Collateral Damage
Episode Eight: Legalized Takings
Donald Scott was killed in his home by an ad hoc team of raiding cops who were looking for marijuana — but the larger prize may have been his 200-acre Malibu ranch.
Collateral Damage
Collateral Damage is an investigative podcast series examining the half-century-long war on drugs, its enduring ripple effects, and the devastating consequences of building a massive war machine aimed at the public itself. Hosted by Radley Balko, an investigative journalist who has been covering the drug war and the criminal justice system for more than 20 years, each episode takes an in-depth look at someone who was unjustly killed in the drug war.
The so-called “war on drugs” began as a metaphor to demonstrate the country’s fervent commitment to defeat drug addiction, but the “war” part quickly became all too literal, complete with helicopters, tanks, and suspension of basic civil liberties protections.
All wars have collateral damage: the civilians, the noncombatants, the innocent people whose deaths are tragic but deemed necessary for the greater cause. Collectively, we’ve decided that the lives of these people were expendable — unfortunate but acceptable sacrifices for the impossible goal of a drug-free America. They are collateral damage, and these are their stories.
The so-called “war on drugs” began as a metaphor to demonstrate the country’s fervent commitment to defeat drug addiction, but the “war” part quickly became all too literal, complete with helicopters, tanks, and suspension of basic civil liberties protections.
All wars have collateral damage: the civilians, the noncombatants, the innocent people whose deaths are tragic but deemed necessary for the greater cause. Collectively, we’ve decided that the lives of these people were expendable — unfortunate but acceptable sacrifices for the impossible goal of a drug-free America. They are collateral damage, and these are their stories.
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Collateral Damage
Episode Seven: Dirty Information
Years before the police killing of Breonna Taylor brought “no-knock” raids into the national spotlight, the NYPD mistakenly raided Alberta Spruill’s home — and literally scared her to death.
Collateral Damage
Episode Six: Airborne Imperialism
A U.S.-led program killed a young missionary and her daughter in Peru after mistaking their plane for drug smugglers in 2001. Trump’s Venezuela boat strikes have made their deaths newly and urgently relevant.
Collateral Damage
Episode Five: What Fourth Amendment?
How the killing of Trevon Cole by Las Vegas police almost made prime-time TV.
Collateral Damage
Episode Four: Criminalizing Care
The remarkable life and cruel death of Peter McWilliams, an AIDS and cancer patient who played a critical role in the legalization of medical marijuana.
Collateral Damage
Episode Three: Blown Cover
How confidential informants like LeBron Gaither, recruited by police as a teen and killed by a drug dealer, are seen by the criminal system as disposable.
Collateral Damage
Episode Two: A Death in the Dark
How the pre-planned no-knock raid — a violent, volatile tactic that became a common tool of the drug war — led to tragic consequences, in the story of Ryan Frederick and Detective Jarrod Shivers.
Collateral Damage
Episode One: Dirty Business
The Atlanta narcotics unit’s deadly raid on 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston.
Collateral Damage
Trump’s War on Drugs
Journalist Radley Balko examines how Trump’s war on immigrants merges and expands the lethal policies of the wars on drugs and terror.
Collateral Damage
Introducing Collateral Damage
The Intercept is launching a new podcast series reported and hosted by investigative journalist Radley Balko.