My mother deserves far more thanks than I can give her for a lifetime of standing by me and never complaining about the hardship I brought upon her and my siblings.
My thanks go to East Baton Rouge Parish librarian Elva Jewel “Peggy” Carter, who contributed research to many Angolite articles and became a treasured personal friend, and to Louisiana State Library librarian Marc Wellman, another friend to whose research assistance this book owes much.
To Dr. Marianne Fisher-Giorlando, who brought her students to tour Angola every year and steadfastly supported both The Angolite and me, I owe great thanks.
For her unwavering support and readiness to help me anytime, anywhere, I would like to thank my birthday buddy and longtime friend Leslie Turk.
I owe a great debt to the remarkable talent and generosity of the late Peter Golden, a Lafayette, Louisiana, dentist who traveled to Angola many times to save my teeth, pro bono, after they had all been declared beyond repair by the prison.
To Dr. Susan Jones of Lake Charles, I am grateful for the many times she came to the Calcasieu Parish jail during the last four years of my imprisonment to give me flu shots and other medical attention, pro bono.
My debt to lawyers is truly incalculable, beginning with Julian Murray, Louisiana’s “Atticus Finch” and best criminal trial lawyer, who fought for my freedom for two decades, pro bono.
I’m thankful that George Kendall brought not only his own pro bono legal brilliance to the fight to free me, but the resources of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the law firm of Holland and Knight. Those resources included talented young attorneys Laura Fernandez, Vanita Gupta, Chris Hsu, Parisa Tafti; and bright, energetic young law students Michael Block (Harvard), Katherine Bolton (NYU), Michael Bullerman (NYU), Deborah Cornwall (Harvard), Jerome Del Pino (NYU), Charles Hart (NYU), Annie Jacobs (NYU), Sarah Johnson (NYU), Dan Korobkin (Yale), Vivian Labaton (NYU), Susan Lee (NYU), Matt Mazur (Harvard), Michael Oppenheimer (CUNY), Susan Plotkin (NYU), Gretchen Rohr (Georgetown), Priy Sinha (NYU), Jonathan Smith (NYU), Aimee Solwtkway (NYU), Maria Fernanda Torres (NYU), and Ben Wizner (NYU).
Ron Ware, the public defender in Calcasieu Parish who put his career on the line when he refused to go along with the attempt to judicially lynch me, has both my thanks and my great admiration.
To the late, consummate trial lawyer Johnnie Cochran, I am indebted not only for his pro bono legal help but for his steadfast faith in miracles, which reinforced my own.
My thanks go also to James Wood, the attorney just two years out of law school who defended me at my 1970 trial, but more important, whose testimony decades later helped me win the new trial that freed me in 2005.
To Ginger Berrigan, my first pro bono attorney and now a federal judge in the Eastern District of New Orleans, I offer my deepest gratitude for her faith in me and her unflinching support over the past thirty-five years.
I am grateful to Elaine Jones and her successor as president of the Legal Defense Fund, Ted Shaw, for undertaking the fight for judicial fairness for a guilty prisoner when there were, and are, so many incarcerated innocents begging for help, and not enough resources to meet the need.
To the jury of twelve ordinary citizens from one of Louisiana’s most conservative parishes, I can only express gratitude that knows no bounds for the verdict that freed me.
I also owe thanks for the generosity of friends and strangers alike who have helped me since my release from prison.
To Catholic Charities’ Prison Ministry Coordinator Linda Fjeldsjo and the St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Stores operated by the Catholic Diocese of Baton Rouge, I owe thanks for assisting me when I had nothing.
Dr. Frank J. Alvarez, III, and nurses Tina Davis and Leslie Murphy of the Baton Rouge Clinic have my great thanks for supplying me with free blood-pressure medication during my first year of freedom, when I could ill afford to buy it.
I would also like to thank Baton Rouge attorney Gary McKenzie and his assistant Audra Bodin, who worked pro bono to have me declared bankrupt to rescue me from unprecedented court costs meant to cripple my ability to rebuild my life.
I owe particular thanks to the Open Society Institute of the Soros Foundation for their financial support while I wrote this book and am honored to be among the many Fellows they support who are dedicated to relieving misery and doing good in this sometimes cynical world.
To Robert Barnett and Deneen Howell of Williams and Connolly, I owe thanks for jump-starting my life with their work to find a publisher for this book.
This book owes much to David Friend of Vanity Fair for his enthusiastic support and for his suggestion that I keep a journal as I awaited retrial in Lake Charles. Similarly, my thanks go to Ted Koppel for his good advice that I keep a journal of my first days and months of freedom. Both journals have proved immensely helpful in the writing of this book.
I am especially indebted to Jonathan Segal, my editor at Knopf, for taking a chance on me. His insightful suggestions and guidance have been invaluable to me in the writing of this book.
Finally, I am deeply grateful for Linda LaBranche, the petite Shakespeare scholar who became my knight in shining armor. Her friendship and love, first as my supporter and now as my wife, made everything else possible.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wilbert Rideau spent forty-four years in the Louisiana prison system before winning a new trial and his freedom. He pioneered a free press behind bars in 1976 when he became editor of The Angolite, a prison newsmagazine that during his tenure was nominated seven times for a National Magazine Award. In 1979, he became the first prisoner ever to win the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award; the following year he received journalism’s prestigious George Polk Award. While in prison, he was a correspondent for National Public Radio’s Fresh Air; coproduced and narrated a radio documentary “Tossing Away the Keys,” for NPR’s All Things Considered; coproduced and narrated “In for Life” for ABC-TV’s Day One; provided the story and guidance for the television documentary Final Judgment: The Execution of Antonio James, for which he received the Louisiana Bar Association’s highest award for Overall Excellence in Journalism; codirected the Academy Award-nominated film The Farm: Angola USA, which earned him a Tree of Life Award from Friends of the Black Oscar Nominees. Since his release from prison in 2005, he has received the Human Rights Award from the Southern Center for Human Rights and the Champion of Justice Award from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Since 2007 he has been a Soros Fellow and has worked as a consultant with the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel project to improve communications between de fense teams and their clients. He now lives in Baton Rouge with his wife, Linda.
THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF
Copyright © 2010 by Wilbert Rideau
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
www.aaknopf.com
Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are
registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
This book was supported in part by a grant from the Soros Justice Fellowship Program of the Open Society Institute.
All photographs courtesy of the author or public domain with the following exceptions: Larry Smith (courtesy of Larry Smith); John Whitley (courtesy of John Whitley); supporters Sister Benedict Shannon and others, and Rev. J. L. Franklin leading a protest (Walter Jean); Wilbert Rideau with his mother (Leslie Turk).
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Rideau, Wilbert.
In The Place of Justice: A Story of Punishment and Deliverance/Wilbert Rideau.—1st ed.
p. cm.
“A Borzoi book”—T.p. verso.
eISBN: 978-0-307-59374-0
1. Rideau, Wilbert. 2. Louisiana State Penitentiary—History—20th century.
3. African American prisoners—Louisiana—Biograph
y. 4. Prisoners—Louisiana—
Biography. 5. Prisoners—Louisiana—Social conditions—20th century. 6. Criminal
justice, administration of—Louisiana—History—20th century. 7. Corruption—Louisiana—History—20th century. 8. African American journalists—Biography.
I. Title.
HV9475.L22L646 2010
365′.440923960730763—dc22 2009038526
v3.0
Wilbert Rideau Page 46