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An American Tragedy:
The real story behind Theodore Dreiser's wildly popular novel was the murder of lovely (and pregnant) Grace Brown by her boyfriend, Chester Gillette.
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Andersonville:
A massive graveyard where the corpses were still breathing and graves were yet to be covered. A shameful American model for Auschwitz.
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Fatty Arbuckle:
Beloved comedian is charged with the rape and murder of the beautiful, but promiscuous, actress Virginia Rappe. It takes three different trials to sort out what really happened at the wild party at San Francisco's St. Francis Hotel.
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Taylor Behl:
Seventeen-year-old Virginia college student disappeared without a trace, until her remains were found a month later. A former friend, Ben W. Fawley, claims he killed her accidentally. Fawley, a 38-year-old amateur photographer, faces grand jury Jan 17.
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The Birdman of Alcatraz:
Robert Stroud, self-taught prison inmate spent most of his adult life in jail becoming an expert on birds, their breeding and diseases. Stroud was a very controversial prisoner who fought until his death for the freedom to pursue his scientific achievements.
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Robert Blake:
The full story behind the murder of Bonny Lee Bakley and the trial of her celebrity husband.
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The Black Dahlia:
Hollywood's most famous murder case took place in post-war Los Angeles. Elizabeth Short, an engagingly attractive young woman was found brutally murdered and dumped in a vacant lot. She was called the "Black Dahlia" because she always dressed in black. This unsolved case became an obsession and will continue to be legendary when the Black Dahlia movie comes out this fall with an all-star cast.
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Lizzie Borden:
This classic has to be one of the most enduring murder mysteries America has ever produced. Elderly Andrew Borden, still in his heavy morning coat, reclines on a mohair-covered sofa, his boots on the floor so as not to soil the upholstery. As he naps, his wife, Abby, is on the floor of the guestroom upstairs, dead for the past hour and a half, killed by the same hand, with the same axe, that is about to strike him, as he sleeps.
The bloodiness of the acts is startling. Along with the gruesome nature of the crimes is the unexpected character of the accused, not a hatchet-wielding maniac, but a church-going, Sunday-school-teaching, respectable, spinster-daughter, charged with parricide, the murder of parents, a crime worthy of Classical Greek tragedy. Many people believed she killed her father and stepmother, but recent forensic research suggests that she didn't.
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Powder Brown:
Two white sisters are brutally murdered, but was the dead black teenager the killer?
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Thomas Capano:
Powerful, wealthy attorney manipulates the system to cover up his murder of the secretary of the Governor of Delaware.
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Rick Chance:
Generous, ambitious and wildly successful born-again Christian entrepreneur falls prey to his baser instincts.
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Mark David Chapman:
The assassin who snuffed out the life of John Lennon and ended an era
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Bob Crane:
The star of Hogan's Heroes and subject of the new movie Auto Focus was a sex addict and a blabbermouth about his myriad of sexual conquests. His murder remains mysterious.
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Peggy Cuttino:
Distinguished judge attacks controversial murder case.
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Doctors Who Kill:
Dr. Katherine Ramsland explores cases of doctors who kill and why they do it. Includes new case file on Dr. Robert Bierenbaum.
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Robert Durst:
Rich and powerful, eccentric and very arrogant, he shoplifted a chicken sandwich and was apprehended for the mutilation murder of an old man. This millionaire cross-dressing killer may have murdered his best friend and others as well. New Chapter on the latest trial.
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Ginny Foat:
When Ginny Foat walked out of the Jefferson Parish Courthouse in Gretna, Louisiana a free woman on November 16, 1983, she and others who sided with her during her high-profile trial on murder charges were quick to proclaim it a victory for the feminist cause.
But was it a victory for a noble cause or was it merely a personal triumph for an abused, formerly battered woman who found herself on the dark end of a bad situation? Was Ginny Foat truly "innocent" in the 1965 bludgeoning death of an Argentine businessman visiting New Orleans or was she found "not guilty" simply because there was too much reasonable doubt in the minds of a sympathetic jury?
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Deborah Gardner:
Dubbed the most beautiful girl in the Peace Corps, she is stabbed in Tonga by another Peace Corps worker who is alive and well and free in New York City.
