I have been representing death-row inmates, mostly in Texas, since the late 1980s. The stories in this book are true. I was involved in all the cases I have described (although not always as the lead lawyer), and all the factual details are based on my own firsthand knowledge. I have not exaggerated to heighten drama.
In telling these stories, however, I have confronted constraints. A lawyer’s obligation to keep his client’s secrets confidential remains even after the client has died. I have therefore changed many of the names, and I have altered many identifying details.
In addition to using pseudonyms, I have occasionally changed genders, ages, races, locations (including cities), dates, and restaurants. I have not altered the facts of the crimes nor of my relationships with my clients, but I have taken procedural details of some cases and attributed them to other cases. In some cases where there were multiple execution dates, I have told the story as if there was only one. I have transposed the geographical location of certain events (including where certain things took place inside the prison or jail, which county some crimes were committed in, and whether a legal proceeding took place in state or federal court), and I’ve altered the timing of others, though the basic chronology of events is accurate.
I have also probably put some of Katya’s words in my mouth, and vice versa. I recall many of our conversations with near-perfect clarity (although, as she will tell you, I forget many more), but I often recall what was said without remembering which one of us said it.
Scores of lawyers have worked on the cases I describe in the following pages. To avoid burdening the reader with a Shakespearean cast, I refer to only three of them, using pseudonyms, in the text. I list all their actual names in the Acknowledgments.
I have made the changes I did for many reasons: to protect attorney-client privilege, as I said, which survives even after the client dies; to avoid revealing confidential information of present and former clients; to protect the families of both murder victims and the criminals who killed them (even families of murderers are entitled to privacy and respect); to conceal the identities of people who would not want their help to me revealed (including guards, police officers, court personnel, judges, and prosecutors); to protect living clients from retaliation or jealousy; to compress into a two- or three-year period stories that in some cases lasted a decade or longer; and to tell the stories without getting too bogged down in legal and procedural details. I have endeavored to write an honest memoir without revealing confidences, so I have told these stories in a way that is faithful to the truth as well as to the individuals they feature.