Massachusetts Could Loosen Life Without Parole Restrictions For Young People Justices in the state’s highest court are weighing whether it is unconstitutional to sentence people convicted of murder and aged 18 to 20 to life without parole. Ella Fassler
Ed Gainey Wins Democratic Nomination for Pittsburgh Mayor The state representative will almost certainly be the city’s first Black mayor, and his victory follows a year of nationwide social upheaval over police and racial justice issues. Joshua Vaughn
The U.S. Economy Won’t Recover Until Black Workers Do Biden’s American Rescue Plan is a start, but more public investment is needed to address racial inequality in the labor market. Ashley Mitchell
The Dissenter Former Louisiana Supreme Court Chief Justice Bernette Johnson’s fiery dissents on mass incarceration and sentencing in America’s most carceral state garnered international attention. But the rise of the first Black woman on the court was characterized by one battle after another with the Deep South’s white power structure. Elon Green
At Least 5 Capitol Rally Participants Were In A Violent ‘Patriot March’ In San Diego Right-wingers and ultranationalists convened in the city days after the Washington insurrection, but the police crackdown that day fell on counterprotesters. James Stout
This Biden Nomination Is Extremely Important For Everyday People The Office of the Comptroller of Currency is responsible for ensuring the safety, soundness, and broad accessibility of financial institutions. President Biden must choose someone to lead the agency who brings expertise and relevant lived experience to the job. Jamaal Bowman, Ayanna Pressley
What Prosecutors Should Learn from 2020’s Pandemic and Protests In the new year, every prosecutor’s office should commit to protecting victims and workers, holding police accountable, and keeping families together. Chesa Boudin
What Biden Can Do To Address The Student Debt Crisis Civil rights organizations and Democrats in Congress are calling on the president-elect to provide relief to millions of borrowers once he takes office. Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg
Philadelphia Teacher Faces 65 Years In Prison After Another Person Torched A Police Car During A Protest U.S Attorney William McSwain denies he’s targeted the social justice leader, but experts say prosecutors’ use of the man’s clothing and social media to argue that he should be detained pretrial is unusual. Rachel M. Cohen
Chicago’s Mayor Turns City’s Infrastructure Into Weapons Against Protesters When election and racial justice protests rocked the city, Lori Lightfoot used raised bridges and shutdown public transportation as crowd control measures, which harmed the city’s workers. Maya Dukmasova
For a Glimpse of the Racial Justice Protests’ Staying Power, Look To Detroit Under the banner of Detroit Will Breathe, the city’s Black Lives Matter activists have formed a cohesive and lasting local political force. Chris Gelardi
How Antitrust Perpetuates Structural Racism Antitrust law, which was once a top line cause of populist and progressive movements fighting for a fair and democratic society, did control corporate authority in the past and can do so again. Sandeep Vaheesan
The Mississippi Program That’s Showing How Effective Direct Cash Transfers Can Be Researchers say that programs like the Magnolia Mother’s Trust, which gives Black women $1,000 a month, could be crucial in reducing the racial wealth gap. Lauren Gill
Social Workers Are Rejecting Calls For Them to Replace Police Some say their roles are already too close to those of law enforcement and are organizing for a radical rethinking of the profession. Mia Sato
People Are About To Be Pushed Into Homelessness On A Large Scale. Hotels Are Key To Keeping Them Off The Streets. Tens of thousands of people in Los Angeles County are at high risk for becoming homeless after the temporary halt on evictions is lifted—one of the largest mass displacements the region has ever seen. Ananya Roy, Jonny Coleman
Healthcare In The U.S. Is Still Segregated, So Community Organizations Are Taking COVID-19 Testing Into Their Own Hands Predominantly Black neighborhoods have less access to primary care physicians and healthcare services, at a time when COVID-19 is killing Black Americans at a rate 2.3 times higher than white Americans. Now grassroots organizations are trying to compensate for failures of public health. Akilah Wise
New York City Laundry Workers Struggle in the Face of COVID-19 Workers report facing a difficult choice between earning a living and feeling safe and healthy at their job. Amir Khafagy
Why Is COVID-19 Hitting Black Communities Harder? Residential Segregation Is a Key Factor. Segregation not only increases individuals' exposure to the novel coronavirus, it also leaves them more susceptible to its effects and limits the quality of care they will receive, experts say. Akilah Wise
Voting Rights Advocates Sound the Alarm About Disenfranchisement of Black Voters in Wisconsin’s Primary 'We literally held an election during a pandemic.' Kira Lerner
Justice In America Episode 24: Death Penalty Josie Duffy Rice and guest co-host Darnell Moore focus on the death penalty as they talk with State Attorney Aramis Ayala of the Ninth Judicial Circuit Court of Florida.
