Books

A new book by Professor Austin Sarat (pic­tured) focus­es on clemen­cy’s role in the U.S. crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem: ​“Mercy on Trial: What It Means to Stop an Execution.” According to U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy, ​“This thought­ful book should be read by every cit­i­zen who cares about the issue, and by every gov­er­nor and pres­i­dent entrust­ed with the pow­er to pun­ish or par­don.” In ​“Mercy on Trial,” Sarat reviews the com­plex­i­ties of clemen­cy and exam­ines issues such as reha­bil­i­ta­tion. (Princeton University Press, 2005).See Books on the Death Penalty. See also Clemency.…

Two new books by American University Criminology Professor Robert Johnson, includ­ing one book of satire and a sec­ond book of short sto­ries co-authored with pris­on­er Victor Hassine and crim­i­nol­o­gist Ania Dobrzanska, address life in prison and on death row in the United States. Johnson’s first book of satire, ​“Justice Follies,” offers a col­lec­tion of par­o­dies that seek to high­light a host of prob­lems with­in the American prison sys­tem. ​“This book made me laugh out loud. It is out­ra­geous… and the most out­ra­geous thing about it is its ring of truth,”…

The Death Penalty: Constitutional Issues, Commentaries and Case Briefs is a new text­book that brings togeth­er many of the legal issues of the death penal­ty and presents them in an easy-to-digest form. The book pro­vides a brief ret­ro­spec­tive analy­sis of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment over the past two cen­turies, and then details the cur­rent sta­tus of the U.S. death penal­ty. With a chap­ter that focus­es on the U.S. Supreme Court cas­es Furman v. Georgia and Gregg v. Georgia, as well as chap­ters on race, the men­tal­ly impaired, rep­re­sen­ta­tion, appeals, and oth­er issues,…

Craig Haney, pro­fes­sor of psy­chol­o­gy at the University of California, Santa Cruz, has just pub­lished a new book, Death By Design: Capital Punishment as a Social Psychological System (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2005). Haney explores a num­ber of areas that skew death penal­ty sen­tenc­ing in America:

Victims of Justice Revisited, a new book by Thomas Frisbie and Randy Garrett, details the inno­cence case of Rolando Cruz, an Illinois man who was wrong­ly con­vict­ed and sent to death row for the 1983 mur­der of 10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico. The book tells the sto­ry of Cruz and his two co-defen­dants, Alejandro Hernandez and Stephen Buckley, from the day of the crime to the ground­break­ing tri­al of sev­en law enforce­ment offi­cers accused of con­spir­ing to deny Cruz a fair tri­al. Cruz’s case was one of sev­er­al inno­cence cas­es that…

The Cultural Lives of Capital Punishment, a new book edit­ed by pro­fes­sor Austin Sarat of Amherst College and lec­tur­er Christian Boulanger of the Free University in Berlin, exam­ines the com­pli­cat­ed dynam­ics of the death penal­ty in eleven nations to deter­mine what role cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment plays in defin­ing a coun­try’s polit­i­cal and cul­tur­al iden­ti­ty. The edi­tors note that a nation’s val­ues and cul­tur­al his­to­ry influ­ence its rela­tion­ship with cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The book includes exam­i­na­tions of the death penal­ty in Mexico, the United States, Poland, Kyrgyzstan, India, Israel, Palestine, Japan, China,…

Murdering Myths: The Story Behind the Death Penalty, a new book by Judith W. Kay, uses the per­son­al expe­ri­ences of both crime vic­tims’ fam­i­lies and those on death row to exam­ine America’s beliefs about crime and pun­ish­ment. Noting that researchers have raised ques­tions about the exe­cu­tion of inno­cent peo­ple, racial bias in sen­tenc­ing, and cap­i­tal pun­ish­men­t’s fail­ure to act as a deter­rent, Kay asks why Americans still sup­port the death penal­ty. She uses inter­views with those most close­ly impact­ed by vio­lent crime and cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment to exam­ine whether punishment…

“Hidden Victims,” a new book by soci­ol­o­gist Susan F. Sharp of the University of Oklahoma, exam­ines the impact of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment on the fam­i­lies of those fac­ing exe­cu­tion. Through a series of in-depth inter­views with fam­i­lies of the accused, Sharp illus­trates from a soci­o­log­i­cal stand­point how fam­i­ly mem­bers and friends of those on death row are, in effect, indi­rect vic­tims of the ini­tial crime. The book empha­sizes their respons­es to sen­tenc­ing, as well as how they grieve and face an impend­ing exe­cu­tion. Sharp also exam­ines the issues of wrong­ful conviction…

“Scott Sundby’s new book, ​“A Life and Death Decision: A Jury Weighs the Death Penalty” is an impar­tial look at cap­i­tal jury delib­er­a­tions through the exam­i­na­tion of data col­lect­ed by the Capital Jury Project and oth­er stud­ies of group deci­sion-mak­ing. Drawing on the Capital Jury Project’s inter­views with more than 1,000 jurors from across the coun­try who had tak­en part in death penal­ty cas­es, the book address­es cru­cial issues such as jury instruc­tions, jury room set­up, and voir dire pro­ce­dures. While focus­ing on a sin­gle case, Sundby also sheds light…

Executed on a Technicality: Lethal Injustice on America’s Death Row, by Professor David Dow, is a behind-the-scenes look at the death penal­ty through the lens of an attor­ney who for­mer­ly sup­port­ed cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Dow, who teach­es at the University of Houston Law Center and found­ed the Texas Innocence Network, pro­vides case his­to­ries illus­trat­ing seri­ous flaws in the death penal­ty sys­tem. He uses these cas­es to guide read­ers through a web of coerced con­fes­sions, incom­pe­tent rep­re­sen­ta­tion, racist juries, and unfair judges, all of which he believes con­tribute to the arbi­trari­ness of…