Voir Dire: Conversations from the Harvard Kennedy School Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management

Latest Episodes:

Women Coming Home from Prison with Stacey Borden Apr 18, 2022

Show notes

Stacey Borden is the Founder and Executive Director of New Beginnings Reentry Services, Inc., which provides services to women coming home from prison. She talks about the unique experiences of women in prison and the challenges they face coming home.

Violence & Restorative Justice with Danielle Sered Apr 01, 2022

Show notes

Danielle Sered is the author of Until We Reckon: Violence, Mass Incarceration, and a Road to Repair. The book is based on her work as the founder and Director of Common Justice, an alternative-to-incarceration and victim-service program that focuses on violent felonies. We discuss violence, restorative justice, and the abject failure of the criminal legal system to do justice or create safety.

Law of Human Trafficking with Julie Dahlstrom Mar 02, 2022

Show notes

Human trafficking happens here in the United States. More needs to be done to prevent and address it. At the same time, the law of human trafficking, although young, is actually quite robust. And it’s being applied in novel, complex, and (some would say) questionable ways. Julie Dahlstrom, Director of BU Law’s Immigrants’ Rights & Human Trafficking Program, discusses these trends.

A Wrong Turn: How the Law of Cars Expanded Police Power with Sarah Seo Jan 24, 2022

Show notes

Sarah Seo is the author of Policing the Open Road: How Cars Transformed American Freedom. She explains how traffic enforcement fundamentally changed Fourth Amendment jurisprudence in the 20th century. Namely, it vastly expanded police discretion, creating the law enforcement regime that has presided over numerous high profile killings of unarmed black drivers by police in recent years. We rethink that regime. Then, we take a turn to ask what the 20th century’s major technological disruption (cars) can teach us about how we in the 21st century can respond to new disruptive technologies like big data.

The Birth Lottery of History with Robert Sampson Dec 09, 2021

Show notes

People with similar demographics, individual characteristics, and family and economic backgrounds have substantially different chances of getting arrested depending on the years during which they were 17 to 23 years old. Professor Robert Sampson outlines a groundbreaking new study showing the way that historical context predicts arrest rates.

Attorney-Client Relationship as Locus of Inequality w/ Matthew Clair Sep 27, 2021

Show notes

Matthew Clair is the author of Privilege and Punishment: How Race and Class Matter in Criminal Court. In the book, he uncovers how privilege and inequality play out in criminal court interactions, especially in the attorney-client relationship. In this conversation, we explore the attorney-client relationship in greater detail and the ways that it exacerbates inequality and legitimates injustice in the courts.

The Criminal Injustice System with Alec Karakatsanis Aug 12, 2021

Show notes

Alec Karakatsanis is the author of Usual Cruelty: the Complicity of Lawyers in the Criminal Injustice System and the founder of Civil Rights Corps. We discuss why he calls it the criminal injustice system and the dangers of criminal justice "reform."

The Corporate Enforcement Gap with Jenny Montoya Tansey Jun 28, 2021

Show notes

A national study commissioned by Public Rights Project revealed a massive enforcement gap in corporate abuse--with 54% of those surveyed saying they have experienced wage theft, predatory lending and debt collection, corporate pollution, and/or unsafe rental conditions at least once in the past 10 years. The criminal legal system could intervene. Hear how from Jenny Montoya Tansey, PRP's Policy Director.

The CAHOOTS Model Jun 01, 2021

Show notes

Most agree that the police are asked to do far too much, including tasks that they are not trained to do and so are ill-equipped to do well. The CAHOOTS model is an exciting one. It relieves the police from undertaking tasks for which they are ill-equipped, especially those related to mental health crises, it does so effectively and without force/violence, and it does so far more cheaply. We invited Tim Black to learn more about CAHOOTS, how it got started, what they do and how they do it, and why this might be a critical option for other jurisdictions across the country that are trying to address public safety issues without such a heavy reliance on police.

Progressive Probation with Wendy Still Apr 26, 2021

Show notes

Wendy Still has achieved remarkable reductions in the probation population while serving as Chief Probation Officer of San Francisco and Alameda Counties, California. She discusses what progressive probation looks like, including in the context of the defund movement, as well as her experiences during her long career.

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Voir Dire: Conversations from the Harvard Kennedy School Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management

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