What Became Of The Actors The

Night President Lincoln Was Killed?

We all know the story, either the abridged textbook lesson we were taught in school or the more historical interpretation we learned from extensive study in college or afterwards. On the night of April 15, 1865 Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by actor John Wilkes Booth while watching a play—Our American Cousin—at Ford’s Theater in Washington, DC. Booth was not in the play but had watched a rehearsal of it the day before, presumably to determine just the right moment to pull the trigger. Still, since he was an actor who was working with co-conspirators, the police believed others on stage or who worked behind the scenes might have been involved in the plot to kill the 16th president of the United States. The play was presented that night by well-respected New York producer Laure Keene, and because of their shared profession, many of the actors knew the Booth family and quickly came under suspicion. As Mariah Fredericks wrote in a CrimeReads article last week (the 156th anniversary of the murder), two days after the assassination Keene and some members of her company were arrested at the train station in Harrisburg, ostensibly on their way to Ohio, and were questioned by the military. Male lead Harry Hawk was detained on a $1000 bond as a witness, and many of the 44 actors, managers and stagehands working at the theater were questioned. One of them, stagehand Edmund “Ned” Spangler, was arrested as part of the conspiracy and was sentenced to six years hard labor for helping Booth escape.

The 30 Best Mysteries Of All Time?

While even writers debate the elements that actually make up a great mystery, it’s a lot like what Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said of obscenity in 1964: “I know it when I see it.” Or, in this case, read it. So…what are the best published mysteries of all time? Any such list would be highly subjective, of course, not only in matters of taste, but also because one person’s mystery might be another person’s thriller. Or crime novel. Or suspense story. From Christie to Chandler to Forsyth to Hammett, this list—courtesy of Reedsy.com (no relation to this writer)—provides a good (but arguable) lineup if you’re hunting for The 30 Best Mystery Books Of All Time.

Netflix Series Suggests Mafia

Ties In 1990 Boston Art Theft

A new four-part docuseries on Netflix explores who may have pulled off the 1990 robbery of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (left) in Boston, where thieves made off with $500 million in rare artwork. On March 18 of that year, two men posing as Boston Police Department officers managed to gain entry to the city’s famed museum and, 81 minutes later, walked out with 13 works of art—including Rembrandt’s The Storm on the Sea of Galilee and Vermeer’s The Concert—valued by the FBI at approximately $500 million. In the 31 years since that heist, none of the pieces has been recovered, and none of the individuals responsible for the theft has been definitively identified, let alone brought to justice. A new theory suggested by This is a Robbery: The World’s Biggest Art Heist, is that infamous New England art thief Myles Connor—who had an airtight alibi because he was in jail at the time—was in league with Bobby Donati, an Italian mafioso with whom he’d previously partnered on an art-snatching job. The program speculates that Donati and his close confidant Bobby Guarente concocted the plan, which was then carried out by a group of gangsters that included Carmello Merlino, Charlie Pappas, David Turner, George Reissfelder, and Leonard Dimuzio and operated out of an auto electric shop in Dorchester.

Agatha Christie’s Country Home

Can Be Yours For $3.8 Million

For those aspiring writers who want to have the mojo of a world-famous mystery writer rub off on them, your dream home is on the market. Winterbrook House, home to legendary crime writer Dame Agatha Christie for more than 40 years, is now available for £2.75million ($3.8 million). The home has five acres of gardens, direct frontage on the River Thames, and an attached one-bedroom cottage that can easily be rented out to her millions of fans. The interior has over 4,000 sq ft of living space, with a grand kitchen/breakfast room, a dining room, a drawing room, a study, and five bedrooms. The principal bedroom has an en suite bathroom and a full dressing room. Of course, there's also the library where Ms. Christie wrote many of her works, including Death On The Nile, The Body In The Library, and 4.50 From Paddington. Outside is a detached cottage with a stable and a triple bay car port. She purchased the house in 1934 after she saw a newspaper ad, and she and her husband Max Mallowan purchased it almost immediately. The couple lived there until she died there in 1976, at age 85. The writer is buried in the nearby St Mary’s churchyard in the village of Cholsey and her husband was buried alongside her when he died two years later.

COLD CASE UPDATE

Police Arrest Two Suspects In

Disappearance of Kristin Smart

Last summer (August 3, to be precise) BunzelGram reviewed the cold case of Kristin Smart, the student who went missing from the campus of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo on May 25, 1996 after attending a fraternity party. No one was ever charged in the case, although authorities long believed that fellow student Paul Flores somehow was involved with her disappearance. Last week police arrested Flores—now 44 years old—and his father Ruben, following a thorough search of Ruben’s property in Arroyo Grande, about 20 miles south of the university. Investigators believe the younger Flores killed Smart in his dorm room, and they apparently know where her body was buried but have not yet located it or disclosed the location. Prosecutors have filed a first-degree murder charge against Paul Flores and an accessory after murder charge against his father, Ruben Flores, for helping his son conceal Smart's body. As reported by CBS News, District Attorney Dan Dow says he has have evidence that there were other people not yet identified that have had some kind of a criminal act perpetrated on them by Mr. Flores. “We're concerned about sexual assault," he said during a news conference.

Tired Of Not Being Able To Travel?

Watch These 10 International Thrillers

Most of us have been locked down for the past year, with no chance to visit family just a few counties away, let alone take a long-needed vacation in some exotic place. While not nearly as exciting as hopping on a plane and flying across multiple time zones, television provides an opportunity to travel without getting off the living room couch. In a recent article in Crime Reads, author Kris Calvin recounts how, over the last month, she has binge-watched dozens of international thriller TV series in a variety of subgenres—espionage, political, romantic, and more—from continents across the globe. “I feel considerably less home-bound, and have drawn from what I learned about the wider world as I write my next book,” she says. “Based on that experience, I’m delighted to share with you my Top 10 Streaming International Thriller Series.” Criteria for inclusion in this list are a) The show must be highly entertaining, well-written, and well-acted; b) It must have diverse characters ethnically and racially, across the gender continuum, and in sexual orientation; and c) It must provide the feeling that the viewer is “there” and can “see” vistas and cities as though being a part of them.

Recently I’ve been promoting the hell out of the release of Skeleton Key—the fourth in my Jack Connor mystery series—but I don’t want to ignore Seven-Thirty Thursday, which was released last year by Suspense Publishing. Early this month I finished the final draft of the sequel to that book, titled Every Second Sunday, and I ask you to lodge it firmly in the back of your mind. Both Key and Thursday are available through Amazon, and wherever books are sold.