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He Who Must Be Obeid: The Untold Story
Kate McClymont - 2014
New South Wales has Eddie Obeid.Meet Australia's most corrupt politician whose brazen misdeeds were on a scale said to be "unexceeded since the days of the Rum Corps".From the shadows Obeid ran the state as his fiefdom, making and unmaking premiers. Along the way he pocketed tens of millions of dollars following corrupt deals. This explosive book chronicles the grubby deals the powerbroker had been making for decades before he was exposed. His tentacles stretched through all levels of government, encircling almost every precious resource - coal leases, Circular Quay cafes, marinas, even the state's water. All of them were secret money-spinners for Obeid and his family.Above ground, below ground, in the air, on the water, there was no domain beyond Obeid's grasp. Now, many of the key politicians of his era have given a candid account of Obeid's pernicious backroom influence.Following their groundbreaking investigations, the award-winning journalists Kate McClymont and Linton Besser have unearthed the vast but secret empire Obeid built over the decades, producing an authoritative account of how he got away with so much for so long.
Other People's Money: The Rise and Fall of Britain's Boldest Credit Card Fraudster
Neil Forsyth - 2007
Until, at the tender age of sixteen, he worked out how to use the credit card system to his advantage. Identifying the banks' security weaknesses, utilising his intelligence and charm, Elliot embarked on a massive spending spree. From London to New York, Ibiza to Beverly Hills, he lived the fantasy life, staying in famous hotels, flying first class, blowing a fortune on designer clothes. Time and time again, Elliot managed to wriggle free of the numerous authorities who were on his tail, while his life spiralled out of control. Meanwhile, from a police station at Heathrow, a detective was patiently tracking him down . . . With a likeable hero, filled with humour and as fast-paced as a thriller, Other People's Money is crime writing at its best.'A fascinating and illuminating story' Irvine Welsh'Exhilarating Brit variation on Catch Me if You Can, which never misses an opportunity to up the sweaty-palmed suspense.' "Arena"
Killer Dads: 16 Shocking True Crime Stories of Fathers That Killed
Jack Rosewood - 2021
Jade
Jade Goody - 2006
Bubbly, fun, and full of infectious laughter, Jade quickly captured the hearts of a nation. This volumewhich covers Jade's amazing rags-to-riches storywas initially banned after allegations of racism in the Celebrity Big Brother house, but is now back in print. Jade reveals all about her life, from her troubled childhood to how she found fame and fortune. Packed with incredible highs and tearful lows, Jade tells the story of her successes, failures, and her life with beloved sons Bobby and Freddy.
You Got Nothing Coming: Notes From a Prison Fish
Jimmy A. Lerner - 2002
You wake up in an 8' x 6' concrete-and-steel cell designated "Suicide Watch #3." The cell is real. Jimmy Lerner, formerly a suburban husband and father, and corporate strategic planner and survivor, is about to become a prison "fish," or green new arrival. Taken to a penitentiary in the Nevada desert to begin serving a twelve-year term for voluntary manslaughter, this once nice Jewish boy from Brooklyn ends up sharing a claustrophobic cell with Kansas, a hugely muscled skinhead with a swastika engraved on his neck and a serious set of issues. And if he dares complain, the guards will bluntly tell him, "You got nothing coming."Bringing us into a world of petty corruption, racial strife, and crank-addicted neo-Nazis, Jimmy Lerner gives us a fish’s progress: a brash, compelling, and darkly comic story peopled with characters who are at various times funny, violent, and surprisingly tender. His rendering of prison language is mesmerizingly vivid and exact, and his search for a way not simply to survive but to craft a new way to live, in the most unpropitious of circumstances, is a tale filled with resilience, dignity, and a profound sense of the absurd. In the book’s climax, we learn just what demonic set of circumstances–a compound of bad luck and worse judgment–led him to the lethal act of self-defense that landed him in a circle of an American hell.Electrifying, unforgettable, bracingly cynical, and perceptive, You Got Nothing Coming is impossible to put down or shake off. What the cult favorite Oz is to television, this book is to prose–and all of the events are real.From the Hardcover edition.
Conversations With a Killer (Singles Classic)
Alec Wilkinson - 2016
The murders took place between 1972 and 1978, when he was caught and arrested. No one else in America has ever been convicted of killing so many people. Twenty-seven of the bodies were buried in a crawl space beneath the house where Gacy lived, in a neighborhood out by O’Hare Airport. About many of the murders there was a suggestion of sexual torture. Twenty-one of the murders were committed before Illinois had enacted a death penalty, and for those Gacy was sentenced to twenty-one terms of life in prison. For the others, he was sentenced to death. He is to be killed on the tenth of May.Published just a month before Gacy’s execution, Alec Wilkinson’s Conversations With a Killer presents a chilling portrait of one of America’s most heinous killers as he sits on death row and maintains his innocence. At once too close for comfort and impossible to put down, Conversations With a Killer is a must-read for true crime fans. Conversations with a Killer was originally published in The New Yorker, April 18, 1994.Cover design by Adil Dara.
