Book picks similar to
Why Do They Kill?: Men Who Murder Their Intimate Partners by David Adams


nonfiction
psychology
finder-keepers
mental-health-and-criminal-psych

L.E.O.: The True Stories of Lt. Wayne Cotes


Wayne Cotes - 2018
    Some of his tales will seem far fetched, unless you're a cop and then you know that anything can happen - and just when you think you've seen it all, someone will surprise you.

Scarred: The True Story of How I Escaped NXIVM, the Cult That Bound My Life


Sarah Edmondson - 2019
    Lying there completely naked, I am at my most vulnerable but determined to prove my strength. I try to keep my legs closed as my body wills itself to protect my most private area. . . . I tell myself: I am a warrior. I birthed a human. I can handle pain. But nothing could have ever prepared me for the feel of this fire on my skin."The shocking and subersive memoir of a 12-year-NXIVM-member-turned-whistleblower, and her inspiring true story of abuse, escape, and redemption.In 2005, Sarah Edmondson was a young actress starting out in Vancouver and hungry for purpose when she first heard about NXIVM, a personal and professional development company founded by Keith Raniere. Intrigued by the organization's promise to provide the tools, community, and insight to help her reach her potential, Sarah would go on to become one of NXIVM 's most faithful devotees, running a company center and enrolling more than 2,000 members.In this tell-all memoir, Sarah shares her true story from the moment she takes her first NXIVM seminar, to the moment she begins to question why those members who ask questions promptly leave or disappear, to the invitation she accepts from her best friend, Lauren Salzman, to the initiation ceremony for DOS - a "secret sisterhood" within NXIVM. Thanks to Sarah's fearlessness as she put her life on the line, that ceremony would mark the beginning of the cult's end.Complete with personal photographs, Scarred is an eye-opening story about abuses of power, the role female friendships play in cults, and how sometimes the search to be "better" can override everything else.

Britain's Most Notorious Hangmen


Stephen Wade - 2009
    Britain has always been a land of gallows, and every town had its hanging post and local 'turn off man.' First these men were criminals doing the work to save their own necks, and then later they were specialists in the trade of judicial killing. From the late Victorian period, the public hangman became a professional, and in the twentieth century the mechanics of hanging were streamlined as the executioners became adept at their craft. Britain's Most Notorious Hangmen tells the stories of the men who worked with their deadly skills at Tyburn tree or at the scaffolds in the prison yards across the country. Most were steeled to do the work by drink, and many suffered deeply from their despised profession. Here the reader will find the tale of the real Jack Ketch, the cases of neck-stretchers from the drunks like Curry and Askern, to the local workers of the ropes, Throttler Smith and the celebrated Billington and Pierrepoint dynasty. Along with some of the stories of famous killers such as William Palmer and James Bloomfield Rush, here are the bunglings, failures and desperate lives of the notorious hangmen, some who could entertain the vast crowds enjoying the show, and others who always faced the task as a terrible ordeal.

Hunting A Psychopath: The East Area Rapist / Original Night Stalker Investigation


Richard Shelby - 2014
     Hunting A Psychopath chronicles the on-going search for the identity of the serial rapist and murderer known both as the East Area Rapist and Original Night Stalker. The author first lays the ground work for how the investigation was conducted. Then using what reports are still available, plus some personal insights, he examines each assault in the order they occurred. Gradually the methods used by the EAR/ONS in first searching out his victims, then stalking them, come to light. The EAR/ONS first surfaced in June,1976,in Sacramento, CA. He was last heard from in May, 1986,in Irvine, CA, where he brutally murdered an eighteen year old woman. In between those years he stayed busy, assaulting fifty-three people, and murdering twelve more, while spreading a blanket of fear across central CA and parts of Southern CA. It has been over thirty-years now,and still he has not been brought to justice. Although there have been other unsolved crimes of this same nature and of even greater magnitude, this series seems to have had a lasting impact on the public -- enough so that a virtual army of private citizens are pursuing this investigation on their own. When time permits, there are full time police officers who also work this investigation. By examining the information from each assault, it gradually becomes clear just how meticulous the EAR/ONS was. Every detail, from selecting a victim, to the actual assault, appear to have been carefully planned and orchestrated. The EAR/ONS was as devoted to committing sexual assaults and murders as anyone devoted to their own profession. In a distorted way, he was a professional rapist / murderer, and quite probably a certifiable psychopath. Perhaps this continuing interest is because those wanting to involve themselves in the investigation know it can still be brought to a satisfactory conclusion.

