by Thomas P. Puccio with Dan Collins (1995)
During his 13 years as a federal prosecutor, Thomas Puccio unraveled the French Connection theft, prosecuted the first FBI agent ever convicted of corruption, and masterminded the Abscam investigation. He tells of turf wars inside the Justice Department and of deals cut between judges and attorneys, revealing an underside of law enforcement seldom seen by the public.
Nancy Grace with Diane Clehane
A compelling, intelligent and gutsy read, OBJECTION! captures Nancy’s inimitable voice that has become a source of insight to millions of television viewers and radio listeners around the country. OBJECTION! will provide an in-depth, yet accessible and entertaining, look at the inner workings of the US judicial system, and give insightful criticisms of how the media has the power to manipulate and shape court decisions.
Layla Skinns, Michael Scott, Tony Cox
"Recent events from the economic downturn to climate change mean that there has never been a better time to be thinking about and trying to better understand the concept of risk. In this book, prominent and eminent speakers from fields as diverse as statistics to classics, neuroscience to criminology, politics to astronomy, as well as speakers embedded in the media and in government have put their ideas down on paper in a series of essays that broaden our understanding of the meaning of risk. After twenty-five years, the prestigious Darwin College Lectures are one of the most popular public lecture series at the University of Cambridge. The risk lectures in 2010 were amongst the most popular yet and, in essay form, they make for a lively and engaging read for specialists and non-specialists alike"--
Deborah Halber
The Skeleton Crew provides an entree into the gritty and tumultuous world of Sherlock Holmes-wannabes who race to beat out law enforcement -- and one another -- at matching missing persons with unidentified remains. In America today, upwards of forty thousand people are dead and unaccounted for. These murder, suicide, and accident victims, separated from their names, are being adopted by the bizarre online world of amateur sleuths. It's DIY CSI by ordinary citizens equipped only with laptops and a knack for puzzles.
Roy Black
Roy Black is one of America's toughest and shrewdest criminal defense lawyers. Whether defending a wealthy celebrity or an indigent death row inmate, Black sees his job as doing whatever it takes to get his clients fair trials. In Black's Law, he takes us behind the scenes of four difficult and dangerous cases to reveal the legal strategies, no-holds-barred tactics and courtroom psychology he used to make sure his clients received every protection promised by the law. Black's cases illustrate the life-and-death struggles that occur every day in our criminal courts. In Alvarez, Black has to convince a jury to put aside poisonous pre-trial publicity, the threat of a race riot and almost universal pressure for a conviction in order to keep a young Hispanic police officer out of jail for killing a young black hoodlum in the line of duty.^ In Knight, Black must contend with issues of class and race as he wages a four-year struggle to persuade federal appeals court judges to overturn the death sentence imposed on an insane, brutal killer because of the incompetence of his first lawyers. In Hicks, Black has to prove the innocence of a client who is his own worst enemy by convincing a jury that the police conducted a sloppy murder investigation. And in De La Mata, Black must persuade jurors to disregard the damaging testimony of admitted drug dealers who have plea-bargained for lesser sentences in order to save a former bank president caught in the crosshairs of a federal prosecutor waging his own relentless war on drugs. At a time when the public and its elected officials are giving prosecutors and judges more power to put criminals behind bars, defense lawyers are often seen as being on the side of the bad guys.^ But Roy Black believes that when we chip away at the rights of the accused, we diminish our own rights as well. In our adversarial system, all too often the only person standing between a defendant and jail -- or the death penalty -- is the criminal defense lawyer. In these accounts, Black demonstrates in riveting detail how a defense attorney must investigate criminal cases by sifting through evidence and preparing for trial. (It's like preparing for a war.) He shows us how the principles of law, cross-examination and evidence -- as well as careful jury selection and skillful use of expert witnesses -- can level the playing field to counter the enormous resources that state and federal prosecutors have at their disposal. Black's Law reveals what really goes on in our criminal courts and makes resoundingly clear the crucial role that criminal defense lawyers play in safeguarding the basic right to a fair trial for all.