Catherine McDonald

Patricia Newberry
JRN 350
21 January 2016
The Marshall Project
The Marshall Project is a non-profit news organization that was started in August of
2014, and focuses on the criminal justice system in the United States. It was started by Neil
Barsky who was a hedge fund manager, and Bill Keller who spent 30 years at the New York
Times. Prior to coming to New York, our class needed to research each organization and who we
were visiting there. The idea behind the Marshall Project is for the writers to tell the American
people the cold hard facts. They are not afraid of disclosing certain information because they
think that powerful writing can lead to change. Although their writers try not be biased, they
approach their writing with the mindset that the criminal justice system needs to be rethought.
This paper will go a little further in-depth about three of the main issues TMP addresses: the
death sentence, rape, and prisons and jails.
Neil Barsky's imagination was sparked after reading two important books that addressed
problems in the criminal justice system. The first book The New Jim Crow talks about how the
mass incarceration of African Americans is comparable to slavery and Jim Crow laws. The
second book is called Devil in the Grove which tells the story of 4 wrongly accused African
American men because the story was not covered by the national press. He makes a great point
on the Marshall Projects website that the more we incarcerate people, the less the general public
cares about it. The criminal justice system is extremely expensive and some times proves to be
very ineffective. During our interview Bill Keller said TMP's goal was to change the way we

think about criminals. The way they aim to due this is through telling the real stories of these
criminals.
One big issue that the Marshall Project brings attention to is the execution of criminals in
their feature The Next to Die. This feature can be found on the organization's website and the
two identified issues with the death penalty are racial bias and the method of killing. The Next to
Die tracks 10 different states: Texas, Oklahoma, Virginia, Florida, Missouri, Georgia Alabama,
Ohio, Arizona, and Arkansas. Texas has the lead with the most executions in total at 531, but
Missouri is surpassing them as the most active state currently executing criminals. Since 1976,
there have been 1,423 executions and the names of those criminals are all listed on the site.
When you click on the link to the page, the first thing you see is the shadow of a man and the
name of someone who is currently on death row, with the time they will be executed. On the site
now, it reads Richard Allen Masterson is scheduled to be executed in 4 hours and 12 minutes.
Below that is a list of recent updates that describe other people who have been executed recently,
issues with the supreme court, and links that go into further detail about these cases. For
example, there was an update about the execution of Oscar Rae Bolin JR. and the link attached
had the full story of his murders, how he was caught, who put him on death row, and that he was
killed by lethal injection.
On the side bar of the homepage there is a list of all of the 10 states that The Next to Die
focuses on. For example, Ohio has a page where they describe how many executions they have
done, when the next ones are scheduled, and flaws they have noticed in the system. In Ohio, their
biggest problem is obtaining the drugs for lethal injection. Because of this problem, the state of
Ohio has decided to hold off on any executions until 2017, giving them time to obtain the correct
lethal drugs, legally. The issue of race is also brought up stating that the majority of people on

death row in Ohio are responsible for killing white people. This is seen as an issue because the
majority of murder victims in the state are African American. This leads people to believe that
the judicial system is taking more action for the sentencing of those who killed white people over
those who killed African Americans. This seems to be a reoccurring theme for many of the states
that are analyzed. Another identified issue that was interesting was the execution of a Georgia
woman who did not actually commit the murder herself. Kelly Gissendaner was put to death last
year after she persuaded the man she was having an affair with to kill her then husband. This is
controversial because she was the first woman to be executed in 60 years in Georgia, and she
was the one being executed as opposed to her lover. Overall, The Next to Die offers a chilling
look into the lives of people on death row. It also points of many of the flaws in the criminal
justice systems of these states. What is the criteria for someone to qualify for the death penalty?
How does each state decide the person who has the final say? The Marshall Project works to
provoke all of these questions that few people are talking about.
The next big issue that The Marshall Project addresses is the sentencing of rape and
culture of rape in America, especially with teenagers. Our class was assigned to read a feature
from TMP called An Unbelievable Story of Rape. There were two stories being told in segments
and the authors switched on and off with the two. They told the stories of two women who were
both raped in Colorado and Washington. The woman in Colorado had been raped in her
apartment by a man who jumped on her back and took pictures of her with a small portable
camera. The second woman was a teenager who had spent her entire life in foster care moving
from house to house. She finally moved in to her own apartment and claimed she was raped one
night in a similar manner as the first girl. When she was questioned, there were many
inconsistencies in her story, and she eventually recanted the story and said she made it up. She

