Due Process. Presumption of Innocence. Constitutional Accountability.
Deep-dive legal analysis of criminal trials. No cheerleading for prosecution or defense. Just the truth about how the system works, and doesn't.
Brianna Moore asked a Hillsborough County judge to let her wait out her trial with her family in Mississippi. He said out loud he did not think she would run. He denied her anyway.
Read →Andrea Shaw asked an Idaho judge to cut her $2,000,000 bond to $100,000 so she could go home to her newborn. The judge revoked it instead, and the reason sits in one line of the Idaho constitution most people have never read.
Read →A full mistrial in State of Georgia v. Kianna Davis. The jury deadlocked on all seven counts, the judge discharged it with no verdict, and the State must now decide whether to try the death of 2-year-old Karter Ambrose a second time.
Read →The jury deciding who killed 2-year-old Karter Ambrose is deadlocked on all seven counts with no verdict. What a deadlock does and does not mean, what the Allen charge is, and why the split is sealed.
Read →The Bloody Sword jury deliberated through a courthouse power outage and convicted Isaac Apodaca of first-degree murder and conspiracy, for a killing he planned with his phone and never touched with his hands.
Read →Day one of the Kirk hearing brought the first evidence and the first cross-examination of the entire case, and the most direct footage of the shooting never left the judge's own screen.
Read →Across Days 2 and 3 of the Blaise Taylor poisoning trial, the state's own witnesses kept reaching for the proof of a poisoned drink and finding it missing, moved, or empty.
Read →The State spent the first day of testimony building a poisoning narrative through paramedics, an OB-GYN, a friend on the phone, and two patrol officers, and the defense spent the same day showing every one of them reaching past what they could actually know.
Read →The charge conference locked the jury's instructions, the sixty-day misdemeanor this case started as never reached the verdict form, and the man at the helm turned down the safe landing himself, leaving the jury a choice between a felony and freedom.
Read →The defense rested behind a concussion it never tested, the defendant exercised his right to silence, the court refused to throw the case out, and the state closed its rebuttal on two fathers, leaving the nine-seconds question to the jury.
Read →Select a case to explore background reports, daily breakdowns, and all coverage in one place.
Every case runs in four lanes: the full live broadcasts, the No Breaks edition with every recess removed, the trial analysis podcast, and the key moments. Pick a trial and pick your lane.
Playlists for every past case live on that case's coverage page, and the full library is on the channel.
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One Decision Changes Everything
A CPA's life is destroyed after a tragic accident. But was the process that convicted him actually just?
Dave Schrader had everything. A successful practice. A family who loved him. Then came the party, the dark country road, and the split-second choice that would cost a sixteen-year-old boy his life. What follows isn't just a story about guilt or punishment. It's a story about what happens when a man enters a system designed to produce outcomes, not fairness.
Justice isn't an outcome. Justice is a process.
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I'm not a lawyer. I'm trained differently.
At age 12, I watched my father get indicted. I sat in the courtroom audience. I reviewed his files. I got an education no law school provides. I became a criminal defendant's family member facing the possibility of losing everything.
My father, Steven M. Askin, was a renowned West Virginia criminal defense attorney for 23 years. He was prosecuted twice by the system he challenged. First for protecting attorney-client privilege. Later for teaching people their constitutional rights from a coffee shop.
"The system only works if we force it to work. If we watch. If we question. If we refuse to let them operate in darkness."
Justice Is A Process continues his legacy. We cover trials not to entertain, but to educate. To teach people how the system really works. To be the watchdog the justice system needs.
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1948 — 2024
Steven M. Askin was a West Virginia criminal defense attorney for 23 years. He wasn't just a lawyer. He was a fighter who believed that constitutional rights belong to everyone, not just those who can afford them.
In 1994, the federal government came for him. He refused to violate attorney-client privilege, even when a judge ordered him to testify. He went to prison for seven months. The West Virginia Supreme Court disbarred him in 1998.
But he didn't stop. He rebuilt. He became a street lawyer, working from coffee shops in Martinsburg, helping people the system abandoned. People who couldn't afford lawyers. People fighting Pro Se against a machine designed to crush them. He taught them the law. He showed them how to stand up for their rights. He did it for free, or for whatever they could afford.
In 2009, on the morning he was supposed to get his law license back, he was indicted on 11 counts of unauthorized practice of law. For helping people from a coffee shop. For teaching them their constitutional rights. The prosecutor said she feared he would "disrupt the legal system."
She was right to be afraid. His mission lives on.
"The system only works if we force it to work. If we watch. If we question. If we refuse to let them operate in darkness."
Follow his story in the documentary podcast series
Watch Episode 1: The Story BeginsNew episodes on the Justice Is A Process YouTube channel
