A review by anj_t
You Might Go to Prison, Even Though You're Innocent by Justin Brooks

challenging informative medium-paced

5.0

 I loved You Might Go to Prison, Even Though You’re Innocent! Don’t think it could happen to you? Author and founding director of the California Innocence Project Justin Brooks (@justinobrooks) has receipts. With crisp, clear, engaging, and often heartbreaking writing, he presents actual cases of real prisoners who have been exonerated. He debunks common beliefs that only low income, poorly educated, criminally-adjacent people land in these nightmares. Some scenarios he describes- again, from actual cases— include 1) “you hired the wrong lawyer”... 2) “you got a jury that was blinded by science”... 3) “you have or care for a sick child”... and 4) “you (kind of) look like other people in the world. That’s just to name a few. The sick child chapter will frustrate and unsettle you, but then all of the cases show that there is work to be done at every level of our justice system. Buy it, read it, keep it handy because even if you’re living like a monk, it only takes one incident to bring the full force of the law on you. It pays to be prepared. (BTW you’ll never watch “Law & Order” the same way again.)