Product Description

When the body of eleven-year-old Thuy Sen is found in San Francisco Bay, the police swiftly charge Rennell and Payton Price with her grisly murder. A twelve-person jury, helped along by an incompetent lawyer for the defense, are quick to find the brothers guilty - and to sentence them both to die for their crimes.

Product Details

• Published on: 2005-04-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 465 pages

From Publishers Weekly
After focusing on gun control and tort reform (in Balance of Power) and late-term abortion and Supreme Court nomination (in Protect and Defend), Patterson takes on the death penalty, exploring its uncertainties and injustices from the perspective of San Francisco lawyer Christopher Paget—hero of the author's first book, The Lasko Tangent—and Paget's lawyer wife, Terri. The horrific crime on which the novel hinges is the killing of nine-year-old Thuy Sen, whose body is found in San Francisco Bay. The medical examiner quickly ascertains that the little girl did not drown but choked to death on semen. After Thuy Sen's picture is broadcast on television, an elderly eyewitness identifies her dope-dealer neighbors Payton and Rennell Price as the killers. This story is told in flashback after Terri Paget, who specializes in representing death row inmates, takes on the 15-year-old case, representing Rennell, who has 59 days before he is to die by lethal injection. Rennell is a hulking retarded black man whose sullen passivity inspires little sympathy in anyone. Over the next several months, Teresa comes to believe in Rennell as she fights not only to stop his execution but to prove him innocent. It's a compelling story, but Patterson's true interest is in the legal details. He mostly succeeds at explaining the often Orwellian legal complexities of the death penalty, but the price he pays as a novelist is high. Many readers will skip over vast sections of the book, but those who stick with it will find the ending moving and come away with a greater understanding of a controversial issue.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From AudioFile
Payton and Rennell Price are sentenced to death for the brutal murder of 9-year-old Thuy Sen, who choked to death on semen. Now, 15 years later, pro bono lawyer Theresa Peralta Page has 59 days to find factual, legal, or moral error and determine if a reliable sentence was rendered, possibly saving her client from execution. Patricia Kalember narrates with such subtle nuance about the doubts that exist in the case that each time we hear Rennell Price say, "I didn't do that little girl," it becomes eerily evident that being innocent may not be enough to save his life. Orwellian legal complexities of the death penalty, so brilliantly presented, serve to raise compelling and challenging questions. K.A.T. © AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

From Booklist
Former trial lawyer Patterson, who has tackled such weighty issues as abortion (Protect and Defend, 2000) and the Second Amendment (Balance of Power, 2003), now turns his keen eye to the issue of the death penalty. Terri Peralta Paget has just taken the case of Rennell Price, who is on death row for the murder of a nine-year-old girl. Rennell and his older brother, Payton, were convicted 15 years ago of sexually abusing the girl and killing her in the process. But as Terri goes over the case and talks to the detective in charge of the initial investigation and the lawyer who handled Rennell's subsequent appeals, she starts to have doubts about Rennell's mental capacity and his guilt. Physical evidence placed the victim at the scene, and the prosecution's star witness, Eddie Fleet, named the brothers as her killer, but the same lawyer, an incompetent cokehead who mishandled their defense, represented both Rennell and Payton. As with his previous novels, Patterson examines a complex issue through the lens of a compelling, gripping story. Readers familiar with his characters (many of whom have appeared in his previous novels) and those looking for a powerful courtroom drama will not be disappointed. Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Customer Reviews

Review of "Conviction"
This book is an excellent legal thriller with special emphasis on death penalty cases. If you like John Sandford, you will like Richard North Patterson's "Conviction". The characters are both believable and likable and the plot has depth without going overboard. Excellent!

What A Stinker
Up until the last few pages, I would have rated this novel as 5 stars. Patterson had very well defined characters and an exceptional knowledge of Death Penalty Law at all court levels, including the United States Supreme Court.

It concerned the multiple hearings of a truly innocent man, who finally, in the last pages of the book, dies by lethal injection - a disasterous result for one who looks forward to a good ending, only to get a lousy one.