Her Crime Files volumes, based on fascinating case histories, have assured her reputation as our premier chronicler of crime. Now the former Seattle policewoman brings us the horrific account of a charismatic man adored by beautiful and brilliant women who always gave him what he wanted...sex, money, their very lives.... 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. Dead By Sunset is Ann Rule at her riveting best.

    He has confronted, interviewed and researched dozens of serial killers and assassins, including Charles Manson, Richard Speck, John Wayne Gacy, and James Earl Ray - for a landmark study to understand their motives. To get inside their minds. He is Special Agent John Douglas, the model for law enforcement legend Jack Crawford in Thomas Harris's thrillers Red Dragon and The Silence of the Lambs, and the man who ushered in a new age in behavorial science and criminal profiling. Recently retired after twenty-five years of service, John Douglas can finally tell his unique and compelling story.

      Robert Peernock appeared to have the ideal life. Working as a pyrotechnics engineer and computer expert and coming home to his wife and daughter, Peernock projected the American dream. Even when he and his wife separated, it seemed amicable, just a small bump for the well-to-do family. But there was madness in his house: in private, Peernock was violent, subtly manipulative, and bordering on psychotic. But the horrifying details of his home life would only come to light after Peernock finally lost all control.   Peernock had come home, brutally beat both his wife and daughter, force fed them alcohol, and deliberately sent them to their death behind the wheel, staging it to look like a drunk driving accident. He didn’t foresee that his daughter would survive, and even with years of abuse, her attempted murder, and horrendous injuries, he never anticipated that she would speak so powerfully against him.   Throughout his trial, Peernock claimed a massive government conspiracy against him. He hired and fired lawyers multiple times, deadlocking juries and spinning a web of lies. New York Times bestselling author Anthony Flacco chronicles the sensational trial and all the terror that preceded it, looking deep into the mind of a deranged killer whose American dream was a waking nightmare for those trapped within it.

    By the next day three people were dead, and a small war was joined, pitting the full might of federal law enforcement against one well-armed family. Drawing on extensive interviews with Randy Weaver's family, government insiders, and others, Jess Walter traces the paths that led the Weavers to their confrontation with federal agents and led the government to treat a family like a gang of criminals. This is the story of what happened on Ruby Ridge: the tragic and unlikely series of events that destroyed a family, brought down the number-two man in the FBI, and left in its wake a nation increasingly attuned to the dangers of unchecked federal power.

    At the heart of this true tale of love, revenge, and murder Mafia-style are some of the most memorable characters in mob lore: Lefty, the brains of the mob's Vegas casinos; Tony Spilotro, the mob's muscle; and Geri, Lefty's adulterous show-girl wife.

    It explores the motives behind the killing, revealing how the girls wanted to be popular and loved - at any cost.

    What was left of Fred West's eight-year-old stepdaughter was dug up from under the Wests' previous Gloucester home; his first wife and nanny were buried in open country outside the city. Several victims had been decapitated and dismembered, their remains showing signs of sexual torture. These twelve are just the ones the police found when the Wests were arrested in 1994. There may be more whose bones have not been located.Howard Sounes broke the first major story about the Wests as a journalist, and covered the murder trial of Rosemary West, before writing this , the classic book about the case. Beginning with Fred's and Rose's bizarre childhoods, Sounes charts their lives and crimes in forensic detail, creating a fascinating and truly frightening account of a marriage soaked in blood.

    Morgan's Texas-born mother Tanya, a nurse and devoted wife, pulled up stakes with her grieving husband Jim, and moved on. It was the best way to put the past behind them. Until their son Michael, a boy who by all accounts was terrified of his mother, began showing signs of the same affliction that stole the life of his baby sister...First, the suspicion: Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy. Then, Tanya was charged and convicted with felony child abuse of her son. She was later tried and ultimately convicted for first degree murder of Morgan. It would become a landmark trial that unfolded in a series of reversals and bizarre twists of fate as it gradually revealed another side of Tanya Reid—of her own troubling childhood and the dark secrets that drove a woman to the cruelest deception of all...

