Scoundrel : how a convicted murderer persuaded the women who loved him, the conservative establishment, and the courts to set him free / Sarah Weinman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Weinman, Sarah, author.

Contributor:

Lipman Criminology Library Fund.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Murderers--New Jersey--Biography.

Murderers.

Swindlers and swindling--New Jersey--Biography.

Swindlers and swindling.

Homicide--Case studies.

Homicide.

Smith, Edgar, 1934-2017.

Smith, Edgar.

New Jersey.

Genre:

Case studies.

Biographies.

True crime stories.

Physical Description:

447 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, [2022]

Summary:

In the 1960s, Edgar Smith, in prison and sentenced to death for the murder of teenager Victoria Zielinski, struck up a correspondence with William F. Buckley, the founder of National Review. Buckley, who refused to believe that a man who supported the neoconservative movement could have committed such a heinous crime, began to advocate not only for Smith's life to be spared but also for his sentence to be overturned. So begins a bizarre and tragic tale of mid-century America. Sarah Weinman's Scoundrel leads us through the twists of fate and fortune that brought Smith to freedom, book deals, fame, and eventually to attempting murder again. In Smith, Weinman has uncovered a psychopath who slipped his way into public acclaim and acceptance before crashing down to earth once again. From the people Smith deceived--Buckley, the book editor who published his work, friends from back home, and the women who loved him--to Americans who were willing to buy into his lies, Weinman explores who in our world is accorded innocence, and how the public becomes complicit in the stories we tell one another. Scoundrel shows, with clear eyes and sympathy for all those who entered Smith's orbit, how and why he was able to manipulate, obfuscate, and make a mockery of both well-meaning people and the American criminal justice system. It tells a forgotten part of American history at the nexus of justice, prison reform, and civil rights, and exposes how one man's ill-conceived plan to set another man free came at the great expense of Edgar Smith's victims. --Jacket flap.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: pt. I The Sand Pit (1957)

1. "Where Is Vickie?"

2. The Mercury

3. "If You're Looking for a Fall Guy ..."

4. Openings

5. "I Just Threw It Out the Window"

6. "Eddie and Don Aren't Friends Anymore"

7. "It Can't Be"

pt. II The Death House (1958

1962)

8. Patricia

9. Divorces

pt. III The Conservative (1962

1966)

10. A "Lifetime" Subscription

11. "My God, I Wish I Could Be Absolutely Certain"

12. Meeting in Trenton

13. Waiting for Death

pt. IV Making the Brief (1967

1968)

14. Lunch at Paone's

15. "They Must Think I Am Houdini"

16. Blood, Nerves, Vibrations

17. Hatkic

18. March to Publication

19. The Breach

20. Brief Against Death

pt. V Reasonable Doubts (1969

1971)

21. Rogue's Wake

22. A Reasonable Doubt

23. Bid for a New Trial

24. Conviction Overturned

pt. VI Getting Out (1971

1976)

25. Non Vult

26. Freedom's First Dawn

27. The Celebrity Convict

28. Counterpoint

29. Paige

pt. VII Boiling Over (1976

1979)

30. Rage, Revived

31. On the Run

32. Arrested Again

33. "The Saga of a Bad Man"

34. "Used and Betrayed"

pt. VIII Staying In (1980

2017)

35. A Strange Triangle

36. Vacaville.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Lipman Criminology Library Fund.

Other Format:

Online version: Weinman, Sarah. Scoundrel

ISBN:

9780062899767

0062899767

OCLC:

1250511111

Publisher Number:

99989858260