|
|
|
True Crime Fanatic Interview
This interview was carried out for True Crime Fanatic (www.truecrimefanatic.com), an e-zine owned and produced by a brilliant American writer.
Q, Scott, you are a young author. At what age did you KNOW you HAD to write?
A. It is difficult to remember exactly when I decided I had to write. Writing has been a part of my life since a very young age. When I was six I can remember enjoying writing short stories but I never took it seriously until I was around twelve years old when I used to be convinced I would be famous from writing within a year or so! I’ve learnt a lot since then about how difficult it is to become published.
Q. What was your first writing piece?
A. I used to write a lot of stories with friends at school based upon other books or films we enjoyed. The first serious attempt at writing, by myself, was a ghost story when I was twelve. Looking back at it now I realise how poor an attempt it was. I used to only write fiction until I was sixteen and it was only two years ago that I started to concentrate on non-fiction and, in particular, true crime. I came to realise that I was far better at non-fiction, because magazines and organisations immediately began to accept my work, and so I put the fiction to one side.
Q. When and where were you first published?
A. I was first published when I was seventeen years old, in 2000. I had a written an article for a magazine called ‘Battlefield’ about a battle that had taken place in medieval times near to where I live. My first proper piece of published material was published by the Libertarian Alliance. It was actually an essay about the Barry George case which was published. I have since gone on to have several other essays about miscarriages of justice published by the Libertarian Alliance and other organisations. There are a number available on the Internet.
Q. How did you manage to stumble upon such a serious topic as Barry George?
A. The Barry George case generated a tremendous amount of media attention because the woman who he was convicted for killing, Jill Dando, was a television presenter. You could compare the Barry George trial to that of OJ Simpson in that both caused a huge amount of interest and debate. It was impossible not to hear about the case because it was a massive news story over here. In fact the BBC employed more staff to provide extensive coverage of the trial.
On the evening of Barry’s conviction there was a televised reconstruction of part of the trial. It was only when watching this that the defence case was given sufficient coverage. Previously the media had only focussed on what the prosecution counsel was saying, with Barry often being portrayed as the Devil incarnate. When I began to hear what the defence had said I began to realise just how weak the evidence was. When I heard information that the members of the jury never heard, I began to have serious doubts about the conviction.
Q. Is this case personal to you?
A. This is a question I get asked a lot and people are surprised when I say no because they wonder why I have got involved in the case of someone I had never heard of previously.
With the media frenzy surrounding the trial it was incredibly difficult not to take some interest in this case. Soon after Barry was convicted most people began to forget what had happened; someone was being punished and that was all that mattered to them. However, it was at this point when I began my research because the facts were being released for the first time, facts which even the jurors were not told about but, for me, explained so much and indicated Barry was probably innocent. The more I read, the uneasier I became when viewing the safety of this conviction.
I got involved because I eventually became convinced Barry was innocent. When I realised a miscarriage of justice had taken place I felt I had to do something to make people realise that a man was in prison for a crime he did not commit. I think everyone should be concerned about Barry’s conviction because if he could be sent to prison on very tenuous evidence, then anyone can be. I find it shocking that a man can be convicted on such weak evidence and be told he will die in prison if he does not claim responsibility for a crime he had no involvement in. There is a killer on the loose and an innocent man in prison. Something needs to be done about that.
Q. Can you give us the case in a nutshell?
A. It is incredibly difficult to sum up this case. Barry’s trial lasted ten weeks and so there are many different issues, which require detailed explanation, but I’ll try to give a quick summary. In April 1999 the television presenter Jill Dando was shot dead on her doorstep shortly before noon. The gunman had held her to the ground and fired a single bullet into her head. No one witnessed the crime and the killer left no clues at the scene.
A huge number of motives were suggested as to why the gunman would wish to shoot the presenter. Jill had been involved in many projects including having appealed to raise funds for the Kosovan refugees during the war with Serbia, three weeks before her murder. It was claimed a Serbian hit man could have been responsible. Other suspects included ex-boyfriends, a Mafia boss Jill had once spurned and criminals angered by Jill’s work for Crimewatch UK (a television programme similar to America’s Most Wanted).
Then in April 2000 the police began to investigate Barry Michael George, a disabled 'loner', with a very low IQ and significant brain damage, who lived half a mile from Jill’s former home. He was, the police believed, obsessed with guns although this was a highly misleading assumption as shown in my book. After questioning Barry for four days he was charged with the murder. In July 2001 he was convicted by a majority of ten to one after thirty-two hours of deliberations.
