When VW boss Herbert Diess was recently accused of fraud, he had to pay a few months’ salary to the judiciary. But he was allowed to have the sum reimbursed by VW. And another piece of luck: VW was allowed to deduct the sum from taxes. In his book “Not everyone is equal before the law”, Ronen Steinke accounts for more than 250 pages of a criminal justice system that is becoming increasingly socially unjust. Steinke, a lawyer and SZ editor, takes his readers into the courtroom on the first page and describes the trial of a pensioner who stole a pack of candles worth five euros. Steinke works throughout the book with specific cases, with people and their stories, making the complex subject matter tangible and understandable.
Ronen Steinke, Not everyone is equal before the law. The new class justice. Berlin Verlag, Berlin 2022. 272 pages, 20 euros.