THROUGH OUR LENS

Mass Incarceration & Policing 

How are mass incarceration, policing, and media intertwined?

For decades, the U.S. news media has mirrored the racist practices of policing and arrest. Newsrooms routinely published mugshots of people who had been arrested — often before they were convicted of a crime. While some newsrooms have reconsidered this practice since 2020, public safety reporting continues to rely heavily on police accounts and reinforce racial stereotypes while using language that obscures police responsibility. By focusing on individual incidents rather than root causes and sensationalizing them, news coverage can reinforce the criminal legal system’s narrow framework of “safety.”

Our coverage examines the historical and contemporary relationship journalism has with policing and mass incarceration, from how police violence is initially reported to how newsrooms shape perceptions of crime and punishment. We also examine how incarceration affects journalists on the inside facing restrictions on their ability to report from within the very institutions they are covering.

Police in riot gear confront a camera operator during protests in Washington, D.C., in January 2017. Spenser H / Unsplash