A national bestseller—7 million copies sold. Prosecuting attorney in the Manson trial, Vincent Bugliosi held a unique insider's position in one of the most baffling and horrifying cases of the twentieth century: the cold-blooded Tate-LaBianca murders carried out by Charles Manson and four...  more

A national bestseller—7 million copies sold. Prosecuting attorney in the Manson trial, Vincent Bugliosi held a unique insider's position in one of the most baffling and horrifying cases of the twentieth century: the cold-blooded Tate-LaBianca murders carried out by Charles Manson and four of his followers. What motivated Manson in his seemingly mindless selection of victims, and what was his hold over the young women who obeyed his orders? Here is the gripping story of this famous and haunting crime. 50 pages of b/w photographs. Both Helter Skelter and Vincent Bugliosi's subsequent Till Death Us Do Part won Edgar Allan Poe Awards for best true-crime book of the year. Bugliosi is also the author of Outrage: The Five Reasons Why O. J. Simpson Got Away with Murder (Norton, 1996) and other books. Curt Gentry, an Edgar winner, is the author of J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets (available in Norton paperback) and Frame-Up: The Incredible Case of Tom Mooney and Warren Billings.

The 1893 Chicago World's Fair is the setting for this true account of two very different men: the celebrated architect Daniel H. Burnham who designed and supervised the construction of the "White City" around which the fair was built, and H.H. Holmes (born Herman Webster Mudgett),...  more

The 1893 Chicago World's Fair is the setting for this true account of two very different men: the celebrated architect Daniel H. Burnham who designed and supervised the construction of the "White City" around which the fair was built, and H.H. Holmes (born Herman Webster Mudgett), a fiendishly clever serial killer posing as a doctor who murdered scores of people, mostly young women, in his World's Fair Hotel, which contained a gas chamber and a handy crematorium for disposing of his victims. Telling their entwined stories in alternating points of view, Erik Larson illuminates the lives of these two men, but provides insightful commentary on the changes that were taking place in American society that allowed both phenomena -- a grandiose World's Fair and a string of unsolved murders -- to take place. The book contains cameo appearances by such late-19th-century celebrities as Buffalo Bill Cody, Susan B. Anthony, and Thomas Edison.

Ann Rule's shocking and powerful account of the destructive forces that drove Diane Downs, a beautiful young mother, to shoot her three young children in cold blood.

With the publication of this book, Capote permanently ripped through the barrier separating crime reportage from serious literature. As he reconstructs the 1959 murder of a Kansas farm family and the investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, Capote generates...  more

With the publication of this book, Capote permanently ripped through the barrier separating crime reportage from serious literature. As he reconstructs the 1959 murder of a Kansas farm family and the investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, Capote generates suspense and empathy.

Ann Rule was a writer working on the biggest story of her life, tracking down a brutal mass-murderer. Little did she know that Ted Bundy, her close friend, was the savage slayer she was hunting.  

The groundbreaking #1 New York Times bestselling study of Jack the Ripper-now in trade paperback. America's #1 bestselling crime writer solves the case that has baffled experts for more than a century. For over 100 years the Jack the Ripper murders have remained among the world's greatest...  more

The groundbreaking #1 New York Times bestselling study of Jack the Ripper-now in trade paperback. America's #1 bestselling crime writer solves the case that has baffled experts for more than a century. For over 100 years the Jack the Ripper murders have remained among the world's greatest unsolved crimes, and theories have been posited which point the finger at royalty, a barber, a doctor, a woman, and an artist. Using her formidable range of forensic and technical skills, bestselling author Patricia Cornwell has applied the rigorous discipline of twenty-first-century police investigation to the extant material, and here unmasks the killer.

The gripping account of a heinous crime--and a mystery that has never been solved. When Kathryn Eastburn and her children were found stabbed to death, the brutal crime scene in Fort Bragg, N.C., seemed all too familiar. A suspect was arrested and convicted, but acquitted after spending three...  more

The gripping account of a heinous crime--and a mystery that has never been solved. When Kathryn Eastburn and her children were found stabbed to death, the brutal crime scene in Fort Bragg, N.C., seemed all too familiar. A suspect was arrested and convicted, but acquitted after spending three years on Death Row. Were the murders inspired by the infamous Fatal Vision case? Photos.

This first full-length account of the story that shocked the nation follows the investigation into three-year-old Caylee Anthony's disappearance and murder at the hands of her mother, Casey, who continues to protest her innocence despite being indicted by a grand jury. Original.

The dramatic story of the real-life murder that inspired the birth of modern detective fiction. In June of 1860 three-year-old Saville Kent was found at the bottom of an outdoor privy with his throat slit. The crime horrified all England and led to a national obsession with detection, ironically...  more

The dramatic story of the real-life murder that inspired the birth of modern detective fiction. In June of 1860 three-year-old Saville Kent was found at the bottom of an outdoor privy with his throat slit. The crime horrified all England and led to a national obsession with detection, ironically destroying, in the process, the career of perhaps the greatest detective in the land.At the time, the detective was a relatively new invention; there were only eight detectives in all of England and rarely were they called out of London, but this crime was so shocking, as Kate Summerscale relates in her scintillating new book, that Scotland Yard sent its best man to investigate, Inspector Jonathan Whicher. Whicher quickly believed the unbelievable—that someone within the family was responsible for the murder of young Saville Kent. Without sufficient evidence or a confession, though, his case was circumstantial and he returned to London a broken man. Though he would be vindicated five years later, the real legacy of Jonathan Whicher lives on in fiction: the tough, quirky, knowing, and all-seeing detective that we know and love today…from the cryptic Sgt. Cuff in Wilkie Collins’s The Moonstone to Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade. The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher is a provocative work of nonfiction that reads like a Victorian thriller, and in it Kate Summerscale has fashioned a brilliant, multilayered narrative that is as cleverly constructed as it is beautifully written.

On Christmas Eve in 1985, a hunter found a young boy's body along an icy corn field in Nebraska. The residents of Chester, Nebraska buried him as "Little Boy Blue," unclaimed and unidentified-- until a phone call from Ohio two years later led authorities to Eli Stutzman, the boy's father. Eli...  more

On Christmas Eve in 1985, a hunter found a young boy's body along an icy corn field in Nebraska. The residents of Chester, Nebraska buried him as "Little Boy Blue," unclaimed and unidentified-- until a phone call from Ohio two years later led authorities to Eli Stutzman, the boy's father. Eli Stutzman, the son of an Amish bishop, was by all appearances a dedicated farmer and family man in the country's strictest religious sect. But behind his quiet fa?ade was a man involved with pornography, sadomasochism, and drugs. After the suspicious death of his pregnant wife, Stutzman took his preschool-age son, Danny, and hit the road on a sexual odyssey ending with his conviction for murder. But the mystery of Eli Stutzman and the fate of his son didn't end on the barren Nebraska plains. It was just beginning. . .

