Book picks similar to
Lethal Defense by Michael Stagg
thriller
audible
crime
legal-thriller
Time of Justice
Robin James - 2020
A faceless powerbroker has other ideas… Small-town prosecutor Mara Brent must be tough as nails to succeed in her male-dominated profession. But she harbors a soft spot for the victims who rely on her courtroom skill, especially the wheelchair-bound rape survivor she’s known for twenty years. So when her friend’s unsolved case reopens with a DNA match and an arrest, she’s determined to finally bring a monster to justice.Though the fiend is accused of dozens of similar assaults, only Mara’s case has the iron-clad evidence to put him away. But unexpected bombshells at trial threaten to muddy her black-and-white conviction into frightening shades of gray. She suspects there’s a sinister conspiracy out to torpedo the verdict… and her career.Can the hard-nosed attorney uncover the truth before a serial rapist walks free to strike again?Time of Justice is the first book in the pulse-pounding Mara Brent Legal Thriller Series. If you like strong heroines, page-turning twists, and dark suspense, then you’ll love Robin James’s edge-of-your-seat novel.
Buy Time of Justice to bring the gavel down on a depraved offender today!
Power and Justice
Peter O'Mahoney - 2019
His enemies want blood.And criminal defense attorney Tex Hunter is the only hope he has left.Robert Sulzberger appeared to have a perfect life—a respected position in the City Council, a lovely family, a house with all the trimmings—but behind the façade, his life was crumbling. Drawn into a world of crime and corruption, Sulzberger couldn’t find a way out. He couldn’t escape. And when he tried to walk away, he found himself behind bars.The trial captures the media’s attention and the dark forces of politics are thrown into the limelight. As the son of a convicted serial killer, Tex Hunter knows just how dangerous those forces can be.In the first instalment of the Tex Hunter novel series, Hunter battles against deception, fraud, and cover-ups; risking everything in the most difficult case of his career.Can justice triumph against corruption?Or will the dark side of politics bury the truth forever?This thrilling story will take you for a ride through the courtroom, and end with a twist that you didn’t see coming.
The Professor
Robert Bailey - 2014
But when a power-hungry colleague uses a recent run-in between McMurtrie and headstrong student Rick Drake to end his career, he is left unsure what to do next.Meanwhile, a devastating trucking accident in Henshaw, Alabama, leaves a young family dead. Drake, now a fledgling lawyer, takes the case against the freight carrier and soon begins to uncover the truth behind the tragedy that is buried in a tangled web of arson, bribery, and greed. On the eve of the trial and with his case unraveling in the midst of a dangerous cover-up that threatens to silence his star witnesses, Drake realizes that only his estranged mentor, Professor McMurtrie, can help him now.With everything to lose and only justice to gain, will McMurtrie and Drake overcome bad blood to defeat a ruthless adversary? Can the Professor turn back the clock and recover all that he’s lost?
Revised edition: This edition of The Professor includes editorial revisions.
Justice Redeemed
Scott Pratt - 2015
Now the hotheaded young lawyer is in the public eye yet again—this time, accused of murder.Jalen Jordan retained Street for what seemed to be a minor traffic violation, but when evidence turned up linking Jordan to the death of two boys, Street wanted out of the case. To ensure his lawyer’s cooperation and silence, Jordan threatened to make Street’s son the next victim. Shortly after, Jordan’s own body turned up with a bullet hole in his chest.Now Street is on trial for his life, and the enemy he made in the DA’s office is clearly out for blood. It’s one lawyer out to frame another. Can a desperate father escape punishment for a crime he didn’t commit?
The Racketeer
John Grisham - 2012
Job status? Former attorney. Current residence? The Federal Prison Camp near Frostburg, Maryland.On paper, Malcolm’s situation isn’t looking too good these days, but he’s got an ace up his sleeve. He knows who killed Judge Fawcett, and he knows why. The judge’s body was found in his remote lakeside cabin. There was no forced entry, no struggle, just two dead bodies: Judge Fawcett and his young secretary. And one large, state-of-the-art, extremely secure safe, opened and emptied.What was in the safe? The FBI would love to know. And Malcolm Bannister would love to tell them. But everything has a price—especially information as explosive as the sequence of events that led to Judge Fawcett’s death. And the Racketeer wasn’t born yesterday . . .Nothing is as it seems and everything’s fair game in this wickedly clever new novel from John Grisham, the undisputed master of the legal thriller.
