Surviving Justice

Innocent, but imprisoned—troubling stories of wrongful conviction Surviving Justice presents oral histories of thirteen people from all walks of life, who, through a combination of all-too-common factors— overzealous prosecutors, inept defense lawyers, coercive interrogation tactics, eyewitness misidentification—found themselves imprisoned for crimes they did not commit. The stories these exonerated men and women tell are spellbinding, heartbreaking, and ultimately inspiring. Among the narrators: Paul Terry, who spent twenty-seven years wrongfully imprisoned, and emerged psychologically devastated and barely able to communicate. Beverly Monroe, an organic chemist who was coerced into falsely confessing to the murder of her lover. Freed after seven years, she faces the daunting task of rebuilding her life from the ground up. Joseph Amrine, who was sentenced to death for murder. Seventeen years later, when DNA evidence exonerated him, Amrine emerged from prison with nothing but the fourteen dollars in his inmate account.

"Beverly Monroe spent seven years in prison for murdering her companion of thirteen years; in fact, he had killed himself. Christopher Ochoa was persuaded to confess to a rape and murder he did not commit, and served twelve years of his life sentence before he was freed by DNA evidence. Michael Evans and Paul Terry each spent twenty-seven years in prison for a brutal rape and murder they did not commit. They were teenagers when they entered prison; they were middle-aged men when DNA proved their innocence. After spending years behind bars, hundreds of men and women with incontrovertible proof of their innocence including 120 from death row have been released from America's prisons. They were wrongfully convicted because of problems that plague many criminal proceedings inept defense lawyers, overzealous prosecutors, deceitful and coercive interrogation tactics, bad science, snitches, and eyewitness misidentification. The lives of these victims of the U.S. criminal justice system were effectively wrecked. Finally free, usually after more than a decade of incarceration, they re-enter society with nothing but the scars from a harrowing descent into prison only to struggle to survive on the outside. The thirteen men and women portrayed here, and the hundreds of others who have been exonerated, are the tip of the iceberg. There are countless others thousands by all estimates who are in prison today for crimes they did not commit. These are the stories of some of the wrongfully convicted, who have managed, often by sheer luck, to prove their innocence. Their stories are spellbinding, heartbreaking, unimaginable, and ultimately inspiring. After reading these deeply personal accounts, you will never look at the criminal justice system the same way."--Publisher's website.

Surviving Execution is the story of Richard Glossip, a death row inmate who has always maintained his innocence, and who did not kill anyone. Convicted largely on the word of the self-confessed killer, who escaped the death penalty in return for implicating Glossip, the state of Oklahoma is still intent on executing him for murder. It is also the story of Ian Woods, a Sky News reporter, who came across the case one quiet afternoon, and who has tirelessly campaigned ever since to bring the injustices Glossip has faced to the world's attention. Three times during 2015, Richard Glossip came within hours of being put to death, postponed each time from last minute stays, and Woods was with him in prison, as a witness to the execution, every time. This is the true story of injustice on death row, written by a man with unparalleled first-hand knowledge, access and understanding of the case. It is a history of execution, an examination of the arguments against it, and a call to end this most barbaric forms of American justice. But first and foremost, it is the tale of the growing friendship between the reporter, and the man he believes to be wrongly convicted of murder.

Library Journal Self-Help Bestseller Winner of the 2023 National Indie Excellence Award in African American Nonfiction Silver Winner of the 2023 Nautilus Book Award A revealing look at why domestic violence victims stay with their abusers…and how they can ultimately leave. And survive. One Saturday morning, Gooden is woken up by her husband shoving her off the bed for no discernible reason. Despite her quick thinking and even quicker footsteps, her husband catches her, his sudden anger inexplicable. No words are exchanged. He begins to strangle her as he has done many times before. With unflinching vulnerability, Gooden outlines in painstaking detail what she had to do to walk away and how others can use her experiences to escape their own abuse, from skimming the grocery money, to squirreling away personal belongings, to navigating a domestic violence shelter. She offers strategies for overcoming the barriers survivors often face, such as money, housing, overcritical social circles, or, most powerfully: love. Uniquely compassionate when it comes to the heartbreak of still loving one’s abuser, Gooden shares how she transformed and extended this love outward, using her story to encourage others to choose themselves. The voice and fire behind #WhyIStayed, Bev Gooden is exceptionally positioned to explore the many reasons victims stay in abusive relationships, and how they can muster the resources and motivation to leave. Surviving is unlike any memoir of survivorship, given its nuance, compassion, and candor. Above all, it is an exquisitely powerful testament to Gooden’s healing, survivorship, and dedication to helping others do the same.

