The Dark Marksmen: TV Show Tonight

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Show: Twisted
Episode title: The Dark Marksmen
When: 10:00 pm Eastern, 7:00 pm Arizona
Date: October 21
Network: Investigation Discovery or ID (check your local listings to find which channel this is in your area)

This will air in more than 50 countries. Please check listings in your country. This show airs in Great Britain as "Born to Kill?"


Tonight U.S. television debuts the episode of Twisted that we shot in April. Tune in to the cable channel Investigation Discovery at 10:00 pm Eastern, 7:00 pm Arizona time.

The episode is called "The Dark Marksmen."

Serial Shooter survivor Paul Patrick with British TV producer and moi

 The photo above was taken in the spring when the British crew was filming Paul Patrick, whose story is told in my book, A SUDDEN SHOT.  A few months later, in the summer,  the villain mastermind of the crime spree, Dale Hausner, died in prison.

Hausner died at his own hand, friendless. His family, which had loyally attended his trial for more than 6 long months, had finally concluded that youngest son Dale really was a serial killer, one who gloated at death agonies and taught his toddler the lingo of murder. As the news of his death spread, the Hausner family released this statement: "We as a family stand with the victims of the crimes and their families. Today, a murderer died and is now going on to face the Ultimate Judge. Again, our thoughts and prayers are with the innocent people that were victims of his senseless crimes."

It had taken years for the family to get to that point. They had vigorously defended Dale and believed in his innocence. How well I remember the day, however, that secret recordings of Dale were played in court, recordings that were taken from the apartment next door using special equipment. The Hausner family members, seated not far from me in the courtroom, seemed shaken to the core as they heard his cruel laughter mixed with the innocent voice of his tiny daughter. She could barely talk at all and he was teaching her to ape his private jokes about his secret hobby: murder.   The family put their heads down and wept as her little voice rang out. I could never say for sure, but it seems this child, and the surveillance tape of her, may have been key to the family's finally seeing Dale for the guilty man he was.

This child is grade school age now. Her mother told me some time ago that she is doing well. She has grown up as the adopted child of her mother's husband, unaware of her own association with the infamous crimes of Dale Hausner.

Others who were associated with Dale Hausner were not sorry to see him go. While their professional work on his behalf was scrupulous and vigorous, as every defendant has a right to expect, they are not happy to have their names linked with his for all time. Some will talk to me privately, not for attribution. The day Dale Hausner died, one of them told me "Good riddance." This person went on to say that Dale's suicide was not a suprise.

Indeed, it wasn't. He had tried it before he ever went to trial, in the Maricopa County Jail.  But guards found him and he was revived. Hausner had jovially waved off the incident ever since. After his conviction, though, Hausner pursued his own execution.

In one letter to my colleague and friend Michael Kiefer he wrote, "I mean, really, what's a guy got to do to get to get snuffed out?"

Dale Hausner did not leave a suicide note and we will never know what his true private last thoughts were. But his prison suicide took planning, the long-term hoarding of drugs available to him. When he petitioned Arizona courts to have his appeals stopped and his execution expedited, the state wanted to make sure he was in his right mind to make such a decision.

I was even in court one day when Dale Hausner had planned to appear telephonically but his court appointed appeals attorney, a zealous anti-death penalty advocate, had the court hang up on him so he could not interfere with her legal defense of his life.

As part of this process of determining whether Dale Hausner was competent to rush to meet his execution, the state ordered psychological evaluations of him.

This is one thing we know that Dale Hausner detested, the public disclosure of any psychological report. He waived mitigation, or the portion of an Arizona trial where defense attorneys put on evidence to support a plea for mercy before sentencing, in order to avoid his childhood being publicly explored or psychological reviews being entered.

This time, in trying to expedite his execution, Dale Hausner had no choice in that matter. He could not waive the psychologists away. It's a good bet the approaching catastrophe, as he considered it, of loss of psychological privacy had something to do with Dale Hausner's decision to execute himself at the time that he did.

