The Crowes' peaceful middle class community neighbors in San Diego's North County were shocked by the savagery of the crime -- a young girl murdered, stabbed repeatedly, in her own bed in the dead of night. The lack of any evidence of forced entry led the Escondido police to their inevitable conclusion: someone in the family was responsible for 12-year-old Stephanie Crowe's slaying. The investigation quickly zeroed in on the victim's older brother, Michael, and two teenage friends -- three loners who enjoyed inhabiting dark fantasy worlds of quests and violence. Through efficient, by-the-book police work, the boys were broken down and ultimately confessed. The only problem was the detectives had gotten everything wrong. Shattered Justice is the riveting and disturbing true account of a horrific tragedy and the terrible crime that followed -- a nightmare of four innocent lives shattered, one by a killer's blade, three by obsession and twisted law.
Anything by
Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing by Ted Conover
Ted Conover became a New York State corrections officer at Sing Sing, New York's maximum-security prison, to hear the voices of guards and inmates. The majority of the 1,800 inmates have been convicted of violent felonies: murder, manslaughter, rape, robbery, assault, kidnapping, burglary, arson. After seven weeks of pseudomilitary preparation he faces what the every gaurd faces, isolation in the midst of violence and inmates reliant on them for all their needs.
True Stories of C.S.I.: The Real Crimes Behind the Best Episodes of the Popular TV Show by Katherine Ramsland .
Explores the real-life crimes that inspired revisits the most absorbing episodes of C.S.I., the authenticity of the forensic investigations recreated for the dramatizations and the real forensic in actual cases from mass-murderer Richard Speck, to the massacre of Buddhist monks in Arizona Temple and spontaneous combustion.
Peter Manuel, Serial Killer by Hector McLeod and Malcolm McLeod
Fifty years after he was hanged in Barlinnie prison, the memory of this American-born killer is still fresh in the minds of those who lived through the two terrible years of his murderous rampage in the suburbs of Glasgow. The "Beast of Birkenshaw," Peter Manuel,used the skills he learned in Peterhead Prison to avoid detection. He was charged with eight murders but is reputed to have killed many more. His trial in Glasgow High Court, "the trial of the century," enthralled and astonished theworld . He implicated major underworld figures and revealed Glasgow's sinister gangster activities. He fired his legal team and defended himself.
An Unfinished Canvas: A True Story of Love, Family, and Murder in Nashville by Michael Glasgow and Phyllis Gobbell
On the surface, artist and mother Janet March had a picture-perfect existence before she disappeared. In reality, her husband led a secret, destructive life of promiscuity and neglect. For ten years, Janet's parents would drag him through the court system. And though there was no body, no cause of death, and no physical evidence, they would find justice.
The Darkest Night: Two Sisters, a Brutal Murder, and the Loss of Innocence in a Small Town by Ron Franscell
Casper, Wyoming: 1973. Eleven-year-old Amy Burridge rides with her eighteen-year-old sister, Becky, to the grocery store. When they finish their shopping, Becky’s car gets a flat tire. Two men politely offer them a ride home. But they were anything but Good Samaritans. The girls would suffer unspeakable crimes at the hands of these men before being thrown from a bridge into the North Platte River. One miraculously survived. The other did not. Years later, Ron Franscell—who lived in Casper at the time of the crime, and was a friend to Amy and Becky—can’t forget Wyoming’s most shocking story of abduction, rape, and murder. Neither could Becky, the surviving sister. The two men who violated her and Amy were sentenced to life in prison, but the demons of her past kept haunting Becky…until she met her fate years later at the same bridge where she’d lost her sister.
