Triumph of Justice: The Final Judgment on the Simpson Saga


Peter Knobler - 1998
    Simpson civil trial, he was one of the few people in America who had paid little attention to the Simpson criminal trial. His first inclination was to turn down the case. But as friends and clients urged him to accept, as he got to know not only the Goldmans but the facts of the case and the human tragedy lurking behind it, Petrocelli realized this was something he had to tackle head on.Never having tried a murder case, putting his firm's considerable reputation at risk, confronting a media swarm for which he was totally unprepared, and facing an overwhelming financial disadvantage, Petrocelli nonetheless went on a personal and increasingly passionate mission to bring about justice. Triumph of Justice is a chronicle of that mission.  Petrocelli's insights, observations, and inside information not only show us how he convinced a jury to find O.J. Simpson liable for $33.5 million in the deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman--proving to the American people that their legal system does indeed work--he also makes the story a compelling and exciting legal read.Among the revelations detailed in these pages:Petrocelli's ten-day, no-holds-barred deposition of O.J. SimpsonWhat Petrocelli learned from the incendiary depositions and interviews of Kato Kaelin, Faye Resnick, Marcus Allen, A.C. Cowlings, and othersThe surprising realizations that emerged from a mock jury trial, which Petrocelli lostHis dramatic face-to-face courtroom confrontation with O.J. Simpson on the witness standWhat happened that night in BrentwoodPetrocelli also offers insight into the larger issues--of race, wealth, celebrity, and police competence--surrounding the case. He places the trial in its proper context and, in so doing, examines legal questions and issues about our justice system that affect and reflect upon every one of us.Triumph of Justice proves, conclusively, that O.J. Simpson told lie after lie and that he did indeed kill his ex-wife and an innocent man. It is the story you haven't heard about the trial you didn't see and is the closest, most in-depth look at an important murder case since Helter Skelter.

No Matter How Loud I Shout: A Year in the Life of Juvenile Court


Edward Humes - 1996
    Granted unprecedented access to the Los Angeles Juvenile Court, including the judges, the probation officers, and the children themselves, This book provides evidence of the system's inability to slow juvenile crime or to make even a reasonable stab at rehabilitating troubled young offenders. Humes draws a portrait of a judicial system in disarray.

The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court


Bob Woodward - 1979
    The Brethren is the first detailed behind-the-scenes account of the Supreme Court in action.Bob Woodward and Scott Armstrong have pierced its secrecy to give us an unprecedented view of the Chief and Associate Justices—maneuvering, arguing, politicking, compromising, and making decisions that affect every major area of American life.

Reasonable Doubts: The Criminal Justice System and the O.J. Simpson Case


Alan M. Dershowitz - 1996
    Using the O.J. Simpson murder case as the backdrop, Reasonable Doubts explores the larger issues that shape our country's legal system.Chosen to prepare the appeal should O.J. Simpson be convicted, Alan Dershowitz is uniquely suited to deconstruct the case in order to use it in understanding the modern criminal justice system. The crucial questions raised by the O.J. Simpson case, and Dershowitz's answers, invite a reassessment not only of the case itself, but also of the strengths—and weaknesses—of the legal system in America today.

Incarceration Nations: A Journey to Justice in Prisons Around the World


Baz Dreisinger - 2016
    Professor, journalist, and founder of the Prison-to-College-Pipeline, Dreisinger looks into the human stories of incarcerated men and women and those who imprison them, creating a view of a world to which most are denied access, and a rethinking of one of America’s most far-reaching global exports: the modern prison complex.From serving as a restorative justice facilitator in a notorious South African prison and working with genocide survivors in Rwanda, to launching a creative writing class in an overcrowded Ugandan prison and coordinating a drama workshop for women prisoners in Thailand, Dreisinger examines the world behind bars with equal parts empathy and intellect. She journeys to Jamaica to visit a prison music program, to Singapore to learn about approaches to prisoner reentry, to Australia to grapple with the bottom line of private prisons, to a federal supermax in Brazil to confront the horrors of solitary confinement, and finally to the so-called model prisons of Norway. Incarceration Nations concludes with climactic lessons about the past, present, and future of justice.

Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic


Sam Quinones - 2015
    Communities where heroin had never been seen before—from Charlotte, NC and Huntington, WVA, to Salt Lake City and Portland, OR—were overrun with it. Local police and residents were stunned. How could heroin, long considered a drug found only in the dense, urban environments along the East Coast, and trafficked into the United States by enormous Colombian drug cartels, be so incredibly ubiquitous in the American heartland? Who was bringing it here, and perhaps more importantly, why were so many townspeople suddenly eager for the comparatively cheap high it offered?With the same dramatic drive of El Narco and Methland, Sam Quinones weaves together two classic tales of American capitalism: The stories of young men in Mexico, independent of the drug cartels, in search of their own American Dream via the fast and enormous profits of trafficking cheap black-tar heroin to America’s rural and suburban addicts; and that of Purdue Pharma in Stamford, Connecticut, determined to corner the market on pain with its new and expensive miracle drug, Oxycontin; extremely addictive in its own right. Quinones illuminates just how these two stories fit together as cause and effect: hooked on costly Oxycontin, American addicts were lured to much cheaper black tar heroin and its powerful and dangerous long-lasting high. Embroiled alongside the suppliers and buyers are DEA agents, local, small-town sheriffs, and the US attorney from eastern Virginia whose case against Purdue Pharma and Oxycontin made him an enemy of the Bush-era Justice Department, ultimately stalling and destroying his career in public service.Dreamland is a scathing and incendiary account of drug culture and addiction spreading to every part of the American landscape.

The Most Dangerous Man in America: Timothy Leary, Richard Nixon and the Hunt for the Fugitive King of LSD


Bill Minutaglio - 2018
    Davis, authors of the PEN Center USA award-winning Dallas 1963, comes a madcap narrative about Timothy Leary's daring prison escape and run from the law. On the moonlit evening of September 12, 1970, an ex-Harvard professor with a genius I.Q. studies a twelve-foot high fence topped with barbed wire. A few months earlier, Dr. Timothy Leary, the High Priest of LSD, had been running a gleeful campaign for California governor against Ronald Reagan. Now, Leary is six months into a ten-year prison sentence for the crime of possessing two marijuana cigarettes. Aided by the radical Weather Underground, Leary's escape from prison is the counterculture's union of "dope and dynamite," aimed at sparking a revolution and overthrowing the government. Inside the Oval Office, President Richard Nixon drinks his way through sleepless nights as he expands the war in Vietnam and plots to unleash the United States government against his ever-expanding list of domestic enemies. Antiwar demonstrators are massing by the tens of thousands; homemade bombs are exploding everywhere; Black Panther leaders are threatening to burn down the White House; and all the while Nixon obsesses over tracking down Timothy Leary, whom he has branded "the most dangerous man in America." Based on freshly uncovered primary sources and new firsthand interviews, The Most Dangerous Man in America is an American thriller that takes readers along for the gonzo ride of a lifetime. Spanning twenty-eight months, President Nixon's careening, global manhunt for Dr. Timothy Leary winds its way among homegrown radicals, European aristocrats, a Black Panther outpost in Algeria, an international arms dealer, hash-smuggling hippies from the Brotherhood of Eternal Love, and secret agents on four continents, culminating in one of the trippiest journeys through the American counterculture.

A Knock at Midnight: A Story of Hope, Justice, and Freedom


Brittany K. Barnett - 2020
    Barnett was only a law student when she came across the case that would change her life forever--that of Sharanda Jones, single mother, business owner and, like Brittany, black daughter of the rural South. A victim of America's ruthless and devastating war on drugs, Sharanda had been torn from the arms of her young daughter and was serving a life sentence without parole--all for a first-time drug offense. In Sharanda, Brittany saw haunting echoes of own life, both as the daughter of a formerly incarcerated mother and the one-time girlfriend of an abusive drug dealer. As she studied Sharanda's case, a system slowly came into focus: one where widespread racial injustice forms the core of our country's addiction to incarceration. Moved by Sharanda's plight, Brittany began to work towards her freedom.This had never been the plan. Bright and ambitious, Brittany was already a successful accountant with her sights set on a high-powered future in corporate law. But Sharanda's case opened the door to a harrowing journey through the criminal justice system, in which people could be locked up for life under misguided appeals for law and order. Driven by the realization that her clients' fates could have easily been her own, Brittany soon found herself on a quest to unlock the human potential of those our society has forgotten how to see. Living a double life, she moved billion dollar corporate deals by day, and by night worked pro bono to free Sharanda and others in near-impossible legal battles. Ultimately, her journey transformed her understanding of injustice in the courts, of genius languishing behind bars, and the very definition of freedom itself. A Knock at Midnight is Brittany's riveting, inspirational memoir, at once a coming-of-age story and a powerful evocation of what it takes to bring hope and justice to a system built to resist both at every turn.

