Review of Monster City by Michael Arntfield

Author: Michael Arntfield

Release date: September 4, 2018

Publisher: Little A

Pages: 300

Buy from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Monster-City-Murder-Mayhem-Nashvilles/dp/1503952886/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

“When I hear music, I fear no danger. I am invulnerable. I see no foe.” —Henry Davis Thoreau, “Winter”

Nashville is a hub for hopeful musicians and a magnet for country music fans. It’s often referred to as Music City, and by the time Pat Postiglione arrived there in 1980, it had already borne witness to a string of brutal unsolved sex slayings. These murders would serve as a portent to worse things to come. As Postiglione was promoted from Metro beat cop to detective sergeant in the elite cold-case unit “Murder Squad,” some of America’s most heinous, elusive, and violent serial killers were calling Nashville home. Over the next two decades, the body count continued to climb.

From Vanderbilt University to dive bars and out-of-the-way motels, Postiglione followed the blood-stained tracks of these ever-escalating crimes—each perpetrated by a different killer who had one thing in common: the intent to murder without motive or remorse. But of all the investigations, of all the fiends Postiglione hunted, few were as frightening, or as game changing, as the Rest Stop Killer: a homicidal trucker who turned the interstates into his trolling ground. His next stop was Nashville, but Postiglione was waiting.

“. . . he hadn’t returned to Music City for the pedal steels, fiddles, or line dancing . . . He was awake now. His eyes wide open. When it was all over, they would use newfangled terms like activated psychopath and malignant narcissist to try to capture the essence of his malevolence—to clinically classify and quantify his pure evil . . . He’d inevitably fooled just about everyone . . . But there was one person he couldn’t fool. It was the one cop who’s caught him—the same cop who’d solved his first murder and who’d lock him up . . .”

Michael Arntfield is a true crime broadcaster, university professor, former police detective, and author of over a dozen books and articles that include the bestselling Murder City: The Untold Story of Canada's Serial Killer Capital, 1959–1984 (2015, Friesen Press). In his captivating new book, Monster City: Murder, Music and Mayhem in Nashville’s Dark Age, Arntfield examines the true accounts of the serial killers who terrorized Nashville during the last decades of the 20th century and the elite police squad that was determined to bring them to justice. In it he contends that the characteristics of the serial killings committed during this time frame were perpetrated by “the hedonistic-thrill killer . . . a special breed of psychopath with an insatiable desire for stimulation.”

Throughout Monster City Arntfield does an excellent job of detailing the investigations, forensics, and theories behind the motivations of these brutal murders. It is a powerful expose that studies the deep dark nature of the criminal mind.

Although at times Arntfield’s writing style tends to be a little bit sensational and there’s some repetition, overall this book is informative and shines a spotlight on some of Nashville’s most brutal and long forgotten crimes. It also does an excellent job of describing the heroic police detectives who put themselves in harm’s way. These brave men and women through countless hours of self-sacrifice to pursue these heinous criminals to make our streets safe for everyone. Their steadfast resolve and persistence must be honored and applauded. Monster City will make an excellent addition to any true crime enthusiast's library.

Michael Thomas Barry is the author of eight nonfiction books and a staff reviewer for the New York Journal of Books.

This review first appeared at the New York Journal of Books on September 7, 2018 - https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-review/monster-city

Review of The Cadaver King and the Country Dentist by Radley Balko and Tucker Carrington

Author: Radley Balko and Tucker Carrington

Release date: February 27, 2018

Publisher: Public Affairs

Pages: 416

Buy from Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/Cadaver-King-Country-Dentist-Injustice/dp/161039691X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1519837858&sr=8-1&keywords=Radley+Balko

After two three-year old girls were raped and murdered in rural Mississippi, law enforcement pursued and convicted two innocent men, Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks. Together they spent a combined 30 years in prison before being exonerated in 2008. Meanwhile, the real killer remained free.

The Cadaver King and the Country Dentist: A True Story of Injustice in the American South, co-authored by Radley Balko and Tucker Carrington, recounts the story of how the criminal justice system allowed this to happen, and how two men, Dr. Steven Hayne and Dr. Michael West, built successful careers on the back of that structure.

For nearly two decades, Hayne, a medical examiner, performed the vast majority of Mississippi’s autopsies, while his friend Dr. West, a local dentist, pitched himself as a forensic jack-of-all-trades. Together they became the go-to experts for prosecutors and helped put countless Mississippians in prison. But then some of those convictions began to fall apart.

Radley Balko is an opinion writer and investigative reporter for the Washington Post and authored two books that includes Rise of the Warrior Cop (2013) and The Militarization of America’s Police Force (2013). Tucker Carrington is criminal defense lawyer and director of the George C. Cochran Innocence Project at the University of Mississippi.

“In America, actual wrongful convictions estimates range from 2 to 10 percent, but getting an exact number is difficult. These numbers may seem low, but when applied to a prison population of 2.3 million, they become staggering: Anywhere from 46,000 to 230,000 innocent people could be locked away right now.”

