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Until We Reckon: Violence, Mass Incarceration, and a Road to Repair

Danielle Sered

4.46 · Rating details · 435 ratings · 84 reviews

In the eloquent tradition of Bryan Stevenson’s Just Mercy, an award-winning leader in the movement to end mass incarceration takes on the vexing problem of violent crime

Although over half the people incarcerated in America today have committed violent offenses, the focus of reformers has been almost entirely on nonviolent and drug offenses. Danielle Sered’s brilliant and g ...more

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Hardcover, 305 pages

Published March 5th 2019 by The New Press

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Nov 24, 2020 Lucy Dacus rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Great intro resource about reshaping America’s reliance on punishment. It doesn’t get into abolition as much as I expected it to, but the scope of the book has to do with violence and mass incarceration as related but different issues. Points that really hit home were how incarceration fails at every level (doesn’t foster healing, make people safer, isn’t cost effective, etc), that accountability infrastructure is possible and effective, and how change will have to happen within culture before i ...more

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Mar 29, 2019 Katie marked it as need-to-check-out-again

Shelves: nonfiction-profiler, current-issues, netgalley-reviewed

If you are interested in social justice regarding mass incarceration, you must read this book! The Director of Common Justice Danielle Sered eloquently explains our need to find restorative alternatives to mass incarceration for violent offenders in the interest of victims/survivors, offenders, communities and all of us. The arguments were so powerful that I had to stop reading and ruminate about them to integrate the ideas into my thinking. Highly recommend!

Thanks to NetGalley, The New Press, a ...more

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Jul 01, 2020 Hadiya rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: masters

EVERYONE should read this book. Trying to figure out how to get your skeptical friends/families to be abolitionists? Read this. Don't consider yourself a prison abolitionist? Read this. Suffering from white guilt and don't know what to do with it? Read this. A crime survivor who is weary about prison abolition? Read this. A law student? Read this. An American? Read this. Everyone should read this. ...more

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Mar 18, 2019 Celine rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, race-racial-issues

I think this would make a really great follow-up read to Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption. Sered makes a compelling argument for steering our criminal justice system toward restorative justice principles and away from an over-reliance on incarceration, using both quantitative data and anecdotal evidence to prove her point. It's a resounding answer to the dreadful "why should we care about addressing people's trauma?" question that seems to permeate traditional discourse on criminal ...more

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Apr 27, 2019 Julie rated it it was ok

Shelves: finished-2019, cultural

I hate to give this only two stars but I can't honestly say I liked it. It's an extremely worthwhile topic and Sered is doing great work with Common Justice, her foundation that works to change the current prison system. However, the book itself is too pie-in-the-sky for me. After detailing just how incredibly horrible & miserable the current judicial & prison system is, she proceeds in the second half of the book to list what we "should" do to fix it, without once explaining how on earth all th I hate to give this only two stars but I can't honestly say I liked it. It's an extremely worthwhile topic and Sered is doing great work with Common Justice, her foundation that works to change the current prison system. However, the book itself is too pie-in-the-sky for me. After detailing just how incredibly horrible & miserable the current judicial & prison system is, she proceeds in the second half of the book to list what we "should" do to fix it, without once explaining how on earth all those "shoulds" could possibly come about.

The first half of the book, detailing the miseries upon miseries that exist, I found very difficult to read. I didn't want to read about them and was tempted to put the book down. However, I won an advance copy of this book in a giveaway and thus had promised to both read & review the book. I persevered and kept going.

I thought of the book White Fragility and how I have the privilege to ignore this topic if I so choose. Neither me nor my family are directly impacted by any of the things Sered writes about. None of my family members are in prison. I've never lived in a violent neighborhood. I've always had access to good schools, healthcare, jobs, etc. Violence - knock on wood - has never been a part of my life. I can stick my fingers in my ears and go "la la la" and ignore the situation if I desire. A lot of white people do act this way, which is a big reason why there is so little change in the current situation. I am trying to push against my first reaction, which is to stick my head in the sand.