    This book highlights a case that was front page news--featured on "60 Minutes, " in The New York Times in 1993. HC: Bantam.

    It ended with the discovery of human bones in the Florida underbrush. Two Michigan teenagers were enjoying their dream vacation in Daytona Beach, Florida. Then, along came a spider and a snake....Spider was a bone-thin loser. Snake was the real thing- pure evil and armed to the teeth. For the two teenagers, these madmen planned a night of lingering, inhuman terror. Investigators were left with a twisting trail of clues and lies that led from the blazing Florida heat to the stark chill of a morgue. The frantic families of seventeen-year-old Jim Boucher and nineteen-year-old Daryl Barber were left with a living nightmare of false leads and fading hopes...until the whole shocking truth finally came out about the two innocent young men and two deadly predators who called themselves...The Snake and The Spider.

    They were young and in love; he was about to enter the Navy and she was eager to start a family. But it wasn't long before the dream exploded. James became abusive and violent, prone to sudden bursts of anger, long silences, and unexplained disappearances. But Linda vowed to hold on, despite the pain and fear . . . and her disturbing suspicions about her husband's secret life.Then, not long after their move to Houston, Texas, she made a terrifying discovery: James's hidden cache containing duct tape, a ski mask, and handcuffs. No longer could Linda Bergstrom deny the hideous truth.The man she lived with, the man she married for love, was a dangerous psychopath. And there was no escape and nowhere to run. Because no one—not her friends, the Navy, or the police—would believe her.

     A star athlete with a winning smile, Pernell Jefferson had no trouble attracting women. But beneath his immaculate exterior lurked a beast that left nothing but battered women and broken dreams in his path. Addicted to steroids and nearly destitute after walking away from a football career with the Cleveland Browns, Pernell set his sights obsessively on Jeannie Butkowski. Calling her at every hour of the day, showing up to her home unannounced, and battering her when she turned her attention toward other men, Pernell made Jeannie a prisoner of her own home and her own mind. After Jeannie’s sudden disappearance, the Butkowski family and Jeannie’s friends could name the man responsible. But police, despite subsequently discovering Jeannie’s charred remains in a small Virginia town, refused to question the man most likely linked to the brutal crime. Deadly Goals explores the devastating details of Pernell Jefferson’s past, the disturbing nature of his crimes, and the impassioned cries for justice from Jeannie’s family at a pace so compelling that True Crime fans won’t be able to set down this must-read from seasoned author Wilt Browning.

    a remarkable story—Leeza Gibbons, NBC-TV • Grippingly told ... a wonderful, powerful book—David Berner, Radio CKNW Vancouver • Reads with the pace of a taut thriller—George Henderson, Gloucestershire Citizen • Mesmerizing—Bob Stall, Vancouver Province. Now revised and updated. The amazing, true story of how medical authorities allow a family doctor to continue practising even after he begins living with a 15-year-old patient—and allegedly has sex with another girl in exchange for giving drugs to her father. The notorious doctor still carries on as before and a third patient complains about infamous conduct—until he silences her by putting out a contract for murder.

    But with Anson, his oldest, it would prove to be an ongoing uphill battle. At a young age, Anson began to angrily shun authority, and soon became involved with a number of illicit activities, including drugs, forgery, and theft. After each jail stay, Anson would vow to get clean and start anew. It became a revolving door for both father and son, until Anson, twenty-five years old and strung-out on amphetamines, brutally murdered his young ex-wife.In a brave, honest, and moving work, bestselling true-crime writer Carlton Stowers examines the downfall of his eldest son, once a happy child full of promise, now a convicted murderer serving a sixty-year sentence. With a reporter's shrewdness and a father's heart, Stowers presents a true story of two lives irrevocably lost, and of one man struggling to both understand-- and move beyond-- the...Sins of the Son.