Bright, attractive, and both from good families, University of Texas college student Colton Pitonyak and vibrant redhead Jennifer Cave had the world at their beckoning. Cave, an ex-cheerleader, had just landed an exciting new job, while a big-money scholarship to UT's prestigious business...  more

Bright, attractive, and both from good families, University of Texas college student Colton Pitonyak and vibrant redhead Jennifer Cave had the world at their beckoning. Cave, an ex-cheerleader, had just landed an exciting new job, while a big-money scholarship to UT's prestigious business school lured Pitonyak to Austin. Yet the former altar boy had a dark, unpredictable streak, one that ensnared him in the perilous underworld of drugs and guns. When Jennifer failed to show up for work on August 18, 2005, her mother became frightened. Sharon Cave's search led to Colton's West Campus apartment, where Jennifer's family discovered a scene worthy of the grisliest horror movie. Meanwhile, Colton Pitonyak was nowhere to be found. A Descent Into Hell is the gripping true story of one of the most brutal slayings in UT history—and the wild "Bonnie and Clyde-like" flight from justice of a cold-blooded young killer and his would-be girlfriend, who claimed that her unquestioning allegiance to Pitonyak was "just the way I roll."

"Free the West Memphis Three."Maybe you've heard the phrase.But do you know why their story is so alarming?Do you know the facts?The guilty verdicts handed out to three Arkansas teens in a horrific capital murder case were popular in their home state -- even upheld on appeal. But after two HBO...  more

"Free the West Memphis Three."Maybe you've heard the phrase.But do you know why their story is so alarming?Do you know the facts?The guilty verdicts handed out to three Arkansas teens in a horrific capital murder case were popular in their home state -- even upheld on appeal. But after two HBO documentaries called attention to the witch-hunt atmosphere at the trials, artists and other supporters raised concerns about the accompanying lack of evidence. Now, award-winning journalist Mara Leveritt provides the most comprehensive look yet into this endlessly shocking case.For weeks in 1993, after the murders of three eight-year-old boys, police in West Memphis, Arkansas, seemed stymied. Then suddenly, detectives charged three teenagers -- alleged members of a satanic cult -- with the killings. Despite stunning investigative blunders, a confession riddled with errors, and an absence of physical evidence linking any of the accused to the crime, the teenagers were tried and convicted. Jurors sentenced Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley to life in prison. They sentenced Damien Echols, the accused ringleader, to death. Ten years later, all three remain in prison. Here, Leveritt unravels this seemingly medieval case and offers close-up views of its key participants, including one with an uncanny knack for evading the law....

For more than two decades, Vanity Fair has published Dominick Dunne’s brilliant, revelatory chronicles of the most famous crimes, trials, and punishments of our time. Here, in one volume, are Dominick Dunne’s mesmerizing tales of justice denied and justice affirmed. Whether writing...  more

For more than two decades, Vanity Fair has published Dominick Dunne’s brilliant, revelatory chronicles of the most famous crimes, trials, and punishments of our time. Here, in one volume, are Dominick Dunne’s mesmerizing tales of justice denied and justice affirmed. Whether writing of Claus von Bülow’s romp through two trials; the Los Angeles media frenzy surrounding O.J. Simpson; the death by fire of multibillionaire banker Edmond Safra; or the Greenwich, Connecticut, murder of Martha Moxley and the indictment—decades later—of Michael Skakel, Dominick Dunne tells it honestly and tells it from his unique perspective. His search for the truth is relentless. With new essay, “Mourning In New York,” about September 11, 2001.

Jeffrey MacDonald was the quintessential American golden boy: a young Princeton-educated doctor and Green Beret who married his high school sweetheart and had two adorable daughters. But then, in 1970, someone viciously murdered MacDonald's wife and children, stabbing them many times. MacDonald...  more

Jeffrey MacDonald was the quintessential American golden boy: a young Princeton-educated doctor and Green Beret who married his high school sweetheart and had two adorable daughters. But then, in 1970, someone viciously murdered MacDonald's wife and children, stabbing them many times. MacDonald maintained that the murders had been committed by demented hippies, Manson-like intruders who had broken into his home and, after tangling briefly with MacDonald himself, had moved on to the rest of the family. Various investigators and laypeople felt differently, but the evidence was inconclusive and it took years of court battles to bring MacDonald to justice. Joe McGuinness combines meticulous forensic analysis with a riveting narrative of the crime, investigation, and trial. He also paints a subtle psychological portrait of MacDonald, which unfolds over the course of the book to create a harrowingly plausible answer to the question: how could a man like Jeffrey MacDonald slaughter his entire family in cold blood?

When the bodies of three teenagers were found on the shores of Lake Waco, Texas in July, 1982, even seasoned lawmen were taken aback by the savage mutilation and degradation they had been subjected to. Yet only 52 days after the gruesome triple-murder was discovered, frustrated authorities...  more

When the bodies of three teenagers were found on the shores of Lake Waco, Texas in July, 1982, even seasoned lawmen were taken aback by the savage mutilation and degradation they had been subjected to. Yet only 52 days after the gruesome triple-murder was discovered, frustrated authorities suspended the case indefinitely. Patrol Sergeant Truman Simons, who had been called to the scene that night, saw the carnage first-hand -- and vowed to find the ferocious killer or killers. He soon became a man with a mission, risking his career and his family's safety in search of evidence. Plunging himself into a netherworld of violence and evil, Simons finally got close enough to a murderous ringleader to hear his careless whispers--and ultimately, put him and his three accomplices behind bars for the brutal slayings.Now, in his Edgar Award-winning account of the Lake Waco killings, acclaimed true crime writer Carlton Stowers lays bare the facts behind the tragic crimes, the twisted predators, and the heroic man who broke the investigation--with important updated information based on new developments in the case.

On December 26, 1997, near the affluent community of Bainbridge Island off the coast of Seattle, a house went up in flames. In it was the shy, beloved minister’s wife Dawn Hacheney. When the fire was extinguished, investigators found only her charred remains. Her husband Nick was visibly...  more

On December 26, 1997, near the affluent community of Bainbridge Island off the coast of Seattle, a house went up in flames. In it was the shy, beloved minister’s wife Dawn Hacheney. When the fire was extinguished, investigators found only her charred remains. Her husband Nick was visibly devastated by the loss. What investigators failed to note, however, was that Dawn’s lungs didn’t contain smoke. Was she dead before the fire began? So begins this true crime story that’s unlike any other. It investigates Nick Hacheney, a philandering minister who had been carrying on with several women in the months before and just after his wife’s death. He would be convicted for the murder five years to the day after the crime.

Follows the murder of attorney Cheryl Keeton and the trial of her husband, Brad Cunningham, recounting his bizarre life of multiple marriages, financial manipulations, and acts of harassment and revenge. When attorney Cheryl Keeton's brutally bludgeoned body was found in her van in the fast...  more

Follows the murder of attorney Cheryl Keeton and the trial of her husband, Brad Cunningham, recounting his bizarre life of multiple marriages, financial manipulations, and acts of harassment and revenge. When attorney Cheryl Keeton's brutally bludgeoned body was found in her van in the fast lane of an Oregon freeway, her husband, Brad Cunningham, was the likely suspect. But there was no solid evidence linking him to the crime. He married again, for the fifth time, and his stunning new wife, a physician named Sara, adopted his three sons. They all settled down to family life on a luxurious estate. But gradually, their marriage became a nightmare... In this gripping account of Cheryl's murder, Ann Rule takes us from Brad's troubled boyhood to one of the most bizarre trials in legal history, uncovering multiple marriages, financial manipulations, infidelities, and monstrous acts of harassment and revenge along the way.

