The book is dedicated to my mother-in-law, Phyllis McCarthy; I will also acknowledge the help and support of Steve and Patty Metzler, Carol Wells, Georgine Ent and Nell Ritchey, who are relatives.
Mike Webber worked with me during part of the time this book was in progress. I used to say to him, “Mike, there’s this book I need; could you find a copy of it?” and he would come in four days later with a copy of the book and say that it had cost him 85 cents on eBay. It’s an amazing world we live in. I am not acknowledging eBay; screw ’em.
I am certain I have forgotten someone. I shall remember you next week, and thank you then, but the book will gone and it will be too late, so let me apologize here and thank you later.
Any errors appearing in this book are, of course, the responsibility of the author. Almost all of the people acknowledged here helped to spot errors and remove them, but I make so many mistakes I can defeat a legion of editors, and I am sure that some things slipped through.
I shall resist the impulse to express my gratitude to Richard Hickock and Perry Smith, or even to Truman Capote. I owe so much of my life to the newspapers. I can’t say when or why I started reading crime stories; they have just always been a part of me. I grew up sort of in the middle of nowhere, without television or money, cut off from most of the human race by rudeness and fear, obsessing endlessly about the nature of a world that lay outside my reach and my experience, a little bit as if the universe was an unsolved crime and each newspaper was a clue. I remember in the fifth grade I was supposed to prepare a report on current events, which I had forgotten about, but I stood up and chattered about Caryl Chessman until the teacher told me to sit down. My sister Georgine would go to the library and bring home a stack of books, and I would sort through them for the crime books; I should acknowledge Georgine, and the library. Each crime is a clue to human nature—and not always a gloomy one; I still believe this.
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BILL JAMES made his mark in the 1970s and 1980s with his Baseball Abstracts. He has been tearing down preconceived notions about America’s national pastime ever since. His books include The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, Whatever Happened to the Hall of Fame?, Win Shares and The Neyer/James Guide to Pitchers (with Rob Neyer). James’s essays are published annually in The Bill James Gold Mine and regularly on Bill James Online. He is currently the Senior Advisor on Baseball Operations for the Boston Red Sox. James lives in Lawrence, Kansas.
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Index
abortion, 18–19, 22, 286
Adams, Charles Francis, 29–30
Adams, John, 29
Adams, John Quincy, 29
Adams, Randall Dale, 287, 288, 289, 378
African Americans:
executions of, 286
Jewish relations with, 117–18
murders of, 25, 96
Southern prejudice against, 116
see also Scottsboro Boys
Airman and the Carpenter, The (Kennedy), 152–53
Alcatraz, 219, 220
Alcott, Bronson, 30
Alexander, Shana, 446
Alibrandi, Tom, 336, 446
Allen, Arthur Leigh, 265, 266, 272
American Tragedy (Schiller and Willwerth), 451
America’s Most Wanted, 281, 282
Ames, Aldrich, 452
Anastasia, Albert, 140