    Louis housewife who abandoned her family and became the sex-slave of ex-Folsom Prison convict Greg Marlow, known to his fellow inmates as "Folsom Wolf". Together, the pair went on a cross-country spree of sex, torture and murder that ended with their convictions and death sentences.

    But the nightmare to come was worse than they could ever imagine. Only five doors away, in the home of John and Elizabeth Golub, police found Kelly Ann's body stuffed in a plastic garbage bag. She'd been brutally beaten, stabbed, strangled, and mutilated. After weeks of intense investigation, police arrested the Golubs twenty-one-year-old son, Robert - a reclusive young man obsessed with bodybuilding and given to fits of rage. The sensational trial and subsequent conviction of Robert Golub shocked the nation and tore the once peaceful community apart. Neighbors took sides. So did the media. And no one who lived on Horton Road would ever be the same.NOTE: This book was re-edited in May, 2013 to correct OCR conversion errors.

    She spent the next seven months as a juror on a high-profile murder trial: The People versus Erik Menendez. Erik and his brother Lyle were on trial for shot-gunning their parents to death in their Beverly Hills home. In this book, she describes the day-to-day experiences of a juror.

    He spied on them, silently invading their most intimate moments, then entered their homes. For the victims of serial rapist Ronnie Shelton, the ordeal began with his terrifying whisper: "Don't look at me. Do what I say and you won't get hurt...."Each woman had been attacked by a stranger who in a moment devastated her life and left her to face "unfinished murder" - the emotional and psychological devastation that is the aftermath of rape. At the end of a five-year manhunt, Shelton would be convicted of raping twenty-nine women - probably less than a third of those he actually raped.Unfinished Murder is the incredible story of a group of survivors who found the courage to speak out, to testify against Shelton and see justice served. During his reign of terror, they lived in fear and silence, warned by him that if they talked he would come back and kill them. After his arrest, they bonded together and found understanding and healing.... Among his victims were Karen Holztrager, a wife and mother who was haunted later by recurring nightmares... Becky Roth, a teacher of the handicapped, who after the rape suffered depression, suicidal feelings, and, subsequently, a shattered marriage... Betty Ocilka, a postal worker and policeman's widow, who forced herself not to cry during the attack because the sound would frighten her young son sleeping upstairs. Detective Bob Matuszny, who knew Betty Ocilka and had known her late husband, made Shelton's arrest his personal mission. Matuszny was outraged that a serial rapist was marauding through his city - and furious that the police were being outwitted by a criminal who brazenly struck the moment their lookouts were down. Despite bureaucratic red tape and paralyzing city budget cuts, Matuszny persevered. But it would take years to make the connection that the low-level criminal brought in by police over a dozen times - for assault, probation violations, bar brawls, and disturbing the peace - was guilty of so much more.Based on author James Neff's interviews with the survivors, police, psychiatrists, and with Ronnie Shelton, Unfinished Murder probes the contradictory mind of a sex offender to determine what went wrong - and why the warning signs of his disturbing behavior went unnoticed for so long. Shelton's distorted sexual fantasies and propensity for violence during his teenage years made a lethal mix; yet he slipped through every one of society's safety nets to become a calculating and seemingly unstoppable adult offender. Unfinished Murder is an astounding expose of police work hampered by an overtaxed urban criminal justice system; it is also an indictment of society's failure to address the issue of rape and its brutal aftermath. Most of all, it is the uplifting story of women who found a unified voice with which to demand justice. Their silent fear turned to triumph on the day Ronnie Shelton was sentenced to 3,198 years in prison. Their healing process continues.

    The authors chronicle both infamous and little-known serial killers, as well as the effects of a changing social climate.

    and exposes facts that prove the case was far more sinister than meets the eye. In presenting a scenario of what really happened late one night on Bundy Avenue, Singular proves that no one was truly innocent in this horrible crime. Ships in late November.

