The Permanent Record

Our latest episode features founder and executive director of Playback Memphis , Virginia Murphy, and Memphis Police Officer Chris Street. Officer Street is former military and makes for the quintessential cop in appearance and pedigree. But the way he describes his job and his experiences as a police officer will surprise you. Virginia brings grace, thoughtfulness and delight to otherwise dauntin...

Homeboy Industries bills itself as the largest gang intervention program on the planet. There is little doubt that this unassuming collection of neighbors has transformed thousands of lives and saved thousands more. The Homies, as they are known, give tours, bake bread, learn trades, and generally invest in each other and their neighborhoods. Two Homies, Omar and Jason, were in town recently with...

During the recent commemoration of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the community in which he was sacrificed offered symposia, galas, and more than a few bus wraps as reminders of his work and legacy. In our opinion, a few voices rose above the cacophony. Dr. Charles McKinney was one of those voices; he is an Associate Prof of History and Director of Africana Studies at Rhodes Col...

Adam Foss founded Prosecutor Impact in 2016 with the mission to improve community safety in the United States through a better understanding of the most important actor in the criminal justice system: the criminal prosecutor. They pursue education, training, and improved access to technology for the American prosecutor, which they believe will improve public safety results in our communities. Adam...

Abe Fortas was born in Memphis in 1910 and would go on to become a Supreme Court Justice of the United States. His journey to the nation's highest court took him far away from his hometown, but the impact of growing up poor in the South is evident in nearly everything he accomplished.  For this episode, we interview Tim Huebner, Professor of History at Rhodes College, who recently published a...

For our first episode of the new year, we spoke to the mayor of Gary, Indiana, Karen Freeman-Wilson. Mayor Freeman-Wilson co-chairs the committee on criminal and social justice for the US Conference of Mayors and helped produce that section of the mayors’ agenda entitled Leadership for America: Mayors’ Agenda for the Future.  Read more about the Mayors' Safety and Security Plan here . During o...

Richard Ransom has been covering the news in Memphis for more than 20 years, and recently became Weeknight Anchor and Managing Editor for Local 24 News. Shortly after beginning his new role, Richard stated “Reporting crime all the time is not a responsible or accurate reflection of life in our city, and I am proud to work with a news team that wants to inform you, not scare you.” This edition of T...

For our third interview in Just City's continuing examination of the link between mass media and public policy, we spoke with Eric Barnes, Publisher and CEO of the Memphis Daily News and host of "Behind the Headlines" on WKNO-TV. A twenty-year veteran of Mid-south publishing, Eric describes the rapidly evolving business models that are driving the way daily print outlets report the new...

For our second interview in a series of four episodes in which we’ll be interviewing the interviewers, and looking at the unique role that the media plays in covering the criminal justice system, we interviewed Jessica Pishko of the Fair Punishment Project.  Jessica graduated from Harvard Law School and writes frequently about criminal justice issues, especially prosecutors and their influential r...

This interview with NPR's Carrie Johnson marks our first in a series of four episodes in which we’ll be interviewing the interviewers, and looking at the unique role that the media plays in covering the criminal justice system.  Carrie joined NPR News in 2010. She covers the Justice Department closely and has reported extensively on its agreement with the Shelby County Juvenile Court. Speaking...

Allison Gibbs is a Florida native, who moved to Memphis to teach and organize communities around education. Seeing the damage that the criminal justice system was doing to the communities where she taught and organized, she shifted her focus and effort to criminal justice reform. She became Just City's first employee in the summer of 2015.  Since then, Allison has essentially helped build a no...

Marco Pavè is an activist, a musician, and a Memphis native. Earlier this year, he released the album "Welcome to Grc Lnd," which documents an exceptionally turbulent period in Memphis' recent history, including the 2016 Black Lives Matter protests at the Hernando-DeSoto Bridge and Elvis Presley's Graceland. Marco believes that artists have a unique responsibility to capture and sh...

State Representative Jeremy Faison lives in Cosby, Tennessee, in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains. He was elected in 2010 to represent the 11th District, where he is an outspoken advocate for the legalization of medicinal cannabis and (here's our favorite part) a smaller, fairer, and more humane criminal justice system. As a member of the Republican super-majority in the state legisl...

