True Murder: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History and the Authors That Have Written About Them

Rebecca Salcedo had an easy smile, a sexy body, and strong appetites-she wanted the world. Bruce Cleland, she decided, would buy it for her. The shy engineer quickly fell victim to her charms, getting her whatever she wanted. A new car. A boat. A house. But he wasn’t Rebecca’s only admirer… Even after Rebecca manipulated Bruce into marrying her, hoping to divorce him and take him for everything he had, she occupied herself with a series of lovers…Male strippers, women…they all spent time in Rebecca’s bed. But when she learned that a divorce would only get her a few pennies, she knew she had to find another way to secure Bruce’s fortune. Enlisting two family members as killers-for-hire, Rebecca set in motion her solution to the problem. While she watched, the first bullet hit Bruce in the face. Three more would follow. But while Rebecca kept the blood off her hands, she could not conceal evidence that led straight to her, culminating in a trial that would shock a community. HONEYMOON WITH A KILLER-Don Lasseter.

It's Christmas time and the perfect opportunity to recap the first year almost of True Murder and great interviews with great authors discussing their fine books. I'll be speaking about a few things of interest, the latest update on the Sidney Teerhuis appeal and the very best books and interviews I've had the pleasure to do. A big thank you for all the listeners-over 75,000 in the last 3 months alone. I'll open the lines for anyone to call in and comment-and help you usher in the holidays with some recommendations for books you really should check out and read. And-stay tuned for news of exciting new authors and their books for the new year. Thanks for listening!

William Vandergraff began his career as a police officer in 1972. After 6 years of walking Main Street beats he graduated to detective, which he worked as most of his 29 years. He worked as Staff Sergeant and was in charge of Homicide, Major Crime and Street Gang Unit. He was also the Witness Protection Coordinator and a Hostage Negotiator. On Christmas Eve, 1987 Larry Fisher and Jon Waluk visited the home of Agnes Kirk-Kirton looking for her husband Terry. He escaped out the window but the men shot and killed the mother and her 2 small children. William assembled a squad of officers, Waluk was captured quickly and 2 days later Fisher was in custody. After extensive questioning the motive was discovered. Fisher did not want his girlfriend using drugs and the Kirtons were her heroin connection and Fisher infuriated that they had sold her the drugs. In the 90's 3 men were found savagely butchered in a home. 2 Los Bravos bikers were arrested. The motive was that 2 of the men were in competition for control of some prostitutes. The third man simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. 13 year-old Beeper Spence was out walking alone in a north-end neighborhood when he was gunned down by gang members, mistaken for a rival gang member. William became aware of L.E.A.P, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, a U.S. based group comprised of police officers, judges, prosecutors, prison officials and politicians from around the world who recognized that the prohibition of drugs was causing the very same crime problems that the alcohol prohibition had done early in the 20th century. William believes that the majority of murders he investigated could be attributed to the Prohibition on Drugs. William will discuss his career working in Homicide in Canada's murder capital and the work he now does with L.E.A.P. LAW ENFORCEMENT AGAINST PROHIBITION-William Vandergraff.

The affluent suburb of Cheshire, Connecticut, seemed like the perfect place for Dr. William Petit and his wife Jennifer-Hawke-Petit to raise their two lovely daughters...Until July 23, 2007, when according to police, two ex-cons invaded the Petit home hoping to embark on a routine robbery-one that would ultimately prove deadly. What unfolded at 300 Sorghum Mill Drive was a tragic and horrifying sequence of events that shocked a community and made headlines across the nation. Before the morning was over, Mrs. Hawke Petit and one of her daughters would be sexually assaulted, the entire house would go up in flames, and only Dr. Petit-his head bloodied, his legs bound-would manage to escape with his life. With the help of neighbors and local police, the two suspects were soon captured. Now Joshua Komisarjevsky and Steven Hayes await trial for murder. IN THE NIDDLE OF THE NIGHT-Brian McDonald

In 1990, a young woman was strangled on a jogging path near the home of Pat Brown and her family. Brown suspected the young man who was renting a room in her house and quickly uncovered strong evidence that pointed to him-but the police dismissed her as merely a housewife with an overactive imagination. It would be six years before her former boarder would be brought in for questioning but the night Brown took action to solve the murder was the beginning of her life's work. Pat Brown is now of the nation's few female criminal profilers-a sleuth who assists police departments and victim's families by analyzing both physical and behavioral evidence to make the most scientific determination possible about who committed a crime. Brown has analyzed many dozens of seemingly hopeless cases and brought new investigative avenues to light. In THE PROFILER, Brown opens up her case files to take listeners behind the scenes of bizarre sex crimes, domestic murders, and mysterious deaths, going face-to-face with killers, rapists, and brutalized victims. A rare, first-person account of the real world of police and profilers as they investigate crimes-the good and bad, the cover-ups and the successes. THE PROFILER-MY LIFE HUNTING SERIAL KILLERS AND PSYCHOPATHS-PAT BROWN

