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http://www.kickinglettuce.com/bookreviews/Grisham/innocent.php

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The article is about John Grisham coming up with and writing the story

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NEW YORK -- John Grisham's latest book, "The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town," has the usual touches fans have come to expect from the master of the legal thriller: suspense, shock, even a wrongful conviction and near-execution. But this time, the tale is true.

In his first nonfiction book, Grisham tackles the story of Ron Williamson, a former baseball player who was wrongfully convicted of murder in Ada, Okla., and came within five days of being executed before he was finally acquitted _ after nine years on death row.

"The story was all there," Grisham said in an interview with The Associated Press. "All I had to do was put it together."

Grisham read Williamson's obituary in The New York Times on Dec. 9, 2004, and he knew he wanted to write the story. He got on the phone with Williamson's sisters and the deal was done in about three hours. "I was struck by just the compelling nature of the story _ it had small town, it was about a trial gone wrong, prosecution not right, man who was mentally ill and a good baseball player."

Grisham hates research and he was in uncomfortable territory, wading through boxes of documents and materials from the family, mental health records, trial transcripts, depositions, fourth grade report cards. He traveled around with a recorder for 18 months, interviewing lawyers, judges and Williamson's co-defendant, Dennis Fritz, carefully transcribing the quotes.

"When I write fiction, it takes a lot to get me out of the seat to check anything," Grisham said. "I hate to stop the writing to go check a fact, to go find a city, to go to a hotel _ I'll just make stuff up."

But with "The Innocent Man," published by Doubleday, he was dogged about getting his facts straight, especially because some of the people in the book are still alive, and because the prosecution botched the case so badly, many individuals aren't portrayed in good light.

"Many of those people bought that book today, and they're reading the book now, and what I don't want people to do is say, 'Well, here's a mistake.'"

Williamson and Fritz were convicted in the slaying of Debra Sue Carter, who was sexually molested and strangled in 1982 in Ada, Okla. Frtiz got a life sentence. Williamson spent nine years on death row, at one time coming within five days of execution before a stay was ordered. In April 1999, an Ada judge noted that DNA tests of semen and hair samples did not genetically match Fritz or Williamson and he dismissed the charges.

Glen Gore, the man last seen with Carter, and who helped convict Williamson and Fritz, was eventually convicted in her death, with the help of DNA evidence.

Barry Scheck, a lawyer who founded the Innocence Project _ a legal group that uses DNA to exonerate convicts _ and represented Fritz, said he hopes Grisham's book will put more focus on the problem of wrongful conviction for people who may not be familiar with such cases.

"Having a writer of his ability and reach getting a story like this will turn the heads of most Americans," Scheck said. "Hopefully, they will learn that there are solutions, there are ways to make these problems better."

The story made Grisham _ who is against the death penalty _ want to get out of his seat and practice law again, although he's not headed back to the courtroom anytime soon.

"I'm not a crusader," he said. "I don't stick to just one issue, I tend to write about it, then leave it. But I hope this book makes people think about the justice system."

Working with characters he could not control was often difficult for Grisham, especially as he got to know Williamson, who died of cancer. A former baseball player in the minor leagues, Williamson was often selfish, a serious drinker and eventually diagnosed with bipolar disease. His behavior often made women uncomfortable.

"About halfway through, I realized my hero was not likable, and that could never happen in fiction, because you control the story," Grisham said. "I was pretty nervous about the reader. But by the time you get to the trial, you're sympathetic."

The story haunts Grisham, who hasn't been back in court since 1996 when he represented the family of a railroad brakeman killed when he was pinned between two cars. (Grisham won the case, earning his clients a jury award of $683,500 _ the biggest verdict of his career.)

He'd much prefer to be at his Charlottsville, Va., home writing or with his wife, Renee, who trains horses. The couple's son, 22-year-old Ty, just started law school at the University of Mississippi, his father's alma mater, and their daughter, Shea, 20, is in college.

Born in Arkansas and raised throughout the South, Grisham was a small-town lawyer and state legislator in Southaven, Miss., when he decided in the early 1980s to wake at dawn every morning to write a novel about a racially charged rape and murder trial.

