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The Marshall Project
Don’t Expect Mass Prison Releases From Biden’s Marijuana Clemency
This is The Marshall Project’s new Closing Argument newsletter, a weekly deep dive into a key criminal justice issue. Want this delivered to your inbox? Subscribe to future newsletters here. Last week President Joe Biden announced the largest act of clemency in a generation: a mass pardon for people...
How A Suburb Spent COVID Relief Funds on Sniper Rifles, Tactical Helmets and Police Bonuses
The American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) provides federal funding to local governments in amounts not seen in decades, giving them wide latitude to spend on police, corrections and courts. In Independence, Missouri, a city of 117,000 just outside of Kansas City, those spending decisions proved controversial, with the debate among local officials reaching a boiling point at the city council meeting on October 4, 2021. Council members could not agree on amendments to the $20.3 million spending plan proposed by the city manager. — Municipal budget meetings can be brief and perfunctory — this one was not. It ran twice as long as normal, as council members argued over proposed amendments to reallocate funds for police. “We have gotten behind in public safety,” said council member Mike Steinmeyer, who supported his colleague Brice Stewart’s proposal to reallocate money for police body cameras. “Let’s make it a priority. This is a redemptive moment for this council.”
Daphne Duret Joins The Marshall Project to Cover Policing
The Marshall Project has hired Daphne Duret as staff writer to cover policing. In this role, Duret will report on policing issues across the country. — "We can't wait for Daphne to deploy her considerable investigative prowess to examine law enforcement," said Susan Chira, editor-in-chief of The Marshall Project. "She brings deep experience, as well as a passion for collaboration and mentoring young journalists."
The Problem With The FBI’s Missing Crime Data
This is The Marshall Project’s new Closing Argument newsletter, a weekly deep dive into a key criminal justice issue. Want this delivered to your inbox? Subscribe to future newsletters here. The FBI released its 2021 national crime data estimates this week, and, as expected, the takeaway is far from...
Alabama Said Prison Strike Was ‘Under Control.’ Footage Shows System in Deadly Disarray.
Last Friday, five days after Alabama prisoners launched a statewide labor strike, Republican Gov. Kay Ivey assured reporters that the head of the state’s beleaguered corrections department had things “well under control.” But images and interviews from inside the state’s prisons show a system in disarray, with deteriorating conditions, pervasive violence, multiple deaths and little oversight from staff.
What an Alabama Prisoners’ Strike Tells Us About Prison Labor
This is The Marshall Project’s Closing Argument newsletter, a weekly deep dive into a key criminal justice issue from reporter Jamiles Lartey. Want this delivered to your inbox? Subscribe here. People incarcerated in the Alabama prison system began striking Monday over what they’ve described as inhumane treatment. Organizers say...
How I Survived a Year in ‘the Hole’ Without Losing My Mind
When I went to prison at age 19, my greatest fear was being hurt by other people serving time. So when I passed through the prison gates, I took on the persona of a deadly gangster. I did things that landed me in “the hole” — slang for administrative segregation — over and over. At Potosi Correctional Center, the Level 5 maximum security prison in Missouri where I’m currently serving life without parole for murder, the hole is typically a 7-by-9 foot cement room. This room has a steel door with a slot for receiving meals and a small window to see outside. Inside there is just a cot, a thin mattress, a toilet and a sink. You can only shower once a week and spend one hour outside each day. Sometimes you can’t receive mail. And while you can yell out to other prisoners, you can’t see them. If you aren’t prepared for these conditions, they can make you crazy.
Cleveland Has Spent Millions on Police Cameras. Why Are the Locations a Secret?
Cleveland has spent at least $7 million to dot the city with about 1,500 surveillance cameras since 2007. It’s poised to invest nearly $4.7 million for 300 more and fix or replace nearly 40 that are old or damaged. Unlike some other cities, Cleveland officials have refused to share...
‘A Moral Disgrace’: How The U.S. Stopped Counting Deaths Behind Bars
This is The Marshall Project’s new Closing Argument newsletter, a weekly deep dive into a key criminal justice issue from reporter Jamiles Lartey. Want this delivered to your inbox? Subscribe to future newsletters here. Are you curious about the mating strategies of the foothill yellow-legged frog? Good news: The...
Cleveland Police Hiring Practices Are ‘Alarming’ and ‘Disturbing,’ Feds Say
A new report, from a federal monitor overseeing police reforms, is calling several Cleveland Division of Police practices “disturbing” and “alarming.” Among other findings, Cleveland hires officers who couldn’t pass background checks with other police forces. — The issues in the report mirror problems that surfaced in 2014 after an officer shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice. The department never investigated why that officer left a suburban force after a few months,Ideastream reported in 2014. A year later, the department was placed under a federal consent decree.
