Marcelle McDannel

Many people in Anchorage probably have not yet gotten to know a transgender person. Backers of Proposition 1 are counting on this.

Here’s a label I never thought would apply to me: June bride. Always a tomboy, I wasn’t the type of little girl who grew up dreaming of her wedding day, draping herself in her mother’s dresses to play bride. Maybe even as a preschooler I sensed there would be no “Mr. Right” in my future, … Continue reading Society, courts aren’t treating my wedding differently, but I was

OPINION: Alaska's bail statutes overtly discriminate against the poor and help waste millions of public dollars. Budget hawks in the Legislature should welcome the chance for reforms.

OPINION: The simplistic way we treat homeless people in Alaska and ignore the reasons they have nowhere to go is a moral failing, a stain on our entire community.

OPINION: Transcripts from the case of the Fairbanks Four show in vivid detail why police interrogation techniques usually used on adult suspects can produce false confessions when used on juveniles.

OPINION: Police are not the best at policing themselves; Alaska should have an independent council to investigate complaints.

OPINION: We can save lives and money if we help the victims of childhood sexual abuse heal and recover - otherwise we'll perpetuate a cycle of misery.

OPINION: Alaskans will pull together and make sacrifices, but it's hard take the hit when legislative majority leaders squander public money against Medicaid expansion.

OPINION: It's hard to do a cool legal analysis of the Supreme Court's same-sex marriage decision when that decision is a thunderbolt in your own life.

OPINION: Sen. Mike Dunleavy has just managed to take legislation designed to empower children against sexual abuse and turn it into something that actually undermines that objective.

OPINION: Most police are honest, dedicated public servants. But we should acknowledge that there have been enough instances of officers committing serious crimes in Alaska and then account for it in our policies.

OPINION: Getting rid of one local district attorney for enforcing a statewide policy is wrong. The Alaska Department of Law's bad policy shift in the wake of the shocking case of Jerry Active must be corrected.

OPINION: Drunk drivers are the most uniformly dangerous offenders to the broadest swath of the population, and the punishment should match that danger.

OPINION: Our system of justice is founded on the notion that an adversarial contest is ideal for ferreting out the truth, except when it comes to grand juries and their decisions about whether to charge someone with a crime.

OPINION: The rules that grand juries must follow are practically designed to favor the prosecution, but when procedures aren't followed, everyone loses.