Author: Michelle Lyons,Ben Dirs

Publisher: N.A

ISBN: 9781788701495

Category:

Page: 304

View: 8514

DOWNLOAD NOW »

Author: Michelle Lyons

Publisher: Bonnier Publishing Ltd.

ISBN: 1788700449

Category: True Crime

Page: 352

View: 4449

DOWNLOAD NOW »

IN 12 YEARS, MICHELLE LYONS WITNESSED NEARLY 300 EXECUTIONS. First as a reporter and then as a spokesperson for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Michelle was a frequent visitor to Huntsville's Walls Unit, where she recorded and relayed the final moments of death row inmates' lives before they were put to death by the state. Michelle was in the death chamber as some of the United States' most notorious criminals, including serial killers, child murderers and rapists, spoke their last words on earth, while a cocktail of lethal drugs surged through their veins. Michelle supported the death penalty, before misgivings began to set in as the executions mounted. During her time in the prison system, and together with her dear friend and colleague, Larry Fitzgerald, she came to know and like some of the condemned men and women she saw die. She began to query the arbitrary nature of the death penalty and ask the question: do executions make victims of all of us? An incredibly powerful and unique look at the complex story of capital punishment, as told by those whose lives have been shaped by it, Death Row: The Final Minutes is an important take on crime and punishment at a fascinating point in America's political history.

Author: Michelle Lyons

Publisher: Ulysses Press

ISBN: 9781612438764

Category: True Crime

Page: 312

View: 9282

DOWNLOAD NOW »

What really happens inside America's most active death row chamber? "I can’t remember his name or his crime. What I remember is the nothingness. No family members, no friends, no comfort. Maybe he didn’t want them to come, maybe they didn’t care, maybe he didn’t have any in the first place. It was just a prison official and two reporters, including me, looking through the glass at this man strapped fast to the gurney, needles in both arms, staring hard at the ceiling. When the warden stepped forward and asked if he wanted to make a last statement, the man barely shook his head, said nothing and started blinking. That’s when I saw it: a single tear at the corner of his right eye. A tear he desperately wanted to blink away, a tear he didn’t want us to see. It pooled there for a moment before running down his cheek. The warden gave his signal, the chemicals started flowing, the man coughed, sputtered and exhaled. A doctor entered the room, pronounced the man dead and pulled a sheet over his head." — Michelle Lyons, from the Prologue. Michelle Lyons witnessed nearly 300 executions at the Texas State penitentiary. This behind-the-scenes look at those haunting final moments of life relates shocking true stories of the inmate, his/her family members, prison officials, the death-row chaplain and the victim’s loved ones—all of whom come together in the death chamber.

Author: Michael O’Brien

Publisher: Waterside Press

ISBN: 190997692X

Category: Social Science

Page: 172

View: 6759

DOWNLOAD NOW »

Killing Justice in the Lone Star State is a reality check on active Death Row cases (and some post-execution ones). The book offers a fresh perspective for campaigners and reformers which ranges across theory, policy and practice. It also explains the much criticised Texas ‘law of parties.’ Many organizations are engaged in a race to prevent the execution of death sentenced prisoners in Texas (and elsewhere in the USA). Some men and women on Death Row claim to be completely innocent as described in this book. Michael O’Brien — who was himself wrongly convicted of murder — dissects cases with the eye of someone who has spent years watching how miscarriages of justice happen and why. He explains how practitioners and others are in denial and tunnel vision helps to sustain politicians, livelihoods and profits that depend on a conveyor belt from the courts to the execution chamber. He describes a killing process aided by bias, discrimination, prejudice, unfair trials, supposed expert evidence and closed minds. This is just one hallmark of a country obsessed with guns, violence and the ultimate penalty. Texas is the most punitive place within one of the harshest penal systems in the world. But no legal system should take away human lives, especially one tarnished by defects of the kind the author sets out in this book. Extract ‘Can you just imagine being an individual who is innocent but facing execution, whether in Texas or elsewhere? Or you were on Death Row but you did not take part in any killings, just got caught up in the hysteria? Can you picture the pressure and abject loneliness of serving 15 years or more, and then the State setting a date to kill you?’

Author: Steven Hale

Publisher: N.A

ISBN: 9781612199283

Category:

Page: 346

View: 6575

DOWNLOAD NOW »

A bold new look at justice and ethics in America, told through interwoven lives of condemned prisoners and the men and women who come to visit them In 2018, after a decade's hiatus, the state of Tennessee began executing death row inmates. In two years, six men have been executed and more await. While nationally executions are at historic lows, Tennessee is executing more prisoners than any other except Texas, a state six times larger. Award-winning Nashville Scene journalist Steven Hale has been the leading reporter in on these executions, covering it both in state and nationally for The Appeal. Death Row Welcomes You traces the interwoven lives of condemned prisoners and the men and women who come to Riverbend Maximum Security Institution on a near-weekly basis to visit them. With their Monday night gatherings at the heart of the story, the book will trace the paths that brought the characters -- visitors and convicted murderers alike -- to death row. These visitors are, for the most part, not activists -- or at least they did not start out that way. Nor are they the sort of killer-obsessed death row groupies who one occasionally finds in such settings. In fact, in most cases they are average people whose lives, not to mention their views on the death penalty, were turned upside down by a face-to-face meeting with a death row prisoner. Through his reporting, Hale was introduced to many of the people that make up the community at the center of Death Row Welcomes You. It has afforded him access that no other journalist has been granted, largely because Tennessee's Department of Correction has all but shut off official media access. Combining topics that have long fascinated readers--crime, death, and life inside prison--Hale writes with humanity, empathy, and insight earned by befriending death row prisoners and standing witnessing to their final moments.

