Examining Wrongful Convictions: Stepping Back, Moving Forward - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1611632528 ISBN 13: 9781611632521

Publisher: Carolina Academic Press, 2014

Synopsis

In Examining Wrongful Convictions: Stepping Back, Moving Forward, the premise is that much can be learned by ''stepping back'' from the focus on the direct causes of wrongful convictions and examining criminal justice systems, and the sociopolitical environments in which they operate. Expert scholars examine the underlying individual, systemic, and social or structural conditions that may help precipitate and sustain wrongful convictions, thereby ''moving forward'' the related scholarship.

About this title

About the Author:

Allison D. Redlich is an Associate Professor in the School of Criminal Justice at the University at Albany, SUNY. James R. Acker is a Distinguished Teaching Professor in the School of Criminal Justice at the University at Albany, SUNY. Robert J. Norris is a PhD candidate in the School of Criminal Justice at the University at Albany, SUNY. Catherine L. Bonventre is a PhD candidate in the School of Criminal Justice at the University at Albany, SUNY.

Review:

''Examining Wrongful Convictions is a book that has no equal. With full and up-to-date chapters dedicated to the unique vulnerability of adolescents, insufficiently protected; the enabling role of a ''muddled'' news media, including the internet; the plight of African Americans; the invisible and often pernicious effects of adversarialism; the mechanisms of plea bargaining, now responsible for 97% of convictions; psychological perspectives on miscarriages of justice; public policy implications; and the methods of empirical research that can be used to study innocence; this book is destined to become that kind of book that all judges, prosecutors, defense lawyers, criminal justice professionals, and social scientists interested in innocence will find indispensable.'' --Saul Kassin, Distinguished Professor of Psychology, The John Jay College of Criminal Justice, NYC

''This book offers the most comprehensive and insightful treatment of wrongful convictions to date. Thanks to the exhaustive nature of this compilation, the reader will miss neither the forest nor the trees. The contributions span disciplines and domains, leading the reader from the level of concrete biases and errors of individual legal actors to structural features of the system that impede its overall performance. The book's particular strength lies in the latter domain, highlighting the sociopolitical environment — the wars on drugs and crime, the culture of punitiveness, and racial animus — and accentuating the shortcomings of the legal process itself — the plea mill, excesses of adversarialism, prosecutorial culture, stunted discovery rules, and the paltry remedial powers of appellate and collateral review. The book opens the door to further research and to the generation of novel ideas for increasing the accuracy of criminal verdicts.'' --Dan Simon, Richard L. and Maria B. Crutcher Professor of Law and Psychology, Gould School of Law, University of Southern California

''We've learned a huge amount about wrongful convictions in the past twenty years. It's impossible to summarize all this work in a single volume, but Examining Wrongful Convictions does a first rate job of surveying the field and peering into the future. A well-written and wide-ranging collection of essays by many of the best scholars in the field, this book is an excellent introduction to the rapidly changing body of research and writing on the causes, the effects and the means of preventing convictions of innocent criminal defendants.'' --Samuel Gross, University of Michigan Law School, Editor of the National Registry of Exonerations

About this edition

• Publisher: Carolina Academic Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1611632528
• ISBN 13: 9781611632521
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384
• Editor: Redlich Allison, Acker James, Norris Robert, Bonventre Catherine