Certainly the smirking killer had other reasons to take such a drastic step, since we know he had been trying and planning for years. Listening to the tape of Dale Hausner, private, not knowing a cadre of law enforcement were wiring microphones into the drywall of his apartment, re-living his crimes and glorying in the sufferings of those he left to die on sidewalks all over the Phoenix metro area, it can not be doubted that the thing that made him happiest was killing.  In prison, the power to kill was lost to him forever. Without feeling the ultimate joy of his power of death, his status as "a god among mortals" (read the book if you want to learn more about that quote), Dale Hausner must have felt life was no longer sweet.

* * * * * * *

As this show goes to air, I would like to thank once again the incomparable Mary Morrison of the House of Broadcast Museum in Scottsdale. Here she is with me the day we shot this episode. We are standing behind the crew's camera. Thank you so much, Mary! 

Jodi Arias and Mitigation

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Jodi Arias hears the verdict: Murder 1   Pool photo

Now that the "guilt" phase of Jodi Arias's trial is over and she is a convicted 1st degree murderer, we are trying to move into the "aggravation" phase.

I say "trying" because it was supposed to begin on Thursday, but was mysteriously cancelled while we were waiting in the hall outside locked courtroom doors. The reason for the cancellation may have something to do with the exclusive interview Arias gave to Fox10's Troy Hayden, less than half an hour after she heard jurors convict of her of pre-meditated murder. Or it may not. All is speculation right now.

But in that interview Arias herself spoke directly about the mitigation process. She told Troy Hayden that she has "no mitigating factors." I'll come back to that. First I'd like to explain more about the process.

For 4 months, people have observed a woman who sits behind the defense team and often interacts with Arias during the breaks and also with her family. She is the mitigation specialist. While Nurmi and Wilmott, Arias's defense attorneys, are there to give their client the best legal advocacy they can, Arizona law affords her one more chance on top of that. 

Mitigation is not about guilt or innocence. It is about mercy. So the mitigation specialist is rarely, if ever, a lawyer.  The person who fills this job is more likely to be a trained social worker or counselor. This person puts together an extensive report on the defendant's background and/or accomplishments.

Jodi Arias told Troy Hayden with bitter irony that her mother "didn't beat her hard enough" therefore she has no pathetic childhood stories with which to touch the jurors' heartstrings. 

But Arias is missing the biggest point of the entire mitigation proceeding. The most effective thing a convict can do to mitigate their sentence is to show humility and remorse. 

This is what worked for Sam Dieteman, one of Arizona's notorious serial killers. Did you hear that?  A serial killer.

I am not here to be defending or admiring Sam Dieteman in anyway. He did some horrific things and caused incalculable human sorrow (< < click thru) and laughed while doing so. But once he was caught, he had at least enough remorse to confess. He pled guilty without any deals and spared the community a long trial. Dieteman cooperated with the state by testifying against his former "buddy," Dale Hausner, all the while knowing the state still intended to try to get a different jury to give him the death penalty when they were done with Hausner. 

Dieteman's testimony in the Hausner trial was compelling. He told the jurors that he had become a "piece of shit" prior to his incarceration. He did not blame Hausner for his own degeneration. He appeared in stripes and chains before the Hausner jury, not cocky and never sparring with the attorneys. He told jurors that he believed in the death penalty and that he deserved it.  

A few weeks later, the same attorneys who had called him as a friendly witness asked for his execution in front of a different jury. Dieteman knew they would. His demeanor before his own jury did not change from the Sam we had seen helping to convict Dale. But this second jury was moved to mercy.  It was not Dieteman's less than stellar childhood that did it. It was Dieteman's lack of defiance and refusal to defend his own despicable acts that stayed their hands.  Sam Dieteman did not get the death penalty though he killed more times than did Jodi Arias.

So far Jodi Arias has displayed less remorse than a serial killer. 

When her lies had caved in on her and she sat with Troy Hayden in a basement cell well below the fifth floor courtroom Wednesday afternoon, Arias could have embraced the truth at last. She could have used Troy's cameras to tell the world how sorry she was that she had taken a life. She could have expressed a sense of shame and sorrow. 

But as people all over the world have seen by now, the only sorrow on display was a brief moment when Troy asked her about her mother. Knowing she would remain behind bars instead of walking free, Jodi Arias had a sudden repentance for how she had treated her mother "not very well."  She averted her face, hiding behind her sheet of hair, and went through the motions of someone overcome by emotion.