Three Classic Volumes from the Crime Files of Anne Rule A Rose for Her Grave: First in the acclaimed series, made its debut in 1993. Distinguished by the former Seattle policewoman's razor-sharp eye for telling detail and her penetrating analysis of the criminal mind, this gripping...  more

Three Classic Volumes from the Crime Files of Anne Rule A Rose for Her Grave: First in the acclaimed series, made its debut in 1993. Distinguished by the former Seattle policewoman's razor-sharp eye for telling detail and her penetrating analysis of the criminal mind, this gripping collection of accounts drawn from her personal files features the twisting case of Randy Roth, who married -- and murdered -- for profit. In her trademark narrative style, Ann Rule weaves a tale that is riveting, enraging, and heartbreaking all at once, and brilliantly chronicles the fateful confluence of a killer and his female victims, as well as the shattering investigation into Roth's heinous crimes. You Belong to Me: this collection consists of one book-length treatment and five shorter case histories from her true-crime files. Meticulous in her coverage, Rule demonstrates her signature, compassionate re-creation, when describing the numerous lives affected when Florida highway patrolman Tim Harris obsessively stalked his wife and then raped and murdered a female driver near I-95. Operating on many levels, it can be read as the psychological profile of a man for whom a wife was simply another possession or as a wonderfully detailed police procedural, complete with frustrating false leads and a brilliantly inspired interrogation scene. In each of the subsequent cases, Rule shifts the focus slightly, concentrating on an entangled forensics puzzle in one, on a two-year missing-person search complicated by a psychic goose chase in another. Rule's considerable reporting skills and hindsight analysis make her a gifted cautionary guide through the hazards of human folly. Yet, as she admits in the chilling "Black Christmas," when a picture-perfect family can be brutally murdered due to an absurd misunderstanding, all the little red flags in the world may mean nothing. A Fever in the Heart: Dissects an explosive love triangle that led to obsession and murder in a small town in the north-west of America. Ann Rule reveals the story of an alluring wife and the two men desperate for her love; a story with a bizarre and deadly twist that no one could have suspected. In this and several other riveting true-crime cases from her personal files, Ann Rule masterfully probes the delusions of the criminal mind, the fateful circumstances and the unrelenting investigative forces at work in the aftermath of murder.

Praying for a happy ending, friends and family stood by Laci's grieving husband Scott. Four months later, Laci's decomposed body was found in the murky waters of San Francisco Bay. The body of her child had washed ashore about a mile away, after a possible "coffin birth." It was a sad closure to...  more

Praying for a happy ending, friends and family stood by Laci's grieving husband Scott. Four months later, Laci's decomposed body was found in the murky waters of San Francisco Bay. The body of her child had washed ashore about a mile away, after a possible "coffin birth." It was a sad closure to an exhaustive search, and a grim end to a marriage that by all accounts had appeared to be perfect. Scott Peterson's behavior had cast a mysterious shadow over the death of his pregnant wife: his alibi on the day of the disappearance was questionable; he admitted to an affair with another woman; and when he was finally charged with capital murder, he had altered his appearance. Almost immediately, the media condemned Scott, even though he maintains his innocence. Is Scott Peterson a victim of circumstantial evidence? Despite the state attorney general's claim of a "slam dunk", the case that has gripped the nation is much more complex, and is yielding even more questions, doubts, accusations, and shocking revelations.

On April 20, 1999, two boys left an indelible stamp on the American psyche. Their goal was simple: to blow up their school, Oklahoma-City style, and to leave "a lasting impression on the world." Their bombs failed, but the ensuing shooting defined a new era of school violence --...  more

On April 20, 1999, two boys left an indelible stamp on the American psyche. Their goal was simple: to blow up their school, Oklahoma-City style, and to leave "a lasting impression on the world." Their bombs failed, but the ensuing shooting defined a new era of school violence -- irrevocably branding every subsequent shooting "another Columbine." When we think of Columbine, we think of the Trench Coat Mafia; we think of Cassie Bernall, the girl we thought professed her faith before she was shot; and we think of the boy pulling himself out of a school window -- the whole world was watching him. Now, in a riveting piece of journalism nearly ten years in the making, comes the story none of us knew. In this revelatory book, Dave Cullen has delivered a profile of teenage killers that goes to the heart of psychopathology. He lays bare the callous brutality of mastermind Eric Harris, and the quavering, suicidal Dylan Klebold, who went to prom three days earlier and obsessed about love in his journal. The result is an astonishing account of two good students with lots of friends, who came to stockpile a basement cache of weapons, to record their raging hatred, and to manipulate every adult who got in their way. They left signs everywhere, described by Cullen with a keen investigative eye and psychological acumen. Drawing on hundreds of interviews, thousands of pages of police files, FBI psychologists, and the boy's tapes and diaries, he gives the first complete account of the Columbine tragedy.  

Harold Schechter is a historian: he takes old files and yellowed newspaper clippings, and brings their stories to life. Deviant is about everyone's favorite ghoul, Ed Gein -- whose crimes inspired the writers of Psycho, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and The Silence of the Lambs. Schechter deftly...  more

Harold Schechter is a historian: he takes old files and yellowed newspaper clippings, and brings their stories to life. Deviant is about everyone's favorite ghoul, Ed Gein -- whose crimes inspired the writers of Psycho, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and The Silence of the Lambs. Schechter deftly evokes the small-town 1950s Wisconsin setting -- not pretty farms and cheese factories, but infertile soil and a bleak, hardscrabble existence. The details of Gein's "death house" are perhaps well known by now, but the murderer's quietly crazy, almost gentle personality comes forth in this book as never before.

"America's principal chronicler of its greatest psychopathic killers" (The Boston Book Review), Harold Schechter brings his expertise to the shocking true story of the most fiendish murderer of the early twentieth century. In May 1928, a kindly old man came to the door of the...  more

"America's principal chronicler of its greatest psychopathic killers" (The Boston Book Review), Harold Schechter brings his expertise to the shocking true story of the most fiendish murderer of the early twentieth century. In May 1928, a kindly old man came to the door of the Budd Family home in New York City. A few days later, he persuaded Mr. and Mrs. Budd to let him take their adorable little girl, Grace, on an outing. Albert Fish appeared to be a harmless, white-haired grandfather. The Budds never guessed that they had entrusted their child to a monster. Six years later, after a relentless search by a New York detective and nationwide press coverage, the mystery of Grace Budd's disappearance was finally solved -- and an unparalleled crime of gore and horror was revealed. The truth behind Grace's murder was so revolting and shocking that it changed American society forever. What Albert Fish did to Grace Budd, and perhaps fifteen other young children, went beyond every parent's worst nightmare. And he did it in a way that caused experts to pronounce him the most deranged human being they had ever seen.

This is a riveting true story of money and murder. The story of a torrid August night in Forth Worth, Texas, when a man in black entered a $6 million mansion, put a bullet through the chest of sexy, blond Priscilla Davis, and murdered her lover and her daughter. The story of the arrest of...  more

This is a riveting true story of money and murder. The story of a torrid August night in Forth Worth, Texas, when a man in black entered a $6 million mansion, put a bullet through the chest of sexy, blond Priscilla Davis, and murdered her lover and her daughter. The story of the arrest of Priscilla's estranged husband, Cullen, a multimillionaire oilman. The story of a flamboyant lawyer, a country judge, and a lurid murder trial. The story of brothers feuding over a billion-dollar corporation, of drugs and orgies, of a high-stakes divorce and the underground life of the Texas rich. It is a story of unremitting suspense, excitement, and surprise. And it is absolutely true.

