Progressive Prosecution

Race and Reform in Criminal Justice

Kim Taylor-Thompson, Anthony C. Thompson

• Publisher: NYU Press
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN:
  9781479809950
• eBook ISBN:
  9781479809967
• Topic: Law
• Subtopic: Criminal Law
• Index: Law

Provides compelling and manageable solutions for how to reform the criminal justice system from the inside out

A racial reckoning in the US criminal justice system was long overdue well before the highly publicized murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and many others in 2020. Progressive Prosecution argues that prosecutors, having helped build our failed system of mass incarceration, must now lead the charge to dismantle it.

With contributions from practicing district attorneys as well as leading scholars in the fields of law and criminal justice, Taylor-Thompson and Thompson's volume offers an unapologetically ambitious vision for reform. The contributors draw from empirical evidence and years of combined research experience to argue that change must happen at the local level, with prosecutors choosing to adopt race-conscious approaches. These prosecutors must do the hard work themselves, actively focusing on the ways that race misshapes perceptions of criminality, influences discretionary calls, affects how we select juries, and induces a reliance on punitive responses. Progressive Prosecution acts as both a call to action and a practical guide, instructing prosecutors on what they need to do to bring about lasting and meaningful change. Progressive Prosecution is an urgent work of scholarship, a must-read for anyone committed to racial equity and meaningful criminal justice reform.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Introduction: Reckoning in the Moment
• 1. A Progressive Vision: Leading the District Attorney’s Office
• 2. 2020 Vision and the Five Pillars of Criminal Justice Reform
• 3. Transforming the Culture: Internal and External Challenges to a New Vision of Prosecution
• 4. Rethinking How Prosecutors Deal with Race and Implicit Bias
• 5. There Are Children Here: Reconceiving Justice for Adolescent Offenders
• 6. Prosecutors’ Offices as Data-Driven Organizations: Improving Effectiveness and Fairness
• 7. The Crucible of Progressive Prosecution: Notes from the Field
• Acknowledgments
• About the Editors
• About the Contributors
• Index