When a drive-by shooting in Holyoke, Massachusetts, claims the lives of a Puerto Rican drug dealer and a hockey mom volunteering at an inner-city clinic, the police arrest a rival gang member. With no death penalty in Massachusetts, the US attorney shifts the double homicide out of state jurisdiction into federal court so he can seek a death sentence.
This is the plot of The Hanging Judge: A Novel – it is based on the experience of the author, a senior judge on the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts – Michael Ponsor.
