Customer Reviews

Fatal Vision

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This is one of the most sobering of true crime tales, and one of the most intriguing. Former Green Beret officer Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald (still in prison last time I checked) called the police early one morning to report that his pregnant wife and two young daughters had been murdered by a marauding gang of hippies shouting "Kill the pigs, acid is groovy" while he received some superficial wounds trying to fight them off.

Joe McGinniss who at the time was best known for his Nixon campaign book (The Selling of the President 1968) jumped on the case and made arrangements with MacDonald to follow him around and interview him. McGinniss has said that initially he believed MacDonald was innocent, but as he grew to know MacDonald, and as he sifted through the evidence he began to change his mind until in the end he believed along with the prosecution and the jurors that MacDonald had murdered his family. McGinniss reports all this in such a compelling manner that the reader is lead step by step to the same horrific conclusion (or at least most readers are). Also changing their minds about MacDonald were the wife's parents who at first refused to believe that he could have done something like this. Yet in the end they too were convinced.

Not convinced however were MacDonald's many supports including as I recall members of the Long Beach, California police department, many of MacDonald's co-workers, and a number of women who found the doctor very attractive.

All of this is interesting but what I think most fascinated McGinniss and what most fascinates me is an answer to the questions of Why did he do it? and How could any human being do something like that?

The most plausible theory (this is basically McGinniss's theory as well) to explain why he did it goes something like this: In a rage (possibly induced in part by amphetamine use) MacDonald badly or fatally injured one of his family. Rather than own up to this and face the consequences he had the "fatal vision" (thought to have been conjured up in part from an Esquire Magazine article or in remembrance of the Mason family murders) of acid-crazed hippies breaking into his home and attacking his family with him in heroic defense. To make this work he would have to kill everybody except himself and construct a crime scene that would support his story. The prosecution and McGinniss careful show how MacDonald's crime scene construction failed. Readers interested in forensic science will find this aspect of the book absolutely fascinating, even if not entirely convincing.

But to convict a man of murdering his family based on circumstantial evidence especially when the motive is not another woman, or money, but is instead merely a desire to hide what at worse would be manslaughter, seems quite a stretch for any jury, or so MacDonald apparently figured. But what went wrong was not only the evidence, but his personality.

As McGinniss spent time with MacDonald he came to realize that Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald was not like other people. He was charming and very bright but there was a cold aspect to his personality, what in autism is called a "lack of affect." Obviously he was not autistic, or perhaps his is a form of autism. Anyway, according to the current psychiatric wisdom, such a person is called a psychopath or a sociopath. The words mean approximately the same thing, that is, a person who values only his or her own life and welfare, a person who has no real feelings of warmth for others, a person who has no compunction about taking the life of another if he or she can gain from it and get away with it.

The compelling psychological argument for me (and perhaps for the jury that convicted him) is that ONLY such a husband and father could have done that. The fact that he fit the psychopathic personality type was what led to his conviction as much as the forensic evidence. I should add that even though over the years there have been tips about, and bizarre manifestations of, possible hippy suspects, MacDonald has remained the only real suspect.

But did he do it? This book makes a powerful case that he did. Followers of sensational crimes such as the Jon Benet Ramsey case or the current case of Scott Peterson (reported as "laughing and joking" with his attorneys in court today as I write this) will see similarities here. In the Jon Benet case there is the sense of an attempt to cover up some violence inflicted on a member of the family because somebody (probably the mother) lost her temper, while in the Scott Peterson case there is the phenomenon of the sociopathic personality to explain an otherwise unthinkable crime.

I originally thought that MacDonald was guilty and I still do, but I admit there is some doubt. Whether that doubt is "reasonable" is for you to decide. The jury has already decided. Someday there may be another trial. If so, that jury will decide. You might also want to read the "answer" to this book, Fatal Justice: Reinvestigating the MacDonald Murders (1992) by Jerry Allen Potter. Or go to the various Websites. I think you'll discover, as I did, why we have trials by jury in which both sides present their arguments. Just hearing one side seems so convincing until you hear the other side.

Bottom line: one of the very best true crime reads, the book that made McGinniss's career and helped to end MacDonald's: one of the classics of the genre.

'Fatal Vision' has to be my favorite true-crime story, partly because of the compelling way McGinniss leads us through the long process of catching Dr. MacDonald, and the cold brutality of MacDonald himself. If there was a store for Psychopaths R' Us, Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald would be in the front window.

On February 17th, 1970, pregnant Colette MacDonald and her two young daughters, Kimberly and Kristen, were brutally murdered in their own home. Left alive was Colette's husband, Green Beret Jeffrey MacDonald, to tell a Manson-like story of home invasion resulting in the slayings. There was a man with a knife, a woman in white boots holding a candle while chanting "acid is groovy", and "Kill the pigs" written in blood on the headboard. MacDonald sustains a superficial puncture wound in his chest.

Colette's parents, Freddy and Mildred Kassab, were devastated and rushed to MacDonald's side. There was nothing but sorrow for this young man who, in one fell evening, lost his entire family.