When the urge took hold, serial killer Larry Bright brought women back to his home. After raping and murdering his victims, he brutally disposed of their bodies. Sometimes he built a white-hot fire and burned them in his backyard. Other times he dumped them along nearby roads and fields. For years, Bright had trolled the roads and back streets of Illinois for the most helpless, desperate women he could find. Then one woman escaped, and suddenly police were looking for bodies everywhere-trying to find out how many women Bright had really killed and what he'd done with their remains. Step by step, an all-out investigation would shock hardened detectives. From interviews with women who survived their encounters with him to the forensic search for bone fragments and pieces of burned, buried flesh, the case against Larry Bright finally closed like a vise-on the man who turned his victims into ashes. BONE CRUSHER-Linda Rosencrance

On Aug. 17, 1992, 11 year-old Holly Staker was baby-sitting a 5-year-old boy and his 2 1/2-year-old sister. After eating pizza, the boy went out to play. At 8 p.m., when a neighbor noticed he was still outside, the boy said he was locked out. The neighbor took the boy to his mother at her job at a nearby tavern. The mother, Dawn Engelbrecht contacted Holly's mother, and the two of them went to the apartment, where they found the 2 1/2-year-old girl unharmed but Holly was dead in a bedroom. She had been stabbed 27 times and brutally raped. In the days after the crime, Juan Rivera was jailed on an unrelated burglary charge. Another inmate told authorities that Rivera told him he knew who had killed Holly. Police focused on Rivera, then just a few days short of his 20th birthday. Ultimately, Rivera signed two confessions to the crimes. He later testified at a pretrial hearing that he was coerced into confessing and had nothing to do with the rape and murder. Engelbrecht, whose children Holly was baby-sitting, had initially told police after Rivera was arrested that he had approached her outside her apartment on the night of the crime and asked, "What's happening?" She later recanted that identification, however, and said she believed Rivera was not Holly's killer. In 1993 Rivera was sentenced to life in prison. That sentence and the conviction were set aside in 1996 by the Illinois Appellate Court, which ruled the judge in the case had made errors. In 2005 new DNA testing excluded Juan Rivera as the killer rapist prompting a third trial with Juan, his family, defense attorneys and supporters believing in his innocence, confident that Juan would finally be released. On May 8, 2009 Juan was convicted of Holly Staker's rape and murder yet again, even though DNA excluded him. Prosecutors cited Juan's confession as proof of his guilt. FREE JUAN RIVERA- Rob Warden of the Center on Wrongful Convictions.

In Creekstone, Texas, a small, quiet suburb of Houston, football was king...and David Temple was a prince. A former high school and college gridiron star-turned-coach, he had a fairy-tale marriage to bright, vivacious Belinda Lucas, a teacher at the local high school who was so warm and poular her colleagues called her "The Sunshine Girl." The fairy tale ended savagely on January 11, 1999, when belinda's lifeless body was discovered in a closet. Her skull had been shattered by a shotgun blast at close range. She was eight months pregnant. Threre was no damning evidence directly linking the brutal murder to husband David, who stood by emotionless and dry-eyed as police searched the crime scene. But a dogged eight-year investigation would expose a shocking history of domination, infidelity and rage, ultimately resulting in an epic courtroom battle for the ages, as the scandalous truth was revealed about love betrayed and innocent lives...SHATTERED-KATHRYN CASEY

Cho Oyu Mountain lies 19 miles east of Mount Everest on the border between Tibet and Nepal. To the elite mountaineering community, it's known as the sixth highest mountain in the world. To Tibetans, Cho Oyu represents a gateway to freedom through a secret glacial path: the Nangpa La. On September 30, 2006, gunfire echoed through the thin air near Advance Base Camp on Cho Oyu and climbers preparing to summit watched in horror as Chinese border guards fired at a group of Tibetans fleeing to India, via Nepal. Murder in the High Himalaya is the unforgettable account of the brutal killing of Kelsang Namtso, a seventeen-year-old Tibetan nun fleeing with the group to Dharamsala to escape religious persecution. Kelsang's death is a painful example of Tibet's oppression by China, but this time a human rights atrocity was witnessed and documented by dozens of Western climbers. Their moral dilemma was plain-would they tell the world what they had seen? The center of the story is an American climber, struck with a crisis of conscience, who gambled with his career to speak out and a young, Tibetan girl who sacrificed her rights to ever return to Tibet by telling the Western media about the murder of her best friend. Both risked their futures to expose the abuses of China in Tibet and paid a terrible price. MURDER IN THE HIGH HIMILAYA-Jonathan Green

