Book Selections

Is the Death Penalty Dying? provides a careful analysis of the historical and political conditions that shaped death penalty practice on both sides of the Atlantic from the end of World War II to the twenty-first century. This book examines and assesses what the United States can learn from the European experience with capital punishment, especially the trajectory of abolition in different European nations. As a comparative sociology and history of the present, the book seeks to illuminate the way death penalty systems and their dissolution work, by means of eleven chapters written by an interdisciplinary group of authors from the United States and Europe. This work will help readers see how close the United States is to ending capital punishment and some of the cultural and institutional barriers that stand in the way of abolition.

The phenomenal growth of penal confinement in the United States in the last quarter of the twentieth century is still a public policy mystery. Why did it happen when it happened? What explains the unprecedented magnitude of prison and jail expansion? Why are the current levels of penal confinement so very close to the all-time peak rate reached in 2007? What is the likely course of levels of penal confinement in the next generation of American life? Are there changes in government or policy that can avoid the prospect of mass incarceration as a chronic element of governance in the United States? This study is organized around four major concerns: What happened in the 33 years after 1973? Why did these extraordinary changes happen in that single generation? What is likely to happen to levels of penal confinement in the next three decades? What changes in law or practice might reduce this likely penal future?

"Beginning in Africa and ending in Europe, Incarceration Nations is a first-person odyssey through the prison systems of the world. Professor, journalist, and founder of the Prison-to-College-Pipeline, Dreisinger looks into the human stories of incarcerated men and women and those who imprison them, creating a jarring, poignant view of a world to which most are denied access, and a rethinking of one of America's most far-reaching global exports: the modern prison complex. From serving as a restorative justice facilitator in a notorious South African prison and working with genocide survivors in Rwanda, to launching a creative writing class in an overcrowded Ugandan prison and coordinating a drama workshop for women prisoners in Thailand, Dreisinger examines the world behind bars with equal parts empathy and intellect. She journeys to Jamaica to visit a prison music program, to Singapore to learn about approaches to prisoner reentry, to Australia to grapple with the bottom line of private prisons, to a federal supermax in Brazil to confront the horrors of solitary confinement, and finally to the so-called model prisons of Norway. Incarceration Nations concludes with climactic lessons about the past, present, and future of justice."--Publisher's description.

This volume specifically examines current concerns about imprisoned fathers and highlights best practices with a group of children and parents who present significant vulnerabilities. It brings together contemporary works in this area, to share and consolidate knowledge, to encourage comparisons and collaborations across jurisdictions, and to stimulate debate, all with the aim of furthering knowledge and improving practice in this area.

TheI Know This to Be True series is a collection of extraordinary figures from diverse backgrounds answering the same questions, as well as sharing their compelling stories, guiding ideals, and insightful wisdom. Bryan Stevenson has committed his career to fighting wrongful convictions, systemic poverty, and mass incarceration--here, he shares the lessons he's learned throughout his life. Stories include how his slave ancestry shaped his childhood, how a poignant conversation with a death row inmate impacted his work, and why he believes the worst thing that happens to a person shouldn't define their life. * Bryan Stevenson is one of today's most influential social justice attorneys and author of the bestselling bookJust Mercy * This book is an encouraging road map for aspiring activists and anyone who believes in second chances * The landmark book series brims with messages of leadership, courage, compassion, and hope Inspired by Nelson Mandela's legacy and created in collaboration with the Nelson Mandela Foundation,I Know This to Be True is a global series of books created to spark a new generation of leaders. This series offers encouragement and guidance to graduates, future leaders, and anyone hoping to make a positive impact on the world. * Royalties from sales of the series support the free distribution of material from the series to the world's developing economy countries * A highly giftable and lovely hardcover with vivid photographic portraits throughout * Great for those who lovedLetters of Note: An Eclectic Collection of Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience by Shaun Usher,Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela by Nelson Mandela, andJust Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson

When can a state give political support to a military intervention in another state? The Government of the Netherlands commissioned an international Expert Group composed of eminent members from the fields of international law, international relations and diplomacy. The Expert Group's objective was to examine this complex, topical and time-sensitive question and to consider whether the government should press for international acceptance of humanitarian intervention as a new legal basis for the use of force between states in exceptional circumstances. This volume is the result of those efforts. The Expert Group was led by Professor Cyrille Fijjnaut and consisted of Mr. Kristian Fischer, Professor Terry Gill, Professor Larissa van den Herik, Professor Martti Koskenniemi, Professor Claus Kreß, Mr. Robert Serry, Ms. Monika Sie Dhian Ho, Ms. Elizabeth Wilmshurst and Professor Rob de Wijk. Their thorough analysis and recommendations offer important insights that can aid governments in formulating a position on political support for the use of force between states and humanitarian intervention. The volume also constitutes a useful tool for scholars and practitioners in considering these difficult and important issues. From the Foreword by Stef Blok, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands:"The Expert Group's thorough analysis and recommendations on this complex subject offer important insights that can aid the government in formulating its position on political support for the use of force between states and humanitarian intervention. In drawing up this advisory report the Expert Group has helped the government develop a new, contemporary vision on these issues...."

"America's first known system of law enforcement was established more than 350 years ago. Today law enforcement faces issues such as racial discrimination, use of force, and Body Worn Camera (BWC) scrutiny. But the birth and development of the American police can be traced to a multitude of historical, legal and political-economic conditions. [This book] traces how and why law enforcement agencies evolved and became permanent agencies; looking logically through history and offering potential steps forward that could make a difference without triggering unconstructive backlash."--

First hand accounts, supplemented by the writing of noted experts, explore the psychological, legal, ethical, and political dimensions of solitary confinement.

A seminal work, this is a unique book in that it provides personal accounts from prisoners telling what it is really like to live in prison as well as historical and contextual information. It is the personal stories, which provide a realistic and poignant look at what life is like as a prisoner, that are the strength of this book.

A Chicago Cook County Jail chaplain and mass-incarceration sociologist examines the lifelong realities of a criminal record, demonstrating how America's justice system is less about rehabilitation and more about structured disenfranchisement.

Documents the true story of one of the longest wrongful imprisonment cases in U.S. history, detailing how three African-American men were incarcerated for nearly four decades before a questionable witness recanted his testimony.;"From award-winning investigative journalist Kyle Swenson, the true story of one of the longest wrongful imprisonments in the United States to end in exoneration, and a critical social and political history of Cleveland, the city that convicted them. In the early 1970s, three African-American men--Wiley Bridgeman, Kwame Ajamu, and Rickey Jackson--were accused and convicted of the brutal robbery and murder of a man outside of a convenience store in Cleveland, Ohio. The prosecution's case, which resulted in a combined 106 years in prison for the three men, rested on the testimony of a twelve-year-old boy from the neighborhood. Almost four decades later, the eyewitness recanted his testimony, and the convictions of Wiley, Kwame, and Rickey were overturned. But while their exoneration may have ended one of American history's most disgraceful miscarriages of justice, the corruption and decay of the city responsible for their imprisonment remain. Interweaving dramatic details of the case with his own research into Cleveland's history, award-winning journalist Kyle Swenson reveals how decades of bad policy and policing were often catastrophic for the city' most vulnerable citizens. Good Kids, Bad City is a work of astonishing empathy and insight: an immersive exploration of systemic racism in America, the struggling Midwest, and how lives lost to incarceration can be recovered."--Jacket.

Since 1980, the number of people in U.S. prisons has increased more than 450%. Despite a crime rate that has been falling steadily for decades, California has led the way in this explosion, with what a state analyst called "the biggest prison building project in the history of the world." Golden Gulag provides the first detailed explanation for that buildup by looking at how political and economic forces, ranging from global to local, conjoined to produce the prison boom.

