Jack Olsen

Keith Hunter Jesperson

The author profiles serial killer Keith Hunter Jesperson, the "Happy Face Killer" from Oregon who strangled eight women in the 1990s, detailing his evolution from angry child to psychotic murderer.

I: The Creation of a Serial Killer

Recounts the tragic events that followed the arrest of Fred Coe, a conservative, clean-cut young man, for a series of rapes committed in the city of Spokane and led to revenge and murder

A Psychopath and His Victims

"Son"

"For more than two years, a rapist prowled the night streets of the homey, All-American city of Spokane, Washington, terrorizing women, sparking a run on gun stores, and finally causing one newspaper to offer a reward--the calls taken by the distinguished managing editor himself, Gordon Coe. In March 1981, luck and inspired police work at last produced an arrest, and Spokane shuddered. The suspect was clean cut and conservative ... and Gordon Coe's son. For eighteen months, Jack Olsen researched the cases of Fred and Ruth Coe to try to learn not only what happened within that family, but how and why. He interviewed more than 150 people and built up a portrait not only of that extraordinary family, but of the mind of a psychopath. And searching the memories of the women in Fred Coe's life, he unearthed a most horrifying question: What is it like to love and live with a man for years--and then discover he is a psychopathic criminal?"--Provided by publisher.

The Man With The Candy

Night of the Grizzlies

A true account of the murder of the Campbells, a wealthy Houston couple, by their daughter Cindy and her lover, David, and of the investigation that followed by private eye Kim Paris

Cold Kill

Describes how Arthur Shawcross, a paroled child killer, shot, stabbed, suffocated, and strangled sixteen Rochester, N.Y., prostitutes and how the legal system failed his victims

The Misbegotten Son

rape, madness, and injustice in Seattle

Predator

a true story of law and disorder in the American West

Give a boy a gun

The mass murder of almost thirty young boys in Houston may well have been the most heinous crime of the century. How could such a series of murders go undetected for almost three years before being exposed? The Man with the Candy is a brilliant investigative journalist's story of the crime and the answer to that question. The night David Hilligiest didn't come home was both like and unlike other nights when other Houston boys disappeared between the years 1971 and 1973. At three in the morning the police were called, but they just said that boys were running away from the best of homes nowadays and that they'd list David as a runaway. No, there would be no official search for the youngster. Aghast, the Hilligiests, in the months that followed, hired their own detective, put up posters, even sought the aid of clairvoyants. But David never did come home again because, along with at least twenty-six other Houston boys, he had been murdered and buried by the homosexual owner of a candy factory, the mass murderer of the century, Dean Corll, according to his two teenage confessed accomplices, Elmer Wayne Henley, Jr., and David Brooks. Many of the young boys had not even been reported as missing, and the fact that they were dead would probably never have come to light had not one of the murderers confessed. For in Houston, where in a typical year the total number of murders is twice that of London despite the fact that London is six times as large and far more densely populated, missing persons and violence are likely to be considered commonplace. In the months before the trial of Henley and Brooks, Jack Olsen interviewed and probed for answers about the criminals, the victims and the city itself, which remained for the most part silent, angry and defensive. The result is a classic of true crime reportage.

The Man with Candy

The climb up to hell

The Rape of the Town of Lovell

Describes the devastating impact on Elaine and Joe Gere of the disappearance of their twelve-year-old daughter Brenda, the battle of one determined California woman to uncover the truth about a crime that led, six years later, to the prosecution of Michael Kay Green for the child's murder. Reissue.

Salt of the Earth

In the heart of the Swiss Alps stand the three majestic peaks of the Bernese Oberland, Europe's most famous mountain range. The highest, at 13,638 feet, is the Jungfrau. Next is the Mönch, at 13,465 feet. But it is the smallest, the Eiger, rising 13,038 feet above sea level, that is by far the deadliest. Called a "living" mountain for its constantly changing conditions-unpredictable weather, disintegrating limestone surfaces, and continuously falling rock and ice-its mile-high north wall is perhaps the most dangerous climb in the world. And that may be just what beckons elite Alpinists to scale the treacherous peak against the odds. In 1957, nearly forty years before the well-known Mount Everest tragedy, two teams of confident climbers set out to summit the north wall of the Eiger Mountain. Not long into their journey, onlookers could tell that the four men were headed for disaster. Soon rescue teams from all over Europe raced toward the Eiger-yet only one of the four climbers survived to face unfounded international accusations. In a story as fascinating as any novel, Jack Olsen creates a riveting account of daring adventure, heroic rescue, and one of the most baffling mysteries in the history of mountain climbing. KIRKUS REVIEW The forbidden, formidable north wall of the Eiger Mountain in the Bernese Alps, while it was first successfully climbed in 1938, has remained a supreme challenge to the most seasoned climber and in 1957 two teams of two Germans and two Italians again made the attempt with devastating results. while Corti, the only survivor, was perhaps talented- all were seemingly uninformed and ill-prepared, certainly for the wind and weather conditions which were to defeat them and make their rescue so difficult. Corti's partner, Longhi, was the first to entertain misgivings and was soon worn out, suffering frostbite as well; the Germans lost their food and were sustained chiefly by an innate, irrational mystique. Rescue crews were quickly organized, but only Corti, who ""looked like a live corpse"", was salvaged; his partner had been left lower down- to die, and the bodies of the other two ropemates were only found months later. In the avalanche of blame, resentment (against the guides as well as Corti) to follow, no true judgement could be reached although Olsen, a Sports Illustrated staff writer, does absolve Corti after a final interview... The folly and the fascination of "vertical Russian roulette", the courage compounded with stupidity, the doubts and recriminations which lingered on long after this disastrous ascent, all intensify the drama of this attempt and revive the furor it occasioned at the time. It will keep its readers on the ropes.

