Murder In The Family

THE *INSTANT* NEW YORK TIMES, USA TODAY AND TORONTO STA BESTSELLER *THE FIRST EVER STAND-ALONE FROM AUTHOR OF THE DI ADAM FAWLEY MILLION-COPIES-SOLD SERIES*

This is the tragic story of Kent Whitaker's heart-wrenching journey toward forgiveness and faith after the brutal murder of his wife and one of his sons. Straight from the headlines comes an incredible true story of a son's treachery. For the first time, readers are offered inside access to the emotional drama that went on behind the scenes. At the core is the remarkable healing power of forgiveness, demonstrated by Kent Whitaker, which shows how the survivors of such atrocious events can still forgive those who have permanently damaged their lives. One evening, the Whitaker family returned home after dinner, celebrating a son's impending graduation from college. On opening the front door, they faced a gunman lying in wait. The gunman opened fire, instantly killing the younger son and Kent's wife, leaving Kent and his older son lying wounded until police and ambulances arrived. While recovering in the hospital, Kent resolved in his heart to forgive whoever was responsible for the deaths of his wife and son. Over the next few weeks, it was discovered that the whole murder plot had been orchestrated by the surviving son -- whom Kent had unknowingly forgiven. After a trial that resulted in a death sentence for his son, Kent emerged from this harrowing ordeal to share their astonishing journey toward forgiveness and redemption.

Shortlisted for the 2021 Crime Writers of Canada Brass Knuckles Award for Best Nonfiction Crime Book Diplomat father. Murdered mother. Emotionally neglected children. An apparent cover-up. Family dinners will never be the same. "I think that my father murdered my mother." That terrible belief spurs author Jeff Blackstock to investigate the circumstances of his mother Carol's death when he was a child. Carol Blackstock died at age 24 in 1959--poisoned by arsenic--but the cause of her death remained shrouded in mystery for decades. Jeff's father George Blackstock was a career diplomat in Canada's foreign service, posted to glamorous Buenos Aires with his wife Carol and their three children. A little more than a year after the family's arrival, the vivacious young mother, now emaciated and in terrible pain, was transferred to Montreal for treatment of a mysterious illness that proved fatal. In the following year, George Blackstock remarried, and a young woman named Ingrid became the feared stepmother to Jeff and his two siblings. Carol's parents soon had suspicions about their son-in-law George but were unable to get justice for their daughter. Class privilege--George was the scion of a Toronto establishment family and Carol was from modest beginnings--and an aversion to scandal all figured in an apparent cover-up. But secrets have a way of eventually disrupting all families. A damning autopsy report about arsenic poisoning, found among their grandmother's effects, leads Jeff Blackstock and his sister to horrifying revelations about their father. Eventually, they confront him and accuse him of their mother's murder. But George offers only vague explanations that don't add up. George died a broken man, mostly abandoned by his adult children. A compelling story of a high-society murder, a heartbreaking tale of emotionally neglected children, and an inquiry into the power and privilege of the Anglo upper classes of the time, Murder in the Family chronicles the shocking legacy of deeply buried secrets and betrayal in one's own family.

Now updated, the New York Times bestseller about a horrifying Alaska massacre and a controversial trial: “Barer writes true crime at its best.” —Jack Olsen On March 15, 1987, police in Anchorage, Alaska, arrived at a horrific scene of carnage. In a modest downtown apartment, they found Nancy Newman’s brutally beaten corpse sprawled across her bed. In other rooms were the bodies of her eight-year-old daughter, Melissa, and her three-year-old, Angie, whose throat was slit from ear to ear. Both Nancy and Melissa had been sexually assaulted. After an intense investigation, the police focused on a principal suspect: twenty-three-year-old Kirby Anthoney, a troubled drifter who had turned to his uncle, Nancy’s husband John, for help and a place to stay. Little did John know that the nephew he took in was a murderous sociopath. These shocking, tragic events stunned Anchorage residents and motivated the Major Crimes Unit of the city’s police department to get everything right. Feeling the heat, Kirby bolted for the Canadian border. But he was caught in time—and the cops and a tenacious prosecutor began a long, bitter battle to convict him, up against an equally tough defense lawyer and the egomaniacal defendant himself. The tale reached its climax in a controversial trial, where for the first time an FBI profiler was allowed to testify and the pre-DNA science of allotyping was presented to a jury. But justice would not be served until after the psychopathic Kirby Anthoney took the stand in his own defense—and showed the world the monster he truly was.

As the old saying goes, "You can pick your friends, but not your relatives." In tranquil Northumberland County, Ontario, two families are well acquainted with the grim truth of that innocuous-sounding expression. They are the descendants of the first, and only, man executed in Northumberland's history. In a sordid true-crime tale of poison and philandering in 1850s Ontario, the respected Dr. William Henry King astonished the countryside with the sinister murder of his wife and with his subsequent attempts to evade justice. His capture and conviction were triumphs of vengeful relatives and early forensic science. Dan Buchanan, a blood relative of Dr. King's, grew up dogged by rumours of his ancestor’s bloody crime, but family shame and obfuscation left him with more questions as time wore on. Now, based on original documents, breathless reportage of the sensational King trial, and interviews held just after the notorious hanging, Buchanan reconstructs the full tale of crime and punishment, which shocked the province and has engendered speculation for over a century and a half.

A storm-struck island. A blood-soaked bed. A missing man. In this captivating mystery that's perfect for fans of Knives Out, Senior Investigator Shana Merchant discovers that murder is a family affair. Thirteen months ago, former NYPD detective Shana Merchant barely survived being abducted by a serial killer. Now hoping to leave grisly murder cases behind, she's taken a job in her fiancé's sleepy hometown in the Thousand Islands region of Upstate New York. But as a nor'easter bears down on her new territory, Shana and fellow investigator Tim Wellington receive a call about a man missing on a private island. Shana and Tim travel to the isolated island owned by the wealthy Sinclair family to question the witnesses. They arrive to find blood on the scene and a house full of Sinclair family and friends on edge. While Tim guesses they're dealing with a runaway case, Shana is convinced that they have a murder on their hands. As the gale intensifies outside, she starts conducting interviews and discovers the Sinclairs and their guests are crawling with dark and dangerous secrets. Trapped on the island by the raging storm with only Tim whose reliability is thrown into question, the increasingly restless suspects, and her own trauma-fueled flashbacks for company, Shana will have to trust the one person her abduction destroyed her faith in—herself. But time is ticking down, because if Shana's right, a killer is in their midst and as the pressure mounts, so do the odds that they'll strike again.

This book offers a unique framework for examining the various types of family murder -- delving into the commonalities, the differences, and society's misconceptions and providing readers with a comprehensive guide to begin to understand these tragedies.

Early on an April morning, eighteen-year-old Billy Frank Gilley, Jr., killed his sleeping parents. Surprised in the act by his younger sister, Becky, he turned on her as well. Billy then climbed the stairs to the bedroom of his other sister, Jody, and said, “We’re free.” But is one ever free after an unredeemable act of violence? The Gilley family murders ended a lifetime of physical and mental abuse suffered by Billy and Jody at the hands of their parents. And it required each of the two survivors–one a convicted murderer, the other suddenly an orphan–to create a new identity, a new life.