Almost 70 years ago Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black wrote there ''can be no equal justice where the kind of trial a man gets depends on the amount of money he has.” In THE FEAR OF TOO MUCH JUSTICE, legendary death penalty opponent Stephen Bright and legal scholar James Kwak show the myriad ways the US criminal legal system fails to live up to this ideal of fairness: Innocent people are condemned to death and convicted of crimes because they cannot afford lawyers and because of the color of their skin. Racial discrimination in jury selection perpetuates all-white juries even in communities that have substantial Black and Latino populations. The mentally disabled are incarcerated instead of given the treatment they need, while the poor are processed through many courts with little or no legal representation in an assembly-line fashion. And many courts act as centers of profit whose main purpose is to raise money by imposing fines on the most vulnerable in their community and jailing them when they cannot pay. 

But Bright and Kwak also see the promise of meaningful change on the horizon. They point to jurisdictions across the political spectrum that have made significant progress. The use of the death penalty has plummeted, and the authors see a future where it will remain in only the most ardent holdouts. Public defender offices that protect clients from wrongful convictions have been established across the country, and many places have reduced the use of cash bail and stopped imposing fines and fees on people who cannot afford them.

THE FEAR OF TOO MUCH JUSTICE is a timely and trenchant look at the numerous injustices occurring in criminal courts today and a practical look at how they can be corrected to create a brighter and more equitable future.