was charged with a misdemeanor for this and many people stopped being her friend and trusting
her because of this lie. While investigating the rape that occurred in Colorado, the police found
out that a few other women had been raped in the same way nearby. They eventually found the
man and all of his pictures he took of his victims. It was then that they noticed one more victim
who they had not recognized, it was the girl from Washington. She had not made up that she was
raped, however she felt pressured by the police with the threat of a lie detector test. This article
does a really great job of pointing out the flaws in the police system due to their lack of
communication with each other. If they had communicated about the details of the rapist such as
his camera and his style of attack, they might have made the connection earlier. This would have
prevented a lot of emotional damage that was caused on the girl in Washington, that took years
for her to recover from. It also touched on the idea of calling false rape which was a big issue in
2015 due to the Rolling Stone article that caused so much controversy.
The third and final feature that TMP has written about is This is Rikers, which identifies
all of the struggles within the prison and how New York City is not doing much to change this.
Rikers has a range of inmates from big name criminals to people who committed petty crimes
and could not afford to post bail. There are gangs within the jail and inmates often engage in
relationships with correctional officers for sex, drugs, and alcohol. There is also a huge
mistreatment of those who are mentally ill. This was a huge issue for Bill Keller when we visited
The Marshall Project, and he talked about it pretty in depth. Some of the largest mental health
facilities in big cities such as NYC and LA are jails Keller said. Many people are placed in jail
because they are mentally ill, but nothing is ever done to help them get better or to treat this
illness. This only adds to the problem and increases the amount of people who are in jail. When
asked about the solution to this problem, Keller said in order to provide the mental health

services required, we need more money from the government. At Rikers it is often common for
correctional officers to abuse the mentally ill, which was exposed in a series by The New York
Times. Rikers is only one example of the problems that occur every single day in jails across the
United States. However, the in-depth research that went in to this feature allows people to see
how real it is, and how nothing drastic is being done to change it. The article finishes off by
providing testimonials from people who are in the jail, people who work there, family members,
and lawyers. This allows the reader to get to know the situation on a more personal level.
Readers can see what criminals are doing on a daily basis and how many times they are
extremely disrespected by the people who work there.
Since the start of 2015 The Marshall Project has published over 400 stories addressing
and touching on certain aspects of the criminal justice system. The whole idea behind the
organization was to go more in-depth on issues that aren't always published in national
newspapers. People always think of criminals as these awful, scary people, but not many people
know just how many people are criminals. While visiting TMP offices in New York City, Bill
Keller informed us that over 65 million people in the United States have a criminal history.
Considering that over 318 million people live in America, that is pretty drastic. After further
research of this company, I think they have been extremely successful in exposing the flaws in
the criminal justice system, and allowing people to tell their sides of their stories. Not many
people want to talk about criminals and things such as jails, because it doesn't directly affect their
life. But, when the research is done they will see just how many people are mistreated and how
poorly the government is funding the improvement of these problems. The Marshall Project was
one of the most interesting stops we made on our trip in New York City, and after this research I
will take away new perspectives on this situation.

Sources:
Armstrong, Ken, and T. Christian Miller. "An Unbelievable Story of Rape."The Marshall
Project. N.p., 15 Dec. 2015. Web. 20 Jan. 2016.
Bill Keller, Interview, 13 Jan. 2015
Dance, Gabriel, Tom Meagher, and Andy Rossback. "Who Is The Next to Die?" The Marshall
Project. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Jan. 2016.
Malone, Noreen, and Raha Naddaf. "This Is Rikers." The Marshall Project. N.p., 28
2015. Web. 20 Jan. 2016.
"Mission Statement."About The Marshall Project. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Jan. 2016.

June