Guilty Not Guilty

***Thrillers that race from the very first page*** 'Felix Francis' novels gallop along splendidly' Jilly Cooper ‘From winning post to top of the bestseller lists’ Sunday Times It is said that everyone over a certain age can remember distinctly what they were doing when they heard that President Kennedy had been assassinated, or that Princess Diana had been killed in a Paris car crash, but I, for one, could recall all too clearly where I was standing when a policeman told me that my wife had been murdered. Bill Russell is acting as a volunteer steward at Warwick races when he confronts his worst nightmare – the violent death of his much-loved wife. But worse is to come when he is accused of killing her and hounded mercilessly by the media. His life begins to unravel completely as he loses his job and his home. Even his best friends turn against him, believing him guilty of the heinous crime in spite of the lack of compelling evidence. Bill sets out to clear his name but finds that proving one’s innocence is not easy – one has to find the true culprit, and Bill believes he knows who it is. But can he prove it before he becomes another victim of the murderer. Guilty Not Guilty is a journey of greed and jealousy set against the grief of personal tragedy and loss, with many a twist and turn along the way. Praise for Felix Francis's novels: ‘As usual with a Francis, once I opened the book, I didn’t want to put it down… Felix’s resolution is darker and more shocking than his father would ever have contemplated, but reflects grittier times and changing tastes in fiction. Now, what am I going to do for the next 12 months until the next one?’ Country Life ‘He has become his own man as a purveyor of murder mysteries' The Racing Post 'The Francis flair is clear for all to see' Daily Mail 'From winning post to top of the bestseller list, time after time' Sunday Times 'The master of suspense and intrigue' Country Life 'A tremendous read' Woman's Own

When Keely Bennett's world is shattered by the suicide of her beloved husband, Richard, she and her nine-year-old son Dylan have to start over. Her late husband's childhood friend, Mark Weaver, helps Keely settle Richard's affairs and sweeps her into a whirlwind romance -- and eventually a comfortable suburban lifestyle that includes marriage and a beautiful baby girl. The darkness that clouded Keely's past has all but vanished. Yet Dylan, now a teenager, remains distant, brooding and resentful of his stepfather and baby sister, Abby. Then history repeats itself, and her life is once again thrown into chaos. But Keely's nightmare is just beginningŠfor the authorities are looking for a murderer, and they already have a prime suspect: Dylan. Refusing to believe her son is a killer, Keely vows to clear his name. But the prosecutor has a personal stake in seeing Dylan convicted -- and her pleas for help from the police fall on deaf ears. To save her son, Keely must rely on herself. But she is far from alone; someone is watching her every move. When her investigation threatens to uncover a conspiracy of secrets and corruption, she is suddenly plunged into the path of danger -- and into the sights of a ruthless killer who will stop at nothing to ensure the truth stays buried forever.... Seamlessly weaving a psychological portrait of the bond between a mother and son with the breathless intrigue of a murder mystery, Not Guilty is a novel that finds Patricia MacDonald at the height of her celebrated powers.

“A brilliant book that masterfully debunks the conventional wisdom that those who are charged with crimes in our criminal justice system, even when they are acquitted at trial, are almost certainly guilty. It is a data-driven tour de force.” --Richard A. Leo, author of Police Interrogation and American Justice “Givelber and Farrell make a persuasive case that most jury acquittals are based on evidence not emotion, and that acquittals should be taken to mean what they say: that the defendant is Not Guilty.” --Samuel Gross, co-author of A Modern Approach to Evidence: Text, Problems, Transcripts, and Cases As scores of death row inmates are exonerated by DNA evidence and innocence commissions are set up across the country, conviction of the innocent has become a well-recognized problem. But our justice system makes both kinds of errors—we acquit the guilty and convict the innocent—and exploring the reasons why people are acquitted can help us to evaluate the efficiency and fairness of our criminal justice system. Not Guilty provides a sustained examination and analysis of the factors that lead juries to find defendants “not guilty,” as well as the connection between those factors and the possibility of factual innocence, examining why some criminal trials result in not guilty verdicts and what those verdicts suggest about the accuracy of our criminal process.

