criminal justice system

While Jovaan Lumpkin was in prison, his mother spent thousands of dollars in phone calls to stay connected. His mom, Diane Lewis, continues to advocate to make these calls free for prisoners and their families.

Economy

A captive market: The high price of prison phone calls

7:06pm June 20, 2024

When Diane Lewis' son, Jovaan, was sentenced to prison, she told him to call her every day. What he didn't know at the time is that those collect calls often meant Diane was unable to pay her other bills. Today on the show, how prison phone calls got so expensive, and the movement to make them free.

Related listening:
The Uncounted Workforce
From Prison to the Workforce
The Prisoner's Solution

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Queue Listen Now

What the reaction to Trump's felony conviction tells us about the word "felon"

Should we stop using the word "felon"?

11:05am June 12, 2024

This week, we're turning our sights on the word "felon", and looking into what it tells us (and can't tell us) about the 19 million people in the U.S. — like Donald Trump and Hunter Biden — carrying that designation around.

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Tenor Curtis Bannister sings the role of Stan in Beethoven's Fidelio, in a dress rehearsal.

Prison choirs sing in a reboot of Beethoven's opera about unjust incarceration

5:21pm February 19, 2022

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

A New York City opera company created an updated version of Fidelio for the Black Lives Matter era. The performance features singers who are incarcerated in real life.

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Health & Safety

Setting Precedent, A Federal Court Rules Jail Must Give Inmate Addiction Treatment

10:32am May 04, 2019

by Willis R. Arnold

Many jails and prisons refuse to offer medication for opioid addiction, even to inmates who had been in treatment before incarceration. A recent ruling in a federal court says that's not acceptable.

The street where the body of Jeffrey Young was found in Dallas.

National

Why A Man Declared Innocent Can't Get Out Of Prison

4:36pm December 06, 2017

by Barbara Bradley Hagerty

Benjamine Spencer's case illustrates how difficult it can be for some prisoners in Texas to prove they did not commit a crime without new and unassailable evidence, such as DNA.

Health & Safety

Report: Some Who Died In N.C. Jails Not Properly Supervised

12:50pm August 08, 2017

by Paul Garber and The Associated Press

A North Carolina newspaper has examined jail deaths across the state and found a disturbing trend– many of them died while left unsupervised longer than they should have been.

Crime

North Carolina To Limit Use Of Solitary Confinement

10:52am July 20, 2017

by Neal Charnoff

Prisoners in North Carolina will be spending less time in solitary confinement.

The lethal injection chamber at Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Ala., as seen in 2002.

National

Alabama Inmate Coughed, Heaved For About 13 Minutes During Execution

1:05pm December 09, 2016

by Rebecca Hersher

Ronald Bert Smith Jr. died by lethal injection late Thursday night, after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to stay his execution. A judge sentenced Smith to die for murdering a man in 1994.

Four states have no legal insanity defense.

With No Insanity Defense, Seriously Ill People End Up In Prison

3:13pm August 05, 2016

by Natalie Jacewicz

Four states have no insanity defense. Advocates say that means seriously ill people can be executed where in other states they wouldn't be convicted at all, and it makes it harder to get treatment.

'Guilty But Mentally Ill' Doesn't Protect Against Harsh Sentences

1:25pm August 02, 2016

by Natalie Jacewicz

Jurors often are reluctant to acquit someone who committed a crime while mentally ill, or to find that person guilty. So they take a third option: guilty but mentally ill. It's far from perfect.