Such Good Boys: The True Story of a Mother, Two Sons and a Horrifying Murder by Tina Dirmann
Raised in the suburb of Riverside, California, twenty-year-old college student Jason Bautista endured for years his emotionally disturbed mother’s verbal and psychological abuse. She even locked him out of the house, tied him up with electrical cord, and on one occasion, gave him a beating that sent him to the emergency room. His fifteen-year-old half brother Matthew Montejo also was a victim to Jane Bautista’s dark mood swings and erratic behavior, but for some reason, Jason received the brunt of the abuse—until he decided he’d had enough. On the night of January 14, 2003, Jason strangled his mother. To keep authorities from identifying her body, he chopped off her head and hands, an idea he claimed he got from watching an episode of the hit TV series “The Sopranos.” Matthew would later testify in court that he sat in another room in the house with the TV volume turned up while Jason murdered their mother. He also testified that he drove around with Jason to find a place to dump Jane’s torso. The morning following the murder, Matthew went to school, and Jason returned to his classes at Cal State San Bernardino. When authorities zeroed in on them, Jason lied and said that Jane had run off with a boyfriend she’d met on the Internet. But when police confronted the boys with overwhelming evidence, Jason confessed all. Now the nightmare was only just beginning for him.
The Devil's Dozen: How Cutting-Edge Forensics Took Down 12 Notorious Serial Killers by Katherine Ramsland
Case histories of the twelve most notorious serial killers of the last hundred years, and answers: What clues did they leave behind? How were they eventually caught? How was each twist and turn of their crimes matched by the equally compelling weapons of science and logic? A fascinating window into those who kill—and those bringing them to justice.
When investigators were called to the secluded farm of attractive, fortyish Sheila LaBarre, they found the dismembered and incinerated remains of her young lover, a man with a child's I.Q. A series of young men had come and gone from the farm over the years, all seeming to vanish into thin air. Now LaBarre was on the run. Eventually she would be caught and would plead insanity. But was she indeed insane — an "avenging angel sent to kill pedophiles," as she claimed — or a vicious, calculating serial killer?
Savage Grace: The True Story of Fatal Relations in a Rich and Famous American Family by Natalie Robins and Steven Aronson
A tale of money and madness, incest and matricide, the saga of Brooks and Barbara Baekeland -- beautiful, rich, worldly -- and their handsome, gentle son, Tony. Alternately neglected and smothered by his parents, he was finally driven to destroy the whole family in a violent chain of events. Savage Grace unfolds against a glamorous international background New York, London, Paris, Italy, Spain; features Salvador Dalí, James Jones, the Astors, Vanderbilts, and European nobility; and tells the Baekelands' story through candid interviews, private letters, diaries, confidential hospital, State Department, and prison documents.
A Descent Into Hell: The True Story of an Altar Boy, a Cheerleader, and a Twisted Texas Murder by Kathryn Casey.
Bright, attractive, and both from good families, University of Texas college students Colton Pitonyak and Jennifer Cave, a former cheerleader had a lot to look forward to. Cave had an exciting new job and a big-money scholarship to UT's prestigious business school lured Pitonyak to Austin. Yet the former altar boy had a dark, unpredictable streak that ensnared him in an underworld of drugs and guns. When Jennifer failed to show up for work on August 18, 2005, her mother, Sharon Cave's, search led to Colton's apartment, to a scene worthy of a horror movie. One of the most brutal slayings in UT history—Pitonyak and his devoted girlfriend were nowhere to be found.
The Good-bye Door: The Incredible True Story of America's First Female Serial Killer to Die in the Chair by Diana Britt Franklin
"Blonde Borgia," Anna Marie Hahn, was a cold-blooded serial killer who preyed on the elderly in Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine District in the 1930s. Born in Bavaria in 1906, Anna Marie brought shame to her pious family when as a teenager, she gave birth to an illegitimate son, Oscar. Shipped off to America in 1929 she lived with the elderly relatives in Cincinnati, she married Philip Hahn, a Western Union telegrapher, they bought a new house and she opened a delicatessen/bakery. During the Depression, Anna Marie found ways to get money to bet on horses. She tried burning down the house and deli and tried killing her husband for the insurance. She befriended the elderly, taking their life savings before feeding them arsenic.For weeks her Cincinnati trial, "the greatest mass murder in the history of the country" was a front-page national news. Nearly 100 witnesses gave testimony against her, when all appeals were exhausted, Anna Marie, age 32, was executed on December 7, 1938, at the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus. In a handwritten "confession" found in her cell, she admitted to four murders.