    When a jury, in November 1982, acquitted Jane Stafford of first degree murder in the death of her common-law husband, Billy, the packed courtroom rose as one to applaud the verdict.  The case attracted national attention and, because of it, the battered wife syndrome is now an accepted defense and it is permissible to bring forward, evidence of longtime abuse in cases in which women have killed heir mates.  The issue of violence against women was just beginning to some out of the closet in the late seventies and early eighties when Billy was battering Jane.  She didn't know there were such places as transition houses.  She learned about them and was soon advocating their need in every community.  Now, Jane's voice has been silenced, but her legacy will live on.  Through the tears and grief over Jane's death, others have pledged to carry on her fight with the same grit and determination.  Jane's youngest sister, Mona Donnelly, articulated that pledge at a memorial service.--

    Anne's mother and two sisters were murdered, but her story unfolds as one of hope and survival.

    Tells of the way in which the family coped with the loss of Janine, the police investigations and the lengthy trial.

    

    Strong, handsome, smooth talking, with an array of tattoos adding to his masculine aura, he came on as a rugged outdoorsman looking for a mate. But in reality, O'Neall was a nightmare of savage, sexually violent crimes that put him on the FBI's Most Wanted list.Here is the bone-chilling true story of the twisted killer whose masterful ability to change appearances confounded authorities again and again...and a mother's agonizing search for her missing daughter. It is the story, too, of the brilliant police work and startling psychic detection that teamed with a family's outrage to bring him to justice. But it was too late for the young woman whose dream of a hunk "to die for" became a chilling reality!Notice to readers: This book was previously published as Blind Rage.

    294 pages. Book is VG dust jacket also

    Cullen Davis--the richest man ever indicted for murder--teems with the outlaw money and attitude of Texas, where justice can be bought and no one ever behaves as they should.

    Arriving from Tipperary, Ireland in the 1840s, the family settled in the boisterous pioneer community near London, Ontario. For the next 30 years, their activities gained wide notoriety in the area. James was convicted of murder but escaped the gallows. The sons grew up to be handsome, reckless, enterprising in business and very dangerous in combat.What is it about The Donnellys that still fascinates people? Were they really as evil as their enemies portrayed them? Why was no one ever convicted of their murders? What happened to the surviving Donnellys? And why do local people still feel strongly, taking sides for or against the family?After 15 years of exhaustive research, lawyer Ray Fazakas has produced the definitive account of the famous feud and its tragic consequences. He has also collected an astonishing treasure trove of old photographs, period drawings, maps and documents, showing the Donnellys, their murderers and the sites and people involved.This unique combination of narrative and illustration recreates an epic tragedy of frontier life.

    Smith, husband of Susan Smtih, the woman convicted of murdering their two young sons in August 1994, speaks out about his marriage, his beloved children, and the painful process of putting his life back together. Smith has updated this edition with a chapter exploring his feelings about Susan's conviction and his life today. 16-pp photos.

    

    It is a law intended to protect the innocent from unfair harassment and persecution.But sometimes it protects the guilty as well.Guilty As SinThe circumstantial evidence against southern businessman Mel Ignatow was solid -- effectively damning him for the savage 1988 sex torture/slaying of his former girlfriend, Brenda Schaefer. There was motive, unimpeachable forensic evidence . . . even testimony from an eyewitness who took photographs of the gruesome, horrific crime. But in a Kentucky courtroom, frustration, ignorance, incompetence and fate pulled a supposedly open-and-shut case in shocking, unexpected directions -- and tied the concept of American justice into knots that might never be undone.

    The inside story of the Bamber murders.

    The sensational trials of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka for abduction, rape, manslaughter and murder caused widespread controversy, as did the twelve-year sentence Homolka received as part of her deal with government lawyers. Yet, even though the publication ban on the case has been lifted, there is much the Canadian public still has not been told. Nick Pron now gives us a comprehensive account of previously banned information about Bernardo and Homolka's backgrounds and early relationship; of Homolka's role in the death of her sister, Tammy; of what turned Bernardo into a sadistic rapist and killer; of slip-shod police work and lack of communication that gave Bernardo and Homolka the opportunity to murder schoolgirls Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French; of the fifteen-month suppression of key videotape evidence; and a host of disturbing facts that were ruled inadmissable at the trial.Warning: This book contains graphic descriptions of violence.From the Paperback edition.

