Larry's blog

The prosecutor stared down at the defendant, steely eyed, for a long moment. The defendant, Dan Rosinsky, fidgeted in his seat, but never blinked as he stared back at Robert Jackson, the prosecutor in a Marin County courtroom. Finally, he answered in a firm voice, “No, I did not plan to kill Jane Orman that night at our knife throwing performance. It was a freak accident, something that can always happen despite our best preparation. The act was real. Everything happens just as it looks – no optical illusions, fake knives, or sleight of hand. Naturally there are some risks with this kind of act.” The trial began earlier in the day. Dan was charged with second degree murder of the woman who is known in the industry as a “target girl.” A target girl is a female assistant in "impalement" acts such as knife throwing. Jane would stand in front of a target board while Dan threw knives that would hit the board and just miss Jane, often by a fraction of an inch. They had...

Ron Stander left his office near midtown at 5 PM on a sunny, pleasant Wednesday afternoon. As an executive in the music industry, his interest in R & B and the delta blues belied his conservative, button down looks. People often assumed he was a WASP, but his ancestry also included an Afro-Caribbean mix on his mother’s side, though he looked like the English/Welsh descendants on his father’s side. A man in his mid 40’s, he often wore horn rimmed glasses and was partial to three-piece suits. Though he lived in Manhattan for over twenty years, his musical tastes were influenced by his childhood in northwestern Mississippi, and he still retained a trace of a southern accent as evidence of his origin. He turned the corner on West 59th Street and took the N train downtown. His destination station at Times Square often featured street musicians hustling a few bucks on the platforms. He sometimes tipped them on his way out the station, but rarely stopped to listen. The music almos...