The Deserving What the Lives of the Condemned Reveal About American Justice

by Elizabeth Vartkessian · 2026

A groundbreaking new take on the American justice system from one of its unknown “mercy workers,” offering a powerful new vision of responsibility, punishment, and repair.“We need the work that is mitigation. It is mercy work.” -Sister Helen PrejeanElizabeth Vartkessian works with criminal defense teams as a mitigation specialist. She isn't part of the Innocence Project; her clients are often legally guilty, and often of terrible crimes. Rather, her job is to spend hundreds of hours per case talking to the parents, siblings, teachers, and neighbors of a defendant, situating their crimes in context. Founder and director of nonprofit mitigation team Advancing Real Change Inc., Vartkessian weaves powerful, gripping stories from her extraordinary career into an inspiring argument for dignity in American justice. Her unique experience has taught her that when personal or generational trauma enters the body, it finds its way out eventually, sometimes through violence. She contends that we cannot hold her clients solely responsible for their actions, nor can we continue to stomach harsh penalties that deny real justice to perpetrators and victims alike. Amid the Trump administration's record-high executions and calls to expand the use of the death penalty after decades of progress, The Deserving is required reading for a dangerous new era of rollbacks.