    Beales reveals through his detailed examination not only of the actual defence papers but also of the original DPP file closed under the 75 year rule and the trial itself, an extraordinary plot by a man who, driven by intolerable pressures, contrived the state execution of Herbert Armstrong for the poisoning of his wife with arsenic.

    He's one of the best con men, and estimates the money he swindled to be around ten million dollars. No institution was immune, for Jacob targeted everyone--banks, airlines, casinos, credit card companies, and countless others. Jacob is currently serving a seven-and-a-half year sentence in a federal prison for check fraud.

    

    There is usually no hard evidence beyond ballistics and a car description so generic it is virtually useless. In Drive-By, Gary Rivlin penetrates the anonymity of one such incident and creates an extraordinary portrait of the people entangled in it. He takes us behind the headlines, and through bold investigative reporting, finds the individuals so often left out of the story. In this real-life narrative, we meet the teens who, on Sunday, the eighth of July, were involved in a scuffle over a bicycle, and on the ninth became murderers and victims. By presenting the story of this murder in human terms, Rivlin challenges the stereotypes and indifference that allow the problem of inner-city violence to escalate.

    Follows the case of Matthew Heikkila, a young man who was tried for killing his adoptive parents Richard and Dawn and who pleaded not guilty by reason of the ""Adopted Child Syndrome.""

    STALKING JUSTICE focuses on the heroic efforts of the lone investigator who, by using his gut instincts and twenty-first-century technology, ended the vicious rampage of an elusive killer.Detective Joe Horgas suspected that Susan Tucker's murder was connected to a similar case nearly four years earlier-a murder to which another man had already confessed. Horgas's theories were dismissed by superiors and colleagues alike; undaunted, he developed his own leads, and ultimately targeted a suspect. But he had nothing except semen stains from the crime scene to tie his suspect to the murder-nothing but a genetic code that, once deciphered, would break open the case. In a historic breakthrough for the U.S. criminal justice, DNA testing would be used to catch a killer.

    Learn of Hawkeye's experiences - good and bad, sad and humorous, dangerous and surprising - in the U.S. prison world. This quote from the book perhaps sums it up "Beeing locked up is the male equivalent of having PMS. It's an emotional roller coaster, and you can never predict on a day-to-day basis where the scary parts of the ride are going to be. One day it might be a confrontation with a guard, some other time is might be a bad-news letter from home, or on another day it might be a hostile inmate not liking the way you looked at him...."

    Bock

    In this book, Stewart Holbrook recounts ten murders that shocked the quiet country towns where they were committed and are still in the minds and conversations of local inhabitants. Includes: Death & Times of a Prophet, The Great Homestead Murders, Murder at Bad Axe, Belle of Indiana, Who Called on Sarah Meservey?, more.

    Sandy Johnson was in shock. Her husband, Duane, and young daughter, Sherrie, were violently ill when word arrived that her infant nephew just died of mysterious causes. Days earlier, the entire family was happy, healthy, and living the American dream. Now they were at the center of a terrifying medical crisis.   Duane soon died in a condition unlike anything the doctors had ever seen. As they raced to discover what disease or toxin could have done so much damage so quickly, Lt. Foster Burchard of the Omaha police began to suspect foul play. Sandy herself became a primary suspect, as did her ex-boyfriend Steven Harper—a man prone to violence who never got over their breakup.   In Toxic Love, investigative reporter and true crime author Tomás Guillén offers a detailed and vivid account of this baffling case from the day of the poisoning to the harrowing trial and the murderer’s eventual suicide on death row.

