At 3:58 in the morning of June 5, 2002, Ed and Lois Smart awoke to the sound of their nine-year-old daughter Mary Katherine’s frightened voice. “She’s gone. Elizabeth is gone.” At first they thought she was having a bad dream about her older sister, but Mary Katherine’s seeming bad dream would quickly become their worst nightmare. Their daughter Elizabeth was gone.They were not sure why the media picked up on Elizabeth’s story, but after their daughter was kidnapped she became the ...

This riveting inside story of the intense search for the Salt Lake City teenager reveals never-before-told details of the largest investigation in Utah state history. The firsthand account of Tom Smart, Elizabeth's uncle and one-time suspect, reveals the details of the flawed police investigation, the media's manipulation of the family, and the eyewitness account of nine-year-old Mary Katherine Smart that went largely ignored by investigators. New research is presented on the family backgr...

An in-depth look at one of the most shocking and controversial crimes to capture the nation's attention from the New York Times –bestselling author.Praying for a happy ending, friends and family stood by Laci Peterson's grieving husband Scott. Four months later, Laci's decomposed body was found in the murky waters of San Francisco Bay. The body of her child had washed ashore about a mile away, after a possible "coffin bir...

The miracle of life turns into the horror of murder in a shocking account of the woman who killed for an unborn child—from the acclaimed true crime writer.When Lisa Montgomery presented her husband Kevin with their new-born baby girl, he was ecstatic. Naming the child Abigail, the couple brought her to their local pastor. Miles away, police were investigating the brutal murder of a pregnant woman . . .Twenty-three-year-old Bobbie Jo Stinnett was found by her ...

**2024 EDGAR AWARD NOMINEE FOR BEST FACT CRIME NOVELIn Tangled Vines, bestselling true crime author John Glatt reconstructs the rise of the prestigious Murdaugh family and the shocking double murder that led to the downfall of its patriarch, Alex Murdaugh.**Among the lush, tree-lined waterways of South Carolina low country, the Murdaugh name means power. A century-old, multimillion-dollar law practice has catapulted the family into incredible wealth and local celeb...

A Chilling True Story of a Picture-Perfect Family Shattered by Secrets and MurderWhen high school sweethearts Karen and Richard Sharpe married, they shared an interest in medicine, a desire for family, and a dream for the future. But behind the doors of their upscale Massachusetts home, Dr. Sharpe was hiding dark secrets that would ultimately lead to cold-blooded murder.After years of abuse at the hands of her physician husband, Karen put an end to their 26...

In the fall of 1999, a twenty-two-year-old woman was discovered naked and bleeding on the streets of a small New Mexico town south of Albuquerque. She was chained to a padlocked metal collar. The tale she told authorties--of being beaten, raped, and tortured with electric shock--was unthinkable. Until she led them to 59-year-old David Ray Parker, his 39-year-old financee Cindy Hendy--and the lakeside trailer they called their "toy box". What the FBI uncovered was unprecedented in the annal...

A seemingly perfect world held an even more unlikely killer...Julie Keown had a great job, financial security, and a perfect husband who was attending Harvard Business School. But after Julie suddenly died, and doctors discovered she's been poisoned with the main ingredient in antifreeze, her parents began to suspect that her husband, James, was not so perfect. This blow-by-blow account shows how investigators and state police unraveled James Keown's chilling web o...

The Edgar Award–nominated true crime story of the 2001 death of Kathleen Peterson and the trial against her husband Michael—the subject of an acclaimed documentary, The Staircase , and an HBO Max miniseries starring Colin Firth."[Fanning's] writing is superb. . . . [She] has written a true-crime book focused more on the truth than on the crime. . . . A triumph." —Vance Holmes, author of ...

A survivor's awe-inspiring story of how she overcame tragedy and re-created herself as a wife, mother, and woman.She was a hardworking business woman, had a loving husband and an infant son, and a confidence born of intelligence and beauty. But on 9/11, good fortune was no match for catastrophe. When a wall of flame at the World Trade Center burned more than 80 percent of her body, Lauren Manning began a ten-year journey of survival and rebirth that tested her almo...

AN ABUSIVE MOTHERRaised in the suburb of Riverside, California, twenty-year-old college student Jason Bautista endured for years his emotionally disturbed mother's verbal and psychological abuse. She even locked him out of the house, tied him up with electrical cord, and on one occasion, gave him a beating that sent him to the emergency room. His fifteen-year-old half brother Matthew Montejo also was a victim to Jane Bautista's dark mood swings and erratic behavior,...

"I KILLED MY PARENTS."Seventeen-year-old Tyler Hadley posted an invitation on Facebook: party at my crib tonight. But this was no ordinary house party in the Florida suburbs; it was a grisly crime scene. Later that night, Tyler revealed to his best friend, Michael, that he'd bludgeoned his parents to death with a hammer. Michael didn't believe him…until he entered the master bedroom and saw the bodies of Tyler's parents on the floor—murdered, beyond the sha...