Nigel Duara

California correctional officers train like ‘they are going to war’ to work in state prisons. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to transform San Quentin could require a kinder approach.

Fentanyl is driving California’s deadly overdose crisis. A new law taking effect Jan. 1 targets dealers by increasing criminal penalties for trafficking the drug.

More California police departments are deploying body cameras. A new court ruling restricts how prosecutors can use footage of witness accounts at trial.

Locally elected sheriffs manage California jails and are responsible for the safety of the inmates they hold. Record deaths in San Diego’s jail are shaping a plan for new statewide oversight.

‘You small, pathetic man,’ Gavin Newsom wrote in a Twitter post suggesting he’d pursue criminal charges against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis over recent migrant flights to Sacramento.

California is unwinding the prison-building boom of the 1980s and 1990s. The cuts are falling on small towns that banked on government jobs to anchor their communities.

A 2021 state law took investigations into California police shootings out of the hands of local cops. Now, some families say the new system is agonizing in its own way.

California spends more than $15 billion a year on its prison system. Now, with the number of people behind bars plummeting, the Newsom administration is moving to shut down more institutions.

Sheriff ends daytime patrols in Tehama, reflecting officer shortage throughout California and national trend. Law enforcement blames low pay and tougher regulations; lawmakers and civil rights advocates disagree.

The state’s prisons are no longer a world rehabilitation model, but Stockholm Prize winner Francis Cullen says the system could return to greatness.

In the aftermath of George Floyd’s death in Minnesota at police hands, California stepped up with a plan: Put the state in charge of investigating police shootings of unarmed people. CalMatters is tracking these cases and, so far, the Justice Department is struggling to keep up.

A bill before Gov. Gavin Newsom would make the nation’s most wide-ranging changes to solitary confinement.