Debating the Death Penalty: Should America Have Capital Punishment? the Experts on Both Sides Make Their Best Case


Hugo Bedau - 2004
    Few controversies continue to stir as much emotion as this one, andpublic confusion is often the result. This volume brings together seven experts--judges, lawyers, prosecutors, and philosophers--to debate the death penalty in a spirit of open inquiry and civil discussion. Here, as the contributors present their reasons for or against capital punishment, the multiple facets of the issue arerevealed in clear and thought-provoking detail. Is the death penalty a viable deterrent to future crimes? Does the imposition of lesser penalties, such as life imprisonment, truly serve justice in cases of the worst offences? Does the legal system discriminate against poor or minority defendants? Isthe possibility of executing innocent persons sufficient grounds for abolition? In confronting such questions and making their arguments, the contributors marshal an impressive array of evidence, both statistical and from their own experiences working on death penalty cases. The book also includes the text of Governor George Ryan's March 2002 speech in which he explainedwhy he had commuted the sentences of all prisoners on Illinois's death row. By representing the viewpoints of experts who face the vexing questions about capital punishment on a daily basis, Debating the Death Penalty makes a vital contribution to a more nuanced understanding of the moral and legal problems underlying this controversy.

A Bit of a Stretch


Chris Atkins - 2020
    Where can a tin of tuna buy you clean clothes? Which British education system struggles with 50% illiteracy? Where do teetotal Muslims attend AA meetings? Where is it easier to get 'spice' than paracetamol? Where does self-harm barely raise an eyebrow?Welcome to Her Majesty's Prison Service, a creaking and surreal world that has been left to rot for decades in the shadows of polite society. Like most people, documentary-maker Chris Atkins didn't spend much time thinking about prisons. But after becoming embroiled in a dodgy scheme to fund his latest film, he was sent down for five years. His new home would be HMP Wandsworth, one of the oldest, largest, and most dysfunctional prisons in Europe.Horrifying, moving, and darkly funny, this is the unvarnished depiction of what he found. With a cast of characters ranging from wily drug dealers to corrupt screws to senior officials bent on endless (and fruitless) reform, this is the reality behind the locked gates. Full of incredible and hilarious stories, A Bit of a Stretch reveals the true scale of our prison crisis and why it is costing us all.

Satan’s Silence: Ritual Abuse and the Making of a Modern American Witch Hunt


Debbie Nathan - 1995
    In this powerful book, Debbie Nathan and Mike Snedeker examine the forces fueling this blind panic.

Grace and Justice on Death Row: The Race against Time and Texas to Free an Innocent Man


Brian W. Stolarz - 2016
    The book chronicles Brown’s extraordinary journey to freedom against very long odds, overcoming unscrupulous prosecutors, corrupt police, inadequate defense counsel, and a broken criminal justice system. The book examines how a lawyer-client relationship turned into one of brotherhood.Grace And Justice On Death Row also addresses many issues facing the criminal justice system and the death penalty – race, class, adequate defense counsel, and intellectual disability, and proposes reforms.Told from Stolarz’s perspective, this raw, fast-paced look into what it took to save one man’s life will leave you questioning the criminal justice system in this country. It is a story of injustice and redemption that must be told.

China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power


Nicholas D. Kristof - 1994
    An insightful and thought-provoking analysis of daily life in China, China Wakes is an exemplary work of reportage. 16 pages of photos.

Death and Justice


Mark Fuhrman - 2004
    Are innocent people being executed? Is capital punishment justice or is it revenge? Into the debate steps Mark Fuhrman, America's most famous detective, and no stranger to controversy himself.Fuhrman seeks to answer these questions by investigating the death penalty in Oklahoma, where a "hang 'em high" attitude of cowboy justice resulted in twenty–one executions in 2001, more than any other state. Most of these cases came from one jurisdiction, Oklahoma County, where legendary DA Bob Macy bragged of sending more people to death row than any other prosecutor, and police chemist Joyce Gilchrist was eventually fired for mismanaging the crime lab. Examining police records, trial transcripts, appellate decisions and conducting hundreds of interviews, Fuhrman focuses his considerable investigative skills on more than a dozen of the most controversial Oklahoma death penalty cases.

Convicting the Innocent: Where Criminal Prosecutions Go Wrong


Brandon L. Garrett - 2011
    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.