Author Bio
Growing up in Winnipeg, Manitoba and Philadelphia, my favorite authors included Hugh Lofting (Doctor Doolittle, who talked to animals and championed them), the incomparable Madeleine L’Engle – I probably read A Wrinkle in Time 100 times – and then my hero Harper Lee. To Kill A Mockingbird – also read about 100 times.
After high school I embarked on a six year, four college extended tour and finally graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a dual degree in International Relations & French. I moved to New York after I landed my first job out of school, getting my foot in the door as an executive secretary at ABC News. From there I worked my way up the ladder to producer and in 1989 I was part of the team that started up PrimeTime Live with Diane Sawyer and Sam Donaldson.
My first producer credit at PTL was for a piece called “The Prime Suspect,” my introduction to the Patz case. I also produced features on many socially important topics including the abortion rights battle, gays in the military, and rape victims’ rights. I produced an Emmy award winning town meeting with Peter Jennings, where I took an undercover camera with me as I bought semi-automatic weapons to show how easy it was; I traveled to Louisiana’s infamous Angola prison with Cynthia McFadden and camped on Death Row to follow a condemned inmate in his last weeks before his execution; and I produced Diane Sawyer’s intimate portrait of the celebrated victim who put serial rapist Alex Kelly in prison.
In 1998, I moved to CBS News “60 Minutes II” where I produced for six years - stories that included living with Alzheimer’s and the aftermath of 9/11. I also reported again on the Patz case, in a 2000 report in which Stan Patz, Etan’s father made his case against the prime suspect, and in a 2004 update about the civil lawsuit against that man, Jose Antonio Ramos.
In 2004, I left television news to write my first book, and the first book ever on the Patz case. It has been five long years, but I’m proud of the results!
I live in New York City, and I’m also directing a long term documentary following an extraordinary woman who beat breast cancer, who is now taking on the American health care system. I also teach broadcast journalism at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, and do media consulting.
Selected sites:
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
Patz Imaging - Stan Patz’s website with a wonderful gallery of his photography work
Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind - a canny, hip look at the convergence between mystery, crime and writing.