“I never thought federal officers could behave this way. I really didn’t,” she said. “I always thought people must be provoking them or something, that they would never do this unprovoked. Obviously, I was wrong.”

ICE detains lawfully present Richmond father as son waits for school bus www.vpm.org/news/2025-10...

“I don’t want to live in an increasingly surveilled police state. I trust the police to do their jobs well, without cameras. Why do I need AI police when I have you?” said a resident of Bridgewater, VA. www.dnronline.com/news/public_...

DHS includes a bunch of false and defamatory statements in their tweet about Kilmar Abrego Garcia as they prepare to send him to Uganda.

So he got the weekend off

DOJ’s attempts to charge these cases in DC and LA have been resoundingly unsuccessful. Grand juries have rejected a huge proportion of the attempts to indict. One case in LA that went to trial as a misdemeanor recently ended in acquittal

As immigration agents have escalated their tactics, US citizens, many of them Latino men, have been stopped and in some cases taken into custody by law enforcement officers. Allison, Jenny and I took a closer look at the encounters. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/29/u...

What’s for lunch? Join the @urichmond Carrico Center for Pro Bono & Public Service for its virtual Law Over Lunch series today from 12-1:30PM. Today’s speakers: @rpogge and Julie McConnell. The program is free, but advance registration is required. calendar.richmond.edu/page.html?ev...

Today in "neither our media nor our political system is designed to deal with a far right authoritarian party"

How is this happening in America? 📌 Los Angeles 📌 Washington. D.C. 📌 Chicago Next Portand

Flock around, find out: Flock apparently decided to reinstall all of the ALPRs they recently took down in Evanston. One problem though: they didn't consult Evanston about it. The city sent a cease & desist letter, and Flock has "committed to promptly removing the cameras." Full story here ⬇️

Sentencing guidelines called for 1 day to 6 months of incarceration, yet Shebri Dillon was sentenced to 30 yrs in a Virginia prison! We’ve filed an amicus brief highlighting how old mandatory jury sentencing laws support Shebri’s ineffective counsel claims. 1/4 justiceforwardva.com/blog/2025/9/...

Law enforcement agencies across the U.S. accessed Bridgewater,VA’s surveillance data 6.9MILLION times. “I’m concerned with the degree to which this kind of data could be used to suppress dissent, to suppress freedom of opinion,” said a resident. vcij.org/stories/stat... @whropublicmedia.bsky.social

Karina Villa protecting her constituents by literally running ICE off the streets in West Chicago and yelling to residents to stay inside their homes.

Brian Kilmeade endorses euthanizing homeless people: "Involuntary lethal injection, or something. Just kill them."

The incoming prosecutor of Newport News, Virginia, Shannon Jones says she identifies with the “progressive prosecutor” movement and hopes to show that focusing on public safety goes hand in hand with promoting civil rights.

The recent federal bill will be damaging to the people of Virginia and also to our state’s capacity to help families meet their basic needs. More details on the growing cost for the #VaBudget. ⤵️

Hampton University and Virginia State University have received campus threats. VSU is currently on lockdown, and Hampton has canceled classes. www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/t...

Today, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is reviewing and voting on bills that would undo decades of evidence-based criminal justice reforms in Washington, D.C. and trample on Home Rule. DC deserves real safety solutions, not mass incarceration!

A Georgia judge said today that he intends to dismiss the racketeering charges brought two years ago against dozens of “Cop City” protesters under Georgia’s RICO statute.

Join us for FAMM's Storytelling Workshop, "Creating an Advocacy Story About Oversight & Prison Conditions." Learn to use your story as a tool for reform! 🗓️ Wed, Sept 10 at 6 PM ET. Don’t miss out—register now! ✍🏽 https://pulse.ly/okm5p9eh7s

My statement on the Supreme Court ruling this week to permit racial profiling:

I dunno, maybe the Supreme Court majority could have the decency to bestir themselves to write an actual, you know, opinion, with their names on it, explaining their endorsement of using race and ethnicity as part of a national policy of harassing and intimidating non-white Americans.

"Half the population” of greater Los Angeles "now meet the government’s criteria for reasonable suspicion," in the wake of today's 6-3 SCOTUS ruling. www.latimes.com/politics/sto...

Public defenders from across the country share their challenges, triumphs, heartbreaks, & moments of profound humanity in this new book from the @americanbar.org Proud to say New Mexico LOPD contributed 5 of the 45 stories It's available now on the ABA website www.americanbar.org/products/inv...