This books main focus is on Steven Hayne’s and Michael West’s roles in the trials of Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks, both men were wrongly convicted and eventually exonerated in the sexual assault and murder of two children in the 1990s. With keen insight the authors methodically dissect Hayne’s and West’s false and misleading testimony and pin point major flaws in the prosecution’s case.

Of course, it is not just these two men at fault here. They argue that bad forensics, blatant racism, greed, and systematic institutional failures are fundamentally at fault in this case and many others, and these failings have raised thought provoking questions about Mississippi’s ability and willingness to address these central problems.

In this riveting new exposé Balko and Carrington have detailed the fundamental flaws of the broken Mississippi criminal justice system, which is a relic of the Jim Crow era. They reveal that the root of police misconduct lay in corrupt political maneuvering and the justice system's reliance on shaky expert testimony. Because prosecutors were primarily interested in pushing cases off their dockets. They relied on flimsy and dishonest testimony to guarantee quick convictions for black defendants rather than identifying the actual perpetrators. How this occurred for so long, unrestrained and unapologetic, is perplexing.

“Those in innocence work have made some strides. Over the last 25 years, more than 2,000 exonerations have occurred in the United States, but workers know that they have only truly begun to scratch the surface.”

The Cadaver King and the Country Dentist is a wide-ranging and explosive investigation of a racist criminal justice system that allows for the tragic exploitation and incarceration of black people in Mississippi. With detailed and wide-ranging storytelling techniques, Balko and Carrington build a hard-to-ignore case for comprehensive criminal justice reform. This book is certain to give pause to even the most ardent supporters of law enforcement and is a wake-up call to anyone who thinks police militarization and brutality isn't a political issue.

Michael Thomas Barry's most recent book is In the Company of Evil: Thirty Years of California Crime, 1950–1980. He is the author of six other nonfiction books and is a columnist for CrimeMagazine.com.

Review first appeared at the New York Journal of Books on February 27, 2018 - https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-review/cadaver-king

Review of A Murder in Music City by Michael Bishop

Author: Michael Bishop

Publish Date: September 5, 2017

Publisher: Prometheus Books

Pages: 330

Buy from Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/Murder-Music-City-Corruption-Innocent/dp/1633883450/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1504644031&sr=8-1&keywords=michael+bishop

“Paula Herring’s murder had been predicted for months. That the victim was a [pretty blond coed wasn’t all that surprising to authorities, especially since a number of young women in one of Nashville’s newest subdivisions had been targeted by a rapist for more than a year. Metro Police had predicted that the activities of the rapist would eventually escalate to murder.”

Eighteen-year-old Paula Herring was “a girl full of the joy of being alive . . . warm, lovable, intensely energetic, and full of plans for the future.” On February 22, 1964, the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, freshmen was shot to death in the den of her mother’s suburban Nashville home. In the next room slept her six-year-old brother, apparently unaware of the gruesome event.

A few months later a judge’s son is convicted of the crime. Decades after the slaying, author Michael Bishop stumbled upon a secret file related to the case and with the help of some of the world’s top forensic experts—including forensic psychologist Richard Walter (aka “the living Sherlock Holmes”) he uncovered the truth of what really happened to Paula Herring, and his conclusions are completely different from what the public was initially led to believe.

In 1997, Michael Bishop, a sales executive for a healthcare learning company accidently came across files that contained information about the Herring murder case. For the past two decades he tenaciously investigated and enthusiastically followed the evidence trail, which led to a new theory of who might have actually murdered Paula Herring.

In A Murder in Music City: Corruption, Scandal, and the Framing of an Innocent Man, Bishop lays out the shocking and overwhelming evidence that led to his startling conclusion that a small group of influential Nashville residents played a significant role in covering-up evidence and actively assisted in sending an innocent man to prison for a crime he did not commit.

In this gripping page-turner, Bishop reveals the grisly realties and true story behind the murder of Paula Herring. This first time author and amateur detective proves to be amazingly effective in his writing abilities and his first-person description of the steps he used to discover evidence in the case gives the story a sense of proximity to the present.

By relentlessly following every lead and using his “sales skills” to gain the trust of those he questioned, Bishop reveals plausible proof that John Randolph Clarke was indeed framed for the murder, and goes on to formulate a reasonable and disturbing theory as to the scandalous identity of the actual killer.

Overall, A Murder in Music City gives the reader a good sense of what it was like to live in 1960s Nashville, and as his investigation into this half a century’s old closed case unfolds into the present day. Bishop’s shocking and very plausible conclusions are thought provoking and compelling. But because it tends to follow the author’s own experiences with the case, the narrative unfortunately tends to get off track and bogs down in places. With that said, true crime enthusiasts will most certainly find this book to be hauntingly compelling. A highly recommended thrill ride of narrative true crime that tells a sad story of murder, family betrayal, and political corruption that is equal parts thought provoking, captivating, and unforgettable.

Michael Thomas Barry's most recent book is In the Company of Evil: Thirty Years of California Crime, 1950–1980. He is the author of six other nonfiction books and is a columnist for CrimeMagazine.com.

Review first appeared at the New York Journal of Books on September 4, 2017 - http://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-review/murder-music