Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Justice on Fire: The Kansas City Firefighters Case and the Railroading of the Marlborough Five

Justice on Fire: The Kansas City Firefighters Case and the Railroading of the Marlborough Five

O'Connor, J. Patrick

Hardcover

General LawRegional: MidwestTrue Crime

Publisher Price: $37.99

ISBN10: 0700626719
ISBN13: 9780700626717
Publisher: Univ Pr Of Kansas
Published: Aug 21 2018
Pages: 352
Weight: 1.55
Height: 1.20 Width: 6.40 Depth: 9.50
Language: English
On the night of November 29, 1988, near the impoverished Marlborough neighborhood in south Kansas City, an explosion at a construction site killed six of the city's firefighters. It was a clear case of arson, and five people from Marlborough were duly convicted of the crime. But for veteran crime writer and crusading editor J. Patrick O'Connor, the facts--or a lack of them--didn't add up. Justice on Fire is O'Connor's detailed account of the terrible explosion that led to the firefighters' deaths and the terrible injustice that followed.

Justice on Fire describes a misguided eight-year investigation propelled by an overzealous Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agent keen to retire; a mistake-riddled case conducted by a combative assistant US attorney willing to use compromised snitch witnesses and unwilling to admit contrary evidence; and a sentence of life without parole pronounced by a prosecution-favoring judge. In short, an abuse of government power and a travesty of justice. O'Connor's own investigation, which uncovered evidence of witness tampering, intimidation, and prosecutorial misconduct, helped give rise to a front-page series of articles in the Kansas City Star--only to prompt a whitewashing inquiry by the Department of Justice that exonerated the lead ATF agent and named other possible perpetrators who remain unidentified and unindicted. O'Connor extends his scrutiny to this cover-up and arrives at a startling conclusion suggesting that the case of the Marlborough Five is far from closed.

Journalists are not supposed to make the news. But faced with a gross injustice, and seeing no other remedy, O'Connor felt he must step in. Justice on Fire is such an intervention.

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