SOURCE: "Crime that Pays," in Yale Review, Vol. 81, October, 1993, pp. 45-61.

[In the following essay, Fabian remarks on the history of true crime writing and published confessions.]

In the summer of 1977, the New York police finally caught "Son of Sam," a serial killer who had been preying on young women. The tabloid press had reveled in the hunt, following both the police and the killer for one long year. David Berkowitz, the man who called himself the Son of Sam, was ruled insane and locked away. Although the man was incarcerated, his story remained at large. To stop those who had seen financial opportunity in the story of the captured killer and had offered him large sums of money to tell it, the New York legislature passed a law that denied criminals the profits obtained from the sale of their stories. The law stipulated that the state would...