True Con Artist

1982: Oregon businessman Phil Champagne, age 52, dies in a tragic boating accident off Lopez Island. He is survived by one ex-wife, four adult children, an octogenarian mother, and two despondent brothers. Phil didn't know he was dead until he read it in the paper. All things considered, he took it rather well. So did Phil's brother, Mitch, the beneficiary of a 1.5 million dollar policy on Phil's life.

In the summer of 1913, under the cover of London’s perpetual smoggy dusk, two brilliant minds are pitted against each other - a celebrated gentleman thief and a talented Scotland Yard detective - in the greatest jewel heist of the new century. An exquisite strand of pale pink pearls, worth more than the Hope Diamond, has been bought by a Hatton Garden broker. Word of the “Mona Lisa of Pearls” spreads around the world, captivating jewelers as well as thieves.

Millions of people who turn to digital social networks for friendship, connection, or love wind up devastated—and not just emotionally. Fraudsters doling out online harassment, destroying reputations, and causing their victims to rack up crushing debt are on the rise, and dismissive authorities and institutions are leaving said victims desperate.

En 1927, Charley Braggs llegó a casa y encontró a dos de sus hijas muertas. El médico que observó a las niñas en sus últimos momentos diagnosticó que había sido a causa de una intoxicación alimentaria. No fue necesario realizar una autopsia. Su esposa, Nannie, atribuyó a los granos de avena contaminados como la causa de la intoxicación, pero Charley no estaba convencido.

When it comes to cold-blooded murder, nobody who is a part of civilized society can stand the thought that someone out there would actually get away with such horrendous crimes. We all want these wayward criminals to be caught and held accountable for their actions. This book demonstrates the lengths that some have gone to and the depths that they have plumbed just to make sure that the long arm of the law finally reached the barbaric perpetrators of unspeakable deeds and brought them to justice.

The ultimate collection of Australia's craziest cons and mad schemes from a master storyteller. Australia is the birthplace and setting of some of the wildest, craziest and least-likely-to-succeed cons and rorts in history. From the cleverest double-crosses to the most unlikely and maddest schemes, master storyteller Jim Haynes reminds us that we've never been shy of pulling a trick or two.

Napoleon famously observed that "history is a set of lies agreed upon", and Edward Steers Jr. investigates six of the most amazing frauds ever to gain wide acceptance in this engrossing book. The controversies that Steers presents show that there are two major factors involved in the success of a hoax or forgery - greed and the desire to believe.

"Being in the same room with him and looking at him, I realized that one day I would be in the same position as he, facing death. Before it happens I mean to do the things I want to do. I will not end up saying I wish I had." When Sal Mineo said those words about his dying father, nobody could have predicted that just four short years later, he would himself be facing death.

Vier erschütternde wahre Kriminalgeschichten in einem Band von bestsellerautor Ryan Green.

In November 1974, British MP and former cabinet minister John Stonehouse walked into the sea off a beach in Miami and disappeared, seemingly drowned. Then he was found—on the other side of the world, in Australia—and his extraordinary story began to come to light: a Labour cabinet minister and a devoted family man, also in a long-term affair with his secretary, and a spy for the Czech State Security agency, who had committed fraud and attempted to fake his own death to escape catastrophic business failures.

London, 1932. Thomas James Wise is the toast of the literary establishment. A prominent collector and businessman, he is renowned on both sides of the Atlantic for unearthing the most stunning first editions and bringing them to market. Pompous and fearsome, with friends in high places, he is one of the most powerful men in the field of rare books. One night, two young booksellers - one a dishevelled former communist, the other a martini-swilling fan of detective stories - stumble upon a strange discrepancy. It will lead them to suspect Wise and his books are not all they seem.

Would you like to find out how to avoid being manipulated by people you trusted? If your answer to this question is yes, then keep reading to find out more. Human beings have the unique capacity to alter their environment to suit their needs. This capacity to alter the environment can be stretched as far as manipulating others to inadvertently do their bidding. This poses a significant threat to the much-treasured freedoms that ought to be enjoyed by all without external influence.

London 1901. The city is in the grip of "monkey man mania". Intrepid explorer Drake Patterson has caused a media storm following his astonishing discovery of a frozen ancient man in the remote Himalayan Mountains. This primal man has been triumphantly transported back to England as proof of the missing link in evolutionary theory. The upcoming auction of the specimen causes a stir amongst academics and the board of the British Museum.

In the heart of Indian country in the American west, clandestine criminals were profiting greatly from the sale of sacred Native American artifacts stolen from tribal lands. These artifacts were so ancient they had been used since the migration of the first Americans into North America some 15,000 years ago. In the year 1998, the illegal trafficking of these artifacts peaked in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

The OneCoin global cryptocurrency fraud stole tens of billions of dollars from ordinary people around the world. Unlike Madoff or Enron, who relieved the world’s wealthiest investors of their cash, the exploiting genius of the OneCoin scam was targeting the poorest people in the world, the “unbanked”—those who struggled to live or get mainstream banking support. The arrogant assumption was that the downtrodden wouldn't have the means or will to fight back. They didn’t reckon on Jen McAdam—a teenage mother, young grandmother, and modern-day Erin Brockovich.

We all know Sydney is full of corruption and crime, but none of us expected to read about a Sydney businessman being shot in the back of his head, in his driveway, in front of his nine-year-old son, in Cremorne. Nor that the order would come from a Point Piper millionaire. Kate McClymont is Australia's best-known investigative journalist. Kate and McGurk received intel that he was going to be 'hit'. Before the two could meet, McGurk was murdered.

Don't hint that Richard Hauptmann was executed as an innocent man. Don't dare to think that Charles Lindbergh had clean hands when it came to the kidnapping and murder of his son. It's unpopular and may be dangerous to say aloud, but there was no kidnapping at the Lindbergh estate in 1932...No kidnapping...Instead of the story of the American hero and the trial, those parts are summarized, and the emphasis is on the actual evidence and the investigation. Hauptmann was innocent, there was no kidnapping, and the true killer is named.

En 1988, los detectives del Departamento de Policía de Sacramento, fueron llamados para investigar la desaparición de un hombre en su última dirección conocida: una casa de huéspedes para ancianos, indigentes y enfermos mentales. La propietaria, Dorothea Puente, era una adorable anciana que cuidaba de los vagabundos y del resto de los náufragos de la sociedad. ¿Estaban perdiendo el tiempo persiguiendo a una anciana encantadora y caritativa o se estaban acercando a una asesina encubierta que explotaba a los miembros más vulnerables de la sociedad?

If you want to keep a secret, put it on Facebook! What would you do if you found out that the man you married had a secret life that culminated in the ultimate betrayal? Yve Gibney tells the real-life story from their love-at-first-sight chance encounter while working as expats in Nigeria to the gradual realization that her husband of 19 years, Maurice Gibney, was actually full of deceit, manipulation, and coercive control and that their marriage had been a lie from the moment they had met.

Nina, a new graduate from fashion design in college, gladly accepts the offer to have her palm read as a graduation gift. Smiling, the palm reader tells Nina that she has a long lifeline, as she traces it on her hand. As soon as the words are uttered, the palm reader’s facial expression turns to one of fear. In broken English, she whispers, “Break – very bad break in middle of life. Maybe you die.”