The Big Eddy Club: The Stocking Stranglings and Southern Justice [Hardcover]

David Rose (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2007 | ISBN-10: 1565849108 | ISBN-13: 978-1565849105

Race, injustice, and serial murder in the Deep South—Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil with an investigative edge.

"The crime happens, the mob gathers. Far too often, the question is, which nigger's neck are we going to put the noose around?"—Gary Parker, former defense lawyer for Carlton Gary

Over the course of eight bloody months in the 1970s, a serial rapist and murderer terrorized Columbus, Georgia, killing seven elderly white women by strangling them in their beds. In 1986, eight years after the last murder, an African American, Carlton Gary, was convicted and sentenced to death. Though many in the city doubt his guilt, he remains on death row.

Award-winning Vanity Fair reporter David Rose has followed this case for a decade in an investigation that led him to the Big Eddy Club—an all-white, members-only club in Columbus, frequented by the town's most prominent judges and lawyers...as well as most of the seven murdered women. Among Rose's discoveries was that a young black man was lynched in 1912 in Columbus after he was tried for murder and freed, and that the Columbus judge to whom the Gary case was first assigned in 1984 was the son of the mob leader in the 1912 lynching.

Framed by the tale of two lynchings—one carried out illegally at the start of the twentieth century, and the other a legal lynching carried out at the century's end—The Big Eddy Club is a gripping, revealing drama, full of evocatively drawn characters, insidious institutions, and the extraordinary connections that bind past and present. The book is also a compelling, accessible, and timely exploration of race and criminal justice, not just in the context of the South but in the entire United States, as it addresses the corruption of due process as a tool of racial oppression.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This ineptly titled tome is an engrossing blend of true crime, legal drama and acute exposé of racial antagonism. Vanity Fair contributing editor Rose (Guantánamo: The War on Human Rights) examines the brutal rape-murders of seven older white women in Columbus, Ga., in 1977–1978. In the mid-'80s, the police charged Carlton Gary, a charismatic black ladies' man with a long rap sheet; Gary was convicted and sentenced to die. Rose (who, controversially, agreed to turn over new findings to the defense in exchange for their cooperation) presents a riveting case that Gary, still on death row, may be innocent. Police and prosecutors, he contends, may have lied to the jury and withheld possibly exculpatory evidence from Gary's attorneys, whose defense of their indigent client was hamstrung by the judge's refusal to give them funds. Later, Gary's appeals were hobbled by procedural rules; the legal "technicalities" decried on cop shows, the author argues, more often railroad than protect defendants. Rose sets the story against Columbus's history of racial oppression and biased justice, comparing Gary's prosecution to the lynchings of yesteryear. The author harps unconvincingly on the "Southern rape complex" and insinuates more than he demonstrates about the role of Columbus's Big Eddy Club of white movers and shakers. Still, Rose presents a compelling indictment of justice gone awry. Photos. (May)
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Review

[D]eeply fascinating . . .a damning, shameful saga.
—Cleveland Plain Dealer

A compelling legal drama andexposé of racism in the justice system.
—Atlanta Journal-Constitution

About as good a piece of investigative reporting as you’re ever likely to get.
—Sunday Times (UK)

[An] engrossing blend of true crime, legal drama and acute exposé of racial antagonism.
—Publishers Weekly

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 350 pages
• Publisher: New Press, The (May 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1565849108
• ISBN-13: 978-1565849105
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.5 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,091,938 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

David Rose is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair and has worked for The Guardian, The Observer, and the BBC. He is the author of six books and lives in Oxford, England. His most recent book is The Big Eddy Club: The Stocking Stranglings and Southern Justice.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars The Real Truth, August 23, 2007

By 

JudyB "Judy" (Georgia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Big Eddy Club: The Stocking Stranglings and Southern Justice (Hardcover)

Mr. Rose weaves a tale that exemplifies full blown prejudice against white southerners (as do some of the reviewers). The tale also lacks full, impartial coverage of the facts. For the record, in July 2007 Carlton Gary's DNA was matched to a 1975 rape/murder victim in Syracuse, NY. He will now be charged with that murder as NY officials plan to prosecute, regardless of his current death row status. Perhaps, irrefutable DNA evidence might sway some of previous true believers. To believe Mr. Rose's account, one would have to believe that judges, detectives, attorneys and the Supreme Court have participated in a conspiracy against Gary. Gary was convicted of only 3 of the 7 Columbus murders he allegedly committed and HIS fingerprints were found in the bedrooms of those three elderly women. His case has gone to the US Supreme Court where he was denied a second trial. One would assume that all of the Supreme Court justices are white southerners that are also conspiring against Gary. As far as the Big Eddy Club having influence in the case, that is bizarre. Yes, the Big Eddy Club was an elite group of wealthy Columbus families. But as one reviewer stated, that type of group can be found in cities across the nation. Rose's book is nothing but personal prejudices and reverse racism/bigotry. If the readers want to form an objective opinion on the case, do some research other than Rose's book. Racism, prejudice and bigotry can be found in the north, east, west and yes sometimes still in the south. But you should not condemn an entire region or group of people based on one person's view. This book is not a "true" account of the crime, the facts or the people involved in the case.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Agenda Journalism at Its Worst, February 24, 2008

