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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It's getting harder for "wandering cops" — people who lose law enforcement certification in one state and get hired elsewhere. Many more departments are now performing interstate background checks
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A new analysis commissioned by DARPA quantifies how the decentralized tech that runs the currency system could be compromised. -
School police officers are trained in best practices for stopping an active shooter. The law requires it, and there's money to pay for it. And yet, that training seems to have failed in Uvalde, Texas.
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School police officers are trained in the best practices for stopping an active shooter. The law requires it, and there's money to pay for it. And yet, that training seems to have failed in Uvalde.
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Red Flag laws temporarily remove guns from owners who pose a danger to themselves or others. Several states have passed the laws in recent years, but research on their effectiveness is mixed.
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President Biden has marked the second anniversary of the murder of George Floyd by signing an executive order. It will set up some of the police reforms that stalled in Congress.
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The order will be signed Wednesday, the second anniversary of the murder of George Floyd while in police custody. But it only applies to federal law enforcement — not local forces
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Efforts by states to to raise the minimum age for buying a long rifle have been challenged in court by gun rights activists.
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The alleged Buffalo shooter, age 18, had no problems buying his semi-automatic rifle. Some states have tried to limit sales to those under 21. A new generation of conservative judges stand in the way.
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The California state senate voted to allow people who aren't United States citizens to be police. Some more conservative voices say government authority should be embodied by citizens.
