The Road Out of Hell: Sanford Clark and the True Story of the Wineville Murders

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Sterling Publishing Company, Inc., 2009 - True Crime - 285 pages
From 1926 to 1928, Gordon Stewart Northcott committed at least 20 murders on a chicken ranch outside of Los Angeles. His nephew, Sanford Clark, was held captive there from the age of 13 to 15, and was the sole surviving victim of the killing spree. Here, acclaimed crime writer Anthony Flacco--using never-before-heard information from Sanford's son Jerry Clark--tells the real story behind the case that riveted the nation. Forced by Northcott to take part in the murders, Sanford carried tremendous guilt all his life. Yet despite his youth and the trauma, he helped gain some justice for the dead and their families by testifying at Northcott's trial-which led to his conviction and execution. It was a shocking story, but perhaps the most shocking part of all is the extraordinarily ordinary life Clark went on to live as a decorated WWII vet, a devoted husband of 55 years, a loving father, and a productive citizen.In dramatizing one of the darkest cases in American crime, Flacco constructs a riveting psychological drama about how Sanford was able to detoxify himself from the evil he'd encountered, offering the ultimately redemptive story of one man's remarkable ability to survive a nightmare and emerge intact.

 

Contents

ONE
1
Two
17
THREE
39
FOUR
52
FIVE
66
SIX
80
SEVEN
100
EIGHT
125
TWELVE
196
THIRTEEN
210
FOURTEEN
239
FIFTEEN
264
EPILOGUE
268
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
270
AUTHORS NOTE
272
SELECTED REFERENCES
276

NINE
143
ΤΕΝ
152
ELEVEN
175
INDEX
277
ABOUT THE AUTHOR 287
Copyright

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About the author (2009)

Anthony Flacco is an acclaimed author, ghost writer, screenwriter, and public speaker. He is a member of the Writers Guild of America/West, International Thriller Writers, and the Mystery Writers of America. Recent speaking engagements include MediaBistro seminars and the Jack London Writers Conference. He is also co-author of Publish Your Nonfiction Book, coming from Writer’s Digest in November. For more information, visit www.anthonyflacco.com.

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