CRIMINAL JUSTICE + POLICING
How to give incarcerated people a fighting chance against opioids
By Libby Jones The overdose crisis has wreaked havoc on the health of Virginians, claiming over 1,000 lives each year across the Commonwealth – and 107,000 across the United States. A closer look into these staggering numbers reveals an even more alarming truth: some members of society, specifically those battling opioid use disorders behind […]
Bribery conviction upheld for Va. man who offered town $500 to back gaming machines
The Virginia Court of Appeals upheld a bribery conviction Tuesday for a Southside Virginia convenience store operator who offered the town of La Crosse a $500 monthly donation in exchange for officials’ support for gaming machines at his business. Businessman Mamdoh Abouemara was appealing his 2021 guilty conviction in Mecklenburg County, arguing prosecutors hadn’t sufficiently […]
How Virginia is spending new state funding to prevent gun violence
The office of Attorney General Jason Miyares plans to hire six prosecutors and group violence intervention coordinators with the $2.6 million in grant funding it received to try to reduce gun crime. Another $5 million will go toward the extension of a hospital-based violence intervention program meant to help people escape life circumstances that led […]
Justice system reform will improve police accountability
By Alan Davis When a grand jury declined to indict the officer who shot Timothy Johnson last month, the decision was disappointing, but not necessarily surprising. As a retired senior law enforcement officer who’s spent the last decade exploring issues in policing, I know that more than individual bad actors, it is often the broader […]
Researchers unearth century-old documents in Virginia Beach lynching
After the Virginia Mercury’s two–part investigative series into the 1885 lynching of Noah Cherry in what is now Virginia Beach, staffers at the Library of Virginia in Richmond searched archives and discovered a variety of documents, including the coroner’s inquest about Cherry’s death, which hasn’t been seen publicly since the late 19th century. In a […]
Supreme Court of Virginia says it won’t reconsider Wegmans decision
The Supreme Court of Virginia turned down a request by Wegmans to reconsider a February decision that found neighbors had a right to challenge local approvals of the grocery giant’s plans to build a massive distribution center in Hanover County. The denial, issued May 11, was terse and offered no explanation of the reasoning of […]
Youngkin says he believes ‘full investigation’ resolved State Police hiring error
Gov. Glenn Youngkin said Monday that he’s confident the state’s watchdog agency conducted a “full investigation” into Virginia State Police hiring practices after a former trooper killed three people, despite the lack of an independent report by the Office of the State Inspector General laying out any findings or analysis. Youngkin had called for an […]
Appeals court questions state law on referendum signature collectors
The Virginia Court of Appeals is asking a lower court to consider whether state law setting a local residency requirement for people collecting and witnessing signatures in support of a referendum violates political speech rights under the First Amendment. The case, Williams v. Legere et al., concerns an attempt by Williamsburg resident Margaret Williams to […]
Virginia’s probe into State Police hiring of ‘catfish cop’ ends with no investigative report
After it was revealed Virginia State Police failed to fully check the mental health background of a former state trooper who killed three people in California last November while attempting to abduct a teenage girl he had chatted with online, Gov. Glenn Youngkin said he had requested a “full investigation” into the agency’s vetting process. […]
Virginia considers private prison contract renewal despite $4.3 million in breaches
As Virginia weighs whether to renew its contract with GEO Group to run the Lawrenceville Correctional Center, the state’s only privately operated prison, records show persistent staffing shortages at the facility have cost the company $4.3 million since August 2018. Under GEO’s current contract, which ends July 31, the Virginia Department of Corrections can dock […]
Louisa County man trafficked $13,000 worth of turtles on Facebook Marketplace
A Louisa County man amassed nearly $13,000 selling box turtles on Facebook Marketplace, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. Stanlee Fazi, 41, pleaded guilty to trafficking turtles in a federal court in Alexandria after admitting he illegally collected the animals from the wild, bound them in socks and shipped them by FedEx to online […]
Restoration of rights should be automatic
By Duane Edwards and Barbara Harris for Virginia Organizing We want Gov. Glenn Youngkin to bring back the Restoration of Rights process that previous governors of both parties developed over the 13 years before he took office. It was a simple, fluid process that resulted in tens of thousands of returning citizens getting their rights […]