I come from a family of Black cops and have drawn on this experience to inform my criminal justice journalism. In 2024, The Marshall Project published “Out of the Blue,” my profile of a Black officer who was promoted after controversially shooting a Black man. But later, when the same cop became an advocate for police reform, his career went off the rails.

In 2015, Vice published my documentary “The Cleveland Strangler,” which investigated how police failed to stop a serial killer who targeted Black women. The documentary was viewed more than 1 million times and was nominated for a National Magazine Award.

I’m currently writing “The Black Shield,” a book that will explore the radical promise and conflicted reality of Black people in law enforcement, by combining history, reporting and the stories of my own family. In support of this work, I won the 2024 Richard J. Margolis Award.