Killer Instinct: Having A Mind for Murder


Donald Grant - 2018
    Is it a chill whisper of fear reminding us we too can kill? Grant describes ten true murder cases, each different, each complex, each with unique triggers. Fact leaves fiction for dead. For those directly affected, murder is a sombre and scarring event. For most of us, murder is an arm’s length experience, close enough to frighten and fascinate yet far enough not to traumatise. Grant proposes that our restless chatter about it, our state of heightened alert, our endless viewing, may be play therapy, reassuring us that our own killer instinct is under control.

True Crime UK: Real Criminal Cases From Great Britain (True Crime International English)


Adrian Langenscheid - 2020
    

In Fear of Her Life: The true story of a violent marriage


Frances Smith - 2015
    Married at 16 to a Dublin criminal, she endured years of relentless mental and physical torture until she found the strength to fight back.This is her courageous story told with brutal honesty and at times humour. It chronicles her descent to the brink of suicide and consequent rebuilding of her life.This unique account is essential reading for all those who have ever endured cruelty at the hands of a man, or another human being for that matter. It gives hope to all those who have been victimised.One day she found the courage to change the locks, seek a divorce and let his mistress have him for keeps. It was then that she realised he meant the vows he took on his wedding day - 'Till death do us part…'The names and identities of the characters in the book have been changed to protect the author who still lives in daily terror.

Journey To Hell: Inside the World's Most Violent Prison System


Donald MacNeil - 2006
    The pay was good and the work was easy - or so he thought. Then the truth was revealed: he had to sail to South America to collect one of the biggest shipments of cocaine ever bound for the UK. And to the gangsters who hired him, refusal was not an option.There followed a harrowing journey to Venezuela, where almost £50 million of coke was waiting. But someone had tipped off the authorities. Donald and his fellow crewman were arrested, convicted of drug smuggling and sentenced to six years in the notorious island prison of San Antonio.He soon discovered why Venezuela’s prisons are the most violent in the world, a nightmare gulag where hundreds are killed and thousands maimed every year in riots, vendettas and petty disputes. Thrown into a filthy, over-crowded dormitory known as Pavilion 4, and surrounded by armed gangs, crack addicts, death and disease, he faced a daily fight to survive. Ferocious guards beat prisoners indiscriminately and many cut themselves in “blood strikes” to protest against the scarce food, undrinkable water and lack of medical care. Finally a war broke out between two prison compounds, involving guns, machetes and even grenades.Through it all, and despite witnessing the brutal killing of his friend and mentor, MacNeil clung to the belief that one-day he would be home. Journey To Hell is a harrowing but compelling account of man’s extraordinary will to survive in a world gone mad.

Mistresses of Mayhem: The Book of Women Criminals


Francine Hornberger - 2002
    As detailed here, when it comes to crime, the so-called fairer sex have given men a real run for their money.

Season of Madness


Robert Scott - 2013
    . .Annette Edwards was a vivacious 19-year-old on her way to watch the Fourth of July fireworks. Eighteen-year-old Pam Moore was a former beauty pageant contestant, hitching a ride on a busy street. Linda Slavik was a young mother enjoying a night out with a friend. Annette Selix was just eleven, an innocent child on her way home from the market. Each of them was attacked without warning, brutally assaulted, and left for dead by a bitter, disfigured man in the grip of a violent frenzy: the so-called "Hilltop Rapist." But serial predator Darrell Rich didn't stop at just four victims. He couldn't stop. . ."Scott tells a true story with compassion and taste." --Reviewing the Evidence Praise for Robert Scott and Shattered Innocence "Compelling and shocking. . .a ground-breaking book." --Robert K. Tanenbaum "Fascinating and fresh. . .a fast-paced, informative read." --Sue Russell