The second half of the book is the part that really bugged me. Her solutions are all great ideas that should happen - eliminating 3 strikes & you're out, reclassifying a wide range of felonies, creating incentives for community program participation, reducing collateral consequences such as denying ex-convicts the right to vote, denying them student loans, food stamps, section 8 housing etc. Ok, so how do we concretely go about implementing all these changes? Who knows! Sered sure doesn't. What needs to happen, according to her, is "a massive cultural reorientation". That's it. Just somehow, someway, the current American culture needs to dramatically change. Yeah, obviously.

It's all very "if I were Queen of the World" then this is how it would be. I actually came out of reading this more depressed about the situation than I was before reading. If our only hope for change is some magical massive cultural reorientation, then we are screwed.

...more

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Aug 09, 2019 Cal Barnett-Mayotte rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Sered makes the most compelling and thoughtful case for a path forward, for both interpersonal and state violence, both individual and societal justice. Remarkably thorough and oozes wisdom.

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Mar 23, 2020 Lori Green rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Another very important read.

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Apr 06, 2019 Hannah Sotnick rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This book should be required reading for everyone everywhere! Incredibly written distillation of what it means to hold ourselves accountable and work to recognize and heal individual and community trauma.

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Aug 20, 2020 Melanie rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-fiction

An excellent collection of case studies and well-defined theses on white society's obligation to face its obsession with violence and punishment and start putting effort into healing and community building at all levels from school suspensions to incarceration for violent offenses. ...more

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Aug 26, 2019 Christopher Hudson Jr. rated it it was amazing

Shelves: criminal-justice

People familiar with the uncomfortable details of mass incarceration know that meaningful reform in the US will require us to reevaluate how we respond specifically to violent crime. Because incarceration is the default in our criminal justice system, it can be difficult for people to conceptualize any realistic alternatives, especially for perpetrators of serious violence. Until We Reckon bravely tackles this question head on. Instead of punishment for punishment’s sake, author Danielle Sered p ...more

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Mar 13, 2020 Renny Thomas rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Was a but slow at first but you needed the base of understanding the relationships between the harmed and those who harm to understand how effective reformative justice can be. I wish there were more anecdotes about some of the people who have gone through common justice

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Dec 10, 2020 Jake Cooper rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, female-author

The 1st half, on the origins of American violence and the failures of the US prison system, is fabulous*. The 2nd half, on how to move forward, is vague to the point of vacuity. Defining a problem is so much easier than proposing a solution.

* What I took from the 1st half: Violence is often a reaction to the shame of powerlessness and the denial of pain. Powerlessness and brutish non-pain are embedded in the American myths of (a) colonial manifest destiny in a backdrop of white supremacy, and (b ...more

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Jun 28, 2019 Heather KD rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

While I have the highest regard for Michelle Alexander and her ground-breaking book of 2010, "The New Jim Crow", Danielle Sered's work takes the conversation about race and mass incarceration to another level. Sered makes necessary connections between the criminal justice system in the United States and the wider culture of violence--and her clear analysis enables her to propose real solutions to violence on both an interpersonal and system level. Plus, Sered's entire argument begins and ends wi ...more

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May 21, 2019 Nadav David rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

A brilliant book that uncovers the ways our society's obsession with locking people in cages, especially POC, poor and trans/GNC folks, destroys our ability to face and heal from harm that occurs in our communities. Sered provides a powerful framework and narratives to speak to the power of restorative and transformative justice practices, and is especially focused on violent crimes, which feels missing in so much of the liberal/moderate conversations about mass incarceration. So many nuggets of ...more

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Nov 29, 2020 Natsumi Paxton rated it liked it · review of another edition

I would recommend this for progressives who are invested in reducing prison populations but take for granted that imprisonment is the best response to violence. Sered's analysis of how imprisonment effects individuals and communities, and her anecdotes of Common Justice clients shows how policing and imprisonment reproduce violence, rather than counter it.

It's not abolitionist, Sered upholds the value of incapacitation and of the state overall. This book is not an analysis of prison's function a ...more

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Dec 03, 2019 Bridget rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Important for the 2020 election

Read this before considering your vote. This book helps me move through fear and into action. Will read it again.

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Jul 28, 2019 Leigh rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Just read this, please.

