True Crime Stories

This is a difficult blog to title.  One has to wonder if the bigger crime was the murder of the young 13 year old girl or the lynching of the probable innocent man two years later.  Once again however, much like the case I blogged of previously, Laura D. Fair, the media and their coverage played a large role in this case.  The difference here is that a likely innocent man lost his life.  Of course the media was not completely at fault.  Much like cases we hear of today, this case was full of speculation, recantations, as well as allegations of police and prosecution corruption and misconduct. In the early morning of April 27, 1913 the body of young National Pencil Company employee, Mary Phagan was found in the basement of the factory by the nightwatchman, Newt Lee in Atlanta Georgia.  There are a few things that we have to remember about this time. First you have an issue of the "deep" south.  There was a lot of antisemitism going on.  The ...

Many murder victims are innocent people and many crimes are vicious.  When you watch the true crime magazine type shows you often hear a police officer talking about a particular case being the worse crime they had investigated, or the worse crime scene ever.  I admit that I often roll my eyes to these statements because they seem overly dramatic for television purposes, or so it seems.  There are few cases in which if I were to hear an officer state that I would understand why.... the Sylvia Likens case was one.... the Shanda Sharer case is another.   In a sense the two cases have many similarities.  Both girls were teenagers.  Sylvia was 16 when she was tortured and murdered in 1965... Shanda was 12 when she was tortured and burned alive in 1992.  Both girls were murdered in Indiana.  Both cases involved multiple people and sadly they both involved other teenagers. Shanda lived in a small southwestern Indiana town, New Albany, with her mothe...

I am what I consider a true crime buff.  I spend an enormous amount of time watching shows such as "48 Hours," "Dateline" and just especially the programming on the Discovery ID channel.  Sometimes it seems rare that a "new" program comes on about a story that I have not at the very least heard about. Many I have seen several shows about or read a book.  Often times after I will come to the "information highway" and search all that I can on a subject.  For the record, while I do read Wikipedia I often use that as a jumping off point for a subject, but I never simply stop there. In writing these blogs I will attempt to first state what facts are KNOWN about a case and then go into greater detail and I am sure my opinion of thse facts as I continue.  Reader beware as I am often long winded, especially about subjects I am passionate about or have a strong opinion of. The Amanda Knox case has been especially challenging for me in finding accura...