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Author: Gerhard Falk
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 0313383480
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 260
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Book Description
This critical yet honest appraisal of our criminal justice system addresses its strengths and its flaws—and makes recommendations for improvement. The American Criminal Justice System: How It Works, How It Doesn't, and How to Fix It calls attention to a criminal justice system that needs improvement. Author Gerhard Falk shows that the police themselves often violate the law; that prosecutors send innocent citizens to prison and even to death row; that defense attorneys take on cases they are not prepared to handle; that juries vote guilt or innocence on the basis of emotion, not facts; that judges are often failed attorneys or unscrupulous politicians; and that jails and prisons are too frequently warehouses of the poor. As background for his analysis, Falk discusses the history of the police, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and judges, as well as the history of prisons and "the prison industrial complex." He also offers a devastating analysis of the death penalty and its practitioners. The book ends with recommendations for the improvement of our criminal justice system so that America can truly be, as our Supreme Court proclaims, a land of "Equal Justice under Law."
Author: Gerhard Falk
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 0313383480
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 260
Get Book
Book Description
This critical yet honest appraisal of our criminal justice system addresses its strengths and its flaws—and makes recommendations for improvement. The American Criminal Justice System: How It Works, How It Doesn't, and How to Fix It calls attention to a criminal justice system that needs improvement. Author Gerhard Falk shows that the police themselves often violate the law; that prosecutors send innocent citizens to prison and even to death row; that defense attorneys take on cases they are not prepared to handle; that juries vote guilt or innocence on the basis of emotion, not facts; that judges are often failed attorneys or unscrupulous politicians; and that jails and prisons are too frequently warehouses of the poor. As background for his analysis, Falk discusses the history of the police, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and judges, as well as the history of prisons and "the prison industrial complex." He also offers a devastating analysis of the death penalty and its practitioners. The book ends with recommendations for the improvement of our criminal justice system so that America can truly be, as our Supreme Court proclaims, a land of "Equal Justice under Law."
Author: James B Bolen PhD
Publisher: Page Publishing Inc
ISBN: 1641386959
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 130
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Book Description
What war on drugs? Is our government complicit in the continued proliferation of the illegal drug trade in our nation? This supposed war on drugs has been ongoing for better than one hundred years with no apparent conclusion in sight. Perhaps we should entertain a new strategy to achieve ultimate victory in this never-ending conflict.Our criminal court system provides numerous avenues for offenders to eschew responsibility for their misdeeds. Overburdened criminal courts rely heavily u
Author: Chris W Surprenant
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000750523
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 222
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Book Description
American criminal justice is a dysfunctional mess. Cops are too violent, the punishments are too punitive, and the so-called Land of the Free imprisons more people than any other country in the world. Understanding why means focusing on color—not only on black or white (which already has been studied extensively), but also on green. The problem is that nearly everyone involved in criminal justice—including district attorneys, elected judges, the police, voters, and politicians—faces bad incentives. Local towns often would rather send people to prison on someone else’s dime than pay for more effective policing themselves. Local police forces can enrich themselves by turning into warrior cops who steal from innocent civilians. Voters have very little incentive to understand the basic facts about crime or how to fix it—and vote accordingly. And politicians have every incentive to cater to voters’ worst biases. Injustice for All systematically diagnoses why and where American criminal justice goes wrong, and offers functional proposals for reform. By changing who pays for what, how people are appointed, how people are punished, and which things are criminalized, we can make the US a country which guarantees justice for all. Key Features: Shows how bad incentives, not "bad apples," cause the dysfunction in American criminal justice Focuses not only on overincarceration, but on overcriminalization and other failures of the criminal justice system Provides a philosophical and practical defense of reducing the scope of what’s considered criminal activity Crosses ideological lines, highlighting both the weaknesses and strengths of liberal, conservative, and libertarian agendas Fully integrates tools from philosophy and social science, making this stand out from the many philosophy books on punishment, on the one hand, and the solely empirical studies from sociology and criminal science, on the other Avoids disciplinary jargon, broadening the book’s suitability for students and researchers in many different fields and for an interested general readership Offers plausible reforms that realign specific incentives with the public good.
Author: William J. Stuntz
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674051750
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 425
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Book Description
Rule of law has vanished in America’s criminal justice system. Prosecutors decide whom to punish; most accused never face a jury; policing is inconsistent; plea bargaining is rampant; and draconian sentencing fills prisons with mostly minority defendants. A leading criminal law scholar looks to history for the roots of these problems—and solutions.
Author: Paul Brakke
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781977606983
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 170
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Book Description
The sad truth is that the U.S. Criminal Justice System doesn't work for many different reasons -- from our overflowing prisons to the destructive war on drugs and disproportionate effect on minority communities to conflicts between police and citizens and problems with prosecutors and the courts. In FIXING THE U.S. CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM, author Paul Brakke provides an in-depth look from a conservative perspective at the many flaws in the system and how to fix them. The chapters in the book cover these topics: - why our criminal justice system is a national shame - how families suffer severe collateral damage - alleged misconduct by the police - how powerful prosecutors misbehave - when judges show bias and exceed their judicial power - how the media makes matters worse with their sensationalized coverage - nine prescriptions to fix our broken criminal justice system This is an important, break-through book that shows the damage of the system not only to individuals accused of crimes but to their families, the economy, and society as a whole.
