True Crime

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A Dark Room In Glitter Ball City : Murder, Secrets, And Scandal In Old Louisville

Author(s):

David Dominé

Description:

"On June 18, 2010, police discover a body buried in the wine cellar of a Victorian mansion in Old Louisville. James Carroll, shot and stabbed the year before, has lain for 7 months in a plastic storage bin--his temporary coffin. Homeowner Jeffrey Mundt and his boyfriend, Joseph Banis, point the finger at each other in what locals dub The Pink Triangle Murder. On the surface, this killing appears to be a crime of passion, a sordid love tryst gone wrong in a creepy old house. But as author David Dominé sits in on the trials, a deeper story emerges: the struggle between hope for a better future on the one hand and the privilege and power of the status quo on the other. As the court testimony devolves into he-said/he-said contradictions, David draws on the confidences of neighbors, drag queens, and other acquaintances within the city's vibrant LGBTQ community to piece together the details of the case. While uncovering the many past lives of the mansion itself, he enters a murky underworld of gossip, neighborhood scandal, and intrigue"-- Provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Dom

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A Taste For Poison : Eleven Deadly Molecules And The Killers Who Used Them

Author(s):

Neil Bradbury

Description:

This book reveals how eleven notorious poisons affect the body--through the murders in which they were used. Poison is one of the most enduring--and popular--weapons of choice for a scheming murderer. How exactly do these poisons work to break our bodies down, and what can we learn from the damage they inflict? Dr. Neil Bradbury explores this most morbidly captivating method of murder from a cellular level. Alongside real-life accounts of murderers and their crimes are the equally compelling stories of the poisons involved: eleven molecules of death that work their way through the human body and, paradoxically, illuminate the way in which our bodies function. This book weaves together the tales of spurned lovers, shady scientists, medical professionals and political assassins to show how the precise systems of the body can be impaired to lethal effect through the use of poison.-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

615.9 Bra

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Confident Women : Swindlers, Grifters, And Shapeshifters Of The Feminine Persuasion

Author(s):

Tori Telfer

Description:

"Why do we love stories about scammers so much? Journalist Tori Telfer dives into the stories of historical female con women and explains why we are so enamored by their scams"-- Provided by publisher.The art of the con has a long and venerable tradition, and its female practitioners are some of the best-- or worst. Telfer introduces us to a host of lady swindlers whose scams ranged from the outrageous to the deadly. Among them: In 1700s Paris, Jeanne de Saint-Rémy scammed the royal jewelers out of a necklace made from six hundred and forty-seven diamonds by pretending she was best friends with Queen Marie Antoinette. Cassie Chadwick got banks to loan her upwards of $40,000 by telling people she was Andrew Carnegie's illegitimate daughter. In the 1970s teenager Roxie Ann Rice scammed the entire NFL. And the scams continue.... -- adapted from jacket

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.163 Tel

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Couple Found Slain : After A Family Murder

Author(s):

Mikita Brottman

Description:

The story of Brian Bechtold, who killed his parents in 1992 at the age of twenty-two. Mikita Brottman takes us into the life of a murderer after his conviction--when most stories end but the defendant's life goes on.-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Bro

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Dear Damage

Author(s):

Ashley F. Farmer

Description:

An essay collection weaving narratives about family, gun violence, art, and the American Dream. Two weeks before her grandfather purchased a gun, Ashley Marie Farmer's grandmother tripped as she walked across their living room. It was a swift accident on an ordinary day: her chin hit the floor; her cervical spine shattered. She asked, "I'm paralyzed, aren't I?" Later, thinking to put her out of her misery, he kissed his sleeping wife of sixty-three years and shot her in the chest. He tried to shoot himself too, but the weapon broke apart in his hands. He was immediately arrested. This is the scene we are greeted with at the outset of Farmer's collection of hybrid essays. One of its greatest features is the variety of voices, a kaleidoscopic approach that corrals in autobiography, audio transcripts, media, legal documents, internet comments, short prose pieces, and more. The result is a moving, deeply satisfying, and eye-opening story.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

814 Far

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Did You Hear What Eddie Gein Done?

