Hi, I’m Angie Moon and I’m not just a classic rock historian, I’m also a true crime author, particularly one that specialises in celebrity true crime. I love true crime in general, but the stories that fascinate me the most are the ones that involve celebrities, which is why I’ve chosen that as my writing niche. I’ve written about rock stars who have killed people and rock stars who have had encounters with murderers, serial killers, and attempted presidential assassins.
You can read all of these stories in my book Crime of the Century: Classic Rock & True Crime. I wrote this book because I not only noticed how many connections there are between these two topics that interest me a lot, but also how deep these connections run. Researching this book has taught me a lot and there are so many surprises and I’ve learnt a lot from this book. I’m also working on another celebrity true crime related project that goes even broader in scope, but also more specific, kinda paradoxical but you’ll understand when I talk more about it. There’s an important lesson I learnt from writing about that, but I’ll talk about that when that book is finished. These ideas do go hand in hand, but for now I’ll talk about the most important lesson I’ve learnt from all my years, well decades, consuming true crime books and documentaries. Yes, I got into true crime when I was still in primary school. Despite it being on national television, it was still kinda taboo to like. Thankfully these days I can be more open about this interest.
In this blog post I want to talk about the most important lessons I’ve learnt from true crime that go hand in hand: two things can be true at once and the most dangerous people are often the most charming, the people you’d never expect would do such a thing.
What is true crime’s appeal?
Why do I like true crime? It’s not the blood and gore at all! I’m fascinated with the legal system: investigations, detective work, court proceedings, appeals, and what life is like in prison. My dad briefly worked as a police officer in California and his desire to do something good for society was why he wanted to be a police officer. Similarly, he has an interest in the legal side of it.
He and I both have a fascination with the psychology of it. A big part of the investigation and the mystery is the motive. Why did someone commit that crime? What was going on in their head? What makes someone do that? I’ve always been the type of person to want closure, to want answers, to gain an understanding so I can learn something. Carl Sagan said it best: “every question is a cry to understand the world.” In all of my work, I encourage questions and curiosity.
Celebrity true crime adds another fascinating angle to this.
The allure of celebrity true crime:
Celebrities are people we simultaneously know and don’t know. We know, and perhaps love (or hate), things they’ve created. We see a lot about their lives in the media. Yet we don’t know them because they’re not in our world, they’re in a different world. Celebrities are so near and yet so far from us, especially in this day and age with social media.
Stardom is something that so many people strive for. I’ve interviewed a lot of musicians and for the most part, everyone’s goal is to have their works of art be heard and enjoyed by large audiences. Fame isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be though. I’ve interviewed and read stories of musicians who have spent years and years toiling and paying their dues to get in the spotlight and get their name in lights, they finally get there, and then they’re like is that it? They feel unfulfilled, like is that what stardom really is? One of my favourite online series talking about the realities of fame is Alyson Stoner’s Dear Hollywood, which focuses on their experience as a child actor and all the toxic stuff that goes on behind the scenes. Even if you get famous as an adult, sure you may have better coping mechanisms and ability to defend yourself than you did as a child or teenager, but you still have to deal with power dynamics and imbalances, public scrutiny, self esteem issues, loss of privacy, and toxic/abusive behaviours from your peers and higher ups.
Celebrities have that star power and that’s what makes true crime cases involving them interesting. It’s like a car crash. People love a rise and fall story, the media loves to build that celebrity up on a pedestal higher and higher only to revel in their downfall, the harder the fall the better. You worry about them if they’re the victim or if they had a close encounter with a killer. If they’ve been accused of doing something wrong, there are so many questions related to the psychology of it. They had it all! Why would they do such a thing? How could they? How can someone who has won in life go from red carpet events and lavish parties to a courtroom and a jail cell? The contrast is striking!
When a celebrity is on trial it’s a spectacle and it’s an over 130 year long tradition that has changed a lot because of the advancements of technology! We went from print to radio to TV to the internet in that time. Sometimes the celebrity’s on trial and rightfully so, but other times it’s unjust! Look at Mae West, Pete Seeger, Lenny Bruce, and Muhammad Ali.
My Top Takeaway From True Crime: The Most Dangerous People Are Those You’d Never Suspect
I’ve done multiple talks on my book and I always try to drill this point into everyone’s head. The most dangerous people are often those you’d never suspect. They’re often ordinary people in your community: a coworker, friend, relative, neighbour, or someone from church. They can be the most charming, friendly, charismatic people. They can be well respected people, esteemed pillars of the community. Sometimes they’re right under your nose.
I remember reading Roald Dahl’s short story Lamb to the Slaughter in English class when I was around 13 and spoiler alert (and this pains me to write as a longtime vegetarian, now vegan): A husband wants to leave his wife. The wife bonks her cop husband on the head with a frozen leg of lamb, killing him. She cooks the leg of lamb in the oven and goes to the shop to create a fake alibi for herself and then calls the police. The cops arrive and they’re all his friends and they look for the weapon, but no dice. She serves them the lamb and one cop says the weapon is probably under our noses.
