Not-so-distant look back at competitive news

by Cathy ScottI was reminded in a recent Twitter post of the strong competitiveness in a small newsroom I once worked in. The Twitter comment came from Charlene "Charlie" Fern, managing editor in the early '90s at the now-closed Vista Press, a daily newspaper in North San Diego County. The 50-year-old Vista Press was in direct competition with the San Diego Union's North County edition, which (before it merged to become the San Diego Union-Tribune)...

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Free at Last, Free at Last

by Katherine ScardinoIs it my imagination, or are we reading too many stories about citizens in this country spending many years of their lives locked in a box in prison and then, decades later, some magic occurs and we learn the person is innocent?In March a year ago, I wrote an article for Women in Crime Ink about Henry Skinner, who had been requesting DNA testing on the evidence in his case ever since his conviction in 1994. In March, there was...

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Celebrity Justice?

by Robin Sax Celebrity justice: is it an oxymoron?  Do celebrities get justice?  Do they get treated better?  Do they get treated worse?  Most people believe that celebrities get preferential treatment with shortened sentences, easy plea deals and the like.  The New York Daily News, supporting this view, has provided its findings as proof that celebs do the crime -- they just don’t do the time.   The site offers...

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The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From The Tree

by Donna PendergastThe development of DNA databases is helping investigators solve crime by looking for genetic near-matches -- results close enough to an already-stored DNA profile to suggest the crime was committed by a relative. Familial DNA database searches are based on the fundamental principle that DNA profiles of persons who are related are likely to contain similarities. Parents, siblings, and even more distant relatives such as aunts, uncles...

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Glorifying the Criminal

by Diane DimondThere are always so many topics to write about, but today I want to tell you about Frank. He’s written a book. And he appears to be the toast of the town, getting full page write-ups for his new autobiography, Original Gangster. His publicity machine from St. Martin's Press has tried to convince TV and radio personalities to interview Frank because his story is "a chilling look at the rise and fall of a modern legacy.” And besides,...

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Exciting News from Women in Crime Ink!

by Women in Crime InkNotice anything different about us? Nope, no new hair styles, and no we haven’t lost weight. Here’s a hint: Peruse the photos on the right-hand column. Ah ha, you say. There it is! Two new women. And you recognize them? Of course you do! Women in Crime Ink, the blog the Wall Street Journal calls “worth reading,” is adding two new contributors. Beginning August 1, legal analyst Anne Bremner and body language expert Dr. Lillian...

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A Partnership in Crime

by Stephen SingularThe night we met in the fall of 1990, Joyce and I spoke about my first book, Talked to Death, which chronicled the 1984 neo-Nazi assassination of Denver talk show host Alan Berg. She said she wanted to read it and a few days later I gave her a copy. Independently, we’d early in life developed an interest in non-fiction crime books by reading Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood and one day we’d journey together to Holcomb, Kansas, and...

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