Cannibal Killers: The Impossible Monsters by Moira Martingale
The cannibalism phenomenon back to the 16th century to Sawney Bean family who consumed more than 1,000 people over a 25 year period. Modern murderers including Fritz Haarmann—would tear out young men's throats to drink their blood, before selling their flesh for meat; Jeffrey Dahmer, murderer of 17 young men whose body parts were found in his apartment; Edward Gein—who after his mother's death began killing and eating women; and Andrei Chikatilo, a Russian, the worst cannibal killer in recent history. Is there a clinical explanation for vampirism?
Never Seen the Moon: The Trials of Edith Maxwell by Sharon Hatfield
In 1935, free-spirited young teacher Edith Maxwell and her mother were indicted for murdering Edith's conservative and domineering father, Trigg, in their Wise County, Virginia, home. Edith claimed her father had tried to whip her for staying out late and she defended herself by striking back with a high-heeled shoe. Maxwell was championed as a martyr by women's advocates and granted celebrity status by Hearst press. National news and detective magazines, Warner Brothers created a screen version and Eleanor Roosevelt helped secure her early release from prison.
Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters by Peter Vronsky
The comprehensive examination into the history of serial homicide documents the psychological, investigative and cultural aspects of serial murder beginning with its first recorded instance in Ancient Rome, through fifteenth-century France, up to such notorious contemporary cases as cannibal/necrophile Ed Kemper, Henry Lee Lucas, Ted Bundy and what he classifies as the "serial rampage killer" such as Andrew Cunanan. Sound theories on what makes a serial killer, but also provides concrete suggestions on how to survive an encounter with one-from recognizing verbal warning signs to physical confrontational resistance. Exhaustively researched with transcripts of interviews with killers, and featuring up-to-date information on the apprehension and conviction of the Green River Killer and the Beltway Snipers. Vronsky offers sound theories on what makes a serial killer but also provides concrete suggestions on how to survive an encounter with one-from recognizing verbal warning signs to physical confrontational resistance. Up-to-date information on the apprehension and conviction of the Green River Killer and the Beltway Snipers.
A Priest in Hell: Gangs, Murderers and Snitching in a California Jail by Randall Radic
This memoir describes a California jail, beginning on November 5, 2005, when the author, a parish priest, in a small town in northern California, is charged with 10 felonies. After an investigation, his congregation learns he mortgaged the parish house, took the money and sold off the church. Convicted of embezzlement, forgery, and fraud, he spends six months in prison. Older than most of the prison population at age 54, his background as a priest makes him a target and a confidant. As he writes about anger and contrition, inmates and indignities of jail life.
By Their Father's Hand: The True Story of the Wesson Family Massacre by Monte Francis
Neighbors were unaware of what went on behind the closed doors of the home of 300-pound Marcus Wesson, his wife, children, nieces, and grandchildren in Fresno, California. March 12, 2004, after gunshots were heard inside their home police officers responding were horrified by the carnage they discovered. A chilling story of incest, abuse, madness, murder, and one family's terrible and ultimately fatal ordeal at the hands of a powerful, manipulative man—a cultist who envisioned vengeful gods and vampires, and totally controlled those closest to him.
Never Enough by Joe MacGinnis
At thirty-nine, Nancy Kissel's royal lifestyle of an expatriate wife of Merrill Lynch investment banker, Robert Kissel, three young children -- ended in November 2003 in the bedroom of their luxury apartment above Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour. Hong Kong prosecutors, who charged Nancy with murder, said she wanted to inherit Rob's millions and start a new life with a blue-collar lover in a New Hampshire trailer park. She said she'd killed in self-defense while fighting for her life against an abusive, cocaine-addicted husband who forced her to submit to his brutal sexual demands for years. Her 2005 trial captivated Hong Kong's expatriate community and attracted attention worldwide. Less than a year after the unexpected verdict, Rob's brother, Andrew, a Connecticut real estate tycoon facing prison for fraud and embezzlement, was also found dead: stabbed in the back in his Greenwich mansion. This is the story of two brothers, Robert and Andrew Kissel, who wound up murdered half a world apart; and of Nancy Kissel. Joe McGinniss explores a smart and beautiful family so corroded by greed that it destroys itself from within.
