It took Leah Carroll years to determine that her mother was murdered by an organized crime syndicate as a suspected drug informant.
Search results
My Aryan Princess
In this epic, seven-part feature, Scott Farwell tells the story of Carol Blevins, a heroin addict and “Aryan Princess featherwood” (property of a gang member) who became the FBI’s most important confidential informant in a massive, six-year investigation into the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas — an organized crime syndicate responsible for over 100 murders and […]
‘Nobody Is Safe’: A Dispatch from Manila
At The New York Review of Books, James Fenton reports from the night shift in Manila, giving us a glimpse into the war on drugs in the Philippines, from “buy-bust” undercover operations to EJKs (extrajudicial killings).
A Small Town Crushed By a Big Weight — the Military-Industrial Complex
This meticulously-reported piece explores the bungled investigation into a 1994 double murder in Oak Grove, Kentucky, a small town weighed down by the military-industrial complex.
Treating Our Border As a Battle Zone
Twenty years after Marines fatally shot an innocent 18-year old man in West Texas, the War on Drugs and militarization of the US-Mexico border has left many local people feeling less safe.
Law and Order, Coffee Shop Edition
Susan Read’s short fiction centers on a Kafka-esque interrogation in the back room of a coffee shop — you know, the one where they wear the green aprons — that’s a stinging indictment of the byzantine policies, procedures, and psychology of being a low wage employee.
An Interview with Sarah Smarsh, Author of ‘Heartland’
The author of “Heartland,” a National Book Award longlisted memoir about growing up poor in rural America, gives her views on politics, identity, and cultural appropriation.
Nell Battle Lewis, Storyteller for Jim Crow
How an otherwise high-minded social reformer preserved and perpetuated her white supremacist worldview.
Conspiracy to Cover-up: Why We’ll Never Learn the Truth About the Attica Prison Riot
On how the state covered up the truth of the Attica Prison riot: a grisly state-initiated mass murder in the name of justice and order. Of the 43 dead, 29 were inmates — many of them shot in the back or executed at close range as the state attempted to regain control of the prison.
Kafka in Vegas
Despite a judge’s proclamation of of convict Fred Steese’s innocence, in light of new evidence and prosecutorial misconduct, the state offered him a bizarre deal called an Alford plea: go free, but remain a convicted felon.
