What really happened before, during and just after the sensational, Prohibition era murder of the police chief by the town's most admired physician has been saved from oblivion by this book by retired newspaper editor Wint Capel, "The Good Doctor's Downfall." The author dug up the facts and has arranged them to show in great detail how brilliant Dr. J. W. Peacock ambushed the young, arrogant police chief, John Taylor, on a busy downtown street in Thomasville, a small North Carolina factory town. The doctor finished him off with a World War I souvenir, a German Luger. The doctor, also a city councilman, and the chief began feuding after the chief decided to crackdown on those, like the doctor, who ignored the laws against gambling and drinking. The feud became unbelievably bitter and explosive. By the time of the attack downtown, the doctor had been convinced, "It's either him or me." In a trial that featured the best legal minds in North Carolina, the doctor barely escaped the electric chair. Then, a year later, he escaped a prison for the criminally insane. He managed to outrun them all. Only a horrible accident in California could rob him of his freedom.

This book provides a concise and engaging examination of the subculture of the Crips and Bloods-the notorious street gangs that started in Los Angeles, but have now spread throughout the United States. Despite the dangers and harsh realities intrinsic to street life and criminal activity, the no-holds-barred lifestyle of gangs continues to interest mainstream America. This provocative book provides an insider's look into the subculture of two of the most notorious street gangs-the Crips and the Bloods. Crips and Bloods: A Guide to an American Subculture traces the evolution of the two gangs, covering their origins in South Central Los Angeles to the organizations' current presence throughout the United States. The author analyzes the ways in which the gang subculture is created, promoted, and perpetuated; shows how the groups currently recruit their members; and explores the ways Crip and Blood culture has expanded beyond the gangs into the larger mainstream society. Includes a timeline of significant events related to the counterculture Offers a bibliography of print and non-print resources for student research Describes the symbols, objects, words, colors, and images used to represent the gangs Provides a comprehensive glossary of street literacy terms

The bestselling author and true crime master Ann Rule presents her fifteenth volume of the acclaimed Crime Files series focusing on disturbing stories of people in danger,. Walking home on a dark night, you hear footsteps coming up behind you. As they get closer, your heart pounds harder. Is it a dangerous stranger or someone you know and trust? The answer is as simple as turning around, but don't look behind you...run. With her signature in-depth research and compelling writing, Ann Rule chronicles fateful encounters with the secret predators hiding in plain sight. First in line is a stunning case that spanned thirty years and took one determined detective to four states-ending, finally, in Alaska-where he unraveled not one but two murders. A second case appears to begin and end with the hunt for the Green River Killer, focusing on a Washington State man who was once cleared as a suspect in that deadly chain of homicides. In another true story, a petite woman went to a tavern, looking only for conversation and fun. Instead, she met violent death in the form of a seven-foot tall man who had seemed shy and harmless. You'll feel a chill as you uncover these and numerous other cases of unfortunate victims who made one tragic mistake: trusting the wrong person-even someone they thought they knew.

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. American Kompromat unravels the Russian-influenced operations that amassed the dirty little secrets of the richest and most powerful men on earth. American Kompromat is based on extended and exclusive interviews with high-level sources in the KGB, CIA, and FBI, as well as lawyers at white-shoe Washington firms, associates of Jeffrey Epstein, and thousands of pages of FBI reports, police investigations, and news articles in English, Russian, and Ukrainian. A narrative offering jaw-dropping context, and set in Upper East Side mansions and private Caribbean islands, gigantic yachts, and private jets, American Kompromat shows that, from Donald Trump to Jeffrey Epstein, Russian operations transformed the darkest secrets of the most powerful people in the world into potent weapons that served its interests. Among its many revelations, American Kompromat addresses what may be the single most important unanswered question of the entire Trump era - and one that Unger argues is even more important now that Trump is out of office: Was Donald Trump a Russian asset? Just how compromised was he? And how could such an audacious feat have been accomplished? To answer these questions and more, Craig Unger reports, is to understand kompromat - operations that amassed compromising information on the richest and most powerful men on earth, and that leveraged power by appealing to what is, for some, the most prized possession of all: their vanity. This is a story that transcends the end of the Trump administration, illuminating a major underreported aspect of Trump's corruption that has profoundly damaged American democracy.

Steeped in conspiracy, scandal and socialism - the disappearance of radical icon Victor Grayson is a puzzle that's never been solved. A firebrand and Labour politician who rose to prominence in the early twentieth century, Grayson was idolised by hundreds of thousands of Britons but despised by the establishment. After a tumultuous life, he walked out of his London apartment in September 1920 and was never seen again. After a century, new documents have come to light. Fragments of an unpublished autobiography, letters to his lovers (both men and women), leading political and literary figures including H.G. Wells and George Bernard Shaw, and testimonies from members of the Labour elite such as Clement Attlee have revealed the real Victor Grayson. New research has uncovered the true events leading up to his disappearance and suggests that he was actually blackmailed by his former Party. In a time when homosexuality was illegal, and socialism an international threat to capitalism, Grayson was a clear target for those wanting to stamp out dissent. This extraordinary biography reinstates to history a man who laid the foundations for a whole generation of militant socialists in Britain.

