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Rehabilitation and Incarceration: In Search of Fairer and More Productive Sentencing


Still yearning for more on the criminal justice system after Confessions of an Innocent Man and When Justice Fails? Looking for another perspective from that of the (fictionally) wrongfully accused or social science researchers? Not to fret… Rehabilitation and Incarceration: In Search of Fairer and More Productive Sentencing offers a unique, judicial perspective from the late Hon. Harold Baer Jr., who served on the New York Supreme Court and later “The Mother Court.”

In Rehabilitation and Incarceration, U.S. District Judge Harold Baer Jr. explains the crisis of mass incarceration; how it came about; and the pressing need and means to reduce prison populations and recidivism, promote rehabilitation and re-entry into society, and protect public safety.

Having presided over the experimental re-entry court of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Judge Baer brings to Rehabilitation and Incarceration insight from his extraordinary experience in taking responsibility at every stage of the criminal law process—from federal prosecutor to defense attorney to judge presiding at trial and sentencing. In this book, Judge Baer recounts the lessons learned from his re-entry court experience and argues that public safety and our sense of humanity require that we drastically improve prisoner sentencing and re-entry into society to reduce the high rate of recidivism.

Of the book, Fordham University Norris Professor of Law John D. Feerick writes, “Judge… Baer lived a life of good works and service to the community, with a faith in humanity and the worth of every individual. Deploring a culture of mass incarceration and severe collateral consequences of sentencing, the book offers many ideas for a better way of achieving the ideal of rehabilitation. It reflects the author’s passionately-held view that in a country unique in the history of the world as a bastion of freedom, new and realistic approaches can and must be taken to reduce prison penalties, mandatory minimum sentences, and recidivism. The book is excellently documented in dealing with the problem of incarceration and filled with invaluable insights as to fairer and more productive sentencing. Judge Baer has left us an important legacy in the writing of his last manuscript. It deserves a wide reading by interested observers of criminal justice.”


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