Hey South Carolina – Symbols Matter
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 06/23/2015. South Carolina flies the Confederate flag in its state capitol. To many, that flag is a symbol of a violent, racist past. A nostalgic celebration of a time when blacks were actively oppressed, enslaved, and brutalized while government officials looked the other away – or even actively participated. […]
Keeping the Death Penalty Alive: It’s a Texas Thing
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 06/11/2015. People like to say that the death penalty is for the “worst of the worst” offenders. But they are wrong. The death penalty depends on where people live. Particularly for the people who live in Texas. Just look at the numbers: there have been 1146 executions in the […]
Tsarnaev’s Sentence: A Deeply American Choice
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 05/04/2015. Jurors in the Boston bombing trial have found Dzhokhar Tsarnaev guilty of murder and other horrific acts of violence. They now have to make the difficult choice of deciding which punishment is most appropriate for his crimes: the death penalty or life without parole (LWOP). The sentencing decision […]
The Slender Man Stabbings: Is Everything About the Suspects Based on Fiction?
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 03/19/2015. The tale of the Slender Man stabbings is a surreal one. For those of you not in the know, last May, in a small town in Wisconsin, two 12-year-old girls were accused of stabbing a fellow 12-year-old classmate 19 times. As the story goes, the two girls did […]
Another Innocent Black Man on Death Row
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 03/10/2015. As President Obama proclaimed at the Selma memorial march, race relations may have improved in the last fifty years, but there is still much work to be done. Nowhere is this more evident than in the case of Rodney Reed. Reed, who is black, was convicted in Texas […]
For the Mentally Disabled, Some States Are Deadly
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 02/23/2015. One of the major problems that I have with the death penalty is its randomness. Geography, for instance, matters in ways that has nothing to do with the crime. A person who commits murder in a state without the death penalty will not be sentenced to death, while […]
Top 10 Ways to Fix the Criminal Justice System
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 12/22/2014. It’s that time of year when people are making lists and checking them twice. Here is my action list about ways to fix the criminal justice system, with suggestions for steps we all can take. What would be on your list? 10. Return to Community Policing. If the […]
In the Wake of Garner, A Plea for Hope
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 12/07/2014. In the days after Ferguson, and just before the Garner decision, I spoke with a group of high school students about race and the criminal justice system. A young black teen in the audience asked a devastating question: “How come we [the black community] always have to be […]
Race Matters, Even Though It Shouldn’t
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 11/14/2014. You do the crime, you do the time. But not always for the reasons you may think. Because it’s not just about crime. Or about whether an accused person in fact committed the crime. It’s not just about the quality of the evidence, or whether the prosecution can […]
When Children Are Not Children: A 10-Year Old Murder Suspect Is Charged as An Adult
*Originally published in the Huffington Post 10/23/2014. 10-year-old Tristen Kurilla has been charged as an adult in Pennsylvania in the murder of a 90-year-old woman in his grandfather’s care. According to reports, the woman yelled at the fifth-grader after he asked her a question and, in response, he reportedly held a cane to her neck […]