The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town QUOTES

2 " A hundred years earlier, in Hopt v. Utah, the Supreme Court ruled that a confession is not admissible if it is obtained by operating on the hopes or fears of the accused, and in doing so deprives him of the freedom of will or self-control necessary to make a voluntary statement. In 1897, the Court, in Bram v. United States, said that a statement must be free and voluntary, not extracted by any sorts of threats or violence or promises, however slight. A "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

4 " 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a case known as Bishop v. United States, ruled that the conviction of a mentally incompetent person was a denial of due process. Where doubt exists as to a person’s mental competency, the failure to conduct a proper inquiry is a deprivation of his constitutional rights. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

6 " The prosecution was forced into the bizarre position of admitting Ward and Fontenot were lying while asking the jurors to believe them "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

8 " Bram v. United States, said that a statement must be free and voluntary, not extracted by any sorts of threats or violence or promises, however slight. A confession obtained from an accused who has been threatened cannot be admissible. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

10 " Miranda v. Arizona, the most famous of all self-incrimination cases, the Supreme Court imposed procedural safeguards to protect the rights of the accused. A suspect has a constitutional right not to be compelled to talk, and any statement made during an interrogation cannot be used in court unless the police and the prosecutor can prove that the suspect clearly understood that (1) he had the right to remain silent, (2) anything said could be used against him in court, and (3) he had a right to an attorney, whether or not he could afford one. If, during an interrogation, the accused requests an attorney, then the questioning stops immediately. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

12 " Justice cannot be equal where, simply as a result of his poverty, a defendant is denied the opportunity to participate meaningfully in a judicial proceeding in which his liberty is at stake. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

14 " This is not a problem peculiar to Oklahoma, far from it. Wrongful convictions occur every month in every state in this country, and the reasons are all varied and all the same—bad police work, junk science, faulty eyewitness identifications, bad defense lawyers, lazy prosecutors, arrogant prosecutors. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

16 " About a month later, Riggins changed his mind. In an interview with the police, he said he was incorrect about Ron Williamson, that in fact the man he heard doing the confessing was Glen Gore. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

18 " In 1960, in Blackburn v. Alabama, the Court said, “Coercion can be mental as well as physical.” In reviewing whether a confession was psychologically coerced by the police, the following factors are crucial: (1) the length of the interrogation, (2) whether it was prolonged in nature, (3) when it took place, day or night, with a strong suspicion around nighttime confessions, and (4) the psychological makeup—intelligence, sophistication, education, and so on—of the suspect. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

20 " He made a mistake, one that would send him to death row and eventually cost him his freedom for life. "

― John Grisham , The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town