In January 1923, the Black town of Rosewood, Florida was surrounded, burned, and erased after a white woman accused a Black man of assault—an accusation never proven and never investigated. Over the course of several days, white mobs hunted residents, destroyed homes and churches, and forced families to flee into swamps and forests to survive. When it was over, Rosewood no longer existed—and no one was held accountable.

In this episode of When Killers Get Caught, Brittany Ransom examines the Rosewood Massacre, one of the most devastating and least discussed acts of racial violence in American history. We break down how false accusations, racial hysteria, and government inaction led to the destruction of an entire Black community, why official death tolls never matched survivor testimony, and how the state of Florida failed to protect its own citizens.

This episode is part of a Black History Month series exploring violence against Black Americans, alongside the Tulsa Race Massacre, the murder of Emmett Till, and the assassination of Fred Hampton. Though Rosewood was buried for decades, survivors eventually forced the truth into the light—leading to a rare moment of accountability when Florida acknowledged its role and paid reparations.

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Music featured in this podcast is used with permission from Myuu.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://spoti.fi/1Uda2ci

In this episode, Brittany Ransom investigates the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, one of the deadliest and most deliberately obscured acts of racial violence in American history. What happened in Greenwood, often called Black Wall Street, was not a riot, it was a coordinated assault that left as many as 300 Black residents dead, more than 35 city blocks destroyed, and over 10,000 people homeless.

Early reports falsely minimized the devastation. Decades later, survivor testimony and official investigations revealed a very different truth: white mobs looted and burned Greenwood block by block, while airplanes flew overhead, dropping incendiary devices and firing into the neighborhood. Homes, churches, schools, hospitals, and businesses were reduced to ashes in less than two days.

More than 1,200 homes were burned, with property losses exceeding $1.5 million in 1921—the equivalent of tens of millions today. Insurance companies refused to pay claims. Families were forced into Red Cross tents through the winter. City officials worked to bury the evidence and erase the crime from public memory.

This episode confronts the uncomfortable reality that the perpetrators were never held accountable, and asks what it means when a mass killing goes unpunished.

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Now Active: Subscription-Only Content.Have a case, story, or idea you’d like us to explore? Submit it to ⁠⁠CaseCloserSubmissions@gmail.com⁠⁠ and be part of the discussion.

Music featured in this podcast is used with permission from Myuu.⁠⁠⁠⁠https://spoti.fi/1Uda2ci

Every time a Black person is killed, the lie arrives faster than the facts.

He had a gun. He was high. She was threatening.

In this alternative episode of When Killers Get Caught, Brittany Ransom steps away from a traditional case to examine a pattern that stretches from Emmett Till to the present day and why the phrase “they’re killing Americans now” is landing as confirmation, not concern, for Black Americans and other marginalized communities.

This episode explores how state violence has historically been justified through dehumanization, fear, and selective citizenship. From Indigenous displacement and slavery to policing, internment, mass detention, and modern use-of-force narratives.

Drawing on history, law, and the warnings of James Baldwin, this episode asks a difficult but necessary question: Who is recognized as fully human, and when does injustice finally “count”?

This is not about partisanship. It’s about citizenship, power, and the cost of a system that teaches itself how to look away.

Content warning: This episode discusses state violence, racism, and historical trauma.Sources for this episode include U.S. Supreme Court decisions, federal legislation, Department of the Interior reports, and the work of James Baldwin, Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Michelle Alexander, Erika Lee, and other historians and legal scholars.

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Coming February 2026: Subscription-Only Content.Have a case, story, or idea you’d like us to explore? Submit it to ⁠⁠CaseCloserSubmissions@gmail.com⁠⁠ and be part of the discussion.

Music featured in this podcast is used with permission from Myuu.⁠⁠⁠⁠https://spoti.fi/1Uda2ci