Ep. 7 Dirty Information: The NYPD’s Shock Tactics and the death of Alberta Spruill
In 2004, New York narcotics officers raided Alberta Spruill’s home, shattering her door and detonating a flash grenade. Spruill, a 57-year-old city worker, went into cardiac arrest and died two hours later. The raid was based on faulty intel from a discredited informant, and the suspect they were searching for was already in custody. Spruill’s death came amid a surge in New York City Police Department raids, which had skyrocketed from 1,400 in the mid-’90s to over 5,000 by the time she was killed, nearly all no-knock.Despite repeated warnings that these reckless raids would end in tragedy, few listened. This episode of Collateral Damage, hosted by Radley Balko, explores how Spruill’s death catalyzed the political rise of Eric Adams, a young Black NYPD officer who would later become mayor. It also examines how promises of reform quickly faded, and the NYPD returned to business as usual.You can support our work at theintercept.com/join. Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a real difference. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Ep. 6 Airborne Imperialism: The Tragic Deaths of Veronica and Charity Bowers
Veronica and Charity Bowers, a young Christian missionary and her daughter, are killed when the Peruvian Air Force shoots down a small passenger plane in 2001. The plane had been mistaken for a drug smuggling plane and was shot down as part of a joint anti-drug agreement between the CIA and the Colombian and Peruvian governments.President Donald Trump has made the Bowers's deaths newly and urgently relevant since he began ordering the U.S. military to strike down alleged drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean in September 2025. By early November, the U.S. had launched a total of 17 strikes, killing at least 70 people, and those figures seem to grow almost by the day. The attacks are illegal under both U.S. and international law. The administration also provided no documentation of the alleged drug trafficking. The attack on the Bowers family pierced the veil that obscures drug war foreign policy because of their nationality, skin color, and relatability. More than 20 years ago, House Oversight Committee hearing members Jan Schakowsky and Elijah Cummings demanded accountability after U.S. drug interdiction forces killed the Bowers. They demanded to know how such a mistake could happen, and how we could prevent the loss of innocent life going forward.“The kind of action we saw in Peru … amounts to an extrajudicial killing,” said Schakowsky at the time. Cummings added, “The Peruvian shootdown policy would never be permitted as a domestic United States policy precisely because it goes against one of our most sacred, due process principles — namely, that all persons are presumed innocent until proven guilty.”Now, a new administration openly celebrates summary execution of alleged drug smugglers without a hint of due process, and is now threatening to topple another government to prevent the U.S. from sating its appetite for illicit drugs. The story of Veronica and Charity Bowers is a stark reminder of how aggressive drug policy is wasteful and futile, how we never seem to learn from past failures, and how the generations-long effort to stop people from getting high also — and necessarily — treats human lives as expendable.You can support our work at theintercept.com/join. Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a real difference. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Ep. 5 What Fourth Amendment? How the Killing of Trevon Cole Almost Made Prime-Time TV
In June 2010, Las Vegas police conducted a no-knock raid on Trevon Cole’s apartment, where he lived with his nine-months-pregnant fiancée. Cole, who occasionally sold small amounts of marijuana, rushed to the bathroom to flush a bag down the toilet. An officer followed and shot him in the head, killing him. Cole was unarmed. The officer claimed Cole made a “furtive” movement, but others present, including Cole’s fiancée, never heard any warning.Cole had no prior criminal record, but police secured the warrant by falsely linking him to a different Trevon Cole with a criminal history in Texas. Despite the clear misidentification and Cole’s lack of threat, a coroner’s inquest cleared the officer, who had previously shot two other men, killing one. This episode of Collateral Damage, hosted by Radley Balko, examines how the courts have failed to protect the Fourth Amendment in drug cases, featuring interviews with constitutional law scholars, Cole’s fiancée, and the daughter she was carrying during the raid, now a teenager.You can support our work at theintercept.com/join. Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a real difference. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Ep. 4 Criminalizing Care: The Remarkable Life and Cruel Death of Peter McWilliams
Peter McWilliams was an optimist, activist, poet, and advocate for personal freedom. His book “Ain’t Nobody’s Business If You Do: The Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in Our Free Country” resonated across the political spectrum. After contracting AIDS and being diagnosed with AIDS-related non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 1996, McWilliams turned to medical marijuana to manage his nausea and keep down his medication. He became a vocal advocate for medical cannabis, but in 1997, he was arrested by federal authorities for running a grow operation, despite California creating some protections for medicinal use at the time.As a condition of his bail, McWilliams was forced to stop using marijuana, even though it played a critical role in his treatment. He later died after choking on his own vomit, while awaiting sentencing by a federal judge. This episode of Collateral Damage explores McWilliams’s life and legacy, and examines how the drug war has obstructed health care. You can support our work at theintercept.com/join. Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a real difference. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Ep. 3 Blown Cover: The Preventable Murder of LeBron Gaither
When LeBron Gaither was 17, he got into an altercation with a staff member at his school that resulted in assault charges. As Gaither faced the possibility of a criminal record, a Kentucky State Police detective offered him a deal: Charges would go away if Gaither agreed to become a drug informant. At the time, such an agreement was illegal without consent from Gaither’s parents or guardian. But Gaither agreed. In 1996, Gaither’s body was found in the woods. Gaither had helped police build a case against a local drug dealer, and a grand jury member had tipped off the dealer that Gaither had testified against him. An autopsy revealed Gaither had been tortured before he was murdered. This episode revisits Gaither's case and others in which police were reckless and careless with the lives of those they pressured to become informants.You can support our work at theintercept.com/join. Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a real difference. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Collateral Damage is an investigative podcast series examining the half-century-long war on drugs, its enduring ripple effects, and the devastating consequences of building a massive war machine aimed at the public itself. Hosted by Radley Balko, an investigative journalist who has been covering the drug war and the criminal justice system for more than 20 years, each episode takes an in-depth look at someone who was unjustly killed in the drug war.The so-called “war on drugs” began as a metaphor to demonstrate the country’s fervent commitment to defeat drug addiction, but the “war” part quickly became all too literal, complete with helicopters, tanks, and suspension of basic civil liberties protections. All wars have collateral damage: the civilians, the noncombatants, the innocent people whose deaths are tragic but deemed necessary for the greater cause. Collectively, we’ve decided that the lives of these people were expendable — unfortunate but acceptable sacrifices for the impossible goal of a drug-free America. They are collateral damage, and these are their stories. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
USA