The majority of Sankey diagrams I have come across so far show energy flow systems (see this post or this one) and material flow systems (my last post or this one). To a lesser extent the examples found on the web show flows of materials in process systems (e.g. a plant).
To show the number of people that have been accused of abuse of detainees in a Sankey diagram is a novel idea. The example below, originally published by the New York Times (and posted by Derek Cotter on Edward Tufte’s board ‘Ask E.T.’) features the distribution of the 600 cases and what the different outcomes were.
The poster of the comment does criticize the inadequate diagram and says that “it might as well have been a pie chart instead”, however, the use of a Sankey diagram does give a kind of time line or at least a line of the decisions taken in the juridical system.
Choosing gray as the color rather than making it a colorful Sankey does reflect the topic adequately, I think.
Guilty of Sankey abuse? Or acquitted?