Usual Cruelty
“Karakatsanis puts ‘human caging’ and ‘wealth-based detention’ in America on trial.”
Harvard Magazine
An investigation into the role of the legal profession in perpetuating mass incarceration, from the award-winning civil rights lawyer
Usual Cruelty is a radical reconsideration of the American "injustice system" by someone who is actively-and successfully-challenging it. Hailed as a "fiery indictment" (Publishers Weekly) as well as a "compelling and damning argument" (Slate), Usual Cruelty offers a paradigm-shifting look at our legal system and the central role lawyers play in the "punishment bureaucracy."
"Passionately argued" (the New Yorker), the book explores the viciousness of our courts, prisons, and jails and the ways in which the legal profession has allowed itself to become desensitized to the pain these institutions inflict on our most vulnerable populations.
Usual Cruelty will cement Karakatsanis's reputation as one of the most inspiring civil rights leaders of our time.
Praise