Reckon Radio

What was it about the killing of Bonita Carter that sparked police reform? The search for that answer led the Reckon Radio team into the bowels of the Birmingham Public Library, to a recently discovered box of “Birmingham Police Shooting and Incident Cards.” These cards, seen by almost no one in decades, detail the lives of hundreds of people in Jefferson County, Alabama – the deaths of hundreds, killed by police and security officers and written off, seemingly casually, as “justifiable.”

Almost all the victims are Black. Almost all are men. Many are young, teenagers, shot in the back as they ran, or walked away, or were simply suspected of a crime as trivial as picking up a few bucks off a lunch counter. What was it about Bonita Carter? The answer in these files and others, which indicate that more police in this one county shot as many as 500 people in the last century, that they were not just allowed to shoot people they believed had committed a crime, they were expected and encouraged to do it. Especially if the suspect were Black.

Show Notes:

Guests: Cynthia Carter, Brian Burghart, Jay Glass, Uche Bean

Creator: John Archibald

Hosts: John Archibald & Roy S. Johnson

Executive Producer: John Hammontree

Producer & Audio Engineer: Alexander Richey

Producers: Amy Yurkanin and Marsha Oglesby

Score: Thad Saajid, Austin Motlow, David Marsh, and Danny Ray Wilkerson, Jr. Additional music contributed by Jeremy Smith.

Music: "Vehemence," by Thad Saajid

Voice Acting: R.L. Nave, Barnett Wright, Danny Ray Wilkerson, Jr.

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Protest began to swell in Birmingham began to swell the night Bonita Carter was killed, and it grew larger and larger in the days that followed. Black people, who had marched for voting power and integrated water fountains and lunch counters a decade and a half before, took to the streets to condemn police violence from a department built by Bull Connor. The killing of Bonita Carter seemed to be the last straw, especially when the mayor, a progressive named David Vann who had helped push Connor out in the ’60s, hesitated to discipline the police officer who shot her. The killing demanded change.

What was it about her that seemed to mobilize a city?

Show Notes:

Guests: Solomon Crenshaw, Nathaniel Bagley, TK Thorne, Richard Mauk, Richard Arrington, Jr.

Creator: John Archibald

Hosts: John Archibald & Roy S. Johnson

Executive Producer: John Hammontree

Producer & Audio Engineer: Alexander Richey

Producers: Amy Yurkanin and Marsha Oglesby

Score: Thad Saajid, Austin Motlow, David Marsh, and Danny Ray Wilkerson, Jr. Additional music contributed by Jeremy Smith.

Music: "Hard to Stay Cool," by Cedric Burnside; Single Lock Records

Voice Acting: Nigel Thomas, Sheikilya Thomas, Alexander Richey, Barnett Wright and John Hammontree

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June 22, 1979, just another evening in Birmingham Alabama, and Bonita Carter and her friends ride their bikes to a convenience store as the sun sets. What happened there would change their lives, and their cities forever. Chapter one of “Unjustifiable” reconstructs those events, moment by moment and step by step, from the vantage points of onlookers, participants, store workers, witnesses and police. By the end of the night, a police officer named George Sands fired four shots into a car, killing the unarmed young Black woman, after a white man pointed to the car and screamed that she was dangerous man with a shotgun. Carter’s friends screamed too: “It’s a girl in the car!”

They were ignored.

Show Notes:

Creator: John Archibald

Hosts: John Archibald & Roy S. Johnson

Executive Producer: John Hammontree

Producer & Audio Engineer: Alexander Richey

Producers: Amy Yurkanin and Marsha Oglesby

Score: Thad Saajid, Austin Motlow, David Marsh, and Danny Ray Wilkerson, Jr. Additional music contributed by Jeremy Smith.