Dangerous people don’t have flashing neon signs above their heads that read “MONSTER!”. I get tired of people who are like “I knew that person was trouble as soon as they walked in the door!” Oh really? Then why didn’t you warn people? You could have saved someone’s life! You could have prevented someone from being traumatised and injured! Why did you stay quiet? Or were you playing Monday morning quarterback? Hindsight is 20/20.
It reminds me of people who tell victims of domestic violence “How could you not know that they were abusive? The signs were all there!” Well, it’s easy to see those signs when you’re removed from the situation, when you take a step back, it’s a different perspective. Abusive relationships and cults have a lot in common, it’s like a frog in a boiling pot of water. The abuser doesn’t jump out and say “Hey I’m abusive” and then smack you straight away. The cult recruiters aren’t going to start with the sketchy, messed up aspects of the cult. It starts small, with little digs and small, but manipulative requests in an abusive relationship. It starts small, with a non-threatening event: a coffee morning, ice cream social, poetry slam, gig, lecture, party, or a film screening. No one suspects anything if they’re being invited to something innocuous like that. Grooming works in a similar way and I’ll talk more about this later.
Look at the stories of Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, and the Manson Family. To get that high of a body count, Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy had to lure their victims and so they turned on the charm and looked like normal people. So many people were fooled by Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy. Ted Bundy once worked at a suicide hotline, was a law school student, and was involved with the Republican Party. He was a generic looking brown haired man who was charismatic and he’d use his youthful looks and lie to lure his victims. In the case of John Wayne Gacy, he was involved in his community and was very social. He was a Jaycee, involved with the Democratic Party, owned a business, joined a Moose Fraternity Club, appeared at fundraisers, entertained hospitalised children as Pogo The Clown, and was the director of the Polish Constitution Day Parade in Chicago. Seven months before his arrest for murder, he was photographed with First Lady Rosalynn Carter! That’s not something you could just do willy-nilly, he was given special clearance.
I’ve interviewed musicians who have met the Manson Family. And you know what they’ve said? I never suspected a thing! I thought they were ordinary people, okay maybe Charlie was a bit of a weirdo, but I didn’t think he’d be behind the Tate-LaBianca murders. Mind you, there were people who actually believed that Charles Manson was framed and this was all cooked up to make hippies look bad and start a race war. If you look at the Manson girls: Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel, and Leslie Van Houten, they look like young women you know. Heck, Squeaky Fromme was very artistic and was a dancer and a seamstress. There’s a surprising amount of talent in the Manson Family: lots of musicians and artists!
It’s true that we should be careful when talking to people we don’t know, but the truth is that the vast majority of victims of violent crimes knew the perpetrator and it was often someone they thought they could trust: a friend, family member, classmate, neighbour, partner/spouse, ex-partner/friend, colleague, or authority figure. Stranger danger is a myth and it actually endangers people.
The Second Takeaway: Two Things Can Be True At Once
This point goes hand in hand with the point that the most dangerous people are often the most ordinary, charming, charismatic people. These things can both be true at the the same time. I have autism and I’ve worked hard over the ~25 years since my diagnosis to unlearn black and white thinking and thinking in absolutes. There are many shades of grey. I’ve expressed my frustrations with the Disneyfication of classic rock storytelling before on this blog. People like simplicity. Simplicity is comfort. When a story is sanitised and simplified with a clear hero vs villain story arc all so we can have a nice movie wrapped up with a bow on top, inaccuracies are introduced and we don’t get the full story and the bigger picture with different perspectives. The truth is messy. The truth is complicated.
In Mean Girls, Aaron Samuels tells Cady Heron when she asks him why he likes Regina George, “There’s good and bad to everybody, right? […] She’s just more up front about it.” Two things can be true at the same time! Regina George is confident, clever, social, and has a magnetic aura, but she’s also manipulative, controlling, vindictive, and cruel. She can turn on the charm and she can also be a total bitch.
Similarly, someone’s good points do not negate their bad points, and someone’s bad points don’t negate their good points. Someone who is overall mean can do good things and someone who is usually a really nice person can do bad things. We’re not perfect.
I thought about this when I shared some meme making fun of Phil Spector and someone was like “Phil Spector is forgiven for any murder”. That made me feel really uncomfortable and uneasy. Is forgiveness yours to give if you’ve not been personally affected? No. Only Lana Clarkson’s family can give forgiveness. As far as I can tell, Donna Clarkson has not forgiven Phil Spector. His death in 2021 did give her some closure, but closure cannot bring Lana back. During the years long Spector murder trial media circus, Lana Clarkson’s character had been flattened into a washed up B-movie actress. Meanwhile Phil Spector was characterised as a once genius producer.
