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True Detective
October 2012 (TDOCT2012)
£3.50
“Babes,” Jim Red Dog wrote, “I went crazy last night and killed Hugh. I know this is it for me so I’ll make one last request. Say a prayer for me every day and know that if it wasn’t for my mind being so whacked out that we would’ve lived the life we dreamed of...I just wish things could’ve turned out better for us. My last thoughts will be of you and me...I love you so much and I’m sorry for what I have done. Hold me baby always don’t let me go, never!!!” “By The Way – My Husband’s A Murderer” – it’s this month’s America’s Most Evil feature.
Over the last year True Detective has been marking the 30th anniversary of the abolition of the death penalty in France with the series Grisly Tales Of The Guillotine in which we have examined the crimes that led to some of the last beheadings for “ordinary” offences. This month, to mark the end of the popular series, we focus on the facts and figures of French judicial executions and the part the guillotine played not only in France and Europe but around the world.
A mentally fragile teenager when his saga started, Juan Rivera was less than bright with a petty crime record and a suicide attempt behind him. But was he the brutal murderer the authorities alleged him to be? His electronic ankle tag and DNA both indicated he was innocent. So why did three juries convict him of murder? See this amazing case – and perhaps you can tell us what you think via Your Letters.
Last month’s Under The Spotlight featured the murder of Olive Young in her Finborough Road, Fulham, flat by Ronald True. This month we return to Finborough Road for the murder of another prostitute 26 years later and only a few doors away.
The last public execution in France took place at Versailles in 1939 and after the Second World War the guillotine was used only sparingly. By the late 1970s France’s practice of capital punishment was out of step with the rest of Western Europe and the guillotine regarded as barbaric. But in 1977 it was wheeled out one last time for a young, one-legged Tunisian.
* TD’s Crime Photos/Prize Competition
* “Should I Strangle, Drown Or Set Fire To Emily?”
* Jennifer Kills Husband – But Was it By Accident?
* Under The Spotlight: Death Of A Gangster – Hollywood Style
* Make A Break: Crossword
* Your Letters
* Last Executions In Ireland Part 10: When A County Kerry Eviction Led To Murder
* Grisly Tales Of The Guillotine Final Part: Beheaded – The Facts And Figures
* America’s Most Evil: “By The Way – My Husband’s A Convicted Murderer”
* Murder Revisited – And The Lady In Red
* Readers’ Jury
* Innocent Man Served 19 Years For Murder
* Questions & Answers: “I Knew Jack The Ripper”
* Execution USA
* Caught At Last? – The Angarsk Maniac
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