When my parents packed my brother, sister and me into the family van and drove us to Missouri for Spring Break, we brought our entirely imagined city-hardness with us. The hard truth that we were about to learn was that, in fact, we weren't tough kids at all. Our life in the city had not...  more

When my parents packed my brother, sister and me into the family van and drove us to Missouri for Spring Break, we brought our entirely imagined city-hardness with us. The hard truth that we were about to learn was that, in fact, we weren't tough kids at all. Our life in the city had not prepared us for anything. Nothing could prepare us for this. A Rip in Heaven is Jeanine Cummins's story of a night in April 1991, when her two cousins, Julie and Robin Kerry, and her brother, Tom, were assaulted on the Chain of Rocks Bridge that spans the Mississippi River just outside of St. Louis. When, after a harrowing ordeal, Tom managed to escape the attackers and flag down help, he thought the nightmare would soon be over. He couldn't have been more wrong. Tom, his sister Jeanine, and their entire family were just at the beginning of a horrific odyssey through the aftermath of a violent crime, a world of shocking betrayal, endless heartbreak, and utter disillusionment. It was a trial by fire from which no one would emerge unscathed. This is one family's intimate, immediate, and unforgettable story of what victims can suffer long after they should be safe.

A modern murderous Medea... In June of l985, while her teenage sons held their half-sister down, Theresa Cross beat her 19-year-old daughter Sheila unconscious and then stuffed her into a 2' X 2' storage locker. After three days, the knocking, kicking, and cries stopped. Theresa and...  more

A modern murderous Medea... In June of l985, while her teenage sons held their half-sister down, Theresa Cross beat her 19-year-old daughter Sheila unconscious and then stuffed her into a 2' X 2' storage locker. After three days, the knocking, kicking, and cries stopped. Theresa and her sons dumped the girl's body in the desolate High Sierras... The summer before, Theresa had dug a bullet out of her daughter Suesan's chest with a paring knife. When Suesan failed to recover (without benefit of doctors or hospital), Theresa and her two sons drove the delirious girl to the mountains , doused her with gasoline, and set her on fire... For nearly nine years, Theresa Cross Knorr got away with murder, until her youngest daughter, Terry Knorr Graves, finally found a cop who believed the incredible story of her two murdered sisters. That story is all here, the shocking life of a woman whose violence, jealousy, rage, and domination led to a brutally heinous crime of ruthless ferocity.

On Easter Monday of 1982, Margaret Barbera, an accountant, was shot to death in a parking lot on a Manhattan pier; three technicians from the nearby CBS-TV studios who went to her rescue also were killed. Hammer here recreates the crime and the police work that led to the killer, Donald Nash, a...  more

On Easter Monday of 1982, Margaret Barbera, an accountant, was shot to death in a parking lot on a Manhattan pier; three technicians from the nearby CBS-TV studios who went to her rescue also were killed. Hammer here recreates the crime and the police work that led to the killer, Donald Nash, a handyman hired by a jewelry manufacturer named Irwin Margolies. Margolies, only a marginally successful entrepreneur, had hatched a plot with the aid of a lawyer to defraud a factoring firm owned by a New York bank. The scheme, which netted millions thanks in part to creative bookkeeping by Barbera, began to unravel, and Margolies determined that the safest course was to eliminate her.

Two Innocent Teens: The crime was unspeakable. On a summer night in Houston, two bright, beautiful, success-bound teenage girls crossed paths with a group of young men fueled with alcohol and rage. Four days later, when searchers finally found Jennifer Ertman and Elizabeth Pena, their bodies...  more

Two Innocent Teens: The crime was unspeakable. On a summer night in Houston, two bright, beautiful, success-bound teenage girls crossed paths with a group of young men fueled with alcohol and rage. Four days later, when searchers finally found Jennifer Ertman and Elizabeth Pena, their bodies were unrecognizable... An Orgy Of Violence: At first, the teenage boys grabbed Elizabeth, while Jennifer escaped. But Elizabeth's desperate cries brought Jennifer back to help her best friend. Both girls were subjected to sexual assaults of every conceivable kind...and long, painful, drawn-out deaths... No Mercy: For days afterward, the killers bragged openly about their crime. By the time prosecutors got the case, convictions for double murder looked like a "slam dunk." But the families of the victims were in for a horrible surprise. In this terrifying case, justice would be a torturous journey... Includes 16 Pages Of Shocking Photos

They Knew He Was Out There He took his time. He watched his victims and chose carefully. Then he struck -- each attack more brutal than the last. By the time detectives arrived, all they found were gruesome crime scenes of bloodied, brutalized bodies... They Knew He Would Strike...  more

They Knew He Was Out There He took his time. He watched his victims and chose carefully. Then he struck -- each attack more brutal than the last. By the time detectives arrived, all they found were gruesome crime scenes of bloodied, brutalized bodies... They Knew He Would Strike Again For more than ten years in South Louisiana the killings went on. Task forces were formed. The killer even spent time in jail. But that wouldn't stop the bloodshed. One victim was stabbed with a screwdriver 83 times... But They Couldn't Stop Him -- Until Was Too Late He was a father. A husband. A co-worker. And a killer. Derrick Todd Lee was ultimately convicted of two savage murders and tied to at least seven more. From the slender trace of DNA that finally nabbed him to the courageous prosecutors who took him down in court, this is the shocking story of a homicidal maniac hiding in plain sight -- and an evil that could never be washed away. Includes 16 pages of shocking photographs Previously published as I've Been Watching You

Sharon Marshall was a brilliant and beautiful student whose future was filled with promise. But her murderous, fugitive father had drawn her into a lifetime of deception that became one of the most baffling cases in the annals of American crime.

Winner of the 1980 Pulitzer Prize In what is arguably his greatest book, America's most heroically ambitious writer follows the short, blighted career of Gary Gilmore, an intractably violent product of America's prisons, who became notorious for two reasons: first, for robbing two...  more

Winner of the 1980 Pulitzer Prize In what is arguably his greatest book, America's most heroically ambitious writer follows the short, blighted career of Gary Gilmore, an intractably violent product of America's prisons, who became notorious for two reasons: first, for robbing two men in 1976, then killing them in cold blood; and, second, after being tried and convicted, for insisting on dying for his crime. To do so, he had to fight a system that seemed paradoxically intent on keeping him alive long after it had sentenced him to death. Norman Mailer tells Gilmore's story -- and those of the men and women caught up in his procession toward the firing squad--with implacable authority, steely compassion, and a restraint that evokes the parched landscapes and stern theology of Gilmore's Utah. The Executioner's Song is a trip down the wrong side of the tracks to the deepest sources of American loneliness and violence. It is a towering achievement -- impossible to put down, impossible to forget.

The killings began with the murder of a feisty millionaire widow and her beautiful daughter in their posh Louisville, Kentucky, home. Months later, another wealthy widow and her prominent son and daughter-in-law were killed in North Carolina. Clues led to the person who linked the families,...  more

The killings began with the murder of a feisty millionaire widow and her beautiful daughter in their posh Louisville, Kentucky, home. Months later, another wealthy widow and her prominent son and daughter-in-law were killed in North Carolina. Clues led to the person who linked the families, former child "princess" and fraternity sweetheart Susie Sharp Newsom Lynch.

