Listen to these podcasts, 2024 edition
Here's what I've enjoyed over the last year
About a year ago, I put up a post of recommended podcasts. A few of you have asked for more recommendations. So here’s a list of the podcasts I’ve enjoyed over the last year.
As with last time, I’ll just note that some of these descriptions include spoilers, so if you’re a fan of those “big reveal” podcast moments, you might want skip the descriptions.
Feel free to recommend your own favorites in the comments.
A phenomenal investigative journalism podcast from TV producer Jucinda Davis and attorney Susan Simpson of the Undisclosed podcast (also recommended). In the first season, the two bring their respective legal and journalistic experience fixing wrongful convictions to a horrific case near Rome, Georgia in which two men were convicted of murder for a death that was in all likelihood an accident. In this first season alone, Davis and Simpson managed to secure two exonerations. Regular readers of this newsletter will recognize some familiar themes, including the difficulty of getting back into court in post-conviction, a shady coroner, and tunnel-visioned police investigators. It’s also just superb storytelling.
The second and current season is more of the same, as Simpson and Davis turn to the convictions of two men for the murder of a teen girl in California. This season is ongoing, but thus far, they appear to be closing in not just on another pair of wrongful convictions, but on finding the actual perpetrator of the crime. One of the two men who were convicted was severely beaten in prison, nearly to death. The other was murdered by his cellmate. Both were marked men behind bars for having been convicted of sexual assault. Proof is fearless journalism with a healthy dose of empathy. Season one is often heartbreaking. Season two is often chilling.
I’ve reported and written quite a bit myself about the wrongful conviction of Toforest Johnson. And to be candid, as a journalist it’s hard to avoid feeling a bit of envy and harumph-iness upon hearing that another reporter is doing a reported podcast about a case you’ve covered. So here’s probably the best compliment I can pay to Beth Shelburne: Those feelings dissipated the moment I started listening. She did an incredible job — better than I could have done — and uncovered a ton of important new evidence. She did it mostly through tedious, shoe-leather reporting — knocking on doors, scouring transcripts and police reports, and hunting down witnesses through social media. There are some incredible moments when she confronts the detective who investigated this case with evidence of his own incompetence.
It’s also an absolute outrage and a damning indictment of the Alabama justice system that after all that we knew before this podcast, and then with all that Shelburne found — and given that the current DA, the man who prosecuted Johnson, and members of the jury who convicted him all now say Johnson innocent — he’s still on Alabama’s death row.
From Wesley Lowery, Ernie’s Secret is a historical investigation of the legacy of Ernest Withers, the iconic civil rights photographer who was also an informant for the FBI. Lowery draws on the reporting first done by Memphis journalist Mark Perrusquia, then scrubs down to reveal the complicated relationship between the civil rights movement and the bureau that was both its protector and its antagonist — how the FBI used the trust and access it had won by investigating the murders of civil rights leaders to then surveil, infiltrate, and subvert the movement.
A terrifying investigation into how one judge oversaw the illegal jailling of countless kids in a suburb of Nashville, often in solitary confinement. It’s also the story of how a ragtag team of local lawyers helped expose what was going on.
Crooked City: Youngstown, Ohio
I’ll listen to just about anything hosted by Mark Smerling. This is one of his best. If you liked the two seasons of Crimetown, which I recommended in last year’s post, you’ll love this immersive series about Youngstown. Smerling walks you through the long history of corruption, mob influence in the working class city, primarily through the rise and fall of the weird, defiant, nutty late congressman, Jim Trafficant. It’s an eye-popping story. The fierce loyalty of Trafficant’s constituents, even in the face of overwhelming evidence of his corruption, also offers some insight into Ohio’s political evolution in the age of MAGA.
Smokescreen: Just Say You’re Sorry
Maurice Chammah of the Marshall Project looks into the sordid case of a Texas Ranger who was unusually skilled at getting people to confess to crimes. As you might guess, the “skill” here is more just getting any confession, not necessarily accurate ones.
I particularly liked three seasons of this series from from Campside Media. The Friendly Fire season looks at an incident in which a police officer shot and killed a fellow officer during a raid in Scott County, Tennessee. Borderlands looks at the rise and fall of the sheriff in a Texas border town who, at the height of the drug war, was working with drug runners to import massive quantities of cocaine. Finally, the season titled Fade to Black investigates the mysterious 1997 disappearance of Hollywood screenwriter Gary Davore. As it does, you’ll learn about the surprisingly (for me at least!) influential role the CIA has played in the U.S. movie industry. A favorite tidbit: In the movie Meet the Parents, the original script planned to demonstrate the shady of influence of Robert De Niro’s character by having Ben Stiller find (authentic, and at that point declassified) CIA torture and kidnapping manuals in his desk. After the CIA objected, the movie instead just showed photos of De Niro posing with world leaders.
I already recommended Hunter Parnell’s excellent podcast on indigent defense in a previous post about that issue. And this podcast probably isn’t for everyone — each episode features Parnell and a guest wading deep into the weeds about public defense. But if you are into this stuff, as I am, it’s endlessly informative. He’s quickly building an archive that’s probably already our best resource on the day-to-day goings on in the criminal justice system.
In season one of On Our Watch, a reporting team from NPR and KQED in San Francisco take advantage of a new California open records law that provides more transparency to police departments to investigate a broad range of misconduct, from the tactics police use when informing the families that their loved ones have been killed by cops, to internal investigations of cops accused of sexually harassing women, to some eye-popping new revelations about the shooting of Oscar Grant. I haven’t yet listened to season two, which apparently looks correctional officer whistleblowers at New Folsom Prison.
