A Neolithic True Crime Case

In September of 1991, adventurers Erika & Helmut Simon were hiking through the Alps near the border between Austria and Italy. They stumbled across what they thought, at first, to be a recently deceased fellow hiker partially frozen into the icy ground. They alerted the authorities, who removed the body and transported it to the …

Reflections & Opinions on Jonestown

Racial Dynamics CW: Mentions of suicide and child death Peoples Temple and Jim Jones touted themselves as racially progressive. They promoted racial equality in the press, and they provided services to some communities in need during their time in the United States. Jones was so proud of his "rainbow family." But I think that he …

Jonestown

Those who dive into the true crime genre often know that feeling when a particular story gets to you. We are actually a compassionate bunch generally speaking, but not every case has the same gut-twisting effect as those particular ones. When I first heard of Jonestown, I was up for hours doing research, both sickened …

Why I Often Think About Henry “Hank” Gafforio

As an avid consumer of the true crime genre, I obviously read about a whole spate of sad things. An occurrence that I find particularly sad, though, is when certain people who have been harmed seem to slip through the cracks, fading into obscurity over time as if they never existed. Society attributes greater or …

An Essay on “Cyntoia’s Story”

For my first real post (real as in about something, other than just talking about myself), I thought it might be fun to share an essay I wrote in 2013 for a Criminology course I was taking. Since the exciting news of Cyntoia Brown's imminent release from prison, this essay might be an interesting lil' …