Kingston Penitentiary

In December 1883, Peter Lazier was shot in the heart during a bungled robbery at a Prince Edward County farmhouse. Three local men, pleading innocence from start to finish, were arrested and charged with his murder. Two of them — Joseph Thomset and David Lowder — were sentenced to death by a jury of local citizens the following May. Nevertheless, appalled community members believed at least one of them to be innocent — even pleading with prime minister John A. Macdonald to spare them from the gallows.

In the Skin of a Lion is a love story and an irresistible mystery set in the turbulent, muscular new world of Toronto in the 20s and 30s. Michael Ondaatje entwines adventure, romance and history, real and invented, enmeshing us in the lives of the immigrants who built the city and those who dreamed it into being: the politically powerful, the anarchists, bridge builders and tunnellers, a vanished millionaire and his mistress, a rescued nun and a thief who leads a charmed life.

Alias Grace is based on the story of the notorious 1843 murders of Thomas Kinneat and his housekeeper Nancy Montgomery in Upper Canada. While the novel is based on true facts, the perspective is written through the eyes of a fictional doctor, Simon Jordan, who is researching the case. The story follows Jordan's researching of criminal behaviour, but is altered to the attempt to reconcile the truth about the case, and Grace Marks's involvement. Grace Marks and fellow servant of the house, James McDermott, were convicted of the crime.

Using a rigorous marxist structuralist methodology, the book draws the reader into a compelling web of economic, social, and geographical structures, showing how human actions, sometimes murderous, arise from forces larger than the individual.

In 1987, Merilyn Simonds happened upon a cache of letters, albums, and clippings in the attic of her house in Kingston, Ontario. Among the overflowing boxes and stuffed sugar sacks was a collection of letters from the months immediately after the First World War.

This text fills a longstanding and growing need for a current and comprehensive overview of women and the Canadian criminal justice system, in all its aspects. The wealth of content includes everything from an accessible overview of essential theory, to practical challenges such as mental health issues and community reintegration, to an examination of women’s roles and careers in the field of criminal justice. 

Rose Ricciardelli draws on interviews with almost sixty former federal prisoners to show how their criminal convictions, masculinity, and sexuality determined their social status in prison and, in consequence, their potential for victimization.

The book outlines the modern “inmate code” that governs prisoner behaviours, the formal controls put forth by the administration, the dynamics that shape sex-offender experiences of incarceration, and the personal growth experiences of many prisoners as they cope with incarceration.

Understanding Crime in Canada: An Introduction to Criminology provides an overview of the foundations of criminology, and is intended for an introductory-level university and college audience. In addition to surveying the key theoretical approaches, it also examines important aspects in the study of criminology, including the role of the media; key points of criminal law; ways of measuring crime; and a thorough survey of the various types of crime. Case studies and boxes are used throughout to illustrate the theoretical aspects of the text in a real-world context.

Murray explores how far local characteristics affected the operation of a criminal justice system transplanted from England; his analysis includes how legal processes affected Upper Canadian morality, the treatment of the insane, welfare cases, crimes committed in the district, and an examination of the roles of the Niagara magistrates, constables, and juries. Murray concludes by arguing that while the principles and culture of British justice were firmly implanted in the Niagara district, this did not prevent justice from being unequal, especially for women and visible minorities.

In The Truth about Luck, Iain Reid, author of the highly popular coming-of-age memoir One Bird's Choice, accompanies his grandmother on a five-day vacation -- which turns out to be a "staycation" at his basement apartment in Kingston. While the twenty-eight-year-old writer is at the beginning of his adult life, his ninety-two-year-old grandmother is nearing the end of hers.

Lead authors Karla O'Regan and Susan Reid have produced a concise, accessible, and engaging text that covers the main curriculum requirements for introductory-level Criminal Justice courses in Canadian universities and colleges. Drawing on well-known case studies to connect the book's theoretical content to real-world issues, it lays out the key concepts, terms, and history for readers before shifting its focus to an exploration of key questions and issues in Canadian criminal justice today.