Hi everybody, it's John. Here at C-Non Radio, we ask a lot of questions about the systems that shape our world and our worldview,

what happens when they fall short, and what happens when they work as intended. We're hard at work on our season 8,

but in the meantime, we wanted to share an episode from another

show that's roughly similar in spirit. It's a powerful new series from revisionist history,

bestselling author Malcolm Gladwell's podcast, a series called The Alabama Murders. It tells the

story of Charles Senate, an Alabama minister who,

in 1988, trying to hide an affair, arranged for three men to murder his wife. One of the men

convicted in the murder, Kenny Smith, spent decades on death row, only to have his execution go horribly wrong.

Eventually, the consequences would lead to the center of a hot national debate

about who should be allowed to live, who should die, and how they should be killed.

The series isn't just about this one case.

It's about the systems we've created that are meant to uphold an impression of justice, but instead can result in legal, moral, and institutional failures.

In the episode you're about to hear, Malcolm talks with a psychologist who worked with Kenny Smith while he was on death row, and goes to Alabama to understand this story that had ripple effects

for years to come. To hear the full story, it's a seven-episode series. Look for revisionist history

wherever you get your podcasts.

Bushkin.

A little while ago, a friend of mine told me, you have to meet this person I know.

Kate Porterfield,

she's got the strangest job in America. So I did. We got together, Porterfield and I, in a little conference room in Manhattan. I just want to understand how you ended up where you are.

So you're kind of viewing as we're just talking, you're thinking about whether there's something here that will evolve over time that you would imagine putting in the podcast?

Is that kind of what you're thinking? Yeah.

Yeah.

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