Rough Justice: Do we have the law we deserve?

Do we have the law we deserve? Has justice improved for the victim, the accused and society? What even is justice?

Following her Sunday Times bestseller Unlawful Killings, Her Honour Wendy Joseph KC reconstructs four gripping courtroom dramas, drawing on her many years’ experience as a murder trial judge to ask whether our justice system works, and if it has improved over the centuries.

Have we got any better at delivering what is right and fair, both to the perpetrators and the victims of society’s most heinous crimes?

From the trial of a child charged with disposing of dismembered body parts, to the woman accused of killing her own husband, Joseph is utterly compelling as she sets out how the system works. But, as she compares these modern courtroom tales with eerily similar cases and miscarriages of justice from years ago, might the most chilling story of all be that the lessons of the past have yet to be learned?

Incisive, masterfully crafted, Rough Justice illuminates the struggles of any one of us caught up in our legal system – but particularly the marginalized and the easily exploited – and grapples with the concept of ‘justice for all’ so that we might demand better.