Book review: Criminal Women: Gender Matters

‘Criminal Women: Gender Matters’, by Grace et al. (2022), makes for an uncomfortable but important read on past and current realities of women within the criminal justice system (CJS) in the United Kingdom and Ireland. The book swiftly brings the word ‘justice’ into doubt, given the multiple oppressive harms women experience for failing to meet society’s ‘expectations’ of womanhood. Many women within the CJS who engage in crime, often crimes that are of a non-violent nature, report that they have experienced childhood trauma, addiction, poverty, have lived in care, or are victims of male violence. Indeed, entry into criminality is often inextricably bound up with traumatic experiences such as these, resulting in penal punishments that equally have repercussions on the women’s families and wider society. Concerns that the CJS is unresponsive to the specific needs of women are long-standing.