15 Memorable Crime Stories We Published This Year

Scores of former convicts are exonerated every year, and the number is growing. But for Clarence Harrison and many others, walking out of the pen with a clear name and cash for all the years lost doesn’t mean living happily ever after.

Over the past two decades, Colombia’s Iglesia de Dios Ministerial de Jesucristo Internacional — La Ministerial — has built a massive following with almost 900 churches worldwide. The Ministerial calls itself a prophetic faith, but defectors call it a cult that targets immigrants to fill its charismatic leaders’ coffers.

What’s at stake when police arrest women who they believe falsely reported rape? For Lara McLeod, it was her reputation, her mental health, and maybe even her baby nephew’s life.

Last year, former Oklahoma City Department Police Officer Daniel Holtzclaw was accused of abusing women in the community he patrolled. In December, he was found guilty of many of their charges. But the testimonies of these women have never been reported in full before.

People in Texas get thrown behind bars just because they can’t afford their traffic tickets. That’s a disaster for people who are already struggling. It’s also completely against the law.

Shut out of legitimate financial institutions, marijuana entrepreneurs are finding unusual ways to park their cash.

In a city wrestling with fast-rising housing costs and demographic change, a security guard’s attack of a poor black man at Whole Foods has come to represent what many black residents fear: Oakland wants them out.

More trans women were killed in the United States in the past 12 months than any year on record — and nowhere do the violence and homicides appear as concentrated as the Palmer Park area in Detroit.

How did a homeschooled, evangelical Christian from Chattanooga become an ISIS wife and mother?

Officially, former college wrestler Michael Johnson was on trial for not telling his sexual partners that he had HIV. But inside the courtroom, the man known as Tiger Mandingo was also up against America’s attitudes on race and sexuality.

Michelle Esquenazi owns one of the largest bail bond agencies in New York state, thriving in an industry that is half insurance company, half privatized law enforcement.

A year ago, 43 students disappeared in Mexico after they were attacked by the police in the middle of the night, and their relatives are still looking for answers.

A short checklist called the Static-99 weighs facts about a sex offender’s past in order to predict the likelihood of future crimes. Many legal and scientific experts worry that the way the test is often used — to make high-stakes decisions about an individual’s liberty — is critically flawed.

When states ran out of execution drugs, they started paying tens of thousands of dollars to Chris Harris, a salesman in India with no pharmaceutical background.

How a high-speed chase in Cleveland with two unarmed suspects led to two deaths, more than a hundred shots fired, and a police officer facing trial.