Download or read book Crimson Letters Voices from Death Row written by Tessie Castillo and published by Black Rose Writing. This book was released on 2020-03-12 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through thirty compelling essays written in the prisoners’ own words, Crimson Letters: Voices from Death Row offers stories of brutal beatings inside juvenile hall, botched suicide attempts, the terror of the first night on Death Row, the pain of goodbye as a friend is led to execution, and the small acts of humanity that keep hope alive for men living in the shadow of death. Each carefully crafted personal essay illuminates the complex stew of choice and circumstance that brought four men to Death Row and the cycle of dehumanization and brutality that continues inside prison. At times the men write with humor, at times with despair, at times with deep sensitivity, but always with keen insight and understanding of the common human experience that binds us.
Download or read book Right Here Right Now written by Lynden Harris and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2021-03-22 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Upon receiving his execution date, one of the thousands of men living on death row in the United States had an epiphany: “All there ever is, is this moment. You, me, all of us, right here, right now, this minute, that's love.” Right Here, Right Now collects the powerful, first-person stories of dozens of men on death rows across the country. From childhood experiences living with poverty, hunger, and violence to mental illness and police misconduct to coming to terms with their executions, these men outline their struggle to maintain their connection to society and sustain the humanity that incarceration and its daily insults attempt to extinguish. By offering their hopes, dreams, aspirations, fears, failures, and wounds, the men challenge us to reconsider whether our current justice system offers actual justice or simply perpetuates the social injustices that obscure our shared humanity.
Download or read book Prisoner Voices from Death Row written by Reena Mary George and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-03-03 with total page 140 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Death penalty has produced endless discourses not only in the context of prisons, prisoners and punishment but also in various legal aspects concerning the validity of death penalty, the right to life, and torture. Death penalty is embedded in Indian law, however very little is known about the people who are on death row barring a few media reports on them. The main objective of this book is to enquire whether the dignity of prisoners is upheld while they confront the criminal justice system and whilst surviving on death row. Additionally, it explores the lived-experiences and perceptions of prisoners on death row as they create meaning out of their world. With this rationale, 111 prisoners on death row in India and some of their family members were interviewed. The theoretical underpinnings of phenomenology and symbolic interactionism coupled with data analysis lead to an understanding of the prisoners on death row with special reference to their demographic profile and the impact of death sentence on their families. George’s research highlights three salient features, namely: poverty, social exclusion and marginalisation are antecedent to death penalty; death penalty is a constructed account by the state machinery; and prisoners on death row situate dignity higher in the juxtaposition of death and dignity.
Download or read book Voices from Death Row Second Edition written by Bruce Jackson and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2022-10-01 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Voices from Death Row is considered a classic work on the strange "living limbo" inhabited by condemned men in Texas, who await resolution of their sentence in execution, death by other causes, commutation to a term of life sentence, or exoneration. This book offers first-person accounts of life on death row that still holds for condemned men and women today. The accessibility the authors had to Texas Death Row in 1979—to sit in the cells and listen—is unimaginable in today's closed prison environment. Today, however, conditions on Texas's Death Row are far more punishing and brutal; and, while the number of death sentences has declined, the number of sentences of life without parole has increased hugely. This second edition updates and expands on the original stories that these men told, revealing the names of those men whose stories have ended with either exoneration or death. New photographs enhance the text to give it a full picture of the brutal conditions that these prisoners experienced.
Download or read book Prisoner Voices from Death Row written by Reena Mary George and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-03-03 with total page 165 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Death penalty has produced endless discourses not only in the context of prisons, prisoners and punishment but also in various legal aspects concerning the validity of death penalty, the right to life, and torture. Death penalty is embedded in Indian law, however very little is known about the people who are on death row barring a few media reports on them. The main objective of this book is to enquire whether the dignity of prisoners is upheld while they confront the criminal justice system and whilst surviving on death row. Additionally, it explores the lived-experiences and perceptions of prisoners on death row as they create meaning out of their world. With this rationale, 111 prisoners on death row in India and some of their family members were interviewed. The theoretical underpinnings of phenomenology and symbolic interactionism coupled with data analysis lead to an understanding of the prisoners on death row with special reference to their demographic profile and the impact of death sentence on their families. George’s research highlights three salient features, namely: poverty, social exclusion and marginalisation are antecedent to death penalty; death penalty is a constructed account by the state machinery; and prisoners on death row situate dignity higher in the juxtaposition of death and dignity.
