Chloe Jones

Grand Avenue thrift shop owner no longer facing eviction thanks to community support Edward Blackwell moved into his thrift store — which is slightly larger than a walk-in closet — on Feb. 4. He said he fell on hard times and couldn’t afford rent at his apartment and the business, and his business landlord said he could live at his store, the Giving Vine Thrift Store inside Desert Sun Plaza on Grand and 15th avenues. Sales slowed down, and even though Blackwell was able to stay afloat with a s

Kids, students and adults wore masks as they spun dreidels at tables placed six feet apart in Law Tigers Yard at Rohr Chabad House Jewish Student Center, each hoping to land on “gimel” — meaning they won all of the chocolate coins in the pot. It was the weekly Friday Shabbat dinner, where Arizona State University's Jewish community gathers to eat and rest from the week. In years past, Chanukah Shabbat dinner would attract over 100 people, but amid an early end to the college semester and a glob

Protestors gathered at the Sandra Day O'Connor U.S. Courthouse in downtown Phoenix to protest the planned confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett.

A protest calling for racial justice and equity began with mindful breathing, closed with a dance party and ended with seven arrests of protesters who were walking to their cars or already driving home Saturday evening. Earlier that evening, Lee Percy Christian — known as Percy — had given a speech to protesters about his experience being targeted by police. "We were in the streets, we were called civil disobedience, good trouble. But it's caused us to become targets," Christian said in the sp

Rae'Lee Klein, who was recently asked to step down as station manager for Arizona State University's student-run Blaze Radio, said she will not resign. Klein has taken to Twitter to show conservative politicians support her after she tweeted about Jacob Blake, a Black man who was paralyzed after Kenosha police officers shot him seven times in the back. Klein deleted and apologized for a tweet where she shared a New York Post article with the caption "Always more to the story, folks. Please rea

The child welfare and juvenile justice systems are meant to help the nation’s most vulnerable children, but the two are rarely in sync, and young people who have been part of both systems make up more than half of those who get in trouble with the law. “Once a child enters the child welfare system, the decisions made for that child by the child welfare system may, in fact, be pushing the kid towards juvenile justice,” said Denise Herz, a criminal justice professor at California State University, Los Angeles and one of the few researchers who has been studying so-called crossover kids, or dual-status youth, for years.

During the mid to late 1990s, a fear of violent youth crime swept the nation, fueled by inaccurate estimates from criminologists and media reports. A substantial rise in youth violent crime in the 1980s through early ‘90s prompted criminologist and then-Princeton University professor John DiIulio to write an article in 1995 predicting that a new breed of juveniles were going to terrorize the nation: “super-predators.” The youth violent crime rate began to significantly decrease that same year,

In most schools, the landmark Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education is taught as a major victory for reaching equality in education. The 1954 decision desegregated schools and united Black and white students under one roof. What they don’t mention is what the nation lost after Brown versus Board of Education, and how it laid the groundwork for the school-to-prison pipeline. In a 2019 study by Princeton University, researchers found that Black students were three times more likely to b

In response to an Instagram post showing support for Black Lives Matter demonstrators, GOP justice of the peace candidate Michael Irish wrote that it was “time to start putting these idiots in their place.” Irish, who is running to be a justice of the peace in the Moon Valley district in north Phoenix, also said that Black Americans were actually to blame for the police violence against George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Dion Johnson and others that sparked nationwide Black Lives Matter protests calling for an end to systemic racism in policing.

Several hundred protesters descended on Tempe Thursday afternoon demanding the city defund the police by about $22 million and instead use the money to fund affordable housing, preschool and transit programs. As the protesters marched, they chanted, “The strategy is to defund the police, the goal is to abolish the police, and the attitude is

It’s been a month since Juana stopped taking her key medication to treat the chronic vascular disease that attacks her immune system and debilitates her blood vessels. She has had three heart attacks in the past eight years. Without the medication, Juana said it’s only a matter of time before her symptoms — burning sensations in her legs and feet, severe fatigue and difficulty walking — come back. Without treatment, she could eventually suffer organ failure and die. Juana, who asked that her l

Becoming American takes more than an application. The process is long and arduous, and it comes with struggles in and between each step. Stories and photos by Chloe Jones, Cronkite News

PHOENIX – After nearly two decades, tens of thousands of calls and countless crises, a series of four calls broke Lauren Pacimeo. As a 911 dispatcher for the fire department, Pacimeo is trained to keep her composure on calls and always has. But in November, her 18 years in the dispatch room caught up with her. The first call was a battalion chief’s 14-year-old son with a fatal gunshot wound. Then she responded to a fire next to her aunt’s house. And after that, her friend dialed 911 when her s

People who live in Imperial Beach, California, in Naco and Nogales in Arizona and in Texas communities along the Rio Grande all say the same thing: When it rains, it stinks. The reason is a failing, aging network of pipes and wastewater treatment plants that run from Mexico into each of these communities. When heavy rains fall, the pipes often break and spill raw sewage on both sides of the border, causing not only a putrid odor but public health and environmental concerns...

‘The cellphone does everything’: Smartphones, internet access are key tools of 21st century migration LIMA, Peru – Many of the more than 700,000 Venezuelans who have fled to Peru have arrived with next to nothing: a backpack, perhaps, carrying a toothbrush, a change of clothes and, most important, a cellphone. For most, their phones are lifelines. “The Venezuelan has broken, has finished with that old adage that the best friend of man is the dog. For a Venezuelan, his best friend is the cellphone...

The first thing you see is a beautiful, well-kept park, but the first thing you notice is the crumbling road as your car jolts hitting one of the many potholes in the streets of Rillito. A large number of the homes are abandoned and the streets are littered with trash. “Rillito’s a good town, but it’s a forgotten town. It’s a good community. But if you on the freeway and you blink, and you driving by, you miss it,” said Robert Brown, a lifelong resident of Rillito, Arizona. The community is adjacent to...