Justice in America Episode 21: Police Accountability Josie Duffy and co-host Darnell Moore discuss police accountability and explain why it’s so hard for the criminal justice system to hold police accountable.
Elizabeth Warren Announces Plan to Legalize Marijuana If Elected President The Democratic candidate also pledged to expunge prior criminal convictions for marijuana and invest in the communities most affected by the war on drugs. Joshua Vaughn
Jamal Trulove: The Enduring Trauma of Stop-and-Frisk As a Black child in San Francisco, I learned early that mine and others’ bodies meant nothing to those supposedly tasked with our protection. Jamal Trulove
A Black California Man Says a White Ex-Employee Assaulted Him. He Was the One Detained. Erick Wallace’s federal civil rights lawsuit joins a long line of litigation and misconduct allegations against the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Jerry Iannelli
Harris County D.A.’s Office Dropped Theft Case After Defense Attorney Alleged Race-Based Jury Selection A Texas judge approved a Batson motion, then overruled it. But a transcript shows that a Black man was struck unfairly, the attorney said. Aaron Morrison
As Support For Capital Punishment Wanes, An Ohio D.A. Continues To Push For Death In Franklin County, experts say Ron O’Brien’s capital cases—which can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars— amount to ‘just taxpayer money being lit on fire.’ Joshua Vaughn
In Third Debate, Democratic Presidential Candidates Condemn Mass Incarceration Without Naming Its Main Driver Candidates offered reforms for people accused of low-level, nonviolent offenses, but more than half of U.S. prisoners have committed a violent crime. Aaron Morrison
Report Praises High School in Jail But Fails to Ask Why Kids Are Locked Up at All A Pittsburgh public radio piece lacked critical reporting about the many problems with jailing children in adult facilities. Adam H. Johnson
‘You Don’t Own Me’ At 16, Larry Rosser was imprisoned for killing a woman who sexually and physically abused him. He served 22 years in the California prison system before being released in 2017, after parole commissioners became convinced he was a rehabilitated victim. Aaron Morrison
The Persistent History of Excluding Black Jurors in North Carolina A statewide pattern of discrimination in jury selection has gone largely uncorrected, while lives remain in the balance, advocates say. Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg
Sanders And Warren Just Released the Most Decarceral Criminal Justice Platforms Ever The 2020 presidential candidates recently unveiled national criminal justice agendas that reimagine public safety and punishment. Aaron Morrison
Media Frame: Chicago ‘Bean’ Graffiti Outrage Prioritizes Property Over People Outlets ran over 200 articles covering the vandalism. The outsize attention will likely damage young lives. Adam H. Johnson
New Orleans Youth Crime: The Epidemic That Wasn’t In rhetoric reminiscent of the ‘superpredator‘ scare of the 1990s, the New Orleans District Attorney warned of ‘a brazen population of delinquent teens.‘ But advocates and crime analysts alike say the data doesn't support his fearmongering claims about kids and crime. Mike Hayes
Houston Cop Who Led Botched Drug Raid Overwhelmingly Arrested Black People After a drug bust involving Houston narcotics officer Gerald Goines turned deadly, questions are being raised about how he operated during his time on the force. Mike Hayes
Black Mississippians Say Sheriff’s Office Deputies ‘Terrorize The Community Like A Gang Would’ Attorneys and advocates call for change in Madison County after the deaths of three Black people at its jail and because of what they allege is a system of roadblocks targeting Black residents. Aaron Morrison