The Climb Up to Hell

Drawing on unprecedented access to interviews, diaries, court records, and the criminal himself, "I" is the inside story of Keith Hunter Jesperson, Oregon's Happy Face Killer, who strangled to death eight innocent women in the 1990s. The murderer's own words chronicle his evolution from angry child to sociopathic murderer, from tormentor of animals to torturer of women. Through Olsen's profoundly disturbing account, the killer describes in harrowing detail how he played his "death game, " how he got away with it, taunting police after they incarc

The Creation of a Serial Killer

Award Winner! For twenty-five years, the trusted family doctor in a small Wyoming town had been raping and molesting the women and children who most relied on him. Mostly Mormons, the naive victims sometimes realized on their wedding nights the truth about what had happened in Dr. Story's office. In riveting detail, veteran crime writer Jack Olsen tells the searing story of a small group of courageous women who decided to bring a doctor to justice — and unearthed a legacy of pain and anger that would divide their families, their neighbors, and an entire town Publishers Weekly: This masterful book by the author of Son, as much a searching sociological study as a true-crime narrative, tells what happened in Lovell when these happenings came to light: the community lost its bearings and the doctor was convicted of rape. Kirkus: From popular true-crime veteran Olsen (Son; Cold Kill; etc.), the widely publicized case that tore a small Wyoming town apart when the local doctor was accused, then convicted, of raping patients under the guise of giving them pelvic examinations. Lowell, Wyoming, was a town divided largely along religious lines: a Mormon majority and a Baptist minority. When Dr. John Story arrived to start up a practice, he found a warm welcome: a doctor was needed and, though he was a Baptist, his strict habits (which led him to start his own, more fundamentalist church) won the respect of Mormons who flocked to him as patients. But in 1983, after years of suspicions they had tried to dismiss, two sisters came forward with accusations of rape, inspiring dozens of other women (some elderly) to at last speak up. Some victims had been silent because of the Mormon code that seemed to hold women responsible for any extramarital sex; others had taken their case to the police (and not been believed), to Church leaders (who told them to switch doctors), and to the medical association (which did nothing). The 1983 accusers were vilified by the town (even by many Mormons, some grateful for Story's medical care, others sensitive to his claim that the case was a Mormon conspiracy); some lost their jobs and businesses, but Story was eventually convicted and is now doing 15-20 years. Engrossing true drama--and a more balanced than usual picture of Mormon life and values. The award-winning author of thirty-three books, Jack Olsen’s books have published in fifteen countries and eleven languages. Olsen's journalism earned the National Headliners Award, Chicago Newspaper Guild's Page One Award, commendations from Columbia and Indiana Universities, the Washington State Governor's Award, the Scripps-Howard Award and other honors. He was listed in Who's Who in America since 1968 and in Who's Who in the World since 1987. The Philadelphia Inquirer described him as "an American treasure." Olsen was described as "the dean of true crime authors" by the Washington Post and the New York Daily News and "the master of true crime" by the Detroit Free Press and Newsday. Publishers Weekly called him "the best true crime writer around." His studies of crime are required reading in university criminology courses and have been cited in the New York Times Notable Books of the Year. In a page-one review, the Times described his work as "a genuine contribution to criminology and journalism alike."

Doc: The Rape of the Town of Lovell

Recounts the criminal activities of Dr. John Story, a man who used both his authority and the intimidation of his patients to sexually abuse a large percentage of a small town's women

"Doc"

For more than half a century, grizzly bears roamed free in the national parks without causing a human fatality. Then in 1967, on a single August night, two campers were fatally mauled by enraged bears -- thus signaling the beginning of the end for America's greatest remaining land carnivore. Night of the Grizzlies, Olsen's brilliant account of another sad chapter in America's vanishing frontier, traces the causes of that tragic night: the rangers' careless disregard of established safety precautions and persistent warnings by seasoned campers that some of the bears were acting "funny"; the comforting belief that the great bears were not really dangerous -- would attack only when provoked. The popular sport that summer was to lure the bears with spotlights and leftover scraps -- in hopes of providing the tourists with a show, a close look at the great "teddy bears." Everyone came, some of the younger campers even making bold enough to sleep right in the path of the grizzlies' known route of arrival. This modern "bearbaiting" could have but one tragic result…

Jack Olsen's Last Man Standing is the gripping story of Geronimo Pratt, war hero and community leader, who was framed by the FBI in one of the greatest travesties of justice in American history. Geronimo Pratt did not commit the murder for which he served twenty-seven nightmarish years. As a UCLA student, though, he had led the Los Angeles Chapter of the Black Panther Party, and became a target of the FBI. Here is the spellbinding saga of Pratt, his heroic lawyers, Johnnie Cochran and Stuart Hanlon, and the Reverend James McCloskey, who overcame all the odds to bring the truth to light and free Geronimo.

Jack Olsen

About

Books

Join the club