Tunnel vision puts blinders on criminal justice system

Sabrina Butler sat terrified in the dimly lit interrogation room in Columbus, Mississippi. White men towered over the 17-year-old Black grieving mother.

News, Mississippi News, Civil RIghts, Prison Reform, PrisonJerry MitchellOctober 23, 2022wrongful conviction, wrongfully convicted, exonerated, death row, murder charge, prison, innocent people, death penalty, eye witness, Sabrina Butler Smith, kidney disease, Johnny Lee Gates

Junk science tilts justice against those charged with crimes

More than 3,200 Americans have been wrongfully convicted in recent decades, more than half of them because forensic science has been misapplied, or worse, the evidence is false.

Black Americans seven times more likely to be wrongfully convicted

Eddie Lee Howard Jr. and Sherwood Brown each spent 26 years on Mississippi’s death row for murders they did not commit — only to walk free last year.

News, Mississippi News, Civil RIghts, Prison Reform, Broken Justice, PrisonJerry MitchellOctober 11, 2022wrongful conviction, wrongfully convicted, exonerated, Sherwood Brown, death row, murder charge, Black Americans, prison, innocent people

The Justice Department drops the hammer on Alabama’s prison system. Could Mississippi be next?

A year after deadly riots, the U.S. Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division continues to investigate Mississippi prisons.

Mississippi News, Prison, Prison ReformKatherine MitchellJanuary 5, 2021prison, prison reform, contraband, prison gangs, MDOC, prison inspection, Mississippi State Penitentiary, Mississippi department of health, Mississippi prison system, Denorris Howell

Will prison contraband go up in smoke when Mississippi’s tobacco ban ends? Will it mean higher health care costs?

Mississippi officials are hoping that lifting the ban on smoking inside prison will help curb the huge contraband trade that some inmates estimate may run in the millions.

Mississippi News, Prison, Prison ReformKatherine MitchellDecember 29, 2020prison, prison reform, contraband, smoking, tobacco ban, cigarettes, Burl Cain, East Mississippi Correctional Facility, prison gangs, MDOC

No-Show Prison Workers Cost Mississippi Taxpayers Millions

Prisoners, guards face danger from chronic understaffing by MTC

Trump Hailed This State’s Prison Reforms as a National Model — but the Numbers Reflect a Grim Reality

When Mississippi lawmakers passed prison reform legislation in 2014, they pledged to devote some of the savings to drug rehabilitation, reentry programs and prison alternatives. That hasn’t happened.

Prison, Prison ReformKatherine MitchellMay 8, 2019Mississippi Center for Investigative Reportingprison, prison reform, prison reform bill, what is prison reform, mississippi department of corrections, first step act

Years Ago, I Exposed Horrors In Mississippi Prisons. Here’s Why I’m Back at It.

What began as a call from an inmate turned into a years-long effort to chronicle corruption, gangs, violence and maltreatment inside Mississippi prisons.

Prison, Prison ReformKatherine MitchellMay 8, 2019prison, prison reform bill, prison reform, what is prison reform, prison reform bill passed, federal prison reform