The Art of Bidding, or How I Survived Federal Prison
The first time I heard someone use the term “bid” was on my first day in federal prison, just four days before my 21st birthday. It was after the intake process, after I was fingerprinted, strip-searched, photographed, and given an inmate-ID card, an orange jumpsuit, and a roll of bedding. Before any of this, I’d been instructed by my pre-sentencing probation officer that I could bring “absolutely nothing” with me into the prison. “Just your body,” he’d said. So I left my eyeglasses at home, assuming I’d be issued a new pair. I walked blindly through a labyrinth of buzzing steel doors, deeper and deeper into the compound. When I asked about receiving a pair of glasses, one of the guards told me I’d have to wait until next year, since the eye doctor only came around once a year, and he’d just recently visited.
Local Mission Includes Connecting with Incarcerated Community to Raise ‘Awareness’
Louis Fields, outreach manager for The Marshall Project-Cleveland, is leading efforts to connect with incarcerated community, including recently released and active family members. In Cleveland, The Marshall Project’s local mission includes connecting communities with information from the criminal justice system. Part of that work is being done by an outreach...
Oklahoma Is Prosecuting Pregnant Women for Using Medical Marijuana
NEWKIRK, Okla. — Early in her pregnancy, Amanda Aguilar struggled with severe nausea that sometimes made it hard to eat. A doctor had previously approved a medical marijuana license for her, so she used pot to ease her morning sickness. — Aguilar, 33, said she stopped using marijuana after her third month of pregnancy and tested negative for the drug after her healthy son was born in October 2020. But the hospital found traces of marijuana in her baby’s stool.
Federal Oversight of Police Has Cost Cleveland Millions. What’s Changed?
With no end date in sight to free Cleveland's police force from federal oversight, residents and elected leaders question whether the $60 million spent so far has improved the department's relationship with the public. The disagreement comes as residents and leaders fear an uptick in more violent crime. — The...
Why Record Heat Can Be Deadlier in Prisons
This is The Marshall Project’s new Closing Argument newsletter, a weekly deep dive into a key criminal justice issue from reporter Jamiles Lartey. Want this delivered to your inbox? Subscribe to future newsletters here. This week, California endured what may have been the worst heat wave in state history,...
Rifles, Tasers and Jails: How Cities and States Spent Billions of COVID-19 Relief
President Biden’s signature American Rescue Plan Act gave local governments $350 billion to recover from COVID-19. They spent much of it on police, prisons and the courts. After signing the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) last spring, President Joe Biden touted what the economic stimulus bill would deliver: food assistance to millions of people in need, lower healthcare premiums for millions of Americans, and $350 billion for state and local governments to spend on COVID-19 recovery. Economists say it was the largest infusion of federal funding in local governments in almost 40 years.
Thousands of Migrants Are Now Pawns in Immigration Politics.
This is The Marshall Project’s new Closing Argument newsletter, a weekly deep dive into a key criminal justice issue from reporter Jamiles Lartey. Want this delivered to your inbox? Subscribe to future newsletters here. Two buses chartered by the state of Texas arrived in Chicago late Wednesday evening, carrying...
My Wild and Winding Path to a College Degree Behind Bars
As a kid, I didn’t see the value of education. My mother sent my brother and me to Catholic school as a path out of our dangerous Brooklyn neighborhood, but I saw it as the place where bullies lay in wait for us kids wearing plaid uniform ties. I got good grades until high school, when I made fighting bullies my priority. The altercations escalated, leading me to transfer to different New York City schools before finishing in Detroit. I did not attend the graduation ceremony because my classmates were strangers. — When it came time to apply for college, I didn’t bother. My grades did not match my brains, and I lacked athleticism, so a scholarship was not happening. Plus, I did not know what I wanted to be. Without rich parents to foot the bill, going into student debt to find myself was out of the question. I needed an immediate income to get out of Brownsville, Brooklyn.
They Lost Their Pregnancies. Then Prosecutors Sent Them to Prison
Some were already mothers, excited about having another baby. Others were upset or frightened to find themselves pregnant. All tested positive for drugs. And when these women lost their pregnancies, each ended up in jail. More than 50 women have been prosecuted for child neglect or manslaughter in the United...
She Lost Her Baby, Then Her Freedom
In its war on drugs, Alabama targets moms. Two months after she had a stillbirth, officers arrested Brooke Shoemaker at her parent’s home in east Alabama, weeks before her 37th birthday. Police contended drug use caused the loss of her baby. She suddenly found herself facing decades in prison for the unusual charge of “chemical endangerment causing death,” a law unique to Alabama.
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The Marshall Project is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization that seeks to create and sustain a sense of national urgency about the U.S. criminal justice system.
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