A gritty, extensively-reported series on the crack-era corruption scandal in the NYPD’s 30th District, which was probably the biggest scandal in the department’s history.
Suspect: Five Shots in the Dark
I recommended the first season of Suspect in last year’s post. The third season is also very good. Host Matt Shaer teams up with University of San Francisco law professor Laura Bazelon to investigate a wrongful conviction in Indiana. This one too has a happy ending.
No one owns the FBI informant beat like Trevor Aaronson. The first season of this podcast looks at a creepy sex pest the FBI paid thousands of dollars infiltrate the racial justice protesters in Colorado in the summer of 2020 — and the bullshit crimes he lured a couple protest leaders into committing. The second season is about a (apparently) well-intentioned immigrant who appears to have thought he was helping the CIA catch an illegal arms dealer, but ends up charged and imprisoned himself after involvement from the DEA. If you enjoy those seasons, you should also check out Aaronson’s season for the Chameleon podcast called High Rollers, about how the FBI managed to turn an investigation into a Las Vegas botox and diet clinics into an international money laundering conspiracy that necessitated FBI agents getting lap dances and racking up huge bar tabs.
Longtime readers or those of you who read my first book will be interested in this one, which investigates the case of David Martinez, a California man convicted and imprisoned for killing a police officer during a nighttime raid on his home. Martinez insists that he didn’t now the raiders were police. Incredibly, after a jury acquitted him of first degree murder, prosecutors charged Martinez again for second-degree murder for the same crime. He was again acquitted. So prosecutors brought a manslaughter charge. Martinez finally accepted a plea bargain on that charge. After spending more than eight years in jail, he was paroled last summer.
I guess the theme of my year in podcast listening it’s bungling FBI agents. I’d actually considered myself fairly well-read on the anthrax attacks and botched investigation, but there was a lot in here that I’d forgotten, or maybe never knew. It’s mostly a tell of cascading government failure, from refusing to take the initial attacks seriously, to failing to warn and assist exposed postal workers to the seven years they spent ruining lives with a series of incompetent investigations. After FBI officials finally settled on a microbiologist named Bruce Ivins as the culprit, they hounded him until he killed himself. The really galling part is that the agents interviewed for the podcast seem genuinely offended that, after all of that, anyone would doubt them about Ivins. By the end, I found myself hoping Ivins really is guilty, because it would just be to soul-crushing to contemplate otherwise.
Non-criminal justice related podcasts:
The life and times of Ronald Dante, a hypnotist, prolific scam artist, self-help guru, and founder of a fake university who was once married to Lana Turner. It’s an absolutely bonkers story.
Mike Birbiglia’s Working It Out
The affable standup comedian interview other comics about bits and shows in progress, and helps them work through their material. A fascinating glimpse into the comedy workd.
You’re either an obsessive fan of the British TV show Taskmaster, as I am, in which case you’re probably already aware of this podcast, or you aren’t, in which case this podcast will make absolutely no sense to you whatsoever (one day I will bore you all with a post about my fondness for this show). But on the off chance there’s someone at the intersection of “Taskmaster fan” and “not aware of the Taskaster podcast,” this is for you. Host Ed Gamble chats with current and former taskmaster contestants about a given episode and its component tasks. They discuss strategy, behind the scenes stuff, and debate whether Taskmaster Greg Davies’ point allocations were just and fair. Extremely nerdy stuff.
Speaking of nerdy stuff, this podcast by historian Patrick Wyman is excellent. It’s a nice mix of modern and ancient history (he did a massive series of episodes on the Bronze Age collapse alone), along with some really interesting episodes that get into prehistory, anthropology, and paleontology. If you you’re excited by at the thought of a lesson on the Hittites followed up by an hour-long discussion of Denisovans, this is the podcast for you.
Another terrific history podcast, this time with British historian Dan Snow. This one focuses more on providing historical context for contemporary headlines, though that can sometimes mean digging pretty deep into the past.
Over the last few years, Chris Hayes’s show has become my go-to when I need a briefing on the latest headlines a bout our slow march to autocracy. I find him accurate and trustworthy, even when I may not agree with him. His podcast is basically a concentrated version of his show. He brings in someone with expertise on something headlines, then he and that expert spend an hour drilling down on that issue. Always informative.
Jon Ronson’s two seasons on the origins of the culture wars is fascinating and informative, and Ronson himself is a gifted storyteller. Both seasons are highly listenable, and the episodes work both on their own and in telling a broader story about grievance culture. The episodes about the origins of the pro-life movement, excited delirium, the World Economic Forum conspiracies, and the Plandemic “documentaries” are particularly good. The episode about Tammy Faye Baker’s decision to interview a gay man with AIDS at the height of the epidemic was incredibly moving. One mild criticism: Ronson does occasionally indulge in some distracting and unnecessary both-sides-ism. And there are betters examples of culture war excesses on the left than those he chooses to highlight. Still, both seasons are terrific and definitely worth your time.
Thank you very much for this! I read all your posts and learn so much from them! It’s comforting to me to know that other talented reporters are covering these issues like you. Sometimes it feels like you didn’t have other fighters alongside you in this battle. So good to know journalists are in this fight!
Radley! Thank you so much for lifting up Toforest and the work we did on Earwitness. You can't imagine how much I appreciate it. I admire your work so much, which makes this extra amazing. And you are recommending a few podcasts that I haven't listened to and didn't know about, so thanks for that too!