Last Trial

(2020) From the bestselling author of Presumed Innocent, Scott Turow’s The Last Trial recounts the final case of Kindle County’s most revered courtroom advocate, Sandy Stern.

Already eighty-five years old, and in precarious health, Sandy Stern has been persuaded to defend an old friend, Kiril Pafko. A former Nobel Prize-winner in Medicine, Pafko, shockingly, has been charged in a federal racketeering indictment with fraud, insider trading and murder.

As the trial progresses, Stern will question everything he thought he knew about his friend. Despite Pafko’s many failings, is he innocent of the terrible charges laid against him? How far will Stern go to save his friend, and – no matter the trial’s outcome – will he ever know the truth? Stern’s duty to defend his client and his belief in the power of the judicial system both face a final, terrible test in the courtroom, where the evidence and reality are sometimes worlds apart.

Full of the deep insights into the spaces where the fragility of human nature and the justice system collide, Scott Turow’s The Last Trial is a masterful legal thriller that unfolds in page-turning suspense – and questions how we measure a life.