Sixteen-year-old Cassie Jo Stoddard agreed to house sit for relatives on the weekend of September 22, 2006. It was something the teenager had done before…but this time something went terribly wrong. When the family returned home at the end of the weekend they found Cassie lying on their living room floor brutally stabbed to death. Detectives focused on two of Cassie’s classmates who had briefly visited her on the night that she was murdered: Torey Adamcik and Brian Draper. Initially both boys denied any knowledge of the crime, but after two separate interrogations, Brian Draper told detectives a chilling story of murder straight out of a horror movie. The two boys were immediately arrested, and a shocking videotape was discovered that seemed to depict the two teens not only planning the cold-blooded murder, but celebrating it. Community outrage was strong and immediate. The public demanded justice. But was the video actually what it appeared to be: a cold-blooded documentary that detailed the plotting of Cassie’s murder; or something else entirely? Could anyone uncover the truth in time and convince a jury that sometimes things aren't always what they appear to be? The Guilty Innocent is narrated by Shannon Adamcik, mother of Torey, one of the accused boys. It takes readers behind the scenes of a trial where prosecutors cared more about public opinion than truth, defense attorneys, who had never argued a murder case, were in over their heads, and a young boy’s life hung in the balance. The United States is the only country in the world that will charge a juvenile as an adult and sentence them to life without parole. As the mother of one such child, I know exactly what happens when a juvenile is placed in adult court where they cannot defend themselves. They are immediately cut off from all human contact, locked in isolation, and railroaded through a justice system they simply cannot comprehend. Consequently, many of these juveniles are sentenced too much longer and harsher terms than their adult counterparts. I've personally lived through this, and I was compelled to write about it. I began for the simple reason that I had lived through this horrendous ordeal and I ached for someone to confide in. But reliving the most painful part of my life was extraordinarily difficult. Ultimately the only reason that I was able to persevere was my deep belief that the story was important and needed to be told. That is still true. This is a true story and no one can tell it better than the people who lived it. A crime reporter can look at the details of a case, but they cannot tell you how it feels to live through it. I can and I did. I used the pre-trial and trial transcripts, copies of the police reports, the autopsy and DNA reports, and DVD recordings of all of the evidence in the case. I've done copious research. But more importantly, I take readers step-by-step through what it feels like when your 16-year-old son is accused of first-degree murder; all the odds are stacked against him; and his defense is in the hands of attorneys you can’t fully trust to come through for you.

The best-seller that helps you say: "I just said 'no' and I don't feel guilty!" Are you letting your kids get away with murder? Are you allowing your mother-in-law to impose her will on you? Are you embarrassed by praise or crushed by criticism? Are you having trouble coping with people? Learn the answers in When I Say No, I Feel Guilty, the best-seller with revolutionary new techniques for getting your own way.

In the nation's justice system, innocent people are occasionally convicted. This riveting book describes many such cases, including the execution of Mary Surratt for involvement in Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Includes photos.

Only fifty years ago, sex between men was a crime. The Sexual Offences Act 1967 changed that in part, sparking a chain of social reforms that altered the face of British society for ever. But it was only the beginning of the long fight for equality in the eyes of the law, in society and in millions of private lives. This vital new oral history - to accompany a Channel 4 documentary of the same name – tells that story through the lives of gay men who lived through those years. Built around the intimate testimonies of some exceptional but largely unknown characters, it gives voice to previously untold stories of denial, deceit and subterfuge, public pain and secret pleasure through the ten tumultuous decades before and since that watershed Act. The human variety of gay experience is all here: lives lived in joyous defiance of the law and a repressive society; others always in fear of a prurient tabloid press. Those committed to love and others to licence: lifelong affairs alongside casual sex. Young gay men may now take for granted the equal treatment denied those who went before. This vibrant celebration of past achievements and hardwon freedoms offers a powerful reminder of how much has changed in the past fifty years, and a warning that hard-won freedoms can so easily be eroded in uncertain times.

Many Christians have been seduced into thinking that they must earn the right to experience the forgiveness of sin and the joy of answered prayer. But Dr. Creflo A. Dollar explains that both are simply the product of righteousness.