Invitation to a Murder: 48 Hours by Gail A Zimmerman
August afternoon, in suburban Springfield, Illinois, Donnah Winger was murdered by an intruder; who was shot fatally by Mark, Donnah's husband, a respected nuclear scientist. The couple had an adopated infant daughter. After four years of investigation, new witness testimony reveals the truth.
Pure Murder by Corey Mitchell
On a summer night in Houston, two teenage girls crossed paths with a group of teenage boys fueled with alcohol and rage. Four days later, when searchers finally found Jennifer Ertman and Elizabeth Pena, their bodies were unrecognizable...They grabbed Elizabeth, while Jennifer escaped. But her cries brought Jennifer back to help her. Both girls were subjected to sexual assaults and long, painful deaths. The killers bragged about their crime, butvictim's families were in for another horrible surprise.
Witch: The True Story of Las Vegas' Most Notorious Female Killer by Glenn Puit
Brookey Lee West, a Silicon Valley technical writer's twenty year crime and killing spree.
Body Parts by Caitlin Rother
When he walked into the Humbolt County Sheriff's Office in Northern California with a woman's severed breast in his pocket, 36-year-old Wayne Adam Ford wasn't a suspect. But before it was over, he would be convicted of the grisly torture and murder of four women, two of whom he dismembered. If Ford hadn't confessed, he'd probably still be out there today. But he did confess - because he knew he'd kill again.
A Slaying in the Suburbs: The Tara Grant Murder by Andrea Billups and Steve Miller
To their suburban Detroit neighbors, Stephen and Tara Grant were happy. But their marriage, plagued by resentment and extramarital affairs, wasonly held together by their children. Until Stephen snapped, strangled and dismembered his wife, then disposed of her body piece by piece in the park his children played in.
To Have and To Kill: Nurse Melanie McGuire, an Illicit Affair, and the Gruesome Murder of Her Husband by John Glatt
Three suitcases were pulled from the Chesapeake Bay with body parts of William McGuire. William and his wife, Melanie, a registered nurse had just closed on their New Jersey dream home. For Melanie was involved in a long-term affair with a married doctor at the fertility clinic where she worked—and plans for the future that didn’t include William.
Murder in Mayberry: Greed, Death and Mayhem in a Small Town by Mary Kinney Branson and Jack Branson
Crime never happened in Madisonville, Kentucky. That’s why the slaughter of one of its female citizens was so stunning. Even more so was the identity of the killer whose flight from the law made him one of the FBI’s Most Wanted.
Tacoma Confidential: A True Story of Murder, Suicide, and a Police Chief's Secret Life by Paul LaRosa
Gig Harbor, Washington, a quiet Tacoma suburb, knew little of tragedy and scandal-until April 26, 2003. On that day, David Brame, distraught over his impending divorce, shot his wife to death in a busy public parking lot. Then, with the couple's two children only feet away, he turned the gun on himself. Brame was, after all, the chief of police. But as the investigation unfolded, a bizarre and depraved side of Brame and his marriage came to light.
The Prom Night Murders: A Devoted American Family, their Troubled Son, and a Ghastly Crime by Carlton Smith
In 1989, a shocking tragedy shattered a small Indiana community. Pastor Robert L. Pelley was found slain in his home. In his basement were the blood-soaked bodies of his wife and daughters, executed by shotgun at close range. The doors to the house were locked, and there were no signs of forced entry. The pastor’s son, Jeff, was nowhere to be found. Police had a hunch Jeff was responsible, but they didn’t have enough evidence to convict until, more than a decade later, when law officials resolved to unravel the truth about Jeff and to establish a motive.
Secrets in the Cellar by John Glatt
Josef Fritzl, a 73-year-old retired engineer in Austria seemed to be living a normal life with his wife, Rosemarie, and their family—though one daughter, Elisabeth, had decades earlier been “lost” to a religious cult. Throughout the years, three of Elisabeth’s children mysteriously appeared on the Fritzls’ doorstep; Josef and Rosemarie raised them as their own. For twenty-seven years, Josef had imprisoned and molested Elisabeth in his man-made basement dungeon, complete with sound-proof paneling and code-protected electric locks. There, she gave birth to seven of Josef’s children. One died in infancy—and three were raised alongside Elisabeth, never to see the light of day. Then, in 2008, one of Elisabeth’s children became seriously ill, and was taken to the hospital. It was the first time the nineteen-year-old girl had been outside—soon the truth about her background, her captivity, and Josef’s crimes would come to light.
