Back Story: “What Happened in Craig”

The plan for “What Happened in Craig” was set in motion in early 1992, just after “Butcher, Baker” was published. In fact, Walter Gilmour and I pitched it to NAL/Dutton after our too-fun-for-reality appearance on the Sally Jessy Raphael show. Which, by the way, was an unmitigated disaster. [Another story for another time.]

At lunch with our editor, Michaela Hamilton, I recounted the broad arc of the story: a mass murder on a fishing boat in the remote village of Craig, Alaska. A place so undeveloped that the only way to get there was by float plane or boat (there was a ferry from Ketchikan, of course, and roads too, but like most villages in southeast Alaska, the roads go practically nowhere).

Happened
Photo courtesy U.S. Corps of Engineers

The crime first revealed itself as a fishing boat on fire. Initial thoughts were that someone had a bad season and had torched the vessel for insurance money. And then things turned grim. It wasn’t just a fire on board the fishing boat known as the “Investor.” There were bodies. Several bodies. Four bodies, to be precise. What started as a suspected arson quickly became a homicide investigation.

As those first bodies were brought to shore, there were intimations of a crazed crewman gone off the deep end. Others thought it had to be a professional hit. Cocaine was mentioned. And, really, with a crime so heinous, the imagination quickly outran itself. Craig suddenly turned into the world’s greatest rumor mill.

Ms. Hamilton was intrigued by all this, but she waved me off, determined that Gilmour and I be completely indoctrinated into her true crime mantra:

“True Crime has to be about a high body count, or someone rich and famous,” she insisted.

“Butcher, Baker” surely qualified. So, too, did “What Happened in Craig.” We were off to the races. Little did we know that this book would lead Walter and I to different places. Our partnership suffered, then broke. As always, it was “Butcher, Baker” that brought us back together.

But this author couldn’t let go of the story of Craig, Alaska, and the “The Investor.” Some stories are like that.

Copyright Leland E. Hale (2018). All rights reserved.


Order “What Happened In Craig,” HERE and HERE, true crime on Epicenter Press.

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