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SURVIVING JUSTICE
Methodology
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This
book grew out of a class co-taught
by Lola Vollen and Dave Eggers
at the University of California,
Berkeley Graduate School of
Journalism. The task of the
class, which comprised fourteen
students over two semesters,
was to interview the exonerees
represented in this book,
edit their transcripts into
clear narratives, and to surround
these narratives with sidebars
explaining the issues pertaining
to wrongful conviction and
exoneration.
Many of the exonerees were
first interviewed by Sarah
Stewart Taylor, a reporter
with expertise in prison issues.
Later, each exoneree was interviewed
by a UC Berkeley graduate
student. Half of these interviews
took place in Berkeley, when
six of the exonerees were
flown to campus to participate
in the weekend-long roundtable
discussion and a series of
individual interview sessions.
The rest of the interviews
took place in the home cities
of the exonerees. The interviews
ranged in length from four
hours to twelve hours. Once
the recordings of these conversations
were transcribed, the students
then edited each transcript
down to a clear narrative.
In most cases, this process
involved paring a raw transcript—on
average, the transcripts were
about 45,000 words—down
to a narrative of about 12,000
words. In no cases were any
changes made to the content
or meaning of the exonerees’
words. Editing was done to
make the narratives concise
and as linear as possible.
The edited versions were then
sent to the exonerees for
approval. Changes were made
when passages or details were
incorrect or unclear, though
the editors sought to maintain
each exoneree’s distinct
voice. The editors of Voice
of Witness are dedicated to
presenting the stories of
the interviewees as accurately
as possible; the only way
to safeguard this, we feel,
is to involve the interviewees
throughout the process. The
changes requested by the exonerees
or their lawyers were commonly
limited to those involving
grammar and factuality. In
addition to receiving the
approval of all of those whose
stories are told in Surviving
Justice, all of the narratives
were fact-checked against
news reports, court records,
police records, and documents
and notes kept by the lawyers
involved. |
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