Post by sclcookie on Jun 3, 2006 2:36:06 GMT -5
Attorney's new book takes you to Ridgway's murder trial
Nearly 5 years ago, police and prosecutors decided they had accumulated
enough evidence to arrest Gary L. Ridgway in the Green River killings.
When Mark Prothero heard the news, he was living one half of his dual
life. Prothero, a defense attorney, also coached his son and other members
of the swim team at Kent-Meridian High School, about 20 miles south of
Seattle.
Somebody would need to defend Ridgway. It would be an ugly assignment,
because if indeed Ridgway were the Green River Killer, that meant he had
murdered 48 women minimum, probably 71 - and maybe even more, starting in
the early 1980s.
Prothero worked as a public defender, which means representing mostly
low-income clients. Did Ridgway have enough money to hire a
private-practice lawyer, Prothero wondered, or would the case become part
of the public-defender portfolio?
If Ridgway ended up in the public-defender system, Prothero figured he
might serve as the lead lawyer, given his expertise analyzing DNA evidence
and his designation as one of just a few certified to handle death-penalty
cases.
Prothero received a call from his supervisor, telling him it appeared the
public defender's office would represent Ridgway. Talk to Ridgway as
quickly as possible, the supervisor said. So Prothero did.
Then he called Kelly, his wife of 19 years, who reminded him about dinner
plans that night with another couple.
**
author appearance
Mark Prothero will give a talk on "Defending Gary: Unraveling the Mind of
the Green River Killer" at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Elliott Bay Book Co., 101 S.
Main St., Seattle; free (206-624-6600 or http://www.elliottbaybook.com). When
Prothero arrived at dinner, friends asked the question heard often by
defense lawyers who represent alleged monsters: "Mark, are you really
gonna do this case?"
**
It looks like it, Prothero replied.
"What's he like?" the friends asked. "Was he creepy?"
Prothero replied, "He seemed really nice. Normal, polite. He wasn't
freaked out at all. He was a little stressed. He wanted me to call his
wife and his brother."
Their friends asked Kelly what she thought about her husband defending
perhaps the most prolific mass murderer in U.S. history. "Kelly had no
moral objection to an accused serial murderer having a constitutional
right of representation," Prothero writes in "Defending Gary: Unraveling
the Mind of the Green River Killer" with Carlton Smith (Jossey-Bass, 558
pp., $24.95). "She understood what my job was; her misgivings were much
more practical. She'd already guessed that such a case might take over our
lives."
She also understood that her husband wanted to handle one of the most
gruesome, challenging cases of all time. If Ridgway were innocent,
Prothero would want to participate in the exoneration. If Ridgway were
guilty, Prothero would want to save him from the death penalty.
It seems unlikely that any Seattle-area resident reading this review is
ignorant of the facts of the Green River Killer case. The book does not
add a great deal to the public record.
Before Ridgway's arrest, Prothero's co-author collaborated with fellow
Seattle Times reporter Tomas Guillen to write a detailed book about the
stymied investigation to catch the Green River Killer (Smith and Guillen
have since left the paper).
Since Ridgway's arrest, Guillen has written another book about the case
(reviewed earlier this year in The Seattle Times). True-crime writer Ann
Rule and former King County Sheriff Dave Reichert have published books,
too.
The chief value of Prothero's book is its detailed narrative about the
workings of the criminal-justice system in a case with the death penalty
in play. One feature of that system is that defendants who have committed
crimes that lead to a death-penalty charge receive more thorough
representation than defendants who committed lesser crimes, and who might
be worthy of rehabilitation. This book offers insights into behaviors of
police detectives, prosecutors, judges, forensic psychiatrists,
journalists and defense lawyers.
For readers interested more in Ridgway than in judicial-system operations,
the book is both sober and titillating. I found the long sections about
Ridgway occasionally tedious, mostly because it is often impossible to
know whether the killer is lying. If Ridgway is telling lies to Prothero,
I don't want to waste my time absorbing them.
As for Prothero, he seems to have come through the grueling experience in
good shape. "I make no apologies for helping to get Gary Ridgway life in
prison rather than execution. Through this deal, law enforcement was given
a rare opportunity to get inside the mind of the nation's most prolific,
and successful, serial killer. Knowledge was indeed gained, knowledge
which will help in future serial murder investigations. And, hopefully,
save some lives."
