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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Police are building software systems to integrate their data flows 鈥� from cameras to license plate scanners and social media 鈥� to better identify threats and suspects. But there's a privacy backlash. -
The video, released by the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, outlines the chain of events leading up to the explosion at Tesoro's Anacortes Refinery that killed 7 people. -
The attorney general's view could make it easier for marijuana businesses to have bank accounts. But shop owners say they never doubted that banks want a cut of a billion-dollar industry. -
Bertha, the world's largest underground boring tool, ground to a halt late last year as it was tunneling under the city. Authorities still aren't sure what happened. -
A potent, syrupy extract of marijuana has become a popular way to ingest pot among young people, particularly in places where pot use has been liberalized. That has public safety officials worried, in part because making the substance can have explosive side effects.
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In Seattle, an underground mystery has halted the digging of a new highway tunnel underneath downtown. The world's largest tunneling machine ground to a halt two weeks ago, and engineers are still trying to figure out why.
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Colorado and Washington state are setting up legalized marijuana markets, and advocates are celebrating. But there are signs of discontent. Even a founder of a marijuana legalization group says there's a possibility of a popular backlash. -
The deadline to apply to legally grow and sell pot is coming up in Washington, but growers are finding there are pros and cons to going legit. Applicants must invest big money to qualify for a license, and it's unclear what the new system will mean for existing medical growers. -
The U.S. landline network was once the best in the world. But these days, phone companies see them as a burden, an old technology too expensive to maintain. AT&T wants to start replacing the system with cheaper options. Some call it a hasty abandonment of the tried-and-true traditional network. -
The "no" campaign appears to have an insurmountable lead in early counts with 54 percent of votes.
