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Author: JoAnn Bren Guernsey
Publisher: Twenty-First Century Books
Published: 2009-09-01
Total Pages: 164
ISBN-13: 0761340793
DOWNLOAD EBOOKDiscusses the history of execution, the process from sentencing to execution, moral issues involved in the death penalty, arguments for and against it, and the shrinking number of countries with it.
Author: Maurice Chammah
Publisher: Crown
Published: 2021-01-26
Total Pages: 368
ISBN-13: 1524760277
DOWNLOAD EBOOKNEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • A deeply reported, searingly honest portrait of the death penalty in Texas—and what it tells us about crime and punishment in America “If you’re one of those people who despair that nothing changes, and dream that something can, this is a story of how it does.”—Anand Giridharadas, The New York Times Book Review WINNER OF THE J. ANTHONY LUKAS AWARD In 1972, the United States Supreme Court made a surprising ruling: the country’s death penalty system violated the Constitution. The backlash was swift, especially in Texas, where executions were considered part of the cultural fabric, and a dark history of lynching was masked by gauzy visions of a tough-on-crime frontier. When executions resumed, Texas quickly became the nationwide leader in carrying out the punishment. Then, amid a larger wave of criminal justice reform, came the death penalty’s decline, a trend so durable that even in Texas the punishment appears again close to extinction. In Let the Lord Sort Them, Maurice Chammah charts the rise and fall of capital punishment through the eyes of those it touched. We meet Elsa Alcala, the orphaned daughter of a Mexican American family who found her calling as a prosecutor in the nation’s death penalty capital, before becoming a judge on the state’s highest court. We meet Danalynn Recer, a lawyer who became obsessively devoted to unearthing the life stories of men who committed terrible crimes, and fought for mercy in courtrooms across the state. We meet death row prisoners—many of them once-famous figures like Henry Lee Lucas, Gary Graham, and Karla Faye Tucker—along with their families and the families of their victims. And we meet the executioners, who struggle openly with what society has asked them to do. In tracing these interconnected lives against the rise of mass incarceration in Texas and the country as a whole, Chammah explores what the persistence of the death penalty tells us about forgiveness and retribution, fairness and justice, history and myth. Written with intimacy and grace, Let the Lord Sort Them is the definitive portrait of a particularly American institution.
Author: Russell G. Murphy
Publisher:
Published: 2010
Total Pages: 334
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK"Through the statements of witnesses who testified at historic hearings in New York between December 2004 and February 2005, [the book] seeks to educate a national and international citizenry about capital punishment. ... present[ing] the essential facts relating to the death penalty and the major categories of debate over capital punishment worldwide"--Introd.
Author: Lynden Harris
Publisher: Duke University Press
Published: 2021-03-22
Total Pages: 246
ISBN-13: 147802142X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKUpon receiving his execution date, one of the thousands of men living on death row in the United States had an epiphany: “All there ever is, is this moment. You, me, all of us, right here, right now, this minute, that's love.” Right Here, Right Now collects the powerful, first-person stories of dozens of men on death rows across the country. From childhood experiences living with poverty, hunger, and violence to mental illness and police misconduct to coming to terms with their executions, these men outline their struggle to maintain their connection to society and sustain the humanity that incarceration and its daily insults attempt to extinguish. By offering their hopes, dreams, aspirations, fears, failures, and wounds, the men challenge us to reconsider whether our current justice system offers actual justice or simply perpetuates the social injustices that obscure our shared humanity.
Author: Rick Unklesbay
Publisher: Wheatmark, Inc.
Published: 2019-05-10
Total Pages: 162
ISBN-13: 1627876812
DOWNLOAD EBOOKOver a career spanning nearly four decades, Rick Unklesbay has tried over one hundred murder cases before juries that ended with sixteen men and women receiving the death sentence. Arbitrary Death depicts some of the most horrific murders in Tucson, Arizona, the author's prosecution of those cases, and how the death penalty was applied. It provides the framework to answer the questions: Why is America the only Western country to still use the death penalty? Can a human-run system treat those cases fairly and avoid unconstitutional arbitrariness? It is an insider's view from someone who has spent decades prosecuting murder cases and who now argues that the death penalty doesn't work and our system is fundamentally flawed. With a rational, balanced approach, Unklesbay depicts cases that represent how different parts of the criminal justice system are responsible for the arbitrary nature of the death penalty and work against the fair application of the law. The prosecution, trial courts, juries, and appellate courts all play a part in what ultimately is a roll of the dice as to whether a defendant lives or dies. Arbitrary Death is for anyone who wonders why and when its government seeks to legally take the life of one of its citizens. It will have you questioning whether you can support a system that applies death as an arbitrary punishment -- and often decades after the sentence was given.