"I can't talk right now," she whispered to Troy, through her drapes of locks. 

Mama Arias had become a much more important figure, Jodi had seemed to realize, now knowing she would not be following in Casey Anthony's footsteps, free to crash-bang her way through life on her own terms. In county jail, just about anyone is free to visit an inmate. Jodi had been receiving fans from the public so much that even her mother was denied access when Jodi ran out of allotted visits for the week. The sheriff who runs the jail is even more in love with TV cameras than Jodi is, allowing what seems to be access unprecedented in other jails across the country.  By the way, that is how the Troy Hayden interview was allowed -- it had nothing to do with Judge Sherry Stephens. The inmate is in the custody of the county sheriff and this particular sheriff has never asked a judge for permission to do anything in his life. 

County jail, though, is for un-sentenced inmates and short-termers. The famous tents are filled with DUIs and probation violators, not with capital defendants. As soon as Jodi Arias is sentenced, you can expect to see her custody transferred from the county sheriff to the state prison system, possibly on camera.

Arizona's Department of Corrections has a dramatically different policy toward the media than does the county jail.  A TV crew can get a state prisoner on the phone for a recorded interview, but they are never allowed to bring in the cameras for a personal interview with an inmate about his or her crime. AZDOC may allow a camera in from time to time to do a story about a new rehabilitation program, for instance. But officials there have told me they simply refuse to put inmates up for individual stories "about my life and times in crime," as they sarcastically put it. I've made the requests myself and so have many TV crews I've worked with. So far, no results. 

AZDOC is also much stricter about who can come in for a regular visit. No longer a first-come, first-serve system where you can show up unexpected and have the inmate brought out to you, in Arizona prisons an inmate must designate visitors on a list. Each person named by the inmate as a welcome visitor must undergo their own background check by the prison. Plenty of people could be refused access to prison invitation, starting with people who have their own felony convictions. 

The visitor list is restricted to 20 people, last time I checked. So to receive any visitors at all, an orange jump-suited guest of the State of Arizona must hope for people who are both willing to submit to the background check and who will pass it.

The jail system Jodi Arias has been in the last five years has facilities that are close to downtown Phoenix or are actually in downtown Phoenix. From the airport, you could be filling out your visitor pass within 20 minutes and be seated at a restorative fine dinner 20 minutes after your visit to the grimy, smelly jail.

The prisons where Jodi Arias will live out the rest of her life, one way or another, are out in the wild boondocks, though. After your arrival at Phoenix Sky Harbor you'd have to drive another hour or so to the east, well into the desert.* The small town available to you out there is not a thriving major metropolitan city full of hiking trails and golf courses; it's a prison industry village with forgotten diners and spare accommodations. 

Jodi Arias, knowing that she will soon leave Maricopa County's convenient and accessible jails, knows she now needs her mother. Her display of repentance about her behavior to her mother could easily be seen as a last minute grasp for the one person who might be willing and qualified to go through everything it takes to stand by Jodi in the state prison complex east of Phoenix. Inside the courtroom during the trial, I have seen Jodi look toward her mother from time to time. But I never saw the message in her eyes that expressed love, connection, shame, or fear. It was more of a cold roll-call. In those days, Jodi still expected the testimony of Alyce LaViolette, Richard Samuels and her own self had washed over the jurors like a tidal wave of righteous truth. She could afford to be haughty and demanding with her mother. Frankly, I have seen more emotionally connected wordless exchanges between serial killer Dale Hausner (< < click thru) and his family in the court gallery than I did in this trial. 

The shock of her conviction left one thing clear to Jodi. Having lived on the inside for 5 years, she must know from the stories of other inmates how different it is in state prison. With her tentacles to the outside world severely clipped as the last of 12 jurors firmly called out "yes" to affirm their vote, Jodi knew she had to reel Mama Arias back in as close as she could get her.  The dip of the head, the falling sheet of hair, the "my mom is a saint" comment to Troy Hayden, seemed to me to be designed to that end.

