In his book, ​“Quest for Justice: Defending the Damned,” Richard Jaffe explores the prob­lems of the American death penal­ty sys­tem through his expe­ri­ence as a cap­i­tal defense attor­ney in Alabama. During the past twen­ty years, Jaffe has helped secure the release of three death row inmates: Randall Padgett and Gary Drinkard, who were ful­ly exon­er­at­ed, and James Cochran, who was cleared of mur­der charges, but plead­ed guilty to a relat­ed rob­bery charge. In his book, Jaffe wrote, ​“I always keep in mind the max­im that his­to­ry will judge a soci­ety by the way it treats its weak­est and most vul­ner­a­ble. Although most would assume that applies to the poor and the elder­ly, all one has to do is look at those who end up on death row: an over­whelm­ing num­ber are poor, dis­en­fran­chised and suf­fer from some men­tal defect or even brain dam­age.” Charles J. Ogletree, Jr., a Harvard Law Professor, said of Quest for Justice, ​“This book tells the sto­ries of peo­ple once con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death and lat­er acquit­ted of the same charges. It tells how it hap­pened, shows the crim­i­nal courts are fal­li­ble and that poor peo­ple fac­ing the death penal­ty may live or die depend­ing on the com­pe­tence and ded­i­ca­tion of the lawyers appoint­ed to defend them.”

(J. Reeves, ​“Alabama attor­ney ques­tions death penal­ty in new book,” New Haven Register, January 29, 2012; DPIC post­ed Mar. 24, 2014; New Horizon Press (2012)). See Books and Innocence.

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