Published by a small press in 1989, "A Time to Kill" sold just 5,000 copies. Then came "The Firm," which sold 1 million copies in 1991 and made Grisham a star. Now, a standard first printing for a Grisham hardcover is an astronomical 2.8 million copies, Doubleday said.

Each Grisham book is a best seller _ even a non-courtroom novel such as "Skipping Christmas," and even those no longer among his favorites, such as "The Client," which he calls "bloated" and too long.

"The Innocent Man," which came out Tuesday, is shaping up to the same kind of success, said Bob Wietrak, vice president for merchandising for Barnes & Noble, Inc.

"When we don't have a John Grisham book out we're disappointed, because we count on the sales of his book as well as bringing customers into our stores," he said. "He's a sure bet." Wietrak said Grisham's success is because of his storytelling talents.

Grisham said he has a knack for pacing and suspense that readers really enjoy, and has a very simple, chronological style that people can follow without much work.

He is methodical about his writing, publishing a book every year. He usually writes for six months, but "The Innocent Man" took 18 months, and he's eager to get back to fiction writing.

"I enjoyed almost all of it, even the research," he said. "It'll be a long time before I do nonfiction again. I can't wait to get back to the novels."

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Grisham's New 'Innocent Man' a True Tale

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NEW YORK -- John Grisham's latest book, "The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town," has the usual touches fans have come to expect from the master of the legal thriller: suspense, shock, even a wrongful conviction and near-execution. But this time, the tale is true.

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“God help us, if ever in this great country we

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Dennis Fritz

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http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/burden/profiles/fritz.html

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Cases of Injustice Archives - NAARPR

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John Grisham - The Innocent Man - Book Review | BookPage

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A movie trailer made by a student based on the book

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The article talks about the taped confession to Debbie Carter's murder Ron Williamson was always ranting about in jail.

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ADA - Jurors heard Ricky Jo Simmons' 1982 video taped rape and murder confession Monday, at the retrial of Glen Gore for first degree murder of Debra Sue Carter. Attorneys for Gore hope the confession will raise doubt of his guilt. Gore could receive a death sentence, if found guilty.

Gore's retrial was ordered by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals because appellate judges held the opinion he was denied a fair trial when defense was not allowed to present evidence of an alternate suspect. The Simmons' tape was not heard in the first trial, nor was the defense allowed to point a finger at Ron Williamson. The retrial is under way at Pontotoc County District Court with Judge Thomas Landrith presiding.

Believing he did something wrong, Simmons told investigators he was on acid and was mad at his brother the night Carter died. "I believe I did something out of anger," he said one day after Carter's murder.

Simmons said he rode and slept in Carter's car that night. However, he didn't think she knew he was in the backseat. He contradicted himself when he said she offered him a ride, but he thought her car was a tan 1977 Olds Cutlass or a maroon 1975 Camaro. Simmons couldn't say for sure if he stabbed her, but said he may have.

"I asked her if she believed in the Lord and she said 'Yes', and then I killed her," he said. Simmons said he did not know if he strangled her with his bare hands or used a rope in her living room. He said he heard a voice telling him to "Do it, do it."

On the taped interview, the investigators said they did not believe Simmons killed Carter and offered to get him psychiatric help, to which he agreed.

"I think it helped us (the prosecution) more than them (the defense)," referring to the taped confession," said Prosecuting Attorney Richard M. Wintory.

Jean Baxter testified Gore needed a place to stay temporarily, so she allowed him to sleep on her couch for two or three weeks.

"It was long before the holidays in 1982," she said.

Gore stood at one point, supplying questions to his attorney, David D. Smith, to get Baxter to recall Thanksgiving dinner that year. Smith asked if she remembered serving turkey to Gore and his boss from Harold's bar, but she denied Gore was there or that his boss ever had dinner at her house.

Gore's alibi for Dec. 7, 1982, the night Carter was killed, was that he spent the night at Baxter's house.

