Books

In her book, ​“Lethal Punishment: Lynchings and Legal Executions in the South,” University of Memphis pro­fes­sor Margaret Vandiver explores the com­plex rela­tion­ship between these two forms of pun­ish­ment and chal­lenges the assump­tion that exe­cu­tions con­sis­tent­ly grew out of — and replaced — lynch­ings. Vandiver’s book exam­ines lynch­ings and legal exe­cu­tions in three cul­tur­al­ly and geo­graph­i­cal­ly dis­tinct south­ern regions. First she researched rur­al north­west Tennessee, where lynchings outnumbered…

In ​“Last Words From Death Row: The Walls Unit,” Norma Herrera recounts the tribu­la­tions she and her fam­i­ly suf­fered as they worked to free her broth­er, Leonel, from death row in Texas. The book doc­u­ments court events and press cov­er­age of the case and cap­tures the fam­i­ly’s efforts to assist Leonel pri­or to his exe­cu­tion in 1993, four months after the U.S. Supreme Court held in Herrera v. Collins that, in the absence of oth­er con­sti­tu­tion­al vio­la­tions, new evi­dence of inno­cence is no reason…

In the Shadow of Death: Restorative Justice and Death Row Families is a new book by Professors Elizabeth Beck, Sarah Britto, and Arlene Andrews that exam­ines the debil­i­tat­ing effects that a death sen­tence can have on the fam­i­lies of the offend­ers. With a for­ward by Steve Earle, the book pro­vides an in-depth analy­sis of restora­tive jus­tice, which focus­es on crime as an act against an indi­vid­ual or the com­mu­ni­ty, rather than the state. In their exam­i­na­tion of how capital punishment…

The Fairer Death: Executing Women in Ohio is a new book by Victor Streib, a pro­fes­sor at the Ohio Northern University College of Law. The book explores Ohio’s use of the death penal­ty for women and exam­ines the impli­ca­tions for women on death row through­out the coun­try. Streib care­ful­ly describes the cas­es of all four women exe­cut­ed by Ohio in its his­to­ry and those of the 11 women sen­tenced to death in the state dur­ing the mod­ern death penal­ty era (1973-present). Professor Streib’s analysis…

“Living With the Death Penalty” is a new book that exam­ines the impact of exe­cu­tions on cor­rec­tion­al offi­cers, offend­ers, chap­lains, attor­neys, and vic­tims’ fam­i­ly mem­bers. In this book, author Courtney Vaughn, a rape vic­tim and an Educational Leadership and Policy Studies pro­fes­sor at the University of Oklahoma, offers first-per­son accounts of what it is like to expe­ri­ence the death penal­ty from a vari­ety of per­spec­tives. She explores the sac­ri­fice, alien­ation, and…

Former Texas death row inmate Kerry Max Cook has authored a book detail­ing his wrong­ful con­vic­tion and his 22-year fight for free­dom. Cook’s book, ​“Chasing Justice,” pro­vides a first-hand account of his tri­al, his two-decade stay on death row in Texas, and his release after DNA evi­dence linked anoth­er man to the crime for which he was sen­tenced to die. Publisher HarperCollins notes that the book is ​“a shock­ing look inside death row, a legal thriller, and an inspirational story…

Corrections: A Contemporary Introduction is a new aca­d­e­m­ic text being released by Allyn & Bacon pub­lish­ers. Authored by Leanne F. Alarid of the University of Texas and Philip L. Reichel of the University of Northern Colorado, this resource offers a thor­ough exam­i­na­tion of all aspects of the cor­rec­tions area in a graph­i­cal­ly rich for­mat. It offers stu­dents the oppor­tu­ni­ty to think crit­i­cal­ly about the future of this field. The text­book fea­tures a chap­ter on Capital Punishment,…

Professor Matthew Robinson of Applachian State University has writ­ten a new book enti­tled Death Nation: The Experts Explain American Capital Punishment. This book pro­vides a sol­id yet brief back­ground on the major issues per­tain­ing to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the United States. It cov­ers top­ics such as the his­to­ry of the death penal­ty in America, American death penal­ty law, jus­ti­fi­ca­tions for cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, as well as alleged prob­lems with its prac­tice. The book also presents a study…

Wounds That Do Not Bind: Victim-based Perspectives on the Death Penalty, a book by James R. Acker and David Reed Karp, exam­ines how fam­i­ly mem­bers and advo­cates for vic­tims address the impact of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The book presents the per­son­al sto­ries of vic­tims’ fam­i­ly mem­bers and their inter­ac­tions with the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem. It also exam­ines the rel­e­vant areas of legal research, includ­ing the use of vic­tim impact evi­dence in cap­i­tal tri­als, how cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment affects victims’…