Crime & Law Enforcement

Attorneys Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld. They co-founded the Innocence Project, dedicated to freeing innocent people from jail using DNA tests to do so. Barry Scheck is best known for his DNA analysis on the OJ Simpson defense team. They've collaborated on a new book (along with columnist Jim Dwyer) about their efforts, "Actual Innocence: Five Days to Execution, and Other Dispatches From the Wrongly Convicted." (Doubleday).

Pierre-Richard Prosper served as a prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal in Rwanda. In 1994, more than a half-million Rwandans were killed in a massacre. Last year, he successfully prosecuted the former Mayor of Taba, Rwanda for genocide. He also convicted the former official on rape charges. This is the first time rape has been recognized as a instrument of genocide. Prosper is an American attorney who worked for the Justice Department and for the Los Angeles County D.A.'s office.

Last year New Orleans became the first city to file suit against the gun industry. Chicago followed. And now many other cities (including Philadelphia, Boston, Miami, San Francisco and L.A.) are considering similar actions. Journalist Fox Butterfield writes about crime and criminal justice for The New York Times. He'll discuss these suits as well as one filed in New York by a group of individuals who lost family members from gun violence. Butterfield was a member of the Times writing staff that won a Pulitzer Prize for its publication of The Pentagon Papers.

Executive director Richard Feldman of the American Shooting Sports Council which represents gun manufacturers.

Senior policy analyst Tom Diaz at the Violence Policy Center, a non-partisan non-profit public policy institute working to reduce gun violence. He's the author of the new book, "Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America" (The New Press). In the book, Diaz writes how in an attempt to increase profits, the gun industry has introduced more aggressive and lethal guns to the public. DIAZ says they do this free from regulation and under a cloak of secrecy.

Criminologist Richard Wright. He teaches at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. He'll discuss the statistics released last month by the Justice Department showing that the crime rate has been falling steadily since 1991. He'll also discuss the link between the crime rate and the decline in crack use which he has studied. Wright is the co-author of the book, "Armed Robbers in Action: Stickups and Street Culture" (1997, Northeastern University Press).

Husseini writes for the Jordan Times, the country's only English-language daily. Her reporting on "crimes of honor" has brought to light the practice of a woman being murdered by her own relatives when it's thought the woman brought dishonor upon them. In one instance a 16 year-old schoolgirl was killed by her older brother because her younger brother raped her. Police and prosecutors have taken little notice of "honor killing" but that attitude has begun to shift because of Husseini's efforts.

Journalist Eric Schlosser talks about who is profiting from America's prison boom. He is a correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly. He wrote this month's cover article entitled "The Prison Industrial Complex."

An expert on prison systems around the world, Vivien Stern. She's written the new book, "A Sin Against the Future: Imprisonment in the World" (Northeastern University Press). Stern is Senior Research Fellow in the International Centre for Prison Studies at King's College and Secretary-General of Penal Reform International.

In 1980, Debbie Morris was a 16 year-old high school junior who was kidnapped, raped, and beaten by Robert Lee Willie. Willie's story was portrayed by Sean Penn in the film "Dead Man Walking." She has written about her life in "Forgiving the Dead Man Walking." (Zondervan)