More from The Appeal:
Pennsylvania’s prisons have the second-highest number of people in the country serving life without the possibility of parole. Nine people who were released after being sentenced to die behind bars share their stories.
Joshua Vaughn Dec 07, 2020
President Trump has appointed a quarter of active federal appellate judges, and they have decisively hampered legal efforts to force prisons and jails to address the coronavirus.
Samuel Weiss Oct 06, 2020
Taewon Wilson and Candace Chavez-Wilson are part of a growing movement to end life without possibility of parole and other harsh sentences.
Mara Kardas-Nelson Aug 24, 2020
Legal experts say the IRS is illegally denying CARES Act payments to incarcerated people.
Jordan Michael Smith Jul 08, 2020
The two men have been awaiting Tom Wolf’s signature for more than six months.
Joshua Vaughn Jul 01, 2020
Despite early warnings, jails and prisons have seen a rapid spread of the virus—a humanitarian disaster that puts all of our communities, and lives, at risk. Every day, The Appeal examines the scale of the crisis, numbers of infected and dead, around the nation.
Kelly Davis Jun 17, 2020
Despite early warnings, jails and prisons have seen a rapid spread of the virus—a humanitarian disaster that puts all of our communities, and lives, at risk. Every day, The Appeal examines the scale of the crisis, numbers of infected and dead, around the nation.
Kelly Davis Jun 03, 2020
The Maricopa County Attorney's Office waited four years to charge Danielle Sutherland for one of the DUIs. After serving time for the others, she received treatment for her substance use issues and pursued a degree.
Meg O'Connor May 29, 2020
New York attorneys have launched a campaign to release transgender, gender nonconforming, and nonbinary prisoners during the pandemic.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg May 28, 2020
Freddy Butler, Oliver Macklin, and Charles Goldblum are among the 17 people who received recommendations for commutations of life sentences in 2019, but Governor Tom Wolf has yet to sign off on their releases.
Joshua Vaughn May 18, 2020
The governor’s requirements for release are too narrow in light of the threat from COVID-19, they say.
Bryce Covert May 13, 2020
The onset of COVID-19—and the need for social distancing—gave an unexpected boost to efforts against plans for a new prison in Washington.
Victoria Law May 04, 2020
In this episode, Josie Duffy Rice and her producer, Florence Barrau-Adams, travel to Fishkill Correctional Facility in Beacon, New York, to interview Rodney Spivey-Jones and Max Kenner about the Bard Prison Initiative and Bard College.
Apr 29, 2020
Telecommunications companies that serve prisons and jails, like Securus Technologies and Global Tel Link, are offering a limited number of free calls, but families say it’s not enough.
Molly Minta Apr 02, 2020
Josie Duffy Rice and guest co-host Donovan Ramsey talk with Bianca Tylek, executive director of Worth Rises, about the privatization of America’s criminal legal system.
Apr 01, 2020
With one term under her belt as Chicago's top prosecutor, Foxx says she has more work to do to right a system that has been "unfair, and totally unjust."
Mari Cohen Mar 16, 2020
Prison-based gerrymandering takes political power away from Black and Latinx communities—power that could be used to push for more funding for schools, social services, infrastructure, and other important reforms.
Robert Saleem Holbrook Mar 02, 2020
A review of charging dockets in Lebanon County shows Ashley Menser was the only person charged with felony retail theft in 2018 to receive a 7-year maximum sentence.
Joshua Vaughn Feb 10, 2020
The state said Michelle Heale shook the baby to death, but some experts say her conviction was based on debunked science.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg Jan 15, 2020
Many liberals support reform in theory. But when unpopular decisions need to be made, it’s back to the 1990s “Tough on Crime” playbook.
Adam H. Johnson Jan 09, 2020
One man, Paul Houser, is serving 60 years on a drug conviction for purchasing cold medicine and batteries. He’s one of 2,600 people incarcerated as a result of the state’s three strikes laws.