"Rapping urges us to understand that meaningful criminal justice reform requires a cultural transformation, and that public defenders, serving as the voice of impacted communities, must be at the center of this effort"--

"In the United States today, one in every 31 adults is under some form of penal control, including one in eleven African American men. How did the "land of the free" become the home of the world's largest prison system? Challenging the belief that America's prison problem originated with the Reagan administration's War on Drugs, Elizabeth Hinton traces the rise of mass incarceration to an ironic source: the social welfare programs of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society at the height of the civil rights era. Johnson's War on Poverty policies sought to foster equality and economic opportunity. But these initiatives were also rooted in widely shared assumptions about African Americans' role in urban disorder, which prompted Johnson to call for a simultaneous War on Crime. The 1965 Law Enforcement Assistance Act empowered the national government to take a direct role in militarizing local police. Federal anticrime funding soon incentivized social service providers to ally with police departments, courts, and prisons. Under Richard Nixon and his successors, welfare programs fell by the wayside while investment in policing and punishment expanded. Anticipating future crime, policy makers urged states to build new prisons and introduced law enforcement measures into urban schools and public housing, turning neighborhoods into targets of police surveillance. By the 1980s, crime control and incarceration dominated national responses to poverty and inequality. The initiatives of that decade were less a sharp departure than the full realization of the punitive transformation of urban policy implemented by Republicans and Democrats alike since the 1960s"--Provided by publisher.

"In this powerful and insightful book, Andrea D. Lyon explicates what is wrong with the criminal justice system through clients' stories and historical perspective, and makes the compelling case for the need for reform at the center of the system; not just its edges. Lyon, suggests that we need someone who represents the poor and disenfranchised. Someone who has a seat at the table for any discussions of policy, funding, or priorities in the administration of justice. The United States needs a Defender General"--

"In March of 2011, Howard University sponsored an Alternative Spring Break trip to Chicago where law students worked with me to create several lessons in constitutional law for middle schoolers. The lesson on policing teaches civilians the constitutional limits on police power. Sometimes referred to as "Street Law," I call the training Know Your Rights. It was a huge hit with middle school students and teachers, and became the genesis for Know Your Rights trainings in other venues. I will never forget Raven and Stanley, the two Howard students volunteering in Chicago who wrote the first drafts of skits we performed, and found ways to connect with the middle school students we taught. When another teacher brought her class to hear the two firebrands, doubling Raven and Stanley's class size, Raven even stood on a chair to be heard"--

Provides a critical understanding and evaluation of police tactics and the use of force Police violence has historically played an important role in shaping public attitudes toward the government. Community trust and confidence in policing have been undermined by the perception that officers are using force unnecessarily, too frequently, or in problematic ways. The use of force, or harm suffered by a community as a result of such force, can also serve as a flashpoint, a spark that ignites long-simmering community hostility. In Evaluating Police Uses of Force, legal scholar Seth W. Stoughton, former deputy chief of police Jeffrey J. Noble, and distinguished criminologist Geoffrey P. Alpert explore a critical but largely overlooked facet of the difficult and controversial issues of police violence and accountability: how does society evaluate use-of-force incidents? By leading readers through answers to this question from four different perspectives--constitutional law, state law, administrative regulation, and community expectations--and by providing critical information about police tactics and force options that are implicated within those frameworks, Evaluating Police Uses of Force helps situate readers within broader conversations about governmental accountability, the role that police play in modern society, and how officers should go about fulfilling their duties.

"The problem is not police training, police diversity, or police methods. The problem is the dramatic and unprecedented expansion and intensity of policing in the last forty years, a fundamental shift in the role of police in society. The problem is policing itself"--Cover.;"Recent years have seen an explosion of protest and concern about police brutality and repression--especially after long-held grievances in Ferguson, Missouri, erupted in months of violent protest following the police killing of Brown. Much of the conversation has focused on calls for enhancing police accountability, increasing police diversity, improving police training, and emphasizing community policing. Unfortunately, none of these is likely to produce results, because they fail to get at the core of the problem. The problem is policing itself--the dramatic expansion of the police role over the last forty years. This book attempts to jog public discussion of policing by revealing the tainted origins of modern policing as a tool of social control and demonstrating how the expanded role of the police is inconsistent with community empowerment, social justice--even public safety. Drawing on first-hand research from across the globe, Alex Vitale shows how the implementation of alternatives to policing, like drug legalization, regulation, and harm reduction instead of the policing of drugs, has led to reductions in crime, spending, and injustice"--Provided by publisher.

