Following the data to a fairer criminal justice system

You can’t change what you can’t see. And good data, Amy Bach believes, is one of the keys to surfacing what’s not working in our criminal justice system. She is the founder of Measures for Justice, a nonpartisan, non-profit organization developing data tools to help community advocates and law enforcement work together to reshape the criminal justice system. Amy believes that data on local trends – like racial disparities in diversions – can become tools to help communities advocate for meaningful change, and a way for prosecutors to demonstrate a commitment to reform. “When we can see where things go wrong, we can work to make them right,” Amy says.

In this episode, Amy and Dwayne talk about what’s possible when data is used to start difficult, community-driven conversations about reform; the story behind Commons, a new criminal justice data platform; and why data can ultimately only ever tell part of the story. Plus, Dwayne reads a Langston Hughes poem to Amy.