Lauren Gill Dec 20, 2019
Alternative approaches to rehabilitation and healing still face resistance, even though the criminal legal system’s reliance on punishment has done little to move the needle on addressing sexual violence.
Tyler Kingkade Dec 10, 2019
With Daniel Harawa, assistant professor at Washington University in St. Louis School of Law.
Adam H. Johnson Dec 05, 2019
In California, a prison program run by people once sentenced to life shows how even the most serious offenders are more than the worst things they’ve done.
The poor healthcare that Bobbie Jean Johnson received during her more than 40 years in prison contributed to her death, family members say.
Roxanna Asgarian Nov 25, 2019
More than 5,400 people in the state are sentenced to life without parole. This month, The Appeal went inside one prison that helps provide end-of-life care for men.
Joshua Vaughn Nov 20, 2019
More than three years after heavy rains and flooding devastated the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women, officials have reached an agreement to build a new facility.
Lauren Gill Oct 29, 2019
The New York Post used a tragedy to target bail reform activists, rather than point to the challenges of a failed mental health system and poverty.
Adam H. Johnson Oct 21, 2019
In a rare move, a federal court vacated Anastazia Schmid’s murder conviction, saying she’d received ineffective assistance of counsel and had been mentally unfit to stand trial. But Schmid, who’d spent 18 years in prison, remained locked up for three months more.
Victoria Law Sep 06, 2019
Our response to crime should focus on healing and accountability, not punishment and retribution.
Chesa Boudin Aug 30, 2019
A statewide pattern of discrimination in jury selection has gone largely uncorrected, while lives remain in the balance, advocates say.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg Aug 26, 2019
The 2020 presidential candidates recently unveiled national criminal justice agendas that reimagine public safety and punishment.
Aaron Morrison Aug 23, 2019
The New York Times’s coverage of the one-off case of a 77-year-old man omits key facts about how older adults are treated by our punitive legal system.
Adam H. Johnson Aug 09, 2019
Richard Kinder thought he would die in an Alabama prison until the Supreme Court ruled mandatory juvenile life without parole unconstitutional. But last year, despite a judge concluding there was “uncontradicted evidence” that Kinder had worked to rehabilitate himself, the state parole board refused him release.
Lauren Gill Aug 07, 2019
Gloria Williams was in her 20s when she was sent to prison for her part in a robbery that turned deadly. After serving nearly five decades, including one decade in solitary confinement, Williams now has a chance at freedom.
Victoria Law Aug 06, 2019
A new report shows that a progressive approach, like the one advanced by Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, can help decrease jail populations—and crime.
Kira Lerner Aug 05, 2019
Recent legal victories have spurred counties and states to provide medication-assisted treatment to prisoners struggling with substance use.
JB Nicholas Jul 31, 2019
The backlash is underway against a recent wave of prosecutors who champion criminal justice reform. Here are some methods of attack.
Though little is known about how Layleen Polanco died, advocates say her story highlights New York City’s flawed approach to criminal justice.
Raven Rakia Jun 12, 2019
Court challenges and a sweeping reform bill are offering hope to men trapped in isolation for decades.
Joshua Manson Jun 03, 2019
Prisoners can shave time off their sentences by participating in shock incarceration programs. More than a dozen former shock prisoners say that comes at a steep cost.
Keri Blakinger May 21, 2019
With Chicago activist Celia Colón
Adam H. Johnson May 16, 2019
Josie and Clint talk about prison abolition with Mariame Kaba.
The Bureau of Prisons’ South Central regional director utilized incarcerated people from a Texas prison to work on a landscaping project at his church.
Lauren Gill Mar 12, 2019
Family members are frantic after 330 prisoners are transferred to Pennsylvania.
Raven Rakia Feb 27, 2019
William J. Richards was cleared in the death of his wife. But he says he was the victim of medical neglect while he was behind bars, which led to a cancer diagnosis becoming terminal. Now he's suing.
Erika Stallings Feb 19, 2019
California amended its felony murder law, which holds accomplices responsible for murder. But reform won’t reach a man sentenced to death in a deadly robbery—even though he was never accused of firing a shot.