Donna Walker, manager of Love's Country Store on Mississippi in 1982, said she remembered Fritz and Williamson were regular customers at Love's for several months before Carter's death. Walker testified that Fritz and Williamson came into the store at 7 a.m. and hung around for at least half an hour drinking coffee every morning.

Chris Ross, assistant district attorney, pointed out to Baxter, Fritz was teaching school at Noble at the time, more than 58 miles northwest of Ada. He asked her how Fritz could make it to school on time if he was drinking coffee until 7:30 a.m. everyday. Ron Williamson and Dennis Fritz were convicted of Carter's murder in 1988, but were released in 1999 when hair and semen evidence thought to be theirs was found to be Gore's through DNA testing.

"We have hair and semen matching the defendant. What more do they need?" said Wintory.

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Jurors hear taped confession to Debra Sue Carter murder

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ADA - Jurors heard Ricky Jo Simmons' 1982 video taped rape and murder confession Monday, at the retrial of Glen Gore for first degree murder of Debra Sue Carter. Attorneys for Gore hope the confession will raise doubt of his guilt. Gore could receive a death sentence, if found guilty.

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Debbie Carter

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About Ron Williamson's history

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Interview with John Grisham about The Innocent Man

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This article gives a bit of history on Ron Williamson and talks about the murder of Debbie Carter.

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Mr. Williamson was charged with the killing. So was a second man, Dennis Fritz, a high school science teacher who had been one of Mr. Williamson's few friends when he returned to town after his baseball career. The evidence, the authorities said, consisted of 17 hairs that matched those of Mr. Williamson and Mr. Fritz, and the account provided by the woman who said she had heard Mr. Williamson confess. A second jailhouse informer later stepped forward to buttress the case against Mr. Fritz.

Mr. Williamson and Mr. Fritz were tried separately and found guilty. Mr. Fritz was sentenced to life in prison, and Mr. Williamson -- who had not received his psychiatric medicines for months before the trial and shouted angrily at the prosecution witnesses -- was sentenced to die.

Mr. Williamson later said the prison guards taunted him over an intercom about Ms. Carter's murder. In September 1994, when all of his state appeals had been exhausted, he was taken to the warden's office and told that he would be executed on Sept. 24. He recalled filling out a form that directed his body to be returned to his sister for burial.

A team of appellate lawyers, however, sought a writ of habeas corpus from Judge Frank H. Seay of Federal District Court, arguing that Mr. Williamson had not been competent to stand trial and that his lawyer had not effectively challenged the hair evidence or sought other suspects. Judge Seay granted a stay five days before Mr. Williamson was scheduled to die.

In 1998, lawyers from the Innocence Project at the Benjamin C. Cardozo School of Law in New York arranged DNA tests for Mr. Williamson and Mr. Fritz. They showed that neither man had been the source of the semen or hair collected from the victim's body. Another man, Glen D. Gore, has since been convicted of the killing and sentenced to die for it.

Mr. Williamson and Mr. Fritz were freed in April 1999. On a visit that spring to New York, they took a tour of Yankee Stadium, and Mr. Williamson wandered along the sparkling outfield grass.

"I just got a taste of how much fun they were having up here," he said.

Besides Ms. Hudson, another sister, Renee Simmons of Allen, Tex., survives.

The two men later won settlements for their convictions. But Mr. Williamson continued to be troubled by his psychiatric problems, Ms. Hudson said. Last year, however, he participated in a one-mile march, making an appeal to the governor of Illinois to commute the sentences of death row prisoners in that state.

Correction: December 11, 2004, Saturday An obituary on Thursday about Ronald Keith Williamson, who was convicted of a murder, condemned to death and later cleared by DNA evidence, referred incorrectly in some copies to the date he and his co-defendant, Dennis Fritz, were freed. It was April 1999, not May 1999.

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Ronald Williamson, Freed From Death Row, Dies at 51

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Ronald Keith Williamson, who left his small town in Oklahoma as high school baseball star with hopes of major league career but was later sent to death row and came within five days of execution for murder he did not commit, dies at age 51; photo (M)/

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Ron Williamson