The Jeff-alytics Podcast

Deciphering The American Way Of Killing with Malcolm Gladwell

The 50th episode of the Jeff-alytics podcast called for a special guest and this episode delivers. Today's guest, Malcolm Gladwell, has a new book out today titled T

Reducing Crime Through Environmental Design with Megan Grable

Most efforts to reduce crime focus on who is committing it. Megan Grable's work focuses on where. She's a neighborhood planner with the city of Fort Wayne, Ind

What Good Policing Should Look Like with Mo McGough

Mo McGough is a former DOJ attorney and self-described cop’s kid who has spent her career trying to improve how police operate. Mo helped build an NIJ program called Law

Running DOJ's Criminal Division with Kenneth Polite

The Department of Justice encompasses nearly a hundred U.S. attorney’s offices, employs thousands of prosecutors, and touches basically every dimension of public safety i

Rebuilding a Police Department in Free Fall with Brian O'Hara

Minneapolis recorded more shooting victims than it had sworn police officers in 2021. At that time, a huge chunk of the department had walked out the door just as gun vio

How The Federal Data Landscape Is Changing With Denice Ross

Every crime rate, every per capita statistic, every trend line in American public safety depends on something most people have never thought about: the data infrastructur

Stitching Together America’s Criminal Justice Data with Mike Mueller-Smith

The criminal justice system is big, it is complicated, and it is expensive. But how do we know what parts of it, if any, are working?  Enter Mike Mueller-Smith. A decad

Guns, Data, and the Law with Thomas Chittum

Every time a gun is recovered at a crime scene in America, a quiet process begins. The gun is traced backward through manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers to find ou

Using Social Networks To Reduce Gun Violence With Andrew Papachristos

My guest today is Andrew Papachristos, one of the smartest people (though he is a Bears fan) thinking through how to use data to reduce gun violence. Andy has spent his c

Crime Is Falling. Can Public Perception Catch Up? with Insha Rahman

My guest today is Insha Rahman, the president of the Vera Institute of Justice, the oldest and largest justice reform organization in the country. Insha has spent the pas

A Deep Dive into Why Crime is Falling with John Roman

Crime is falling fast in America , and, as the many different opinions on the podcast can attest, almost nobody can agree on why. My guest today has spent thirty years i

Using Technology to Improve Crime Analysis with Andy Wheeler

Today's guest is Andy Wheeler, a renowned criminologist, data scientist, and founder of Crime Decoder. Andy is a terrific voice for understanding the role of technol

Documenting the History of Crime & Punishment in America with Lynn Novick

My guest today has an incredible new documentary coming out this November called Crime and Punishment in America. It's a four-part, 8 hour review of the history of c

Improving Policing Through Effective Reform With Christy Lopez

When crime rises, the instinct is usually to hire more officers, increase enforcement, and ask police departments to do even more. But after spending years investigating

Behind Kansas City's Crime Drop With Mayor Quinton Lucas

One of the hardest things for any mayor to do is convince people that a problem can actually be solved. That may sound obvious, but when a city has struggled with violen

The Public Health Approach To Reducing Shootings With Dr. Megan Ranney

“We should treat gun violence like a public health problem” is a phrase that is often used but rarely defined.  My guest today is Dr. Megan Ranney, an emergency physicia

1,000 Levers For Reducing Gun Violence With Rob Wilcox

The national conversation around gun violence tends to revolve around what laws should be passed next. But a lot of the work of reducing violence doesn’t happen in Congre

Building Towards Certainty Rather Than Severity With Greg Newburn

For decades, the response to rising crime has been fairly predictable: increase penalties, increase sentences, and hope it works. My guest today says that framework misse

Why Accountability and Prevention Don't Have to Be in Conflict with Neera Tanden

Most debates about crime policy are framed as a choice. You’re either tough on crime or you’re not. You focus on enforcement or prevention. And the answers tend to sound

The Past, Present, and Future of Gun Violence Reduction with Senator Chris Murphy

What actually drives change on an issue like gun violence? Is it policy? Culture? Policing? Or something harder to measure? To help answer that question I’m turning to S