And I Don’t Want to Live This Life (Spungen), 310, 452
Andrews, Lowell Lee, 216–17
Anthony, Casey, 434–35, 443
Anthony, Caylee, 434, 435, 443
anthrax investigation, 425–27
Anti-Defamation League, 117
Apronia, 1
Arbuckle, Fatty, 468, 469
Aristotle, 36
Arndt, Linda, 387, 388, 394
Aronson, Harvey, 204, 233
Arran, 33–35
Arts & Entertainment, 7
Arvizo, Gavin, 431
Audubon, John James, 30, 31
automobile industry, 319
Avery, Paul, 266
Babyak, Jolene, 180, 220, 446
Bad Company (Wick), 453
Bailey, F. Lee, 88, 198, 204, 241, 446
in Boston Strangler case, 228–30, 232, 233, 234, 235, 236, 239, 240, 241
in O.J. Simpson trial, 241
in Sam Sheppard case, 200, 203, 241
ballistics, in Kennedy assassination, 246, 247–53
Barker, Ma, 173
Basement, The (Millett), 451
Baxter, Linda, 386
Beineman, Karen, 258, 260
Bell, Janice, 385
Belli, Melvin, 178, 265
Beltway Snipers, 108, 430
Bembenek, Lawrencia, 317, 374–75
Bening, Annette, 319
Bennett, Glen, 251
Berdella, Bob, 360
Berkowitz, David, 292, 293, 304
Berry, Howard K., 100, 447
Betrayal (Weiner, Johnston and Lewis), 452
Biography, 7
Bird Man: The Many Faces of Robert Stroud (Babyak), 180, 220, 446
Birdman of Alcatraz (film), 108, 220, 223
see also Stroud, Robert
Birdman of Alcatraz (Gaddis), 108, 219–20, 223, 449
Bishop, Jim, 253, 447
Black Dahlia, 157, 171, 182–86, 241, 352
Black Dahlia Files, The: The Mob, the Mogul, and the Murder That Transfixed Los Angeles (Wolfe), 183–84, 185–86, 453
Blake, Robert, 218, 285, 425
Blind Eye (Stewart), 452
blood spatter, 65, 201, 210, 212
Body Heat (film), 139
Bond, Minnie, 99
Bond, Stanley, 274, 275, 278, 285
Bonnie and Clyde, 96, 108, 173
Borden, Abby, 43, 44, 50, 52, 54, 57–58, 60, 61
Borden, Andrew, 43, 44, 52, 54, 57, 60, 61, 62
Borden, Emma, 56
Borden, Lizzie, 36, 43–44, 49, 50–65, 66–67, 68
Boston, 230
Boston, Mass., 19th century elite in, 30
Boston Cultivator, 23
Boston Globe, 101, 226
Boston Record, 230
Boston Strangler, 226–40, 241, 244, 258, 304, 370
Boston Strangler, The (Frank), 231, 233, 449
Boston Stranglers, The (Kelly), 230, 233, 450
Bosworth, Charles, 398
Bottomly, John S., 227, 230, 244
Bottomly commission, 228, 229, 232, 258
Boyce, Christopher, 450
Boy Next Door, The (Brinck), 349
Bradfield, Bill, 297, 298
Brady v. Maryland (1963), 101, 105
Breckinridge, Henry, 369
Brinck, Gretchen, 349
“Bring Back Our Darling,” 38
Brockway, W. H., 38
Broken Vows, 384
Bronx Home News, 146, 156
Brooke, Edward, 227
Brown, Theresa, 355
Browne, Earle, 252–53
&n
bsp; Brudos, Jerome, 291
Brumberg, Joan Jacobs, 69, 447
Bruno, Anthony, 326, 447
Brussel, James, 231, 234
BTK murders, 289, 339, 340
Buck, Morris, 75, 81
Buckley, William F., Jr., 449
Buda, Mario, 124–25, 126, 127
Budd, Grace, 301
Bugliosi, Vincent, 447
Bulfinch, Charles, 29
Bullitt, 266
Bundy, Ted, 167, 172, 230, 241, 289, 291–92, 293, 304, 339, 360, 370
Burger, Robert, 345–46
Burger, Warren, 286, 309
Burns Detective Agency, 81
Burr, Aaron, 11, 12, 13, 15
Butcher, Baker: A True Account of a Serial Murderer (Gilmour and Hale), 331
Butler, Joan, 355
Cabell, Mrs. Earle, 252
Cagney, James, 76
Cain, James M., 139
California Supreme Court, 188, 223, 366
Campbell, Ian, 108, 220–21, 222
Canadian Supreme Court, 345
Canfield, Chloe, 75, 80, 81
Canning, Elizabeth, 3–6, 8, 9, 25
capital punishment, see death penalty
Capone, Al, 101, 173