A handsome overachiever...A beautiful honors student...Together they would commit savage murder...A Teenage Love Pact Sealed In BloodOutside a small Texas town by the side of the road, high school sophomore beauty Adrianne Jones lay with her skull bashed in and two bullets in her head. She had...  more

A handsome overachiever...A beautiful honors student...Together they would commit savage murder...A Teenage Love Pact Sealed In BloodOutside a small Texas town by the side of the road, high school sophomore beauty Adrianne Jones lay with her skull bashed in and two bullets in her head. She had been driven to an isolated spot outside of Mansfield, Texas by star student David Graham while David's girlfriend, Diane Zamora, hid in the trunk. First David tried unsuccessfully to break Adrianne's neck, then Diane came out of the trunk to attack her with a set of weights. To finish off the job, David shot her between the eyes. For months, there were no leads on the killing until Diane confessed to her military school roommates about the secret she and her boyfriend would take to their graves...Tainted LoveThe brutal killing shocked the entire town of Mansfield. Even more shocking were the killers, David and Diane, model teenagers, devoted high school sweethearts, military academy-bound honors students-- and desperate lovers who feared that Adrianne's sexual encounter with David had come between them. Killing Adrianne was "the only thing that could satisfy [Diane's] vengeance," said David in his confession to police-- the only way, she told David, to restore the 'purity' of their love...Pure VengeanceHere is the unbelievable true story of a macabre love triangle-- and the startling lengths one couple went to in the name of... Blind Love

In the nonfiction tradition of John Berendt ("Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil") and Erik Larson ("The Devil in the White City"), New York Times bestselling author Douglas Preston presents a gripping account of crime and punishment in the lush hills surrounding...  more

In the nonfiction tradition of John Berendt ("Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil") and Erik Larson ("The Devil in the White City"), New York Times bestselling author Douglas Preston presents a gripping account of crime and punishment in the lush hills surrounding Florence, Italy. In 2000, Douglas Preston fulfilled a dream to move his family to Italy. Then he discovered that the olive grove in front of their 14th century farmhouse had been the scene of the most infamous double-murders in Italian history, committed by a serial killer known as the Monster of Florence. Preston, intrigued, meets Italian investigative journalist Mario Spezi to learn more. This is the true story of their search for--and identification of--the man they believe committed the crimes, and their chilling interview with him. And then, in a strange twist of fate, Preston and Spezi themselves become targets of the police investigation. Preston has his phone tapped, is interrogated, and told to leave the country. Spezi fares worse: he is thrown into Italy's grim Capanne prison, accused of being the Monster of Florence himself. Like one of Preston's thrillers, The Monster Of Florence, tells a remarkable and harrowing story involving murder, mutilation, and suicide-and at the center of it, Preston and Spezi, caught in a bizarre prosecutorial vendetta.

John Grisham's first work of nonfiction, an exploration of small town justice gone terribly awry, is his most extraordinary legal thriller yet. In the major league draft of 1971, the first player chosen from the State of Oklahoma was Ron Williamson. When he signed with the Oakland A's, he...  more

John Grisham's first work of nonfiction, an exploration of small town justice gone terribly awry, is his most extraordinary legal thriller yet. In the major league draft of 1971, the first player chosen from the State of Oklahoma was Ron Williamson. When he signed with the Oakland A's, he said goodbye to his hometown of Ada and left to pursue his dreams of big league glory. Six years later he was back, his dreams broken by a bad arm and bad habits--drinking, drugs, and women. He began to show signs of mental illness. Unable to keep a job, he moved in with his mother and slept twenty hours a day on her sofa. In 1982, a 21-year-old cocktail waitress in Ada named Debra Sue Carter was raped and murdered, and for five years the police could not solve the crime. For reasons that were never clear, they suspected Ron Williamson and his friend Dennis Fritz. The two were finally arrested in 1987 and charged with capital murder. With no physical evidence, the prosecution's case was built on junk science and the testimony of jailhouse snitches and convicts. Dennis Fritz was found guilty and given a life sentence. Ron Williamson was sent to death row. If you believe that in America you are innocent until proven guilty, this book will shock you. If you believe in the death penalty, this book will disturb you. If you believe the criminal justice system is fair, this book will infuriate you.

From renowned true-crime historian Harold Schechter, whom The Boston Book Review hails as “America’s principal chronicler of its greatest psychopathic killers,” comes the riveting exploration of a notorious, sensational New York City murder in the 1890s, the fascinating...  more

From renowned true-crime historian Harold Schechter, whom The Boston Book Review hails as “America’s principal chronicler of its greatest psychopathic killers,” comes the riveting exploration of a notorious, sensational New York City murder in the 1890s, the fascinating forensic science of an earlier age, and the explosively dramatic trial that became a tabloid sensation at the turn of the century. Death was by poison and came in the mail: A package of Bromo Seltzer had been anonymously sent to Harry Cornish, the popular athletic director of Manhattan’s elite Knickerbocker Athletic Club. Cornish barely survived swallowing a small dose; his cousin Mrs. Katherine Adams died in agony after ingesting the toxic brew. Scandal sheets owned by Hearst and Pulitzer eagerly jumped on this story of fatal high-society intrigue, speculating that the devious killer was a chemist, a woman, or “an effeminate man.” Forensic studies suggested cyanide as the cause of death; handwriting on the deadly package and the vestige of a label glued to the bottle pointed to a handsome, athletic society scamp, Roland Molineux. The wayward son of a revered Civil War general, Molineux had clashed bitterly with Cornish before. He had even furiously denounced Cornish when penning his resignation from the Knickerbocker Club, a letter that later proved a major clue. Bon vivant Molineux had recently wed the sensuous Blanche Chesebrough, an opera singer whose former lover, Henry Barnet, had also recently died . . . after taking medicine sent to him through the mail. Molineux’s subsequent indictment for murder led to two explosive trials, a sex-infused scandal that shocked the nation, and a lurid print-media circus that ended in madness and a proud family’s disgrace. In bold, brilliant strokes, Schechter captures all the colors of the tumultuous legal case, gathering his own evidence and tackling subjects no one dared address at the time -- all in hopes of answering the tantalizing question: What powerfully dark motives could drive the wealthy scion of an eminent New York family to foul murder? Schechter vividly portrays the case’s fascinating cast of characters, including Julian Hawthorne, son of Nathaniel Hawthorne, a prolific yellow journalist who covered the story, and proud General Edward Leslie Molineux, whose son’s ignoble deeds besmirched a dignified national hero’s final years. All the while Schechter brings alive Manhattan’s Gilded Age: a gaslit world of elegant town houses and hidden bordellos, chic restaurants and shabby opium dens, a city peopled by men and women fighting and losing the battle against urges an upright era had ordered suppressed. Superbly researched and powerfully written, The Devil’s Gentleman is an insightful, gripping work, a true-crime historian’s crowning achievement.

