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How Fyodor Dostoyevsky predicted the 'true crime' craze

Dostoyevsky wrote about crime (in both his fiction and journalism) as a way to uncover the lapses and deficiencies

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Jennifer Wilson | NYT
The “true crime” genre, spurred by podcasts like Serial and shows like Netflix’s Making a Murderer, doesn’t seem to be slowing. That’s welcome news for those who seek criminal justice reform. The genre is increasingly framed as reformist, with critiques of police abuses, overzealous prosecutions and mass incarceration playing central roles.
 
Earlier this month, the Peabody Award-winning podcast In the Dark announced that its second season would focus on the story of Curtis Flowers, a black man in Mississippi sentenced to death for murder after being tried by a prosecutor who reportedly had ties to a white supremacist organisation.