But MacDonald's continuing stories of that fateful evening didn't hold water, and the more he talked, the more suspicions began to mount around him. Freddy, once his staunchest supporter, suddenly turned on him and became MacDonald's most bitter opponent. Too many people begin to suspect that there were no home invaders that night, only MacDonald, alone with a family he had come to resent.

MacDonald went on about his life, free at last of the burdens of the family that he felt had been weighing him down, to become a successful doctor in opulent Huntington Beach, California. But his past would continue to haunt him, as those who realized his guilt refused to give up. MacDonald was finally convicted and sentenced to three consecutive life terms in prison.

Joe McGinniss brings the tale of the MacDonald murders into vivid, breathing life. His account of the murders, investigation, and trials are dramatic and so real you can feel them. McGinniss was approved by MacDonald himself to write an account of the murders, though MacDonald later tried to pull him off the project when he saw that McGinniss would be writing the facts and not just an overblown account of MacDonald himself and fawning for his innocence as many in Huntington Beach did.

Included in the gripping account are floor plans of the murder house, transcribed recordings from MacDonald where his own words are put to the page, love letters from Colette to Jeffrey, and five pages of photographs. Honestly, this is one of the best books I have ever read, and I strongly recommend it to readers of all types of genre, not just true crime fans. Enjoy!

Many years ago, I read "Fatal Vision" with an open mind on the subject. The key elements in this book are keenly subjective, wavering in favor and disfavor of the author's client: Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald. Much has been made of the current effort to free MacDonald on DNA technicalities, with a cadre of trial lawyers, laboring under the altruistic term "Pro Bono", meaning "without charge"...(As if a trillion dollar civil damage suit won't be filed nanoseconds after MacDonald is sprung) presenting their "newly discovered" evidence, which is thoroughly outlined in the book "Fatal Justice". What HAS come to light in the wake of this tragedy is the fallability of military justice, which the book clearly exposes in paragraphs devoted to errors and prosecutorial misconduct made by Army investigative authorities, security personnel, hospital forensic evidence technicians, and command level jurists. There is no doubt in my mind that the prima facia evidence refutes MacDonald's sworn testimony. Blood type evidence, in addition to the pajama top theory, clearly shows MacDonald's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. What irks me is the fact that the Army's investigation errors were instrumental in delaying justice for two young girls, and their pregnant mother.

I finished rereading Fatal Vision yesterday and it still packs a wallop 18 years after I first read it. What starts out as a by the numbers retelling of the investigation is enhanced by first hand recollections by the man who became the prime suspect in the murders of his wife and two daughters: Jeffrey MacDonald. At first those recollections seem like the warm nostalgia anyone has of a happy past, how Jeff and his wife met, the birth of their children, etc. MacDonald does come across as a bit self-enchanted but no more so than any other once-upon-a-time golden boy I've known personally.

Because much of what is presented are transcripts from the grand jury and Article 32 hearing, the reader gets a sense of both sides of the story. But McGinniss ended up believing that MacDonald was guilty of the murders and he tells the story in a way that builds to that conclusion. So we see the Kassabs become first disenchanted with their son-in-law and then come to believe in his guilt, for example. Along with that MacDonald's recollections become increasingly more shallow and more egocentric. More than anything, MacDonald is damned by his own, endless words.

I became convinced of MacDonald's guilt reading this book, mainly because of the physical evidence (the pajama top especially) but in part because of the sheer unbelievability of MacDonald's version of events. Having seen him interviewed several times since, I'm always struck how perfect he appears to be, eerily too perfect.

MacDonald, for some odd reason, has always had his supporters. These are the same people who could have served on the O.J. Simpson jury: completely out to lunch. This book isn't perfect, and Joe McGinniss is certainly not unimpeachable (after all, he's the man responsible for 'discovering' and encouraging Bret Easton Ellis' writing). What it comes down to is this (and I can't figure out how MacDonald's supporters downplay this): the guy was a Green Beret. His family was brutally slaughtered and he had minor wounds. Was he a complete and utter wimp who was physically unable to protect his wife and children (something I can't believe) or was he himself guilty of the killings? This book gives good background on the evidence used to indict and convict the pathological, narcissistic nobody, Jeffrey MacDonald.

Joe McGinniss is one of the two or three greatest writers of the century. Although many contend that McGinniss's book is "biased" I firmly believe he began with a "blank slate" and only later came to the conclusion that MacDonald was guilty.(And to MacDonald supporters who contend that McGinniss is "persona non grata" is the literary world--check out his latest, published by Little, Brown & Co.) I rarely read a book more than once, but I've read Fatal Vision time and time again. McGinniss is absolutely perfect in the way he lets MacDonald himself create his own darkly monstrous character with his own words. This is the ONLY book that ever really scared me. McGinniss's enormous talent takes us inside the mind of a convicted murderer like no one ever has before or since and the result is a revelation horrifying beyond belief about the dark side of the human soul. The only thing in the book I don't buy is the diet pill theory, and McGinniss lets us know this is his own theory and we are free to accept it or not. I don't and believe instead that MacDonald simply has a vicious temper when out of control and he certainly was out of control on the night of February 17, 1970. Why? We'll never know. McGinniss does a brilliant job of presenting the facts surrounding the murders and subsequent trial without ever letting them become dry and boring as many true crime stories are. But it is the characterization of Jeffrey MacDonald that sets this book apart from all others. Even if you firmly believe in MacDonald's innocence, I'd still urge you to read "Fatal Vision." It can teach all of us more than we'll probably ever need to know about writing. The best true crime book ever written and one of the top five books of the century. Unforgettably perfect.