For Darlene Roberts, a quiet drive home from work turned out to be the end of the road when a stranded motorist flagged her down. As soon as she stopped, Darlene was forcibly dragged from her car and viciously thrown to the ground, bound with cords and tightly gagged. A second attacker stepped into the scene, a woman in a hood and a mask. In the ensiung struggle, the woman's mask slipped off, revealing the face of Darlene's husband's ex-wife, Barbara Ann Roberts. Darlene broke away, running for her life. The couple pursued her across a field until they found her hiding in the grass. A shotgun was aimed and fired point blank. Later, Darlene was found floating in a pond. Who fired the fatal shot? The bitter ex-wwife? Or her lover and accomplice, millionaire neurosurgeon Dr. Robert Schiess the third? Only one of them would be convicted in this disturbingly twisted tale of lovers, cheaters, and killers in a small Alabama town. BLOOD AMBUSH-SHEILA JOHNSON

Covering the case of one of the most prolific serial killers for 8 years gave Stevie Cameron unmatched access to the entire shocking story as it unfolded. In ON THE FARM, you will read of Pickton's early years and wonder if anything he experienced could ever explain what he later committed. You will learn of the suspicions from some of Pickton's long time friends. You will hear from two women who narrowly escaped being Pickton's victims. Pickton was originally charged with 26 murders in the biggest, longest and most expensive investigation ever conducted in Canada. ON THE FARM delivers a fascinating and horrific account of the life of a serial killer, the women he murdered, the many people that worked to solve the case and the families of victims looking for justice. ON THE FARM-ROBERT WILLIAM PICKTON AND THE TRAGIC STORY OF VANCOUVER'S MISSING WOMEN-Stevie Cameron

Susan Berman was reared in the lap of Las Vegas luxury as the daughter of Davie Berman, a notorious casino mogul and mafia leader. It wasn't until college, well after her father's death that she learned what he really was and really did. She ultimately dedicated her life to learning about Vegas and it's underworld bosses, publishing 2 books on the subject Easy Street and Lady Las Vegas. Her story takes a turn for the bizarre in 1982 when Kathie Durst, the wife of college friend and heir to a New York real estate fortune, Robert Durst-mysteriously disappeared. Robert Durst was the primary suspect but no charges were laid. Shortly after the Kathie Durst case was reopened Susan Berman was found shot in the back of the head, mob execution style. No forced entry, no robbery, nothing missing. Again Robert is a suspect. Did Susan know her killer? Did she she have knowledge about Kathie Durst's death? MURDER OF A MAFIA DAUGHTER-THE LIFE AND TRAGIC DEATH OF SUSAN BERMAN-Cathy Scott

Grab a seat on the wild side of an obsessive relationship, from its erotic beginning to its violent end and the trials required to clean up the mess. Gary Taylor, a former Houston Post reporter recounts his personal, true-life fatal attraction involvement in the trail of violence that dogged texas attorney Catherine McHaffey Shelton for nearly three decades, prompting coverage by newspapers, magazines, 48 Hours, American Justice and even Oprah. The result is a tooth-grinding, genre-bending tale that blends memoir with murder mystery and legal procedural with psycho-killer in an adventure odyssey of self-discovery that nearly cost him his life. LUGGAGE BY KROGER-Gary Taylor

The Caylee Anthony Case: When news broke of 3-year-old Caylee Anthony's disappearance from her home in Florida in July 2008, there was a huge outpouring of sympathy across America. The search for Caylee made front-page headlines. There were disturbing questions raised about Caylee's mother Casey and she became the prime suspect. In October, based on new evidence, her erractic behavior and lies and the signs of human decomposition found in the trunk of her car-a grand jury indicted the young single mother. Two months later police found Caylee's remains just a 1/4 mile away from the Anthony home. Casey pled not guily and professes her innocence to this day. MOMMY'S LITTLE GIRL is the definitive account of one of the most shocking, confusing and horrific murders in American history. MOMMY'S LITTLE GIRL-DIANE FANNING

True crime author Ron Chepesiuk uncovers one of the biggest hoaxes in the history of the international drug trade in Sergeant Smack: The Legendary Lives and Times of Ike Atkinson, Kingpin, and his Band of Brothers. Sergeant Smack details the true legend of Ike Atkinson, one of the biggest Black drug traffickers in U.S. history. Atkinson pioneered some of the most innovative methods used in international drug smuggling. They ranged from duffle and AWOL bags, to the U.S. Army Postal System to the use of unsuspecting crew chiefs who operated military aircraft transporting teakwood furniture. But, contrary to popular belief, Atkinson's methods did not include the bogus cadaver-heroin smuggling connection conspiracy exploited by Frank Lucas in Hollywood 's blockbuster film, "American Gangster." The film not only distorted Atkinson's historical role in the international drug trade, but falsely depicted Lucas as the pioneer of the Asian heroin connection. As the book conclusively shows, the conspiracy is a hoax, as is Frank Lucas' claims of participation with Ike in the conspiracy. SERGEANT SMACK-Ron Chepesiuk