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Dec 03, 2020 Michael-David Sasson rated it it was amazing

Shelves: trauma, liberation-politics

This might be the most important book I read in 2020. I can't recommend it highly enough. ...more

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Feb 10, 2020 Mary rated it it was amazing

The conversation around criminal justice reform a lot of the time stops at low level, non-violent and drug offenses. But to stop mass incarceration and dismantle the current prison system, we have to go beyond that and look at ways to deal with ALL crime differently than by incarceration. This book is a fantastic study in how to do just that.

Highly recommended reading for everyone who wants to have a fair & truly accountable justice system. Also recommended for anyone who thinks prisons mean ac ...more

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Mar 28, 2020 Libby O'Neill rated it it was amazing

A VERY compelling read about the need for restorative justice and the problem of mass incarceration. This book was very accessible and an important read about a serious problem in the US.

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Mar 25, 2019 Megan Henry rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This book was amazing. Using research and data, as well as examples of successful initiatives such as that of Common Justice, Sered paints a picture of survivor-led, community-driven, restorative justice alternatives to mass incarceration and our punitive system of justice. She outlines how these alternatives foster safety and healing in a way our criminal justice system never has. She talks about structural and individual conditions that drive violence and then outlines how mass incarceration a ...more

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May 13, 2019 Winston Plum rated it really liked it · review of another edition

This is a spectacular book. This is a brave book. I strongly recommend it to anyone who would like to know more about the horror of mass incarceration, the stupidity and blindspots of the American criminal justice system, and the systemic racism that undergirds both.

During the first part of the book, Danielle Sered walks the reader through the specifics of the restorative justice process (she has been the executive director of Common Justice in Brooklyn for ten years). What makes the final thir This is a spectacular book. This is a brave book. I strongly recommend it to anyone who would like to know more about the horror of mass incarceration, the stupidity and blindspots of the American criminal justice system, and the systemic racism that undergirds both.

During the first part of the book, Danielle Sered walks the reader through the specifics of the restorative justice process (she has been the executive director of Common Justice in Brooklyn for ten years). What makes the final third of the book so astounding is the way she connects the specifics of the restorative justice process (what's at stake for all us, victims and offenders) with the racism endemic to American history. The material and the detail is riveting, but what takes this book far beyond just a workbook of the restorative justice process is the tone with which she writes: no nonsense, pulling no punches, no sugar-coating anything for a white audience, and no worries whether her ideas can be made into digestible policy proposals. She has a radical, unapologetic, and sane vision for a more humane justice system.

Her closing salvo that speaks to the reckoning America is long overdue for slavery, Jim Crow, mass incarceration, and all the iterations of racism that have existed in this country is breathtaking. I cannot recommend this book strongly enough. It is one of the most powerful, honest books I've read in years. There is a quiet power to her rhetoric, born of years working in the trenches with humans trying to come to terms with seemingly intractable interpersonal dilemmas.

I'm assuming Sered is a white woman, or as Ta-Nehisi Coates might say, "a woman who believes she is white." I am a white male. The more I read work by profound thinkers like Sered, Coates, Michelle Alexander, and Bryan Stevenson, the more I find my voice, as an educator and citizen, to speak out against mass incarceration; the more my ability stregthens to identify the mechanisms by which institutional racism works; the more I challenge myself and those around me to be accountable for words and actions, even thoughts. It's hard to talk about race. One's steps become light, one's words become equivocal. Sered has the bona fides to speak forcefully because of what she has seen and the damage she has seen done by our prison/industrial complex. Her passages about black pain specifically and people of color's pain in general, and the degree to which white supremacy is built and sustained on believing these groups' pain is not to be acknowledged, does not exists to the degree it does for whites, are staggering prose. Rarely does one read a book where the author speaks so clearly about hard to tackle topics that the reader feels her conceptions of race and what it means to be human, and how to think and care about the humanity of those around her, evolving as she reads. ...more

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Jul 26, 2020 Troy Mattila rated it really liked it

Shelves: law

Many good ideas and answers to the question of what we do without prisons, or at least in a world where incarceration is a last resort. Interesting stories of healing, growth, and restoration, and a hopeful vision of a future that cares about all victims, even those responsible for harming others. It's hard to disagree with Sered's general argument that our current system is both irrational and ultimately harmful to everyone.

