Some law enforcement officials and district attorneys say the law has put strain on local jails without providing more resources.
Michael Hewlett
Michael Hewlett is a courts and law reporter for The Assembly. He was previously a legal affairs reporter at the Winston-Salem Journal and has won two Henry Lee Weathers Freedom of Information Awards.
Posted inCourts & Justice
Possible Settlement in eCourts Lawsuit
People who said they were wrongfully detained due to problems with the digital records system filed a class-action lawsuit three years ago.
Posted inCourts & Justice
Air Apparent?
The state Supreme Court weighs in on cases involving whether police can search based on what they believe to be the smell of marijuana.
Posted inCourts & Justice
How Growing Up in Smithfield Shaped Harmeet Dhillon
The high-ranking DOJ lawyer was reared in the 1970s as an outsider—an Indian Sikh girl in a town with a Ku Klux Klan billboard.
Posted inCourts & Justice
DeCarlos Brown Again Found Mentally Incompetent to Stand Trial
The man accused of killing a Ukrainian refugee on a Charlotte light rail train has been found mentally incompetent to stand trial for a second time. Prosecutors and defense attorneys said that the case has not ended.
Posted inCourts & Justice
A Tangled Legal Hell
The legal battle over a judge confiscating a reporter’s notes and issuing a gag order has grown increasingly Kafkaesque.
Posted inCourts & Justice
Charles McNeair Spent His Adult Life in Prison. At 63, He’ll Go Home.
A man imprisoned as a teenager for a crime he has maintained he didn’t commit has finally been granted parole.
Posted inFilm & Television
New Documentary Features Joan Little’s Fight for Justice
In the 1970s, Joan Little was a poor, young Black woman who killed a Beaufort County detention officer who she said tried to sexually assault her. Her case sparked an international movement.
Posted inCourts & Justice
Charlotte Man Found Incapable of Proceeding to Trial in Iryna Zarutska Case
DeCarlos Brown had a long history of mental illness. His lawyers said a state psychiatric hospital found him unfit for trial.
Posted inCourts & Justice
No Shortcuts
Prosecutors wanted the state Supreme Court to review an August ruling that overturned four men’s convictions in the murder of Nathaniel Jones.
