Director Sylvia Ryerson discusses her film Calls From Home after a live screening hosted by Just City on April 13, 2024. The film follows a weekly radio broadcast that serves as an important communication tool for the families of incarcerated people in rural Appalachia.

Jacob Steimer, a journalist with MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, recently authored a series of stories on the presence of lead in neighborhoods across Memphis. He joined us to discuss the science of lead poisoning and how effective abatement strategies can help to lower crime rates.

This episode was recorded live as part of A Day With Just City.

In this special conversation with Cincinnati Black United Front’s Iris Roley, she shares her pioneering experience in seeking police accountability by centering Black community members in reform. She shares the story of filing a first-of-its-kind racial profiling class action settlement that led to a Collaborative Agreement between police and the community that has seen use of force and arrests halve in the two decades since it was first implemented. She talks about how to ensure different impacted groups feel included and find common ground, overcome resistance to oversight reforms, and use data to make a compelling case and evaluate progress.

Professor Michele Deitch, director of the Prison and Jail Innovation Lab at UT-Austin joins us to delve into options for oversight as we see a rise in jail deaths, the risks of treating children as adults in the criminal legal system, and alternatives and best practices for jails. She discusses the importance of empathy for people in the criminal justice system and emphasizes we can have safety and a more humane system.

The Prison and Jail Innovation Lab

Insha Rahman, vice president for advocacy and partnership at the Vera Institute of Justice and expert on bail and pretrial detention, joined us to help correct misunderstandings about bail, and she points out that reforming pretrial detention can make our communities both safe and just. She parses out the politics from the policies both nationally and in Shelby County, Tennessee, where significant changes to the pretrial detention process were implemented in mid-February 2023.

They Knew Which Way to Run is a stunning look at the 1984 Bhopal Gas Tragedy in India. The 7-part podcast series takes us on an amazing exploration of themes often discussed on The Permanent Record. Themes like accountability, pain, harm, and how we deal with those as human beings.

A few short weeks after the killing of Tyre Nichols, UCLA Law Professor Joanna Schwartz released a very timely book. It's called Shielded: How the Police Became Untouchable. In it, she describes how current law makes it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to hold police accountable when they violate the rights of those they are sworn to protect. She has a deep understanding of the law and the rules of civil litigation. She vividly demonstrates how the legal system all-too-often protects police officers despite appalling behavior and clear civil rights violations.

On this episode Josh speaks with newly elected Juvenile Court Judge Tarik Sugarmon. We learned about his career from public defense to finally taking over duties at the Juvenile Court. Judge Sugarmon comes from a family with a very distinguished history of standing up for civil rights, and he carries on that tradition.

We're back with a special interview of the newly elected District Attorney in Shelby County, Steve Mulroy. Steve was elected on August 4th and took office on September 1st. His first week in office was marred by some of the worst incidents of crime that Memphis has seen in a long time. We discussed that first week and what it was like for him personally. Steve and his staff of more than 200 people are responsible for prosecuting every crime in Tennessee's second largest county. We talked about the priorities Steve campaigned on and how he is going about implementing them in his first few months in office. We also discussed some of his hidden talents, things you might not know about him.

Recorded live in front of an audience of Just City supporters at Crosstown Concourse on September 29th, 2022.