Podcasts by White Lies
On the morning of August 21, 1991, a group of Cuban detainees took over a federal prison in Talladega, Alabama, and demanded their freedom. But how did they get here? And what became of them after? In season two of NPR's Pulitzer-finalist show, we unspool a decades-long story about immigration, indefinite detention, and a secret list. It's a story about a betrayal at the heart of our country's ideals. And in charting a course to our current moment of crisis at the border, we expose the lies that bind us together.
Support in-depth storytelling that matters by subscribing to Embedded+ and unlock early access to new episodes and sponsor-free listening. Learn more at plus.npr.org/embedded
Further podcasts by NPR
Podcast on the topic Wahre Kriminalfälle
All episodes
The Excludables from 2023-03-16T10:00
In our final episode of the season, we start researching the names on the secret list of 2,746 Cuban excludables. What we find confirms many of our suspicions about the arbitrariness of how the U.S...
Listen
The Entry Fiction from 2023-02-16T11:00
When President Carter promised to welcome the men and women arriving on the Mariel boatlift with "an open heart and open arms," he had referred to them as refugees. But technically speaking, they w...
Listen
The Rumors from 2023-02-09T11:00
During our reporting, we heard one story over and over again: that Fidel Castro had emptied his prisons to fill the boatlift. It's a story that's been told so often and with such conviction that of...
Listen
The Boatlift from 2023-02-02T10:58
The story of the men on the roof didn't start with that prison takeover in 1991. It didn't start when they were detained in federal prisons. And it didn't start when the government made a secret li...
Listen
The Men on the Roof from 2023-01-26T14:00
It all started with a photograph. A photograph from 1991 of a prison takeover in rural Alabama. A photograph of a group of men on the roof of that prison holding a bedsheet scrawled with a message:...
Listen
Season 2: Trailer from 2023-01-24T14:00:46
In 1991, a group of men took over a federal prison in rural Alabama. But these men weren't prisoners, they were immigration detainees, all of them from Cuba. And none of them were serving time for ...
Listen
A Dangerous Kind Of Self-Delusion from 2019-06-25T04:00:58
In our final episode, we examine the legacy of the Rev. James Reeb's death. We speak both to his descendants and to those of one of his attackers, exploring how the trauma and the lies that followe...
Listen
Learn Not To Hear It from 2019-06-18T04:00:46
In Episode 6, we reveal the identity of the fourth man who participated in the attack on the Rev. James Reeb.
Listen
The X On The Map from 2019-06-11T04:00:51
In Episode 5, we search for the fourth attacker while digging into the murder of Jimmie Lee Jackson, a black civil rights activist who was murdered in Alabama just weeks before the Rev. James Reeb....
Listen
The Sphinx Of Washington Street from 2019-06-04T04:00:12
In Episode 4, we find a woman who says she knows who killed the Rev. James Reeb, because she was there. She's ready — for the first time in more than 50 years — to tell the truth about what she saw.
Listen
The Counternarrative from 2019-05-28T04:00:41
In Episode 3, we break down the conspiracy theory that emerged after the Rev. James Reeb's murder: that he was allowed to die or was killed because the civil rights movement needed a white martyr.
Listen
The Who And The What from 2019-05-21T04:00:24
In Episode 2, we unravel the aftermath of the Rev. James Reeb's murder: the arrest of three men and the defense brought at trial. We also track down the last living jurors.
Listen
The Murder Of The Rev. James Reeb from 2019-05-14T04:00
In 1965, the Rev. James Reeb was murdered in Selma, Ala. No one was ever held to account. We return to the town where it happened, searching for new leads in an old story.
Listen
Introducing White Lies from 2019-05-06T15:05:18
A new serialized podcast from NPR investigates a 1965 cold case. New episodes every Tuesday starting May 14.
Listen