Cruel Games: A Brilliant Professor, A Loving Mother, A Brutal Murder by Rose Ciotta
University of Pennsylvania professor Rafael Robb was an expert on game theory, his colleagues and students marveled over his brilliance. His wife, Ellen, knew his dark side. In December 2006, after years of alleged psychological abuse, she was ready to leave him. She was about to sign a lease on a new home until she was found dead in the home she shared with Rafael and their daughter, Olivia. Rafael claimed she was the victim of a fatal intrusion. Ellen’s friends and family suspected Rafael committed the crime. The police had almost no evidence—and the professor had only one strategy: to win at all costs
No Room for Doubt by Angela Dove
March 25, 1988, Debi Whitlock was brutally murdered in her Modesto, California, home. Debi’s murder devastated her family. Debi’s mother, Jacque, wanted answers. Over the next nine years, Jacque fought what others called a losing battle—and learned to deal with the authorities, the media, and the public so her daughter’s killer would not go unpunished. Debi’s husband, Harold, was tossed down another path. Police investigators focused their suspicions on him, eventually uncovering motives and opportunity—but never enough to make a case. Judged harshly in the court of public opinion, the once funny, intelligent, and fiercely loyal man fell into a spiral of guilt, anger, and alcoholism. Told by Harold’s adult daughter—the last person to see Debi alive—this is the story of a terrible murder and investigation that led to the ultimate end of one man’s life, and a renewed sense of purpose and hope in one woman’s life.
A Dance With the Devil: A True Story of Marriage to a Psychopath by Barbara Bentley
At the start of her relationship with the intelligent and worldly John Perry, Barbara Bentley couldn’t believe her luck—so when things didn’t add up, she struggled to ignore her doubts. She kept trying to put pieces together—unaware some of them were missing. As he drained her credit, dodged her questions, manipulated her and misled her, she stayed with him, suppressing her growing suspicions. Ultimately he would try to kill her. Barbara’s courageous story, after the honeymoon was over, what it took her to escape, start life anew, and her efforts to protect other women and help them learn.
Dance with the Devil: A Memoir of Murder and Loss by Dave Bagby and Elliott Leyton.
Dave and Kate Bagby's son Andrew, a young doctor, was murdered in November 2001. The murderer was his ex-girlfriend Dr. Shirley Turner. She returned to her famiy home in Newfoundland, Canada pregnant with Andrew's son. In September 2003, killed Andrew's 13 month old son and then herself.
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father Starring Kurt Kuenne DVD
by Kathryn Casey
The day before Halloween 2004 was the last day on Earth for professor Fred Jablin. A neighbor discovered his body in a pool of blood in the driveway of his Virginia home. Police turned their attentions to his ex-wife, Piper, a petite, pretty Texas lawyer who lost a bitter custody battle and would do anything to get her kids back. But Piper was in Houston at the time of the slaying. So began an investigation: a conspiracy of lies, rage, paranoia, manipulation, and murder ensnare an entire family—including two look-alike sisters—and reveal the shocking depravities possible when a dangerously disordered mind slips into madness.
Why They Kill: The Discoveries of a Maverick Criminologist by Richard Rhodes
Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Rhodes traces the life of criminologist Lonnie Athens, who grew up in a violent, angry world. He studied it and developed a theory about how violent criminals are created. Athens's work forces readers to consider how violent our society is, how it became that way, and what might be done to change it. When applied to well-known criminals such as Michael Tyson and Lee Harvey Oswald, Athens's ideas become concrete. These are not just descriptions of scumbags' brutal crimes, but intensely personal stories that reveal how a culture of violence propagates itself.
