True Crime Memoir

When Scott Payne was growing up, he never envisioned a future that included what happened on Halloween night 2019. Out in the woods of Georgia, he tried desperately to save a goat from being sacrificed in a ritual by a group of neo-Nazis without revealing that he was actually an undercover agent. Now, this retired FBI agent reveals how and why he infiltrated the rapidly growing American Nazi group, The Base. Known as the “Hillbilly Donnie Brasco,” Payne was guided through some of the most terrifying assignments in the FBI’s history by his devotion to his family and his Christian faith.

In Curated True Crime Volume #13: Cradle Crime, you'll hear about some of the most heartbreaking, premeditated, and tragic murders by people who victimized the most innocent and defenseless victims there are. Follow law enforcement, detectives, and forensic experts as they connect the threads of evidence that lead to relentlessly solving these senseless crimes.

Submersed begins with an investigation into the beguiling subculture of DIY submersible obsessives: men and women—but mostly men—who are so compelled to sink into the deep sea that they become amateur backyard submarine-builders. Matthew Gavin Frank explores the origins of the human compulsion to sink to depth, from the diving bells of Aristotle and Alexander the Great to the Confederate H. L. Hunley, which became the first submersible to sink an enemy warship before itself being sunk during the Civil War.

In The Killer Across the Table, John E. Douglas, the legendary FBI criminal profiler, number one New York Times best-selling author, and inspiration for Netflix’s Mindhunter, delves deep into the lives and crimes of four of the most disturbing and complex predatory killers, offering never-before-revealed details about his profiling process and divulging the strategies used to help crack some of America’s most challenging cases.

For his victims, for their families and for the investigators tasked with finding him, the senselessness and brutality of the Golden State Killer's acts were matched only by the powerlessness they felt at failing to uncover his identity. Then, on April 24, 2018, authorities arrested 72-year-old Joseph James DeAngelo at his home in Citrus Heights, Calif., based on DNA evidence linked to the crimes. Amazingly, it seemed, evil finally had a name. Please note: This work contains descriptions of violent crime and sexual assault and may not be suitable for all listeners.

Four years after his father died a hero's death fighting a fire, Tim Ginocchetti was behind bars for killing his mother. How one tragedy led to another is a true story that puts a horrifying twist on the familiar one of bullied gay teens. In this case, the bully was the teen's own mother, and instead of harming himself he killed her in a momentary but irreversible explosion of rage.

Richard Trenton Chase started life without a hitch. Popular and well-liked, his future looked bright as the Cali sun...but those around knew nothing of the dark truths that he fostered. His parents’ marriage was rapidly falling apart, and soon he began to suffer from strange health problems. Rapidly declining, he decided there was only one solution….

The First Counterspy is the story of spy, counterspy, and an American family unwittingly caught in its web. Until this case, the FBI had never recruited civilian counterspies to catch a Soviet agent. The first two were Larry Haas, a leading aviation engineer at Bell Aviation, and Leona Franey, head librarian at Bell's technical library. The FBI pitted them against Andrei Ivanovich Schevchenko, operating legally as one of the highest Soviet officials in the United States during WWII, and illegally as head of a wide-ranging spy network hidden within the American aviation industry.

On October 20, 1973, in San Francisco, a White couple strolling down Telegraph Hill was set upon and butchered by four young Black men. Thus began a reign of terror that lasted six months and left 15 Whites dead and the entire city in a state of panic. The perpetrators wanted nothing less than a race war.

On November 7, 1974, a nanny named Sandra Rivett was bludgeoned to death in a Belgravia basement. Veronica, Countess of Lucan, was also attacked. The man named as perpetrator of these crimes, Richard John Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan, disappeared in the early hours of the following morning. The case, solved in the eyes of the law, has retained its fascination ever since. Laura Thompson narrates the story that led up to that cataclysmic event, and draws on her considerable forensic skills to re-examine the possible truths behind one of postwar Britain's most notorious murders.