That said, the book probably has a few too many unsupported claims. Mos Many good ideas and answers to the question of what we do without prisons, or at least in a world where incarceration is a last resort. Interesting stories of healing, growth, and restoration, and a hopeful vision of a future that cares about all victims, even those responsible for harming others. It's hard to disagree with Sered's general argument that our current system is both irrational and ultimately harmful to everyone.

That said, the book probably has a few too many unsupported claims. Most of the book is well researched and end-noted, but there are segments where the lack of citations is noticeable. Sered's ideas are powerful and thought provoking, but not necessarily proven or well documented (at least by Sered). I don't necessarily think they all need to be, but some statements were presented as facts that didn't have any references, and it matters when most of the important factual claims are supported.

Finally, the last section on reckoning didn't land for me. It applies the individual model of restorative practices to society, where "we" (society, but generally speaking, white people) acknowledge the impact of our actions on others, express remorse, repair our harms and make sure we don't commit similar harms in the future. While the model serves as an interesting analogy (individual to group), personal responsibility and reckoning is concrete in a way that I would argue group responsibility simply can't be -- it seems to require shared beliefs that aren't exactly possible on a large scale (What did we do? What was its impact? What are we sorry for? What do "you" deserve? To whom do we owe something?, etc.) The final section also seems to assume white people generally, on some level, accept and believe in structural racism, which should be true, but I'm fairly certain isn't.

Final note: read this if you already generally agree with the premise that mass incarceration is a tragedy. I wouldn't recommend it to someone if you hope to change their mind--it doesn't seem aimed at those whose starting point would be against reform. ...more

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Sep 07, 2020 Chuck rated it really liked it · review of another edition

The recent spate of police killings of Black citizens, and the resulting massive social protests, have highlighted an urgent need for reform in our criminal justice system. There are, of course, many different facets to this: reconceptualizing the roles of police and prosecutors, reviewing sentencing guidelines, and drastically reducing incarceration rates, to name just a few. Author Danielle Sered, founder of Common Justice, touches on all of these, but her primary focus is on a process that pr The recent spate of police killings of Black citizens, and the resulting massive social protests, have highlighted an urgent need for reform in our criminal justice system. There are, of course, many different facets to this: reconceptualizing the roles of police and prosecutors, reviewing sentencing guidelines, and drastically reducing incarceration rates, to name just a few. Author Danielle Sered, founder of Common Justice, touches on all of these, but her primary focus is on a process that provides "healing" to victims of violence. Not incidentally, her approach requires involvement of perpetrators, whose lives are usually improved as well.

Sered points out that it's impossible to effect a significant reduction in prison populations by concentrating mainly on non-violent offenses, given that 54% of those incarcerated in state prisons were convicted of violent offenses. Although it is commonly supposed that victims of violence would like to see their assailants "put away", the facts actually lead in a different direction. Victims crave safety, and assurance that other people will not be similarly harmed. When given the opportunity to participate in "restorative justice", whereby perpetrators are obligated to take responsibility for what they have done, and to make things right (insofar that is possible), victims of violence almost always prefer that option over having their assailants imprisoned. After all, prison often inflicts violence on incarcerated people who, when they are released, face numerous barriers, including employment, housing, and education. And a victim of violence facing such impediments is virtually guaranteed to do further harm. In short, incarceration is unlikely to make society any safer.

Sered's approach is victim-centered. The objective is to ease victims' pain, and she observes that "time after time, victims tell parole boards that they still feel exactly the way they did the day the crime occurred" [p. 40]. If the goal is to heal victims, incarceration does not accomplish it, nor does it increase the likelihood that imprisoned people will be transformed by the time of their release.

Racism is a central component of Sered's discussion. White people tend to believe that they are more susceptible to pain than are Blacks. White people are far less likely than Blacks to be convicted of violent crimes, "or given the maximum sentence of any crimes, including drug, property, and violent offenses" [p. 59]. A Black person who murders a white person stands a good chance of being sentenced to death, but capital punishment is extremely rare when the victim is Black. And, astonishingly, "nearly one in two Black women has a family member in prison" [p. 86]. As Sered wryly remarks, "[w]e could reasonably describe whiteness as the oldest alternative to incarceration in America" [p. 154].