If Looks Could Kill by M. William Phelps
Jeff Zack was executed in the parking lot of a BJ's Wholesale Club in Akron, Ohio, by a biker. Jeff Zack's murder stunned investigators - but then, so did his life. Many people had reasons to want Zack dead, including his wife and the husband of a beauty queen he dated openly.
Vanished at Sea: The True Story of a Child TV Actor and Double Murder by Tina Dirmann
Thomas and Jackie Hawks, a retired probation officer and a stay-at-home mom, looked forward to selling their 55-foot, $435,000 yacht to spend time with their grandchildren. They were thrilled when Skylar Deleon wanted to buy the boat for his young family. This unemployed, former childhood actor and dishonorably discharged Marine had plans to lure the couple to sea, force them to sign away their life savings, throw them overboard and leave them.
Beggars And Thieves: Lives Of Urban Street Criminals by Mark S. Fleisher
For policy makers, scholars, activists and citizens who want to defuse urban Americas ticking crime bomb, this book is truly must reading. Mark S. Fleisher has spent years among inmates in jails and prisons and on the streets with thieves, gang members, addicts, and life-long criminals in Seattle and other cities across the country. He writes about how they become and remain offenders, and the actual role of jails and prisons efforts to deter crime and rehabilitate criminals. Fleisher shows that parents who are addicts, abusers, and criminals beget irreversibly damaged children who become addicts, abusers, and criminals. Fleisher contends many well-intentioned educational and vocational training programs are too late to help. And, provides evidence that youthful and adult offenders find themselves better off in prison with work, medical care, a clean place to sleep, meals, and stable social ties than they are in Americas cities. Fleisher calls for bold, practical anti-crime policies. He prescribes life terms for violent offenders in prisons structured as work communities, where privileges are earned through work in expanded, productive industries that reduce the financial burden of incarceration on the public. Most important, he argues the only way to prevent street crime, and cut prison growth is to permanently remove brutalized children from criminal, addicted and violent parents.
Never Leave Me: A True Story of Marriage, Deception, and Brutal Murder by John Glatt
In a quiet community of million dollar homes and SUVs, the Nyce family with their three children projected the image of success. Dr. Jonathan Nyce, an asthma sufferer, achieved medical breakthroughs that offered hope to countless people and made him rich. Michelle’s beauty made her an object of desire. Adultery was her husband’s worst fear. Police found Michelle’s Land Cruiser floating in a creek near home. Michelle’s battered body was not killed in an accident.
Because You Loved Me by M. William Phelps
Jeanne Dominico was a hard-working single mother. Her fiancé found her body on her kitchen floor with more than forty stab wounds and blows to her head with a blunt instrument. Nicole, her fourteen-year-old daughter on the honor-roll was in love with an eighteen-year-old man on the Internet. Once they met in person, Jeanne sensed trouble. If only she'd known that the life in danger was her own.
Love & Death: The Murder of Kurt Cobain by Max Wallace and Ian Halperin
On Friday, April 8, 1994, a body was discovered in a room above a garage in Seattle. For the attending authorities, it was an open-and-shut case of suicide. What no one knew then, however, is that the deceased -- Kurt Cobain, the superstar frontman of Nirvana -- had been murdered. Drawing on case tapes made by a P.I. hired by Courtney Love when her husband escaped from drug rehab and went missing -- and on new forensic evidence and police reports obtained under the Freedom of Information Act -- Love & Death explodes the long-standing theory that Kurt Cobain took his own life. Award-winning investigative journalists Max Wallace and Ian Halperin have conducted a ten-year crusade for the truth, and in Love & Death they present a stunning, convincing argument that the whole truth has yet to be revealed.
The Cop Who Wouldn't Quit by Rick Nelson
July 1979, after seven years as a Houston homicide detective, Johnny Bonds was called to a home. In the den, John, 35, an oceanographer, sat in an armchair, shot twice in the back of the head. Diana, 36,was on the floor, shot once in head. A 14-month-old baby boy lay dead in a crib, shot in the head. The medical examiner called it a murder-suicide but Bonds was not convinced, no gun was found at the scene.The memory of the murdered baby haunted him, and finding the killer became his obsession.
and DVDs
(even his mysteries are good-see