Defrosting Cold Cases

The New Hampshire Supreme Court has accepted an appeal by the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office in the case against David McLeod. Prosecutors have until June 15 to file a brief as posted by the Sentinel Source. McLeod is accused of setting fire to a multi-unit apartment building in the early morning hours of January 14, [...]

“Cold a Long Time: An Alpine Mystery” about Duncan MacPherson by author John Leake is my new “must read” for this summer. Duncan Alvin MacPherson (Feb 3, 1966 – Aug 9, 1989), a Canadian professional ice hockey player, went missing during a short stay in Austria. John emailed to give me the heads up about the book. I scanned [...]

Can you help the Chillicothe authorities in Ohio identify someone? In 1975, a man’s body was pulled from the Scioto River. He was naked and his ankles were tied with rope. The autopsy showed that the man died by drowning but the tied ankles leave authorities with many questions. Was this a murder? The biggest question that [...]

Today, Ken Lang returned for another cclivechat related to his books, his cases used in the books and how he transitioned from cop to author. Ken is not just about crime control. He is an artist as you can see from his 3D skull reconstructions. Ken told us about his work methods, how he styled [...]

Great news: “The Appellate Court is scheduled to hear arguments Friday [today] in the appeal of 66-year-old Richard Lapointe, who was convicted of murdering Bernice Martin and sentenced to life in prison. Lapointe insists that DNA evidence shows he’s innocent and that his former lawyers were ineffective.” On March 8, 1987, fire fighters were called [...]

I am the winner of the StretLaw™ ‘Blawg of the Month prize! The post that won was Part 1 in my April mini-blog tour. It was my first ever attempt at guest blogging on one topic for several hosts. I wrote down my musings about the historical mystery of the Man in the Iron Mask. It is [...]

This post was a long time in the “making” because I went back and forth with my decision and indecision to write this. Nice sentence, right? It reflects how I felt! I read these three books when I was decades younger and at that time, they made an impact on me. After reading them, I [...]

Los Tocayos Carlos … the namesake Carlos … The Guardian has an excellent article about a Texas capital punishment case involving a wrongful conviction, switched identities, an unsolved murder, evidence not tested for DNA, sloppy police procedures and an execution. “Carlos DeLuna was arrested, aged 20, on 4 February 1983 for the brutal murder of [...]

Edward Jesus Elias and Leopoldo Chavez II, both 36, were found guilty of first-degree murder and special-circumstance allegations including murder during a robbery. They were teenagers at the time they killed Keith Combs and Eugene “Cliff” Ellis. Elias and Chavez were both sentenced to serve life without the possibility of parole. They both received consecutive life [...]

Ian Rivers returned as guest to discuss cyber-bullying with us. It was a fascinating hour. We started with cyber-bullying shifting from being predominantly in instant messages (more private) to chat-rooms, emails, and social media so more public. We looked into behaviour and manners we apply in daily life. But somehow, on the Internet they can be [...]