Killer Charm: And Other True Cases

By Linda Fairstein

The complete collection of true crime stories and articles by the New York Times–bestselling author and former prosecutor.

In this collection of horrifyingly true stories, Linda Fairstein provides an in-depth look inside the minds of such psychopaths as Ted Bundy and the Craigslist Killer. Drawing on decades of experience as a sex crimes prosecutor in New York City, she delves into the atrocities of these cold-blooded criminals and explains how they target their unsuspecting victims. A true victim advocate, she deftly touches on taboo subjects like law enforcement’s astounding failure to process rape kits, as well as the false rape claims that ruin innocent people’s lives.
 
With her background in the Special Victims Bureau, Fairstein offers an unfiltered view of rape in the United States. But she doesn’t stop there: She uses her understanding of the inner workings of violent criminals’ minds to outline ways for women to protect themselves.
 
Originally published in Cosmopolitan magazine and collected here for the first time, each essay features a new introduction by the author.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Media
• Release date: Jun 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9781504037563

Linda Fairstein

Linda Fairstein was chief of the Sex Crimes Unit of the district attorney's office in Manhattan for more than two decades and is America's foremost legal expert on sexual assault and domestic violence. Her Alexandra Cooper novels are international bestsellers and have been translated into more than a dozen languages. She lives in Manhattan and on Martha's Vineyard.

Book preview

Killer Charm

And Other True Cases

From the Files of Linda Fairstein

Linda Fairstein

Contents

Killer Charm: The Double Lives of Psychopaths

How Serial Rapists Target Their Victims

The Rape Scandal That Puts You at Risk

The Five Most Dangerous Places for Women

The Most Surprising Crime Zone: Your Own Home

Why Some Women Lie About Rape

About the Author

Killer Charm:

The Double Lives of Psychopaths

From the Files of Linda Fairstein

Linda Fairstein

Introduction

During my thirty-year prosecutorial career, many of the cases my colleagues and I took to trial involved sexual predators who disarmed their victims simply by virtue of the mask of sanity that psychopaths present to the world.

My first high-profile trial, in 1977, involved a well-respected dentist who sedated patients so that he could molest them while they were semi-conscious. Not possible! the media and general public responded when he was arrested. Dr. Marvin Teicher was distinguished-looking, married, and had a great reputation as a dental practitioner. When I wrote Killer Charm in 2009, the country was shocked by the murder of a twenty-five-year-old masseuse in a hotel room in Boston—a victim of the mysterious Craigslist Killer. As other attacks occurred in the area, people were shocked to find that videotapes revealed a handsome young man who casually walked away from the scenes of the crimes. Philip Markoff, the twenty-three-year-old medical student soon charged with the murder and other attacks, was a poster boy for this kind of unexpected psychopathic killer. The superficial charm exhibited by an astounding number of dangerous psychopaths is one of their best weapons to overcome potential victims.

Almost a year after I wrote this piece, on the anniversary of the date Markoff had planned to marry his fiancée, he wrote her name—Megan—in blood on the wall of his jail cell. The unlikely killer had slashed his arteries with a pen that he carved into the shape of a razor. He then covered his head with a plastic bag and stuffed toilet paper in his throat, killing himself before his cases could go to trial.

This horrific end to the predator’s life only provoked more questions: Had anyone known that Markoff was a psychopath before his crimes came to light? Was life not worth living to him, now that the world knew his sane demeanor was only a façade? The extent of Markoff’s spree, like those of Teicher and infamous serial killer Ted Bundy, forces us to think about how easy it is to deny that a seemingly normal person living among us could be capable of inhuman crimes.

Killer Charm

AT 10:15 ON THE EVENING of April 14, 2009, Boston detectives responded to emergency calls from the posh Marriott Copley Place hotel. A young woman, later identified as 25-year-old Julissa Brisman, had been found lying in the doorway of her hotel room on the 20th floor. She had been hit over the head and shot three times. One bullet entered her heart and killed her almost instantly.

Brisman was an aspiring actress and model from New York City, a petite and striking woman who had also worked on and off as an erotic masseuse, advertising her services on Craigslist. It soon emerged that she’d planned to meet an online client that night in Boston. When police uncovered the Craigslist connection, they were instantly reminded of another case: Just four days earlier, in a room at Boston’s nearby Westin Copley Place hotel, a 29-year-old woman who’d listed herself in the erotic-services section on Craigslist had also been attacked by her client. In that case, the assailant pulled out a gun, bound her hands behind her back, and robbed her before vanishing.

As investigators struggled to pull together leads in the two cases, another hotel attack occurred just over the state line in Rhode Island. Two days after Brisman’s murder, another woman who had advertised erotic services on Craigslist was tied up by her client in a room at the Holiday Inn Express, but the assault was interrupted and the attacker escaped.

In the press, the Craigslist Killer case began to take on a psycho-on-the-loose, Silence of the Lambs kind of sordidness: The guy appeared smart and brazen, yet it was hard to picture him as anything other than a lowlife—perhaps an ex-con with a history of robbery or murder, someone who’d give you the creeps if you shared a hotel elevator with him.

But when the cops arrested a suspect within the week,

Reviews for Killer Charm

[Todd Anthony · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

This woman prosecuted 5 teenagers for a crime they didn’t commit. She’s a poor excuse for a prosecutor and an embarrassment to the profession. I figured her books would be any good and l was right. They aren’t.

[SB · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

The author neither sounds engaging nor convincing. I would rate this lower if I could.

[MbuRasmeni · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I honestly don't get why this author even bothers writing books