The Bigamist: The True Story of a Husband's Ultimate Betrayal


Mary Turner-Thomson - 2007
    The woman on the other end of the line told her that Will Jordan, Mary's husband and the father of her two younger children, had been married to her for fourteen years and they had five children together. The Bigamist is the shocking true story of how one man manipulated an intelligent, independent woman, conning her out of £200,000 and leaving her to bring up the children he claimed he could never have. It's a story we all think could never happen to us, but this shameless con man has been doing the same thing to various other women for at least 27 years, spinning a tangled web of lies and deceit to cover his tracks. How far would you go to help the man you love? How far would he go to deceive you? And what would you do when you found out it was all a lie?

In Control: Dangerous Relationships and How They End in Murder


Jane Monckton-Smith - 2021
    Over half the women killed by men are killed by a current or ex-partner. On average domestic abuse victims are assaulted 68 times before calling the police. There is a domestic violence epidemic happening right now, yet as a society we still turn a blind eye to it. In a culture that has normalised misogyny, we determinedly cling to the belief that domestic violence is a private matter in which both parties bear some responsibility. Even our legal system legitimises the idea that people who hurt or kill their partners have snapped and lost control, committed a 'crime of passion'. But domestic violence has a clear pattern. Jealousy. Controlling behaviour. Stalking. Verbal abuse. A history of violence. Specialising in homicide, stalking and coercive control, internationally renowned forensic criminologist and former police officer Jane Monckton-Smith has spent decades researching domestic violence cases that have ended in homicide. From her research she developed an 8-stage timeline which has revolutionised the approach to predicting homicide in domestic abuse cases. Part case study, part social commentary and part memoir of a woman dealing with domestic homicide, In Control shows that there are clear signs when a relationship is about to turn violent - we've just been trained not to see them.

Pure Evil - How Tracie Andrews murdered my son, decieved the nation and sentenced me to a life of pain and misery


Maureen Harvey - 2007
    His girlfriend, Tracie Andrews, claimed he had been murdered in a road rage attack and, days later, appeared at a press conference making an emotional appeal for witnesses to the crime. During the days following the attack, the horrific truth about what really happened that night became apparent. It was Tracie who had killed Lee and then tried to cover her tracks with a web of lies. In this compelling and harrowing book, Maureen shares the turmoil of a bereaved mother trying to come to terms with the brutal murder of her son while at the same time fighting to bring his killer, who she had welcomed into her home, to justice. She also reveals little-known facts about the investigation and speaks of how her shattered family came through their grief and began to rebuild their lives.

Death of a Dream


Paul LaRosa - 2008
     She was a gifted midwestern beauty, the daughter of Ohio State University's marching band director: to dance on Broadway. Soon after high school graduation, Catherine left Columbus for New York City, determined to be a star. Three years later, she was dead -- murdered in cold blood in her East Side apartment. The shocking revelations that emerged from the police investigation made tabloid headlines: few knew that the struggling artist paid her bills by dancing in a topless club. But there was another hidden facet to Catherine's life -- a shattering love triangle with two men, one of whom would ultimately be convicted of her brutal stabbing death. It's a chilling account of obsession, violence, and the surprising, minute evidence on which the entire case hinged. For a talented young woman reaching for the top, and the heartbroken family she left behind, it is truly the death of a dream.

Being the Soham Psychic


Dennis McKenzie - 2009
    'I am really sorry but both the girls are dead'. Dennis McKenzie was brought to the world's attention following his involvement in the tragic Soham murder case. Making stunningly accurate predictions about the deaths of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, he was dubbed the 'Soham Psychic'. Since then, Dennis's expertise has continually been drawn on to help solve many horrific crimes, including the case of the 'BTK' Killer - a serial killer who bound, tortured and killed women in Wichita, Kansas and evaded the police for over 30 years. An ordinary boy from a working-class background, Dennis never imagined his life would follow such an extraordinary path. From his first psychic sighting at the age of four to his traumatic prediction of a family friend's death, Dennis shares the experiences that have defined his remarkable life in his typically frank and down-to-earth way. This is the fascinating story of how Dennis discovered his gift and how, with the help of his spirit guides, he has shared his psychic wisdom with the world.