A laundry list of minor traffic violations can lead to tickets and even jail time. In the worst cases, police stops for trivial infractions turn deadly. But stops for those offenses—tinted windows, a missing inspection sticker, an air freshener dangling from the rearview mirror—don’t make us safer. They do, however, drive racial disparities: study ...

A Virtual Event on the Power of District Attorneys in Criminal Justice

District attorneys wield enormous power in the criminal legal system. They have the power to decide the fate of people accused of crimes at every stage of a criminal case. They have tremendous sway over other actors throughout the criminal legal system, including policing practices and enforcement. We, the people, have the power to influence how th ...

Decades of these policies failed our communities and our nation. From 1970 onward, decisions made to sharply increase the use of jail and prison throughout the country—and to impose harsher sentences for many criminal convictions—are now commonly referred to as the era of mass incarceration. Today, nearly 2.3 million people are behind bars. Mass in ...