In my opinion the case of Barry George is one of the most controversial in British criminal history. Basically the evidence against him was that he was allegedly obsessed with the victim; he had eight newspaper articles relating to her, but he had over eight hundred newspapers. One witness believed she was “very sure” she saw Barry opposite Jill’s home four and a half hours before her murder, but the witness only saw the man for four to five seconds and did not attend a video identity parade until eighteen months after Jill’s death. None of the witnesses who saw the killer flee could recognise Barry as the man they had seen. There was also a single particle of alleged firearms discharge residue (it is called gunshot residue in the USA) found in a jacket belonging to Barry. It was claimed that this was proof Barry had owned a gun, which he has always denied. It also matched with particles found on the victim. It was admitted the particle could possibly have come from a blank firing gun, a firework or from contamination. Recent evidence, discussed in my book, adds weight to the theory the particle was not connected to the murder of Jill Dando.
In my book I have argued that Barry has an alibi for the time of the murdered, provided by a member of staff at an advice centre and partially corroborated by a second member of staff at the centre.
The jury at trial were told Barry tried to falsify an alibi two days after the crime, but they were not informed of information that innocently explains Barry’s behaviour.
Five years after Jill’s death a murderer continues to walk the streets whilst an innocent man has been told he will die in prison if he does not accept he is guilty. Barry continues to protest he is not a murderer and, having studied all of the evidence in detail, I have no doubt whatsoever that he is telling the truth.
Q. Are there things that scare you as you write? What are they?
A. I wouldn’t say I ever feel scared when I write. However, I do have to consider my personal safety. Most of my writing involves me trying to argue that people convicted of crimes are actually innocent. In most cases it is my belief that the true criminals are free to commit further crimes. Obviously that is a worrying issue because it potentially puts me into a dangerous situation. I have to realise that those with a vested interest in the cases I write about will be angered by my work. There are actually people who have, in the past, attempted to silence me (no attempts on my life fortunately). It is a quite troubling to know that as my views become more public I am certain there might be more attempts.
Q. Is it difficult to write true crime?
A. I don’t think it is any more difficult to write true crime than it is to write many other genres. Personally I find writing true crime far easier than writing, for example, crime fiction. The aspect that does make it difficult is that you have to take into consideration the thoughts and feelings of any friends or relatives of the victim(s). The Jill Dando murder shocked the whole of Britain because Jill was fairly well known and this was a woman who was brutally murdered, outside her own home in a London suburb, in daylight. What made it worse was that she was only months away from marrying the man she loved. As a result a lot of people do have a very high regard for Jill and they dislike anyone who besmirches her public reputation, which, unfortunately, is necessary to a degree if you are to understand this case and realise who really killed her.
Also there are many who believe that Barry must have been responsible because he was convicted in a court of law and therefore will not understand why someone should wish to defend him. There are therefore lots of people whose views had to be thought of so that I would not offend anyone.
The same is true for all of the other cases I have written about, whether they relate to miscarriages of justice or not. For example I recently wrote an article about Ricky Dyer Junior. It was difficult to write something that I knew his parents would read because you have to be sensitive to their thoughts.
Q. Are you considering writing another true crime book, and if yes, can you reveal anything about it?
A. Yes, I have actually already started work on three more projects. One will be about the Ricky Dyer Junior case, which I find very interesting and a case which requires great attention so that justice can hopefully be served. That is what I hope to achieve with my writing; making the public aware of cases so that the truth can be determined.
Around one year ago I started writing a book featuring the cases of many victims of miscarriages of justice. I put that on hold whilst I was preparing The Case of Barry George for publication. I hope to have that written and published within the year although I have to wait and see what happens with some of my cases as they are due to be heard at the Court of Appeal in the not too distant future (in fact the case of two men I support will be heard in approximately two weeks time).
I have also recently started writing a book about one case I consider to be a miscarriage of justice. It is a famous case here in Britain involving a notorious convicted multiple killer. I have studied the evidence, including that which has only recently come to light, which proves beyond all doubt that he is innocent. Unfortunately the appeals process is lengthy and so the truth will be revealed to the public in my forthcoming book, which is well under way, and should be a good account of a truly fascinating case.
