Kirjahaku

In 1966 Peter Jan Honigsberg - a young, idealistic law student - arrived in the South to help provide legal representation for civil rights workers. Although based in New Orleans, most of his work was in the city of Bogalusa and in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana. Bogalusa was the heart of the Louisiana movement and the home of one of the most formidable but little-known black organizations in the country - the Deacons for Defense and Justice, the first modern-day African American organization to carry weapons and to respond with force against the Ku Klux Klan. This riveting memoir, one of only a handful of first-person full-length accounts of the civil rights movement, is both a stirring coming-of-age story and a thrilling chronicle of a remarkable era in United States history. Honigsberg's engaging narrative conveys the emotions and personal dangers activists faced.He describes how the Deacons worked with the Bogalusa Voters League to boycott the white-owned businesses in the downtown area and to integrate the local schools, restaurants, parks, and paper mill. Unlike many law students, Honigsberg not only worked on legal issues; he participated directly in marches and demonstrations.His narrative includes lively firsthand accounts of his attempt - with a group of black and white demonstrators - to integrate a beach on Lake Pontchartrain, his experience marching through hostile Ku Klux Klan territory under the eye of the National Guard, and his witnessing a prominent civil rights leader lift his car's trunk to display a cache of carbines and grenades to a station attendant who refused to fill the tank with gas. This memoir provides a unique glimpse into the civil rights movement and the people who were forever changed by its struggle for human dignity and its vision of racial justice and equality.

First-hand testimonies from Guantanamo Bay detainees, family members, personnel and journalists, uncovering the human story behind life there Law scholar and "Witness to Guantanamo" founder Peter Jan Honigsberg uncovers a haunting portrait of life at Guantanamo Bay detention center, using 158 interviews he conducted across 20 countries with former detainees and their families, prison guards, interrogators, interpreters, chaplains, medical personnel, lawyers, and high-ranking military officials. Since the September 11th attacks, approximately 780 men of Arab descent have been detained at Guantanamo Bay as part of America's ill-fated War on Terror. 40 prisoners remained. Many of them have been tortured, and they will likely die there without receiving a trial. Through the stories Honigsberg captures, he introduces readers to an unforgettable cast of characters. There are the many alleged operatives in Guantanamo who were purchased by the United States for ransom from Afghan and Pakistani soldiers. Brandon Neely, a prison guard who processed the first group of suspected operatives to arrive in Cuba. Matt Diaz, a Navy whistleblower who covertly released the names of 500 detainees by sending them in a greeting card to a lawyer in New York. Carol Rosenberg, a journalist who has committed the past 17 years of her career to documenting life at Guantanamo. And many, many more, including Damien Corsetti, an interrogator who came to be known as the "King of Torture." In startling, aching prose, A Place Outside the Law shines a light on these untold stories, and through them, provides a powerful testament to the consequences of unchecked state power.