"In 2002, the Supreme Court decided Atkins v. Virginia, opening the door to the Court's application of the Eighth Amendment on an almost annual basis - Roper v. Simmons (2005), Kennedy v. Louisiana (2007), Baze v. Rees (2008), Graham v. Florida (2010), Brown v. Plata (2011), Miller v. Alabama (2012), Hall v. Florida (2014), Glossip v. Gross (2015), Moore v. Texas (2017), Bucklew v. Precythe (2019), Timbs v. Indiana (2019), Kahler v. Kansas (2019-20 term), and Mathena v. Malvo (2019-20 term). These decisions generated a number of interesting conversations and papers by many of the contributors to this book. Some particularly memorable conversations included a SEALS panel in the summer of 2011 in Hilton Head, South Carolina, with John Stinneford and Corinna Lain; a Law & Society panel in Boston, Massachusetts in 2013 with Rick Bierschbach and Beth Colgan; a Law & Society panel in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 2014 with Richard Frase; an AALS panel in 2016 in New York City with Corinna Lain, Debby Denno, and Eric Berger; and a Law & Society panel in Washington, DC in 2019 with Corinna Lain and John Bessler. And of course, we should mention the SEALS panel we had in August 2018 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida with many of the contributors in preparation for this volume: Rick Bierschbach, Mike Mannheimer, Debby Denno, John Bessler, Corinna Lain, John Stinneford, and Cara Drinan"--

"Driving While Brown is a saga and a warning. Two investigative journalists spent several years chronicling the human consequences of Sheriff Joe Arpaio's relentless immigration enforcement in Maricopa County, Arizona. They tell the tale of two dueling movements--Arizona's restrictionist cause embraced by Joe Arpaio and the Latino resistance that rose up against him. This inside story of the wrenching battles that embittered and divided Arizonans offers a fresh perspective on the roots of the Trump administration's national crusade against immigrants. The narrative follows activist Lydia Guzman, who paid a steep personal price for gathering evidence in a landmark racial-profiling lawsuit that took surprising twists and stunned the nation. The daughter of a Mexican immigrant, Guzman was one voice in the Latino-led resistance--a coalition of men and women of different generations united in their unfaltering resolve to stop Arpaio, reform unconstitutional law enforcement, and fight for their civil rights. Driving While Brown documents Arpaio's transformation from 'America's Toughest Sheriff,' who forced jail inmates to wear pink underwear, into the nation's most notorious immigration enforcer. A polarizing figure in recent American history, the sheriff was celebrated by a national fan base even as he became a symbol of white supremacy to his foes. After being found guilty of a crime tied to disobeying a federal judge, Arpaio was pardoned by his friend, Donald Trump. In Driving While Brown, Terry Greene Sterling and Jude Joffe-Block immerse readers in the lives of people on both sides of this tense narrative. The result of tireless investigative reporting, their book provides critical insights into effective resistance to entrenched, institutionalized racism in law enforcement"--

'Doing Justice, Preventing Crime' lays normative and empirical foundations for building new, more just, and more effective systems of sentencing and punishment in the 21st century. The overriding goals are to prevent crime while treating people convicted of crimes justly, fairly, and even-handedly; to take sympathetic account of the circumstances of peoples' lives; and to punish no one more severely than he or she deserves. Michael Tonry discusses philosophy and punishment theory, surveys what is known about the deterrent, incapacitative, and rehabilitative effects of punishment, and explains what needs to be done to move from an ignoble present to a better future.

"Powerful, wry essays offering modern takes on a primitive practice, from one of our most widely read death penalty abolitionists"--

Since 1996, death sentences in America have declined by more than 60 percent, reversing a generation-long trend toward greater acceptance of capital punishment. In theory, most Americans continue to support the death penalty. But it is no longer seen as a theoretical matter. Prosecutors, judges, and juries across the country have moved in large numbers to give much greater credence to the possibility of mistakes - mistakes that in this arena are potentially fatal. The discovery of innocence, documented in this book through painstaking analyses of media coverage and with newly developed methods, has led to historic shifts in public opinion and to a sharp decline in use of the death penalty by juries across the country. A social cascade, starting with legal clinics and innocence projects, has snowballed into a national phenomenon that may spell the end of the death penalty in America.