Q. Who/what are your favourite true crime authors/books?
A. I don’t read as much true crime as I would like to and when I do the crime I read about is mainly from true crime magazines.
Most people think of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as the creator of Sherlock Holmes and someone who only wrote crime fiction. He did, in fact, write a lot of true crime and it is actually Conan Doyle’s true crime writing which inspired me to write The Case of Barry George. He campaigned for those wrongly convicted of crimes, writing two books in which he tried to destroy the chains of circumstantial evidence used to convict two men for murder. I have not actually read the books themselves, because they are not easily available, but I have read some of Conan Doyle’s other writing about real cases he followed and was involved in. he is a huge influence in my writing and is, without doubt, my favourite author.
I enjoy reading a series of books called ‘The World’s Greatest’. Several are comprised of true crime writing regarding cases from across the world such as the Jack the Ripper murders to the Black Dahlia mystery. The books cover unsolved crimes, serial killers, infamous murders and other such related issues.
I also like the books written by Paul Britton, a prominent offender profiler in Britain. Although the books are not exclusively about crime, as Britton is involved in other work within the field of psychology, I find it fascinating how people attempt to enter the mind of criminals and Britton provides an insight into the activities of murderers and other offenders, by providing detailed accounts of some of the cases he has worked upon. I definitely recommend his books, 'The Jigsaw Man' and 'Picking Up the Pieces' for anyone interested in this relatively new method of detection. I am not always convinced by his theories but his writing is engrossing none the less.
Q. Is there anything you would like to tell true crime readers?
A. One of my main goals is to encourage people to challenge assumptions. Most members of society believe that if a person is convicted of a crime then that person must be guilty. This belief leads to the wrongful conviction, and sometimes execution, of innocent people. Whenever there are innocent people being wrongly punished then justice suffers a tremendous blow. People should try to study the evidence presented at trial, and the evidence which was not presented, and make up their own minds as to whether or not a person is guilty, because whenever justice is prevailing injustices are also being carried out. People should be aware that the system is not as efficient as people would like to believe.
I know that Barry George is innocent and a murderer is still on the loose. I hope that my book persuades people of that fact or at least makes them realise that the evidence used to convict him is not as compelling as people have been led to believe.
Q. Do you have any writing tips to help future true crime writers?
A. I am not sure how easy/difficult it is to find a publisher in the USA. However, in Britain it is very difficult to find anyone who is even willing to take a glance at a manuscript written by a previously unpublished author. So the best advice I can offer is to be persistent. You will receive lots of rejection letters and they will be disheartening. However, always remember that even many of the best writers were rejected when they first tried to have their work published, so never give up trying. If your work is worth publishing then keep approaching publishers. I made the mistake of giving up briefly on pursuing my dream of being published. After receiving several rejection letters from the large publishing companies (and writing to many others who did not have the decency to respond) I assumed no one would be interested and so I stopped approaching publishers for eight or nine months, at which point in time I rewrote various sections, improving the manuscript immeasurably, and the work was accepted by the first company that read it (Kempton Marks).
It is best to be realistic about publishing companies; the giants in the publishing industry are unlikely to accept your debut book (although it is possible they will, but do not be disheartened if they do not). Try some of the smaller companies who, although they will not have as many resources and will not be able to publish as many manuscripts each year, they will often receive fewer manuscripts and so are more likely to read your work. As the old saying goes, it is often better to be a big fish in a small pond than a small fish in a big pond.
Join some writers groups; there are loads of yahoo discussion groups created so that writers can share their work and receive honest appraisals and suggestions of how to improve their writing. They can also offer advice about how to write a good synopsis, which is important for when you approach book publishers. If you don’t write a good synopsis then it is unlikely a publisher will be interested.
Be wary of companies who offer to publish you work at a cost to you. There are a lot of genuine companies who help you self-publish but there are also many Vanity Presses who will give you plenty of compliments and you will provide a lot of money (often many thousands or tens of thousands of dollars) and see nothing in return. Always check with a reputable organisation if you are in any doubt. My own publisher, which normally helps people to self-publish for a fee, is one of the few that can be trusted.
Even if you do everything right, and you have a fantastic book to offer publishers, you might still not succeed. However, if you do manage to achieve the almost impossible (some people have claimed only one percent of all manuscripts accepted are published), it will be well worth all of the hard work. Good luck!
|
|
|