True Stories from an Unreliable Eyewitness


Book Description

“This collection captures, in writing, the same array of emotions that Christine brings to the stage and screen with her acting. Funny with heart. Tears with a hint of hope. A fantastic mosaic that, when cobbled together, offers a stirring range of humanity.” — Alan Zweibel, original SNL writer and Thurber Prize winning author of The Other Shulman “Christine Lahti’s autobiographical essays are a beautiful, painful, funny, fiercely honest walk through the streets of her life. Gorgeous landscape, dangerous potholes and all. The whole unedited she-bang. It’s Oz with the curtain pulled back. At once soul-baring, hilarious, moving and smart. I’m a fan.” — Kathy Najimy, actress and comedienne “Lahti launches into the literary world with the same dynamism that has enlivened her acting roles. With brazen honesty, she recounts the many surprising, heartbreaking, and identity-building events that have punctuated her life. True Stories of an Unreliable Eyewitness oozes modesty, humor, and complete levelheadedness.” — Kirkus Reviews “Christine Lahti has lived a full, ferocious life and her stories will break, beat and blister your heart.” — Amber Tamblyn, author, actress, and director “Engrossing, hilarious, tragic—this amazing book of essays by a wonderful actor whom we now know is also a great American storyteller, takes us from the Midwest to Hollywood to the moment of women’s rebellion we are currently in. Couldn’t put it down!” — Michael Moore, Academy Award winning filmmaker and bestselling author “An intimate, conversational collection. Lahti writes with ease and authenticity... her timely chronicle of aging wisely, gracefully, and with self-respect will resonate with many readers” — Publishers Weekly “Lahti’s style is irreverent, bawdy, and laugh-out-loud funny, but she doesn’t shirk from painful subjects, including family mental illness. Lahti is one of those rare celebrities who not only has a fascinating life but who can also tell a relatable story with humility and humor.” — Booklist




Witness for the Defense


Book Description

Includes material on the case of Steve Titus, Ted Bundy, Timothy Hennis, Tony Herrerez, Howard Haupt, Clarence Von Williams, John Demjanjuk, and Tyrone Briggs.




Actual Innocence


Book Description

Ten true tales of people falsely accused detail the flaws in the criminal justice system that landed these people in prison




Cold-Case Christianity


Book Description

Written by an L. A. County homicide detective and former atheist, Cold-Case Christianity examines the claims of the New Testament using the skills and strategies of a hard-to-convince criminal investigator. Christianity could be defined as a “cold case”: it makes a claim about an event from the distant past for which there is little forensic evidence. In Cold-Case Christianity, J. Warner Wallace uses his nationally recognized skills as a homicide detective to look at the evidence and eyewitnesses behind Christian beliefs. Including gripping stories from his career and the visual techniques he developed in the courtroom, Wallace uses illustration to examine the powerful evidence that validates the claims of Christianity. A unique apologetic that speaks to readers’ intense interest in detective stories, Cold-Case Christianity inspires readers to have confidence in Christ as it prepares them to articulate the case for Christianity.




Jesus and the Eyewitnesses


Book Description

Noted New Testament scholar Bauckham challenges the prevailing assumption the accounts of Jesus circulated as "anonymous community traditions," instead asserting that they were transmitted in the name of the original eyewitness.




Desire Street


Book Description

A searing anatomy of a New Orleans murder trial and a system of justice gone wrong. In a New Orleans supermarket parking lot in the fall of 1984 ,two disparate lives become inextricably bound for the next fourteen years. The first, the life of Delores Dye, a white housewife and grandmother. The second, a young black man with a gun in hand. Moments following their maybe not so chance encounter, Mrs. Dye lay dead on the sunbaked macadam, and the killer had made off with her purse, her groceries, and her car. Four days later, following a tip, authorities arrested a known drug dealer and father of five named Curtis Kyles. Kyles would then be tried for Mrs. Dye's murder an unprecedented five times, though he maintained his innocence throughout each trial. Convicted and sentenced to death in his second trial, he would spend fourteen years on death row. After a fifth jury was unable to reach a verdict, New Orleans Parish District Attorney Harry Connick, Sr., finally conceded defeat and dropped the murder charge. But the case slowly yielded a deeper drama: The crime turned out to have been the side effect of an intricately plotted act of revenge. That police and prosecutors may have been complicit in the vengeance that framed Kyles cuts to the heart of a system of justice for Southern blacks in the era since lynch mobs were shamed into obsolescence. A compellingly written legal drama that has at its heart passionate intrigue and justice gone awry. Desire Street is a 2006 Edgar Award Nominee for Best Fact Crime.