Capote, Truman, 217, 218, 344, 447
Carlo, Philip, 447
Carlyle, Thomas, 457
Carpenter, David, 337
Carroll, Hattie, 472, 473, 474
Carter, Jimmy, 241
Casals, Pablo, 187
Case Closed (Posner), 245, 247, 249, 251
Cash, Johnny, 450, 472, 473
Cast of Killers, A (Kirkpatrick), 450, 467, 468–69, 470–71
CBS, 247, 368
Cell 2455 Death Row (Chessman), 190, 447
Chandler, Harry, 185
Chaney, James, 118, 243–44
Channing, Stockard, 297
Chapman, Duane (Dog), 430–31
Chase, Alston, 447
Chase, David, 326–27
Chase, Richard, 291, 336
Cher, 255
Chessman, Caryl, 153, 187–93, 447
Chicago, Ill., early 20th century legal practices in, 86
Chicago Seven, 87
Chicago Tribune, 40
Chikatilo, Andrei, 163–64, 242–43, 447–48
children:
crime stories about, 25
murders of, 95, 397, 443
sexual abuse cases involving, 317, 431, 432
see also Phagan, Mary; Ramsey, JonBenet
Cho, Seung-Hui, 434
Christgen, Eric, 299, 300, 302
Christian Register, 23
civil rights movement, 118, 243–44, 449
Civil War, U.S., 31, 32, 116
Clark, Delores, 282
Clark, Marcia, 45, 46, 371
Clarke, James W., 294, 295, 336, 447
Clarkson, Lana, 431
Claudius, 1
Clemens, Will, 21, 22
Clinton, Bill, 241
Clutter, Herb, 217
Clutter family, 108, 217–18
CNN, 392
Cochran, Johnnie, 84, 241, 371
Colbert, Maizie, 120–22, 445–46
Collins, Joan, 76
Collins, John Norman, 172, 258–61, 291
Colt, Samuel, 32
Compulsion, 223
Condit, Gary, 424, 425
Condon, John F., 145–47, 149, 150, 151–52, 154, 155, 156, 369
confessions, 47, 221, 236, 240
Congress, U.S., 426
Conley, Jim, 111–13, 114, 115, 116
Connally, John, 247, 249
Conradi, Peter, 447–48
Contract on America, 254
Cook, Richard, 19, 20
Cooper, Cynthia L., 204, 213
Copeland, Faye, 357
Copeland, Ray, 356–58, 360
Copeland Killings, The (Miller), 358
Coppolino, Carl, 240
Corll, Dean, 291
Cormier, Frank, 253
Corona, Juan, 278–81
Corona, Natividad, 279, 280
Corrigan, William, 201–2
Costas, Bob, 195–96
Cotten, Joseph, 269
Couey, John, 432, 443
Courtroom: The Story of Samuel S. Leibowitz (Reynolds), 101, 451
Coyote, Peter, 297
Crazymaker (O’Donnell), 316
crime books, 7, 9, 99–100, 217–18, 222, 223, 294–95, 316, 321–22, 345–46, 384–85
authors’ ignorance of subject matter in, 471
author’s recommended list of, 446–53
“author’s solutions” in, 296–97, 468–69, 470–71
on Black Dahlia case, 182–83
on Boston Strangler case, 230, 231, 232–33, 235
on Kennedy assassination, 245, 247, 248, 253–54, 255, 451
on Lindbergh case, 148, 150, 152–56
outlandish theories in, 231, 352, 468–69, 470–71
police in, 349
on Ramsey case, 398–99, 400, 401–3, 405, 451
research in, 455–56
on Rosenberg case, 196–97, 451, 452
on Sam Sheppard case, 199–200, 203, 204–5, 210, 451
about serial murderers, 292–93, 321–22, 331, 335, 336–37, 352–54, 355–56, 359, 447–48, 450, 451
serial murderers’ descriptions in, 336–37
sympathy in, 283–84
tangential evidence in, 48
crime rates:
in 18th–19th century New York, 11
historical American, 31–32, 33, 93, 95–96
mid-1960s explosion in, 223, 224, 286, 443–44
crime stories:
academic attitude toward, 2, 7–8, 9, 22
compelling elements of, 8, 24–25, 29, 30, 35–36, 40, 53, 77, 106–10, 113–14, 139, 369–70, 374–75
criticism of, 7–8, 193, 437–42
of early 20th century, 68, 69–79, 139–40, 466–72
endurance of, 2
fictional elements in, 374–75, 382, 386
fictionalization of, 244–45, 345, 368, 465
