Jenkins won’t charge the security guard who shot Banko Brown to death. That’s precisely why San Franciscans elected her in the first place.

In Illinois alone, around 500 people are currently serving first-degree felony murder sentences for killings they did not commit themselves or intend to commit. Reform efforts must consider past injustices as well as future abuses.

A criminal-legal reporter ventures into Night Court—the cringy sitcom reboot and the real courtroom in Manhattan.

At least 42 people have been charged with “domestic terrorism” under the state’s wide-ranging statute. Legal experts are calling it a “sloppy” and unprecedented attack on constitutional rights to free speech and protest.

Under state law, adult prison sentences are automatically enhanced based on prior youth adjudications. New legislation would rein in the practice and allow for reconsideration of extreme sentences.

It’s been four years since a Phoenix police officer killed Jacob Harris. Records obtained by The Appeal show officials have made inconsistent or false statements about the night police killed him. As Harris’s friends grow up behind bars, his father won’t stop until he gets justice for his son.

gorodenkoff / iStock by Getty Images Over-Reliance on Plea Deals is Damaging the Criminal Legal System by Nneka Ewulonu It’s easy for the average American to envision a courtroom trial. Shows like “Law and Order” inundate us with fictional depictions of trials—from the thud of a gavel to the inquisitive eyes of a jury—with an […]

Pamela Price is running a progressive campaign to change the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office in California. She’s winning. But her opponent, longtime prosecutor Terry Wiley, is trying to paint her as the next Chesa Boudin to score votes.

After a six-year investigation, the DOJ says Orange County law-enforcement unconstitutionally used jailhouse informants to elicit confessions and incriminating evidence from people for years.

Fulton County Sheriff Patrick Labat says the county needs more jail beds to fix the jail’s crisis. But a new ACLU report says that significant numbers of people in the jail can be released.

A judge allowed a Civil War-era law to go back into effect today. The law requires two to five years in prison for people who provide abortions, except to save the life of the pregnant person.

Roughly 30 states still have some form of HIV criminalization law or sentencing enhancement on the books. Advocates say it’s long past time for change.

If Brooke Jenkins fails to deliver results with “tough-on-crime” policies, will San Franciscans blame her, just as they did her predecessor, Chesa Boudin?

The new San Francisco DA is mixing “tough-on-crime” rhetoric with phony progressivism. Neither will solve the city’s problems.

The law granted embryos and fetuses the same rights as a person. Civil rights groups sought an injunction out of concern the law could criminalize people who provide or obtain abortions.

As Fulton County DA Fani Willis’s profile rises, the glossy coverage has largely ignored her crusade to incarcerate teachers accused of cheating on tests.

The probe will assess whether the SVD engages in a “pattern or practice of gender-biased policing,” according to the DOJ.

For the wealthy backers of the Boudin recall, “progressive” prosecutors are the perfect scapegoat for what they see as threats to a system that treats them just fine.

Expert says trauma from childbirth, not shaking, led to the death of Danyel Smith’s two-month-old child.

Prosecutors across the country could soon be tasked with enforcing abortion laws that require people to reproduce against their will.

Maricopa County elects a new top prosecutor this year. In the meantime, state law could let the county’s conservative county attorney prosecute abortions if Roe falls.

As politicians look to build public support for homeless encampment sweeps, they’re using tactics popularized in LA—the site of one of the nation’s most intense battles over the unhoused.

New laws imposing criminal penalties for trans healthcare follow a long legislative history of explicitly targeting queer people in the United States.

The racketeering charges against Young Thug, Gunna, and YSL are over-broad, over-stated and unnecessarily harsh.

Accused of faking his symptoms, Joshua Lee Smith was dragged from his hospital bed, called a “junkie,” and thrown in jail, his lawsuit says. Then, he woke up paralyzed.

In the raucous debate over bail reform, simple facts have fallen out of sight.

A Supreme Court decision overturning the constitutional right to an abortion could force thousands of incarcerated people to carry pregnancies to term.

In January, a New Jersey judge said Shaken Baby Syndrome is “akin to junk science.”

An incarcerated writer reflects on what her “going home” story will look like when home no longer exists.

We’re celebrating 4/20 by tackling some popular myths about marijuana and the criminal legal system.

Serving out a sentence in a Washington state prison, I was certain I’d never own a home. When my wife and I started the process, we found out just how difficult it would be.

Two years into the COVID-19 pandemic, “prison warehousing”—which used to be a derogatory term—would look like an upgrade. At least warehouses care about the value of the goods they store.

Less than two years after racial justice protests sparked calls to “defund the police,” states and jurisdictions are using pandemic aid to pad already bloated law enforcement budgets.

Corrections officials confirmed finding legionella at five facilities over the past 12 months.

A cycle of hopelessness is taking its toll in prisons across the country, amid continued restrictions on the things that make life more bearable.

After giving tablets to incarcerated people, prison telecoms giants are charging prisoners and their families exorbitant prices on everything from emails to movies.

In the ’90s, the city passed a policy requiring the police department to pay some of their own legal costs. There’s no evidence that the department ever paid up.

After a bold campaign promise, the president has remained almost silent as thousands languish in solitary in federal prisons. Advocates say they remain hopeful that he will find his voice on the issue.

Georgia is the strictest state in America when it comes to proving intellectual disability in capital cases. This month, the Supreme Court could save the life of a man who says he is mentally disabled—or let the state kill him.

Spurred by an Appeal investigation into Michelle Heale’s controversial 2015 case, a law professor is asking New Jersey’s Conviction Review Unit to “correct an injustice” and set Heale free.