Recommended reading on how COVID-19 is impacting incarcerated populations and what must be done to avoid catastrophe: "Let the People Go" by Joseph Margulies in the Boston Review.
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COVID-19 has exposed systemic injustice and institutional failures at every level of society, and nowhere more than in the criminal justice system. Incarcerated people are already being hit hard by the pandemic, but the situation is rapidly deteriorating -- and the effects will be felt beyond the walls of prisons and jails.
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Louisiana's public defender system is funded by fines from traffic violations. But with far fewer cars on the road due to COVID-19, an already badly underfunded system is at the breaking point.
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Workplaces are adjusting to life under lockdown by holding meetings via videoconference — and the U.S. Supreme Court is no exception.
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President Trump claims “total authority” to override governors and end their stay-at-home orders, yet again raising the question: can he do that? No, as Dave explains on 90.5 WESA’s The Confluence, he cannot.
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A trademark lawsuit out of Chicago raises the question: in the midst of a global pandemic, what counts as a legal “emergency”?
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The COVID-19 pandemic is forcing our institutions to confront a host of thorny problems. Among the thorniest for the criminal justice system: how to uphold the constitutional right to a speedy trial when courts are effectively shut down.
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Squalid and unhealthy even in the best of times, prisons and especially jails are especially vulnerable during a pandemic. That's not just a danger to incarcerated people -- it's a disaster for public health.
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