Synopses & Reviews
If history is right, a 26 year-old beauty named Winnie Ruth Judd murdered her two best girlfriends one hot Phoenix night in 1931. Then she hacked up their bodies, stuffed the pieces into a trunk, and took them by train to Los Angeles as her baggage.
If history is right, she was sentenced to die but ""cheated the gallows"" by acting insane. She spent nearly 40 years in Arizona's insane asylum-flummoxing officials by escaping six times.
If history is right, she only got her freedom at age 66-after serving more time than any other convicted murderer in the history of the nation--because Arizona was finally tired of punishing her.
But if history is wrong, Winnie Ruth Judd's life was squandered in a horrible miscarriage of justice.
Award-winning journalist Jana Bommersbach reinvestigates the twisted, bizarre murder case that has captivated the nation for decades. She not only uncovers evidence long hidden, but gets Winnie Ruth Judd to break her life-long silence and finally speak.
In telling the story of this American crime legend, Bommersbach also tells the story of Phoenix, Arizona-a backwater town that would become a major American city-and the story of a unique moment in American history filled with social taboos.
But most of all, she tells the story of a woman with the courage to survive.
Review
"A backward look at a headliner who did in and chopped up two women, put the pieces into two trunks and calmly started to ship them. It was the pieces-parts angle that captured the headlines, that and the fact that Winnie Ruth was, if we are to believe the photos, a real stunner.
Glamour, blood and a cold-case, what more could even a tabloid desire? But there was more to it than that and Bommersbach weaves the tale well & with care and detail, including the endings which make Judd into a female Houdini who drove the Arizona prison system nuts. Pick your own star when you mentally cast this for a mini-series." --Courier Gazette
Review
"Bommersbach takes a fresh, in-depth look....She makes a convincing case..."San Francisco Chronicle
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”Let this be your warning: once you start reading, it will be difficult to put down.” San Mateo Times
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”Bommersbach takes a fresh, in-depth look....She makes a convincing case...” San Francisco Chronicle
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""The book uncovers some ugly truths about one of the copper state's dirtiest secrets..."" --Los Angeles Daily News
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”Jana Bommersbach has beautifully re-created the society (of Depression-era Arizona)" Los Angeles Times
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”Like a good lawyer, Bommersbach builds a powerful circumstantial case...” The Arizona Republic
About the Author
Jana Bommersbach is one of Arizona's most respected and acclaimed journalists. She has earned numerous national, state and regional awards, including the prestigious Don Bolles Award for investigative reporting for the newspaper series on Winnie Ruth Judd that led to this book. She lives in Phoenix.