Deliver Us (True Crime) by Kathryn Casey

Paperback:  "Deliver us from evil."

Deliver Us (2015) is a journalistic account of the murders of young women around the I-45 corridor that runs south from Houston into Galveston between 1970 and 2000, an area loosely dubbed by the press as the I-45/Texas Killing Fields.  Three decades of loss and redemption all center on a fifty-mile section of Interstate 45.  

The events recounted in this book are true.  The personalities, events, actions and conversations in this book have been constructed using court documents including trial transcripts, extensive interviews, letters, personal papers, research and press accounts.  Quoted testimony has been taken from court transcripts and other sworn statements.  

Kathryn Casey wrote in the Prologue, "As I began writing this book, my goal was  simple:  to tell not all but some of the victims' stories along with those of the people who toiled to bring their killers to justice.  I hoped to share the trials of the families, those who never overcame their grief and others who used it to build a better world.  For even in the deepest despair, there were those who found inspiration and redemption.  At the same time, I wanted to give a voice to those suspected of the crimes, for they, too, had important stories to tell."  

"This book is divided into three sections organized by decades:  the seventies, eighties and nineties.  For the most part, the first two, the seventies and eighties, are organized chronologically.  In contrast, the nineties unfold in two distinct parts.  The first set of chapters explores the 1996 murder of Krystal Jean Baker, the investigation into her death and the trial of her killer.  The final chapters examine one of the Gulf Coast's most infamous case, the 1997 abduction and killing of little Laura Kate Smither."  

The victims were strangled, shot or savagely beaten.  Six met their demise in pairs.  They had one thing in common:  being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Suzanne Bowers, 12, left her grandparents' Galveston house on 21 May 1977, intending to walk home and get a swimsuit.  She never arrived.

Heide Villareal Fye, 25, waitress and bartender, left her parents' house to hitchhike to see her boyfriend on 7 October 1983.

Jessica Cain, 17, left a cast party after appearing in a play on 17 August 1997.

In this harrowing true crime expedition, award-winning journalist Kathryn Casey tracks these tragic cases, investigates the evidence, interviews the suspects and pulls back the cloak of secrecy in search of elusive answers.  

"The young girls in the newspaper pictures troubled me, seemed to ask for help, wanting their stories to be told...  I had to do something because the victims were real, they mattered and they deserved not to be forgotten...  In the end, if nothing else, I hope this book serves as light into the darkness."

About the author:  Kathryn Casey is an award-winning journalist who has written for Rolling Stone, TV Guide, Reader's Digest, Texas Monthly and many other publications.  She's the author of seven previous true crime books and the creator of the highly acclaimed Sarah Armstrong mystery series.  Casey has appeared on Oprah, Oprah Winfrey's Oxygen network, Biography, Nancy Grace, E! network, truTV, Investigation Discovery, the Travel Channel and A&E.  She lives in Houston with her husband and their dog, Nelson.  For more information, visit her website.