Jodi never used the interview with Fox10 to exhibit any other remorse. Quite the opposite, she slammed the dead man yet again, over and over, with various questions that Troy lobbed to her. Don't blame Troy, he got her to reveal herself and reveal she did. 

Lead defense counsel Kirk Nurmi is the one who told her she had no mitigating factors, Jodi reported to Troy. Her communications with Nurmi are privileged so there's no way to prove it, but I personally believe that is an outright lie. Nurmi must have told her that bad childhoods aren't the be-all and end-all of mitigation.

But Jodi wouldn't have listened to Nurmi's advice on that. Just like she didn't want to listen to the advice of one of her earlier attorneys; she petitioned the court to have Maria Schaffer removed from her case years ago. It's clear Jodi didn't like Ms. Schaffer. But the attorney who successfully guided admitted serial killer Sam Dieteman clear of a death penalty was, in fact, Maria Schaffer.

There are things far more powerful than past hardship during a mitigation hearing.

Humility.

Remorse.

Restitution.

Jodi could have been funneling her art sale proceeds to the Alexander family or even to Deanna Reid at least to defray Napoleon's expenses. She could have been using her much cherished verbal intelligence to help with literacy courses for other inmates. She could have been honest on her numerous psychological exams and begun an earnest course of self-improvement. 

In her five years in jail, Jodi Arias did none of that. In her 45 minutes with Troy Hayden's cameras trained nowhere but on her, she did none of that. 

What she did reveal is what Travis Alexander himself told us from the grave as his text messages to her were displayed for all the world to see while Jodi Ann Arias was on trial. What Travis said to her is, "You only have tears for yourself."

*Much thanks to @Sandaholics for reminding me that Jodi Arias is more likely to go to Perryville, than to Florence. Perryville is west of Phoenix and is not as far. 

Jodi's statements to Troy Hayden about mitigation  < < click here 

**Link to this or any post is always welcome, but posting the whole text to another site makes me go all frowny!**

I Feel Angry %#!$!!

The very 1st lipstick mark forehead kiss for Paul. He gave me roses, I responded spontaneously.

 On June 8, 2006 Paul Patrick was a hard-working family man. That is, he provided for his ailing mother while his sister did the caretaking.  Before that night was through, he was sprawled on a blistering sidewalk, shot full of lead, the RANDOM victim of evil disgusting serial killers. He would never work again. His whole family has been drained, exhausted, and shattered.

Today is June 8, 2012. This is an important anniversary for Paul. Whenever he autographs a book for a fan, he always writes "6-8-06" under his name.  There is no chance he can ever forget the date his once robust and productive life took a screeching halt and became a daily battle for every breath.  Ever since I've known Paul, we have had a special visit on this anniversary. He gives me more details of what he remembers from that night. He tells me witty and often rhyming slogans that embody his philosophy of fighting on, of triumphing.

But late last year, Paul lost his mother, who on June 8, 2006 had gone from the family heart patient to the family engine, staying at Paul's side constantly, advocating for him in endless hospitals and nursing homes.  Pushing his buttons as only a mother can, Mary Patrick nurtured the twinkle in Paul's eye and helped him focus on goals.  She also saved him from several medical crises in which her instincts proved superior to customary but off-the-mark-in-this-case institutional regimens.  Without her quiet captaining of Paul's journey, his path has veered.  2012 has been very, very hard on him. And on those of us who now do the hand-wringing and have no idea how to make things any better. Early in the year he endured yet another major surgery. Instead of making his life better, soon he was in the ICU and we were bracing ourselves for the worst, which seemed inevitable.  He pulled off another of his Hollywood comebacks, and the threat of imminent death passed. But he has never bounced back from this surgery and near-death experience. His level of health and quality of life are dramatically worse than they were last year.

I went to see Paul today -- June 8, 2012. I wanted to start our visit by showing him recent messages of support he'd received on FaceBook. I had gotten a screen all ready because there is no wi-fi where he currently is.

I couldn't wake him up.  I am under instructions from the family to do so if I find him in slumber, because he hates so much to miss my visits. Today he fluttered up to brief moments of recognition but quickly slid back into the Sand Man's grasp. I asked for professional help from the staff, but they told me this has become "normal" for him.  Guess I'm lucky that in all my other visits, I found him so much more "present." Nevertheless, they tried to wake him, too. Finally I leaned down and gave him the forehead kiss that leaves the famous lipstick mark he loves so much.  No response.

