Josephine Ross and Roger A. Fairfax, Jr. discuss their writings and research on the injustices of our criminal justice system and shed light on the ways policing and our legal systems can be improved.
About Josephine Ross and A Feminist Critique of Policing:
Josephine Ross is a professor at the Howard University School of Law and a recognized expert on policing and the Constitution. Early in her career, she served as a public defender, representing clients who faced a range of charges, from misdemeanors to serious felonies. At Boston College Law School and then at Howard, Ross supervised law students who represented clients in the criminal trial courts of Boston and Washington, DC. Along with Howard law students, Ross went into the community for “Know Your Rights” trainings, including training teens who had been arrested by police. She teaches courses in criminal procedure, evidence, seminars on policing, including a seminar on the television show The Wire, and recently started a reentry clinic. Professor Ross published several law review articles in favor of marriage equality before any state recognized same-sex marriage. She then turned her attention to criminal (in)justice and has written extensively in that area for the last ten years. For more, see https://josephineross.info.
A Feminist Critique of Police Stops examines the parallels between stop-and-frisk policing and sexual harassment. An expert whose writing, teaching and community outreach centers on the Constitution's limits on police power, Howard Law Professor Josephine Ross, argues that our constitutional rights are a mirage. In reality, we can't say no when police seek to question or search us. Building on feminist principles, Ross demonstrates why the Supreme Court got it wrong when it allowed police to stop, search and sometimes strip-search people and call it consent. Using a wide range of sources - including her law students' experiences with police, news stories about Eric Garner and Sandra Bland, social science and the work of James Baldwin - Ross sheds new light on policing. This book should be read by everyone interested in how Court-approved police stops sap everyone's constitutional rights and how this form of policing can be eliminated.
About Roger A. Fairfax, Jr. and Policing the Black Man:
Roger A. Fairfax, Jr. is the Patricia Roberts Harris Research Professor, and Founding Director of the Criminal Law and Policy Initiative at The George Washington University Law School. Professor Fairfax teaches courses in criminal law, constitutional and adjudicatory criminal procedure, criminal litigation, prosecutorial and criminal defense ethics, and seminars on the grand jury, white-collar investigations, and race and criminal justice policy. He conducts research on discretion in the criminal process, the grand jury, prosecutorial ethics, and criminal justice policy and reform. His scholarship has been published in edited books, including his own Grand Jury 2.0: Modern Perspectives on the Grand Jury, and in articles and essays appearing in a number of leading journals. Professor Fairfax has testified before Congress, spoken at the White House, and advised local, state, and national government officials and candidates on criminal justice policy. He worked on criminal justice reform as a Senior Legislative Fellow with the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism and as a Senior Fellow at Harvard Law School's Charles Hamilton Houston Institute. For more, see https://www.law.gwu.edu/roger-fairfax-jr.
Policing the Black Man is a thought-provoking and compelling anthology, edited and with an introduction by Angela J. Davis, that features essays by some of the nation’s most influential and respected criminal justice experts and legal scholars. The book explores and critiques the many ways the criminal justice system impacts the lives of African American boys and men at every stage of the criminal process, from arrest through sentencing. Essays range from an explication of the historical roots of racism in the criminal justice system to an examination of modern-day police killings of unarmed black men. The contributors discuss and explain racial profiling, the power and discretion of police and prosecutors, the role of implicit bias, the racial impact of police and prosecutorial decisions, the disproportionate imprisonment of black men, the collateral consequences of mass incarceration, and the Supreme Court’s failure to provide meaningful remedies for the injustices in the criminal justice system. In Policing the Black Man, Roger A. Fairfax, Jr. explores these injustices in his essay "The Grand Jury and Police Violence Against Black Men".
This event is co-sponsored with Bookends & Beginnings.
Praise for the Books:
A Feminist Critique of Police Stops
"Josephine Ross has blessed us with a highly readable and spot-on account of stop and frisk from the perspective of its survivors. A Feminist Critique of Police Stops is a provocative mash up in which #metoo meets #blacklivesmatter and makes the world a better place." --Paul Butler, Georgetown University Law Center, author of Chokehold: Policing Black Men
"A critical book for these times."--Michele Goodwin, UC Irvine School of Law and author of Policing the Womb
Policing the Black Man
“Somewhere among the anger, mourning and malice that Policing the Black Man documents lies the pursuit of justice. This powerful book demands our fierce attention.” —Toni Morrison
"The essays collected here by Angela Davis effectively demonstrate how the painful history of racial injustice in America informs a black male’s experience of virtually every aspect of our system of justice, from arrest, through prosecution and sentencing, to incarceration. This book is essential reading for all of us who love the concept of justice in America, and seek for its practical applications to live up to its theoretical ideals.” —Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
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