The Third Victim
Phillip Margolin - 2018
She tells a horrific story about being kidnapped, then tortured, until she finally managed to escape. She was the lucky one--two other women, with similar burns and bruises, were found dead.The surviving victim identifies the house where she was held captive and the owner, Alex Mason--a prominent local attorney--is arrested. Although he loudly insists upon his innocence, his wife's statements about his sexual sadism and the physical evidence found at the scene, his summer home, is damning.Regina Barrister is a legendary criminal defense attorney, known as "The Sorceress" for her courtroom victories. But she's got a secret, one that threatens her skill, her reputation, and, most of all, her clients. And she's agreed to take on the seemingly impossible task of defending Alex Mason.Robin Lockwood, a young lawyer and former MMA fighter, has just left a clerkship at the Oregon Supreme Court to work for Regina Barrister. The Alex Mason trial is her first big one, a likely death penalty case, and she's second chair to Regina. Increasingly, she's worried her boss's behavior and the details in the case against their client don't quite add up.
An Innocent Client
Scott PrattScott Pratt - 2008
A beautiful, mysterious young girl is accused. In this Mystery Readers International finalist for "Best Debut Mystery," criminal defense lawyer Joe Dillard has become jaded over the years as he's tried to balance his career against his conscience. Savvy but cynical, Dillard wants to quit doing criminal defense, but he can't resist the chance to represent someone who might actually be innocent. His drug-addicted sister has just been released from prison and his mother is succumbing to Alzheimer's, but Dillard's commitment to the case never wavers despite the personal troubles and professional demands that threaten to destroy him. "Pratt's richly developed characters are vivid and believable, especially the strong Southern women who fight their male-dominated culture from behind a facade of vulnerability in this brilliantly executed debut." -- Publisher's Weekly. "It’s Scott Turow and Grisham... The opening chapter is maybe the most compelling I’ve read in a decade.” – Ken Bruen. Smart and sophisticated, with a plot twist that will leave you shaking your head in wonder, "An Innocent Client" -- the first in the acclaimed Joe Dillard series -- will also leave you wanting more.
The Advocate
Teresa Burrell - 2009
The search for her brother and her career as a juvenile court attorney collide when she defends a nine-year-old whose father will go to any length to obtain custody. Sabre finds herself immersed in a case with too many unanswered questions. Her quest for the truth takes her coast to coast and five years into the past. Confronted with mysterious clues and strange occurrences, Sabre is threatened by someone wanting to make her suffer the unbearable anguish of losing everything-including her life. As Sabre's passion to find the answers intensifies, she discovers a twisted history of desperation, deceit, and revenge. And she discovers how obscure and treacherous the truth can be.
The Guilty Die Twice: A Legal Thriller
Don Hartshorn - 2020
Last Chance Lassiter
Paul Levine - 2012
Lassiter represents Cadillac Johnson, an aging rhythm and blues musician who claims his greatest song was stolen by a top-of-the-charts hip-hop artist. Lassiter's personal life is in chaos. He loses his job at a deep-carpet law firm and moves to a dumpy office in a Miami Beach parking garage. Then his lawyer-girlfriend, the ambitious Kim Coates, dumps him for not being "partnership material." Not only that, he faces disbarment after punching out his own client. Only a few years out of law school, Lassiter is already developing his iconoclastic rules. "I will live by no code but my own." This time, that code could leave him disbarred or bankrupt...or worse.Author's Note: A 25,000 word novella, "Last Chance Lassiter" is the brand-new prequel to "To Speak for the Dead."
