Our Reporting

August 27, 2018

She was a first-generation college student looking for a different life

For Katy Sorto, college seemed like the way to a different life. But she had no idea how hard it would be.

August 20, 2018

Did going to college change your social class?

We asked some of our readers and listeners to tell us about their experiences with college and social mobility. Here are a few of their stories.

July 24, 2018

Cops' psychological testing cited in lawsuit

Family: Minneapolis didn't properly assess mental fitness of officers involved in daughter's death.

July 14, 2018

Lola Flowers dies, mother and source of spiritual support to son, Curtis, imprisoned on death row

For 21 years she regularly visited her son in Parchman prison and never gave up hope he'd be exonerated.

July 3, 2018

Execution in Mississippi: Who lives and who dies

Can Mississippi, with its ugly history of racial oppression, administer the death penalty fairly?

June 26, 2018

The saga of Bobby Joe Townsend

Not long after the Tardy Furniture murders, Doug Evans may have sent an innocent man to prison.

June 26, 2018

The other suspects: Who law enforcement did and didn't investigate in the Tardy Furniture murders

What an Alabama crime spree might reveal about the Curtis Flowers investigation.

June 26, 2018

Was there a Brady violation in the Curtis Flowers case - and why does it matter?

If prosecutors didn't turn over critical evidence to the defense, Curtis Flowers could get a new trial.

June 19, 2018

Why the eyewitness IDs of Curtis Flowers may not be reliable

Catherine Snow and Porky Collins picked Curtis Flowers out of photo lineups. But, according to two experts, the flawed procedures used by investigators make these identifications highly questionable.

June 19, 2018

John Johnson: The investigator in his own words

The most extensive record of Johnson talking about his work comes from a sworn deposition he gave in 1978 after he was sued in federal court.

June 12, 2018

The rise and reign of Doug Evans

How to spend nearly three decades in office.

June 12, 2018

Mississippi D.A. Doug Evans has long history of striking Black people from juries

We gathered data on juries in central Mississippi going back 26 years. Analyzing hundreds of trials, we found that prosecutors were more than four times more likely to exclude Black jurors.

June 5, 2018

How did Curtis Flowers end up with a nearly all-white jury?

In 2010, a jury of 11 whites and one African-American convicted Flowers and sentenced him to death. Defense attorneys would later claim the trial essentially had been decided in jury selection. Here's how it went down.

June 5, 2018

Why a nearly all-white jury might be legal

When is a strike legal? Take our quiz below and try to spot an unconstitutional strike, using potential jurors from trials in the Fifth Circuit Court District, where Doug Evans is district attorney, and the reasons given for striking them.

June 5, 2018

Acquitting Emmett Till's killers

There was overwhelming evidence that J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant had murdered the 14-year-old in 1955, but they never spent a day in prison thanks to an all-white jury.

May 29, 2018

Letter from Parchman: Inside Mississippi's notorious prison

The state penitentiary began more than a century ago as a way to subjugate African-Americans after the end of slavery, and it later maintained segregation well into the 1970s. And it's where Curtis Flowers has spent much of his adult life, sometimes in brutal conditions.