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Bonnie Garland:
Wealthy Scarsdale student is brutally bludgeoned in her sleep by her Mexican-American boyfriend. A bizarre public relations campaign orchestrated by the Catholic clergy results in a trial that portrays the killer as the victim.
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Karen Grammer:
The particularly vicious murder of actor Kelsey Grammer's 18-year-old sister is solved by master detective Lou Smit of JonBenet Ramsey fame.
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Barry George:
Stalker targets popular British television personality Jill Dando for death.
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Genore Guillory:
Kind black benefactor is killed by white trash family that she helped.
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Captain Charles Hall:
Famous Arctic explorer is murdered. Did the German Dr. Bessels do it and, if so, why?
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Hall-Mills Murders:
Fascinating classic unsolved mystery of minister and his choir singer lover
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Brooke Hart:
The Lindbergh-vintage kidnap/murder of this popular & attractive young man drove the people of San Jose to lynch the suspects.
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Haunted Crime Scenes:
Dr. Katherine Ramsland tours "America's Most Haunted" — scenes where ghosts of past crimes still roam the earth.
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Carl Hall & Bonnie Heady:
Alcoholic couple tricks school into releasing Bobby Greenlease into their custody. A classic murder/kidnap case.
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Patty Hearst:
Impressionable young newspaper heiress robs banks with Kathleen Soliah and the Symbionese Liberation Army who kidnapped her.
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Glenn & Justin Helzer:
Two "nice" Mormon boys become murdering monsters when they create cult called the Children of Thunder.
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Helen Jewett:
Beautiful and cultured New York City prostitute fell in love with her wealthy client. Suddenly, Helen is murdered and her lover suspected.
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Sante & Kenny Kimes:
Mother and son team were bold con artists and murderers, as well as lovers. Adrian Havill, author of the definitive book on the case, writes up the highlights of their audacious criminal career.
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Andrew Kissel:
Hated embezzler found murdered in his empty Greenwich mansion after his wife left him with just a bed to sleep on just before his date with federal prison. With so many enemies, police have many potential suspects his estranged wife, a Columbian "Man Friday," and the many people who were Kissel's victims. Could his death have been a staged suicide?
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Marleen Konings:
Lovely foreign exchange student murdered by habitual criminal, who was released early only to kill two people and break his parole repeatedly.
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Ervil LeBaron:
Renegade Mormon fundamentalist wooed child brides and used them as the instruments of his murderous designs.
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Bruce George Peter Lee:
Troubled 19-year-old arsonist sets fire to the home of the Hasties in Hull, England. Called a one-family crime wave, the Hastie family murders suggested revenge by some criminal associates. Attention focused on Lee who surprised police by confessing to 23 murders by arson, including the killing of a baby.
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Leopold and Loeb:
Wealthy, brilliant young thrill killers
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Mary Kay Letourneau:
Bizarre case of married teacher who raped her young student and eventually had two children by him. Now out of prison, she has married her victim. Happy ever after? Not entirely.
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The Lindbergh Kidnapping:
Son of an American hero kidnapped and murdered
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Chuck Long:
Former Marine runs a "tough love" boot camp near an Apache reservation in Arizona. Two children die and an investigation shows the conditions are shocking.
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Internet-assisted Suicide:
The Sharon Lopatka case is a new twist in deviant behavior.
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The Main Line Murders:
Affluent Philadelphia suburban school system experiences an unusual staff problem- a principal who is a pervert, and two flaky English teachers, who have an affair. One of them and her two children are murdered. Who did it: the other English teacher or the principal who has a "thing" for animals?
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Charles Manson:
Many hardened criminals blame their crimes on their parents, but few have as clear a case as Charles Manson. His mother was an alcoholic prostitute who sold him for a pitcher of beer. In and out of reform school as a youngster, he had an IQ of 109 and became a kind of institutional politician and manipulator by age 19.
From then on his continuous scrapes with the law landed him in prison. His record there described Charlie as having "a tremendous drive to call attention to himself.