The Neon Lawyer
Victor Methos - 2014
He joins a seedy fly-by-night firm in Salt Lake City out of desperation. After he loses his first case—a speeding ticket—he’s convinced his career is over. But to his shock, his boss hands him a slightly more complex case: capital murder.Brigham’s new client is Amanda Pierce, a lost, exhausted woman who gunned down the man who tortured and killed her six-year-old daughter. A jury may prove sympathetic to her unbearable pain, but the law is no fan of vigilante justice—and neither is Vince Dale, the slick and powerful prosecutor who’s never lost a murder case. There’s no question that Amanda pulled the trigger—she did it in front of five witnesses. If she pleads guilty, she will avoid a death sentence, but saving her life this way comes with an admission that what she did was wrong. However, if she refuses the “guilty” label, Brigham will have no choice but to fight for his career—and Amanda’s life.
The Lincoln Lawyer
Michael Connelly - 2005
But what he should have been on the watch for was evil.Haller is a Lincoln Lawyer, a criminal defense attorney who operates out of the back seat of his Lincoln Town Car, traveling between the far-flung courthouses of Los Angeles to defend clients of every kind. Bikers, con artists, drunk drivers, drug dealers — they’re all on Mickey Haller’s client list. For him, the law is rarely about guilt or innocence — it’s about negotiation and manipulation. Sometimes it’s even about justice.A Beverly Hills playboy arrested for attacking a woman he picked up in a bar chooses Haller to defend him, and Mickey has his first high-paying client in years. It is a defense attorney’s dream, what they call a franchise case. And as the evidence stacks up, Haller comes to believe this may be the easiest case of his career.Then someone close to him is murdered and Haller discovers that his search for innocence has brought him face-to-face with evil as pure as a flame. To escape without being burned, he must deploy every tactic, feint, and instinct in his arsenal — this time to save his own life.
Daddy's Girl
Lisa Scottoline - 2007
Greco's classes at Penn Law -- the History of Justice, for example -- aren't nearly as well attended as those taught by charismatic and handsome prof Angus Holt. Greco herself is far from immune to Holt's charm, so when he asks her to accompany him to Chester County Correctional Institution to lecture to inmates involved in an externship program, she quickly agrees. But the professors' visit soon turns deadly; a riot erupts, and amid the chaos Greco finds herself alone with a dying correctional officer who has been stabbed through the heart with a metal shank. His last words are a cryptic message to his wife: "It's under the floor." Soon thereafter, Greco is inexplicably set up for the murder of a state trooper and is forced to become a fugitive from justice while she tries to unravel the mystery of the dying man's words. While not as sexually supercharged or frenetically paced as Dirty Blonde, Daddy's Girl derives its power from the subtle and compelling coming-of-age of protagonist Greco, a sheltered and socially naive woman who, when faced with the ultimate adversity, discovers herself.
Hostile Witness
Rebecca Forster - 2004
Josie, once a hot-shot criminal defense attorney, left the fast track behind for a small practice in Hermosa Beach, California. But Hannah Sheraton intrigues her and, when the girl is charged as an adult, Josie cannot turn her back. But the deeper she digs the more Josie realizes that politics, the law and family relationships have created a combustible and dangerous situation. When the horrible truth of the murder is uncovered it could save Hannah Sheraton or destroy them both.
The Defense
Steve Cavanagh - 2015
The truth doesn't matter in a trial.The only thing that matters is what the prosecution can prove.Eddie Flynn used to be a con artist. Then he became a lawyer. Turned out the two weren't that different.It's been over a year since Eddie vowed never to set foot in a courtroom again. But now he doesn't have a choice. Olek Volchek, the infamous head of the Russian mafia in New York, has strapped a bomb to Eddie's back and kidnapped his ten-year-old daughter Amy.Eddie only has 48 hours to defend Volchek in an impossible murder trial—and win—if he wants to save his daughter.Under the scrutiny of the media and the FBI, Eddie must use his razor-sharp wit and every con-artist trick in the book to defend his 'client' and ensure Amy's safety. With the timer on his back ticking away, can Eddie convince the jury of the impossible?Lose this case and he loses everything.