Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
|
Your cart is empty |
|||
Books > Fiction > True stories
"Profiling the Criminal Mind" is, as the subtitle indicates, is a text and reference on behavioral science and criminal investigative analysis for investigators, forensic scientists, prosecutors, behavioral scientists, and academics. This compilation combines crime scene forensics and experience with behavioral science to get into the criminal's mind and interpret crime scenes. A practical guide to applied criminology, the author brings together his years of experience as a detective/investigator and professor of criminology and criminal justice to outline an inter-disciplinary approach to analyzing crime scenes and crime scene behavior. Multi-discipline sleuths and researchers into the criminal mind will find this combined approach to analysis a valuable strategic approach to the study of violent criminal behavior.
'Ndizisa ipasela' ('I have a delivery'). With these innocuous words, four men entered a home in suburban Cape Town on the morning of 15 June 2005. Within minutes, Jordan Leigh Norton, the six-month-old daughter of Natasha Norton, had been murdered. As the weeks went by, a shocking story began to emerge: Jordan had been slain by killers hired by Dina Rodrigues, the lover of Natasha's former boyfriend (and Jordan's father). The callous murder - thought to be the world's first contract killing of a child - was the start of a horrific ordeal for the Norton family, and culminated in one of South Africa's most sensational murder trials. In cold blood goes behind the tabloid headlines to tell the story of the Norton family. This is the story of a child whose short life touched all around her; of a young and vulnerable mother trying to make a life for her child; the close-knit family that rallied around her; and the marathon murder trial that captured the world's attention. Shocked by the senseless murder, the family struggled to come to terms with the loss of Jordan, the scarcely credible story of the conspiracy and the media storm that erupted around the case. Led by Vernon Norton, Natasha's father, the family was sustained by the support of the community and by an abiding faith that justice would prevail. In Cold Blood is a dramatic personal story, but also draws attention to the ongoing problem of violence against children in South Africa.
'Carefully compiled' in 1867 'from prison documents, ancient papers, and other authentic sources,' this extremely rare book contains the full details of the crimes, trials and executions of every murderer, highwayman, rogue and rebel ever to swing from the York Tyburn. From nobles such as Lord Hussey, Sir Robert Aske and the Earl of Northumberland (who mounted the scaffold 'with a firm step'), to notorious villains such as William Nevinson, Dick Turpin (whose right leg started to shake as he awaited the drop) and Knaresborough schoolteacher-turned-murderer Eugene Aram, it is an enthralling tour through the executions of the North. Including the last words and prison letters of many of the condemned, and laced with a grim humour (as seen in the case of the murderer who begged the hangman to check the rope carefully lest it break and leave him 'a cripple for life'), it will fascinate anyone with an interest in criminal history.
The fresh telling of the famous and sensational Scottish trials featured in this wide-ranging collection will enthral today's reader just as much as the drama of the original trials must have fascinated those who were following what was happening in court at the time. The people whose trials are covered in this book include: royal Scots accused of crimes against the Crown (for example, Mary Queen of Scots and Charles I) and those less noble accused of nefarious crimes such as burglary and worse (for example, Deacon Brodie and Burke and Hare); men like Joseph Knight, who today is seen as the man whose court case helped demonstrate Scotland was always against slavery, and Thomas Muir, whose actions in support of freedom for the common man were interpreted as seditious and worthy of punishment by transportation to Australia; and women like Madeleine Smith, who was accused of poisoning her lover in strict Victorian times.