and justice system, 109, 305, 306, 443, 444
media coverage of, 6, 7, 24, 107, 130, 156–58, 186, 241–44, 293, 365–66, 369, 438–41, 443, 444
in newspapers, 15, 22, 68, 107, 157–58, 173, 453, 467, 469–70
of 19th century, 33, 453
of 1930s, 173–74
politics and, 108, 127, 197
significance of, 8–9, 22, 94, 103, 127–28, 140, 256, 305, 306, 341–42, 439–40, 441–44
songs written on, 472–73
sympathetic suspects in, 316–22
universality of, 6, 7
see also media
criminal profiling:
and Lizzie Borden case, 64
and Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run case, 164–72
Croucher, Richard, 13
Cuckoo’s Egg, The (Stoll), 363, 452
Cunanan, Andrew, 173
Curtis, Tony, 230, 450
Dahmer, Jeffrey, 108, 160, 241, 360
Dalton, Emmett, 41
Dalton, J. Frank, 41
Daniels, Paul Michael, 375, 377, 380
Dannehl, Sean, 348–49
Danson, Ted, 222
Darden, Chris, 372
Darrow, Clarence, 82, 83–88, 110, 122, 174, 241
Darrow (Tierney), 86
D’Autremont, Hugh, 136, 137
D’Autremont, Roy and Ray, 135–37
Davies, John, 347, 348, 349
Day Kennedy Was Shot, The (Bishop), 253
Deadly Lessons (Englade), 367, 368
Deakin, James, 448
Dear, William, 312–13, 314, 448
Death, Dr., 288
Death in Belmont, A (Junger), 233, 234, 235–36, 450
Death of Innocence, The (Ramsey and Ramsey), 398
Death of Old Man Rice, The (Friedland), 74
death penalty, 69, 188, 189–90, 193, 197, 222, 261, 285–86, 288, 342, 345,
422, 444
Death Sentence (Sharkey), 281, 283, 452
Debs, Eugene, 83
Defense Never Rests, The (Bailey and Aronson), 198, 204, 233, 235, 236, 446
DeFreeze, Donald, 277–78
Degnan, Suzanne, 181
DeLorean, John, 318–19
DeMeo, Roy, 324–25, 326
Democratic Convention of 1968, 87
DeSalvo, Albert, 228–40, 241, 275, 304
Des Moines Tribune, 467
detective stories, 18, 22
Devil in the White City, The (Larson), 67–68, 450
Dickens, Charles, 31
Dickinson, Emily, 30
Dietz, Park, 325
Dillard, Tom, 252
Dillinger, John, 108, 173
Dirty Harry, 266
Discovery Channel, 7
DNA, 47–48, 49
Doctorow, E. L., 79
doctors, 168, 352
Dodd, Westley Allan, 331
Dolezal, Frank, 160–61, 163
Donahue, Howard, 245, 247–48, 249, 250–51, 252, 253, 254
Dondoglio, Nestor, 123
Dorsey, Hugh, 114–15
Double Indemnity (Cain), 139
Double Jeopardy (Hill), 365, 449
Douglas, Joe, 38, 39, 40
Douglas, John, 164, 230, 291, 292, 293, 339–40
Doyen, Dorcas, see Jewett, Helen
Doyen, Jacob, 455
Dreams of Ada, The (Mayer), 340–41, 451
Dreyfus case, 195
Dreyfus cases, 107, 108, 115, 128, 177
Drimmer, Frederick, 190–92
Dr. Sam: An American Tragedy (Pollack), 204
Ducet, Jeffrey, 319–20
DuClos, Bernard, 331
Duke Lacrosse case, 4, 109, 114, 316, 432–34
Duncan, Ron, 276
Dungeon Master, The (Dear), 314, 448
Dungeons & Dragons, 311
Dunkle, Jon, 305, 347–51
Dwight, John, 26
Dylan, Bob, 472–73
Eastwood, Clint, 266
Eberle, Danny Joe, 335
Eberling, Richard, 204, 205, 206, 210–11, 212, 213
Echoes in the Darkness (Wambaugh), 297–98
Edwards, Willie, 243
Egbert, James Dallas, III, 310–14
Eller, John, 391, 392, 393, 399, 408
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 30
Endure and Conquer: My Twelve-Year Fight for Vindication (Sheppard), 204
Englade, Ken, 368
Era, 21
Escobedo v. Illinois, 221
Evans, John, 98
evidence, 44–50
adultery as, 202–3, 380–82
behavior as, 55–56, 382
in Boston Strangler case, 231
in Caryl Chessman case, 192
in criminal cases, 9, 14, 45–46, 52–53, 56–57, 59