About
Laura Caldwell (October 24, 1967 – March 1, 2020) was an American civil trial lawyer and also a law professor at Loyola University Chicago School of Law, founding director of Life After Innocence, published author of 14 novels and two non-fiction books. The latest book she co-edited is “Anatomy of Innocence: Testimonies of the Wrongfully Convicted” (Liveright, 2017), which tells the true stories of over a dozen innocent men and women who were convicted of serious crimes and cast into the maw of a vast and deeply flawed American criminal justice system before eventually, miraculously being exonerated.
With novels published in over 25 countries and translated into more than 13 languages, Caldwell had left the law behind, or so she thought. Research on her sixth novel led her to the criminal case of a young man sitting in a Cook County holding cell for nearly six years without a trial. Compelled by his story, Caldwell joined a renowned criminal defense attorney to defend him, ultimately proving his innocence and inspiring her first nonfiction book, Long Way Home: A Young Man Lost in the System and the Two Women Who Found Him (Free Press, Simon & Schuster).
By working with him and witnessing…
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