--
Justice is, in this day, bewailing its plight…
The murder of a retired Los Angeles school teacher in 2004 never made the evening news, yet within hours arrests were made, charges filed, and a speedy conviction sent to prison Jimmy Kitlas, an incredibly shy, special needs teenager with no criminal history whatsoever.
20 years after the murder, a woman named Kelley Leigh asked Burl Barer and Frank C. Girardot to investigate. She believed that the case's rapid resolution concealed a deeper, more troubling narrative-one marked by deception, manipulation, dishonesty, and a profound disregard for truth and justice.
She was right. Of the last three people to see the victim alive, only one had both the motive and the opportunity to strangle him to death, and it wasn't Jimmy Kitlas.
What begins with a dead body on the bed leads to a bizarre scheme to steal a fortune in gold, a plot to smuggle MDMA, and an incredible joint effort by the American Mafia and the Russian Mob to defraud the United States Government out of billions of dollars.
Editorial Reviews
"Tautly written and deeply reported, the authors have created a gripping page-turner…A masterwork of true crime-and an unforgettable study of injustice."
--Kerrie Droban, true crime author of Running with the Devil
"The darkness lurking just beyond the glow of Hollywood lights amid those Los Angeles nights has spawned countless cliches over the past century, but with Where Murder Lies writers Barer and Girardot mine that well-trod landscape and a peculiar murder to deliver a delicious read of substance that rattles off the pages with such journalistic precision you can practically hear the clatter of the Smith Corona as you turn the pages."
-- Mark Cromer, journalist and author of California Twilight: Essays and Memories of The End of The Golden State
"In 'Where Murder Lies' Burl Baer and Frank C. Girardot, Jr again deliver a page-turner that takes readers into a world rarely seen by most. This writing team delivers a deeply reported, complex, yet classic story of murder and betrayal that readers have come to expect from them."
-- Author J. Brian Charles
About the Authors
Burl Barer
Burl Barer is a NYT Best Selling author, Edgar Award winner, and two-time Anthony Award nominee with extensive media, advertising, marketing, and public relations experience. Garnering accolades for his creative contributions to radio, television, and print media, Barer's career has been highlighted in the London Sunday Telegraph, New York Times, USA Today, Variety, and on ABC's Good Morning America. He has hosted the Internet's first award-winning true crime podcast, True Crime Uncensored, for 17 years. The author of several true crime classics, Barer co-authored with Frank C. Girardot, Jr. "Betrayal in Blue" and "A Taste for Murder."
Frank C. Girardot Jr.
Frank C. Girardot, Jr., born in Detroit in January 1961, is an award-winning journalist, author, victim advocate, and former radio host. His career launched as a copyboy at the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, evolving into coverage of landmark cases like the O.J. Simpson trial. Girardot's acclaimed biography "Becoming Clark Rockefeller" exposed serial imposter Christian Gerhartsreiter (aka Clark Rockefeller). A board member of Justice for Homicide Victims, he is the author of "Burned" and co-author with Burl Barer of "Betrayal in Blue" and "A Taste for Murder" with Burl Barer, blending meticulous reporting with compassionate advocacy.
