Real True Crime

TRUE CRIME! PTA president Kelli Peters had a normal, happy life in Orange County, California, where she volunteered at her daughter's school, carpooled, and took care of her family. When a school parent angrily accused Kelli of keeping her son waiting during the afterschool pick-up, it appeared to be a simple confrontation with an overprotective mother. Kelli soon learned, however, that she was the target of a twisted plot against her that involved drugs, lies, schemes, and a campaign to ruin her life. The vendetta led to reputations tarnished, careers lost, secret lives uncovered, two ...

It was a bleak November in 2012 when Cari Lea Farver vanished from Omaha, Nebraska. Cari, 37, was a devoted mother, reliable employee, and loyal friend - not the type to shirk responsibilities, abandon her son, and run off on an adventure while her dying father took his last breaths. Yet, the many texts from her phone indicated she had done just that. While Cari's boyfriend, Dave Kroupa, and her supervisor were bewildered by her abrupt disappearance, they accepted the texts at face value. Her mother, Nancy Raney, however, was alarmed and reported Cari missing.

As Bill Clinton's political and business mentor, Jim McDougal, with his knowledge of embarrassing real-estate and banking deals, bribes, and obstructions of justice, long haunted the White House. McDougal's vivid self-portrait, completed only days before his death and coauthored by veteran journalist Curtis Wilkie, reveals the hidden intersections of politics and special interests in Arkansas and the betrayals that followed.

Zoe Nolan disappeared from Manchester University in 2011. Her story was sad, certainly, but hardly sensational, Joseph Knox thought. As a crime writer, he felt that dead girls were everywhere, and the missing ones just didn't cut it. He wouldn't have given her any more thought were it not for Evelyn Mitchell. Another writer struggling to come up with a new idea, Evelyn attended one of Joseph's publicity events, and she was wondering just what happened to all the girls who go missing.

In the best-selling tradition of The Devil in the White City, award-winning author Brian Hicks tells the explosive story of the Morro Castle, the elegant luxury liner that burned off the coast of New Jersey on September 7, 1934. The captain died under mysterious circumstances seven hours before his ship caught fire off the New Jersey coast.

Monster stories aren’t just meant to entertain. They’re meant to inform, even educate. Above all, they ask us to question our own humanity. Nowhere is this truer than in stories of serial killers. What are the origins of this monstrous archetype? Why are we so fascinated with such gruesome terror? What do they reveal about our fears and anxieties? Explore these and other questions in Serial Killers: Real and Imagined, where public scholar Emily Zarka looks at the serial-killer trope across history, from murky 17th-century legends to 21st-century true-crime obsessions.

Petrifying. Bone-chilling. Depraved. Their acts made headlines. Their names live in infamy in the darkest recesses of the internet, but for those who are left behind, these heartless monsters are always there, looming over their every move. This true crime four-book set exposes their inner secrets, details their heinous crimes, and pulls the curtain on the long, hard-fought investigations.

A murder shook a border town in northern Spain. Initially, all signs pointed to a crime of passion, and the main suspect had already been identified. The evidence seemed undeniable, and society was demanding a swift response from the police. However, years later, many doubts arose regarding the investigation and the guilt of the supposed murderer. An engaging story that continues to stir Basque society, revealing deeper and more surprising layers than originally thought.

The Mexican drug trade has inspired prejudiced narratives of a war between north and south, White and Brown; between noble cops and vicious kingpins, corrupt politicians and powerful cartels. In this first comprehensive history of the trade, historian Benjamin T. Smith tells the real story of how and why this one-peaceful industry turned violent. He uncovers its origins and explains how this illicit business essentially built modern Mexico, affecting everything from agriculture to medicine to economics - and the country’s all-important relationship with the United States.

