African Americans win top law enforcement posts in North Carolina. Originally published in the The Washington Post. DURHAM, N. C. — THREE DAYS AFTER HE WAS SWORN IN as Durham County’s new sheriff last month, Clarence Birkhead ended his department’s cooperative relationship with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Within a week, his staff rebuffed ICE […]
Mindful Policing: The Future of Force
With police violence in the news, and public scrutiny on the rise, cities turn to mindfulness to help officers deal with the stress of the job. Originally published in Mindful. “YOU GUYS READY FOR A TECHNIQUE?” the trainer asks. “Everybody, sit up straight. Uncross your legs. Just look straight ahead.” Eric White gathers his 6-foot-8 […]
The Case of the Battered Pet
Who would suspect that a family’s animals could be pawns in domestic violence? Or that their sad condition might tip off investigators to women in trouble? The terrifying truth about cats and dogs. Originally published in O, The Oprah Magazine. MARCELLA HARB-HAUSER, DVM, WAS DOING HER morning rounds at a San Rafael, California, veterinary hospital when […]
A Mother Finds Her Voice
Judy Shepard, whose son Matthew was murdered because he was gay, has summoned the courage to share her story. Originally published in Us Weekly. ONE DAY LAST MAY, while she was in Toronto, Judy Shepard looked up and caught a glimpse of her older son crossing the street. Wearing khakis and a blue-checked shirt that hung loosely […]
Surgical Strike
Originally published in Mother Jones. BARBARA HARRIS WAS EAGER TO BECOME a foster mother when she received a call from a social worker in 1990, asking her to take in an eight-month-old girl born to a woman addicted to crack cocaine. Harris, a waitress at a pancake house, agreed. Over the next two years, she […]
A Hideous Hate Crime
In 1963, four African-American girls were murdered in Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. Now the granddaughter of one of the bombers—and the sisters of a victim—confront Alabama’s racist legacy. Originally published in Glamour. TERESA STACY WAS STANDING IN HER KITCHEN on a hot Texas afternoon in 1997 when the local television news came on. It was one […]
Steel-Town Lockdown
Corrections Corporation of America is trying to turn Youngstown, Ohio, into the private-prison capital of the world. Originally published in Mother Jones. Reprinted in The Best Business Stories of the Year, edited by Andrew Leckey and Marshall Loeb (Vintage Books, 2001). BOB HAGAN WAS READING HIS E-MAIL one July afternoon when the telephone rang at his home in Youngstown, […]
Shocking Discipline
Originally published in Mother Jones. WHEN JEFFREY LEE WEAVER went on trial last year for killing a police officer, court officials in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, decided to try out their newest piece of electronic gadgetry. Because Weaver was serving as his own lawyer and would have to move around the courtroom, the 37-year-old couldn’t wear shackles. So […]
Rain of Nails
When an anti-gay bomb shattered the peace in Atlanta, was the far Right’s new “leaderless resistance to blame? Originally published in Out. EVEN THOUGH IT WAS ONLY 9:45 P.M., early for a Friday night in Atlanta, the Otherside Lounge was already cranking up February 21. One hundred and fifty women and men had settled into […]
The Real State Takeover
Lobbyists are brandishing a new weapon at local governments: preemption. Originally published in The Nation. WHEN OFFICIALS IN TULSA, OKLAHOMA, were planning the 1996 State Fair, they decided to play it safe and ban concealed weapons. With more than 1 million people drinking beer and getting rowdy over eleven days and nights, they reasoned, allowing guns […]
