The Supreme Court blocked the execution of a Texas murderer because of racially discriminatory testimony presented by his own defense team. The 6-2 ruling was the second in the court's new term to overturn a death sentence, and it could be a harbinger of things to come. USA Today, February 2017.
The death penalty won newfound support in the November 2016 election as voters in three states approved ballot measures backing capital punishment. Reuters, November 2016.
"Successful reintegration is not just a concern for those who return from prison: it is also a matter of public safety and economic necessity. Accordingly, a criminal justice system that emphasizes incarceration but does not support the journey home does a disservice to the formerly incarcerated as well as to the public." Brookings Institute, October 2016.
An opinion article discussing the contradiction that many forms of evidence are not scientifically valid, yet are allowed as evidence in criminal trials. Washington Post, September 2016.
This article is part biography of Bryan Stevenson, part history, and part report on Stevenson's efforts to create a memorial in Montgomery, Alabama, for the over 4,000 victims of lynching. New Yorker, August 2016.
The Justice Department proposed the first department-wide standards for forensic expert testimony Friday, responding to findings in 2015 that nearly every examiner in an elite FBI forensic unit had overstated testimony in criminal trials for decades. Washington Post, June 2016.
The Supreme Court gave a black death-row prisoner new life by ruling that prosecutors unconstitutionally barred all potential black jurors from his trial nearly 30 years ago. USA Today, May 2016.
At a time when other states in the US are backing away from the death penalty, Missouri has done the opposite. It is currently executing its death row inmates faster than any other state in the country, at a rate of about one per month. BBC, September 2015.
An article by Ta-Nehisi Coates. American politicians are now eager to disown a failed criminal-justice system that’s left the U.S. with the largest incarcerated population in the world. But they've failed to reckon with history. Fifty years after Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s report “The Negro Family” tragically helped create this system, it's time to reclaim his original intent. The Atlantic, October 2015.
A 2015 report on a joint study between The Innocence Project and the FBI. The FBI has concluded that the examiners’ testimony in at least 90 percent of trial transcripts the Bureau analyzed as part of its Microscopic Hair Comparison Analysis Review contained erroneous statements. FBI.gov, April 2015.
For most major crimes, police don't even make an arrest or identify a suspect. That's what police call "clearing" a crime; the "clearance rate" is the percentage of offenses cleared. This article explains the issues created with clearing crimes. NPR News, March 2015.
Confessions and eyewitness testimony are generally considered strong evidence at criminal proceedings. This scholarly article explores the idea that memories of crime may not be reliable, as the human mind can create what are known as "autobiographical false memories." The empirical demonstrations of such false memories for crime and corresponding false confessions carry major implications. Psychological Science, January 2015.
Capital punishment information is collected annually as part of the National Prisoner Statistics program. This is a comprehensive summary of that data through 2013. Bureau of Justice Statistics, December 2014.
Although public attention has focused on the disproportionate number of youth of color in confinement, it is necessary to view the justice system as a process. This exhaustive article examines statistics from every part of that process. National Council on Crime and Delinquency, January 2007.