From Amanda Knox to O.J., Casey Anthony to Kyle Rittenhouse, our justice system faces scrutiny and pressure from the media and public like never before. Can the bedrock of "innocent until proven guilty" survive in what acclaimed Seattle attorney and legal analyst Anne Bremner calls the age of judgement? When unscrupulous Italian prosecutors waged an all-out war in the media and courtroom to wrongly convict American exchange student Amanda Knox for a murder she didn't commit, family and friends turned to renowned Seattle attorney and media legal analyst Anne Bremner to help win her freedom. The case was dubbed the "trial of the decade" and would coincide with the explosion of social media and a new era of trying cases in public as much as the courtroom. While Italian prosecutors, the press, and online lynch mobs convicted Knox in the court of public opinion, Bremner would draw upon her decades in the courtroom and in front of the camera to turn the tide with a new kind of defense in pursuit of justice. In Justice in the Age of Judgement, Anne Bremner and Doug Bremner take us inside some of the biggest cases of recent times and offer their expert, thought-provoking insights and analysis as our legal system faces unprecedented forces fighting to tip the scales of justice their way. Why couldn't prosecutors convict O.J. Simpson despite all of the evidence seemingly proving he killed his wife Nicole? Could a jury remain unbiased in the face of overwhelming public pressure in the trial of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd? Why was Kyle Rittenhouse exonerated after shooting three people (killing two) with an assault rifle at a violent rally despite widespread media reports seemingly proving his guilt, and national calls for his conviction? Justice in the Age of Judgement is an unparalleled and unflinching look at the captivating cases tried on Twitter and TV, where the burden of proof and fundamental legal tenet of "innocent until proven guilty" is under assault from the court of public opinion.
'Richly textured, compelling, emotionally complex' Tammy Cohen 'The trouble is, we don't recognise every danger when we see it. And that's how Mr Man manages to creep into our lives.' It is 1966, and things are changing in the close-knit Napier Road. Stephanie is 9 years old, and she has plans: 1. Get Jesus to heal her wonky foot 2. Escape her spiteful friend Dawn 3. Persuade her mum to love her But everything changes when Stephanie strikes up a relationship with Mr Man, who always seems pleased to see her. When Dawn goes missing in the woods during the World Cup final, no one appears to know what happened to her - but more than one of them is lying. May 1997, and Stephanie has spent her life trying to bury the events of that terrible summer. When a man starts following her on the train home from London, she realises the dark truth of what happened may have finally caught up with her.
The chilling tome that launched an entire genre of books about the sometimes gruesome but always tragic ways people have died in our national parks, this updated edition of a classic includes calamities in Yellowstone from the past sixteen years, including the infamous grizzly bear attacks in the summer of 2011, as well as a fatal hot springs accident in 2000 in which the Park Service was sued for negligence.
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice. A fierce memoir of a mother's murder, a daughter's coming-of-age in the wake of immense loss, and her mission to know the woman who gave her life. When Sarah Perry was twelve, she saw a partial eclipse; she took it as a good omen for her and her mother, Crystal. But that moment of darkness foreshadowed a much larger one: two days later, Crystal was murdered in their home in rural Maine. It took twelve years to find the killer. In that time, Sarah rebuilt her life amid abandonment, police interrogations, and the exacting toll of trauma. She dreamed of a trial, but when the day came, it brought no closure. It was not her mother's death she wanted to understand, but her life. She began her own investigation, one that drew her back to Maine, deep into the darkness of a small American town. “Pull[ing] the reader swiftly along on parallel tracks of mystery and elegy" in After the Eclipse, “Perry succeeds in restoring her mother's humanity and her own" (The New York Times Book Review).
John "Red" Shea, 40, was a top lieutenant in the South Boston Irish mob run, led by James "Whitey" Bulger. An ice-cold enforcer with a red-hot temper, Shea was a legend among his peers in the 1990s South Boston, as much as John Gotti, Bugsy Siegel, and Al Capone were in their time and place. When the actor and producer Mark Wahlberg, raised in nearby Dorchester, learned of a script based on Shea's life circulating in Hollywood, he immediately committed to playing the gangster on screen. A major feature film project is now in development. From the age of thirteen, when he started robbing delivery trucks, to the age of twenty-seven, when he began serving a twelve-year federal sentence for drug trafficking, Shea was a portrait in American crime - a bantam-weight, red-headed terror, brutal with his fists and deadly with a lead pipe, a baseball bat, or a knife. At fifteen he was selling marijuana . At seventeen he was handling Bulger's cocaine. At eighteen he was loan sharking and laundering Bulger's money. At twenty, initiated into Bulger's inner circle at the point of an Uzi, he was running a multimillion-dollar narcotics operation for his mentor. RAT BASTARDS was the first-ever, firsthand account of mob life that wasn't told by a rat. Red Shea did his crime, then did his time--and never informed, unlike Henry Hill of Wiseguy, Sammy "The Bull" Gravano of Underboss, and so many others. Holding fast to the code of his upbringing, he remained a man of honor.
