Just Mercy

Title: Just Mercy

Author: Bryan Stevenson

Genre: Criminology

PopSugar Reading Challenge Prompt: a book about a social justice issue

Of course I’ve heard of this book and subsequent movie, which I haven’t seen. But I know that it features a young lawyer trying to get a falsely convicted man out of prison. That’s the bare bones of this book, though. I had no idea this book was about prisons in general and how the criminal justice system fails so many people.

From Goodreads: An unforgettable true story about the potential for mercy to redeem us, and a clarion call to end mass incarceration in America — from one of the most inspiring lawyers of our time.

Bryan Stevenson was a young lawyer when he founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a nonprofit law office in Montgomery, Alabama, dedicated to defending the poor, the incarcerated, and the wrongly condemned.

Just Mercy tells the story of EJI, from the early days with a small staff facing the nation’s highest death sentencing and execution rates, through a successful campaign to challenge the cruel practice of sentencing children to die in prison, to revolutionary projects designed to confront Americans with our history of racial injustice.

One of EJI’s first clients was Walter McMillian, a young Black man who was sentenced to die for the murder of a young white woman that he didn’t commit. The case exemplifies how the death penalty in America is a direct descendant of lynching — a system that treats the rich and guilty better than the poor and innocent.

As captivating as Walter’s story is, the rest of the book is just as fascinating. Stevenson briefly tells about other cases he’s worked on, people with mental disabilities or juveniles who were guilty of crimes, but who had received extraordinarily harsh punishments. Several juveniles who received life without parole for a non-homicide crime committed at age 14 or 15. How anyone thought this was appropriate to begin with was beyond me. I used to teach that age group. As mature as teens appear to me, they are still children and their brains just aren’t fully developed at all. They do and say bone-headed things. I get holding people accountable for their crimes, but you can’t just make an extreme punishment like that.

This book was fascinating and deeply disturbing. So many of these incarcerated people, whether they are falsely accused or received unnecessarily harsh punishment, had their own story tell. Some were clearly framed, some had terrible, abusive childhoods, and some just had damn bad luck. An attorney, Stevenson’s writing was easy to follow and understand for non-attorneys. The statistics are incredible and shocking. This book is a must read for insight into the terrible world that is our criminal justice system.