The author identifies four principal rationales for incarceration -- Deterrence, Rehabilitation, Incapacitation, and Retribution -- and she responds to each of them. (1) The prospect of imprisonment can deter criminal behavior only if a would-be perpetrator has a roughly accurate idea of how the punishment would fit the crime, but in fact this is seldom the case; moreover, sentences for the same crime are not remotely uniform. (2) Typically, prisons foster violence rather than helping inmates to become responsible citizens (although there are rare exceptions, when, for example, prisons offer significant educational opportunities). (3) Incapacitation may have its place, but most people who are imprisoned are eventually released, and without any serious intervention, they are apt take up where they had left off. Finally, (4) "Retribution sits uncomfortably at the intersection of two aspects of our responses to harm: our desire for people to suffer and our desire for people to change" [pp. 89-90]. Sered proposes substituting accountability for retribution -- a substitution that requires a perpetrator of violence to acknowledge what he has done, and treats him as a free agent with the power to help right a wrong.

There's a sharp contrast between responding to violent crime in a purely legal vs. restorative fashion. "If the primary understanding of crime is about legal infraction, then the most urgent concern is to reassert the power of the state through the enforcement of the law. But if the core concern is that people have been harmed, the priority is to repair that harm" [p. 138].

Statistics bear out the value of this approach. Although incarceration cannot be eliminated, "restorative justice can be an effective response to violent crime, reducing recidivism rates by as much as 44 percent and helping to break cycles of violence" [p. 133].

Soon after the names of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and other victims of police killings became familiar, and nationwide protests erupted, there was talk about defunding police departments. Predictably, that term was immediately misconstrued by right-wing politicians in order to push their "law and order" agendas. But, as Sered observes, police departments have been required to do far too much. "They are charged with addressing mental health crises, addiction, and other social challenges that are beyond the scope of their training, expertise, or fundamental responsibility" [p. 179]. Defunding police ought to be construed as reallocating resources so as to direct various social needs to the personnel who are best equipped to address them.

Danielle Sered has a lot of important and timely ideas, but her book is overly long and frequently repetitive (the term "heal" and its variants appear more than 200 times by my count). Her writing style is competent but often prosaic. Nevertheless, she describes a clear antidote to a system that is seriously broken. According to an overused aphorism, insanity means repeating the same behavior while expecting a different outcome, but that seems to be an accurate characterization of how our current criminal justice system functions. Restorative justice offers a rational and refreshing alternative. ...more

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Jan 02, 2020 Penny rated it did not like it · review of another edition

The vast majority of sexual abuse survivors never receive anything resembling justice. Ever. My concern about those who promote "restorative justice" for sexual violence is that their moral vanity takes precedence over the feelings and safety of abuse survivors. The Catholic Church practiced "restorative justice" with priests while their victims were told to "forgive" & forget. Most churches claim the moral "high ground" when they "forgive" rapists and child molesters in their ranks. There is no ...more

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Jul 26, 2020 David Kraus rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Just a wonderful, revolutionary book. It will change the way you think about violence and the penal-carceral arm of the state. Plus it’s exquisitely written.

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Jun 17, 2020 The Bean of rated it liked it · review of another edition

