podcast
CNN Presents: Tortured Justice with Omar Jimenez
CNN Presents is the home for powerful, narrative-driven audio storytelling, featuring in-depth reporting from CNN journalists. The new season, Tortured Justice with Omar Jimenez, follows the story of James Gibson, who was tortured by the Chicago Police Department and sent to prison for 30 years for a crime he was later cleared of. In this three-part series, Jimenez tells the story of how a CPD unit nicknamed “The Midnight Crew” violently produced wrongful convictions, the toll it took on survivors like Gibson and if — even with a massive public reckoning — justice can ever really be served. Tortured Justice drops in this feed on September 17, 2025. Also in this feed: Persuadable with Donie O’Sullivan and All Over the Map with John King.
It’s 1989. James Gibson is back in Chicago for Christmas when he’s picked up by police on suspicion of murder. He will end up spending nearly 30 years in prison, convicted of a crime he’d one day be cleared of. That cold December night would spark a decades-long fight for justice — one that’s entwined in a dark legacy of torture perpetrated by Chicago police commander Jon Burge and his “Midnight Crew.”
This is part one of a three-part series. This episode contains descriptions of violence.
H...Show moreost: Omar Jimenez
Producers: Graelyn Brashear, Madeleine Thompson, Emily Williams, Kyra Dahring, Sofia Sanchez, and Lauren Kim
Editor: Lacy Roberts
Technical director: Dan Dzula
Executive producer of CNN Podcasts: Steve Lickteig
Production help from: Jake Sorgen, Joe DeCeault, David Guggenheim, and Jessica Pupovac
Sep 17, 2025
James Gibson’s story might never have seen the light of day if not for one man — maybe the unlikeliest imaginable. Andrew Wilson’s relentless legal battle exposed a decades-long pattern of torture by Chicago police and the cover up that hid it.
This is part two of a three-part series. This episode contains descriptions of violence, including sexual violence.
Host: Omar Jimenez
Producers: Graelyn Brashear, Madeleine Thompson, Emily Williams, Kyra Dahring, Sofia Sanchez, and Lauren Kim
Edito...Show morer: Lacy Roberts
Technical director: Dan Dzula
Executive producer of CNN Podcasts: Steve Lickteig
Production help from: Jake Sorgen, Joe DeCeault, David Guggenheim, Jessica Pupovac
Special thanks to: Ferlon Webster, Jr. and Ed Kelly
Sep 17, 2025
In the presence of torture, can real justice still exist? With the truth of torture under Chicago police commander Jon Burge and his detectives finally out in the open, the city and victims grapple with a terrible legacy, while James Gibson continues his struggle to clear his name and reclaim his life.
This is the conclusion of a three-part series. This episode includes descriptions of violence.
Host: Omar Jimenez
Producers: Graelyn Brashear, Madeleine Thompson, Emily Williams, Kyra Dahring...Show more, Sofia Sanchez, and Lauren Kim
Editor: Lacy Roberts
Technical director: Dan Dzula
Executive producer of CNN Podcasts: Steve Lickteig
Production help from: Jake Sorgen, Joe DeCeault, David Guggenheim, Jessica Pupovac, Miriam Annenberg, and Jordan Guzzardo
Special thanks to: Haley Thomas, Robert Mathers, Alex Manasseri, Jo Parker, Kate Carrol, Emma Lacey-Bordeaux, Frank LaMonte, Ferlon Webster Jr., Ed Kelly, and the Chicago Police Torture Archive
Journalist John Conroy and civil rights attorney Flint Taylor devoted years to ensuring the story of police torture in Chicago was heard. Their original reporting and fact-finding was essential to this series.
Sep 17, 2025
Imagine you were tortured by police and sent to prison for 30 years for a crime you didn’t commit. Is there anything that could make up for what was done to you? What would justice look like? Would it even be possible?
In a new series, CNN's Omar Jimenez tells the story of one of the darkest chapters in American policing history. For decades, a police commander on Chicago's South Side and the officers under him routinely tortured suspects, often extracting false confessions that saw dozens wrongfully convicted.
Chicago is still in the midst of a reckoning. And the costs are high. Listen to Tortured Justice September 17, 2025.
Trailer
If loneliness and social isolation are part of what pushes people down the rabbit hole, what’s the cure? CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan sits down with a cult survivor who explains why conspiracy theories can have such a powerful hold on believers, and he learns from a pair of documentary filmmakers who have a prescription for a fractured, lonely society.
Diane Benscoter is the founder of the nonprofit Antidote, and she's the author of Shoes of a Servant: My Unconditional Devotion To A Lie. You can listen to more of Donie's conversation with Diane on YouTube.
Pete Davis and Rebecca Davis are the directors and producers of the documentary Join or Die. You can learn more about their film here.
May 14, 2025
What would you do if the person closest to you woke up believing something that sounded completely crazy? That’s what happened to Stephen Ghiglieri when his then- fiancée, Katrina Vaillancourt, became a Q-Anon believer overnight. But their story is a hopeful one. In part two of Persuadable, CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan explores one route out of conspiracy theory belief.
Listen to more of Donie's conversation with Dr. Joe Pierre, author of False: How Mistrust, Disinformation, and Motivated Reasoning Make Us Believe Things That Aren’t True, on YouTube.
Read about Katrina Vaillancourt's book, ReQovery: How I Tumbled Down the QAnon Rabbit Hole and Climbed Out, here.
May 7, 2025
Conspiracy theories are not new. They’re as old as time itself. But if you feel like they’re everywhere right now, you’re not alone. So, what do you do when somebody you love has fallen down a rabbit hole? CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan has been covering the world of misinformation for more than a decade, but now he's less interested in what people believe than why they believe it. So, he’s trying to find out.
See more of Donie's interview with Dr. Samuel Veissière on YouTube.
Apr 30, 2025
As the dust settled in the wake of election day, the All Over the Map team started calling up some of the 86 swing-state voters John King has been visiting and revisiting over the last year and a half. Who they ultimately voted for — and why — offers a window on a country taking stock in the aftermath of an unprecedented election.
Nov 11, 2024
With just hours before election day, we’re returning to a handful of people who represent a crucial voter segment: unhappy Pennsylvania Republicans. John King interviews three people who voted for Nikki Haley in the state’s primary back in the spring — long after she’d dropped out. How they and others like them fill out their ballots this week may decide the next president of the United States.
Nov 4, 2024
Wisconsin and Michigan, the big bricks of the former Blue Wall, are considered must-wins for Kamala Harris. They’re also both toss-ups at this point. This week, John talks to voters in Milwaukee and Detroit who have a lot in common: They’re both Black men, about the same age, born and raised in their respective Rust Belt cities, and steeped in a culture that always voted for Democrats. One is voting for Harris. The other is going for Trump. Their choices — and how they got there — tell us a lot about the very tight election math in the upper Midwest.
Oct 28, 2024