Fallen Angel: The Unlikely Rise of Walter Stadnick and the Canadian Hells Angels
Jerry Langton - 2006
At only 5 feet 5 inches, Hells Angels president Walter Stadnick is a living, breathing Napoleon for the hell-for-leather set. This book details his improbable rise to power and eventual conviction for gangsterism.
Cullotta: The Life of a Chicago Criminal, Las Vegas Mobster, and Government Witness (True Crime)
Dennis Griffin - 2007
This no-holds-barred biography chronicles the life of a career criminal who started out as a thug on the streets of Chicago and became a trusted lieutenant in Tony Spilotro’s gang of organized lawbreakers in Las Vegas. Cullotta’s was a world of high-profile heists, street muscle, and information—lots of it—about many of the FBI’s most wanted. In the end, that information was his ticket out of crime, as he turned government witness and became one of a handful of mob insiders to enter the Witness Protection Program. “Frank Cullotta is the real thing,” says Nicholas Pileggi in the book’s Foreword, and in these pages, Cullotta sets the record straight on organized crime, witness protection, and life and death in mobbed-up Las Vegas.
Love You Bye: My Story
Scott Mills - 2012
Whether regaling us with a typically embarrassing celebrity anecdote or trying to control a particularly chaotic round of 'innuendo bingo', his company is always brilliantly entertaining, thanks to his infectious enthusiasm and easygoing manner. But behind the microphone sits a man whose route to the top has been anything but straightforward.In this witty and endearingly honest autobiography, Scott describes his incredible career and the hurdles he's faced along the way. Aside from the sometimes humiliating - but frequently hilarious - jobs that are part and parcel of a local radio DJ's apprenticeship, he's had to deal with crippling anxiety attacks, alcohol and weight issues, and a great deal more over the years. But his desire to land his dream job has always prevailed, and he's now one of the nation's favourite radio and television broadcasters, travelling the world on both serious assignments and altogether more bizarre adventures.From washing cars on a garage forecourt off the A4 in the name of radio entertainment, to encounters with some of the world's biggest celebrities, Love You Bye provides Scott's legions of fans with a fascinating look at the life of the man whose voice they know so well.
Born or Bred? Martin Bryant: the making of a mass murderer
Robert Wainwright - 2009
On a sunny Sunday 29 years later, Carleen and Maurice Bryant's beloved first-born loaded the boot of his yellow Volvo with guns and ammunition and returned to Tasmania's historic Port Arthur settlement, scene of many idyllic childhood summers. There, the young man with the striking surfie hair and mesmeric eyes, calmly shot 35 people dead and injured another 21. His crime, the world's worst killing spree by a lone gunman, horrified the nation and changed Australia forever.Thirteen years on, Robert Wainwright and Paola Totaro, both senior news writers, delve backwards over five generations and across two hemispheres to unravel the complete story of Bryant's life and reveal why he committed this heinous crime. They have uncovered Bryant's family history, spoken to his mother, his psychiatrists, lawyer and others who knew him, to piece together the story of eccentric and disparate characters whose lives intersected – with catastrophic results. From Bryant's shocking behind-the-scenes confessions to his own 11th-hour attempt to turn back, this book asks if the Port Arthur massacre could have been prevented. And explains why it could happen again.
Pablo Escobar's Story 1: The Rise
Shaun Attwood - 2018
"Finally, the definitive book about Escobar, original and up-to-date" - UNILAD
Pablo Escobar was a mama's boy who cherished his family and sang in the shower, yet he bombed a passenger plane and formed a death squad that used genital electrocution.Most Escobar biographies only provide a few pieces of the puzzle, but this action-packed 1000-page book reveals everything about the king of cocaine.
Mostly translated from Spanish, Part 1 contains stories untold in the English-speaking world, including:
The tragic death of his youngest brother Fernando.
The fate of his pregnant mistress.
The shocking details of his affair with a TV celebrity.
The presidential candidate who encouraged him to eliminate their rivals.