Author: Charles E 'Chuck' MacLean
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000544109
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 172
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Book Description
Justice for All identifies ten central flaws in the criminal justice system and offers an array of solutions – from status quo to evolution to revolution – to address the inequities and injustices that far too often result in courtrooms across the United States. From the investigatory stage to the sentencing and appellate stages, many criminal defendants, particularly those from marginalized communities, often face procedural and structural barriers that taint the criminal justice system with the stain of unfairness, prejudice, and arbitrariness. Systematic flaws in the criminal justice system underscore the inequitable processes by which courts deprive citizens of liberty and, in some instances, their lives. Comprehensive in its scope and applicability, the book focuses upon the procedural and substantive barriers that often prohibit defendants from receiving fair treatment within the United States criminal justice system. Each chapter is devoted to a particular flaw in the criminal justice system and is divided into two parts. First, the authors discuss in depth the underlying causes and effects of the flaw at issue. Second, the authors present a wide range of possible solutions to address this flaw and to lead to greater equality in the administration of criminal justice. The reader is encouraged throughout to consider and assess all possible options, then defend their choices and preferences. Confronting these issues is critical to reducing racial disparities and guaranteeing Justice for all. Describing the problems and assessing the solutions, Justice for All does not identify all problems or all solutions, but will be of immeasurable value to criminal justice students and scholars, as well as attorneys, judges, and legislators, who strive to address the pervasive flaws in the criminal justice system.
Author: Kay Whitlock
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520343476
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 275
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Book Description
Introduction : world-making and "criminal justice reform" -- Correctional control and the challenge of reform -- Follow the money -- Criminalization, policing, and profiling -- The slippery slope of pretrial reform -- Courts, sentencing, and "diversion" -- Imprisonment and release -- Threshold.
Author: Alec Karakatsanis
Publisher: The New Press
ISBN: 1620975289
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 130
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Book Description
From an award-winning civil rights lawyer, a profound challenge to our society's normalization of the caging of human beings, and the role of the legal profession in perpetuating it Alec Karakatsanis is interested in what we choose to punish. For example, it is a crime in most of America for poor people to wager in the streets over dice; dice-wagerers can be seized, searched, have their assets forfeited, and be locked in cages. It's perfectly fine, by contrast, for people to wager over international currencies, mortgages, or the global supply of wheat; wheat-wagerers become names on the wings of hospitals and museums. He is also troubled by how the legal system works when it is trying to punish people. The bail system, for example, is meant to ensure that people return for court dates. But it has morphed into a way to lock up poor people who have not been convicted of anything. He's so concerned about this that he has personally sued court systems across the country, resulting in literally tens of thousands of people being released from jail when their money bail was found to be unconstitutional. Karakatsanis doesn't think people who have gone to law school, passed the bar, and sworn to uphold the Constitution should be complicit in the mass caging of human beings—an everyday brutality inflicted disproportionately on the bodies and minds of poor people and people of color and for which the legal system has never offered sufficient justification. Usual Cruelty is a profoundly radical reconsideration of the American "injustice system" by someone who is actively, wildly successfully, challenging it.
Author: Rachel Elise Barkow
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674919238
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 305
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Book Description
America’s criminal justice system reflects irrational fears stoked by politicians seeking to win election. Pointing to specific policies that are morally problematic and have failed to end the cycle of recidivism, Rachel Barkow argues that reform guided by evidence, not politics and emotions, will reduce crime and reverse mass incarceration.
Author: Paul Brakke
Publisher: American Leadership Books
ISBN: 9781949537048
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 236
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Book Description
Crime in America features selections from a series of six books Paul Brakke wrote on what's wrong with the criminal justice system and how to fix it. These books deal with the police, courts, and prisons, and consider of some of the crises now facing American society due to illegal immigration, the opioid crisis, and the growing divide between racial, ethnic, rural-urban, and income groups. This book summarizes the critical insights of these other books in order to reach the widest possible audience, because one of Brakke's reasons for writing this book is to inspire real change.The book is organized into five sections. Part I deals with crime, who commits it, and the police as our first line of defense. Part II deals with punishment and its consequences, including the swamped criminal justice system, the positive and negative results of incarceration, and the collateral damage to the families of those incarcerated. Suggested remedies are scattered throughout these first two sections. Then, Part III concentrates on specific solutions, emphasizing reducing the return of ex-cons to prison and the length of prison sentences. Part IV concentrates on our drug plague, and Part V deals with divisions in the nation, some raised in previous sections, that must be healed to make America great again.
