Justice on Trial: Radical Solutionsfor a System at Breaking Point
CHRIS DAW
(BLOOMSBURY CONTINUUM, 288 PP, £16.99)
Tblet bookshop price £15.29 • Tel 020 7799 4064
Chris Daw would be the brief of my choice if I was in a tight spot as a defendant in a fiercely contested criminal trial. He is a doughty fighter, a doggedly obsessive researcher, a colourful campaigner, a warm empathiser with the human frailties of sinners and a gifted raconteur who does not let the occasional exaggeration spoil a good argument. Part of him could be Rumpole on speed, but he is also a political homme sérieux with a determination to reform our disintegrating criminal justice system.
At first glance he seems to have launched himself on mission impossible. His three most passionate chapters are titled: “Why we should close all prisons”; “Why we should legalise drugs”; “Why children are never criminals”.
I am a supporter of reform in all three areas myself, but as I read these chapters there floated from the attic of my memory a comment made by Iain Macleod about Enoch Powell when they were both youthful acolytes of the Conservative Research Department in the 1950s: “I’m a fellow traveller with Enoch, but I like to get off one or two stops before the train crashes into the buffers at the terminus”. And yet… After reading Daw’s compelling 70 pages arguing for drug legalisation, I would give him my initially sceptical vote in the jury room. He marshals his evidence so thoroughly and persuasively that I found it hard to disagree with his conclusion: “We need a complete reversal of current policy, rolling back half a century of failed prohibition and moving to a legally licensed and regulated drug market.”