In 1854, the United States acquired the roughly 30,000-square-mile region of present-day southern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico from Mexico as part of the Gadsden Purchase. This new Southern Corridor was ideal for train routes from Texas to California, and soon tracks were laid for the Southern Pacific and Santa Fe rail lines. Shipping goods by train was more efficient, and for desperate outlaws and opportunistic lawmen, robbing trains was high-risk, high-reward. The Southern Corridor was the location of sixteen train robberies between 1883 and 1922. It was also the homebase of cowboy-turned-outlaw Black Jack Ketchum's High Five Gang. Most of these desperadoes rode the rails to Arizona's Cochise County on the US-Mexico border where locals and lawmen alike hid them from discovery. Both Wyatt Earp and Texas John Slaughter tried to clean them out, but it took the Arizona Rangers to finish the job. It was a time and place where posses were as likely to get arrested as the bandits. Some of the Rangers and some of Slaughter's deputies were train robbers. When rewards were offered there were often so many claimants that only the lawyers came out ahead. Southwest Train Robberies chronicles the train heists throughout the region at the turn of the twentieth century, and the robbers who pulled off these train jobs with daring, deceit, and plain dumb luck! Many of these blundering outlaws escaped capture by baffling law enforcement. One outlaw crew had their own caboose, Number 44, and the railroad shipped them back and forth between Tucson and El Paso while they scouted locations. Legend says one gang disappeared into Colossal Cave to split the loot leaving the posse out front while they divided the cash and escaped out another entrance. The antics of these outlaws inspired Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid to blow up an express car and to run out guns blazing into the fire of a company of soldiers.

SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING BENICIO DEL TORO, PRODUCED BY LEONARDO DICAPRIO. Cuba, 1961. A failed invasion at The Bay of Pigs results in Fidel Castro tightening his hold over Cuba. Jose Miguel Battle Sr., a former cop and member of the counter-revolutionary group intent on overthrowing him, is captured. Miami, 1962. Jose Miguel Battle Sr. travels to the USA, chased from the island by revolution, and is renamed The Godfather. A 2,500 strong Cuban-American criminal alliance is established. Known on both sides of the law as 'The Corporation', its powerful members were fellow outcasts and enemies of Castro. A hero to many Cuban-Americans, The Godfather created a unit of trusted men who fought alongside him to reclaim their nation from the Marxist dictator. Gaining money, power and inluence by running gambling rackets, money- laundering, drug tra?cking and murder, The Corporation never gave up the dream of killing Castro and reclaiming their homeland. This explosive biography reveals how an entire generation of political exiles, refugees, racketeers, corrupt cops, hitmen (and their wives and girlfriends) became caught up in this violent desire, and built a criminal empire surviving over 40 years. An epic tale of gangsters, drugs and violence, learn how The Corporation grew into one of the USA's most sordid and deadly organisations.

This is a story that is based on truth. Over forty years ago three young lives were taken. They never had a chance for justice until now. But what actually had happened is the wrong man has been convicted of this heinous crime. The real murderer was never tried or convicted. He walked through life with this lie and got away with it. How do I know? He was my father. This is a journey inward to find the disturbing truth about a man that was a mystery to all.

In the 1890s, Amos Lunt served as the San Quentin hangman, tying the nooses that brought the most dangerous criminals in the Wild West to their deaths. A former police chief who became the hangman of San Quentin due to an unfortunate turn of events, Lunt stood on the gallows alongside bank robbers, desperadoes and assassins throughout a five-year career. This book follows Lunt's trail from the Santa Cruz police department to the San Quentin State Prison. Covering his interesting friendship with a series of death row inmates to the gradual deterioration of his sanity, it is a one-of-a-kind biography that profiles an American executioner. Also profiled are his subjects-twenty of the West's most heinous criminals-as well as Lunt's preparations for their hangings and their final moments on the gallows.

Although they account for only ten percent of all murders, those attributed to women seem especially likely to captivate the public. This absorbing book examines why that is true and how some women, literally, get away with murder. Combining compelling storytelling with insightful observations, the book invites readers to take a close look at ten high-profile killings committed by American women. The work exposes the forces that underlie the public's fascination with female killers and determine why these women so often become instant celebrities. Cases are paired by motive-love, money, revenge, self-defense, and psychopathology. Through them, the authors examine the appeal of women who commit murders and show how perceptions of their crimes are shaped. The book details both the crimes and the criminals as it explores how pop culture treats stereotypes of female murderers in film and print. True crime aficionados will be fascinated by the minute descriptions of what happened and why, while pop culture enthusiasts will appreciate the lens of societal norms through which these cases are examined.