The discomforts and indignities of his life are all too easily recognized as he slept. Just for the record, getting shot in the belly leads to very unhappy things.  He is pale. So, so pale.

I am furious.  I want to scream every four letter word ever heard at the docks when the fleet's in.  I want to smash dinner plates with a baseball bat.  I want to cry. I do cry. I am so angry at what has happened to this vital soul, this sparkling personality, this Irish raconteur, this son of a kind and faithful mother. 

I write about Paul Patrick a lot. Yes, out of a cast of hundreds in the A SUDDEN SHOT: THE PHOENIX SERIAL SHOOTER story, Paul is the one who gets most of the attention. While Paul is very special, so are the rest of the characters. It simply isn't possible for me, without benefit of a very large cloning lab, to keep up with all of them in a meaningful way over a period of years.

There are dozens of victims in the Serial Shooter case (a complete list is available in the back of the book). I know that each  one still suffers agonies large and small because of their run-in with the dimmed headlights and swiftly slung rifle barrels of Dale Hausner and Sam Dieteman.  Some families suffer worse than Paul's, because they go to bed each night knowing their beloved died while some creeps laughed.

So I hope that the people who read my updates on Paul remember that every time I write about him, I am really writing about all of them. He made himself their representative at trial. And I must ask him to keep filling that job now. What Paul has lost, they have all shared in.

One of the most frequently asked questions I receive is how do I do this kind of work, it entails so much sadness, so much gore?  My answer usually emphasizes that my work also exposes me to so much heroism and love, so much good, that I "live in that space."

Today I'm finding it hard to live in that space. Today I freakin' hate killers. HATE THEM.

(click on a title below to buy)

Camille Kimball's books:

**What She Always Wanted** as seen on TV!

                 **A Sudden Shot** as seen on TV!

        The Mammoth Book of Tough Guys

Coming soon: Masters of True Crime-Chilling Stories of Murder and the Macabre

Thoughts on this or any article at this site? To the next person whose comment I use for a post I will send a free signed book!  (If you post as "anonymous" for convenience, try to include an identifying website or name in your remark so no one else can claim your prize!)  For an example, please click here.

Wicked Attraction--Dale Hausner

Did you just watch Dale Hausner and Sam Dieteman on TV? On Wicked Attraction?

This is the book that gives the story behind the story...

The book is available at any bookseller including for all e-readers. Download now and be reading in seconds what really happened the night police listened in while Dale and Sam were gloating, how Dale mistook who the police were, how Sam walked right past undercover cops.

The Shoot to Thrill episode of Wicked Attraction is based on the book, A SUDDEN SHOT. There are so many more stories inside the book--read about the "rubber shoe guy," Buddy the burro, what happened to Paul after the trial and so many more. You did so much over the holidays--give yourself a little treat right now! You deserve it!

(click on a title below to buy)

Camille Kimball's books:

What She Always Wanted

                 **A Sudden Shot** as seen on TV!

        The Mammoth Book of Tough Guys

Coming soon: Masters of True Crime-Chilling Stories of Murder and the Macabre

Thoughts on this or any article at this site? To the next person whose comment I use for a post I will send a free signed book!  (If you post as "anonymous" for convenience, try to include an identifying website or name in your remark so no one else can claim your prize!)  For an example, please click here. 

Every Little Triumph

What with one thing and another--losing his physical therapist, heart attack, etc.--Paul has not walked for months.

Until today!

With the help and encouragement of a friend, Paul got up and powered forward Sunday afternoon.

I was in the room and the experience nearly gave me a heart attack. But Paul was elated.

Why was I so scared? Well, with dozens of shotgun pellets still wandering around his body causing one serious problem after another, walking--not to mention maintaining upright balance--is a huge challenge and a lot could go wrong. Sweating and panting, he triumphed over damaged muscles, dead nerves, brain injury and gravity. Oh, and terror. His and mine! He did not fall. That's our guy.

