Barry Latzer

Barry Latzer (born 1945) is an American criminologist and emeritus professor of criminal justice at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice.^[1] He previously taught at the Graduate Center, CUNY. He also prosecuted and defended accused criminals while teaching both there and at John Jay.^[2] In 2016, his book The Rise and Fall of Violent Crime in America was published by Encounter Books.^[3][4] In 2021 The Roots of Violent Crime in America: From the Gilded Age through the Great Depression was published by LSU Press.^[5] In 2022 his book The Myth of Overpunishment: A Defense of the American Justice System and a Proposal to Reduce Incarceration While Protecting the Public was published by Republic Book Publishers.^[6] He is an expert on core curricula^[7] and has lectured and written extensively on capital punishment^{[8][9][6][10]} as well as state constitutional criminal procedure law.^[11]

Latzer's work outside the university included service as an Assistant District Attorney in Brooklyn (1985-1986), and as a member of the Indigent Defendants Appeals Panel in Manhattan (1987-1990).^[12] He also served (2003-2005) as a Senior Consultant for the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a higher education reform organization, where he managed projects involving core curricula.^[13][14] Latzer was a member of the board of trustees of the National Association of Scholars from 2004 to 2017, and a co-founder and member of the executive committee of the CUNY Association of Scholars (1997-2003).^[15]

Barry Latzer has also appeared numerous times on TV and podcasts being interviewed and discussing his books.^[16][17][18]

Education

Latzer received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in 1977, and his J.D. from Fordham University in 1985.^[19]

Books

• State Constitutions and Criminal Justice (Greenwood Press, 1991)^[1]
• State Constitutional Criminal Law (Clark, Boardman, Callaghan, 1995)^[1]
• Death Penalty Cases (Butterworth-Heinemann, 200)^[1]
• The Rise and Fall of Violent Crime in America (Encounter Books, 2016)^[20]
• The Roots of Violent Crime in America: From the Gilded Age through the Great Depression (LSU Press, 2021)
• The Myth of Overpunishment: A Defense of the American Justice System and a Proposal to Reduce Incarceration While Protecting the Public. Description. (Republic Book Publishers, 2022)

Other writing

• "Don't Call Rioters 'Protesters'" (commentary) (subscription required), The Wall Street Journal, June 4, 2020; for context, the WSJ lead online news headline the same day was "Protesters Gather to Memorialize George Floyd" (subscription required).