By The Editors
Once the sentencing rules for an offense are changed to lesser terms, is it fair to still subject some individuals to the old, harsher rules?

By Lee A. Daniels
The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.

That idea, first conceived and expressed by the nineteenth-century abolitionist Theodore Parker and then re-cast and made famous in our time by Martin Luther King, Jr., has always been the guiding force of black Americans’ freedom struggle.

By The Editors
A broad-based group of civil rights groups, faith-based leaders and individuals prominent in other fields, including law enforcement are urging the Harris County (Texas) District Attorney to delay setting an execution date for Duane Buck, who now sits on that state’s death row.

By Lowanna M. Owens
We were a “Bill Cosby” family, educated blacks with class and standards. We were middle class, lived in the suburbs outside of Los Angeles, and had a loving extended family. All was good. Or so I thought.

By Kenneth J. Cooper
Only eight states publicly report the race and ethnicity of juveniles transferred to adult courts for criminal prosecution, the Justice Department has found, and it’s no wonder that more states don’t. Those that do are sending disproportionate numbers of African-American or Hispanic teenagers to face the possibility of the most serious punishment that a juvenile offender can face—getting locked up in a state prison alongside hardened adult criminals.

By Lee A. Daniels
The words allegedly spoken by a New York City police officer accused of illegally arresting a black New York City resident – “fried another nigger,” – are shocking.

(New York, NY)  –  Today the United States Supreme Court rejected a request from the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office to overturn the most recent federal appeals court decision declaring Mumia Abu-Jamal’s death sentence unconstitutional.  The Court’s decision brings to an end nearly thirty years of litigation over the fairness of the sentencing hearing that resulted [...]

By George E. Curry
Ray Charles sings about Georgia being on his mind. But, as Troy Davis is to be laid to rest Saturday in Savannah, Georgia is also on the minds of distraught death penalty opponents who saw him executed on the basis of questionable evidence and despite an array of witnesses who had recanted their original testimony.

By Lee A. Daniels
The New York Times reported yesterday that Mark Melvin, a prison inmate in Alabama, is suing the state department of corrections because they won’t let him have a book his attorney sent him. His lawsuit charges that prison officials characterized the book as “a security threat,” as “too incendiary” and “too provocative.”

By The Editors The U.S. Supreme Court late Thursday stayed the scheduled execution by the state of  Texas of Duane Buck in order to review the appeal of Buck’s attorneys that his sentencing was tainted by racial bias. Buck, 48, who is African American, was convicted of the 1995 murder of his ex-girlfriend, Debra Gardner, [...]