I started out loving this book. Sared's passion was palpable in each sentence. The beginning laid bare the myriad problems with our criminal justice system (5% but 25%; 95% plea bargain etc.) She posed some interesting philosophical questions regarding punishment: who is it for? why do we punish? what even is punishment? why is incarceration our weapon of choice? She then systematically dismantles the whole logic of (mass) incarceration: it alienates the victim from the process, drowning them in I started out loving this book. Sared's passion was palpable in each sentence. The beginning laid bare the myriad problems with our criminal justice system (5% but 25%; 95% plea bargain etc.) She posed some interesting philosophical questions regarding punishment: who is it for? why do we punish? what even is punishment? why is incarceration our weapon of choice? She then systematically dismantles the whole logic of (mass) incarceration: it alienates the victim from the process, drowning them in fees and red tape; it falsely assumes what a typical victim wants, that all one wants is "safety" therefore locking people in cages is justified. "But every single survivor we have spoken to has wanted on thing: to know that the person who hurt them would not hurt anyone else" Pg. 30 Sounds nice at least. Insofar as the victim should be the bedrock of the criminal justice system, we're in agreement. She also articulates the four main drivers of violence: shame, isolation, exposure to violence, and an inability to meet one'e economic means. With that in mind, does locking people in cages seem like a good idea for public safety? Probably not. She then launches her argument for restorative justice, which I found very interesting and compelling. The anecdotes were illustrative. The statistics, while limited, clearly demonstrate better outcomes: reduced recidivism, increased victim satisfaction etc. But then it gets bad. Her arguments loosen, she flippantly philosophizes and makes arbitrary claims without providing evidence. "White culture is characterized by behavior meant to control, punish, exile, an exterminate" Pg. 218. Totally out of the blue. But this is the state of our intellectual discourse apparently, didn't know "white culture" was uncontroversially monolithic and defined by the aforesaid characteristics. Interesting. When she begins to talk about "white violence", it's maybe the most tepid shit I've ever read. She spends a whole page or two disabusing the reader of their apparently default belief that white communities, especially poor ones, don't suffer from violence. It was just sad, especially because Sered is white. So much posturing. But, hey, if you like sentences like "We withdraw support, withdraw love, withdraw resources, withdraw access. We discipline, we insult, we demean, we humiliate, we beat, we burn, we injure, we violate, we abuse, we wound, we shame." Pg. 219 This is only applicable to white people, too. She really isn't a very good writer, but she writes like she think she is one. So many wasted words, and needless pontificating. ...more

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Oct 19, 2020 Drick rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: restorative-practices-justice, political-thought, race-ethnic-studies, urban-studies, criminal-justice

Danielle Sered served for ten years as the Director of Common Justice, an organization in NYC that provides alternatives to incarceration and victim services for serious and violent felonies. Drawing on her experience, she opens the book by claiming that the U.S. will never solve its problem with violence through incarceration. In fact she claims and then shows that there is a positive correlation between the rise in mass incarceration and the rise of violent crime. Moreover, the causes of crime Danielle Sered served for ten years as the Director of Common Justice, an organization in NYC that provides alternatives to incarceration and victim services for serious and violent felonies. Drawing on her experience, she opens the book by claiming that the U.S. will never solve its problem with violence through incarceration. In fact she claims and then shows that there is a positive correlation between the rise in mass incarceration and the rise of violent crime. Moreover, the causes of crime are not only individually-based but also systemically based on the prevalence of poor schools, lack of social services, and general governmental neglect in communities with high crime rates. The bulk of the book discusses how that is so and the alternative to our current policy of putting violent criminals away in prison. Her alternative is built on four principles: Being survivor-centered, accountability-based, safety-driven, and racially equitable. In the chapter on accountability, she lays out the restorative justice process and shows it not only is more difficult than prison for people who caused violent harm, but it changes lives. The final chapters lay out a path for systematic and cultural change. The vision for structural and cultural change both challenging and compelling. She mostly focuses on criminal injustice to people of color but does include a section that deals with the injustices and systemic harm experienced by low-income whites. For those concerned about police violence and our broken prison system, this boo[k provides a vision we can live into as we work for its realization.

What I greatly appreciated about this book was how Sered helps us understand what it feels like to be a person who has survived a violent crime, and what is like to be a person who caused that harm. The genius of the restorative justice approach she proposes is that it proves an arena for the person harmed by another and the person causing that harm to come face to face and to talk in a structured way what that experience meant to both parties and how they can move toward healing and repairing the harm that was caused. ...more

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Apr 27, 2019 Jake rated it liked it

Shelves: goodreads-giveaways

First of all, thank you to the publisher for the free copy. This will be a little hard to review. On one, hand, the ideas contained are great. But then again, it was pretty dry and hard to complete. The basic idea of this book and of restorative justice in general is pretty much what I was taught in church as a kid about when you sin; tell the truth about your actions, face your victim, and pay restitution. Admittedly, most of the people I went to church with as a kid are more interested in bloo ...more

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Jun 30, 2020 Myer rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: blm

I read this book because Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, recommended it in a Jan 17, 2020 New Yorker interview entitled "Ten Years After 'The New Jim Crow'."

Sered's work challenges the conventional myth of how people come to commit acts of violence, a story that emerges from looking at arrest records and seeing people commit more violent crimes over time, leading to the formation of an ever more "hardened criminal."

Instead, Sered ...more

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