"The Third Man Factor" is an extraordinary account of how people at the very edge of death often sense an unseen presence beside them who encourages them to make one final effort to survive. This incorporeal being offers a feeling of hope, protection, and guidance, and leaves the person convinced he or she is not alone. There is a name for this phenomenon: it's called the Third Man Factor. If only a handful of people had ever encountered the Third Man, it might be dismissed as an unusual delusion shared by a few overstressed minds. But over the years, the experience has occurred again and again, to 9/11 survivors, mountaineers, divers, polar explorers, prisoners of war, sailors, shipwreck survivors, aviators, and astronauts. All have escaped traumatic events only to tell strikingly similar stories of having sensed the close presence of a helper or guardian. The force has been explained as everything from hallucination to divine intervention. Recent neurological research suggests something else. Bestselling and award-winning author John Geiger has completed six years of physiological, psychological, and historical research on the Third Man. He blends his analysis with compelling human stories such as that of Ron DiFrancesco, the last survivor to escape the World Trade Center on 9/11; Ernest Shackleton, the legendary explorer whose account of the Third Man inspired T. S. Eliot to write of it in "The Waste Land"; Jerry Linenger, a NASA astronaut who experienced the Third Man while aboard the "Mir" space station--and many more. Fascinating for any reader, "The Third Man Factor" at last explains this secret to survival, a Third Man who--in the words of famed climber Reinhold Messner--"leads you out of the impossible."
Ghislaine Maxwell's life of privilege was unimaginable. Her jetset world was not only made up of Presidents, top billionaires, Hollywood stars, Kennedys and Rockefellers, but also of princes, princesses, dukes and duchesses, all as regular friends - including university friend Prince Andrew, the favorite son of the Queen of England. Yet she still wanted more. Ghislaine met shadowy billionaire Jeffrey Epstein and amassed a fortune of almost $30 million over the course of their friendship. Her arrest by the FBI in July 2020 - almost a year to the day of Epstein's second arrest on sex charges - proved a stinging fall from grace as $30 million bail was refused. GHISLAINE MAXWELL leaves no stone unturned and is the first investigation based on all new sources available. An explosive true story, GHISLAINE MAXWELL is a riveting tale of wealth, power and the almost impervious Teflon power surrounding America's richest citizens.
A comprehensive account of London's celebrated East End killer, revised and updated. The murders in London between 1888-91 attributed to Jack the Ripper constitute one of the most mysterious unsolved criminal cases. This story is the result of many years meticulous research. The author reassesses all the evidence and challenges everything we thought we knew about the Victorian serial killer and the vanished East End he terrorized.
History is filled with stories of the famous crashing to earth, whether through an ill-judged statement, an overweening arrogance, a lust for power or money, or simply a stroke of bad luck. Today, more than ever, the world of the successful is littered with 'banana skins' lying in wait for the unwary, as film stars, politicians, soldiers, scientists, business tycoons, royalty, criminals, sports idols and others make that fatal decision, gaffe or slip. It covers 220 fascinating entries. Packed in a gift size, it is highly illustrated in colour. It is ideal travel and present book. It tells the stories behind the stories. The Hidden Secrets - this beautifully illustrated book charts the hidden secrets behind some of the biggest 'banana skins' of all time - the riveting stories of 200 figures who fell from grace - some for ever, some for a while, some evoke sympathy, a great many do not.
