Canary

Country: USA

Number of Episodes: 7

Average Length: 30 minutes

Year of Release: 2020

Created by: The Washington Post

In 2013 a District of Columbia woman is sexually assaulted. The perpetrator is not charged with a felony and when convicted of his offences receives a surprisingly lenient sentence. The victim speaks out and her public outrage reaches another woman in Birmingham, Alabama. The story of the DC woman stirs something in her which propels her to come forward with her own decades-old story of sexual assault, committed by the very judge who handed down that lenient sentence in DC. The journalist and host, Amy Brittain, seeks to uncover the facts of the Alabama woman's story and corroborate her version of events. The podcast takes its name from the expression "a canary in the coalmine" referring to a harbinger of danger or failure, which Brittain hears used to describe the Alabama woman. The parallel isn't immediately apparent, but as you listen the relevance of the analogy becomes ever more clear and prescient. This podcast shows how investigative journalism should be done - thoroughly, sensitively, and with thought and reflection. Beautiful reporting and storytelling.