Taylor & Francis

Taylor & Francis

English

’This book is a clear, evidence based demonstration of how the emphasis on individualism in the United States undermines the appreciation of social influences on behavior presented in death penalty cases, and raises important questions about the capital punishment process and the resistance to addressing structural social problems.’ Wanda D. Foglia, Rowan University, USA ’This compelling book analyzes how widely-shared assumptions about individualism undermine the consideration of mitigation in capital trials. Drawing on court transcripts, juror interviews, and judicial sentencing opinions in death penalty trials, Professor Kleinstuber persuasively documents the myriad ways in which ideas about individual responsibility lead judges, jurors and attorneys to discount a defendant’s life history, family and economic risk factors, and other mitigation evidence. This book will be of great interest to students, scholars, attorneys, and all who care about ensuring fairness in the justice system. Highly recommended!’ Valerie P. Hans, Cornell Law School, USA and co-author of American Juries: The Verdict ’Kleinstuber's analysis of the death penalty in Delaware is timely, informative and sobering. Drawing upon the research procedures of the Capital Jury Project, Kleinstuber presents findings from transcript reviews, face-to-face interviews with jurors and, unique to the Delaware component of the Project, judges' sentencing orders. This triangulation of data provides a consistent and ultimately reinforcing picture of how life or death decisions are made. More often than not, the primary consideration is couched in terms of the crime, what the defendant did, with little mention of the lived experiences that brought him to the scene of the crime. This approach calls into question whether these life or death decisions take into account the frailties of humankind that, according the US Supreme Court, are to serve as the basis of a reasoned moral punishment dec