Kendall Francois · The Real Harry Bosch
Plus: A doc for your weekend
the true crime that's worth your time
Writing for The Blotter, Mark Blankenship says that Cynthia Rowe’s true crime memoir is that of a “macabre Carrie Bradshaw.” The 2017 tome is called The Spider And The Fly: A Reporter, A Serial Killer, And The Meaning Of Murder, and it’s ostensibly about Poughkeepsie serial killer Kendall Francois, who was convicted of killing eight women between 1996 and 1998.
I say “ostensibly” because Mark writes that “Rowe is writing about herself, and how her obsession with Francois dominated her life for over a decade.”
If that sounds solipsistic, well…it is. There’s no ignoring the author’s narcissism as she becomes a macabre Carrie Bradshaw, turning every detail of Francois’s life and crimes into an excuse to talk about herself. Even when she decides to stop thinking about him, Rowe writes him a letter that includes the following: “You were the start of a very long road. To reach its end, I had to walk away… Thank you for showing me who I needed to be.”
Despite Rowe’s “icky”-ness, Mark says that the book is still worth a look, as “the shocking extremes of Rowe’s behavior make the book incredibly readable, as does her descriptive skill.” You can read his full review here, and if you want to check out the book for yourself, if you buy it via this link we get a little bit of cash. -- EB
The guy who inspired Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch character is getting a true crime show of his own. Sarah is always singing the praises of Amazon’s adaptation of Connelly’s novels (holy cow, it’s on its fifth season?!?), so I’m already eager to hear her assessment of Catching the Cold Killers, a ten-episode documentary series that will follow retired LAPD Cold Case investigators Adam Bercovici (who has quite the resume) and Bosch inspiration Rick Jackson (who, needless to say, bears little resemblance to actor Titus Welliver).
Deadline reports that on the show, Jackson and Bercovici will “re-open cold cases that have bewildered L.A.’s law enforcement community for years.” Here’s where I make a kind of crumple-mouthed shrug, as a lot of cold-case solution series feel like “ghost hunting” shows to me. Let’s face it, if there was real movement on a case (or if someone actually saw a damn ghost) we’d hear about it way before the show makes it to air, right? And if an arrest was made in any of the crimes Jackson and Bercovici looked in to, we probably would have heard by now, as Catching the Cold Killers is slated to make its premiere at entertainment trade show Mipcom next month. -- EB
Just in time for football season, Roll Red Roll has made its way to Netflix. The award-winning documentary about the now-infamous Steubenville, Ohio, high school rape case made its debut on PBS’s POV this summer, and before that it toured the festival circuit to near-unanimous acclaim. (Slate critic Lena Wilson, for example, called it “One of the Most Horrifying Documentaries I’ve Ever Watched, and Everybody Needs to See It.”) Sarah was somewhat less impressed when she covered it in Brief 41.
The film made its global debut on Netflix this week, even as it continues to screen in theaters across the country. You can stream it now, and if you’d like to make arrangements to share it with a larger audience, the sign-up sheet to host a screening is here. -- EB
If you’re interested in the ongoing true-crime scene that is the Catholic church, Slate has a longread you might want to check out. Ruth Graham’s piece, entitled “Theodore McCarrick Still Won’t Confess,” is about a defrocked archbishop who reportedly created a “culture of fear and intimidation” at Seton Hall University during his time in the Archdiocese of Newark. He was convicted by The Holy See on “charges of the sexual abuse of minors and adults,” the Catholic News Agency reported earlier this year, and was sent -- literally in the dead of night -- to Victoria, Kansas, which is where he gave his first interview since the scandal.
I asked him if he had done it. He has been accused of sexually assaulting minors and making unwanted advances on seminary students he invited to his beach house in New Jersey over the course of many decades. Were those stories true? “I’m not as bad as they paint me,” he said. “I do not believe that I did the things that they accused me of.” I told him it sounded like he thought it was possible—that saying he didn’t “believe” he had done those things, or that he doesn’t remember them, makes it sound as if he’s leaving it an open question. No, he said.
You can read Graham’s full report here. -- EB
@ me if you want, but as a person raised in the faith, I feel as qualified to describe the organization as a “crime scene” as I would some blocks in my home city.
Are you ready for more Rachel Monroe? Her media blitz for Savage Appetites has generated loads of coverage -- and good for her, the book sounds cool! (I will read you, book, just give me a minute!) While a lot of her press has been redundant, her appearance late last week on the With Friends Like These podcast is a standout, in part because host Ana Marie Cox gives extremely solid interview, and partially because they pull no punches on the toxic nature of true-crime fandom -- a concern that pairs particularly nicely with Mark’s observations on The Spider And The Fly (see above). (Full circle, you guys!) You can listen to the August 30 episode of With Friends Like These here. -- EB
Monday on Best Evidence: So, how about an Oklahoma tiger breeder who allegedly involved himself in murder for hire? Interested?
What is this thing? This should help.
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