Paul survived the attack of the Serial Shooter in 2006. He has been near death many times but he always snaps back. His story is told in A Sudden Shot: the Phoenix Serial Shooter. You can find him on the A Sudden Shot page on FB (link at right). He loves messages of support and encouragement and continues to inspire thousands of readers across the globe.

Camille Kimball's books are:

What She Always Wanted

A Sudden Shot

The Mammoth Book of Tough Guys

Action Hero...Tonight!

Join us at the Borders Scottsdale Waterfront tonight Wed Sep 8 7pm. Check out page 105. The one in the uniform saved the life of the one in the wheelchair. Saul is my special guest this evening at Borders in a Private Files Exposed event. Photos on the big screen from my private files.

Get Saul's autograph in your book, hear him tell why he ran out into the danger on a dark and bloody night. (That's an actor portraying him 2 posts below, with the handgun)

Borders across from Scottsdale Fashion Square...on the Waterfront...

Dec 27-KPNX tonight

After a couple of rough days, Paul rallied. Today he hosted KPNX and showed off his new head. Watch tonight at 10 pm on Channel 12!

Fairy Dust Needed Today for a Frozen Skull

Long after the prison doors clang shut, the headlines vanish and the lawyers have moved on to other cases, the crime itself is still right where it always was--at the epicenter of a heartbroken family. Paul Patrick was shot by a serial killer in Phoenix in 2006. That wretch is now behind bars. I sometimes cross paths with the excellent lawyers who put him there, when I walk the halls of justice in downtown Phoenix. They are on their way to other courtrooms with other cases and so am I.

But when Paul Patrick walks, it is down his own hall, with the help of two professional aides. And a camera nearby to record it. Because it is a momentous event, Paul taking a few steps. The 12 gauge shotgun in Sam's hands blasted away a good deal of Paul's torso. The eighty or so lead pellets still inside Paul have a tendency to move around and cause him a great deal of trouble. Earlier this year, roving pellets brought him so near death there was only one chance to save him, and that was by attempting to remove half his skull. His mother--whose vigilance is the only thing that has kept him alive on many occasions since the day he was shot--said she just wasn't ready to say good-bye to him yet, so she authorized the almost ridiculously desperate procedure. Against all odds, Paul survived. He has been living without his skull for 9 months now. There is just skin covering the right half of his brain. Any stray elbow or falling nightlight could do him in forever.

Today, the neurosurgeons have decided it's finally time to put the skull back. There is no need to explain how risky this procedure is, I think it speaks for itself. Will it bond? will it swell? will it get infected? will it still fit?

Today is a day people can "light a candle in a dark room" for Paul. Justice and the news machine have moved on. But Paul is still living the same case. He has no choice. I cannot do what I fervently desire, and that is to sprinkle fairy dust on the hands of the surgeon, on the freezer that has kept his skull for almost a year, on the tubes and machines that will keep him alive for the next few days. What I can do is leave no stone unturned in finding people who will blow him a kiss, cheer him on, tell him a joke. Anyone who wants to root for Paul today or send him a Christmas wish can do so here or at the FaceBook page. He and his mother will see the messages, I promise.

Paul's would-be killer has expressed a lot of remorse. He's doing his time, which will be for the rest of his life. But what I learned from this trial is that those things are a tiny part of crime-fighting. Paul fights the crime every day, every minute, for the rest of his life, too. Sam's remorse can't help him now. But your love and well wishes can.

Big Name, Big Style

He is handsome and gracious and held the audience in the palm of his hand. I can't say enough good about our evening with iconic author Joseph Wambaugh.

If by some miracle of fate you don't know him, he is the LAPD cop who burst onto the literary and pop culture scene in 1971 with The New Centurions. His gritty tales--both fiction and non-fiction--of police and their work have influenced and made possible shows like Hill Street Blues and The Shield.

At the Poisoned Pen on a cool December 2 evening, Wambaugh showed why he has been successful enough for a hundred lifetimes. He told charmingly shocking stories of actor James Woods who starred as an unknown in Wambaugh's self-produced The Onion Field. He did an imitation of Truman Capote and snuck us inside the In Cold Blood author's Palm Springs home on a day when it was 120 degrees. He brought us curbside to an almost-shakedown of out of work and forgotten Robert Blake in pre-Baretta days on an evening when a pre-famous Wambaugh was in a patrol car and how the term "Little Beaver" formed an instant connection between the two. And he raised us back up to the heights of glamour on set with Johnny Carson.

