Presumed Innocent

When Scott Turow published Presumed Innocent in 1987, he started a whole new genre: the legal thriller. Turow, a lawyer who continued to practice throughout his writing career, offers the ring of authenticity in his portrayal of the gritty dealings and legal stratagems of the justice system in fictional Kindle County, based on his hometown of Chicago. The novel introduces Rožat “Rusty” Sabich, deputy chief of the Kindle County prosecuting attorney, who finds himself accused of murder when his colleague, Carolyn Polhemus, is found dead in her apartment. Rusty spends his days in the courtroom and his nights trying to find the real killer before he is convicted, setting up a fast-paced, high-stakes investigation that leads dangerously close to home.

Rusty Sabich is shocked when he hears of Carolyn Polhemus’s death—not only because they’ve worked on cases together but also because, until recently, they were having an affair. Rusty’s boss, prosecutor Raymond Horgan, immediately puts him in charge of the investigation, and Rusty recruits his friend, police officer Dan “Lip” Lipranzer, to help. Their investigation is hampered by the shadow investigation run by two members of the prosecutor’s office, one of whom, Nico Della Guardia, is running for election against Horgan. Their goal is to prove the incompetence of Horgan’s staff—in this case, Rusty—by withholding information and slandering him in the media.

Rusty and Lip’s investigation uncovers a “B file” that Carolyn was working on, a designation that indicates it was an investigation into bribery. Digging back into Carolyn’s history, they discover she was a probation officer—in fact, the same probation officer of the man who bribed the official, who remains unknown. However, when Horgan loses the election, Rusty is taken off the case and, shortly thereafter, charged with Carolyn’s murder.

While he and his defense lawyer prepare for trial, Rusty and Lip continue to investigate; both think that whoever accepted the bribe may have orchestrated Carolyn’s death. As the trial begins, Rusty’s lawyer brings up the B file in court several times, trying to create a link, but to no avail. In the meantime, a fingerprinted glass, one of two pillars of the prosecution’s case, goes missing. Turow toggles between courtroom drama and behind-the-scenes investigation while offering plenty of insight into the strategies of both prosecuting and defense attorneys, which is fascinating if you’re the kind of reader who likes to have insider information about how things really work. 

The prosecution’s case against Rusty is mainly based on two things: the fact that Rusty’s fingerprints were found on a bar glass in Carolyn’s apartment and the fact that the blood type of the sperm found in Carolyn’s body matches Rusty’s blood type. However, in the courtroom, their case becomes shakier and shakier as witnesses who should’ve bolstered the case against Rusty end up working in his favor. These dramatic reversals, if more common in fiction than real life, ensure that the largely dialogue-based courtroom drama feels as action-packed and suspenseful as Lip and Rusty’s ongoing investigation. Even Turow’s exposition regarding the legal system doesn’t slow the momentum: “[A] directed-verdict ruling is unreviewable; the state may not appeal. As a result some judges—Larren quite notoriously—use this as a device for imposing the result they favor” (297). With its gossipy aside, this passage captures Turow’s flair for rendering the mechanics of the judicial process digestible and compelling.

That process builds to a thrilling climax. When the prosecution’s case rests, the judge, Lyttle, makes the very unusual move of dismissing the case, citing the missing evidence and general lack of support for the charge. Everyone is shocked, but Rusty quickly realizes the truth: Lyttle was the official who accepted the bribe in Carolyn’s B file. Further, he realizes that his lawyer knew this and purposely brought up the B file during the trial to pressure the judge into dropping the case. Coincidences like this strain credulity at times, but Turow takes pains to remind the reader that the county justice system is a small community, full of gossip and rumors. Throughout the novel, Rusty and Lip use the network they’ve developed over the years to find answers, and those who have been around the longest, like Lyttle and Rusty’s lawyer, know the most.

There are also moments in the novel that remind readers of the fact that this novel was written in the 1980s—particularly its cavalier use of racist language and its overall portrayal of women. Carolyn is intelligent, powerful, and beautiful; however, she is also manipulative, cunning, and cruel, essentially sleeping her way to the top of her profession and slipping over the line into criminal behavior when it helps her get her way. Ultimately, she is a flat character who seems to fulfill men’s worst expectations of women in the workplace at that time. In addition, her death is gratuitously gruesome, as she is brutally tied up and raped. In a similar vein, Rusty’s wife, Barbara, is a fascinating, intelligent woman and (it turns out) an ingenious killer, yet the reader is given almost no insight into her character. This is partly because of Rusty’s own admittedly limited understanding of these women, but it also speaks to the fact that the women in the novel—even the victim and the killer—play supporting roles in the drama of the male-dominated justice system.