A groundbreaking examination of our system of imprisonment, revealing the true causes of mass incarceration as well as the best path to reform The United States, home to about 5 percent of the world's population, holds nearly 25 percent of its prisoners. How did we get to this point? In Locked In, John F. Pfaff argues that existing accounts of the causes of mass incarceration are fundamentally misguided. The most widely accepted explanations-the...

"The fall from politico to prisoner isn't necessarily long, but the landing, as Missouri State Senator Jeff Smith learned, is a hard one. In 2009, Smith pleaded guilty to a seemingly minor charge of campaign malfeasance and earned himself a year and one day in Kentucky's FCI Manchester. Mr. Smith Goes to Prison is the fish-out-of-water story of his time in the big house; of the people he met there and the things he learned: how to escape the attentions...

Juveniles who commit crimes often find themselves in court systems that do not account for their young age, but it wasn't always this way. The original aim of a separate juvenile justice system was to treat young offenders as the children they were, considering their unique child status and amenability for reform. Now, after years punishing young offenders as if they were adults, slowly the justice system is making changes that would allow the original...