Justice In America

On this episode of Justice in America, Josie Duffy Rice and her co-host Derecka Purnell talk about education in prisons. They'll discuss the impact of having access to education, the dire lack of available programming, and what happened to prison education after the 1994 crime bill. They're joined by Dyjuan Tatro and Wesley Caines, alumni of the Bard Prison Initiative. The Bard Prison Initiative is a college program offered through Bard College in six New York State prisons. It's also the subject of a critically acclaimed new documentary series on PBS, called College Behind Bars.

For transcripts and more information please visit theappeal.org.

Who has had the biggest impact on the growth of our incarceration system? It’s not the judge, the jury, or the legislator. It’s not the police, and it's certainly not the President. It’s someone else—the prosecutor. Prosecutors are getting more attention now than ever, but many people still don’t know what they do.

Prosecutors don’t just play an important role at trial. It is prosecutors who recommend what bail a judge should set, prosecutors who decide whether a person should face criminal charges and what those charges should be, and prosecutors who control the plea deal process. Perhaps more than anyone else, prosecutors are responsible for our mass incarceration epidemic. On this episode, we’ll explore the impact prosecutors have and take a look at how they wield their immense power.

We’ll talk about the problems with prosecutors, and their excessive power, negative incentives, and almost total lack accountability. We’ll also talk to John Pfaff, a lawyer, economist, and prosecutor expert, whose book, Locked In, examines the power of prosecutors.

Want to know more? Check out theappeal.org

States and cities across the nation are talking about reforming the money bail system. But what does that mean? What exactly is bail? Who does it harm and who does it benefit? And does bail reform really work? On our first episode, we’re learning all we can about the bail system.

TV courtroom dramas would have you believe that the trial is a major part of the criminal justice process. But most defendants don’t go to trial. Instead, most defendants decide to plead guilty—even when they are innocent.

What is a plea deal, exactly, and how does it function? Who negotiates a plea deal and who approves it? What are the benefits to the state? What are the benefits for defendants? And more importantly, how do plea deals reduce protections for individuals ensnared in the criminal justice system?

On this episode, we’ll answer all these questions and more. We’ll also be talking to Professor Alexandra Natapoff, a law professor at University of California, Irvine, and one of the foremost experts on plea bargaining in America.

For more on plea bargaining, check out our website at https://theappeal.org/topics/podcasts/

John Legend isn’t just one of the most talented musicians of our time—he’s also a leading activist on criminal justice reform. On this episode, Justice in America talks to Legend, singer, songwriter, actor, producer, founder of #FREEAMERICA. #FREEAMERICA is a campaign designed to change the national conversation of our country's misguided criminal justice policies.

John sat down with Josie in Los Angeles, where they talked about prosecutors, bail, immigration, and more.

To learn more about #FREEAMERICA, check out their website.

Earlier this week, John wrote a great op-ed for The Washington Post on the racist origins of Louisiana’s non-unanimous jury system.

In June, he co-wrote this piece for CNN with Color of Change Executive Director Rashad Robinson on the need to end cash bail.

Here’s another op-ed he wrote on police brutality in 2014, after the deaths of Mike Brown and Eric Garner

And yet another piece by John on ending juvenile life without parole in his home state of Ohio.