Criminal

In 1849, abolitionist and attorney Wendell Phillips wrote: "We should look in vain through the most trying times of our revolutionary history for an incident of courage and noble daring to equal that of the escape of William and Ellen Craft; and future historians and poets would tell this story as one of the most thrilling in the nation's annals, and millions would read it, with admiration of the hero and heroine of the story...

In 2010, Michael McIntosh's son was incarcerated at the Walnut Grove Youth Correctional Facility in the small town of Walnut Grove, Mississippi. One Sunday, McIntosh went to visit his son and was turned away because, he was told, prison officials...

To close out 2016, we're bringing you two lighter stories of people exhibiting everyday genius under. . . unusual circumstances. Comedian Dave Holmes' story begins with an upsetting phone call from the IRS. Then we meet a Baton Rouge attorney with a...

Since 1938, a weekly African-American owned newspaper called The Evening Whirl has covered crime in St. Louis with a style all its own, using alliteration and rhyme, and often omitting the usual crime-reporting words like "accused" or "alleged." The paper has been widely criticized for its casual approach to fact-checking and sensational writing style. But the paper's owner, Anthony Sanders, who has been helping out with it since he was 18 years old, doesn't have any plans to change it...

The Magic Castle in Hollywood has been a private club for magicians since 1963, and its walls are lined with portraits of magicians past and present. Among them is a portrait of one of the earliest American organized crime bosses and conmen, Jefferson Randolph "Soapy" Smith. And though it may seem strange that this "mecca of magic" honors a criminal, Soapy's legacy reveals just how blurry the line is between a delightful trick and a dirty one.

SPOILER WARNING: Please listen to Episode 53: Melinda and Judy before you listen to this one. Melinda Dawson found out on the same day in 1998 that her adoptive mother had been killed and that her own husband Clarence Elkins was being charged with the murder. He was convicted in 1999 and given two life sentences. Left alone with her two sons, no money, and no experience, Melinda set out to try and prove that he was innocent...

When Melinda Dawson was seven years old, she learned that she was adopted under suspicious circumstances. As she got older and had children of her own, she tried to learn something about her biological parents. And when she went to the county courthouse and asked to see a copy of her birth certificate, she discovered that she was an unwitting participant in a traumatic history of a small town in Georgia where Dr. Thomas Hicks stole and sold babies to parents desperate for children of their own.

SPOILER WARNING: Please listen to Episode 51: Money Tree before you listen to this one. While working on our last episode, we became curious about the nature of psychopathy -- how it is defined, and what to do if someone close to you meets the criteria of the Hare psychopathy test.

When Axton Betz-Hamilton was 11 years old, her parents' identities were stolen. At that time, in the early 90s, consumer protection services for identity theft victims were basically non-existent. So the family dealt with the consequences as best they could. But when Axton Betz-Hamilton got to college, she realized that her identity had been stolen, too. In fact, her credit score was in the lowest 2%...

To celebrate Criminal's 50th episode, we check in with some of our most memorable guests including Fran Schindler from Episode 17: "Final Exit," Dan Stevenson from Episode 15: "He's Neutral," Corporal Scott Foster from Episode 29: "Officer Talon," and Marian Tolan from Episode 18: "695-BGK."