BOOKS: ​“Life After Death Row: Exonerees’ Search for Community and Identity”

A new book by Professors Saundra Westervelt and Kimberly Cook looks at the lives of eigh­teen peo­ple who had been wrong­ful­ly sen­tenced to death and who were lat­er freed from death row. In Life After Death Row: Exonerees’ Search for Community and Identity, the authors focus on three cen­tral areas affect­ing those who had to begin a new life after leav­ing years of severe con­fine­ment: the seem­ing invis­i­bil­i­ty of these indi­vid­u­als after their release; the com­plic­i­ty of the jus­tice sys­tem in allow­ing that invis­i­bil­i­ty; and the need for each of them to con­front their per­son­al trau­ma. C. Ronald Huff, a pro­fes­sor at the University of California, Irvine, not­ed, ​“The authors skill­ful­ly con­duct a jour­ney inside the minds of exonerees, allow­ing read­ers to see the world from their unique perspectives.” 

Saundra D. Westervelt is an asso­ciate pro­fes­sor of soci­ol­o­gy at the University of North Carolina Greensboro. Kimberly J. Cook is pro­fes­sor and chair of the depart­ment of soci­ol­o­gy and crim­i­nol­o­gy at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.

(S. Westervelt and K. Cook, ​“Life After Death Row: Exonerees’ Search for Community and Identity,” Rutgers University Press, forth­com­ing September 2012). See Death Row and Innocence. Read more books on the death penal­ty. Listen to DPIC’s pod­casts on Death Row and on Innocence.