Maura Ewing Feb 04, 2019
The technology also allows authorities to mine call databases and cross-reference the voices of individuals prisoners have spoken with.
As Kamala Harris begins her presidential run, her move to block gender affirming surgery for an incarcerated transgender woman deserves scrutiny, especially as new cases highlighting the struggle for the rights of imprisoned trans women emerge.
Zoé Samudzi Jan 28, 2019
Prisoners in the state’s Regional Medical Units allege that they are being denied access to essential programs and services like law libraries.
Keri Blakinger Jan 08, 2019
Trump didn’t start it, but we can end it.
Ethan Brown Jan 03, 2019
The Boyd County Detention Center has been consumed in chaos, even as the DOJ investigates it. Now, the community is pinning hopes for reform on a new jailer.
Zachary A. Siegel Jan 02, 2019
But more than 1,100 others are still serving sentences that voters decided were too harsh.
Kira Lerner Dec 19, 2018
Meanwhile, the abysmal medical care that helped spark the riot persists.
Raven Rakia Nov 30, 2018
A lawsuit accuses Illinois of cutting off LGBTQ prisoners’ lifeline to supporters.
Raven Rakia Nov 08, 2018
Dozens of former detainees at the Gwinnett County jail in Georgia claim they were subjected to brutality at the hands of its Rapid Response Team.
Kira Lerner Oct 01, 2018
‘Cold case’ playing cards were just introduced into Delaware prisons in hopes of producing tips on unsolved homicides—but critics warn that informants cultivated behind bars can be dangerously unreliable.
Lauren Gill Sep 27, 2018
Louisiana is keeping people behind bars long after their sentences have expired, attorneys say.
Victoria Law Sep 26, 2018
As media attention wanes, “this is the most dangerous period with any prisoner action,” one organizer said.
Bryce Covert Sep 25, 2018
The company is being paid $4 million a year to open and scan prisoners’ mail into a searchable database.
Raven Rakia Sep 24, 2018
Prisons carry enormous, perhaps impossible to measure social costs—but when assessing the system fiscally, reformers should focus on staffing salaries instead of the number of incarcerated people.
John Pfaff Sep 20, 2018
Now in its second week, a strike staged by prisoners over poor conditions, low wages, and other issues is resulting in consequences, including harsh conduct reports and placements in solitary confinement.
Raven Rakia Aug 31, 2018
Instead of changing its conditions and practices, The Bureau of Prisons is simply moving a problem-plagued federal prison unit in Pennsylvania to Illinois.
Victoria Law Aug 21, 2018
After being released from prison, her only chance is a pardon from the governor.
Jessica Pishko Aug 14, 2018
In the wake of Nia Wilson’s murder, it’s critical that calls for justice in response to anti-Black violence are not contingent upon appeals to white-approved notions of innocence and respectability.
Zoé Samudzi Aug 08, 2018
In one Pennsylvania county, more than three times as many people on the registry were charged in 2016 with failing to follow registry requirements than were charged with a new sexual offense
Joshua Vaughn Aug 01, 2018
A onetime gang liaison for the Baltimore Police Department writes that its database is racist and error-ridden.
Larry Smith Jul 23, 2018
In jurisdictions across the country, people incarcerated before they've ever been convicted of a crime are charged a daily fee just for sitting in jail—and several courts have ruled that the practice is legal.
Steven Hale Jul 20, 2018
As worthy cases for clemency from Cyntoia Brown to Calvin Bryant mount in Tennessee, advocates decry the fact that a Tennessee governor hasn't commuted a prison sentence since 2011.
Steven Hale Jun 12, 2018
A little-known New York Department of Corrections and Community Supervision policy has limited access to books in at least nine prisons for years.
Rebecca McCray Jan 11, 2018
The price of shoplifting at Wal-Mart isn’t always low.
Carimah Townes Sep 05, 2017
“You look like a cold-blooded monster.”
Rebecca McCray Jun 22, 2017