Martin Kaste
Martin Kaste is a correspondent on NPR's National Desk. He covers law enforcement and privacy. He has been focused on police and use of force since before the 2014 protests in Ferguson, and that coverage led to the creation of NPR's Criminal Justice Collaborative.
In addition to criminal justice reporting, Kaste has contributed to NPR News coverage of major world events, including the 2010 earthquake in Haiti and the 2011 uprising in Libya.
Kaste has reported on the government's warrant-less wiretapping practices as well as the data collection and analysis that go on behind the scenes in social media and other new media. His privacy reporting was cited in the U.S. Supreme Court's 2012 United States v. Jones ruling concerning GPS tracking.
Before moving to the West Coast, Kaste spent five years as NPR's reporter in South America. He covered the drug wars in Colombia, the financial meltdown in Argentina, the rise of Brazilian president Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, and the fall of Haiti's president Jean Bertrand Aristide. Throughout this assignment, Kaste covered the overthrow of five presidents in five years.
Prior to joining NPR in 2000, Kaste was a political reporter for Minnesota Public Radio in St. Paul for seven years.
Kaste is a graduate of Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota.
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Walter Scott was laid to rest Saturday, as the Charleston community wrestles with his shooting death. Activists want reform, but others warn against letting the situation become "another Ferguson."
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A funeral was held Saturday in North Charleston, S.C., for Walter Scott, the man shot and killed while fleeing a police officer. That officer, Michael Slager, has been fired and charged with murder.
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A white police officer who shot and killed a black man after a weekend traffic stop was charged with murder in North Charleston, S.C., Tuesday. Officials said a video played a role in the decision.
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Police today are identifying fewer murder suspects than they did a generation ago. One criminologist says that may be because departments are more focused on preventing crimes than on making arrests. -
Several red states, including Louisiana, have been diverting some offenders away from prison and into drug treatment and other incarceration alternatives. But not everyone is embracing the effort. -
It's hard to know when to take violent language seriously online. But when Jonathan Hutson saw an anonymous threat to an unnamed school on Twitter, he couldn't let it go. -
Police have scanned millions of license plates around the country and can save the data on vehicle locations for later use. It's a helpful tool for policing, but critics say it's a threat to privacy. -
A police shooting of a homeless man in Pasco, Wash., is under investigation. Officers shot the man at a busy intersection after he was reportedly throwing rocks at cars. It was the town's fourth fatal police shooting in the past six months.
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The family of Kayla Mueller released a statement on Tuesday confirming her death while being held hostage by ISIS militants. Mueller's death raises questions about whether U.S. policies made it more difficult to save her.
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ISIS claims American hostage Kayla Mueller is dead. The U.S. government says that's unconfirmed. Still, her family is acknowledging for the first time that it is their daughter who's been held.
