A Life in the Balance: The Billy Wayne Sinclair Story, A Journey from Murder to Redemption Inside America's Worst Prison System
(Paperback)
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Publishing Details
A Life in the Balance: The Billy Wayne Sinclair Story, A Journey from Murder to Redemption Inside America's Worst Prison System
By (Author) Billy Wayne Sinclair
By (author) Jodie Sinclair
Skyhorse Publishing
Arcade Publishing
29th March 2012
United States
Classifications
General
Non Fiction
364.1523092
Physical Properties
Paperback
360
Width 146mm, Height 229mm, Spine 155mm
442g
Description
Sentenced to death in 1965 at age twenty for an unpremeditated murder during the bungled holdup of a convenience store, Billy Wayne spent his first seven prison years on death row. When the death penalty was abolished, his sentence was life. Three-and-a-half decades later, Billy Wayne is still behind barsfeared by many politicians and prison officials for his well-known incorruptibility and unrelenting crusade for prison reform. This is his memoir.
A Life in the Balance begins with an almost unbearable account of his early yearswhen he was so abused by his father one wonders how he survivedand his escape into a crowd of hooligans, which led him to the fateful day in 1965 when he held up the convenience store. His story takes you behind the metal doors of the Angola State Penitentiary to reveal the brutal truth of life inside. Here you will meet Billy Ray, Billy Waynes blood brother; old Emmitt Henderson, who died of prison neglect; Jamie Parks, a seventeen-year-old kid whose fate was sealed the day he arrived in Angola; Big Mick, who ran drugs in the prison to earn money to put his handicapped sister through college; Wilbert Rideau, Billy Waynes coeditor on The Angolite; the Dixie Mafia; and Richard Clark Hand, the young lawyer who took on Billy Waynes case and has been fighting for his release for thirty years.
Reviews
A numbing tale of crime, punishment, and redemption.
This is a powerful tale, and readers will be shaken by the sorrow, greed, and corruption they encounter in it.
Author Bio
Billy Wayne Sinclair established himself in prison as a jailhouse lawyer, defending the rights of fellow prisoners, and as a journalist. Released from prison in 2006, he is a senior paralegal at the John T. Floyd Law Firm. He lives with his wife, Jodie, in Houston, Texas. Jodie Sinclair, Billy Wayne Sinclair's wife and coauthor, received her Master of Science in Journalism from Columbia University. She resides in Houston, Texas.
