Stephen Bright and James Kwak, "The Fear of Too Much Justice: Race, Poverty, and the Persistence of Inequality in the Criminal Courts" (The New Press, 2023)
Glenn Ford, a Black man, spent thirty years on Louisiana\u2019s death row for a crime he did not commit. He was released in 2014\u2014and given twenty dollars\u2014when prosecutors admitted they did not have a case against him.\nFord\u2019s trial was a travesty. One of his court-appointed lawyers specialized in oil and gas law and had never tried a case. The other had been out of law school for only two years. They had no funds for investigation or experts. The prosecution struck all the Black prospective jurors to get the all-white jury that sentenced Ford to death.\nIn\xa0The Fear of Too Much Justice: Race, Poverty, and the Persistence of Inequality in the Criminal Courts\xa0(The New Press, 2023), legendary death penalty lawyer Stephen B. Bright and legal scholar James Kwak offer a heart-wrenching overview of how the criminal legal system fails to live up to the values of equality and justice. The book ranges from poor people squeezed for cash by private probation companies because of trivial violations to people executed in violation of the Constitution despite overwhelming evidence of intellectual disability or mental illness. They also show examples from around the country of places that are making progress toward justice.\nWith a foreword by Bryan Stevenson, who worked for Bright at the Southern Center for Human Rights and credits him for \u201c[breaking] down the issues with the death penalty simply but persuasively,\u201d\xa0The Fear of Too Much Justice\xa0offers a timely, trenchant, firsthand critique of our criminal courts and points the way toward a more just future.\n\nOmari Averette-Phillips is a History Educator and an Independent Scholar based in Southern California. He can be reached at omariaverette@gmail.com.\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices\nSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/law