Everyday Injustice

Davis Vanguard Podcast will be covering criminal justice reform, mass incarceration, wrongful convictions, and more.

Everyday Injustice is a news podcast hosted by Davis Vanguard, with 349 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Davis Vanguard hosts Everyday Injustice, a news show with 349 episodes published.

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  Everyday Injustice

  Everyday Injustice Podcast Episode 337: The Death Penalty’s Politics, Failures and Enduring Appeal

  Aug 17, 202638 min

  On Episode 337 of Everyday Injustice, host David Greenwald welcomes back Marc Bookman, legal director of the Atlantic Center for Capital Representation and author of Descending Spiral: Exposing the Death Penalty in 12 Essays, for a wide-ranging discussion about capital punishment at a moment when three executions were scheduled across the country on the same day. Bookman challenges the perception that the death penalty is undergoing a broad national resurgence, arguing that its continued use is increasingly concentrated in a small number of states, particularly Florida and other Southern states. The conversation examines recent polling on capital punishment, including Bookman’s criticism of a Pew poll that asked respondents whether they supported the death penalty without presenting alternatives such as life without parole. Bookman argues that polling produces significantly different results when people are given actual sentencing alternatives, while expressing concern that some respondents support executions despite acknowledging both the possibility of executing innocent people and the lack of evidence that capital punishment deters crime. Bookman and Greenwald also explore what decades of wrongful convictions, DNA exonerations, prosecutorial misconduct, inadequate defense representation and racial disparities have revealed about the reliability of the death penalty. Bookman argues for a broader understanding of wrongful convictions that goes beyond factual innocence to include cases in which evidence was withheld, lawyers performed inadequately or courts improperly tilted proceedings toward the prosecution. Those failures, he argues, become especially significant when the state is deciding whether a person should live or die. The episode also turns to Bookman’s forthcoming novel, Albert’s Time, which confronts capital punishment without relying on innocence as the argument against execution. The novel centers on a person unquestionably guilty of a terrible crime and follows the defendant, his family, defense attorneys, prosecutor and judge as they confront questions of vengeance, punishment and forgiveness. Bookman describes the novel as a realistic meditation on whether even someone guilty of a horrific crime should be executed — forcing readers to confront the death penalty itself rather than the easier question of whether the system might execute an innocent person.

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  Everyday Injustice

  Everyday Injustice Podcast Episode 336: When Bias Turns Innocence Into Guilt

  Aug 4, 202632 min

  On Everyday Injustice Episode 336, host David Greenwald speaks with Valena Beety, a nationally recognized wrongful convictions litigator, former federal prosecutor and law professor, about how stereotypes surrounding gender and sexuality can contribute to innocent people being convicted and imprisoned. Beety, who has spent roughly 15 years representing people challenging wrongful convictions, explains how her own experience as a prosecutor led her to question whether the criminal legal system consistently protects victims, survivors or public safety. Beety focuses on the intersection between wrongful convictions and the criminalization of women and LGBTQ+ people. She argues that prosecutors can exploit longstanding stereotypes portraying queer people as dangerous, deceptive or deviant, particularly when those assumptions are combined with faulty forensic evidence or tunnel vision about who committed a crime. Beety points to cases in which women and queer defendants were prosecuted even when she argues no underlying crime occurred, illustrating how identity can become part of the prosecution’s theory of guilt. The conversation also explores Beety’s new book, “Pink Crime: Fighting Against the Criminalization of Motherhood, Pregnancy, and Queer Identity,” which examines what she describes as an accelerating criminalization of women and queer people following the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade. Beety discusses women investigated following miscarriages, stillbirths or suspected abortions, along with the treatment of pregnant women behind bars and transgender people in prison. She describes inadequate medical care for incarcerated pregnant women, women giving birth without timely assistance and transgender prisoners being placed in prolonged segregation rather than housed in environments appropriate to their circumstances. Beety also discusses cases involving discredited forensic evidence, including bite-mark testimony, and her earlier book, “Manifesting Justice: Wrongly Convicted Women Reclaim Their Rights.” Throughout the conversation, she emphasizes that proving innocence does not necessarily mean someone will quickly — or ever — leave prison, noting that reversing an existing conviction can be substantially more difficult than obtaining one. Despite those barriers, Beety ends on a measure of optimism, arguing that recognizing how women, pregnant people and LGBTQ+ people can be targeted through stereotypes may create common ground for challenging wrongful convictions and broader abuses within the criminal legal system.