For pretty Ohioan Joan Rogers and her two teenaged daughters, a Florida sunset cruise was a dream come true. And even though all three were desperately afaid of the water, they were so taken with friendly boat owner Oba Chandler that they gladly accepted a ride with him on beautiful Tampa...  more

For pretty Ohioan Joan Rogers and her two teenaged daughters, a Florida sunset cruise was a dream come true. And even though all three were desperately afaid of the water, they were so taken with friendly boat owner Oba Chandler that they gladly accepted a ride with him on beautiful Tampa Bay.Little did naive mom and two daughters know that behind Chandler's mask of a gracious host lurked a daring and ruthless ex-con, a thief and a liar, a seductive Don Juan who used and discarded wives and children. As they sun serenely sank below the Gulf of Mexico, Chandler suddenly shut down the engines, dropped anchor...and turned into a sadistic torturer.Hog-tying and brutally raping all three, Chandler tossed them overboard -- alive -- with 40-pound cement blocks tied to their necks. With cruel laughter, he spoke his last words to them: "Swim for it." But the dark green waters of Tampa Bay refused to hold his monstrous secret, and after only three days, the bodies of his victims surfaced.If it hadn't been for a dedicated team of detectives and the clues provided by Chandler's neighbors, a depraved killer might have gotten away with his ghastly crime. Instead, he now paces the floors of a Florida prision awaiting his rendezvous with the electric chair.

The true story of the Tara Grant murder. To their suburban Detroit neighbors, Stephen and Tara Grant were happy as could be. But their marriage, plagued by resentment and extramarital affairs, was held together only by their children. Until the night Stephen snapped, strangled and...  more

The true story of the Tara Grant murder. To their suburban Detroit neighbors, Stephen and Tara Grant were happy as could be. But their marriage, plagued by resentment and extramarital affairs, was held together only by their children. Until the night Stephen snapped, strangled and dismembered his wife, then disposed of her body piece by piece in the very park his children played in.

Hero, Husband, Father . . . Monster? In Creekstone, Texas, a small, quiet suburb of Houston, football was king . . . and David Temple was a prince. A former high school and college gridiron star-turned-coach, he had a fairy-tale marriage to bright, vivacious Belinda Lucas, a teacher at the...  more

Hero, Husband, Father . . . Monster? In Creekstone, Texas, a small, quiet suburb of Houston, football was king . . . and David Temple was a prince. A former high school and college gridiron star-turned-coach, he had a fairy-tale marriage to bright, vivacious Belinda Lucas, a teacher at the local high school who was so warm and popular her colleagues called her "The Sunshine Girl." The fairy tale ended savagely on January 11, 1999, when Belinda's lifeless body was discovered in a closet. Her skull had been shattered by a shotgun blast at close range. She was eight months pregnant. There was no damning evidence directly linking the brutal murder to husband David, who stood by emotionless and dry-eyed as police searched the crime scene. But a dogged eight-year investigation would expose a shocking history of cruelty and domination, infidelity and rage -- ultimately resulting in an epic courtroom battle for the ages -- as the scandalous truth was revealed about love betrayed and innocent lives . . . shattered.

AN ORDINARY LIFE. To the outside world Anthony Allen Shore was an average guy: a twice-divorced father who operated a tow truck company in suburban Houston. Handsome and charismatic, he generally kept a low profile. But in his mind he was a superstar. THE MIND OF A GENIUS. A musical...  more

AN ORDINARY LIFE. To the outside world Anthony Allen Shore was an average guy: a twice-divorced father who operated a tow truck company in suburban Houston. Handsome and charismatic, he generally kept a low profile. But in his mind he was a superstar. THE MIND OF A GENIUS. A musical prodigy who never realized his potential, Shore found a way to outsmart society-by getting away with murder. And he wanted the whole world to know it. After brutally killing a 16-year-old girl, he called the local NBC affiliate and told an editor precisely where to find the body. AND THE HEART OF A KILLER. Eight years passed before DNA evidence caught up with Shore. Subsequent police investigations revealed a violent megalomaniac who had sexually abused his own daughters. He quickly confessed to murdering three females, one only nine years old. And he hinted at many, many more-leading authorities to believe that Anthony Allen Shore could even be the notorious "I-45 Serial Killer," whose bloody legacy had earned for one Texas highway the grisly moniker "Corridor of Blood."

On the night of November 12, 1998, in San Luis Obispo, California, attractive blonde college student Rachel New house was walking home alone when suddenly a stranger appeared in front of her. His visage was a skull-face: a grotesque Halloween mask. Beating her unconscious with his fists, the...  more

On the night of November 12, 1998, in San Luis Obispo, California, attractive blonde college student Rachel New house was walking home alone when suddenly a stranger appeared in front of her. His visage was a skull-face: a grotesque Halloween mask. Beating her unconscious with his fists, the attacker threw her into his pick-up truck, took her to his secluded canyon cabin and raped her - still wearing the mask. Newhouse was hog-tied and left to strangle to death. On March 11, 1999, in the same town, a stalker who had been shadowing college student Aundria Crawford, 20, broke into her apartment, pummelled her into insensibility, and carried her away in his truck to his canyon lair. There, she was raped, tortured, and murdered. As Californians reacted with panic and outrage to the two disappearances, parole officer David Zaragoza paid a visit to one of his charges, Rex Allan Krebs, 33, a violent serial rapist who'd served only ten years of a twenty-year sentence in Soledad State Prison. After sending Krebs back to jail for violating his parole, Zaragoza discovered Crawford's eight ball keychain on the premises. An intensive search of the canyon discovered the two victims' bodies buried in shallow graves on the paroled rapist's property. Confessing, alcoholic sex-and-slaughter addict Krebs conceded, "If I am not a monster, then what am I?" A jury answered his question in May, 2001, sentencing him to death by lethal injection.

Betty Broderick was positioned, by personality and acculturation, to be a victim of her husband, in the view of Stumbo, a recently retired reporter for the Los Angeles Times. Betty, described as beautiful and intelligent, was raised by her rigidly Catholic parents to be the loving wife of one...  more

Betty Broderick was positioned, by personality and acculturation, to be a victim of her husband, in the view of Stumbo, a recently retired reporter for the Los Angeles Times. Betty, described as beautiful and intelligent, was raised by her rigidly Catholic parents to be the loving wife of one man and the mother of his children. She was also trained to have "an infinite capacity to put on a happy face." She helped support Dan while he attended Cornell Medical School and Harvard Law School; after they moved to San Diego, he became a millionaire and president of the local bar association. When Dan began an affair with a former airline stewardess, he divorced Betty and determined to deprive her of their shared assets in a settlement. The San Diego legal community closed ranks behind him in his campaign of what one psychiatrist described as "legal abuse." In 1989, after several years of this treatment, Betty fatally shot both Dan and his new wife Linda. Betty's first trial ended in a hung jury, her second in a guilty verdict and a sentence of 30 years to life. Stumbo's sensitive portrait is not so partisan as to depict Betty as a saintly martyr, but it is nonetheless a searing depiction of a woman so conditioned by what she perceived as traditional femininity that she became self-destructive, "a woman in ruins." Photos not seen by PW. Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The other side of the Jeffrey MacDonald case--an argument that the prosecution mishandled key crime-scene evidence, withheld potentially exculpatory material, and even discounted confessions from other suspects. Whether you change your mind about MacDonald's role in the murder of his family,...  more

The other side of the Jeffrey MacDonald case--an argument that the prosecution mishandled key crime-scene evidence, withheld potentially exculpatory material, and even discounted confessions from other suspects. Whether you change your mind about MacDonald's role in the murder of his family, you will learn much about the case that puts it in a new light. For example, the army narrowed in on MacDonald as their prime suspect very early in the investigation, and discouraged the FBI from developing alternate theories. And the judge in the case, Franklin Dupree Jr. appeared to have been biased in favor of the prosecution. Janet Malcolm, the New Yorker writer who wrote The Journalist and the Murderer (about MacDonald's relationship with McGinniss), called this book "quietly convincing."

