Criminal Sentencing and Punishment

Law Enforcement to Round Up Homeless Sex Offenders Tonight

Homeless Sex Offenders: smart on crime? ​California Attorney General Kamala Harris announced trick-or-treaters will be safer since cops will keep homeless sex offender parolees indoors tonight in San Francisco. That announcement comes even while Harris' office is defending Jessica's Law -- the bal ... More >>

Make Your Mama Cry

Homeless Sex Offenders: smart on crime? ​California Attorney General Kamala Harris announced trick-or-treaters will be safer since cops will keep homeless sex offender parolees indoors tonight in San Francisco. That announcement comes even while Harris' office is defending Jessica's Law -- the bal ... More >>

Tupac's Fam to Broke Death Row: Get Off My Nuts!

Homeless Sex Offenders: smart on crime? ​California Attorney General Kamala Harris announced trick-or-treaters will be safer since cops will keep homeless sex offender parolees indoors tonight in San Francisco. That announcement comes even while Harris' office is defending Jessica's Law -- the bal ... More >>

News of the Hour -- The Lethal Injection Cocktail, Mike Webb Found Dead, Ted Nugent Found Irritating

Homeless Sex Offenders: smart on crime? ​California Attorney General Kamala Harris announced trick-or-treaters will be safer since cops will keep homeless sex offender parolees indoors tonight in San Francisco. That announcement comes even while Harris' office is defending Jessica's Law -- the bal ... More >>

Breaking Down Walls

A liberal intellectual and a right-winger on Death Row discover they have much in common

Unchained Melody

Music and poetry, not plot, create A Place to Stand's emotional impact

Speaking of Phones...

Music and poetry, not plot, create A Place to Stand's emotional impact

Cell Phoney

Making phone calls from jail, Harley Mike allegedly helped three prisoners escape and conned parole agents, sheriff's deputies, and judges.

Suspended Sentence

After Innocence probes life after a wrongful conviction

Baring Equality

The cases of a young defendant and a repeat offender attorney show power and privilege tip the scales

Bullshitting the Lie Detector

Infiltrator cooks up a criminal past. A PAX TV show absolves him of it. Ain't it a great country?

Not About Nightingales

This Tennessee Williams production packs a punch, but it's too loud

Lucifer, Arisen

A quintessential San Francisco story, starring charismatic musician/murderer Bobby BeauSoleil*

*with underground filmmaker Kenneth Anger, cult leader Charles Manson, Church of Satan founder Anton LaVey, and the Straight Satans motorcycle gang in suppo

The Unlikely Lambs

Carandiru reveals the human side of Brazilian prisoners, then leads us to their slaughter

Live to Tell

Even big-name stars can't overpower the stories of exonerated death row inmates

Innocence Arrested

Albert Johnson was exonerated for a crime he didn't commit, but not before spending over a decade in prison. Why guiltless people get jailed -- and how to stop it.

Habitat for Inhumanity

The "asylums" depicted in The Magdalene Sisters undermine both the Catholic Church and the popular image of Ireland

Hidden Treasure

Half a century ago, ex-heroin dealer Alfredo Santos created an epic work of art inside San Quentin. Now, he's coming back to be honored for it.

San Quentin Blues

The prison guards' union angrily ripped the rug from under the governor in February

The Russian Card Game

A peek inside a new form of Russian organized crime and an ingenious method of turning credit card mailings into large amounts of cash

Throwing Away the Key

Why Gov. Davis' just-say-no parole policy is wrong, Exhibit No. 1: Eddy Zheng has earned a college degree in prison, sings in a church choir, works with at-risk youth, has the support of clergymen, college professors, his prison counselor, and the

Rockin' Through the Night

The Alcatraz Night Tour is fascinating and beautiful. Then it's cold and eerie. And then it's -- let's get outta here!

The Last Hope

A new law gives one more chance at freedom to abused women sent to prison for killing their batterers

Transcendental Incarceration

The first San Bruno Jail inmates to take part in an experimental meditation program say it has helped to free their minds, if nothing else

A Sentence Without an Ending

The "used-car rabbi" gets probation instead of jail, but the question of what he did with millions of dollars in donations remains unanswered

Hard Labor

County Jail No. 3 is a hellhole. Can an ancient, intense form of meditation improve life for the inmates?

A Walk in the Dark

The rest of the country is re-appraising the death penalty; California sues to keep a minister from comforting those facing execution

Girl Problems

The juvenile justice system is ignoring delinquent girls -- and creating a social time bomb

Record Caper

Long-missing Alcatraz files make their way back to the Bay Area

South to the Future

New Way to Ease New Economy's Inflation Threat: Release Nonviolent Inmates

Dead Head

Mr. Death

South to the Future

Mumia Abu-Jamal Changes Name, Urges Supporters to Expand Campaign

Cothran

Mumia Abu-Jamal Changes Name, Urges Supporters to Expand Campaign

The Mission District Squeeze

When can a repeat felon manipulate the police and fire departments to crush a law-abiding bar and restaurant? When the felon's a San Francisco pol, and the bar's on Mission Street.

Dead Man Not Praying

The state wants to deny religious counsel immediately before executions. But why?

The Housing Authority's Dirty Dozen

Twelve convicted drug dealers and other major felons have recently been employed by the San Francisco Housing Authority. But are there even more criminals on the public payroll?

Zoom Lens

Twelve convicted drug dealers and other major felons have recently been employed by the San Francisco Housing Authority. But are there even more criminals on the public payroll?

Perverted Justice?

Or is a new law that puts sexual predators in long-term psychiatric lock-up really -- and finally -- justice for perverts?

Night Crawler

Or is a new law that puts sexual predators in long-term psychiatric lock-up really -- and finally -- justice for perverts?

The Black Hole of San Francisco

This jail is a filthy, unhealthy, decrepit, barbaric nightmare. This jail will probably collapse and kill hundreds if there is a significant earthquake. The city of San Francisco keeps using this unconstitutional hellhole because people who call themselve

Unspun

This jail is a filthy, unhealthy, decrepit, barbaric nightmare. This jail will probably collapse and kill hundreds if there is a significant earthquake. The city of San Francisco keeps using this unconstitutional hellhole because people who call themselve

Fewer Pen Pals

As more prisons move to ban skin mags, California prisoners' rights lawyers turn a deaf ear to inmates' howls

Portrait of the Soul-Jacker

Police call Bernard Temple the meanest hit man ever to roam the gang-infested streets of Bayview-Hunters Point. Temple calls himself a soul-jacker -- someone who kills to steal the spiritual power of his victims.

Unspun

Police call Bernard Temple the meanest hit man ever to roam the gang-infested streets of Bayview-Hunters Point. Temple calls himself a soul-jacker -- someone who kills to steal the spiritual power of his victims.

Where do Bad Children Go?

S.F. officials are tilting toward more community-based rehab for youthful offenders -- if they can put the lid on internal bickering that's given new meaning to the term "juvenile justice"

Custody by Ethnicity

Some S.F. probation officers would rather wear the uniform of a Border Patrol guard

Jail Date

Wives of San Quentin inmates protest politicians' efforts to restrict the Family Visitation program

Sister of Mercy

Wives of San Quentin inmates protest politicians' efforts to restrict the Family Visitation program

Payback

Liberals mount a comeback in the juvenile justice system

Death Sentence

Why are prisoners with AIDS dying for release?