On March 21, 1967, Charlie was released from prison in California. He was 32 years old and more than half of his life had been spent in institutions. He protested his freedom. "Oh, no, I can't go outside there...I knew that I couldn't adjust to that world."
Charlie started to attract a group of followers, many of whom were very young women with troubled emotional lives who were rebelling against their parents and society in general.
This was the core of the Manson Family execution team who he ordered to kill pregnant actress Sharon Tate, her wealthy house guests, and the well-to-do LaBiancas.
Charlie was trying to start a race war and vet himself as a prophet of doom.
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Ken McElroy:
Shootist, rapist and consummate intimidator, he terrorized his community until the people took the law into their own hands.
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Dr. Josef Mengele:
Nazi death camp doctor specializes in horrible experiments on Jewish twin children.
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Dr. William Minor:
After murdering a man, brilliant American surgeon contributes to literary masterpiece from an insane asylum.
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The Martha Moxley Murder:
Ineptitude or slanted justice? With updates posted regularly!
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Murder in Tennessee:
Bizarre politician, Byron "Low Tax" Looper, tries to win the election by murdering his opponent.
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Mystery Couple:
Two handsome, affluent young adults are murdered one night on a dark country road. Who are they?
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Russell Obremski:
Alcohol & drug-fuelled binge results in the brutal murder of two women. Instead of serving his two life sentences, quirks in the Oregon prison system let this dangerous man out after a few years.
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Dr. George Parkman:
The murder and dismemberment of this prominent Bostonian by a Harvard Medical College professor creates a major trial event where expert medical testimony is used extensively for the first time in the U.S.
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William "Junior" Pierce:
Air-tight alibi and a coerced "confession" don't protect him from being convicted for the rape and brutal murder of 13-year-old Peggy Cuttino, the daughter of a prominent politician. Many years later, a new trial seems stuck in a judicial and political cul-de-sac. Distinguished judge attacks this controversial case.
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JonBenet Ramsey:
Beautiful and talented child was found dead in the basement of her doting parents' Boulder, Colorado home. Police immediately assumed that either John or Patsy Ramsey are guilty of their daughter's death. The media demonized the parents for entering her in beauty pageants and destroyed the Ramseys' excellent reputation by promoting unsubstantiated rumors and distortions of fact. Finally, retired investigator Lou Smit analyzes the evidence that helped vindicate the long-suffering parents, but stubborn wrong-headed law enforcement in Boulder let the trail of the real killer get cold. This case ranks as one of the worst travesties of justice in recent times.
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The Sidney Reso Kidnapping:
Exxon executive is kidnapped and suffers a lonely and excruciating death at the hands of a former company security consultant.
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Mary Rogers:
The enduring mystery of Mary Roger's murder is the basis for Edgar Allan Poe's "The Mystery of Marie Roget." Poe actually knew the pretty young woman who worked in a New York cigar store that he frequented.
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Michael Rockefeller :
Wealthy young man entered American lore, joining a pantheon of missing persons that includes Ambrose Bierce, Amelia Earhart, Jimmy Hoffa and D.B. Cooper. As with each of the other lost luminaries, various theories about his fate have been floated over the years. Did he simply drown, as his family concluded? Or did he decide to go native and lose himself in the jungles of New Guinea? Was he a meal for a shark or a crocodile? Or, in the most sensational speculative twist, was he a pale human trophy for New Guinean headhunters?
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Gladys Towles Root:
Eccentric & flamboyant lady lawyer defends rapists when the law was a man's world. She also defended the accused in the kidnapping of Frank Sinatra Jr.
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Exclusive Interview With Stephen Singular:
JonBenet Ramsey case expert and author of "Presumed Guilty"
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The Marquis de Sade:
This famous French aristocrats name coined the word sadism. His often violently pornographic writings, espoused a hedonistic lifestyle, free from the restraints of ethics and morals. His libertine behavior and writings earned him significant prison time, but created a legacy that has lived for centuries. Countless books and movies have been inspired by his controversial philosophies.
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Otto Sanhuber:
Can you imagine hiding your lover in your attic for many years without your spouse knowing about it? This amazing story did not fail to get Hollywood's attention. The real story of the man and the woman that kept him which inspired The Man in the Attic and The Bliss of Mrs. Blossom.