The Supreme Court ruled today, agreeing U.S. immigration agents may stop and detain anyone they suspect is in the U.S. illegally based on little more than their working at a car wash, speaking Spanish or having brown skin. Justice Sotomayor dissented. www.latimes.com/politics/sto...

#DC DEEP TODAY… Marching to the White House 🏡

First, there's overwhelming consensus that more police, prosecution, and prison does not lead to more safety or even reduce police-reported crime. This core empirical fact is just ignored, and NYT just let's the misinformation not only sit there but become the central animating theme of its article!

The Feds are sending in the national guard to cities they disagree w politically. They’ve partially nationalized intel and are looking to do the same thing to other defense contractors. What do you think flock will do when hard decisions need to be made?

“I'm not a believer that a Class 1 misdemeanor is going to prevent officer abuse of ALPR data,” says @rpogge.bsky.social. And on fed misuse? “A state law that prohibits access by the federal govt is not going to stop this federal govt from accessing data….period.” www.chlookout.com/p/despite-br...

The Lookout was finally able to get Richmond City Council President Cynthia Newbille on the record about RPD's use of the AI-powered surveillance tech that ICE loves. As far as I can tell, this is her first comment to press about the city's Flock LPR network, for which it paid nearly $400,000. More:

The officials were quick to point to guardrails they've put in place, including a new VA law that makes abuse of the system a Class 1 misdemeanor. But @justicefwdva.bsky.social's executive director @rpogge.bsky.social calls bullshit.

We the people, baby. We the People are going to put a stop to some things

If you are okay with this, if you think this is justified, if you think people living on the street have brought this upon themselves, if you think this is good leadership, you may be able to fool yourself that you care about others but you don’t fool me

I talked to Cook County Public Defender Sharone Mitchell about Trump's order to defund governments that have moved away from cash bail. IL abolished cash bail so people wouldn't be jailed just because they are poor — Mitchell told me Trump's intervention is "Tyranny 101" boltsmag.org/chicago-publ...

There is a humanitarian crisis in Chantilly, Virginia. The immigration prisons can't keep up with the massive spike in arrests in DC, so they're overcrowding people into a Virginia office building w/ little access to food, medicine, hygiene, and legal counsel. www.msnbc.com/msnbc/news/v...

A federal grand jury has declined to indict another person arrested as part of President Trump's D.C. crime surge. This was the only case we know of in which the National Guard participated in an arrest. After the grand jury declined to return an indictment, DOJ moved to dismiss the case.

RICHMOND: There’s help for people saddled with criminal records—at no cost—on Friday, September 12th, 2025. Register for the expungement clinic by September 1, 2025 to remove eligible criminal & traffic charges from public record here: www.virginiajusticeconference.com/richmond-exp...

When I grow up, I wanna be a left of center democrat while a dictator builds a private army to interfere with the midterm elections that way when it all goes to shit I can blame it on those crazy left wing nuts who wanted “universal healthcare” and affordable housing for all.

And here we find the newspaper of record, WaPo, casually and implicitly endorsing proto-fascism because their own irresponsible, alarmist crime reporting has made people feel unsafe, and more likely to click on hogwash like this than learn the actual truth.

“By embedding safeguards against consolidation, investing in the repair of impacted people communities, and ensuring fair competition, Virginia can legalize cannabis right…” @chelseahiggswise.bsky.social virginiabusiness.com/virginias-ch...

Join us at the 2025 Virginia Justice Conference in RVA Sept. 11-12! The event hosts a resource fair, expungement clinic, and panels & workshops focused on VA’s 3 constitutional amendments, probation, parole, higher ed in prison, the politics of crime, and more: www.virginiajusticeconference.com

Absolutely bugfuck that a candidate who can pull this many people on a moments notice for a scavenger hunt isn't being lauded and championed by his party

On this day in 1956, the governor of Virginia pledged to withhold funding from any local government that integrated its schools, saying, "If we accept admission of one Negro child into a white school, it's all over.”

Getting to see a CJ reform from concept to creation is rare. @rpogge.bsky.social not only helped lead the charge for expungement & record sealing reform, but he’s also putting it into action—last week, teaching Shenandoah pub defenders & co-hosting a clinic in Hampton-Newport News! #VALeg