s&d: True Crime! books

I've been reading Dennis L. Breo's The Crime of the Century, about the Richard Speck murders. Would love to see a first-rate documentary that understands the murders as some kind of unimaginable leap into the future.

whoa harbl, that looks scary/good

added to my list

i think you'll like it. i got it from the library before but on the outside of the book it looks kind of boring (lol) but it's an easy read. also i'm from upstate ny and know some of the names/places in it so it's weird.

Yall know about Thomas McDade? published his key to all murderologies in 1961, under the title “The Annals of Murder: A Bibliography of Books and Pamphlets on American Murders from Colonial Times to 1900.” Amazing decription:
http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-indispensable-guide-to-early-american-murder Good slide show too, of illustrations from these pamphlets etc. he tracked down.

NY Mag on the Slender Man stabbing: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/08/slender-man-stabbing.html

― Elvis Telecom, Friday, 4 September 2015 07:33 (10 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Both girls being tried as adults.

http://nymag.com/thecut/2016/07/slender-man-stabbing-wisconsin-girls-to-be-tried-as-adults-appeals-court.html

I've been enjoying the Casefile podcast at work this week - similar to Sword And Scale but with a focus of Australian crimes for the most part. I may only have been half paying attention but it sounded like the alibi one of the suspects had for the 1986 Russell Street police station bombing was that he was at home making a fake bomb to threaten the same police station with, which was O_o.

I'm just finishing a long book about Jimmy Savile (In Plain Sight). I read it mainly because as an American I was v sketchy on who the fuck he even was, and pretty sketchy on the details of his enormities. Now I want to barf. Great book.

xpost ooh that podcast sounds interesting

stumbled on this at the library yesterday looks pretty fascinating
(i will admit that the Ann Rule blurb on the back cover helped seal the deal, I am easily swayed)

Mississippi Mud: Southern Justice and the Dixie Mafia https://www.amazon.com/dp/1439186650/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_9hOMxbYBJWA55

Would like to read last one covered here, The Wicked Boy, and the PD James True Crime collab mentioned as another in this vein:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/31/books/review/true-crime-addict-james-renner-and-more.html?em_pos=large&emc=edit_bk_20160729&nl=bookreview&nlid=65074007&_r=0

this is def worth checking, also incl. updates, like re the Chauncy's Chance saga:
http://gofraudme.com/

not a book, but a great piece of true crime reporting:

http://www.gq.com/story/the-uber-killer

Just finished David Kushner's "Alligator Candy" memoirs about his 11yo brother's murder

Heartbreaking, tragic & awful but strangely beautiful

A+

sorry for NY Post link - it was the one the publisher tweeted - but there's a new thing coming from Knopf about a quadruple murder at a yogurt shop in '91 and it sounsd pretty amazing

http://nypost.com/2016/10/07/25-years-later-killer-behind-gruesome-yogurt-shop-murders-is-still-out-there/

you had me at yogurt shop in '91

Is it the one in Texas? Ah yes it is.

There was a podcast about this recently but idk if it shed much light:

http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/unblocked/in-sight/e/013-austin-yogurt-shop-murders-46389779

Remember this when it happened. Getting the book...

i think i heard about the 'In the dark' podcast, about the jacob wetterling case, through VG on facebook, and i just finished it today - HOLY SHIT what a total balls-up of an investigation. really thorough investigative reporting.

wait - to clarify, i meant a balls-up of a ~police~ investigation, not the reporter's investigation

yeah it's pretty jawdropping

i had no idea that sheriff departments have virtually no oversight, and that there isn't really any kind of proper/official liason between all law enforcement departments. and the clearance rates of so many counties!! 6% clearance of violent crimes?? that kind of blew my mind as well.

Holy shit I just listened to the MFM episode about Mary Vincent - what a hardcore hero! One of the craziest and worst stories I've ever heard.

yeah it's an incredible survival story

i am finally reading Ghettoside by Jill Leovy - i heard it was great but am now blown away by *how* great

I read Who Killed These Girls? finally a couple of weeks ago. So depressing. So similar to the West Memphis Three case, too, and with (predictably) the same results.

i haven't heard of that one
well-written?

Yeah -- it's the recent one about the yogurt shop murders mentioned above by JCLC. It's exceedingly well-written. The author herself is from Texas and was the mother of a son killed by a drunk driver who was never apprehended. She also wrote a book about Karla Faye Tucker I haven't read, but based on this one I'll probably pick it up.