This study discusses the history of Indian policy in Canada, and examines the areas of justice, policy, leadership, culture and economy as factors in self-government.

Honorable Mention, 2019 Distinguished Book Award, given by the Sex & Gender Section of the American Sociological Association Honorable Mention, 2019 Marysa Navarro Book Prize, given by the New England Council of Latin American Studies (NECLAS) A profound reflection on state violence and women’s survival In the 1970s and early 80s, military and security forces in Argentina hunted down, tortured, imprisoned, and in many cases, murdered political activists, student organizers, labor unionists, leftist guerrillas, and other people branded “subversives.” This period was characterized by massive human rights violations, including forced disappearances committed in the name of national security. State terror left a deep scar on contemporary Argentina, but for many survivors and even the nation itself, talking about this dark period in recent history has been difficult, and at times taboo. For women who endured countless forms of physical, sexual, and emotional violence in clandestine detention centers, the impetus to keep quiet about certain aspects of captivity has been particularly strong. In Surviving State Terror, Barbara Sutton draws upon a wealth of oral testimonies to place women’s bodies and voices at the center of the analysis of state terror. The book showcases poignant stories of women’s survival and resistance, disinterring accounts that have yet to be fully heard, grappled with, and understood. With a focus on the body as a key theme, Sutton explores various instances of violence toward women, such as sexual abuse and torture at the hands of state officials. Yet she also uses these narratives to explore why some types of social suffering and certain women’s voices are heard more than others, and how this can be rectified in our own practices of understanding and witnessing trauma. In doing so, Sutton urges us to pay heed to women survivors’ political voices, activist experiences, and visions for social change. Recounting not only women’s traumatic experiences, but also emphasizing their historical and political agency, Surviving State Terror is a profound reflection on state violence, social suffering, and human resilience—both personal and collective.

Surviving the Future is a collection of the most current ideas in radical queer movement work and revolutionary queer theory. Beset by a new pandemic, fanning the flames of global uprising, these queers cast off progressive narratives of liberal hope while building mutual networks of rebellion and care. These essays propose a militant strategy of queer survival in an ever precarious future. Starting from a position of abolition—of prisons, police, the State, identity, and racist cisheteronormative society—this collection refuses the bribes of inclusion in a system built on our expendability. Though the mainstream media saturates us with the boring norms of queer representation (with a recent focus on trans visibility), the writers in this book ditch false hope to imagine collective visions of liberation that tell different stories, build alternate worlds, and refuse the legacies of racial capitalism, anti-Blackness, and settler colonialism. The work curated in this book spans Black queer life in the time of COVID-19 and uprising, assimilation and pinkwashing settler colonial projects, subversive and deviant forms of representation, building anarchist trans/queer infrastructures, and more. Contributors include Che Gossett, Yasmin Nair, Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, Adrian Shanker, Kitty Stryker, Toshio Meronek, and more.

The first book to center the voices of sexual abuse survivors while rethinking key Christian beliefs. Readers will discover new ways of thinking about God that are surprising, challenging, inspiring, and empowering, leading to deep healing for individuals and a transformed church that no longer contributes to the devastation of sexual abuse.

On December 2-3, 1984, India witnessed arguably the world s worst industrial disaster in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, which continues to this day as an economic, medical, environmental, and political disaster. Surviving Bhopal draws on oral testimonials of the affected community and analyzes the cause and aftermath of the disaster from the perspective of those who suffered the severe consequences of systemic failure and travesty of justice. The event resulted in a resistance movement, led by women, against corporate and state power. Mukherjee explores the underlying gender politics, showing how activism challenged and redefined the contemporary model of development.