We can all be a sucker for a good mystery, crime or thriller novel from time to time, but for these authors, their stories weren’t all fiction.
Each of these writers have had a run-in or two with the law. Here, we’ve got all the info on when and why… Read on to find out more.
Nancy Brophy
In her 2011 essay titled How To Murder Your Husband, Nancy Brophy wrote that “adultery, greed and family violence” could push someone to kill their spouse.
Ultimately it was greed, according to prosecutors, that motivated her to kill her husband Daniel, 63, at his workplace in Portland, Oregon, on 2 June 2018.
She was arrested after surveillance footage saw her driving around the scene at the time of the crime. With her series of self-published romantic thrillers not selling as well as she’d hoped, prosecutors claimed Brophy shot Daniel dead to receive a $2.2 million life insurance payout.
After a seven-week trial, she was found guilty of second-degree murder in 2022 and was sentenced to life in prison.
Her neighbour Don McConnell says her reaction to the death was chilling. “She never showed any signs of being upset,” he claims.
Delia Owens
Known for her bestseller Where The Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens, along with her husband Mark, was accused of being involved in the death of a poacher in Zambia’s North Luangwa National Park in 1996.
The pair, who are also zoologists, were in Africa studying elephants, lions and hyenas.
Delia and Mark were being followed by a film crew at the time of the alleged murder, which was caught on camera. The identity of both the murdered poacher and the killer were blurred out and have never been revealed.
The filmmakers were asked to hand over the footage to investigators, but they refused and the couple have always strongly denied having anything to do with the death.
“We were not involved in this incident or in any other incident of this nature,” they insisted in a statement.
Kouri Richins
When 34-year-old mother-of-three Kouri Richins wrote her book Are You With Me?, she was hoping to help her children cope with their father Eric passing away. However, prosecutors now claim she could be responsible for his death.
On 4 March 2022, it’s alleged Kouri laced a Moscow Mule cocktail with a lethal dose of fentanyl and gave it to her husband, 39, while they were celebrating a property purchase.
A spokesperson for Eric’s family, Greg Skordas, says they were immediately suspicious. “Eric told his family, ‘If I die, you need to take a look at her because I think she’s trying to kill me.’”
Kouri – who lived with Eric and their three sons, Carter, then nine, Ashton, seven, and five-year-old Weston, in Kamas, Utah – pleaded not guilty to 11 charges of attempted murder, forgery, intent to distribute a controlled substance, mortgage fraud and insurance fraud in August. She’ll stand trial next April.
Prosecutors allege she killed Eric for financial gain because she was $2.9 million in debt and would have received nearly $3.3 million in life insurance payouts.
They also allege Kouri previously attempted to kill Eric with a fentanyl-laced sandwich in 2022.
A person only referred to as “CL” in the investigation reportedly told detectives Kouri asked them to get her “the Michael Jackson stuff”, referring to the drug.
Kouri has not entered a plea yet and has previously denied the allegations.
Her mother Lisa Darden says she was shocked when she heard her daughter was arrested.
Anne Perry
British author Anne made a name for herself writing detective mysteries, but as a teenager, she was convicted of murder here in New Zealand.
Then known by her birth name Juliet Hulme, the 15-year-old and her friend Pauline Parker bludgeoned Pauline’s mother Honorah to death in a park in Christchurch.
Juliet’s brother Jonathan says the girls killed Honorah because they didn’t want to be separated and Pauline wanted to move with Juliet’s family to England.
Both girls were sentenced to five years in prison in August 1954 and the case inspired Sir Peter Jackson’s film Heavenly Creatures, starring Kate Winslet and Melanie Lynskey.
After serving her sentence, Pauline changed her name and became a recluse.
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