Two things can be true at once. Phil Spector was a pioneering, brilliant producer, but he was also an abusive husband, a hothead who took his anger out on musicians, and a convicted murderer. Yes, “Be My Baby” is a beautifully produced song, but he was so abusive and controlling towards Ronnie and he threatened to kill her. Life in that mansion was like a prison. She had to flee the house barefoot with just the clothes on her back! If anyone saw this murder coming, it was Ronnie Spector!
I will confess something that’s been on my mind recently and it’s something I need to unpack and process through writing. I want to give a content warning because this will involve discussion of grooming and being coerced into sex. I also want to mention that out of respect for me, please do not speculate about the identity of this individual I am talking about. This is not drama or tea, this is a serious matter. I do not believe this person is an imminent threat, which is why I am not naming him. But what he did was wrong and I want to tell that story and talk about its impact on me.
When I was 17 years old, I was groomed online. This person was someone that I once considered a friend and I considered him a huge inspiration. In fact, he encouraged me to write and that encouragement is partially why Crime of the Century exists. I thought that we’d be forever friends. For a long time, I had made excuses for this person. He’s different. He’s my friend. He cares about me. He inspires me. I was so mature for my age. I’m smart. I was a university student at 17 years old, isn’t that a sign of being wise beyond your years? No, younger Angie, no it isn’t.
When I was a teenager I had abusive friends. When I was 16, I had a “friend” (whom I’ve long since cut off contact with) who forced me to watch porn with him and when I was 17 he coerced me into sex. At that point in my life, abuse was the norm. I didn’t know what healthy relationships looked like, so is it any wonder I was groomed? There were also some other dangerous situations I nearly got myself into, like when I tried my hand at modelling at 18 years old and this photographer wanted to pay me to have sex with him and take boudoir photos of me and he said he’d pick me up from the train station in his car and drive me to the house where the photoshoot would take place. Thankfully I didn’t go. I had watched a lot of true crime documentaries and I was wary. It could have been a front for trafficking. I cut off all contact and I didn’t want to model anymore.
I was a 17 year old university first year in a new city. I was lonely. I had low self esteem. I was the perfect target for grooming. It all started when this person responded to my sad posting about how I wanted a boyfriend or girlfriend and I felt ugly because I had never been in a relationship. This person started off with something innocent, saying I think you’re pretty and I think someone would be lucky to have you as their girlfriend. We conversed and we had found a lot of common ground despite being seven years apart in age. We were both classic rock fans, fascinated with history, and skinny and awkward. And it quickly escalated from there. Even though this person damn well knew I was 17, he didn’t care. I definitely looked underage because I have a babyface and I was very skinny and flat chested. I was underweight and eating disordered. I would skip meals, obsessively calorie count, and abuse laxatives. Messages would become more and more sexual even before I turned 18. I remember when he saw my body he said something like you have the perfect body, except for your flat chest. Can’t you grow some boobs? Put some Miracle-Gro on them? I quickly got over this crush when I met the man who would be my husband. This person and I remained friends until recently and I don’t know why. I have concluded that this person must feel some guilt for what had happened back in 2012 and doesn’t want to address it.
Thankfully now I’m slowly building my confidence and finally I’m at a point where I’m getting less self conscious of how I look.
Nevertheless, there was good and bad in the person who sent sexual messages to me when I was underage and groomed me. He was a listening ear early on in our friendship, always was so encouraging of my writing dreams, and a gifted writer who wrote a good book, no doubt. I can’t take that away from him, but what he did to me when I was 17 years old was inexcusable. I can’t rationalise those actions. There’s no ifs or buts. When I was 24-25 years old, I was married, but even if I were single, I couldn’t imagine dating someone younger than 21 or 22!
Cult leaders, abusers, and groomers all go after the same kind of person. Someone vulnerable and unsure of themselves. Someone going through a major life change: a move to a new city, working a new job, lost their job, or had just gone through a breakup. Someone who is going through a hard time: loss, financial problems, abuse. Someone who is looking for something: a purpose, the meaning of life, friendship, community, or love. Most importantly, that person is vulnerable: perhaps they’re depressed, isolated because they’ve moved far away from family and friends, or they’re a bit of a loner.
Cult leaders, abusers, and groomers will erode your boundaries bit by bit, love bomb you at first, shower you with attention or presents, and dangle a prize in front of you: the carrot and stick mentality. You want what I’m offering? Do what I say. They are not your friends.
In Conclusion
The point of this rambling essay, if you can call it that, was to say that the idea that only monsters do evil things is not only wrong, it’s harmful to victims and survivors. It creates this false idea that you can’t be brilliant and awful. Whether or not you intend it, that attitude exonerates talented people who do bad things. The truth is there are a lot of gifted and talented people who are lousy human beings and a lot of geniuses who do evil things. Acknowledging the “positive” traits of a bad person, whether it’s their looks, intellect, wit, charm, or skills doesn’t take away from the bad things they do. It’s not only good, but necessary to take a holistic view of a person. There’s no need to disprove or discredit someone’s talent or good things they’ve done to prove they’ve done awful things. Two things can be true at once.
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