We Are Witnesses: A portrait of crime and punishment in America today

The impact of America’s punishment policies is often measured in numbers: there are now 2.2   million people in our jails and prisons; one in a hundred and fifteen adults is confined behind bars;   our inmate population is four times larger than it was in 1980. “We Are Witnesses,” a collection of short videos, offers a very different sort of calculation: the human cost of locking up so many citizens for so many years. The project comprises nineteen videos, each between two and six minutes long. Taken together, they present a rare 360-degree portrait of the state of crime and punishment in the United States.  “We Are Witnesses” eschews politicians and professors in favor of other kinds of experts: people who have had firsthand experience with the criminal-justice system. Two police officers, a prison guard, two judges, two parents of a murder victim, four ex-prisoners—each one stares straight at the camera, recounting his or her story. Created and produced by the Marshall Project, a newsroom covering the criminal-justice system, “We Are Witnesses” delivers first-person testimonials that are intimate, honest, and revelatory.