFL player in self-defense during a road rage incident has just one black juror. The fatal shooting of former New York Jets running back Joe McKnight in December 2016 quickly triggered accusations of racism in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana’s largest county. The suspect, Ronald […]
New Ruling May Force Louisiana To Stop Using Poor People To Bankroll Its Courts
A groundbreaking new ruling may force a reckoning over the way the most incarcerated state in the world pays for its criminal justice system. On Thursday, Judge Sarah Vance of the Eastern District of Louisiana found that New Orleans’ criminal district judges are operating their courts with a clear conflict of interest: The judges control […]
New Orleans DA bullies public defenders for doing their job
An Assistant District Attorney with the Orleans Parish DA is claiming that the Orleans Public Defenders’ office fraudulently obtained records in the case of a man accused of killing a New Orleans police officer in 2015. The charge is just the latest example of the DA making allegations of misconduct against public defenders for simply […]
Louisiana’s death penalty prosecutor takes aim at his legal opponents
The death penalty is costing the cash-strapped state of Louisiana tens of millions of dollars a year. But there’s one state employee who’s massively profiting off its continued existence. Hugo Holland’s fingerprints are on the bulk of Louisiana’s recent death sentences. He’s been hired by over a dozen district attorneys to prosecute death penalty cases at a rate that […]