The endless turning of human behavior is so unusual, it’s sometimes unbelievable. For people who work in the criminal field, we know it’s not a TV show, so when something truly odd occurs, we’re amazed by it.

I was involved with a case of a large family who all lived together, although they lived in shifts, in a two-story home. Adults and children occupied the house and some of the adults worked real jobs to support the group. Others used government programs for support and others used criminal means to pay their share.

One uncle sold drugs to make ends meet. He’d often do the deals in the back porch while the family ate dinner, for instance.

A particular evening, he invited the buyer into the house. They moved into a bedroom upstairs to do their business. Family members who were home told police, they heard a loud “pop” from upstairs and a few minutes later, the buyer came down and left. No one seemed to notice that the uncle disappeared for the next three days.

They discovered him upstairs in the back bedroom, dead from a gunshot wound. Apparently, no one, including the children, ever thought to look for him or to see what happened in the bedroom.

True story.

Another case involved a father who had unusual ideas for disciplining his children. When they wouldn’t clean their bedrooms as instructed, he went into each one and removed their pet gerbils from the drawers where the children kept them.

In order to teach them a lesson, he took the little animals outside and called for the children to come out with him. When they stepped into the back yard, the father pulled out an air gun with a wide barrel. He loaded the gerbils into the air gun and shot them across the back fence into the neighbor’s yard. The neighbor, as you can imagine, became upset when two rat-like animals flew into his yard unexpectedly.

The neighbor returned the stunned critters. The father was so mad, he took the dazed gerbils and drowned each of them in a pail of water before the kids.

True story.

For a writer, it’s wonderful to transfer these stories into novels. My only problem is I’m afraid no one will believe they really happened!

Do you have weird or unusal stories that could make good plot lines in a book? Please let me know.

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I have two things to remember and be grateful for as the year closes.

In my work as a trial lawyer, I notice stories of courts and trials in the news through out the world. Most of us don’t realize how many billions of people in the world live under political systems that don’t support independent, strong, and effective judicial systems. Trials in these countries are often shams or the outcomes dictated by dictators ahead of time. Evidence is skewed and suppressed when necessary by the people in power.

We complain in the U.S. when we read of outlandish results in trials here, but the reason they attract news attention is because, in reality, they’re so rare. An occasional goofy judge or crazy jury verdict should not cause us to worry.

Also, I want to thank all those people who have supported my new book, Reprisal. Published in September of this year, it has been selling well. I could never have accomplished this without the ideas and editorial help from my wife, Pam. Many others helped with suggestions and reviews. Jeff Holmes created an arresting cover that compliments the story perfectly. Thanks also to my publishers, North Star Press for their great work and help. Thanks to the bookstores who have carried and supported the book.

I’m working on another book about the potential water shortages in the world and the wars that may result from these shortages. Also, I’m happy to announce a new web site and content that should be out in January.

Hope you all have a great new year!

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Although she hasn’t specifically covered crime or courtroom beats that I usually write about, if you’re interested in what it’s like to work for a newspaper, read her book.

What’s particularly charming about the book is that Ms. Hertzel is just like the rest of us–she never went to journalism school, is basically shy by her own admission, never wanted to be a reporter, and yet managed to succeed very well. When her newspaper sends her on assignment to the Soviet Union–before it was as open as it is now–you envy her opportunity but realize she’s still the “accidental journalist” that many of us wish we could be.

For those of you interested in the nuts and bolts of how a major newspaper works to put out their product everyday, Ms. Hertzel takes you from the writing desks, copy desks, and down into the printing rooms where some of the most skilled people labor late into the night to produce the morning paper. She takes you on this tour with humor and respect for all the jobs involved, not only the glamorous ones. Her writing makes mundane work sound interesting and fun.

It’s also a book of loss–the lost era of print journalism before the Internet. Her recounting of scenes of the fedora-wearing men, the cigarette smoke clouding the air, the clattering of wire service machines, and the odd hours all seem tinged in sepia tones around the edges like old photos that are turning brown from age. In spite of that, she’s not critical about the changes occurring in print media. In fact, she points out that newspapers have always been faced with change and have adapted skillfully. Something that will comfort us news paper-loving fans.

I’d recommend the book to you. Meet some of the characters she reported on and the ones she worked with also.

Sometimes, the details became too much for me. For instance, the names of people who worked with her and positions they occupied slowed the book down. However, these details helped to make the scenes come alive.

Still, I liked the book and think you’ll enjoy the “Linda Ellerbee” of the north!