Meet Renee and Herta, two sisters who faced the unimaginable - together. This is their true story. RENEE: I was ten years old then, and my sister was eight. The responsibility was on me to warn everyone when the soldiers were coming because my sister and both my parents were deaf. I was my family's ears. As Jews living in 1940s Czechoslovakia, Renee, Herta and their parents were in immediate danger when the Holocaust came to their door. As the only hearing person in her family, Renee had to alert her parents and sister whenever the sound of Nazi boots approached their home so they could hide. But soon their parents were tragically taken away, and the two sisters went on the run, desperate to find a safe place to hide. Eventually they, too, would be captured and taken to the concentration camp Bergen-Belsen. Communicating in sign language and relying on each other for strength in the midst of illness, death and starvation, Renee and Herta would have to fight to survive the darkest of times. This gripping memoir, told in a vivid 'oral history' format, is a testament to the power of sisterhood and love, and now more than ever a reminder of how important it is to honour the past, and keep telling our own stories. A memoir of the Holocaust Perfect for those who want to learn more about the experiences of people during this period of time in history Written with Joshua M. Greene, a renowned Holocaust scholar.
Imprisoned in a remote Turkish POW camp during the First World War, two British officers, Harry Jones and Cedric Hill, cunningly join forces. To stave off boredom, Jones makes a handmade Ouija board and holds fake seances for fellow prisoners. One day, an Ottoman official approaches him with a query: could Jones contact the spirits to find a vast treasure rumoured to be buried nearby? Jones, a lawyer, and Hill, a magician, use the Ouija board - and their keen understanding of the psychology of deception-to build a trap for their captors that will lead them to freedom. The Confidence Men is a nonfiction thriller featuring strategy, mortal danger and even high farce - and chronicles a profound but unlikely friendship.
New Yorker magazine staff writer Paige Williams delves into the surprisingly perilous world of fossil collectors in this riveting true tale. In 2012, a New York auction catalogue boasted an unusual offering: 'a superb Tyrannosaurus skeleton'. In fact, Lot 49135 consisted of a nearly complete T. bataar - a close cousin to the more-famous T. rex - that had been unearthed in Mongolia. At 2.4 metres high and 7.3 metres long, the specimen was spectacular, and the winning bid was over $1 million. Eric Prokopi, a 38-year-old Floridian, had brought this extraordinary skeleton to market. A one-time swimmer who'd spent his teenage years diving for shark teeth, Prokopi's singular obsession with fossils fuelled a thriving business, hunting for, preparing, and selling specimens to clients ranging from natural-history museums to avid private collectors like Leonardo DiCaprio. But had Prokopi gone too far this time? As the T. bataar went to auction, a network of paleontologists alerted the government of Mongolia to the eye-catching lot. An international custody battle ensued, with Prokopi watching as his own world unravelled. The Dinosaur Artist is a stunning work of narrative journalism about humans' relationship with natural history, and about a seemingly intractable conflict between science and commerce. A story that stretches from Florida's Land O' Lakes to the Gobi Desert, The Dinosaur Artist illuminates the history of fossil collecting - a murky, sometimes risky business, populated by eccentrics and obsessives, where the lines between poacher and hunter, collector and smuggler, and enthusiast and opportunist can easily blur.
This chronicle of ten controversial mid-Victorian trials features brother versus brother, aristocrats fighting commoners, an imposter to a family's fortune, and an ex-priest suing his ex-wife, a nun. Most of these trials-never before analyzed in depth-assailed a culture that frowned upon public displays of bad taste, revealing fault lines in what is traditionally seen as a moral and regimented society. The author examines religious scandals, embarrassments about shaky family trees, and even arguments about which architecture is most likely to convert people from one faith to another.
Jackson is aggressive, confrontational and often volatile. His mother, Kayla, is crippled with grief after tragically losing her husband and eldest son. Struggling to cope, she puts Jackson into foster care. Cathy, his carer, encourages Jackson to talk about what has happened to his family, but he just won't engage. His actions continue to test and worry everyone. Then, in a dramatic turn of events, the true reason for Jackson's behaviour comes to light ... |
You may like...
Don't Give Up, Don't Give In - Life…
Louis Zamperini, David Rensin
Paperback
(2)
The Griekwastad Murders - The Crime That…
Jacques Steenkamp
Paperback
|