Following up last week's Jamie Kalven interview (recorded late 2018), an update on major recent developments in the Laquan McDonald case.
Read More
An algorithm can't be racist, right? As it turns out, facial recognition software trained and tested mostly on white people is really good at identifying race and gender... as long as you're white and male.
Read More
The Supreme Court delivers decisions on two criminal justice hot buttons: civil asset forfeiture and double jeopardy.
Read More
If Donald Trump goes on Fox News to issue what sounds like a veiled threat against Michael Cohen's family, isn't that obstruction? Or witness tampering, at the least? One school of thought holds that Trump's thinking is too disorganized, and his rhetoric too incoherent, to hold him accountable for much of anything he says.
President Trump’s former lawyer and fixer will serve three years in prison for campaign finance violations and other crimes, despite (sorta, kinda) cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller's team. What did Michael Cohen tell them, and what did he leave out?
Read More
Some district attorneys' offices keep secret lists of police officers who are not to be called to testify because their credibility is in question. How widespread is the practice?
Read More
Following his death last month former president George H.W. Bush was eulogized as a moderate who carried himself with dignity and grace, recalling a kinder and gentler era in American politics.But Bush's record on criminal justice tells another story.
Read More
At the start of a new year, producer Josh Raulerson joins David for a recap of 2018's biggest criminal justice stories and a look at what may be in store for 2019.
Read More
The First Step Act was supposed to be a bold, bipartisan move toward federal criminal justice reform. But while the bill may actually become law, it's a baby step at best.
Read More
From marijuana legalization to voter re-enfranchisement, criminal justice-related referenda were all over this year's ballots. Dave breaks down 2018 midterm election results.
Read More
The shooter in the Tree of Life synagogue murders pleads not guilty. David shares analysis on 90.5 WESA's The Confluence.
Read More
Canada becomes the second country in the world to fully legalize marijuana. What happens next?
Read More
Routine traffic stops are the most common interaction between police and citizens. A new book presents the most unambiguous evidence yet that race is a critical factor in who gets pulled over and why.
Read More
Criminal Injustice is made in Pittsburgh, and Saturday's massacre hit us close to home in more ways than one. It's time to be very clear about what we mean by "free speech," and about what kinds of speech can never be accepted in a free society.
Read More
In a rare moment of sanity, Pennsylvania lawmakers from both parties agree: revoking the driver's licenses of people convicted on non-driving-related charges doesn't help anybody.
An update on the case of East Pittsburgh police officer Michael Rosfeld, who shot and killed 17-year-old Antwon Rose last summer, on a recent episode of WESA's The Confluence.
Read More
As we record this, the question hanging over Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court is whether, and how, Senate Judiciary Committee will treat the accusations of criminal sexual assault made against Judge Kavanaugh by Professor Christine Blasy Ford. Whatever happens, the most important thing is to have a full, complete, and independent investigation of the charges before any hearing or vote.
Read More
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein has put cities on notice: don’t try to establish facilities where addicts can inject intravenous drugs safely. What is Rosenstein's justification for this policy? And does the evidence bear it out?
Read More
David discusses three recent criminal justice stories on WESA's The Confluence.
Read More