Jim McCloskey

This is why I love author John Grisham. He is such a talented, extraordinary writer, fiction or nonfiction, that I was barely into the first chapter of Framed and was already incensed, outraged and sick at heart. This book is so compelling, but I hardly know where to begin to review it because it is astonishing and beyond belief that these miscarriages of justice happened over and over and over. Framed reads like bad fiction, where the chain of events, unreliable witnesses, corrupt show more officials, illogical happenings feel like something you couldn’t even make up. It’s chilling when you realize these things really did happen, but even more chilling when you also realize that while the fact that the seventy people serving life or death sentences for the crimes of others Centurion has freed to date is amazing and commendable, it is likely nothing more than a drop in the bucket. How many more people are suffering in prison for crimes they did not commit.

Each of the ten cases presented is unique, but they all also have far too much in common. Their convictions were not accidents but a result of deliberate actions taken by people who work in law enforcement and the medical and judicial systems and for some unfathomable reason decide they are judge and jury and want to be the executioner as well. They lie in suspect interviews, threaten, withhold evidence from the defense because they deem it irrelevant, use scare tactics with children, make deals with jailhouse snitches, conduct procedures and testify when they are not qualified or licensed, fail to follow leads even when the actual guilty party is known; it just goes on and on.

Are these supposed-to-be-trustworthy officials all evil? It’s hard to not believe that, when so many of them work tirelessly to get someone sentenced to death when they know there is no reliable evidence, when few of them suffer consequences for their behavior and in fact get promoted to judges or other high positions. They operate not from a presumption of innocence but of guilt – or is it pride or laziness or power or what that makes them refuse to look elsewhere once they have settled on a suspect, no matter how unlikely their guilt seems. An example: for one judge, as a way to demonstrate his appreciation for his District Court Clerk’s twenty years of devoted service to courthouse administration, he picked her birthday as the date for the subject to die. What??

Framed is a hard book to read, but it should be required reading. It is horrible, heartbreaking, impossible to put yourself in their shoes. It’s eye-opening: when we read or see on television that new evidence has been found, enough to justify a new trial we feel relief, like, wow, it’s finally over for that person. But this is seldom the case. The “system” fights back to keep them incarcerated; it’s decades before most of them are released, if ever.

Framed is masterful and will stay with you a long, long time. When there is finally a release, it’s uplifting and you are glad because so many are working on their behalf, but it’s really more relief than joy, because these poor people have had their lives ruined, taken away, and for many, many years. No, life is not fair, but this is well beyond unfair. Is there any way to avoid this? It’s like a dark domino chain: this points to this, that points to that, then to who, on and on, all based on a false premise, and how on earth can you make someone not be corrupt anymore?

Thanks to NetGalley and authors John Grisham and Jim McCloskey for providing an advance copy of Framed. I voluntarily leave this review; all opinions are my own. show less

John Grisham, best selling author and Jim McCloskey, founder of Centurian Ministries, recount 10 heartbreaking and frightening stories of people wrongfully convicted of crimes and the battles for their exonerations.

Well written and engrossing, this non fiction book is absolutely chilling with the stories of innocent people who have been condemned, have their lives ruined, and, in some cases, put to death because police, prosecutors, so called medical or mental health professionals get it in show more their minds that a persn or persons are guilty and have tunnel vision trying to prove it. They depend on lies, deceit, bribing criminals to lie, developing convoluted and impossible theories just to prove they are right. But, they are so very wrong.

One case involved a woman who was doing her laundry ran out briefly to a convenience store where someone had been murdered. When she tries to do her civic duty and calls to be helpful and share what she knows, she ends up being incarcerated and her life ruined. A warning to all. If you are ever called in as a witness or for any other reason involving a crime, ask for an attorney. Don’t worry that it may make you seem guilty. If the authorities have it in their minds that you are, you don’t have a chance. Tell them you have read Framed and don’t want to proceed until your rights are protected.

Thank you, John Grisham and Jim McClosky for sharing these horrifying and eye opening accounts.

Thanks to #NetGalley and @DoubledayBooks for the DRC. show less

5/5
Enraging but still hopeful. If I could give more, I would.

My first book on wrongful convictions was [a:Kent Roach|159373|Kent Roach|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]'s [b:Wrongfully Convicted: Guilty Pleas, Imagined Crimes, and What Canada Must Do to Safeguard Justice|62241136|Wrongfully Convicted Guilty Pleas, Imagined Crimes, and What Canada Must Do to Safeguard Justice|Kent show more Roach|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1679504306l/62241136._SX50_.jpg|98054048]. This book is just as good. This book is enraging. I was astonished and dumbfounded at the disgusting systemic issues that plagued these cases. I had to put the book down multiple times because I was so frustrated and angry. I'm glad there was hopeful endings to each and it wasn't made even worse, but there are plenty of people who are still in prison, who have still been murdered by the State, and many who will never have a clean record. So although this book offers hope in some ways with these stories, it's only 10 stories out of hundreds of thousands.

The chapters alternated between John Grisham and Jim McCloskey. I didn't notice a huge difference in their tone or writing, but this is the first time I've ever read anything by John Grisham so I can't speak much to that. It flowed well and I only realised who was writing a specific chapter when McCloskey would say something like "and I met him in..." or "and I joined the team when..." since his stories are all personal.

I liked that they both spoke about their sources. I found it interesting since John Grisham's weren't from personal experience, so I enjoyed learning a little bit about that.

This book hit so much harder than Wrongfully Convicted, but the cases were more in depth as there were less of them and Wrongfully Convicted had really interesting sections. This is my new favourite type of Non-Fiction, even though it makes my blood boil. I hope everyone reads this.

Check your local library. Hold lists are sometimes long, but I would happily buy this. Either way, read it! show less

What does it feel like to look at injustice? What does it say that so much goes unremarked and unnoticed by a society when so many live behind bars and who have been stripped of everything that they value and love to the point that they feel separated from any compassion and humanity? In this book John Gresham and Jim McClosely hold that uncomfortable mirror up to the reader and the world we live and pose these, and many more uncomfortable and disquieting questions, to the reader. I found show more myself shocked by so many of the stories here and not just by the crimes these individuals were so wrongfully accused of, but the the many different stages of the legal system that failed to do justice by them.

If stories of true crime capture your interest, these are stories that must be read because they show that justice is something we must all strive to find, hold and protect. We must always seek out not just the price of guilt by the Truth behind actions and deeds. We need to always questions and seek understanding and never presume guilt until proven innocent, but remain impartial and look towards how evidence is sought out and collected and fight to preserve the power of a just and legal system foe all. show less