Giovanni's Ring is the story of "Giovanni Rocco," a New Jersey police officer, known undercover as "Giovanni Gatto," who was the mysterious agent at the epicenter of Operation Charlie Horse, a federal undercover operation that ultimately brought down ten members and associates of New Jersey's DeCavalcante Mafia family, the criminal organization known as "the real Sopranos." The book is not simply a chronicle of Giovanni Rocco's adventures in the murky and dangerous Mafia world he inhabited, but also a fascinating window into the psychological struggles that such a life entails.

This book explores real-life instances in which everyday people like you and me came face-to-face with danger they hadn't seen coming. While some lived to tell the tale, sadly, others did not. Included are true accounts of a power outage that put a young family in the crosshairs of a stranger with ill-intent, a teenager who found herself at the mercy of a pair of would-be kidnappers after being stranded in the middle of the night, a caregiver whose patient may have been more than she seemed, a young girl whose friends turned out to be her worst enemies, a case of mistaken identity that ...

Mix in murderous maids, bumbling burglars, and unflinching local heroes and you have True Crime Philadelphia.

In the heat of the city, a man is out of time: speeding in a beat-up Ford Tempo, blasting easy-listening music. Reporter Steve Everett drinks too much, makes love to his boss' wife, and has just stumbled upon a shocking truth: A convicted killer is about to be executed for a crime he didn't commit. In the cold confines of Death Row, Frank Beachum is also out of time. Ready to say good-bye to the wife and child he loves and hello to the God he still believes in, Beachum knows he did not kill a convenience store clerk six years ago.

In this audiobook set of four true crime books, you will learn about men who performed acts so cruel, inhumanely heartless, and unfathomable that their names will never be forgotten. This collection includes four of the world’s most well-known serial killers: Edmund Kemper, Jeffrey Dahmer, Robert Berdella, and Ted Bundy.

One of the biggest scores in Mafia history, the Lufthansa Airlines heist of 1978 has become the stuff of Mafia legend - and a decades-long investigation that continues to this day. Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Anthony DeStefano sheds new light on this legendary unsolved case using recent evidence from the 2015 trial of 80-year-old Mafia don Vincent Asaro, who for the first time speaks out on his role in the fateful Lufthansa heist.

You step into a doorway to see a man levelling a shotgun at your chest You hold a dying child in your arms You crawl into a mangled car to help someone trapped and bleeding These are a small sampling of the kinds of things that police officers encounter. Not everyone is able to do the job that cops do, fewer still are willing. Those who do it with grace and dignity are special people. CODE 4 is an insider's view of the police profession, seen through the eyes of one of its veterans. Over a 37-year span Terry Smith worked as a uniformed officer, a long-haired undercover narcotics agent, an ...

From the 1920s to 1950, Georgia Tann ran a black-market baby business at the Tennessee Children’s Home Society in Memphis. The publication of Lisa Wingate’s novel Before We Were Yours brought new awareness of Tann’s lucrative career in child trafficking. Adoptees who knew little about their pasts gained insight into the startling facts behind their family histories. Encouraged by their contact with Wingate and award-winning journalist Judy Christie, who documented the stories of 15 adoptees in this book, many determined Tann survivors set out to trace their roots.

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.

Dive into the chilling world of Ed Gein, the real-life inspiration behind some of the most terrifying fictional killers in American horror. In Ed Gein: American Horror Monster – The Butcher of Plainfield Rises, the Paranormal Mystery Alliance faces their darkest and most dangerous investigation yet. When the team sets out to explore the haunted remains of Ed Gein’s notorious property, they quickly realize they’ve unearthed more than just local folklore. The land is alive, pulsating with malevolent energy from an ancient evil waiting to be unleashed. What begins as a routine ...

A gripping collection of stories of human criminality at its most bizarre.

These unusual, sensational murders recall not only gruesome historical crimes, but also touch on shocking and macabre modern murders. Included are details of groundbreaking advances in crime detection, law enforcement, and forensic science. This is the top-secret report on the most grisly, and unusual, criminal activity of our time.