In Broad Daylight [Mass Market Paperback]

Harry M. Maclean (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1990

Ken McElroy terrorized Skidmore, Missouri, for years--robbing, raping, shooting, and maiming the citizens into submission until they had finally had enough. While 45 townspeople looked on, McElroy was shot and killed . . . but the police could find no witnesses. (Nonfiction)((Dell.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Ken Rex McElroy terrorized the residents of several counties in northwestern Missouri for a score of years, and in 1981 he was killed by the men of Skidmore, who closed ranks against all attempts to identify those who had actually pulled the triggers. This Edgar Award-winner "is an engrossing, credible examination of the way vigilante action can take over when the law appears to be powerless," observed PW. Photos. Author tour.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"GRIPPING…excellent and disturbing…a fine and richly rewarding book."
--The Washington Post Book World
 
"FIRST-CLASS…Read and you may find yourself haunted."--Houston Chronicle
 
"A GUARANTEED PAGE-TURNER. [A] truly compelling…piece of reporting."--Rocky Mountain News Sunday Magazine
 

--This text refers to an alternate Mass Market Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback
• Publisher: Dell (January 1, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0440205093
• ISBN-13: 978-0440205098
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,967,769 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Harry MacLean had a successful career as a lawyer before turning to writing. Graduating magna cum laude from the University of Denver College of Law in 1967, he went to work as a trial attorney for the Securities and Exchange Commission in Washington, D.C. He returned to private practice in Denver and accepted an adjunct professor position at the DU College of Law. He was appointed magistrate in the Denver juvenile court, where he served for two years, before becoming First Assistant Attorney General for the Colorado Department of Law. From there, he went to Washington, D.C. as the General Counsel of the Peace Corps in the Carter administration.

Harry returned to Denver in 1980 and was working as an independent arbitrator and mediator when he read the story of the "vigilante killing" of Ken Rex McElroy, the "town bully," in northwest Missouri. After reading what he could find on the murder, he drove to the small town of Skidmore, and found the town wrapped up tight around the killers. Over time, MacLean made friends and became accepted in the community. He lived with a prominent Skidmore family, and for the next four years researched the story. "In Broad Daylight" is the tale of McElroy's reign of terror, his murder, and the ensuing cover up. The book won an Edgar Award, was a New York Times bestseller for twelve weeks, and was made into a movie starring Brian Dennehey, Chris Cooper, Marcia Gay Harden and Cloris Leachman.

"Once Upon A Time" is the story of Eileen Franklin, a California housewife who claimed to recover a repressed memory of her father murdering her playmate twenty years earlier. Based solely on this memory, George Franklin was tried and convicted of the murder. The book chronicles the trial and the story of the highly dysfunctional Franklin family as it played out in court. It also explores the intersection of psychology and the law and the use of repressed memories as evidence in criminal cases. "Once Upon A Time" was selected as a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times.

On his sixtieth birthday, Harry threw a dart at a map pinned to his dining room wall. It landed on Dover, Delaware. One month later, Harry gathered a suitcase and $500 and took a bus to Dover, where for a year he lived on what he could earn. After driving a postal truck down the coast of Delaware in the dark of night for a few months, Harry worked undercover as a prison guard at the maximum security prison in Smyrna. This book chronicling this year is still under construction.

Harry has long been interested in the state of Mississippi as the supposed unrepentant heart of the old South. When James Ford Seale was arrested in January 2007 for his role in the kidnapping and murder of two black youths in 1964, he decided to tell the story of the trial and explore the landscape of modern Mississippi. The result is "The Past Is Never Dead."
Harry continues to live in Denver and work as a labor arbitrator and mediator.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

96 of 99 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars In Broad Daylight, December 3, 2004

By 

William Bill (St. Joseph, Mo USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: In Broad Daylight (Mass Market Paperback)

I live within 50 miles of Skidmore, Mo. I was 12 years old when the shooting happened.I remember watching scenes from Skidmore on Channel 2 news out of St. Joseph Mo the day of the shooting.

The book tells the story quite well. If you have a picturesque mind, what you imagine as you read is how the town really looks. I have friends from Skidmore that were affected by Ken Rex one way or another and to this day if they know who did it they don't say a word.

That's what makes rural America different from the big city. Justice will be done using the civil system or your own.

80 of 88 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dangerous thoughts and ideas, December 18, 2004

By 

Jack Purcell (Placitas, NM USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: In Broad Daylight (Hardcover)

The book is well written, which would get it a 5 star rating from me even if it didn't examine a fundamental paradox of civilization without actually saying so.

A modern town, full of generally law-abiding citizens is forced to live with the kinds of fears law was created to protect them from. When the laws turned backward on themselves and became an instrument of the only person in the community who ignored the law completely, the law abiders all became accessories to a remedy forbidden by their own laws.

Afterward, the machinery of justice finally cranked up and spent an enormous amount of energy trying to make these reluctant lawbreakers pay for the crime of doing what the law was hired to do, and failed.

If you believe the machinery of justice is the friend to the common citizen, you don't want to read this book.

If you have a crack-house the police `can't do anything about' operating in the abandoned house down the block from you, you don't want to read this book.

If your wife or daughter is being stalked by some guy who has a history of rape or homicide, but the police can't stop him, don't read this book.

If there's a guy in your neighborhood who's been in prison for child molesting, you definitely don't want to read this book.

Probably no one should read this book.

76 of 86 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Why did it take so long?, December 18, 2004

By 

Susan107 (Tyler, TX) - See all my reviews

This review is from: In Broad Daylight (Hardcover)

McElroy should have been killed long before July 1981. Apparently, he never intimidated the right people outside of Skidmore. Should have killed his attorney too!