About book Bloodsworth: The True Story Of The First Death Row Inmate Exonerated By DNA (2004)
Kirk Bloodsworth was tried and convicted for the brutal murder and rape of a 9 year-old girl and sentenced to death row. Long professing his innocence, he tried every avenue possible to prove he had been wrongly convicted. Going on a wing and a prayer, and questionable information from a detective novel, he became the first man to be exonerated by DNA.Kirk Bloodsworth is my uncle.I was so young when the crime actually happened, that by the time I was cognizant of my incarcerated uncle, I was so far removed from the details. All I knew is that he wrote me often, and signed all of his cards "A.I.M."-An Innocent Man. I imagined the life he lived, but really never knew the minutia until he sent me a signed copy of this book. To say it was eye-opening would be an understatement. Heart-breaking, gut-wrenching, terrifying...that's more like it. For all parties involved in the crime.Despite my bias, I believe this is a book worth reading. This review could go on forever, I'll let you formulate your own opinion.
A true story of a man who never gave up, this book made me reexamine my views on death penalty. Almost everything that could go wrong in Kirk Bloodsworth's case did go wrong: the police had railroaded him, his lawyers had screwed up, and few people had had a second thought before jumping on the bandwagon of condemnation. And yet when he finally got out, amazingly he did much more than just brood and curse the fate, he used his experience to educate people, to serve a greater good - after getting drunk and eating lots of shell fish, of course!I enjoyed this book even more by reading it in parallel with watching Law & Order. It offers a sobering second look on how likely it is that justice has really been served when Jack McCoy puts down his shiny armor after a hard day of work. It reminds me that even the best intentions can end up ruining an innocent life.
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A little bit of a dry read, full of details...I started zoning out when they discussed all the legal wrangling because that isn't my thing, but the story itself is riveting--and infuriating. Kirk Bloodsworth lost 9 years of his life to a wrongful conviction. And spent several years on death row, where sadistic guards once taunted him by forcing him to paint the interior of the gas chamber where he had been sentenced to die. Definitely a book to read if you think the death penalty should stand as is.
—Shawna
This is an excellent report of the true story of Kirk Bloodsworth, a Maryland waterman who was unjustly accused and convicted of the brutal rape and murder of a little girl. Bloodsworth was convicted based solely on dubious circumstantial and eyewitness testimony, in spite of the fact that the unreliability of eye witness testimony is well known. Numerous errors were made by both the investigators and the prosecution, and the only defense that Bloodsworth and his family could afford did not represent him well.He was imprisoned for a decade (two years of that on death row)in a terrible Maryland prison where--as in most prisons--child abusers are at the bottom of the totem pole. He found the strength to fight his conviction and protest his innocence throughout his time and jail, and finally became the first convict in the United States to be freed because of DNA testing.This is both an inspiring story, and one that shows huge flaws in the the US system of justice.
—Lorin Kleinman
