Deadly Greed: The Riveting True Story of the Stuart Murder Case That Rocked Boston and Shocked the Nation [Hardcover]

Joe Sharkey (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In this reprise for readers not yet sated with the newsmaking case, Sharkey overdramatizes the already sensational 1989 Boston killing in which Charles Stuart fatally shot his pregnant wife Carol, accused a black man, one Willie Bennett, of the crime, thereby causing racial furor, then later jumped to his death from a bridge. In a book that offers no fresh insights--none of the family members or other principals seem to have been interviewed--the character and motivations of those touched by the tragedy remain without definition. Finesse is not Sharkey's metier, as witness his recreation of the murderer's supposed thoughts: he "felt the cold hand of desperation on his broad shoulder." And one wonders if it doesn't dehumanize Carol Stuart's life to state, as the author ( Death Sentence ) grandiloquently would have it, that the case is a metaphor for an era. Photos not seen by PW . First serial to Penthouse.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

For three months in 1989, the entire nation watched aghast as the Charles Stuart murder case played out in Boston. A middle-class white couple, Charles and Carol Stuart, had been accosted in their car by an unknown black male and forced to drive to a deserted black neighborhood where they were robbed. Carol, seven months pregnant, was killed, and Charles severely injured. The problem was that the entire story turned out to be a cruel hoax, ultimately unmasked by Charles's suicide, which, in turn, was prompted by the unraveling of his story by his brother Matthew. Sharkey has gone beyond the facts known to draw a picture of a man consumed by naked ambition, unwilling to let anyone or anything get in his way. To a lesser extent, he successfully has also shown how other factors contributed to Stuart's committing the almost perfect crime: the press, the district attorney's office, and the increased racial tensions in Boston. Possibly the first of many books about the Stuarts, this should be well received. Recommended.
- Sandra K. Lindheimer, Middlesex Law Lib., Cambridge, Mass.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 243 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster; 1 edition (May 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 013584178X
• ISBN-13: 978-0135841785
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,360,944 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A 10th anniversary look back at the crime that rocked Boston, October 19, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Deadly Greed: The Riveting True Story of the Stuart Murder Case That Rocked Boston and Shocked the Nation (Hardcover)

This weekend marks the 10th anniversary of the murders of Carol DiMaiti Stuart and her unborn child. Carol and her husband, Charles were driving home from a birthing class at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Bosston on Oct. 23, 1989, when she was fatally shot. Charles Stuart, at first, fit the image as an heroic husband, fighting against his own injuries to contact police and summon help for his pregnant and seriously wounded wife.

The police, press and communities across the nation believed Stuart's tale of a black man who'd climbed into their car, tried to rob the Reading, MA couple, and shot Carol Stuart. Carol was rushed back to Brigham and Women's Hospital, where she died from the bullet wounds to her head. Her prematurely born son, Christopher died 17 days later.

Young black men in the Mission Hill District were summarily rounded up for questioning, and racial tensions in Boston were enflamed by Stuart's accusations, and the police handling of the investigation. While the accused Willie Bennett was innocent of the Stuart murders, and the allegations against him by Stuart were false, Bennett's prior crimimal record of violent assault with firearms, made him a prime target not only in the eyes of the police, but also in his community.

Meanwhile, Stuart began collecting insurance money from scams he'd been running for months. Even his own family started suspecting his involvement in Carol's shooting. The investigative work by Boston Globe reporter Michele Caruso, and by the authors, outlines how this case fell apart after Matthew, Charles' brother and partner in the scam, came forward to tell authorities what he knew.

Charles Stuart sought refuge in suicide, when it became clear he was a prime suspect in the crime. His body was retrieved from the Charles River in early January, 1990, under a cloud of suspicion. William Bennett was cleared of any involvement, and the DiMaiti family established a scholarship for residents of the Mission Hill District, in an effort to heal the wounds caused by their late son-in-law's hoax.

This is a riveting true account of a monumentally selfish man (Stuart) and the lengths he went to secure his "dream"--even at the expense of his wife and son. It's also a cautionary tale NOT to believe everything you hear, even when the tales carry the weight of truth.

Today many questions remain about the Stuart shooting; what was the extent of Matthew's involvement in the shooting; why were people so willing to believe Stuart's story of a black man robbing them; and how could Stuart have fooled even his own family about his involvement in his wife and son's murder?