Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Sun Does Shine, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Discrimination and the Criminal Justice System
Optimism, Faith, and Choice
The Death Penalty
Suffering, Community, and Support
The Power of Stories
Summary
Analysis
On September 12, 1986, Reggie takes the stand to testify against Ray. Ray is furious, knowing that Reggie is only testifying because he wants to get revenge for the incident with the sisters and because the state offered $5,000 to anyone who could help them catch the killer. Reggie, who works at the Quincy’s where Smotherman was shot, testifies that Ray was the robber and says that Ray asked him two weeks prior what time the restaurant closed, and he even told Ray what kind of car Smotherman drove.
Reggie wants revenge for the time that Ray dated two sisters—the older one in public and the younger one in private—while Reggie was interested in one of them. On another note, the reward for information exposes another potential issue in the criminal justice system: it provides an incentive for poorer people with a vendetta, like Reggie, to provide false information and lie on the stand for gain. The state allows and supports this because it helps their own case, not because it renders justice.
Themes
Ray recognizes the logical fallacies in Reggie’s testimony: if the restaurant closed at 11:00 p.m., it doesn’t make sense that Ray would choose a night he had work, sneak out, rob and murder a man, and then sneak back. Perhacs questions Reggie’s motivation, but Perhacs gets details about the incident with the sisters wrong and doesn’t mention the reward money or call out any of Reggie’s lies.
Again, the entire trial exposes how biased people can greatly affect the criminal justice system. Perhacs bias against Ray and the fact that he isn’t making much money on the case directly translates to the poor defense he mounts: he doesn’t follow up with Reggie on any of his clear lies or demonstrate his financial motivation.
Themes
When Ray returns to his cell each night of the trial, he plays the day’s events over in his head. Any evidence that pointed to Ray not being a killer was left out or lied about. The police didn’t mention the blank piece of paper they wanted him to sign or that Ray’s mom’s gun hasn’t been fired in years. Ray realizes that his only hope is his ballistics expert.
As the trial goes on, Ray becomes increasingly aware of the bias within the system and how easy it is to manipulate. Both Perhacs and the state are completely ignoring or obscuring the truth about anything that might exonerate Ray.
Themes
Ray replays the day that the police arrested him. He wonders if he should have run but thinks that he likely just would have been shot and killed. He misses his mom and Lester. He broke up with Sylvia a year earlier, not knowing how long he would be wrapped up in the trial.
Ray acknowledges that he likely would have been killed if he had run from the police—a brief nod to anti-Black racism in police brutality in addition to that the anti-Black racism that abounds within the criminal justice system. He also reiterates how important the people closest to him are, and how he misses their comfort in this trying time.
Themes
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On Wednesday, September 17, Andrew Payne testifies as Ray’s ballistics expert. His findings prove that Ray is innocent, and he does a good job presenting his case. But when the state starts to cross-examine Payne, they reveal that Payne had never used their brand of comparison microscope to examine evidence before and didn’t know how to operate it. They also note that Payne is blind in one eye.
Here Ray’s lack of funding for his defense creates severe problems for him. Because Perhacs can only find a relatively unqualified man who is blind in one eye to testify on Ray’s behalf, the state is easily able to convince the jury to completely discount his testimony.
Themes
The jury takes two hours to find Ray guilty, and another 45 minutes to determine his punishment: death. In December, before Judge Garrett reads the official death sentence, Ray tells them that God would reopen his case and that they can never take his soul away from him.
The problems with the criminal justice system are exposed in full here as Ray returns to the scene from the opening chapter. Despite the fact that Ray is an innocent man, his race and socioeconomic status meant that he received deeply inadequate defense and subsequently a death sentence.
Themes