Author: Rachel King
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Published: 2003
Total Pages: 318
ISBN-13: 9780813531823
DOWNLOAD EBOOK"Rachel King offers us the stories of families who understand the powerful reality that taking another life in the name of justice only perpetuates the tragedy. I encourage others to read these stories to better understand their journey from despair and anger to some level of peace and even forgiveness."--Sister Helen Prejean, CSJ, author of Dead Man Walking Could you forgive the murderer of your husband? Your mother? Your son? Families of murder victims are often ardent and very public supporters of the death penalty. But the people whose stories appear in this book have chosen instead to forgive their loved ones' murderers, and many have developed personal relationships with the killers and have even worked to save their lives. They have formed a nationwide group, Murder Victims' Families for Reconciliation (MVFR), to oppose the death penalty. MVFR members are often treated as either saints or lunatics, but the truth is that they are neither. They are ordinary people who have responded to an extraordinary and devastating tragedy with courage and faith, choosing reconciliation over retribution, healing over hatred. Believing that the death penalty is a form of social violence that only repeats and perpetuates the violence that claimed their loved ones' lives, they hold out the hope of redemption even for those who have committed the most hideous crimes. Weaving third-person narrative with wrenching first-hand accounts, King presents the stories of ten MVFR members. Each is a heartrending tale of grief, soul searching, and of the challenge to choose forgiveness instead of revenge. These stories, which King sets in the context of the national discussion over the death penalty debate and restorative versus retributive justice, will appeal not only to those who oppose the death penalty, but also to those who strive to understand how people can forgive the seemingly unforgivable. Rachel King is a legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union's Washington national office where she lobbies on crime policy. She is currently working on a book about the families of death row inmates.
Author: Carol S. Steiker
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Published: 2016-11-07
Total Pages: 401
ISBN-13: 0674737423
DOWNLOAD EBOOKBefore constitutional regulation -- The Supreme Court steps in -- The invisibility of race in the constitutional revolution -- Between the Supreme Court and the states -- The failures of regulation -- An unsustainable system? -- Recurring patterns in constitutional regulation -- The future of the American death penalty -- Life after death
Author: Gilbert King
Publisher: Civitas Books
Published: 2008
Total Pages: 410
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe inspiration behind "A Lesson Before Dying" meets the best of John Grisham as a young Cajun lawyer fights to save a black teenager from the electric chair. 16-page b&w photo insert.
Author: Andrea D. Lyon
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Published: 2014-11-06
Total Pages: 176
ISBN-13: 1442232684
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe United States is divided about the death penalty—17 states have banned it, while the remaining states have not. From wrongful convictions to botched executions, capital punishment is fraught with controversy. In The Death Penalty: What’s Keeping It Alive, award-winning criminal defense attorney Andrea Lyon turns a critical eye towards the reasons why the death penalty remains active in most states, in spite of well-documented flaws in the justice system. The book opens with an overview of the history of the death penalty in America, then digs into the reasons capital punishment is a fixture in the justice system of most states. The author argues that religious and moral convictions play a role, as does media coverage of crime and punishment. Politics, however, plays the biggest role, according to the author, with no one wanting to look soft on crime. The death penalty remains a deadly political tool in most of the United States.
Author: Sangmin Bae
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Published: 2012-02-01
Total Pages: 196
ISBN-13: 0791479471
DOWNLOAD EBOOKDespite public support for the death penalty, a remarkable number of countries in different parts of the world have banned capital punishment in all its forms, regardless of the nature of the crime or the criminal. Arguing that international norms are often a critical source of ideas for change in state policy, but that impact varies greatly, Sangmin Bae offers a systemic explanation of how, when, and under what conditions a country complies with international norms. She examines four countries that reached different stages of norm compliance with respect to the death penalty—Ukraine, South Africa, South Korea, and the United States. Focusing on the role of political leadership and domestic political institutions, Bae clarifies the causal mechanisms that lead to state compliance or noncompliance with the norm.
