Books: Prosecutors and Abuse of legal authority
Prosecution Complex by
American prosecutors are asked to play two roles within the criminal justice system: they are supposed to be ministers of justice whose only goals are to ensure fair trials--and they are also advocates of the government whose success rates are measured by how many convictions they get. Because of this second role, sometimes prosecutors suppress evidence in order to establish a defendant's guilt and safeguard that conviction over time. In Prosecution Complex, Daniel S. Medwed shows how prosecutors are told to lock up criminals and protect the rights of defendants. This double role creates an institutional "prosecution complex" that animates how district attorneys' offices treat potentially innocent defendants at all stages of the process--and that can cause prosecutors to aid in the conviction of the innocent. Ultimately, Prosecution Complex shows how, while most prosecutors aim to do justice, only some hit that target consistently.
Call Number: eBook KF9640 .M43 2012ISBN: 0814796249Publication Date: 2012-03-05
Blind Injustice by
Awarded Digital Book World's Best Book Published by a University Press In this unprecedented view from the trenches, prosecutor turned champion for the innocent Mark Godsey takes us inside the frailties of the human mind as they unfold in real-world wrongful convictions. Drawing upon stories from his own career, Godsey shares how innate psychological flaws in judges, police, lawyers, and juries coupled with a "tough on crime" environment can cause investigations to go awry, leading to the convictions of innocent people. In Blind Injustice, Godsey explores distinct psychological human weaknesses inherent in the criminal justice system--confirmation bias, memory malleability, cognitive dissonance, bureaucratic denial, dehumanization, and others--and illustrates each with stories from his time as a hard-nosed prosecutor and then as an attorney for the Ohio Innocence Project. He also lays bare the criminal justice system's internal political pressures. How does the fact that judges, sheriffs, and prosecutors are elected officials influence how they view cases? How can defense attorneys support clients when many are overworked and underpaid? And how do juries overcome bias leading them to believe that police and expert witnesses know more than they do about what evidence means? This book sheds a harsh light on the unintentional yet routine injustices committed by those charged with upholding justice. Yet in the end, Godsey recommends structural, procedural, and attitudinal changes aimed at restoring justice to the criminal justice system.
Call Number: eBook KF9756 .G63 2017ISBN: 9780520962958Publication Date: 2017-10-10
Charged by
A renowned journalist and legal commentator exposes the unchecked power of the prosecutor as a driving force in America's mass incarceration crisis--and charts a way out.
Call Number: KF9640 .B39 2019ISBN: 9780399590016Publication Date: 2019-04-09
Convicting the Innocent by
On January 20, 1984, Earl Washington?defended for all of forty minutes by a lawyer who had never tried a death penalty case?was found guilty of rape and murder in the state of Virginia and sentenced to death. After nine years on death row, DNA testing cast doubt on his conviction and saved his life. However, he spent another eight years in prison before more sophisticated DNA technology proved his innocence and convicted the guilty man. DNA exonerations have shattered confidence in the criminal justice system by exposing how often we have convicted the innocent and let the guilty walk free. In this unsettling in-depth analysis, Brandon Garrett examines what went wrong in the cases of the first 250 wrongfully convicted people to be exonerated by DNA testing. Based on trial transcripts, Garrett's investigation into the causes of wrongful convictions reveals larger patterns of incompetence, abuse, and error. Evidence corrupted by suggestive eyewitness procedures, coercive interrogations, unsound and unreliable forensics, shoddy investigative practices, cognitive bias, and poor lawyering illustrates the weaknesses built into our current criminal justice system. Garrett proposes practical reforms that rely more on documented, recorded, and audited evidence, and less on fallible human memory. Very few crimes committed in the United States involve biological evidence that can be tested using DNA. How many unjust convictions are there that we will never discover? Convicting the Innocent makes a powerful case for systemic reforms to improve the accuracy of all criminal cases.
ISBN: 9780674066113Publication Date: 2012-09-03
Video: Films On Demand - From the series, The System with Joe Belinger
- Prosecutorial Misconduct: The System with Joe BerlingerJournalist Joe Berlinger examines two prominent cases in New York City that involve corruption, deliberate judicial ommissions and the blatant, long-standing misconduct of a veteran police detective and multiple officials within the New York criminal justice system.
Debate: US Prosecutors have Too Much Power
Books: Exonerations of Wrongfully Convicted Citizens
Wrongful Conviction and Exoneration by
Since 1989, there have been over 2,200 exonerations in the United States. These have resulted from a number of factors, including the discovery of new evidence, perjury, false identification, and bad forensic evidence. Even when an individual is exonerated, is it possible to compensate them for their loss of time and money? This volume looks at the issue from varying perspectives, exploring causes of wrongful convictions, ways to increase exonerations for those who were unjustly imprisoned, strategies to decrease the number of wrongful convictions going forward, and appropriate compensation for those who have lost years of their lives.
