Is There Justice in Felony Murder?

The Experiment

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🗓️ 2 December 2021

⏱️ 43 minutes

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Summary

This week, The Experiment takes a look at the charge that sent Anissa Jordan to prison for a crime she didn’t even know had been committed. We consider how the felony-murder rule disproportionately punishes youth of color and women, and the debate over whether the same rule is key to holding police officers responsible in the killings of civilians.

This episode of The Experiment originally ran on April 29, 2021.

A transcript of this episode is available.

Further reading: “What Makes a Murderer?”

This episode is part of The Atlantic’s project “The Cycle,” which is supported by a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge.

Be part of The Experiment. Use the hashtag #TheExperimentPodcast, or write to us at [email protected].

This episode was produced by Alvin Melathe and Julia Longoria, with editing by Katherine Wells. Fact-check by Will Gordon. Sound design by David Herman. Special thanks to Adam Harris and John Swansburg.

Music by Water Feature (“With Flowers,” “Richard III (Duke of Gloucester),” and “A Paradise”), Keyboard (“Being There” and “My Atelier”), H Hunt (“C U Soon” and “Having a Bath”), and R McCarthy (“Home/Home”), provided by Tasty Morsels. Additional music by Bruce Wiley McKinnon Jr. (“Are You a Freak”) and Tyler O. Sterrett and Jason Trotta (“The Hamlet”). Additional audio from KQED and MPR News.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Count one, Malice Murr. We the jury find the defendant Travis McMykel guilty.
0:06.4	You're gonna have to whoever just made it out first.
0:12.5	Last week when a judge in Georgia read the verdict in the trial of three men who
0:19.3	killed Ahmad Arbery, an unarmed black man. Count two, felony murder. We the
0:26.8	jury find the defendant Travis McMykel guilty. You might have noticed there was a
0:31.3	legal principle. Count three, felony murder. That was repeated. Count four, felony murder.
0:37.6	Over and over. Count five, felony murder. We the jury find the defendant Travis
0:43.4	McMykel guilty. Count six. Last spring we did a story about felony murder. A legal
0:51.7	rule you might not have heard of that's applied in all different situations.
0:57.9	And depending on who you talk to, it's either a tool for reform or a barbaric
1:04.0	rule that should be abolished. Today we're re-airing that story.
1:34.0	Do you and I said do you have her dream about prison? No. No. No. Never. No.
2:02.1	That's the last thing I think about.
2:09.1	Before Anissa Jordan went to prison, she just met someone new.
2:18.1	My grandmother introduced me to Douglas. She had never been married before. She was already
2:23.4	a grown woman in her 30s with four kids when she met Douglas. How did you know you were in love?
2:31.7	I was a villain down to my stomach. Like I have butterflies.
2:38.7	I tell him, like, serenade me. He is sing for me. Like Kate, missing you. Mariah Carey.
2:50.0	We belong together. He is dance. You know, and he wasn't that kind of guy, but he had
2:57.2	a cure for me. He put a spark in my life. She hadn't really come alive like that with
3:05.6	anybody for a really long time. Maybe since she was a kid. It was eight of us.
3:12.3	Four girls, four boys. Did you have a favorite sibling?
	...

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