Author(s):

Harold Schechter
Eric Powell

Description:

From the moment his unspeakable crimes were discovered in November 1957, the story of the Wisconsin ghoul Ed Gein gripped the world's imagination with mythic power. The mild-mannered, seemingly harmless farmer from Plainfield was monstrously deranged. Harold Schechter and Eric Powell's true-crime graphic telling captures the various worlds Gein inhabited: the grim, Gothic home that proved a breeding ground for madness; the heartland village whose inhabitants couldn't have imagined the monster in their midst; and the grotesque inner realm of Gein's psychotic fantasy life--an unholy brew of human sacrifice, sexual obsession and bizarre mother worship that drove him to commit some of the most appalling acts in the annals of American crime. --From back cover.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Sch

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Don't Call It A Cult : The Shocking Story Of Keith Raniere And The Women Of Nxivm

Author(s):

Sarah Berman

Description:

Sex trafficking. Forced labor. Gaslighting. Berman explores the shocking practices of NXIVM, a cult run by Keith Raniere and many enablers. She details its rise as a personal development company, its ability to evade prosecution for decades, and the investigation that finally revealed its dark secrets to the world.-- adapted from back cover

Format:

Book

Call Number:

366 Ber

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Escape At 10,000 Feet : D.b. Cooper And The Missing Money

Author(s):

Tom (Writer of children's books) Sullivan

Description:

In 1971, D.B. Cooper extorted $200,000 from Northwest Orient airlines. Once the plane was in the air, Cooper jumped out of the rear stairwell and parachuted to safety ; neither he nor the money were ever seen again. This is the only unsolved airplane hijacking in the United States.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

J 364.15 Sul

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Everything Is Fine : A Memoir

Author(s):

Vince Granata

Description:

Vince Granata remembers standing in front of his suburban home in Connecticut the day his mother and father returned from the hospital with his three new siblings in tow. He had just finished scrawling their names in orange chalk on the driveway: Christopher, Timothy, and Elizabeth. Twenty-three years later, Vince was a thousand miles away when he received shocking news that would change his life--his younger brother, Tim, propelled by unchecked schizophrenia, had killed their mother in their childhood home. Not only devastated by the grief of losing his mother, Vince is consumed by the act itself, so incomprehensible that it overshadows every happy memory of life growing up in a seemingly idyllic middle-class family. He decides to examine the disease that irrecoverably changed his family's destiny and piece together his brother's story. Vince begins the painstaking process of recovering the image of his remarkable mother and salvaging the love for his brother as he faces trial for their mother's murder. This is a powerful and reaffirming portrait of loss and forgiveness.-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Gra

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Golden Boy : A Murder Among The Manhattan Elite

Author(s):

John Glatt

Description:

John Glatt tells the true story of Thomas Gilbert Jr., the disturbed young man accused of murdering his father, a Manhattan millionaire and hedge fund founder. Thomas Gilbert Jr. led a charmed life. The son of a wealthy hedge fund manager and a financier, he grew up surrounded by a loving family and all the luxury an Upper East Side childhood could provide. He was strikingly handsome, moving with ease through glittering social circles and following in his father's footsteps to Princeton. His friends saw him as a leader; his parents adored him. But Tommy always felt different, and the cracks in his façade began to show. What started as quiet exhaustion turned into warning signs of OCD, increasing paranoia, and an indescribable, inexplicable hatred of his father. As his parents begged him to seek psychiatric help, Tommy pushed back by self-medicating with drugs and escalating violence. When a fire destroyed his recently-estranged best friend's Hamptons home, Tommy was the prime suspect--but he was never charged. Months later, he arrived at his parents' apartment, calmly asked his mother to leave, and shot his father point-blank in the head. John Glatt takes an in-depth look at the devastating crime that rocked Manhattan's upper class, constructing the agonizing spiral of mental illness that led Thomas Gilbert Jr. to the ultimate unspeakable act.-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Gla

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Last Call : A True Story Of Love, Lust, And Murder In Queer New York

Author(s):

Elon Green

Description:

The true story of the Last Call Killer and the gay community of New York City that he preyed upon. The Townhouse Bar, midtown, July 1992: The piano player seems to know every song ever written, the crowd belts out the lyrics to their favorites, and a man standing nearby is drinking a Scotch and water. The man strikes the piano player as forgettable. He looks bland and inconspicuous. Not at all what you think a serial killer looks like. But that's what he is, and tonight, he has his sights set on a gray haired man. He will not be his first victim. Nor will he be his last. The Last Call Killer preyed upon gay men in New York in the '80s and '90s and had all the hallmarks of the most notorious serial killers. Yet because of the sexuality of his victims, the skyhigh murder rates, and the AIDS epidemic, his murders have been almost entirely forgotten. This true-crime narrative tells the story of the Last Call Killer and the decades-long chase to find him. And it paints a portrait of his victims and a vibrant community navigating threat and resilience.-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Gre

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Murder Book : A Graphic Memoir Of A True Crime Obsession

Author(s):

Hilary Fitzgerald Campbell

Description:

Why is it so much fun to read about death and dismemberment? Lifelong true-crime obsessive and cartoonist Hilary Fitzgerald Campbell tries to puzzle out the answer. A graphic exploration of a lifetime of Ann Rule super-fandom, amateur armchair sleuthing, and a deep dive into the high-profile murders that have fascinated the author for decades, this is a blend of memoir, cultural criticism, and true crime with a focus on the often-overlooked victims of notorious killers.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1 Cam

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She Kills Me : The True Stories Of History's Deadliest Women

Author(s):

Jennifer Wright
Eva Bee

Description:

In every tragic story, men are expected to be the killers. There are countless studies and works of art made about male violence. However, when women are featured in stories about murder, they are rarely portrayed as predators. They're the prey. This common dynamic is one of the reasons that women are so enthralled by female murderers. They do the things that women aren't supposed to do and live the lives that women aren't supposed to want: lives that are impulsive and angry and messy and inconvenient. This book tells the story of 40 women who murdered out of necessity, fear, revenge, and even for pleasure.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Wri

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The Babysitter : My Summers With A Serial Killer

Author(s):

Liza Rodman
Jennifer Jordan
Andi Arndt
Aida Reluzco

Description:

A chilling true story, part memoir, part crime investigation, about a little girl longing for love and how she found friendship with her charismatic babysitter, who was also a vicious serial killer.

Format:

Audiobook

Call Number:

364.1523 Rod

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The Doomsday Mother : Lori Vallow, Chad Daybell, And The End Of An American Family

Author(s):

John Glatt

Description:

John Glatt tells the twisted tale of Lori Vallow, accused of having her two children murdered to start a new life with her new husband, doomsday prepper Chad Daybell. Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell had fled to Hawaii in the midst of being investigated for the disappearance of Lori's children back in Idaho--Tylee and JJ-who hadn't been seen alive in five months. For years, Lori Vallow had been devoted to her children and her Mormon faith. But when her path crossed with Chad Daybell, a religious zealot who taught his followers how to prepare for the end-times, the tumultuous relationship transformed her into someone unrecognizable. As authorities searched for Lori's children, they uncovered more suspicious deaths with links to both Lori and Chad, including the death of Lori's third and fourth husbands, her brother, and Chad's wife. In June 2020, the gruesome remains of JJ and Tylee were discovered on Chad's property, and the newlyweds were arrested and charged with murder. Horrifying statements revealed that the couple's fanatical beliefs had convinced them the children had become zombies--a belief that may have led to their deaths.-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Gla

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The Good Girls : An Ordinary Killing

Author(s):

Sonia Faleiro

Description:

The girls' names were Padma and Lalli, but they were so inseparable that people in the village called them Padma Lalli. Sixteen-year-old Padma sparked and burned. Fourteen-year-old Lalli was an incorrigible romantic. The cousins grew up in Katra Sadatganj, a village in western Uttar Pradesh crammed into less than one square mile of land. It was out in the fields, in the middle of mango season, that the rumors started. Then one night in the summer of 2014 the girls went missing; and hours later they were found hanging in the orchard. Who they were, and what had happened to them, was already less important than what their disappearance meant to the people left behind. The investigation into their deaths would implode everything that their small community held to be true, and instigate a national conversation about sex and violence. Slipping deftly behind political maneuvering, caste systems, and codes of honor in a village in northern India, The Good Girls returns to the scene of Padma and Lalli's short lives and shameful deaths, and dares to ask: What is the human cost of shame?-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1523 Fal

