"Growing up during the Depression in the segregated coal-mining town of Slab Fork, West Virginia, the bright and willful Doris Payne dreamed big. Fascinated by the fine clothes, jewels, and lifestyles in magazines such as Town & Country and Harper's Bazaar, she imagined a world beyond herself, one in which she did not carry the weight of limitations that others imposed on her and where her beloved mother was free from her father's abuse. After the...

"The extraordinary life and crimes of heiress-turned-revolutionary Rose Dugdale, who in 1974 became the only woman to pull off a major art heist." -- Amazon.com. "In the world of crime, there exists an unusual commonality between those who steal art and those who repeatedly kill: they are almost exclusively male. But, as with all things, there is always an outlier--someone who bucks the trend, defying the reliable profiles and leaving investigators...

In the Australia of the 1960s, '70s and '80s, armed robbers were the top of the criminal food chain. Their dash and violence were celebrated, and men like Ray Denning and Russell 'Mad Dog' Cox were household names long before Underbelly established Melbourne's gangland thugs as celebrities. Both were handsome, charismatic bandits who refused to bow to authority. Both were classified as 'intractable' in prison, and both escaped. Cox was the only man...

It's a total crime wave: A mini encyclopedia of true crime, packed with stories of killers, cons, survivors, forensics and more! More than 200 stories of killers, con artists, master thieves, and brazen kidnappers-and strong survivors, detectives, forensic breakthroughs, and legal minds on all sides of the action. In other words, a mini-encyclopedia perfect for newcomers and hard-core crime fans alike. Here are the big names-Bundy, Manson, Berkowitz,...

The sensational true story of how a bank robber killed a man in a wild shootout, sparking a national debate around gun control and the death penalty. On July 24, 1964, twenty-four-year-old Matthew Kerry Smith disguised himself with a mask and a Beatle wig, hoisted a semi-automatic rifle, and then held up a bank in North York, Ontario. The intelligent but troubled son of a businessman and mentally ill mother, Smith was a navy veteran with a young...

The Kent State University Press is excited to reissue these classic true crime detective stories by Allan Pinkerton, the Scottish American detective and spy who founded the Pinkerton National Detective Agency in 1850. His agency was the largest private law enforcement organization in the world at the height of its power, and its well-known logo of a large, unblinking eye actually served as inspiration for the term "private eye." In Bank Robbers and...

A collection of strange-but-true crime tales featuring cops, lawyers, and some very unusual suspects . . . The fact-finding folks at Bathroom Readers' Institute have rounded up the best cops-and-robber articles we've ever done, plus a rogues' gallery of new offenders. You'll read about dumb crooks and criminal masterminds, mafia henchmen and low-level goons, ancient warriors and Old West gunslingers, crazed cops and jovial judges, and even a...

Floyd was the most infamous bank robber of his time. From his early teens, Floyd believed that crime would lead to happiness and prosperity. But, after each crime, he ended up back in prison, planning his next escape, his next big job. In 1974, he and three others pulled off a one-million-dollar heist, but it didn't end up the way he planned. This book is a personal account of Forsberg's life of crime, beginning with burglary and purse snatching,...

Las Vegas Police Det. Bradley Nickell brings you the inside scoop on the investigation of the most prolific repeat offender Las Vegas has ever known. Daimon Monroe looked like an average guy raising a family with his diffident schoolteacher girlfriend. But just below the surface, you'll learn he was an accomplished thief with an uncontrollable lust for excess. His criminal mind had no bounds-he was capable of anything given the proper circumstances. You...

A thoroughly entertaining and darkly humorous roundup of history’s notorious but often forgotten female con artists and their bold, outrageous scams—by the acclaimed author of Lady Killers. From Elizabeth Holmes and Anna Delvey to Frank Abagnale and Charles Ponzi, audacious scams and charismatic scammers continue to intrigue us as a culture. As Tori Telfer reveals in Confident Women, the art of the con has a long and venerable tradition, and...