For twenty-five years, the trusted family doctor in a small Wyoming town had been raping and molesting the women and children who most relied on him.Mostly Mormons, the naive victims sometimes realized on their wedding nights the truth about what had happened in Dr. Story's office. In...  more

For twenty-five years, the trusted family doctor in a small Wyoming town had been raping and molesting the women and children who most relied on him.Mostly Mormons, the naive victims sometimes realized on their wedding nights the truth about what had happened in Dr. Story's office. In riveting detail, veteran crime writer Jack Olsen tells the searing story of a small group of courageous women who decided to bring a doctor to justice -- and unearthed a legacy of pain and anger that would divide their families, their neighbors, and an entire town.

In the fall of 1999, a twenty-two-year-old woman was discovered naked and bleeding on the streets of a small New Mexico town south of Albuquerque. She was chained to a padlocked metal collar. The tale she told authorties--of being beaten, raped, and tortured with electric shock--was unthinkable....  more

In the fall of 1999, a twenty-two-year-old woman was discovered naked and bleeding on the streets of a small New Mexico town south of Albuquerque. She was chained to a padlocked metal collar. The tale she told authorties--of being beaten, raped, and tortured with electric shock--was unthinkable. Until she led them to 59-year-old David Ray Parker, his 39-year-old financee Cindy Hendy--and the lakeside trailer they called their "toy box". What the FBI uncovered was unprecedented in the annals of serial crime: restraining devices, elaborate implements of torture, books on human anatomy, medical equipment, scalpels, and a gynecologist's examination table. But these horrors were only part of the shocking story that would unfold in a stunning trial...

Karla and Paul seemed like the picture-perfect newlyweds, but were really a pair of vicious killers who abducted, sexually tortured and murdered innocent schoolgirls, videotaping their evil acts in suburban Niagara Falls. Billed as the crime of the century in Canada, this case has received a...  more

Karla and Paul seemed like the picture-perfect newlyweds, but were really a pair of vicious killers who abducted, sexually tortured and murdered innocent schoolgirls, videotaping their evil acts in suburban Niagara Falls. Billed as the crime of the century in Canada, this case has received a great deal of media coverage on both sides of the border. Includes eight pages of photos.

In 1984 the hideously beaten body of a young woman-a wife and new mother- was discovered in a roadside ditch in a remote mountainous area of eastern Pennsylvania. She had been apparently sexually assaulted as well. She was Theresa Benigno Taylor, a beautiful Italian-American born in New York...  more

In 1984 the hideously beaten body of a young woman-a wife and new mother- was discovered in a roadside ditch in a remote mountainous area of eastern Pennsylvania. She had been apparently sexually assaulted as well. She was Theresa Benigno Taylor, a beautiful Italian-American born in New York City, recently married to Kenneth Z. Taylor, a dentist from Indiana with a seemingly bright future, an engaging, athletic and articulate man whom many women had found irresistible. No sooner was her identity established than suspicion focused on Dr. Taylor. And in a very short time he was charged with this heinous and brutal crime. But whether he would be convicted of murder hung very much in the balance.

For years, the affluent village of Winnetka politely ignored Laurie Dann's disturbing behavior: the purchase of handguns, telephoned death threats, the mysterious stabbing of her former husband with an ice pick..... Then on May 20,1988, the 30-year-old baby-sitter delivered poisoned...  more

For years, the affluent village of Winnetka politely ignored Laurie Dann's disturbing behavior: the purchase of handguns, telephoned death threats, the mysterious stabbing of her former husband with an ice pick..... Then on May 20,1988, the 30-year-old baby-sitter delivered poisoned cookies to neighbors, and set fire to a family's home. Armed with three revolvers, she entered the local elementary school and started shooting. Five children were injured, one boy died. Laurie Dann killed herself that fateful day. But the men, women and children who lived through the ordeal would never forget the shock of random violence... and the courage they found within themselves.

The highly publicized Scott Peterson murder case captivated a public hungry for the answer to one question: Why would a man with no known history of violent crime or mental illness and with a pretty wife about to give birth brutally murder her and his unborn son? Forensic psychiatrist Keith...  more

The highly publicized Scott Peterson murder case captivated a public hungry for the answer to one question: Why would a man with no known history of violent crime or mental illness and with a pretty wife about to give birth brutally murder her and his unborn son? Forensic psychiatrist Keith Ablow’s national media appearances, including a groundbreaking interview on Oprah, resulted in enormous public response, saying that his theories about the spawning of a killer inside Peterson were the first that made sense to them. Members of Scott’s and Laci’s families have also stated that his comments were the first that helped them understand what might have happened inside Scott’s mind. Inside the Mind of Scott Peterson takes readers into the psyche of a killer, exploring:How Scott Peterson’s empathy for others was shattered by a three-generation “bloodline” of childhood loss and abandonmentWhy an addiction to sex took root in Peterson’s psycheWhy Peterson’s meeting Amber Frey while his wife was pregnant triggered the “perfect” psychological stormClues to Peterson’s guilt in his interviews with Gloria Gomez and Diane SawyerWhat Peterson was probably thinking as he listened to testimony in court and received his death sentenceWhy Peterson could kill again, if released Using contacts at the FBI, and hiring private investigators and researchers, Keith Ablow delves deeply into Scott Peterson’s life story to answer the question: How did an all-American boy turn into a ruthless killer?

Recounts the Stuart murder case, in which Charles Stuart murdered his pregnant wife and inflamed racial tensions in the Boston area by concocting a fictitious African-American assailant.

Examines the events that led up to and followed the murder of Bonny Lee Bakley, who was allegedly killed by her husband, actor Robert Blake.

"I wasn't sure if what I was seeing was real, " said a witness in the trial of Clara Harris, accused of running her adulterous husband over three times with their luxury Mercedes sedan in a Houston parking lot. The rest of the nation would be left to ask the same question as the entire incident...  more

"I wasn't sure if what I was seeing was real, " said a witness in the trial of Clara Harris, accused of running her adulterous husband over three times with their luxury Mercedes sedan in a Houston parking lot. The rest of the nation would be left to ask the same question as the entire incident was shown on a grainy security videotape, a tragic dose of "reality TV" destined for prime time broadcast. What really happened on July 24, 2002, after Clara caught David with his mistress, Gale Bridges (herself a philandering lesbian) that very night? From the Files of the National Enquirer comes the real story behind a woman who drove over the edge.

Susan Wright was a victim...who admitted to killing her husband Jeffrey in their Harris County home in 2003, by stabbing him to death in self-defense. She recounted a harrowing tale of domestic abuse-one that the raging mother of two finally brought to an end-her way. But prosecutors had a...  more

Susan Wright was a victim...who admitted to killing her husband Jeffrey in their Harris County home in 2003, by stabbing him to death in self-defense. She recounted a harrowing tale of domestic abuse-one that the raging mother of two finally brought to an end-her way. But prosecutors had a story of their own... Susan Wright was a seductress...who set the mood for kinky sex with her unsuspecting husband. After tying Jeffrey to the bed, Susan straddled him, stabbed him 193 times with a butcher knife, then buried his body in a makeshift grave in their backyard. Justice would not come easy. The fury was just beginning. The bloodstained theatrics that unfolded in the Houston courtroom would stun jurors, make national headlines, and brand Susan Wright as both a desperate martyr on the edge and a brutal killer who would be brought to justice.