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The Rope : A True Story Of Murder, Heroism, And The Dawn Of The Naacp

Author(s):

Alex Tresniowski
David Sadzin

Description:

In the tranquil seaside town of Asbury Park, New Jersey, ten-year-old schoolgirl Marie Smith is brutally murdered. Small-town officials, unable to find the culprit, call upon the young manager of a New York detective agency for help. It is the detective's first murder case, and now, the specifics of the investigation and daring sting operation that caught the killer is captured in all its rich detail for the first time. Occurring exactly halfway between the end of the Civil War in 1865 and the formal beginning of the civil rights movement in 1954, the brutal murder and its highly-covered investigation sits at the historic intersection of sweeping national forces, religious extremism, class struggle, the infancy of criminal forensics, and America's Jim Crow racial violence. History and true crime collide in this sensational murder mystery featuring characters as complex and colorful as those found in the best psychological thrillers.

Format:

Audiobook

Call Number:

364.1523 Tre

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Truman Capote's In Cold Blood : Bookmarked

Author(s):

Justin St. Germain

Description:

Justin St. Germain writes about a trip he took to Holcomb, Kansas, the site of the Clutter murders that In Cold Blood claims to be about. Within the story of the trip, St. Germain talks about his obsession with Capote's classic, and its influence on the book he was writing at the time about his mother's murder, which became his memoir, Son of A Gun. -- From back cover.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

813.09 Cap

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Walking The Bowl : A True Story Of Murder And Survival Among The Street Children Of Lusaka

Author(s):

Chris Lockhart
Daniel Mulilo Chama

Description:

This is a real-life story of four street children in contemporary Zambia whose lives are drawn together and forever altered by the mysterious murder of a fellow street child. The book immerses readers in the daily lives of four unforgettable characters: Lusabilo, a determined waste picker; Kapula, a burned-out brothel worker; Moonga, a former rock crusher turned beggar; and Timo, an ambitious gang leader. These children navigate the violent and poverty-stricken underworld of Lusaka, one of Africa's fastest growing cities. When the dead body of a ten-year-old boy is discovered under a heap of garbage in Lusaka's largest landfill, a murder investigation quickly heats up due to the influence of the victim's mother and her far-reaching political connections. The children's lives become more closely intertwined as each child engages in a desperate bid for survival against forces they could never have imagined. The book exposes the perilous aspects of street life through the eyes of the children who survive, endure and dream there, and what emerges is an ultimately hopeful story about human kindness and how one small good deed, passed on to others, can make a difference in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

362.968 Loc

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We Own This City : A True Story Of Crime, Cops, And Corruption

Author(s):

Justin Fenton

Description:

Baltimore, 2015. Riots were erupting across the city as citizens demanded justice for Freddie Gray, a twenty-five-year old black man who had died while in police custody. At the same time, drug and violent crime were surging, and that year, Baltimore would reach its deadliest year in over two decades: 342 homicides in a city of six hundred thousand people. Under intense scrutiny--and a federal investigation over Gray's death--the Baltimore police department turned to Sergeant Wayne Jenkins, and his elite unit, the Gun Trace Task Force, to help get guns and drugs off the street. Despite intense scrutiny, startling police corruption scandals unfolded. Entrusted with fixing the city's drug crisis, Jenkins and his posse of corrupt cops were instead stealing from its citizens--skimming from the drug busts they made, pocketing thousands in cash found in private homes, and planting fake evidence to throw Internal Affairs off their scent. Their brazen crime spree would go unchecked for years, and would result in countless wrongful convictions, the death of an innocent person--and the mysterious death of one implicated cop, who was shot in the head just one day before he was scheduled to testify against the Force. Justin Fenton reports on this rogue police unit and the American city they held hostage.-- From statement provided by publisher.

Format:

Book

Call Number:

364.1323 Fen