    . . Roemer [is] America's most decorated FBI agent."--Chicago TribuneFor forty years Tony Accardo was America's most dangerous criminal. He cut his teeth on the Chicago mob wars of Capone and Elliot Ness. He got his nickname "Joe Batters" for killing two men with a baseball bat. As the bodies piled up, Capone's youngest capo murdered and schemed his way to the top.William Roemer was the first FBI agent to face Tony "The Big Tuna" Accardo. Now, Roemer tells the story that only he could tell: the deals, the hits, the double-crosses, and the power plays that reached from the Windy City to Hollywood and to New York. Drawing on secret wiretaps and inside information, ACCARDO chronicles bloodshed and mayhem for more than six decades--as Roemer duels against the most powerful don of them all. . . ."Roemer brings the reality of organized crime home to us."--Boston Herald"A big, sprawled out account that serves as anecdotal history of organized crime."--Kirkus Reviews

    Comprehensive true-crime encyclopedia

    Six months earlier, Julius Melnitzer had been an eminent trial lawyer at the top of his profession and a prominent senior partner in the prestigious law firm he had founded almost twenty years earlier. All that was behind him now. This is Julius Melnitzer's own story of his journey through prison. It is, at one level, a devastating expose of the corruption and inhumanity of the prison system. At another level, however, it is the remarkable tale of how one man came to terms with his own demons inside a genuinely demonic world.

    Looks at the history of street gangs, explains why young people are drawn to gangs, and discusses the backgrounds of gang members, the types of crimes they commit, and the codes that they follow.

    The author gives a detailed account of the life of the victim and the events surrounding his murder, and describes the cycle of mortuary and seasonal rituals with their elaborate songs and dances. He also looks at the dramatic changes in Tiwi society over the last 100 years, and examines how the Tiwi have responded to the intervention of Western culture. In many areas, he finds, they have adapted and retained their own value system. Venbrux's account of the investigation and trial following the homicide provides timely and important insights into the issue of Aboriginal People, traditional law and the Australian criminal justice system. Through the strong narrative thread of this book we are presented with an incisive picture of a culture amid conflict and change.

    It is the story, too, of a mother's search for her daughter, of brilliant police work and the startling psychic detection that teamed with a family's outrage to bring him to justice. Includes 8 pages of photos.

    Joseph's Training School for Boys in Alfred, Ontario, in 1958. He was twelve years old. Over the course of the next four years, he was repeatedly beaten, sexually molested, and raped by the Christian Brothers who ran the school. Both he and his mother complained but no action was taken. In those days, the word of a delinquent kid carried little weight when opposed by that of a teacher and man of God. McCann put the memories behind him and attempted to get on with his life. More than thirty years later McCann watched, fascinated, when the Mount Cashel scandal broke in Newfoundland. He realised that other men had come forward with similar stories to tell and had been heard. He got in touch with Darcy Henton. The article Henton subsequently wrote in the Toronto Star was like the breaching of a dam: testimony from hundreds of other victims soon flooded the media.Now, half a dozen years later, more than a thousand former wards of the Christian Brothers have come forward to tell their stories. More than thirty Brothers and former Brothers have been charged with more than two hundred crimes, ranging from assault causing bodily harm to indecent assault and buggery.For nearly half a century, the Brothers who ran St. John’s and St. Joseph’s training schools presided over an unparalleled reign of perversion and terror. The story of how David McCann led the surviving wards on a crusade for recognition and justice is stirring and heart-breaking, a triumph of determination in the face of callous indifference.

    

    From the beginning, inexperienced ATF agent Brian Hoback and a handful of others suspected the brilliant, charming, and chilling Walter Leroy Moody; but if Moody was the bomber, he had expertly covered his tracks. Hoback, however, never gave up on his quarry, even when senior officials and dozens of other agents mistakenly focused on another suspect. The key was whether Moody's much younger wife, Susan, could be transformed from devoted helpmate - and battered wife - to stunning star witness for the prosecution, throwing off the influence of her domineering husband and testifying against him.

    Recounts the true story of Connie Krauser Chaney, who left behind a tragic childhood to marry Wayne, unaware of his violent tendencies, and describes how she eventually fled with her young son, only to stalked down and killed.