Call Number: eBook KF9756 .W758 2020ISBN: 9781534505162Publication Date: 2019-07-15
The Sun Does Shine by
Winner of the 2019 Christopher Award Oprah's Book Club Summer 2018 Selection The Instant New York Times Bestseller A powerful, revealing story of hope, love, justice, and the power of reading by a man who spent thirty years on death row for a crime he didn't commit. "An amazing and heartwarming story, it restores our faith in the inherent goodness of humanity." - Archbishop Desmond Tutu In 1985, Anthony Ray Hinton was arrested and charged with two counts of capital murder in Alabama. Stunned, confused, and only twenty-nine years old, Hinton knew that it was a case of mistaken identity and believed that the truth would prove his innocence and ultimately set him free. But with no money and a different system of justice for a poor black man in the South, Hinton was sentenced to death by electrocution. He spent his first three years on Death Row at Holman State Prison in agonizing silence--full of despair and anger toward all those who had sent an innocent man to his death. But as Hinton realized and accepted his fate, he resolved not only to survive, but find a way to live on Death Row. For the next twenty-seven years he was a beacon--transforming not only his own spirit, but those of his fellow inmates, fifty-four of whom were executed mere feet from his cell. With the help of civil rights attorney and bestselling author of Just Mercy, Bryan Stevenson, Hinton won his release in 2015. With a foreword by Stevenson, The Sun Does Shine is an extraordinary testament to the power of hope sustained through the darkest times. Destined to be a classic memoir of wrongful imprisonment and freedom won, Hinton's memoir tells his dramatic thirty-year journey and shows how you can take away a man's freedom, but you can't take away his imagination, humor, or joy.
Call Number: KF224.H565 H56 2018ISBN: 9781250124715Publication Date: 2018-03-27
Exonerated by
The fascinating story behind the innocence movement's quest for justice. Documentaries like Making a Murderer, the first season of Serial, and the cause célèbre that was the West Memphis Three captured the attention of millions and focused the national discussion on wrongful convictions. This interest is warranted: more than 1,800 people have been set free in recent decades after being convicted of crimes they did not commit. In response to these exonerations, federal and state governments have passed laws to prevent such injustices; lawyers and police have changed their practices; and advocacy organizations have multiplied across the country. Together, these activities are often referred to as the "innocence movement." Exonerated provides the first in-depth look at the history of this movement through interviews with key leaders such as Barry Scheck and Rob Warden as well as archival and field research into the major cases that brought awareness to wrongful convictions in the United States. Robert Norris also examines how and why the innocence movement took hold. He argues that while the innocence movement did not begin as an organized campaign, scientific, legal, and cultural developments led to a widespread understanding that new technology and renewed investigative diligence could both catch the guilty and free the innocent. Exonerated reveals the rich background story to this complex movement.
Call Number: eBook KF9756 .N67 2017ISBN: 9781479886272Publication Date: 2017-05-16
Bloodsworth by
"Chilling, heartbreaking, and ultimately inspiring. I urge you to read it." --SISTER HELEN PREJEAN, author of Dead Man Walking CHARGED WITH THE RAPE AND MURDER of a nine-year-old girl in 1984, Kirk Bloodsworth was tried, convicted, and sentenced to die in Maryland's gas chamber. Maintaining his innocence, he read everything on criminal law available in the prison library and persuaded a new lawyer to petition for the then-innovative DNA testing. After nine years in one of the harshest prisons in America, Kirk Bloodsworth became the first death row inmate exonerated by DNA evidence. He was pardoned by the governor of Maryland and has gone on to become a tireless spokesman against capital punishment. Bloodsworth's story speaks for 159 others who were wrongly convicted and have since been released, and for the thousands still in prison waiting for DNA testing. "The reader will be swept along to an amazing and shocking conclusion that could never be believed as fiction." --JOSEPH WAMBAUGH, author of The New Centurions "Unbroken by the horror and anguish of his ordeal, [Kirk Bloodsworth] has now dedicated himself to saving other innocents from the living hell he endured." --SENATOR PATRICK LEAHY, ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee * CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR NOTEWORTHY NONFICTION, 2004 * ATLANTA JOURNAL CONSTITUTION BEST NONFICTION OF 2004
ISBN: 9781565125148Publication Date: 2005-10-14