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Having practiced in the courts for over 30 years, I’ve seen just about everything you can imagine concerning human behavior. I’d like to share some of the funnier/tragic ones with you.

Uncle Charles is upstairs in his bedroom

During a cold spell a few winters ago, the local gas company went out to a home to check on an unusually high meter reading for heat. When they arrived, they found a man passed-out and lying in the back door. He blocked it from closing completely. Inside, a second door had been closed but not tightly enough to prevent the heat from escaping.

While the techs were looking things over in the house, they smelled something bad. They talked to the homeowners, a large family who lived in the house in shifts. People came and went all the time. One of the women took the techs into the kitchen. Although it was a mess, the odor didn’t come from there.

The techs questioned the family. Anything unusual happen recently?

Nothing that anyone could remember. The first woman said, “Come to think of it, Uncle Charles has been missing for a few days.”

Uncle Charles occupied a bedroom upstairs, but he wasn’t seen often because he sold drugs and usually never came home. He had been home the past Sunday while parts of the family ate and watched the Vikings’ game. Charles was upstairs in his bedroom and, at one point, a stranger came to the door. He was looking for Charles and went upstairs . The man came back ten minutes later and left.

What about Charles?

The techs followed the woman upstairs to his bedroom, knocked on the door, and finally pushed it in. There was Charles; he was shot to death. Lying in his bed, he was the source of the foul odor.

Later, the police determined Charles’ visitor had shot him over a drug deal gone bad. The family recalled some noises coming from upstairs but didn’t think any more of it.

Court appearance by speaker phone

Sometimes, if a witness is unavailable in person, a judge may allow the person to testify by speaker phone so everyone in the courtroom can hear.

One man, who lived out of state but had an interest in the outcome of the case, was allowed to participate by speaker phone. As the case proceeded, he could hear everyone in the courtroom and they, in turn, could hear him.

As the case wore on, strange noises started coming from the speaker phone. People in the courtroom began to hear grunts, farts, spitting, and a few gross comments. Apparently, the man forgot that every sound he made could be heard.

When the judge rules against you, go naked.

A lawyer appeared before a particularly tough judge for a hearing. When the judge ruled a second time against the lawyer’s request, he took off his tie and suit coat. Two more rulings against the lawyer made him take off his shirt. As the rulings became worse, the lawyer kept taking off more clothing. When he finally reached his underwear, the deputies moved in to lead him off.

Any of these stories, all true, could give a writer ideas. Do you have any ideas from these stories to share?

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Trying to convey to readers that experience through the use of my words is tougher than it may seem. On the one hand, I could simply “take a photo” and give the reader a detailed description of what I saw. It might sound like this: “He had thin blonde hair combed over his head, green eyes, a long sloping nose with wide nostrils. Two ears on either side of his head framed a mouth in the middle with thick lips…”

Kind of boring.

So, my job becomes one of distilling all the sensory data I received into a few words that will convey something about the person in front of me. It’s more than a photo because as a human, I have a reaction to the meeting while a camera doesn’t. That gives me an opportunity to filter or expand certain impressions as they affected me. One of the questions I often get about representing criminals is, “What’s he really like?”

A photographic description would tell one story about what they’re like but the person asking wants more. They want to know, through my interpretation as another human, what is he like.

As a writer, I have to pick certain details about the killer and tell these to the reader. The trick is to pick just a few that together, convey a feeling or impression that I’ve received by being present with the person. Because I don’t have pages to go on and on describing the character, I have to choose the details carefully and not include too many.

Let’s say I want to convey the distrust/nervousness the killer feels about everything. Maybe I’d write: “Low brows hooded green eyes that darted between me and and the door of the room. The fingers on his left hand squeezed together and tapped on the table while I told him of my qualifications as a lawyer. He was missing the ring finger on that hand.” Okay…not great but you notice how I left out most of everything about his physical appearance. Why? It’s really not important nor does it help to give any sense of the character’s inner feelings.

As readers, none of us want to be introduced to a character like reading an encyclopedia. Our own brains are fully capable of filling-in the picture of a character an author is drawing.

The process reminds me (never actually been there myself) of an LSD trip–a few drops will explode into the brain, creating unexpected colors, sounds, and sensations. My job as a writer is to take a few drops of detail from the killer sitting before me and deposit those in the brain of the reader. If I’m doing my job well and the magic is working, the reader will supply the necessary details and fill-in what I’ve left out. Through their imagination they’ll create a character far better than I ever could as a writer.

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