Download or read book Welcome To Hell written by Jan Arriens and published by UPNE. This book was released on 2005 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now in a new edition, condemned men and women speak for themselves about the reality behind bars on death row.
Download or read book Hell Is a Very Small Place written by Jean Casella and published by New Press, The. This book was released on 2014-11-11 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “An unforgettable look at the peculiar horrors and humiliations involved in solitary confinement” from the prisoners who have survived it (New York Review of Books). On any given day, the United States holds more than eighty-thousand people in solitary confinement, a punishment that—beyond fifteen days—has been denounced as a form of cruel and degrading treatment by the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture. Now, in a book that will add a startling new dimension to the debates around human rights and prison reform, former and current prisoners describe the devastating effects of isolation on their minds and bodies, the solidarity expressed between individuals who live side by side for years without ever meeting one another face to face, the ever-present specters of madness and suicide, and the struggle to maintain hope and humanity. As Chelsea Manning wrote from her own solitary confinement cell, “The personal accounts by prisoners are some of the most disturbing that I have ever read.” These firsthand accounts are supplemented by the writing of noted experts, exploring the psychological, legal, ethical, and political dimensions of solitary confinement. “Do we really think it makes sense to lock so many people alone in tiny cells for twenty-three hours a day, for months, sometimes for years at a time? That is not going to make us safer. That’s not going to make us stronger.” —President Barack Obama “Elegant but harrowing.” —San Francisco Chronicle “A potent cry of anguish from men and women buried way down in the hole.” —Kirkus Reviews
Download or read book Tears from Heaven Voices from Hell written by Diane P. Robertson and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2002 with total page 420 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Tears From Heaven; Voices From Hell capital punishment issues are discussed from the viewpoint of the victims of violent crime and from those condemned to die on America's death rows. Explore the pros and cons of this controversial issue from those who have experienced the pain first hand: victims and death row inmates.
Download or read book Crimson Letters written by Michael J Braxton and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2021-07-30 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through thirty compelling essays written in the prisoners' own words, Crimson Letters: Voices from Death Row offers stories of brutal beatings inside juvenile hall, botched suicide attempts, the terror of the first night on Death Row, the pain of goodbye as a friend is led to execution, and the small acts of humanity that keep hope alive for men living in the shadow of death. Each carefully crafted personal essay illuminates the complex stew of choice and circumstance that brought four men to Death Row and the cycle of dehumanization and brutality that continues inside prison. At times the men write with humor, at times with despair, at times with deep sensitivity, but always with keen insight and understanding of the common human experience that binds us.
Download or read book Let the Lord Sort Them written by Maurice Chammah and published by Crown. This book was released on 2021-01-26 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • A deeply reported, searingly honest portrait of the death penalty in Texas—and what it tells us about crime and punishment in America “If you’re one of those people who despair that nothing changes, and dream that something can, this is a story of how it does.”—Anand Giridharadas, The New York Times Book Review WINNER OF THE J. ANTHONY LUKAS AWARD In 1972, the United States Supreme Court made a surprising ruling: the country’s death penalty system violated the Constitution. The backlash was swift, especially in Texas, where executions were considered part of the cultural fabric, and a dark history of lynching was masked by gauzy visions of a tough-on-crime frontier. When executions resumed, Texas quickly became the nationwide leader in carrying out the punishment. Then, amid a larger wave of criminal justice reform, came the death penalty’s decline, a trend so durable that even in Texas the punishment appears again close to extinction. In Let the Lord Sort Them, Maurice Chammah charts the rise and fall of capital punishment through the eyes of those it touched. We meet Elsa Alcala, the orphaned daughter of a Mexican American family who found her calling as a prosecutor in the nation’s death penalty capital, before becoming a judge on the state’s highest court. We meet Danalynn Recer, a lawyer who became obsessively devoted to unearthing the life stories of men who committed terrible crimes, and fought for mercy in courtrooms across the state. We meet death row prisoners—many of them once-famous figures like Henry Lee Lucas, Gary Graham, and Karla Faye Tucker—along with their families and the families of their victims. And we meet the executioners, who struggle openly with what society has asked them to do. In tracing these interconnected lives against the rise of mass incarceration in Texas and the country as a whole, Chammah explores what the persistence of the death penalty tells us about forgiveness and retribution, fairness and justice, history and myth. Written with intimacy and grace, Let the Lord Sort Them is the definitive portrait of a particularly American institution.
