A New Grisham Novel and Plenty of Real-Life Legal Drama

Jennifer Thompson, whose eyewitness misidentification sent an innocent man to prison for over a decade, stressed the importance of DNA testing in the case of a Texas man on death row

in a letter published in the Washington Post

. Thompson is a co-author of ”

Picking Cotton

,” released earlier this year, written with exoneree Ronald Cotton and Erin Torneo.

A bill pending in the U.S. House of Representatives

would make statements made by defendants inadmissible in federal felony prosecutions if federal police agencies fail to record the entire interrogation.

A South Dakota judge ruled that a jury

will not hear full testimony

from a jailhouse informant in a murder trial set to begin in January.

A new novel by John Grisham, ”

The Confession

,” hits bookstores on Tuesday. The book tells the story of a murderer who decides to admit his guilt to save the life of the man who was wrongfully convicted of the crime and is days away from being executed. Grisham sits on the Innocence Project Board of Directors.

The Innocence Project welcomed

three new members to the Board of Directors

and named former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno a Director Emeritus.