Barry Friedman (2017). Unwarranted: Policing Without Permission: Barry Friedman ( 2017). Unwarranted: Policing Without Permission. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, ISBN: 978-0374280451, $10.74, 448 pages

Abstract

In Unwarranted: Policing Without Permission, Barry Friedman discusses why and how policing has gone wrong in the USA, focusing on the juridical and democratic procedures (or lack thereof). He draws on many different examples of where policing has gone wrong in the USA, including the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, to numerous searches, widespread surveillance and the violation of a broader faith in law enforcement in the USA. In light of ongoing militarization of policing and populist calls for more invasive forms of law enforcement and less privacy, the book is a necessary contribution to our understanding of how policing has become so unwarranted, and what can be done in light hereof. Clearly, an expert in the field, Friedman analyses various policing cases, providing detailed information about criminal justice processes and policing practices, the author concludes that there is an urgent need to ‘fix’ policing.