Download or read book Voices from Death Row written by Kelly Banaski and published by Rj Parker Publishing. This book was released on 2017-07-19 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Some of the country's most infamous inmates serving a death sentence or life without parole are represented in this telling chronicle. True crime author Kelly Banaski takes a look at their gruesome crimes and shares her conversations with them in this look at heinous crimes and life in prison.
Download or read book The Darkest Hour written by Nanon Williams and published by goodmedia press. This book was released on 2012-11 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Darkest Hour emerged from a deep and dark despair in a place where the thought of suicide often holds more appeal than the thought of living. The hopeless ones live below the line but not Nanon Williams. Williams reached high beyond despair with outstretched hands and on tiptoes. He took a firm grip on the branch of hope and hoisted himself up above the line. While on Texas Death Row, Nanon was an inspirational voice. This work, now in its second edition, has expanded his inspirational influence beyond prison walls to men and women everywhere. His voice reaches others who measure their lives by an hourglass and do not see enough sand remaining to do anything of importance with their lives. We all learn from Nanon Williams that we can race against time and win.
Download or read book Prison City written by Ruth Massingill and published by Peter Lang. This book was released on 2007 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Prison City looks beneath the placid surface of Huntsville, Texas, execution capital of the world, and sheds light on controversial issues usually hidden behind penitentiary walls. The authors draw on a multitude of voices from the community surrounding the prison - from inmates and guards to neighboring residents and local politicians - to reflect on questions of crime and punishment, vengeance, and forgiveness. We see how the sophisticated communication techniques employed by inmates, information officers, and community leaders shape opinions in the small towns where prisons are a principal industry. The poignant, evocative stories that run throughout the book highlight the incarcerated population's increasing influence in the political, cultural, and economic landscape in the United States. Most of all, Prison City offers opportunities to understand why the Texas justice system has become a global metaphor for incarceration and capital punishment.
Download or read book Invisible Realities Forgotten Voices written by and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Finding Freedom written by Jarvis Jay Masters and published by Shambhala Publications. This book was released on 2020-07-14 with total page 171 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are many forms of liberation—some that exist at the mercy of circumstance and others that can never be taken away. In this stirring and timely collection of stories, essays, poems, and letters, Jarvis Jay Masters explores the meaning of true freedom on his road to inner peace through Buddhist practice. He reveals his life as a young African American man surrounded by violence, his entanglement in the criminal justice system, and—following an encounter with Tibetan Buddhist teacher Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche—an unfolding commitment to nonviolence and peacemaking. At turns joyful, heartbreaking, frightening, and soaring with profound insight, Masters’s story offers a vision of hope and the possibility of freedom in even the darkest of times.
Download or read book Living on Death Row written by Hans Toch and published by American Psychological Association (APA). This book was released on 2018 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: PROSE Award Finalist for Psychology This book synthesizes scholarly reflections with personal accounts from prison administrators and inmates to show the harsh reality of life on death row.
Download or read book Live from Death Row written by Mumia Abu-Jamal and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 1996-06-01 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Once a prominent radio reporter, Mumia Abu-Jamal is now in a Pennsylvania prison awaiting his state-sactioned execution. In 1982 he was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner after a trial many have criticized as profoundly biased. Live From Death Row is a collection of his prison writings--an impassioned yet unflinching account of the brutalities and humiliations of prison life. It is also a scathing indictment of racism and political bias in the American judicial system that is certain to fuel the controversy surrounding the death penalty and freedom of speech.
