Opening Arguments

by Jeffrey Toobin

First published 1991

Jeffrey Toobin graduates from Harvard Law School and lands on Special Prosecutor Lawrence Walsh's team in January 1987. His target: Oliver North, the central figure in the Iran-Contra scandal. For twenty-eight months, Toobin navigates his first major case while the Reagan administration creates roadblocks and Congressional committees grant immunity to key witnesses. He and his colleagues work in isolation, cut off from newspapers and television for weeks. The case involves obstruction of justice, diverted funds, and corruption at the highest levels of government. Toobin must learn the law while working on one of the decade's most politically charged prosecutions. The book follows his professional awakening as he discovers how justice actually works when politics, law, and morality collide on a national stage.

Genres: 20th-century, crime, biography-memoir, academic, legal-thriller, american-history

Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking

Tropes: fish-out-of-water, professional-awakening

Period: 1987

384 pages · Hardcover · Viking Adult

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