Gangs of Bombay: From Failing a Million-Dollar Startup to Creating a Criminal Empire
Divyansh Mundra - 2019
When the million-dollar stock prediction startup of Lakshya and Naman (two brilliant IIT-grads) tanks; they are taken in by Manav, their college friend who makes a living out of selling drugs. Debt-ridden and homeless, the two decide to help their friend in selling ‘The Holy Grail’, the newest drug in the Indian markets which is sold for margins never heard before, and the three end up making the quickest money they have seen. Lured and intrigued, they decide to sell and make as much as possible in two months before leaving the drug trade for good, and in that time, they expand their drug enterprise under Lakshya’s guidance by applying their startup strategies. Unknown to them though, they cross paths with the five infamous historical gangs of Bombay, who’ve survived and thrived since the British occupation of the city. Artavardiya, the powerful boss of the Parsi gang Surtis, takes interest in Lakshya and his drug enterprise after being charmed by his brilliance and vision. He takes him under his guidance and that is when Lakshya is able to gauge the extent to which the criminal underbelly of Mumbai is spread, spiralling down and knowing in his heart that he’d never be able to escape. In a tale of gang-wars and blood, love and loss, loyalty and betrayal, and mind-numbing revelations spread amidst brutal action and insane twists— explore the crime of the city that never sleeps. Will Lakshya and his friends expand their drug business like a startup? Will they succeed in dealing with mind-games and bullets of the five historical gangs of Mumbai? Will they survive the trials of their personal lives while the demons of their pasts try to catch up with them? And will these brilliant minds fall against the richest crime syndicates of the country? Read the crime-thriller that would keep you on the edge of your seats, about a few brilliant minds who lost their million-dollar startup and turned their skills to create a criminal empire.
Strangeways: A Prison Officer's Story
Neil Samworth - 2018
A tough Yorkshireman with a soft heart, Sam had to deal with it all – gangsters and gangbangers, terrorists and psychopaths, addicts and the mentally ill. Men who should not be locked up and men who should never be let out.Strangeways is a shocking and at times darkly funny account of life in a high security prison. Sam tackles cell fires and self-harmers, and goes head to head with some of the most dangerous men in the country. He averts a Christmas Day riot after turkey is taken off the menu and replaced by fish curry, and stands up to officers who abuse their position. He describes being attacked by prisoners, and reveals the problems caused by radicalization and the drugs flooding our prisons.As staffing cuts saw Britain’s prison system descend into crisis, the stress of the job – the suicides, the inhumanity of the system, and one assault too many - left Sam suffering from PTSD. This raw, searingly honest memoir is a testament to the men and women of the prison service and the incredibly difficult job we ask them to do.
A Stolen Life
Jaycee Dugard - 2011
It was the last her family and friends saw of her for over eighteen years. On 26 August 2009, Dugard, her daughters, and Phillip Craig Garrido appeared in the office of her kidnapper's parole officer in California. Their unusual behaviour sparked an investigation that led to the positive identification of Jaycee Lee Dugard, living in a tent behind Garrido's home. During her time in captivity, at the age of fourteen and seventeen, she gave birth to two daughters, both fathered by Garrido. Dugard's memoir is written by the 30-year-old herself and covers the period from the time of her abduction in 1991 up until the present. In her stark, utterly honest and unflinching narrative, Jaycee opens up about what she experienced, including how she feels now, a year after being found. Garrido and his wife Nancy have since pleaded guilty to their crimes.
Who Killed Betsy?: Uncovering Penn State University's Most Notorious Unsolved Crime
Derek Sherwood - 2011
Thousands of students were interviewed, but no suspects were produced by the police investigation. 41 years later, the case remains unsolved. This book explores the turbulent environment of the late 1960s at Penn State, along with the details, the suspects, and the reasons behind why the killer was able to escape justice for so long, as well as revealing the main individual now suspected in the murder -- a Penn State University graduate student named Richard Charles Haefner who was uncovered by the author and another researcher during their time spent looking into the case. What the Critics are Saying: "Who Killed Betsy is an essential read for any Penn Stater. The descriptive narratives coupled with the intensive investigative steps taken by the author combine to provide a unique glimpse into the life of Betsy Aardsma, into the life of a Penn State student in the 1960s, and behind the mind of her suspected killer. Whether you agree with the author's findings or not, the book will give you insight into a piece of Penn State history like you've never seen it before." -- Eric Weiss, OnwardState.com "Who Killed Betsy? is the kind of book I like. It takes the reader back in time to a unique locale that was populated with weird and intriguing characters. It is well-written and easy to read. Most of all, it opens a window into a long-hidden mystery. Buy it and read it. You'll love it." -- Robert A. Waters, true crime author ""Who Killed Betsy?" is a riveting spin of real life mystery, highly recommended." -- Midwest Book Review