BOOKS: Imprisoned by the Past: Warren McCleskey and the American Death Penalty

A new book by Prof. Jeffrey Kirchmeier of the City University of New York examines the recent history of race and the death penalty in the U.S. The book uses the story of a Georgia death row inmate named Warren McCleskey, whose challenge to the state’s death penalty went all the way to the Supreme Court. In 1987 the Court held (5-4) that his statistical evidence showing that Georgia’s system of capital punishment was applied in a racially disproportionate way was insufficient to overturn his death sentence. McCleskey was eventually executed. The book connects this individual case to the broader issue of racial bias in the American death penalty. Bryan Stevenson, Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative, said of the book,”No legal decision in the last half of the 20th century characterized America’s continuing failure to confront its history of racial inequality more than the McCleskey decision. Jeff Kirchmeier’s welcomed and insightful book brings much needed context and perspective to this critically important issue. Compelling and thoughtful, this book is a must read for those trying to understand America’s death penalty and its sordid relationship to our failure to overcome three centuries of racial injustice.”

(Press release, Oxford University Press: J. Kirchmeier, “Imprisoned by the Past: Warren McCleskey and the American Death Penalty,” 2015; Stevenson quote at amazon.com’s book posting; DPIC posted, Feb. 5, 2015). See Books, Race, and History of the Death Penalty.