What We're Reading
News that caught our attention or cited the Texas Justice Initiative from across the Lone Star State and beyond.
Impact Report: COVID-19 and Jails December 2020 Update
Published on December 6, 2020In this December update, the National Commission on COVID-19 and Criminal Justice examines 19 million daily jail records from 2020 to see how bookings, releases and rebookings changed during the pandemic.
Excited Delirium: The controversial syndrome that can be used to protect police from misconduct charges
Published on December 13, 202060 Minutes' John Dickerson reported on "excited delirium," which was cited in the deaths of George Floyd and Elijah McClain, and how law enforcement have used it in justifying injecting individuals with ketamine.
No Way Out: COVID-19 behind bars in Texas
Published on December 13, 2020A multimedia investigative project by WFAA and The Marshall Project depicts various aspects of COVID-19 in Texas prisons, including its affect on employees and incarcerated people. The reporting "showed that the spread of COVID-19 behind bars was also due to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice's lackluster response, potentially exacerbating outbreaks and putting surrounding communities at risk."
Dead and Undone
Published on November 23, 2020David Barer and Josh Hinkle dig deep into custodial death reporting in Texas in their latest multimedia project for KXAN, which includes televised news stories and a dedicated series of their investigative podcast, Catalyst. TJI is grateful to have been used as a resource for this important work.
Texas prisons, jails worst COVID-19 hotspots of any in US
Published on November 10, 2020The Associated Press' Terry Wallace wrote about a new report by the LBJ School of Public Affairs that uses TJI's data to determine that – even when adjusted for size – "Texas still has the second-highest rate of COVID infections and is tied for the third-highest proportion of its prison population that has died from COVID, among the ten largest prison systems."