Author: Bob Alexander,Richard K. Alvord

Publisher: University of North Texas Press

ISBN: 1574418165

Category: History

Page: 600

View: 7053

DOWNLOAD NOW »

Texas has one of the world’s largest prison systems, in operation for more than 170 years and currently employing more than 28,000 people. Hundreds of thousands of people have been involved in the prison business in Texas: inmates, correctional officers, public officials, private industry representatives, and volunteers have all entered the secure facilities and experienced a different world. Previous books on Texas prisons have focused either on records and data of the prisons, personal memoirs by both inmates and correctional officers, or accounts of prison breaks. Tall Walls and High Fences is the first comprehensive history of Texas prisons, written by a former law enforcement officer and an officer of the Texas prisons. Bob Alexander and Richard K. Alford chronicle the significant events and transformation of the Texas prison system from its earliest times to the present day, paying special attention to the human side of the story. Incarceration policy evolved from isolation to hard labor to rodeo and educational opportunities, with reform measures becoming an ever-evolving quest. The complex job of the correctional officer has evolved as well—they must ensure custody and control over the inmate population at all times, in order to provide a proper environment conducive to safety and positive change. Alexander and Alford focus especially on the men and women who work with diligence and dedication at their jobs “inside the walls,” risking their lives and—in too many instances—giving their lives in a peculiar line of duty most would find unpalatable. Within these pages are stories of prison breaks, bloodhounds chasing escapees, and gunfights. Inside the walls are deadly confrontations, human trafficking, rape, clandestine consensual trysts, and tricks turned against correctional officers. Famous people and episodes in Texas prison history receive their due, from Texas Rangers apprehending and placing outlaws in prison to the famed gunfighter John Wesley Hardin’s time in and out of prison. Tall Walls and High Fences covers numerous convict escape attempts and successes, including the 1974 prison siege at Huntsville and the 2007 prisoner gunfight and escape at the Wynne Unit. Throughout this long history Alexander and Alford pay special tribute to the more than 75 correctional officers, lawmen, and civilians who lost their lives in the line of duty.

Author: Jerry Spinelli

Publisher: Scholastic Inc.

ISBN: 9780590386333

Category: Juvenile Fiction

Page: 164

View: 7769

DOWNLOAD NOW »

The lives of four young people in very different circumstances are changed by their encounters with a mysterious library card that introduces them to the world of books and reading. Reprint.

Author: Keri Blakinger

Publisher: Icon Books

ISBN: 178578871X

Category: Biography & Autobiography

Page: 256

View: 1278

DOWNLOAD NOW »

'A groundbreaking debut from an extraordinary writer ... a testament to where a woman can go after rock-bottom' PIPER KERMAN, New York Times bestselling author of ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK Keri Blakinger's brave, brutal memoir, Corrections in Ink, is a riveting story about suffering, recovery and redemption' DAVID SHEFF, NEW YORK TIMES 'A raw, fast-paced portrait of one woman's descent into a mental abyss' Irish Independent Keri Blakinger had always lived at full throttle. Whether flying through the air, chasing Olympic dreams on the ice rink; surviving on as few calories as she could; or balancing a heroin addiction with pursuing a degree at an Ivy League university. But on a cold December day, Keri is arrested with a Tupperware container full of heroin. Shortly afterwards, she is convicted and sent to prison. Forced to confront her addiction, Keri finally manages to break free of it, and finds herself in a place unlike anything she has experienced before: a world built on senseless brutality, but whose inhabitants, her fellow inmates, will change her life forever. Written in luminous prose, with searing honesty and flashes of dark humour, Corrections in Ink shines a light on a broken prison system, and the cruelty and kindness Blakinger experienced there. It is a radical call for justice, and a testament to the power of finding one's voice.

Author: Rough Guides (Firm)

Publisher: Rough Guides

ISBN: 1858284570

Category: Music

Page: 1234

View: 1595

DOWNLOAD NOW »

Compiles career biographies of over 1,200 artists and rock music reviews written by fans covering every phase of rock from R&B through punk and rap

Author: Nathan Brackett,Christian David Hoard

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

ISBN: 0743201698

Category: Music

Page: 948

View: 9184

DOWNLOAD NOW »

A reference guide to the decade's top trends, performers, and sounds, reviews the most influential albums, provides biographical overviews of key artists, and considers how technology and the Internet have impacted the industry.