One of the best nonfiction books I've ever read. I continue to recommend it to everyone I know who reads journalism or true crime, and they've all been impressed by it.

In the first half of the book, McGinniss presents the history of the case and lets Jeffrey MacDonald present himself, via transcripts of cassette-tape recordings he sent the author. As the falseness and the inconsistencies in MacDonald's version of events, small in themselves, begin to accumulate, the reader begins to wonder.

Most of the second half covers the grand jury hearings and the trial in detail, including the years-long work of MacDonald's (step)father-in-law to have the case tried. Again, the inconsistencies and improbabilities continue to mount, and the reader's uncertainty grows.

In the last section, after the trial, McGinniss begins to research the case and its defendant more closely, looking for answers, feeling his own uncertainty and discomfort. By the end, whether one agrees with his deductions and speculations regarding motive and inciting circumstances, he's done a masterful job of picking apart the thin story MacDonald hid behind for a decade.

Common sense answers all the questions concerning this case. Alledgedly, three crazed men and one woman enter a Green Beret captain's home on the Fort Bragg military installation, and then they slaughter his wife and two children, but they leave a military man, our Green Beret captain, who is in top physical condition alive so that he could call the authorities when they have finished their killing spree on Fort Bragg. Is there something odd about this story?

Read his statement to CID investigators at the beginning of the book. Those criminal investigators have had heard enough liars over their time in their service, and, as they told MacDonald, his story simply didn't ring true. MacDonald uses the wording "my wife", which shows he didn't even have a first name basis with her any longer. Later in his statement he says that "some people were stabbed". Say what? Those people were his wife and children.

This book has some problems for other readers, false tangential questions about drug addled hippies in the Fort Bragg area, but the final conclusion is rock solid. For reasons unknown and unknowable, he deliberately slaughtered his pregnant wife and two children, and then lied about it, in order to try and save himself. His sick self.

I feel truly sorry for those that come up with wacko theories exonerating MacDonald. Hey guys, he's guilty, there's no question of it. Those fools with wacko theories about the four intruders should stick to UFO's or the Loch Ness Monster, they are probably coming after you right now. This Green Beret Army Captain killed his pregnant wife and two children, and this case is closed. With God's Mercy, may he rot and suffer in hell after his natural life for all eternity.

I still can't imagine how he did it but I think Dr. Jeffrey Macdonald will never be free again. The book written by Joe McGinnis who wrote Cruel Doubt and Blind Faith examines the Macdonald's case using Jeffrey Macdonald as a prime resource. I keep thinking of how a military doctor could brutally kill his lovely pregnant wife, and two adorable daughters. The tragedy was even worse when he claimed that hippies were the ones responsible for the crime. Even though at first, he appears as the victim. We learn how involved he was. But my question is why he would destroy his family's life? Doesn't he wish that they killed him too? I don't know what he was thinking and I don't want to know. I keep thinking of two little girls and a beautiful pregnant mother, young and vibrant and full of life. They had a lot to live for but Macdonald took it away and why? That's my question is the motive behind such brutal crimes. Most times, the father would have committed suicide as well rather than live with himself. Is Macdonald that vain, conceited, selfish to do such a brutal crime and live with himself? I guess you can't judge him because he's a soldier and a doctor. The crimes are often done by somebody close by. The doubts must have devastated Colette's family who have removed the Macdonald name from their gravestones. I also feel sorry for Jeffrey's family as well who probably believe or don't. In crimes like this, nobody wins and everybody loses.

Like Fisher's book about the Lindberg Kidnapping, this is a true crime story I find myself picking up to read again and again. There is something just so haunting about Doctor McDonald, a man who had everything and destroyed it all in about two minutes of blind fury.

I'm struck by the hostility expressed in some of the reviews to Joe McGinnis. It seems so misplaced. As the author himself pointed out, "Fatal Vision" did not convict Jeffrey McDonald. That was done by a jury of his peers in a Federal court in North Carolina. Those people --one of them a former member of the Special Forces-- were exposed to far more information (text and graphic) than any book could possibly contain (and that includes "Fatal Justice"). And having heard it, those twelve people voted to convict McDonald.

As for McGinnis, he just wrote the book. He was not a factor in the trial. Maybe he was less than candid with McDonald. Maybe his tactics in winning McDonald's trust were repulsive. But anything McGinnis did pales in comparison to the unspeakable crimes that the defendant committed.

On a final note, I would advise any would-be author of true crime stories to study this book's organization and style. I found it very useful when I wrote my book (which was published in Ireland).

Bottom line: I will always be uneasy about "Fatal Vision." The mind rebels against the notion of a bright, charming, talented doctor savagely murdering his pregnant wife and daughters. But I'd be even more uneasy to see "Doctor" Jeffrey McDonald set free.