Public records shed light on the justice system — but it can be a battle to get them

Child welfare agencies often relied on flawed drug tests administered at childbirth to report tens of thousands of new parents to law enforcement.

In New York, guards who brutalized prisoners or covered it up were rarely fired.

And at least 50 people died while being treated behind bars by a for-profit health care company whose practices endangered those with mental illness.

Without public records, uncovering the facts behind these stories would never have happened. In some cases, reporters from The Marshall Project spent over a year getting the government to turn over key documents. They have also gone to great lengths to scrutinize records, which at times were missing pieces or outright inaccurate.

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