This is another of those books that I want to review simply by saying it’s a vital read, and you should go pick it up. End of review.
Of course I will try to go into more detail, because that’s not very persuasive. But it’s hard to know where to start. This book is written by a civil rights lawyer who has spend his career defending and working to save wrongly convicted prisoners on death row. He also worked on cases where children were tried as adults and imprisoned for the rest of their lives without the possibility of parole.
This book looks at the reasons he does this important work by introducing us to many of the clients he has had over the years. In doing so, he puts several faces on the issues and renders them both more immediate and more personal. He tells us not only the facts of the cases that put his clients in jail, but the context in which their crimes (or alleged crimes) occurred, and the relevant factors – childhood abuse, mental health issues, addiction, manipulation, racism – that helped to create the setting for the crime and sentencing. He examines the cultural and political climates that created biases in the police work done to build a case, the jury who were selected to hear it and the way the judge chose to rule. But he also presents cases where some of those responsible began to consider these factors and question their own assumptions and actions. He shows that everyone deserves the opportunity to change and grow. He is patient and kind, and he doesn’t give up on the humanity of anyone, even those who seem to have little of it.
Though this book discusses cases mainly from the 1980s and ’90s, it seems like one that fits into current discussions of prison reform and institutionalized racism seamlessly. It raises so many issues vital to our understanding of the problems the US justice system is plagued by, and looks at some of the ways it needs to be changed. A few of the major points (aside from biases leading to false arrests and convictions) are providing competent lawyers to those who don’t have the money to pay for them, ensuring that juries are truly representative of the communities they set out to represent, considering the context and lives of those standing trial, providing mental health assessments and following through with treatment where it is needed and treating children as children.
While these cases are as old as I am, they serve to show, in chilling fashion, how little has really changed. I think that’s why this book is getting so much buzz six years after publication (and more than thirty after some of the cases he presents) – because, while we can hope that some of the societal and procedural injustice has been addressed, so often we hear and see that it has not. This book does an important thing: it invites us all to think about our assumptions, and to look at how the world might treat us if we were walking in someone else’s shoes. It invites us to talk about some of these issues, and to consider a wider view of a situation that may seem, on the surface, a simple one to figure out. In doing so it not only addresses the injustice in the American criminal justice system, but it helps readers see how similar assumptions, biases and outmoded concepts of culpability and punishment could be looked at with a more merciful eye. Because of this, I think every one of you should read this book, because I think it helps to encourage humanity, and combat prejudice. And couldn’t we all use a reminder of how important it is to see human beings rather than simple actions in our own day to day lives?
A powerful true story about the potential for mercy to redeem us, and a clarion call to fix our broken system of justice—from one of the most brilliant and influential lawyers of our time
Bryan Stevenson was a young lawyer when he founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a legal practice dedicated to defending those most desperate and in need: the poor, the wrongly condemned, and women and children trapped in the farthest reaches of our criminal justice system. One of his first cases was that of Walter McMillian, a young man who was sentenced to die for a notorious murder he insisted he didn’t commit. The case drew Bryan into a tangle of conspiracy, political machination, and legal brinksmanship—and transformed his understanding of mercy and justice forever.
Just Mercy is at once an unforgettable account of an idealistic, gifted young lawyer’s coming of age, a moving window into the lives of those he has defended, and an inspiring argument for compassion in the pursuit of true justice. – Goodreads
Book Title: Just Mercy
Author: Bryan Stevenson
Series: No
Edition: Paperback
Published By: Spiegel and Grau
Released: August 18, 2015 (First published October 14, 2014)
Genre: Non-Fiction, US Legal System, Criminology, Sociology
Pages: 368
Date Read: December 7-20, 2019
Rating: 9/10
Average Goodreads Rating: 4.64/5 (81,424 ratings)