Watching Wambaugh work was like a master class in the art of being a raconteur. It was also a master class in being a very big person as he frequently and generously shared the spotlight with old friends, fellow cops and even little old moi.

He had the knack for zeroing in on the heart of the matter in seconds as he wrote the exact perfect thing in a book for Paul Patrick and one for Cliff Jewell (hey! they don't know it yet! it's a surprise--they wanted to go but couldn't make it--so a little Wambaugh is coming to them!).

If you ever have the chance to see this gentleman--and I mean that word in its highest literal sense--in person, do yourself a favor: go!

(click on a title below to buy)

Camille Kimball's books:

**What She Always Wanted** as seen on TV!

                 **A Sudden Shot** as seen on TV!

        The Mammoth Book of Tough Guys

Coming soon: Masters of True Crime-Chilling Stories of Murder and the Macabre

Thoughts on this or any article at this site? To the next person whose comment I use for a post I will send a free signed book!  (If you post as "anonymous" for convenience, try to include an identifying website or name in your remark so no one else can claim your prize!)  For an example, please click here.

Transcending evil--Heroes from "A Sudden Shot"

Have you wanted to meet Paul Patrick, whose story is inspiring
so many? Here he is. This is the guy with the roses, the guy
who never gives up, the guy who none of us can stop thinking
about.

After you watch, you may wish to leave a message of encouragement for
Paul. You can do so here or click on the FaceBook badge to the right.

Thanks to my brother for giving up his weekend to shoot and edit this home video.
He's an executive, not a photographer but after reading about Paul, it was a labor of love.

Couldn't be happier

Filled up the Poisoned Pen Saturday with eager citizens oohing and ahing over "my" guys!

Shotgun survivor Paul Patrick mustered the strength to attend....and this time brought me chocolate! I was too greedy to share and will be gobbling it down myself at home. Paul's presence left everyone in awe of him.

Phx PD Officer Darren Burch blushed a little as we made him come up front. I was beside myself to be able to show him off. When you read the book, you'll see what his quick thinking was able to do with a rubber shoe in a life and death moment. If you've already read the book, I know you're oohing and ahing right now--yes, the rubber shoe guy! We even convinced Darren to join the "assembly line" we had set up and sign autographs.

Homicide Detectives Cliff Jewell and Ron Rock autograph books, author Kimball signing, center

Homicide Detective Cliff Jewell brought his private photos and tidbits. The crowd forgot I existed as he took over and gave the inside view of the case. I couldn't be happier!

We even grabbed a big imaginary shepherd's hook and pulled Tolleson Detective Ron Rock up to the front and before he could stop himself, he was taking questions, too.

Our Henry Ford style signature factory started with me (who doesn't count, at all), then people moved on to Ron Rock, then to Cliff Jewell, then to Paul Patrick (who only has one very damaged hand to do this with) then finished up with Darren Burch. That's a whole pack of heroes for less than 8 bucks! Can you really afford to miss one of these events? ;)

If you were there, please send in your photos to asuddenshot at gmail.com so I can post them! If you make hard copies, write me there and I'll give you an address to mail them and I'll put them in the big scrap book for the next event.

And thanks again to Paul for the chocolate! I did put out Cerreta's Jumping Cholla taffy--which everyone loved!--for everybody else, but I had to hoard Paul's gift for myself!

P.S. (next stop, West Valley, check list at right)
P.P.S. ( a wee confession: Paul, I'm having chocolate truffles for breakfast!)

(click on a title below to buy)

Camille Kimball's books:

**What She Always Wanted** as seen on TV!

                 **A Sudden Shot** as seen on TV!

        The Mammoth Book of Tough Guys

Coming soon: Masters of True Crime-Chilling Stories of Murder and the Macabre

Thoughts on this or any article at this site? To the next person whose comment I use for a post I will send a free signed book!  (If you post as "anonymous" for convenience, try to include an identifying website or name in your remark so no one else can claim your prize!)  For an example, please click here.