Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black

  • January 17, 2018
  • 12:00 PM - 1:30 CST
  • Corboy Law Center
  • Evelyn Gonzalez, Constitutionlaw@luc.edu
  • Free
  • Everyone
     Open to the public.
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    Loyola's Raymond and Mary Simon Chair in Constitutional Law
    presents
    Locking Up Our Own:
    Crime and Punishment in Black America
    By James Forman, Jr.

    Wednesday, January 17
    12 p.m.
    (Room TBA)

    Loyola University Chicago School of Law
    Philip H. Corboy Law Center
    Power Rogers & Smith Ceremonial Courtroom
    25 E. Pearson St., Chicago

    Long-listed for the National Book Award
    One of The New York Times Book Review's 10 Best Books of 2017
    Short-listed for the Inaugural Goddard Riverside Stephan Russo Book Prize for Social Justice

    In recent years, America's criminal justice system has become the subject of an increasingly urgent debate. Critics have assailed the rise of mass incarceration, emphasizing its disproportionate impact on people of color. As James Forman, Jr., points out, however, the war on crime that began in the 1970s was supported by many African American leaders in the nation's urban centers. In Locking Up Our Own, he seeks to understand why.
    Forman shows us that the first substantial cohort of black mayors, judges, and police chiefs took office amid a surge in crime and drug addiction. Many prominent black officials, including Washington, D.C. mayor Marion Barry and federal prosecutor Eric Holder, feared that the gains of the civil rights movement were being undermined by lawlessness and thus embraced tough-on-crime measures, including longer sentences and aggressive police tactics. In the face of skyrocketing murder rates and the proliferation of open-air drug markets, they believed they had no choice. But the policies they adopted would have devastating consequences for residents of poor black neighborhoods.
    A former D.C. public defender, Forman tells riveting stories of politicians, community activists, police officers, defendants, and crime victims. He writes with compassion about individuals trapped in terrible dilemmas from the men and women he represented in court to officials struggling to respond to a public safety emergency. Locking Up Our Own enriches our understanding of why our society became so punitive and offers important lessons to anyone concerned about the future of race and the criminal justice system in this country.

    Pizza and soda will be served.

    RSVP
    constitutionlaw@luc.edu