She doesn't stick to a strict chronology or a deep dive into forensic evidence like a lot of true crime writers. It's a more novelistic approach that really works well.

cool! i'll add it to my list

MFM episodes are getting me through my work day. i'm glad i heard about it through vegemitegirl bc i don't think i would have stuck it out past the first episode - which seemed kind of annoying and boring and had shitty sound quality.

Yeah mad props to veg for hooking us up with MFM. Those ladies make me feel like my brain isn't so broken after all.

i've been listening the jacob wetterling podcast, it's really good. has anyone tried the boston strangler podcast they advertise ad nauseum on there?

i just started it - i really like it, very professional & compassionate, and lots of first-person interviews

glad u guys like MFM! It took me a couple of goes to settle into the chattiness of it but it's v valuable to have a true crime show that doesn't make you hate yourself & shows a bit more compassion

my new favorite is Missing & Murdered, produced by CBC in Canada. Investigates the unsolved murder of an indigenous woman: reporter is indigenous herself and it's very compassionate & well reported.
Has made me cry a couple of times already
only 3 or 4 episodes released so far, but i'm def a fan

did i rep for Accused here? Cinncinnati Inquirer show, reporter on it is also a true crime writer. A+ show about the unsolved murder of a woman in Ohio in 1978. SO good. That one's done unless they have any developments -9 episodes

i liked accused but it was ultimately frustrating if you know what i mean
i tried one ep of mfm and i don't think it's for me. the actual discussion of crimes was ok but there was too much other stuff around it.

I haven't heard many of these post-Serial (post-Sword & Scale?) crime podcasts. I tried out "Pin Kings" the one about the wrestling partners who became a drug kingpin and a DEA agent, but it was like being shouted at by a cable TV station you can't see. Horrible.

yeah accused def won't make you feel good lol

If you can hang with MFM for a couple of eps it may grow on you. But it's not for everyone. ppl have told me Last House on the Left is great, like a male MFM, tried a few eps & i hate it. it's like Reddit: The Podcast

i'm really into professional reporters doing unsolved/cold case true crime podcasts. especially if they are from the area and/or seem to care about the case. I've run into a few amateur gumshoe ones lately that start out "serial was so popular we thought we'd try it too!" and idk that turns me off. These are people's lives you're digging into, many of them still have living family members. It should ~matter~ to you.

Up and Vanished was like that. The origin story for the show is the guy literally admitting "I was into Serial so I went online to find my own case to investigate."

that's one of the ones I tried! I noped out after a couple of episodes.

also a lot of xposts but thx to ShariVari for recommending the CaseFile podcast. I freaking love it. It's such a good straight-down-the-line show, well researched, concise. My dream crime podcast basically. The recent 3-parter on Yorkshire Ripper was a corker, I knew some of the story of this one + who dunnit, but still the story itself had me pretty much on the edge of my seat.

It's funny to listen to the older episodes where he talks a mile a minute (ie Australian).

Also I like it bcz he sounds like my little brother lol

Heard the name "Alice Crimmins" today, found this by Sarah Weinman (incl. her own inquiries and other sources cited, some linked): http://hazlitt.net/longreads/why-cant-you-behave-revisiting-case-alice-crimmins All this is just scratching the surface...

great article! Investigation Discovery's "A Crime To Remember" did a good episode on this iirc

All episodes of 'Death on the Staircase', about the 2001 trail of Michael Peterson, are up on BBC Iplayer at the moment (search for 'Storyville'). Easily as gripping as Making of a Murderer or The Jinx (it helped that I had never heard about the case before watching, and managed to resist googling the trial verdict).

blowpoke

I guess "The Staircase" wasn't a sexy enough title?

I love that series. I want to rewatch it

re: true crime podcasts, this looks interesting: https://gimletmedia.com/crimetown/
each "season" is about crime in a different city, made by one of The Jinx guys

ooh! I'm adding it to my list.

^ really enjoying that pod

Finished Ghettoside. It suffers from embedded reporter syndrome: she's too close to several of the detectives she's writing about, and at least one comes across as total caricature, reminiscent of some of the most gullible reporting from the 2003 Iraq war. I also had trouble keeping the several investigations straight, and following the general chronology outside of the Tennelle murder. The epilogue makes it clear she's writing about a specific time frame with its own particular dynamics of murder and murder investigation, post-90s yet pre-SSI. It's a period piece, not unlike The Wire, yet a somewhat misleading one.

That said, I still loved it, and was riveted throughout. It's a powerful argument for how restricting people's physical and financial mobility on the basis of race creates the circumstances for murder. And the scene with Detective Tennelle on the witness stand towards the end... no spoilers, but oof, just brutal.

cute little story http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-thief-who-steals-only-silver