Race and Justice: Rodney King and O. J. Simpson in a House Divided [Paperback]

Jewelle Taylor Gibbs (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 18, 1996

Puts the Rodney King and O. J. Simpson trials under the microscope

Reviews the turbulent events of the Rodney King and O. J. Simpson trials from a social and political framework of race relations and police misconduct. This thought-provoking book shows that the issue of race was at the very heart of both of these emotionally charged cases.

Psychologist and scholar Jewelle Taylor Gibbs shows how King and Simpson have been transformed by their trials into symbols of the different worlds inhabited by blacks and whites in America. Gibbs's compelling analysis of the issues that permeated these trials will challenge even the most cynical observer to rethink any previously held assumptions about race and the criminal justice system.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Gibbs, a clinical psychologist, defends the mostly black O.J. Simpson jury against the perception that race was the key factor in its decision to acquit him of double murder. There was ample cause for reasonable doubt, she argues. Yet race, she maintains, was nonetheless an overwhelming factor in both the Simpson case and in the 1992 acquittal (by a predominantly white jury) of four white LAPD officers who brutally beat black motorist Rodney King. In this detailed, impassioned analysis of both cases and their aftermaths, she emphasizes that African Americans' rage at the King jury, and empathy with the Simpson verdict, reflects their daily personal experience with an inequitable criminal justice system, police harassment and brutality, systemic racism and discrimination. A social policy professor at UC-Berkeley, Gibbs insists the Simpson jury's willingness to entertain the defense's theory of a police conspiracy must be interpreted in the context of a long history of oppression and cover-ups?unpunished police beatings or fatal injuries of black men in police custody; suspected FBI involvement in the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and Medgar Evers; the documented government infiltration of the Black Panthers; and the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, in which life-saving medication was withheld from hundreds of black men with advanced syphilis. Her study makes a vigorous contribution to the debate over race, class and the justice system in America. 50,000 first printing; 50,000 ad/promo.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

A distinguished scholar in the field of social policy, the author is also a clinical psychologist specializing in psychological, social, and mental health issues affecting poor, urban minority groups. She draws upon her expertise to weave common threads of racial inequality, discrimination, and mistreatment into a complex and extended fabric of injustice and misconduct perpetrated against ethnic minorities nationwide in general and against black males in Los Angeles in particular. Taylor-Gibbs adroitly develops this theme within the context of the Rodney King and O.J. Simpson trials. Her careful and provocative analyses of the underlying racial currents in these two cases combine to give her work a level of insight absent from those of courtroom players such as Robert Shapiro (The Search for Justice, LJ 8/15/96) and Gerald Uelmen (Lessons from the Trial, LJ 6/15/96), who focus more closely on the trial evidence, or lack thereof. Essential for anyone interested in a broader perspective of the issues.?Phillip Young Blue, New York State Supreme Court Criminal Branch Lib., New York
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 348 pages
• Publisher: Jossey-Bass; 1 edition (September 18, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0787902640
• ISBN-13: 978-0787902643
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,931,586 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Questionable language, November 13, 2004

By 

Homer Simpson "DOH!" (Springfield) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Race and Justice: Rodney King and O. J. Simpson in a House Divided (Paperback)

Regarding Rodney King's robbing a Korean store with a tire iron, the author says, "perhaps it was the need for money, perhaps it was the stress, perhaps it was the feeling of helplessness and hopelessness over his lack of options". After King gets away in his car, the Korean owner is able to get the license number so King can get arrested. The author says King was just "luckless as usual".

I like the way she distances King's motives from his own self by using the article "the" instead of "his" to describe greed, stress, and helplessness/hopeless. Subtle, but telling. And damn that Korean store owner for giving Rodney bad luck yet again! I mean, hey, doesn't he appreciate that King just hit him with a tire iron and didn't shoot his ass? He ought to have been more grateful and given Rodney a pass I guess?

Maybe it's just me, but this king of language is offensive. WHO IS THE VICTIM IN THIS ROBBERY?!

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vivid Details, November 4, 2006

By 

M. Salahuddin "NEW YORKER" (NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Race and Justice: Rodney King and O. J. Simpson in a House Divided (Paperback)

It is a complex, multi-layered account of the subject. Rich in details, complex and yet exciting and readable.