When Truth Is All You Have


Book Description

“A riveting and infuriating examination of criminal prosecutions, revealing how easy it is to convict the wrong person and how nearly impossible it is to undo the error.” —Washington Post "No one has illuminated this problem more thoughtfully and persistently." —Bryan Stevenson, author of Just Mercy Jim McCloskey was at a midlife crossroads when he met the man who would change his life. A former management consultant, McCloskey had grown disenchanted with the business world; he enrolled at Princeton Theological Seminary at the age of 37. His first assignment, in 1980, was as a chaplain at Trenton State Prison. Among the inmates was Jorge de los Santos, a heroin addict who'd been convicted of murder years earlier. He swore to McCloskey that he was innocent—and, over time, McCloskey came to believe him. With no legal or investigative training to speak of, McCloskey threw himself into the case. Two years later, thanks to those efforts, Jorge de los Santos walked free, fully exonerated. McCloskey had found his calling. He established Centurion Ministries, the first group in America devoted to overturning wrongful convictions. Together with his staff and a team of forensic experts, lawyers, and volunteers—through tireless investigation and an unflagging dedication to justice—Centurion has freed 65 innocent prisoners who had been sentenced to life or death. When Truth Is All You Have is McCloskey's inspirational story, as well as those of the unjustly imprisoned for whom he has fought. Spanning the nation, it is a chronicle of faith and doubt; of triumphant success and shattering failure. It candidly exposes a life of searching and struggle, uplifted by McCloskey's certainty that he had found what he was put on earth to do. Filled with generosity, humor, and compassion, it is the soul-bearing account of a man who has redeemed innumerable lives—and incited a movement—with nothing more than his unshakeable belief in the truth.




Picking Cotton


Book Description

The New York Times best selling true story of an unlikely friendship forged between a woman and the man she incorrectly identified as her rapist and sent to prison for 11 years. Jennifer Thompson was raped at knifepoint by a man who broke into her apartment while she slept. She was able to escape, and eventually positively identified Ronald Cotton as her attacker. Ronald insisted that she was mistaken-- but Jennifer's positive identification was the compelling evidence that put him behind bars. After eleven years, Ronald was allowed to take a DNA test that proved his innocence. He was released, after serving more than a decade in prison for a crime he never committed. Two years later, Jennifer and Ronald met face to face-- and forged an unlikely friendship that changed both of their lives. With Picking Cotton, Jennifer and Ronald tell in their own words the harrowing details of their tragedy, and challenge our ideas of memory and judgment while demonstrating the profound nature of human grace and the healing power of forgiveness.




50 Popular Beliefs That People Think Are True


Book Description

“What would it take to create a world in which fantasy is not confused for fact and public policy is based on objective reality?" asks Neil deGrasse Tyson, science popularizer and author of Astrophysics for People in a Hurry. "I don't know for sure. But a good place to start would be for everyone on earth to read this book." Maybe you know someone who swears by the reliability of psychics or who is in regular contact with angels. Or perhaps you're trying to find a nice way of dissuading someone from wasting money on a homeopathy cure. Or you met someone at a party who insisted the Holocaust never happened or that no one ever walked on the moon. How do you find a gently persuasive way of steering people away from unfounded beliefs, bogus cures, conspiracy theories, and the like? This down-to-earth, entertaining exploration of commonly held extraordinary claims will help you set the record straight. The author, a veteran journalist, has not only surveyed a vast body of literature, but has also interviewed leading scientists, explored "the most haunted house in America," frolicked in the inviting waters of the Bermuda Triangle, and even talked to a "contrite Roswell alien." He is not out simply to debunk unfounded beliefs. Wherever possible, he presents alternative scientific explanations, which in most cases are even more fascinating than the wildest speculation. For example, stories about UFOs and alien abductions lack good evidence, but science gives us plenty of reasons to keep exploring outer space for evidence that life exists elsewhere in the vast universe. The proof for Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster may be nonexistent, but scientists are regularly discovering new species, some of which are truly stranger than fiction. Stressing the excitement of scientific discovery and the legitimate mysteries and wonder inherent in reality, this book invites readers to share the joys of rational thinking and the skeptical approach to evaluating our extraordinary world.




Convicting the Innocent


Book Description

On January 20, 1984, Earl Washington—defended for all of forty minutes by a lawyer who had never tried a death penalty case—was found guilty of rape and murder in the state of Virginia and sentenced to death. After nine years on death row, DNA testing cast doubt on his conviction and saved his life. However, he spent another eight years in prison before more sophisticated DNA technology proved his innocence and convicted the guilty man. DNA exonerations have shattered confidence in the criminal justice system by exposing how often we have convicted the innocent and let the guilty walk free. In this unsettling in-depth analysis, Brandon Garrett examines what went wrong in the cases of the first 250 wrongfully convicted people to be exonerated by DNA testing. Based on trial transcripts, Garrett’s investigation into the causes of wrongful convictions reveals larger patterns of incompetence, abuse, and error. Evidence corrupted by suggestive eyewitness procedures, coercive interrogations, unsound and unreliable forensics, shoddy investigative practices, cognitive bias, and poor lawyering illustrates the weaknesses built into our current criminal justice system. Garrett proposes practical reforms that rely more on documented, recorded, and audited evidence, and less on fallible human memory. Very few crimes committed in the United States involve biological evidence that can be tested using DNA. How many unjust convictions are there that we will never discover? Convicting the Innocent makes a powerful case for systemic reforms to improve the accuracy of all criminal cases.