Our guest for this episode is Rev. Jeannie Alexander. Jeannie is a lawyer and minister. Years ago, she gave up representing corporate clients in Texas and has devoted her life to advocacy for those on the insides of our prisons in Tennessee. For five years, she served as chaplain at Riverbend Maximum Security Prison in Nashville and now directs the No Exceptions Prison Collective in Nashville. [hy...

As a sixteen year old, Meaghan Ybos was raped in Memphis. After reporting the crime and submitting to a forensic exam immediately, it would be nine years before law enforcement investigated her case and tested the rape kit. She was not alone. The number of untested rape kits in Memphis reached 12,000. Today, Meaghan runs PERL (People for the Enforcement of Rape Laws), and her work has resulted in...

Rev. Broderick Greer is a 2015 graduate of Virginia Theological Seminary, Broderick is currently Associate Rector at Grace St. Luke's Episcopal Church and School in Memphis. Broderick often lectures and facilitates conversations at the intersection of social media, American history, queer theory, black theology, human rights, and racial justice. His work has appeared in The Guardian, Teen Vogu...

Noura Jackson was freed from prison in 2016 after her murder conviction was overturned because of prosecutorial misconduct. Charged with the murder of her own mother, the sensational nature of Jackson's case has gained attention from several national media outlets. However, in a new feature in the New York Times Magazine  writer Emily Bazelon explores the human side of a reversed murder convic...

As the daughter of a police officer, Lisa Geis was always an unlikely candidate to be a defense attorney. But after attending law school a little later in life, Lisa has devoted her life to defending children. A little over a year ago, Lisa moved to Memphis to open and direct the Children's Defense Clinic at the University of Memphis Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law. After spending time practi...

After keeping an intentionally low profile since the 2015 Memphis mayoral election, AC Wharton told us he is excited to get involved in the community again. We talked to him at his office at The AC Wharton Group for this episode. Mayor Wharton spoke with his usual candor and warmth, discussing his inspiration for becoming a lawyer, some of the good things he's working on, and how he still has...

Settling in Nashville turned out to be a good decision for former mayor Karl Dean. After graduating from Vanderbilt Law School, he went on to work as a public defender, eventually winning election as Metro Davidson County's Public Defender. From there, he served two terms as Mayor, guiding Nashville through the Great Recession and the catastrophic flood of 2010. Now, Mayor Dean is running for...

For 11 years Wendi C. Thomas was the metro columnist for the Memphis Commercial Appeal. Since leaving that job in 2014, she has completed a fellowship at Harvard and become a frequent contributor to the Christian Science Monitor and The Undefeated, ESPN's new site on sports, race, and culture. On the issues of race and justice, Wendi's voice is as distinct and clear as they come. Before a...

You may not know her name, but if you keep up with Just City, you surely know her work. Chelsea Kapes is Just City's Clean Slate Fund Associate. She was one of several young people spending a year of service and discernment in Memphis as part of the Episcopal Service Corp program.  We talked to Chelsea about what it's like to be the bearer of frequent bad news, how she would change expunge...

State Representative Raumesh Akbari is a native Memphian and has served in the Tennessee General Assembly since winning a special election in 2013. As the youngest member of the legislature she already has a reputation among her peers as a hard-working, no nonsense lawmaker capable of getting things done. Under her leadership, Tennessee passed laws making expungements more affordable and more wide...

For Episode 2 of The Permanent Record we went on the road for one of our two interviews. In Memphis, new lawyer Erica Perry was part of a national action to bail out as many women as possible in advance of Mother's Day. She told us all about it. Then, we went to see Arissa Hall. She works in Brooklyn for the National Bail Fund Network and coordinated similar efforts across the country. Togethe...

For our first episode, we sat down with Memphis Police Department Director Mike Rallings. A Memphis native and long-time member of the force, Rallings was promoted to this position last summer. You may recall his successful and well-received handling of the protest that shut down the I-40 bridge. We spoke to Director Rallings about the appropriate number of officers for Memphis, the challenges of...