'Not a Crime to be Poor' Author Speaks at Boswell Book Co.

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Scholars of all backgrounds have been studying the relationship between poverty and crime for decades, revealing that an unmistakable link between the poor and criminal offenses exists in countries around the world. In America, the poor are disproportionally victims of a criminal justice system that has created economic policies that too often trap poverty-stricken communities in a perpetual cycle of criminalization.

Georgetown law professor Peter Edelman’s new book, Not a Crime to be Poor: The Criminalization of Poverty in America, documents the myriad ways that our local, state and national systems of justice use fines and fees, money bail systems, and strictly enforced behavior guidelines that largely affect the homeless and mentally ill, in order to victimize and demonize the poor. Edelman, who served as an aide to Robert Kennedy during the 1960s and has long advocated for the rights of the disadvantaged, turns our attention to the thousands of forgotten Americans who are imprisoned for no other reason than being poor.

His striking recent examples include the Ferguson Report, which, after its release following the 2014 death of Michael Brown, documented how unjust policing in the city resulted in the imprisonment of many members of the city’s largely poor, African American population. This provocative account extends beyond Ferguson’s biased system of justice to show how similar practices are being replicated in cities across America, sheds new light on the damaging ways that poor children are criminalized through the school system, and documents the increasingly common practice of locking people up for minor violations.

Edelman will speak at Boswell Book Co. at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 29 in a free event co-sponsored by the Community Advocates Public Policy Institute.