The news is out: 2020 saw a 30% rise in murders, nationwide. 2021 isn’t looking good, either. Some want us to turn back to the aggressive policing of the past. But is there a better way to stem the tide of gun violence? What actually works?
Read MoreWhile crime remains down overall, over the last year we've seen a startling spike in the U.S. murder rate. What's going on?
Read MoreWe often hear about new methods police try to achieve better results against crime. But do the police have any reason to believe that their new approaches will work? Are their new initiatives based on hope, or on actual evidence that they will really help?
Read MoreAn 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 MoreFrom Chad in Hawaii, a followup to our Nov. 6 episode on full legalization of marijuana in Canada: if the Canadian government has better data on drug-related crimes than the U.S., do they track other things that we don't? We put the question back to our friends up north.
Read MoreWe often hear about new methods police try to achieve better results against crime. But do the police have any reason to believe that their new approaches will work? Are their new initiatives based on hope, or on actual evidence that they will really help?
Read MoreIn what's turned out to be a week of bombshell Supreme Court news, a lesser-noticed (but still notable) ruling in Carpenter v U.S.: a 5-4 majority concurs that police need a warrant to track someone's location using data from cellular towers.
Read MoreIn the U.S., judges set bail – an amount of money defendants must deposit with the court -- to make sure people appear in court. Defendants must pay the bail amount to get released to wait for trial. Those with enough money to get out before trial, but those without cash stay in jail – regardless of the risk they pose. Could a data-based system do a better job of assessing these risks, and keep the poor out of jail before trial?
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