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  Everyday Injustice

  Everyday Injustice Podcast Episode 334: Trauma-Informed Criminal Defense with Attorney Ernie Stone

  Jun 9, 202637 min

  In Episode 334 of Everyday Injustice, host David Greenwald speaks with Massachusetts criminal defense attorney Ernie Stone about the growing importance of trauma-informed criminal defense and why understanding clients’ life experiences is essential to effective representation. Drawing on nearly two decades of legal practice, Stone argues that what is often called “trauma-informed” lawyering should simply be considered good lawyering, emphasizing that attorneys must understand how trauma shapes communication, memory, decision-making, and trust. The conversation explores the prevalence of trauma among people involved in the criminal legal system and the challenges attorneys face when clients struggle to tell their stories in a linear fashion or respond predictably under stress. Stone explains that criminal charges themselves can be traumatic events, particularly for individuals already facing housing instability, mental health challenges, substance use disorders, or other forms of adversity. He discusses how lawyers can better serve clients by recognizing trauma symptoms and adjusting their communication strategies accordingly. Greenwald and Stone also examine the rise of holistic defense models that combine legal representation with social services, housing assistance, mental health support, and other interventions designed to address the root causes that often bring people into repeated contact with the justice system. While acknowledging resource limitations facing public defender offices across the country, Stone argues that investing in supportive services is both more humane and more cost-effective than relying on incarceration as a substitute for social policy. The episode concludes with a broader discussion about empathy, legal education, and professional responsibility. Stone contends that understanding trauma should be viewed as an ethical obligation for attorneys, much like technological competence has become a professional requirement. For listeners interested in learning more, he recommends The Body Keeps the Score as an accessible introduction to trauma research. Together, Greenwald and Stone make the case that a more trauma-informed approach can improve outcomes not only for defendants, but for the justice system as a whole.

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  Everyday Injustice

  Everyday Injustice Podcast Episode 333: Justine van der Leun on Criminalized Survivors and the Women Behind Unreasonable Women

  Jun 1, 202635 min

  In Episode 333 of Everyday Injustice, host David Greenwald speaks with journalist and author Justine van der Leun about her new book, Unreasonable Women: Three Stories of Violence, Imprisonment and Extraordinary Survival. The conversation explores a troubling reality within the criminal legal system: how survivors of domestic violence and sexual abuse are often criminalized rather than protected. Drawing on years of investigative reporting and extensive research, van der Leun examines the stories of women whose attempts to survive violence ultimately led to their incarceration. Van der Leun explains how her investigation began with the case of Nikki Addimando, a New York woman convicted after killing her abusive partner while claiming self-defense. The case prompted a larger question: How often are survivors punished for acts committed in the context of abuse? To find answers, van der Leun conducted a groundbreaking survey of approximately 10,000 incarcerated women, receiving more than 1,000 responses. Her findings suggest that a significant portion of women in prison are there because they acted to protect themselves or loved ones from violence, while many more carry extensive histories of abuse that went unaddressed by social institutions before they entered the criminal legal system. The episode highlights the stories of three women featured in the book: Tanisha Williams of Michigan, who became entangled in a murder case after being coerced by an abusive partner; Gemma Heffernan of Missouri, who fought back against a husband who subjected her to years of violence; and TC Brooks of California, who killed her abusive stepfather after enduring years of sexual abuse and witnessing ongoing violence against her mother. Through these stories, van der Leun argues that the legal system often struggles to recognize the realities of coercion, trauma, and survival, instead relying on rigid categories that separate victims from offenders. Throughout the discussion, Greenwald and van der Leun examine broader questions about accountability, systemic failure, and reform. Van der Leun contends that many of the women filling America’s prisons were failed long before they entered the criminal legal system and that their cases reveal deep structural shortcomings in how society responds to abuse. The conversation offers a powerful look at the intersection of gender, violence, trauma, and incarceration, challenging listeners to reconsider who the justice system punishes—and why.

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  Everyday Injustice

  Everyday Injustice Podcast Episode 332: Dr. Elizabeth Ostler Turns Family Tragedy into Theater and Advocacy

  May 26, 202638 min

  On this week’s episode of Everyday Injustice, host David Greenwald speaks with Dr. Elizabeth Ostler, founder of the Communal Theater Company and creator of the upcoming play “SisterPlay,” a deeply personal work inspired by the death of her sister Lisa while detained in the Salt Lake County Jail. Ostler recounts how her sister, who struggled with addiction for years, died in custody in 2016 after repeated pleas for medical attention were ignored. Through court records and wrongful death litigation, Ostler learned the extent of the neglect her sister endured while suffering from a perforated ulcer and sepsis-like symptoms inside the jail. She explains how transforming that experience into theater became both a painful and healing process, allowing her to finally tell a story she could not previously discuss publicly. The conversation expands into a broader examination of incarceration, medical neglect, punishment versus accountability, and the importance of restoring dignity to incarcerated people. Ostler and Greenwald discuss how dehumanization fuels systemic abuse inside jails and prisons, while emphasizing the role storytelling and art can play in fostering empathy and reform. Ostler argues that incarcerated individuals should be viewed as vulnerable populations deserving care and humanity, not merely punishment. The episode also explores the potential of theater programs and restorative justice approaches within correctional settings. Ostler shares details about “SisterPlay,” which premieres in New York this September, and discusses her hope of eventually bringing the production into prisons and jails themselves. Greenwald highlights the shared mission between journalism and theater: humanizing people too often reduced to stereotypes within the criminal legal system.

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