Police Unions Fight To Rescind Parole For Former Black Panther In April 2018, Herman Bell was paroled after spending 45 years in prison in a case involving the shooting deaths of two police officers. Now, New York police unions and the widow of one of the slain officers are challenging the decision in court. Victoria Law
Bail Activist Jailed For Trying To Help When Cops Confronted Man In Mental Health Crisis Colorado-based attorney and bail activist Elisabeth Epps was just released after serving a short jail stint related to a 2015 encounter with Aurora Police. The experience gave her a new understanding of the experiences of the people she has bailed out. Aaron Morrison
Black Lives Matter DC’s Battle to End Stop-and-Frisk In The Nation’s Capital Advocates say the city has dragged its feet on legislation meant to ensure transparency on the police practice, and that data released so far—from 2010 to 2016, nearly 82 percent of stops involved Black people—signals that it’s time to end stop-and-frisk entirely. Ella Fassler
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel Won’t Seek A Third Term. These Movements Are A Big Reason. Protesters blasting everything from punitive prosecutors to police brutality should be remembered for their role in upsetting the Windy City's political status quo. Kelly Hayes
Notoriously Brutal, Racist Plainclothes Policing Makes A Return In Baltimore After the Gun Trace Task Force scandal rocked the police department, plainclothes policing was spurned. But a recently resigned commissioner championed plainclothes units, a decision the department seems to be sticking with. Larry Smith
Defund The Baltimore Police A former Baltimore cop questions how a department with a nearly half-billion-dollar budget that is riven by rampant corruption and brutality, bloated overtime spending, and unaccounted for patrol officers can continue to justify its existence Larry Smith
Milwaukee Candidates Clash In Race to Succeed The Infamous Sheriff Clarke Several candidates are vying to become Milwaukee Sheriff in the wake of Sheriff David Clarke's resignation last fall. But will they truly spurn his legacy of jail deaths and cooperation with ICE? Raven Rakia
Pretrial Detainees Are Being Billed For Their Stay in Jail 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
The Baltimore Police’s ‘Summer Surge’ Scam A former Baltimore Police officer says that a plan to flood the streets with local and federal law enforcement is likely to yield more of the same ineffective 'broken windows'-style arrests. Larry Smith
Cuomo the Merciless New York's Democratic governor has granted only a trickle of commutations, fewer than many of his Democratic and Republican predecessors. Victoria Law
Responses to Violence Must Move Beyond Policing The solution to problems like unsolved homicides, especially in communities of color, cannot be reinvestment in institutions that wage violence against them. William C. Anderson
Alice Marie Johnson is free. Now it’s time to free thousands more prisoners with unjustly long sentences. Kim Kardashian's successful campaign to free a 63-year-old grandmother serving a life sentence in a drug case is a reminder that we need to go big on clemency. A 52-year-old grandfather named Euka Wadlington, also doing life in a drug case, would be a great place to start. Shaun King
Black Families Matter: How the Child Welfare System Punishes Poor Families of Color Dorothy Roberts, Lisa Sangoi
Despite Leaders’ Progressive Promises, NYC Remains ’Marijuana Arrest Capital of the World’ Shaun King
San Antonio DA Nico LaHood, an Anti-Islam, Pro-Death Penalty Democrat, Faces Former Pal in Primary Alex Hannaford
Even With A Governor’s Pardon, Jesus Aguirre, Jr. Is Still a Gang Member According to Orange County Jessica Pishko
How a Dallas District Attorney Reached Her ‘Nixon in China’ Moment Faith Johnson’s recent indictment of a Mesquite police officer for shooting an innocent man follows years of work by community activists. Rebecca McCray
California Supreme Court finds “discriminatory bias” in prosecution’s use of peremptory jury strikes Larry Hannan
