Deels onderzoek en deels memoires, “You didn’t see nothin” volgt Yohance Lacour terwijl hij het verhaal herbeleeft dat hem introduceerde in de wereld van onderzoeksjournalistiek, en onderzoekt hoe de nasleep ervan zijn leven in de afgelopen kwarteeuw heeft gevormd. In 1997 werd Lenard Clark in een coma geslagen door een bende oudere blanke tieners, simpelweg omdat hij zwart was in een blanke buurt. Een van de aanvallers van Lenard kwam uit een machtige familie in Chicago. De media richtten zich al snel op verhalen van verzoening en raciale genezing, met medewerking van zwarte leiders en de familie van de aanvaller.
Yohance liet dit niet zomaar gebeuren. Ten tijde van de aanval was hij begin twintig, schreef hij toneelstukken, verkocht hij wiet en woonde hij bij zijn vader in het zuiden van Chicago. Niet in staat om stilzwijgend toe te kijken, begon hij samen te werken met een buurtkrant om de gruwelijke haatmisdaad te onderzoeken. Het verslag doen van het incident deed hem steeds meer vervreemd raken van de journalistiek.
The Pulitzer Prize and Peabody Award-winning “You Didn’t See Nothin” follows Yohance Lacour as he revisits the story that introduced him to the world of investigative journalism. Part investigation and part memoir, Yohance examines how its ripple effects have shaped his life over the past quarter-century.
In 1997, Lenard Clark was beaten into a coma by a gang of older white teens simply for being Black in a white neighborhood. One of Lenard’s attackers was from a powerful Chicago family. The media quickly turned towards stories of reconciliation and racial healing, with cooperation by Black leaders and the attacker’s family.
Yohance wasn’t having any of it.
At the time of the attack, he was in his early 20s, writing plays, selling weed, and living at his dad’s house on the South Side of Chicago. Unable to stand by silently, he began working with a neighborhood newspaper to investigate the vicious hate crime. Reporting on the incident led him to grow increasingly disillusioned with journalism.
From USG Audio and the Invisible Institute – creators of the 2020 Pulitzer Finalist podcast “Somebody” – “You Didn’t See Nothin” finds Yohance back in Chicago after a 10-year prison sentence, tracking down key players to examine how this story connects to our present moment.
Ear Hustle is prison slang for eavesdropping, and that’s what listening to the show feels like: a raw, often funny, and always surprising peek into the reality of life inside prison.
Hosts Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods co-created the show that launched in 2017 while Earlonne was incarcerated at San Quentin State Prison, where Nigel was a volunteer teaching photography. Since Earlonne’s release in 2018, the show has expanded to include stories from prisons across the state, including the California Institution for Women, as well as stories about getting out of prison and starting over, post-incarceration.
From finding romance, to grappling with a life sentence, to trying to parent via 15-minute phone calls, Ear Hustle stories deliver what This American Life host Ira Glass calls a “very real” and “untragic” take on prison life.
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