This vital addition to carceral, prison, and disability studies draws important new links between deinstitutionalization and decarceration Prison abolition and decarceration are increasingly debated, but it is often without taking into account the largest exodus of people from carceral facilities in the twentieth century: the closure of disability institutions and psychiatric hospitals. Decarcerating Disability provides a much-needed corrective, combining a genealogy of deinstitutionalization with critiques of the current prison system. Liat Ben-Moshe provides groundbreaking case studies that show how abolition is not an unattainable goal but rather a reality, and how it plays out in different arenas of incarceration-antipsychiatry, the field of intellectual disabilities, and the fight against the prison-industrial complex. Ben-Moshe discusses a range of topics, including why deinstitutionalization is often wrongly blamed for the rise in incarceration; who resists decarceration and deinstitutionalization, and the coalitions opposing such resistance; and how understanding deinstitutionalization as a form of residential integration makes visible intersections with racial desegregation. By connecting deinstitutionalization with prison abolition, Decarcerating Disability also illuminates some of the limitations of disability rights and inclusion discourses, as well as tactics such as litigation, in securing freedom. Decarcerating Disability's rich analysis of lived experience, history, and culture helps to chart a way out of a failing system of incarceration.

From the author of the national bestseller Dead Man Walking comes a brave and fiercely argued new book that tests the moral edge of the debate on capital punishment: What if we’re executing innocent men? Two cases in point are Dobie Gillis Williams, an indigent black man with an IQ of 65, and Joseph Roger O’Dell. Both were convicted of murder on flimsy evidence (O’Dell’s principal accuser was a jailhouse informant who later recanted his testimony). Both were executed in spite of numerous appeals. Sister Helen Prejean watched both of them die.As she recounts these men’s cases and takes us through their terrible last moments, Prejean brilliantly dismantles the legal and religious arguments that have been used to justify the death penalty. Riveting, moving, and ultimately damning, The Death of Innocents is a book we dare not ignore.

Selected letters from Incarcerated Persons requesting books from Books to Prisoners, a Prison Book Program

In 1982, Sister Helen Prejean became the spiritual advisor to Patrick Sonnier, the convicted killer of two teenagers who was sentenced to die in the electric chair of Louisiana’s Angola State Prison. In the months before Sonnier’s death, the Roman Catholic nun came to know a man who was as terrified as he had once been terrifying. She also came to know the families of the victims and the men whose job it was to execute—men who often harbored doubts about the rightness of what they were doing. Out of that dreadful intimacy comes a profoundly moving spiritual journey through our system of capital punishment. Here Sister Helen confronts both the plight of the condemned and the rage of the bereaved, the fears of a society shattered by violence and the Christian imperative of love. On its original publication in 1993, Dead Man Walking emerged as an unprecedented look at the human consequences of the death penalty. Now, some two decades later, this story—which has inspired a film, a stage play, an opera and a musical album—is more gut-wrenching than ever, stirring deep and life-changing reflection in all who encounter it.

"The job of the exert witness is to offer opinions about a case based on a subjective understanding and analysis of the evidence. It is the nature of litigation that the opposing side will always dispute those opinions and offer their own counter-opinions. The opinions offered in this book about the cases discussed have all previously been disclosed in publicly available expert witness reports and court documents. They are just that, opinions. Only a Judge or Jury can rule on the ultimate issue of guilt or innocence"--

Dead Certainty is about the challenge of judging matters of public concern without a common sense of the good or other shared criteria that validate final decisions. Examining both the philosophical and the practical aspects of this challenge, this book focuses on United States Supreme Court opinions that authorize and regulate the practice of sentencing people to death. Unlike other books that discuss capital punishment, it does not argue for or against the death penalty. Instead, Dead Certainty contributes to a larger project in contemporary political and legal philosophy: re-imagining how people in today's world give coherence and meaning to their shared experience. Culbert's work will be of interest to scholars of political theory, jurisprudence, law and society, rhetoric, continental philosophy, and ethics.

Criminal (In)Justice: A Critical Introductiontakes an unflinching look at the American criminal justice system and the social forces that affect the implementation of justice. Author Aaron Fichtelberg uses a unique, critical perspective to introduce readers to criminal justice and encourages them to look closer at the intersection of race, class, gender, and inequality in the criminal justice system. Covering each of the foundational areas of the criminal justice system--policing, courts, and corrections--this book takes an in-depth look at the influence of inequality, making it ideal for those who want to critically assess and understand the American criminal justice system.