Documentaries on Crime and Criminal Justice

Actor Forest Whitaker narrates the story of a group of inmate volunteers who staff their own hospice inside a maximum security prison in Louisiana where the average sentence is more than 90 years.

Can science help us understand these crimes?

Mila works at Heaven, a little bar on blowjob alley in Angeles City, the Philippines; once the site of the United States Clark Air Force Base, now one of the busiest and sleaziest sex tourist destinations in Southeast Asia. She lives in tremendous hope that someday, some foreigner will rescue her and take her to America. This heartfelt, poignant documentary sheds light on a difficult subject matter which is sensitively narrated by Kiefer Sutherland.

Who Cares follows the stories of Courtney and Shelly, two former Edmontonian prostitutes.

Filmmaker Michael Moore explores the roots of America's predilection for gun violence.

Based on actual events. Two killers walked into a bowling alley changing the lives of seven people & their families; shot multiple times and left for dead. 20 years later the town still seeks justice with the killers still on the loose.

An examination of modern forensic science. Of the more than 200 inmates exonerated by DNA testing since 2000, more than half were initially found guilty in part due to invalid and/or improperly utilized forensic science.

Narco Cultura (Spanish, English subtitles) takes viewers behind the scenes of narcocorridos, the most explosive and violent music subculture in America.

A look into the sex trade of children.

An epic West Coast adventure to the heart of the Emerald Triangle and America's #1 Cash Crop.

English In 1980s Miami, cocaine traffickers brought unprecedented violence. This story shows how Miami became the drug, murder and money center of America.

From PBS and Frontline: An estimated 80,000 Americans are in solitary confinement - even people who haven't committed violent crimes - sometimes for years, or even decades. Using extraordinary access to the segregation unit at the maximum security Maine State Prison, FRONTLINE examines America's use of solitary confinement - a practice U.S. prisons and jails resort to more than most other countries. Some prison officials see it as necessary to keep order and safety, but critics say it is inhumane and counterproductive. "Solitary Nation" is an extraordinarily rare and intimate view of life in solitary, through the stories of inmates living in isolation, the prison officers who keep them locked in, and a new warden who is re-thinking the practice and trying to reduce the number of inmates in solitary.

Revisit famous cases and explore the history of Scotland Yard, one of the world's oldest detective forces and a name synonymous with crime solving.

From PBS and Frontline: With unprecedented access, FRONTLINE investigates the impact of mass incarceration in America, focusing on a troubled housing project in Louisville, Kentucky, and a statewide effort to reverse the trend. There are some 2.3 million people behind bars in the U.S. today, but a disproportionate number come from a few city neighborhoods, and in some places the concentration is so dense that states are spending millions of dollars a year to lock up residents of single blocks. "Prison State" examines one community, Louisville's Beecher Terrace housing project, and follows the lives of four residents as they move in and out of custody, while Kentucky tries break that cycle and shrink its prison state.

Through archival footage Nicholson tells the story of the real Warriors that walked the streets of New York City in the 1970s and the harsh reality of gang life in a city that seemed to be falling apart.

'Our procedure has been always haunted by the ghost of the innocent man convicted. It is an unreal dream.' - Justice Learned Hand, 1923. The prospect of unjust imprisonment is a plight both easily imagined and terrifying, and we all wonder how we might fare in such a grim circumstance. No case in modern America illuminates this condition more completely than the story of Michael Morton. In 1986, his young wife was brutally murdered in front of their only child, and he was accused and convicted of the crime, spending a quarter century in Texas prisons. His unreal dream was and is a powerful journey through despair and abandonment to a greater freedom than most of us know, but all can appreciate.

Documentary depicting day to day life in Angola Prison mostly from an inmate's perspective. Interviews are with several inmates including one with a life sentence who is about to die.

Filmmaker Matthew Heineman examines the state of the ongoing drug problem along the U.S.-Mexican border.

In the early 1900's, the average medicine cabinet was a would-be poisoner's treasure chest.

A convicted murderer who has spent 23 years on Death Row tells his story.

From airlines to universities to parking lots, Ted Kaczynski terrorized America with explosives meant to spread his anti-tech message. This film tells the story of the investigation that tracked him down.

The story of programming prodigy and information activist Aaron Swartz, who took his own life at the age of 26.

Based on the real interview with Ted Bundy, a psychologist interviews a serial killer and asks him about the violent crimes he committed, what it's like to be on death row, and if he believes that he deserves the ultimate punishment in an attempt to have the killer confront himself and see his crimes for what they really are.

Interviews with family members, doctors and victims of 73-year-old Josef Fritzl, who held his daughter captive in a basement for 24 years and fathered seven children with her.

A look at James 'Whitey' Bulger, one of the most infamous criminals in American history.