Guilty : the collapse of criminal justice
Rothwax takes us inside his courtroom and tells tales of justice gone awry that only a seasoned judge could disclose. We are in his chambers as he does battle with lawyers more interested in their personal ambitions than justice. We are at a judicial conference where Rothwax stumps fifty appeals court judges, who admit they don't understand the Supreme Court's latest search-and-seizure rulings. We are in the courtroom, where Rothwax must sit patiently and allow lawyers to willfully obfuscate the truth. According to Rothwax, America is fast becoming a nation of bad laws, in which criminals and defense attorneys hide behind a morass of poorly conceived statutes, procedures, and rulings that prevent courts from resolving the paramount question at hand: Did the accused commit the crime? In trial after maddening trial, Rothwax sees the truth sacrificed at the altar of an increasingly areane process designed to protect the rights of criminals
xiv, 238 pages ; 25 cm
9780679438670, 067943867X
33668237
Prologue: The Passing Parade: The View from the Bench
1. Anything But the Truth: Truth Undermined by "Fairness"
and Criminals Go Free
2. Snowy Nights and Cars on the Run: The Fourth Amendment and the Suppression of Evidence
3. The Silence of the Fox: Miranda and the Quagmire of Coercion, Confession, and Conscience
4. Clam Up and Call Your Lawyer: The Right to Counsel and the Rules of Investigation
5. The Rush to Nowhere: Speedy Trial Statutes Do Not Guarantee Rapid Justice
6. The Theater of the Absurd: Anything Goes in the Modern American Courtroom
7. The Plea Bargain: Tortured Outcome of an Overwhelmed System
8. Poker-Faced Justice: How Liberal Discovery Laws Can Hide the Facts and Subvert the Truth
9. Speak No Evil: The Truth, a Defendant's Accountability, and the Fifth Amendment
10. A Jury of our Fears: Twelve "Ordinary" Citizens the Legal System Doesn't Trust with the Truth
11. Judgment Day: A Demand for Common Sense in the Courtroom
Published simultaneously in Canada