Alan Berlow

Convicted murderer Charles Dean Hood has been granted a stay of execution. But the fact—confirmed at last—that the judge and the prosecutor on his case had "an intimate sexual relationship" has not been addressed

"The case of convicted double murderer Charles Dean Hood raises deeply disturbing questions about the state's administration of justice."

As the legal counsel to Texas Governor George W. Bush, Alberto R. Gonzales—now the White House counsel, and widely regarded as a likely future Supreme Court nominee—prepared fifty-seven confidential death-penalty memoranda for Bush's review. Never before discussed publicly, the memoranda suggest that Gonzales repeatedly failed to apprise Bush of some of the most salient issues in the cases at hand

The prospect that innocent people will be executed in America is horrifyingly likely, the author argues in this unsparing report on the criminal-justice system. Police officers and prosecutors have suppressed evidence. Many public defenders are incompetent. And the appeals process is becoming more difficult