Music: "Ain't Gonna Take No Mess," by Cedric Burnside; Single Lock Records

Voice Acting: Alex Williams, Finn Jasele, David Perry, Jonathan Sobolewski, R.L. Nave, Ike Morgan, Alexander Richey, Barnett Wright, Nigel Thomas and Sheikilya Thomas.

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Reckon Radio presents: “Unjustifiable,” an investigative series from Pulitzer-prize winning columnist John Archibald and Roy S. Johnson examining an overlooked moment of civil rights history in the heart of the South. 

The story begins in 1979, when a police officer with a history of complaints shot and killed a 20-year-old Black woman named Bonita Carter. Her death would forever change the course of Birmingham, Alabama.

The legacy of Bull Connor’s police department looms large over Birmingham. Even today, black and white images of dogs and firehoses used against Birmingham children and foot soldiers are touchstones for protestors demanding police reform. What was it about the death of Carter that motivated Birmingham to change, 16 years after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. penned a letter from a Birmingham jail and four decades before Black Lives Matter. 

In a six episode series, “Unjustifiable” tells the story of Carter, the protests that erupted and the change demanded, resulting in the election of the city’s first Black mayor.

Archibald and Johnson also examine a century of police killings in Birmingham that had been ruled “justifiable.” They’ve identified 500 people killed by police in Jefferson County in the 20th century. What was it about Bonita Carter? She came to represent them all.

“Unjustifiable,” is produced by the award-winning team behind the Reckon Interview and Greek Gods. It features original music recorded in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, at Single Lock Records.

Creator: John Archibald

Hosts: John Archibald & Roy S. Johnson

Executive Producer: John Hammontree

Producer & Audio Engineer: Alexander Richey

Producer: Amy Yurkanin

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In a follow up Reckon Radio’s acclaimed series “Greek Gods” and “Recused,” Reckon by AL.com is launching its newest podcast: The Reckon Interview.

What is the South? A place? A people? A lifestyle? Each week, on the Reckon Interview, host John Hammontree explores that question and more, with some of the most interesting minds in the South – authors, entertainers, artists, activists, and thinkers. Join us as we learn how this place shaped them and how they’re reshaping this place. Think of it as Fresh Air but with a lot more humidity.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Jeff Sessions fought political corruption and drug traffickers as a U.S. Attorney and Alabama attorney general. He didn't mention immigration until his first term in the U.S. Senate. It started with questions about special agent staffing, and ended with one of the most controversial immigration policies in American history.

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Years before he was the U.S. Attorney General, Jeff Sessions served as the Alabama Attorney General. And in that post, he faced a situation similar to the Russia investigation.

It involved a Republican governor, cries of a "witch hunt" and a marble shower stall. Listen to this episode to see the similarities between Sessions' handling of that case and the way he dealt with the Russia investigation.

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In 2016, Jeff Sessions was announced as President Donald Trump's pick for attorney general. For nearly two years, he held his dream job -- but the experience turned into something of a nightmare due to ongoing investigations into allegations of Russian meddling in the election. Sessions recused himself, drawing the ire of the president.

But did you know Sessions political career was almost over before it began? In episode one of Recused, we're going back to a 1986 judicial confirmation hearing. Sessions became just the second person in 50 years to be rejected for an appointment to the federal bench, due to allegations of racism that would haunt him for the rest of his career.

We know how Sessions' story ends. But how did it begin? And what about the fallout for others involved?

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Episode Notes

Reckon's John Hammontree spoke with U.S. Sen. Doug Jones about Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Jeff Sessions and President Donald Trump.

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Episode Notes

Reckon’s Amy Yurkanin dives into the untold story of Jeff Sessions, from the people who knew him best.

• How did Jeff Sessions become President Trump’s most controversial cabinet member? And what led to his downfall? • Did you know President Trump wasn’t the first person to pressure Sessions to look the other way during an investigation into the executive branch? • What was the political fallout of Sessions’ failed judicial confirmation hearing in 1986? • How did he become one of the most anti-immigration Senators in the United States? • All these answers and more.

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