A vivid look at the end of the line in the American legal system, where the rule of law gives way to the correctional process.
Prisons: Houses of Darkness reveals the astonishing lawlessness by which sentencing judges, prison authorities, and parole boards actually operate. It provides an eye-opening history of prisons and an overview of daily prison routine from Attica to Soledad– much of it related in the inmates’ own words– which shatters the myth of rehabilitation and exposes the injustices of prison life. This is an urgent call for reform, a powerful case for applying the rule of law to the American way of punishment.