Crime Writers On...True Crime Review

How did America law enforcement get to its present state of near-unaccountability? An examination of its history shows policing has its origins in running slave patrols, displacing indigenous tribes, and coercing organized labor. Once used as a tool by the powerful to maintain social order and protect their personal property, modern police have become a power unto themselves.

With the help of “tough on crime” politicians, law enforc...

Why is (almost) everyone talking about the Karen Read case? If you've also been wondering, you're in luck. Rebecca was asked to dive into it for the Boston Globe's Say More podcast, and on this special crossover edition of Crime Writers On, we're thrilled to share that episode. 

Rebecca chats with host Shirley Leung and courts reporter Sean Cotter about the case, why it's gotten so much attention, and what's happening in the trial. ...

A hardscrabble journalist is reassigned to help an American podcaster investigate a cold case in a remote Irish village. After twenty years, Bodkin is set to resume its annual Samhain  celebration - a tradition that was canceled after three people disappeared the night of the pagan festival.

While host Gilbert Power focuses primarily on the human interest angle,  Dove Maloney thinks a larger story is hiding within Bodkin. Along with...

Donnie Dunn, an aspiring stand-up comedian, extends a courtesy to a distraught pub customer. Martha Scott becomes a friend and a regular at the bar, but her fixation on Donnie starts crossing boundaries. He tries to push away, but a spurned Martha begins an unrelenting stalking campaign which upends his life. The stress of the stalking triggers repressed feelings of Donnie’s own sexual assault at the hands of an influential televis...

Police in Austin, Texas had no clue as to who was behind a package bomb that killed a homeowner in March 2018. Ten days later, when two more devices exploded in the city, investigators knew they were dealing with a serial bomber. With each new attack, the devices were more sophisticated. But authorities caught a break when bombs found at a FedEx facility could be traced to a suspicious man who dropped them off.

In the newest install...

Grifter Thomas Ripley is hired by a wealthy businessman to convince his prodigal son to return from his extended holiday in Italy. But instead he ingratiates himself with Dickie Greenleaf and shares in his host’s life of luxury. Once he overstays his welcome, Ripley hatches a plan to get rid of Dickie and assume his playboy identity.

Instead of Easy Street, Ripley finds himself living one step ahead of Dickie’s suspicious girlfriend...

In 1988, three months after going missing from a lake in San Angelo, Texas, the bodies of teenagers Shane Stewart and Sally McNelly were discovered - the pair had been shot. Among those in their friend group were a collection of self-styled occultists, and evidence of satanic rituals was found near the park where they vanished. Evidence suggested there was more than one killer and rumors of a falling out between the victims and mem...

Among the missing persons cases online sleuth Todd Matthews followed were that of two boys from the same family who vanished 25 years apart. He was shocked to receive a call from a man who thought he might be Phillip Steven Brandenburg, the baby who went missing in 1974.

Todd determined Steve Patterson was indeed the John Doe they’d been searching for and helped him reconnect with the mother he never knew. Sandi Brandenburgh claimed...

In 2014, Sarah Koenig and Dana Chivvis traveled to Guantánamo Bay hoping to find the untold stories about the infamous military prison. They found many friendly soldiers willing to repeat Army talking points, but no one willing to be candid about life at the detention center.

A decade later, the pair reached out to those people, many who had left the military and were now willing to go on the record. Many remembered Gitmo as a plum ...

After being booked, defendants in Nashville’s justice system must navigate a labyrinth of challenges. They include people whose mental illness gets them in trouble, an abuse survivor who finds herself both victim and defendant, a couple using jail as an opportunity to get clean from heroin, and teenagers facing life sentences for murder. There are also judges and corrections officials who acknowledge the system’s default setting is...

With the nation already on edge after 9/11, envelopes containing deadly anthrax were mailed to journalists and politicians. It killed five postal workers and reporters, and sickened Congressional staffers. Government officials claimed these attacks originated overseas, and used the threat as justification for the invasion of Iraq. The FBI relied on leading experts to decipher the anthrax, and traced the weaponized strain to a parti...

The 2012 murders of 20 school children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary shocked the nation and shattered their grieving families. But InfoWars host Alex Jones immediately unspooled a series of conspiracy theories accusing the parents of faking their kids’ deaths in an elaborate hoax. For years, the families were harassed by conspiracy theorists and routinely slandered by Jones. Fed up, a group of parents sued the host for li...

In June 2021, Ella Mae Begay vanished from her Sweetwater, Arizona home in the middle of the night. Preston Henry Tolth admitted to tribal police he stole the 62-year-old’s truck and beat her, but Ella Mae’s family pressured him to say where on the Navajo reservation he left her. A year later, 38-year-old Kristina Carrillo went missing from the Navajo Nation in New Mexico. But as host Connie Walker investigates her disappearance, s...

To engage his sociology students, Elizabethton High School teacher Alex Campbell created a unique lesson plan. The class would research a 1970s cold case known as the Redhead Murders. By semester's end, the students had created a profile of the possible serial killer. Six months after the class released their findings, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation identified someone who fit their profile. They said DNA linked a now-decease...

Imogene Scott finds herself aboard a luxury cruise ship chartered by the Collier family. The guest list includes powerful friends, as well as Chinese investors interested in acquiring their clothing factory. But after setting sail, an obnoxious passenger is killed with a harpoon through his chest.

Also on board is a figure from Imogene’s childhood: world famous detective Rufus Cotesworth, who tried to solve her mother’s car bombing ...

After profiling lawyer Shane Correia years ago for her podcast, part of his story stuck with host Amory Sivertson. He grew up under the cloud that his sister Sophia had been arrested for murdering her mother-in-law. And it was his brother Sean who said he witnessed Sophia commit the crime. But something about the story bothered Sivertson. Did the six-month pregnant 23-year-old really beat Marlyne Johnson with fireplace tongs just t...

Western news outlets became fascinated with Chen Guangcheng, a blind self-taught lawyer who advocated for human rights inside communist China. When Guangcheng escaped house arrest and fled to the US in 2012, he was held up as a symbol of freedom and democracy. But in the subsequent years, observers were puzzled when Guangcheng re-entered the public sphere as a Trump supporter, repeating right-wing talking points. And the humble dis...