By 

Big D (Auburn, AL. USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Big Eddy Club: The Stocking Stranglings and Southern Justice (Hardcover)

Agenda driven, over-the-top-journalism at its worst. The author, Mr. Rose, has taken what at first was an outstanding work, and ruined it with his agenda driven ideas of American justice and the death penalty.

His work and research into the murders, the arrest and early events of the story are good, oustanding perhaps, but then he unfortunately gets off track and becomes more interested in his agenda of degrading the justice system and of condemning the death penalty.

One may have his or her own opinion about the jusicial system and one may have his or her own opinion about the death penalty, but one should make those points known, then move on, not pound the reader over the head again, again, and again. Mr. Rose demonizes anyone who might have a thought different from his and tries to discredit any idea or perspective that is not in lock step with his own pre-conceived ideas and opinions. In the end, he discredits only himself and his work.

And that's a shame, because he had a good book going and the makings of a good, perhaps plausible argument on his positions on justice and capital punishment. In the end, by over-reaching and pounding the reader on the head too many times, he loses all credibility and what could have been a very good book goes down with him.

Take for instance the title of the book, "The Big Eddy Club." Mr. Rose would have us to beleive that everyone who belongs to that dining club has the same ideas, the same opinions, and is in lock step agreement on all issues of race, prejudice and fairness. That's like saying all Democrats think alike or that all Republicans think alike. It's just not so, and Mr. Rose knows better. Or ought to.

15 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Rose doesn't know as much as he thinks he does, July 1, 2007

By 

Constant Reader In GA (Columbus, GA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Big Eddy Club: The Stocking Stranglings and Southern Justice (Hardcover)

Rose is a talented writer, but I'm speaking of form. In this book, his substance is extremely slanted, off-base, and shows no objectivity. While he obviously did a lot of research, I believe he started into it with his conclusions already made. He then proceeded to pick examples, distort them, and use them to his own end as a paid employee for Carlton Gary. He embellished many things to the point of making them laughable, such as his constant references to supposed Wynnton locations, that are not really in the Wynnton area. Anything to make the story sound good, right? So many of his references to the Big Eddy Club were, also, completely out of context. Including the Big Eddy Club in the title of the book is an attempt to connect the two, which is absurd. Such clubs are characteristic of social classes everywhere, north and south. Have you read any of Harlan Coben's books, and how he describes country clubs in New Jersey? Am I a member of the Big Eddy Club? No, I don't have the money or the pedigree, but the Big Eddy Club has nothing to do with Carlton Gary's trial as portrayed by Mr. Rose except perhaps in Mr. Rose's mind. Rose cites things that are characteristic of older people and old traditions, but transforms them into support of his distorted positions that weave throughout this book. He came into Columbus, GA with a pre-determined prejudice against the southern United States. The Carlton Gary case made us convenient, and he proceeded to intentionally make cariacatures of this city and many of the people he wrote about and quoted. His descriptions of many of our local officials paint them as "good old boy" cariacatures that do not resemble the true individuals. Mr. Rose should also be careful about some of the people he claims to have befriended in Columbus, GA, and who he quotes in support of his theories... he might want to check their criminal backgrounds, as well, before using them as source material. Or, he should at least have included those backgrounds in his text so as to allow for a more balanced portrayal. This book offended me in the worst way; I felt compelled to read it, yet had to close it and put it down every few chapters because it made me so angry. I live in Columbus, GA today and have lived here almost all my life. I was a young adult here through the fear and outrage of the Stocking Strangler case. Racism in Columbus, GA in the 70's was unique neither to the south nor the north. I lived in New York state for a short time just before the stocking stranglings started, and racism was as bad there as it was here. We've come a very long way here since that time, but as in most places, we still have a journey ahead of us. I, and countless others, believe that Carlton Gary is guilty of the crimes for which he was tried and convicted.