Crimes and Misdeeds: Headlines from Arizona's Past

Indeed crime seems to have pay for Mr lane. In elegant prose he recalls the many crimes, often bizare stories of some Arizona's citizens. who surely must have liked the hot climate, since he found so many of them there. The picture on the front page of Dillinger, is chilling,but still I could see how he could have held the attention of the ladies, he certainly was one good looking villain! But finally the story I liked best, was the one about Pia Machita, the Indian Chief who after spending some times in American jails, (with all their comforts,) decided to become a model citizen. Well worth reading!

John Dillinger, Public Enemy #1, snarles from the cover of this engaging book--a mug shot taken when the "podunk" Tucson Police Department arrested him in 1934. Rogers, one of Arizona's top historians, writes with uncommon flair and solid scholarship. He is also one heck of a storyteller, as evidenced by his account of Eva Dugan who lost her head (literally) to a hangman's noose; Winnie Ruth Judd, the so-called "Trunk Murderess," who was said to have hacked up a body and stuffed it into a steamer trunk; and evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson, who turned up in Arizona after staging her own kidnapping. This is a terrific book and a great read. Rogers has written another winner.