Young, blond, handsome Dr. Swango seemed a godsend wherever he was hired to practice medicine. But acclaim would turn to disbelief, dismay, then horror, as the evidence mounted that he could actually be murdering his patients. Then, Dr. Michael Swango would leave that hospital -- only to be...  more

Young, blond, handsome Dr. Swango seemed a godsend wherever he was hired to practice medicine. But acclaim would turn to disbelief, dismay, then horror, as the evidence mounted that he could actually be murdering his patients. Then, Dr. Michael Swango would leave that hospital -- only to be rehired at another. Today the FBI believes that Swango may be the most prolific serial killer in American history. In his brilliant, bestselling Den of Thieves, James Stewart exposed crime on Wall Street in the Roaring Eighties. Now, in Blind Eye, he takes readers into the closed world of America's medical establishment, where doctors repeatedly accept the word of fellow physicians over that of nurses, hospital workers and patients -- even after the horrible truth emerges. With prodigious investigative reporting, Stewart's mesmerizing account moves from the hospital rooms of the prestigious Ohio State University Hospitals to Illinois, South Dakota, New York and finally to a remote missionary hospital in Zimbabwe. There Stewart tracked down survivors, relatives of victims, shaken hospital workers -- and the evidence that may finally lead Swango to be charged with murder. Stewart brings to riveting life the story of a psychopathic physician and those who protected, trusted, pursued and, in some cases, loved him. There were powerful doctors who allowed Swango to practice even following an incident in which a patient was paralyzed after a nurse saw him inject the patient's I.V. There were hospital officials who failed to collect crucial evidence, making it impossible for a prosecuting attorney to pursue Swango for murder. Another doctor admitted Swango to a medical residency when he knew that Swango had been convicted of poisoning coworkers. Stewart recounts the story of a New York woman who saw Swango inject her husband, after which he lapsed into a coma and died. An attractive, vivacious nurse fell in love with Dr. Swango, became his fiancée, and may have learned too much about him. Blind Eye shows us the danger we face in a hospital system that too often puts appearances, reputation and potential liability ahead of patients' welfare -- and tells us what needs to be done to stop it. It exposes the alarming failure of a national policy that is supposed to monitor incompetence and misconduct in the medical profession, as well as the weakness of the federal legislation that is intended to protect the public. Dr. Michael Swango slipped easily through the cracks. Hospital doctors, often strangers when we meet them, are the people who will care for us and our loved ones. If Michael Swango could repeatedly slip through, who else has? James Stewart adds to his reputation as one of the country's most intrepid investigative reporters with this exposure of a dangerous doctor and a failed system.

The autobiogarphy of Serial Killer Gaskins, written as collaboration bwteen Gaskins and Wilton Earle. Gaskins graphic story of his life and crimes.

Covering the case of one of North America's most prolific serial killer gave Stevie Cameron access not only to the story as it unfolded over many years in two British Columbia courthouses, but also to information unknown to the police -- and not in the transcripts of their interviews with...  more

Covering the case of one of North America's most prolific serial killer gave Stevie Cameron access not only to the story as it unfolded over many years in two British Columbia courthouses, but also to information unknown to the police -- and not in the transcripts of their interviews with Pickton -- such as from Pickton's long-time best friend, Lisa Yelds, and from several women who survived terrifying encounters with him. You will now learn what was behind law enforcement's refusal to believe that a serial killer was at work. Stevie Cameron first began following the story of missing women in 1998, when the odd newspaper piece appeared chronicling the disappearances of drug-addicted sex trade workers from Vancouver's notorious Downtown Eastside. It was February 2002 before Robert William Pickton was arrested, and 2008 before he was found guilty, on six counts of second-degree murder. These counts were appealed and in 2010, the Supreme Court of Canada rendered its conclusion. The guilty verdict was upheld, and finally this unprecedented tale of true crime can be told.

In 1978, Rodney Alcala was a contestant on the “The Dating Game,” one of America’s most popular television shows at the time. Handsome, successful, and romantic, he was embraced by the audience—and chosen as the winner by the beautiful bachelorette. To viewers across the...  more

In 1978, Rodney Alcala was a contestant on the “The Dating Game,” one of America’s most popular television shows at the time. Handsome, successful, and romantic, he was embraced by the audience—and chosen as the winner by the beautiful bachelorette. To viewers across the country, Rodney seemed like the answer to every woman’s dreams. Until they learned the truth about his once and future crimes... Ten years before his TV appearance, Rodney was charged with the sexual assault and attempted murder of an eight-year-old girl. In the decades that followed, he would be accused of seven murders—and, as new DNA evidence continues to be uncovered, the list may grow. The case is so disturbing that it’s been documented in several news outlets, from People magazine and USA Today to 48 Hours Mystery and Dr. Phil. This is the shocking true story about the dark and twisted man

"Infamous, I have become disowned, but I am one of your own."  ?Myra Hindley, from her unpublished autobiographyOn November 15, 2002, Myra Hindley died in prison, one of the rare women whose crimes were deemed so indefensible that "life" really did mean "life." Without a doubt Britain's most...  more

"Infamous, I have become disowned, but I am one of your own."  ?Myra Hindley, from her unpublished autobiographyOn November 15, 2002, Myra Hindley died in prison, one of the rare women whose crimes were deemed so indefensible that "life" really did mean "life." Without a doubt Britain's most notorious murderess, her death has done nothing to diminish the shadow she casts across our collective consciousness. But who was the woman behind the headlines? How could a seemingly normal girl, with no intimations of violence in her character, grow up to commit such terrible acts? Her defenders?many of them high-profile individuals?claim she fell under Ian Brady's spell, but is this the truth? Was her insistence that she had changed, that she felt deep remorse and had reverted to the Catholicism of her childhood genuine or a calculating bid to win parole? One of Your Own explores these questions and many others, drawing on a wide range of resources, including Hindley's own unseen writings, hundreds of recently released prison files, fresh interviews, and extensive new research. It is the first in-depth study of Hindley, returning her humanity to her and thereby revealing the woman and her crimes in the context of our collective history. Scrupulously researched and compellingly well written, this book is the challenging, definitive biography of Britain's "most hated woman."

This is the case Eliot Ness didn't solve. During the Depression, the area known as Kingsbury Run on Cleveland's near East Side was filled with the unemployed and homeless who set up shantytowns. It was also the site where the gruesome remains of some of the Torso Killer's victims were found....  more

This is the case Eliot Ness didn't solve. During the Depression, the area known as Kingsbury Run on Cleveland's near East Side was filled with the unemployed and homeless who set up shantytowns. It was also the site where the gruesome remains of some of the Torso Killer's victims were found. "In the Wake of the Butcher" presents the history of these unsolved serial killings in exhaustive detail. Sifting through hundreds of original documents, police files (including the previously unseen files of the case's chief investigator Peter Merylo)and coroner's reports, and conducting interviews with surviving primary sources, Badal pieces together the chain of murders and the investigation that ultimately came up short. Illustrated with maps, rare crime scene and morgue photographs, and newspaper photos, "In the Wake of the Butcher" presents its compelling case and brings Cleveland's infamous Torso Murders back into the spotlight.