Chet Pleban – författare

Bobby Decker, a white police officer, arrests a young black burglary suspect one chilly spring night, but can’t explain how the suspect’s skull was fractured. The elected prosecutor with aspirations of a judicial appointment, claims Decker smashed his skull with a flashlight. Black activists, still critical of that prosecutor’s recent failure to convict a white police sergeant for the brutal beating of a mentally challenged young man in his own home, sees this as yet another case of police brutality and wants justice. A murder charge is brought by an anxious, politically motivated prosecutor before the brain autopsy is completed. In the wake of media efforts to rekindle hostilities between the police and the black community, the jury trial begins. How will the deadly injury be explained by the accused officer? How will the prosecutor prove her theory? Can a fair jury be selected in this racially charged environment? In the end, the jurors will decide the fate of Bobby Decker, or will they?

At the insistence of an influential black state senator and a lack of evidence, Joan Cardwell, an elected prosecutor, amidst racial tensions, brings a murder charge against a white police officer for the death of a black burglary suspect. In return, the prosecutor is promised a judicial appointment. Shortly after that promise is fulfilled, the senator’s son is charged with murdering his girlfriend and the case is assigned to now Judge Cardwell. Jonathan Felbin, the police officer’s former attorney, is hired to represent the senator’s son and quickly suspects that the fix is in. When the trial ends, will Felbin’s suspicions about the judge be verified? Will the real killer be identified or will Felbin search for answers that will lead down a dangerous path filled with twists, turns and dead ends? In the end will the guilty be identified or will politics define the criminal justice system?