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O. J. Simpson:
This may be considered the crime of the last century. t became the most publicized case in US history. It cost over $20 million to fight and defend, ran up 50,000 pages of trial transcript and called 150 witnesses.
No movie or television courtroom drama would have dared to unfold the way this one did, and it was not without coincidence that it evolved in Los Angeles, so often referred to by cynics as "La La Land." The rest of the country became obsessed with the empty, celebrity-dominated West Los Angeles backdrop to the crime.
To many, particularly in minority communities, the trial of Orenthal James Simpson became not so much a determination of his guilt or innocence of murder in the first degree, beyond a reasonable doubt, but whether or not a black man could find justice in a legal system designed by and largely administered by whites. To others, many of whom were white, the key question was whether a mostly minority jury would convict a black celebrity regardless of the weight of evidence against him.
More than 10 years after the murder of his ex-wife and her friend, the former football star continues to stir controversy. Analysis of the murder and road rage trials, and forensics.
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Madeleine Smith:
Did Madeleine Smith poison her lover? A Victorian mystery.
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Charles Starkweather:
The inspiration for movies Natural Born Killers, Badlands, and Wild at Heart
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William Desmond Taylor:
One of Hollywood's most successful directors is murdered. Before police
arrive, a studio exec goes through his house searching for evidence of
scandal, may have planted monogrammed underwear with a famous actress's
initials. What is the studio trying to hide? Who of the many suspects had a
motive for murder? The detailed story.
But some experts discount the rumors that swirled around the
popular director and the cast of characters.
Another view of the case
focuses on confirmed facts.
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Crystal Todd:
Ken Register- clean-cut, polite and religious young man shocked his small town of Conway, SC, when he raped & murdered his best friend, Crystal Todd.
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Trial of Jesus:
Mel Gibson's The Passion has stirred up age-old controversies. Get the facts before you go.
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Typhoid Mary:
Mary Mallon was a New York cook who unknowingly gave typhoid to the families who hired her. When health authorities realized that she was the typhoid carrier, they quarantined her for several years. Then when she agreed not to work as a cook, they let her go, but after several other typhoid outbreaks which were traced to her cooking, health authorities took more drastic measures.
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Unholy Homicide, Part One:
A shocking number of clergymen have committed murder. Motives range from covering theft, getting rid of an unwanted wife or son, retribution, and even the termination of an abortion doctor.
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Unholy Homicide, Part Two:
Cult-like rituals inside the church, a nun murdering another nun for ministering to the prostitutes, a preacher beating his wife to death with a chair leg. The tip of the iceberg in the stories of violent clergy members.
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The Vengeful Heart:
Major true crime authors Stephen Michaud and Hugh Aynesworth tell the most amazing story of a dominating doctor who did the unthinkable to his long-time mistress.
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Stanford White Case:
Great beauty, enormous wealth and murder. He was the architect for the homes of the super rich, but his scandalous seduction of the beautiful actress at age 16 came back to haunt him when her millionaire husband took revenge. This was the famous case that inspired the movie Ragtime.
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Hans Vorhauer:
Son of Nazi SS officer, he deals meth and operates as a contract killer. Forensic sculptor Frank Bender takes expert aim & brings him in.
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Howard Hawk Willis:
Engages his aged mother and aunt in a scheme to hide the murder of his stepfather and a teenage couple he befriended.
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The Wichita Horror:
Shocked by the brutal murders of a teacher and several college-age young people, the city was then plunged into a racial crisis when the case was finally solved.
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Christa Worthington:
Successful fashion writer finds quiet Cape Cod life to raise her daughter, but is suddenly murdered while her young daughter is present. DNA samples focus in on a particular suspect.
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Yahweh ben Yahweh Cult:
Intelligent and educated, the Black Messiah styled himself into a religious leader who preached love and black empowerment but his followers practiced murder, intimidation and extortion. Those who joined the Yahweh ben Yahweh cult included fraternity boys, sheriff's deputies, grandmothers and ex-cons fresh out of prison. They allowed Mitchell to control every aspect of their lives, from their diet to their finances to their sexual liaisons.
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