(source: The Seattle Times - Steve Weinberg is a freelance investigative
reporter in Columbia, Mo. He is a director of the National Book Critics
Circle)
Nearly 5 years ago, police and prosecutors decided they had accumulated
enough evidence to arrest Gary L. Ridgway in the Green River killings.
When Mark Prothero heard the news, he was living one half of his dual
life. Prothero, a defense attorney, also coached his son and other members
of the swim team at Kent-Meridian High School, about 20 miles south of
Seattle.
Somebody would need to defend Ridgway. It would be an ugly assignment,
because if indeed Ridgway were the Green River Killer, that meant he had
murdered 48 women minimum, probably 71 - and maybe even more, starting in
the early 1980s.
Prothero worked as a public defender, which means representing mostly
low-income clients. Did Ridgway have enough money to hire a
private-practice lawyer, Prothero wondered, or would the case become part
of the public-defender portfolio?
If Ridgway ended up in the public-defender system, Prothero figured he
might serve as the lead lawyer, given his expertise analyzing DNA evidence
and his designation as one of just a few certified to handle death-penalty
cases.
Prothero received a call from his supervisor, telling him it appeared the
public defender's office would represent Ridgway. Talk to Ridgway as
quickly as possible, the supervisor said. So Prothero did.
Then he called Kelly, his wife of 19 years, who reminded him about dinner
plans that night with another couple.
**
author appearance
Mark Prothero will give a talk on "Defending Gary: Unraveling the Mind of
the Green River Killer" at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Elliott Bay Book Co., 101 S.
Main St., Seattle; free (206-624-6600 or http://www.elliottbaybook.com). When
Prothero arrived at dinner, friends asked the question heard often by
defense lawyers who represent alleged monsters: "Mark, are you really
gonna do this case?"
**
It looks like it, Prothero replied.
"What's he like?" the friends asked. "Was he creepy?"
Prothero replied, "He seemed really nice. Normal, polite. He wasn't
freaked out at all. He was a little stressed. He wanted me to call his
wife and his brother."
Their friends asked Kelly what she thought about her husband defending
perhaps the most prolific mass murderer in U.S. history. "Kelly had no
moral objection to an accused serial murderer having a constitutional
right of representation," Prothero writes in "Defending Gary: Unraveling
the Mind of the Green River Killer" with Carlton Smith (Jossey-Bass, 558
pp., $24.95). "She understood what my job was; her misgivings were much
more practical. She'd already guessed that such a case might take over our
lives."
She also understood that her husband wanted to handle one of the most
gruesome, challenging cases of all time. If Ridgway were innocent,
Prothero would want to participate in the exoneration. If Ridgway were
guilty, Prothero would want to save him from the death penalty.
It seems unlikely that any Seattle-area resident reading this review is
ignorant of the facts of the Green River Killer case. The book does not
add a great deal to the public record.
Before Ridgway's arrest, Prothero's co-author collaborated with fellow
Seattle Times reporter Tomas Guillen to write a detailed book about the
stymied investigation to catch the Green River Killer (Smith and Guillen
have since left the paper).
Since Ridgway's arrest, Guillen has written another book about the case
(reviewed earlier this year in The Seattle Times). True-crime writer Ann
Rule and former King County Sheriff Dave Reichert have published books,
too.
The chief value of Prothero's book is its detailed narrative about the
workings of the criminal-justice system in a case with the death penalty
in play. One feature of that system is that defendants who have committed
crimes that lead to a death-penalty charge receive more thorough
representation than defendants who committed lesser crimes, and who might
be worthy of rehabilitation. This book offers insights into behaviors of
police detectives, prosecutors, judges, forensic psychiatrists,
journalists and defense lawyers.
For readers interested more in Ridgway than in judicial-system operations,
the book is both sober and titillating. I found the long sections about
Ridgway occasionally tedious, mostly because it is often impossible to
know whether the killer is lying. If Ridgway is telling lies to Prothero,
I don't want to waste my time absorbing them.
As for Prothero, he seems to have come through the grueling experience in
good shape. "I make no apologies for helping to get Gary Ridgway life in
prison rather than execution. Through this deal, law enforcement was given
a rare opportunity to get inside the mind of the nation's most prolific,
and successful, serial killer. Knowledge was indeed gained, knowledge
which will help in future serial murder investigations. And, hopefully,
save some lives."
(source: The Seattle Times - Steve Weinberg is a freelance investigative
reporter in Columbia, Mo. He is a director of the National Book Critics
Circle)