It is no secret that true crime murder stories are not for the faint of heart. They can lead you to double-check your windows and doors at night, and question everything you thought or believed about human nature. Yet they are intriguing and fascinating at the same time. What is it that makes us different from those who take the lives of others? That is a question that many ask themselves, and these true crime stories help to identify the method and psychology behind some of the most terrifying killers in modern history.

In June of 1968, Irene Izak, a young French teacher from Scranton, Pennsylvania, was pulling an all-nighter on the road toward the promise of a new life in Quebec. The last time she was seen alive was at 2:09 a.m. by a toll collector at Thousand Island Bridge, who claimed Irene was visibly afraid. Less than a half-hour later, Irene was found bludgeoned to death in a ravine bordering DeWolf Point State Park. There were no signs of robbery or sexual assault. For reasons unknown, Irene had been compelled to pull off the interstate and abandon her car, only to be brutally murdered.

For nearly 80 years, a huge portion of coastal South Africa was closed off to the public. With many of its pits now deemed "overmined" and abandoned, American journalist Matthew Gavin Frank sets out across the infamous Diamond Coast to investigate an illicit trade that supplies a global market. Immediately, he became intrigued by the ingenious methods used in facilitating smuggling - particularly, the illegal act of sneaking carrier pigeons onto mine property, affixing diamonds to their feet, and sending them into the air.

Award-winning memoirist and New York Times best-selling author Nuala O'Faolain branches into new territory with her biography of the infamous Irish-American prostitute and thief Chicago May. O'Faolain uses May's autobiography, primary sources from the turn of the 19th century, and her own experience as an Irishwoman to bring May and all her heartache, deception, and violence to life.

Raised in a South Boston housing project, James "Whitey" Bulger became the most wanted fugitive of his generation. In this riveting story, rich with family ties and intrigue, award-winning Boston Globe reporters Kevin Cullen and Shelley Murphy follow Whitey’s extraordinary criminal career - from teenage thievery to bank robberies to the building of his underworld empire and a string of brutal murders.

On February 15, 2010, Joseph McStay, his wife Summer, and their two young sons were reported missing from their new home in San Diego County. Their truck sat in the driveway. Their dogs were outside without food. But investigators found no blood, signs of a struggle, or clues to their whereabouts. Did the family take an unannounced vacation? Were they running away from personal problems? Or were they victims of foul play?

When Nathan Carman, a young man with a complicated past, is miraculously rescued from a lifeboat bobbing in the unforgiving North Atlantic, questions swirl about the fate of his mother, who is presumed to have drowned when their fishing boat sank. Nathan is in remarkably good shape for being lost at sea for a week, and his account of what exactly happened out there on the waves raises questions from family members and law enforcement.

Looking for an escape from childhood abuse, Reymundo Sanchez turned away from school and baseball to drugs, alcohol, and then sex and was left to fend for himself before age 14. The Latin Kings, one of the largest and most notorious street gangs in America, became his refuge and his world, but its violence cost him friends, freedom, self-respect, and nearly his life. This is a raw and powerful odyssey through the ranks of the new Mafia.

Capital punishment was abolished for murder in Great Britain in 1969, but remained as the punishment for high treason until as recently as 1998, demonstrating how seriously we take the crime of betraying your country. But even with the threat of the noose hanging over them, many still chose the path of treachery during the cataclysmic events of last century. British Traitors examines the lives and motivations of a number of the perpetrators of this most heinous of crimes.

Whether in Truman Capote’s detailed murder of the Clutter family or Ted Bundy’s small-town charm, criminals have always roamed rural America and towns worldwide. Featuring murder stories, criminal case studies, and more, The Best New True Crime Stories: Small Towns contains all-new accounts from writers of true crime, crime journalism, and crime fiction. And these entries are not based on a true story - they are true stories. Edited by acclaimed author and anthologist Mitzi Szereto, the stories in this volume span the globe.