My alarm blared in my ears as I desperately felt around in the dark for an end to my agony. I didn’t remember setting my alarm for the morning. What the hell was going on? Why was it so hard to open my eyes ? I screamed out in anguish, practically feeling the blood pounding through my optic nerves. I had to make it stop. The blaring, the menacing pressure behind my eyes … the pain. After several failed attempts I was finally able to open my eyes enough to see the blurred digital numbers read 6;03 . Wait, p.m.? This was my get your ass up foreal alarm for my 7:30pm criminal justice class? I’d slept through an entire day and a half it would seem. My mind raced trying to make sense of the loss of time. I struggled to throw my legs over the side of my bed crashing on to the cool California shag rug. Trying hard to steady my shaking arms I pushed my body up, reaching for the refurbished mahogany night stand that sat beside my tufted sapphire headboard. My hands felt gritty as I came to my feet. I had dirt or maybe sand on my hands. I brought my palms to my nose and the smell of stale chocolate dessert began wafting through my sinuses. Crumbs from a Chocolate cake? A chill came over the room and it began to spin. The contemporary modern decor that I once loved seemed threatening and ominous. My potted Birds of Paradise cast looming shadows across the foyer. Ironic. Suddenly Last night's events came crashing into me like a rogue wave threatening to capsize my entire life. I felt naked. Bare. Exposed. I shuddered suddenly hyper-aware of my surroundings. The balcony door was cracked and the vanilla chiffon curtains billowed in the crisp night air. I wobbled cautiously to the patio entrance, still unsure of my legs, I used my backside to slide the door closed. My spine pressed against the cold glass arcadia, my eyes widened and I fell to my knees. Streaks of deep auburn blackened the high-gloss mosaic tile just past the fireplace. Moonlight illuminated the loft, revealing the silver cutlery lying in a pool of liquid reminiscent of rich cabaret. Sputum pooled on the walnut table top of my seven piece Malani dining set. His lifeless body sitting at the head of the table. How could I be so dumb? What was I going to tell the police? Visions of me in prison garb trading cigarettes for someone’s version of a “swissroll” caused my stomach to wrench. I scrambled to the bathroom just barely making it in time to vomit into the black porcelain toilet. My nerves were getting the best of me. I had to pull it together. Icy cold water trickled down my face as I attempted to splash away the terror in my face. My eyes were bloodshot red. I looked like hell. Just remember your story. The dead sack of crap making a mess of my three thousand dollar Caitlan dining armchair was Lucian Knagh. If only he’d shown some self restraint or had an ounce of consideration for other human beings then maybe, just maybe, he’d still be alive instead of croaked over with his eyes bulging like an inflated toad. Boy had I just dodged a major bullet. We were engaged to be married next fall. Last night was like an ordinary evening. I was just getting home from work and Luc was being the pompas narcissistic ass he’d come to grow into in the last three months.We had our usual argument about the corrupt low lives he welcomed into our home with his work and the night ended with me holding a frozen cutlet of beef to my left cheekbone. The past two years together had been wonderful, mostly. But Lucian had a dark side to him that no one knew about other than me and I suspected an ex-girlfriend he didn’t like to mention. See most days Lucian was the perfect gentleman. Soft spoken, slow to anger, and loved by most of his colleagues it was nearly impossible to imagine him having a temper. People would probably never believe me if I told them how I had gotten the bruises. But I didn’t need people to believe that Lucian Knagh beat me from time to time. I just needed them to believe he died from cardiac arrest. Acute cyanide poisoning and stress. High powered criminal attorney like him? Easy sale. Stress kills and he was neck deep in a RICO case involving a couple senators that wanted to remain nameless.With the extra palm greasing Lucian had become a real egotistical jerk and All I needed was for him to do what he did naturally. That morning I baked a few cakes to take to the Community Center’s pop up shop. The kids down at the center, I sometimes took pro bono cases at, would have weekly sales out front. They were just trying to make a few dollars and with all the negative stuff they could be doing I supported them by baking cakes they could sell by the slice. Although my schedule had been hectic I had to bake the cake the same day or Luc would sneak into them. I wouldn’t mind if I cut a slice since they were being sold by the slice anyway. But no, he would take a fork right to the entire cake. Making it nearly impossible to salvage anything for the center. We argued so many mornings about this. He complained that the kids needed to “ find their own hustle” and I was only hurting them by helping them. Self-centered, egotistical BULLSHIT. And I’d had enough. The belittling, the inconsideration, the beatings… It had all just become too much. So as I prepared the cakes for the Center Kids I made a separate batter. Just before I began to mix the chocolate cake batter I reached into the coffee maker and pulled out a wad of toilet paper. Inside the toilet paper was apple seed grounds. Two hundred appleseed grounds to be exact. With a deep breath I spilled the contents into the batter and switched the mixer on. This was it. Once the cake was done mixing I popped it into the oven while I got ready for work. The timer went off just as I was lacing my brown leather Stuart Weit riding boots. I carefully bagged the coffee filter and grounds where I stashed my concoction before setting the cake to cool and darted out the door throwing the evidence away three blocks from the center at a hip little coffee shop called The Ground Floor. When I got in that night the Lucian was dead as a doorknob. Dinner had been made and the candles had burned down to nothing much but a knub. Blackened salmon and buttered asparagus. My favorite. I chuckled. Just like Lucian to try to make a grand gesture just moments before his murder. Ass. I put my plate in the microwave and poured myself a glass of Chateau Lafite as I planned my next move. I drank half the bottle and swallowed a tablet of appleseed ‘dust’. I had made the pill myself using an over the counter rapid relief pain pill. I’d broken the capsule open, dumping its original contents and replacing them with the appleseeds. Not enough to kill me although still enough to show acute signs of cyanide poisoning. And Enough to rule me out as a suspect in my fiance’s murder. The side effects of the appleseed dust took hold fast. The room got blurry and I spilled the remaining red wine on the floor near the fireplace trying to regain my balance. The knife went flying out of my hand as I fell to the floor. My body felt like a limp noodle as I crawled to the floor near my bed pulling myself onto my California King smiling and crying as the room went dark. Lucky for me Lucian was deep in some government cover up, mafia type shit and the list of people that wanted him dead was long. Unlucky for Lucian I was the fiancee of a crooked high powered criminal defense attorney who had learned a thing or two in the last two years. If only he’d shown some self restraint or had an ounce of consideration for other human beings then maybe, just maybe, he’d still be alive instead of croaked over with his eyes bulging like an inflated toad. Maybe he would still be alive. Maybe he wouldn’t have undergone such an unseemly death. A death by... chocolate.
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The Night the City Learned How Quiet a Crime Could Be
M Mehran At exactly 1:13 a.m., the security cameras on Fifth and Monroe froze for three seconds. Not long enough to trigger an alarm. Not long enough for anyone to notice. But long enough for a man to walk through the blind spot and disappear into the city. By morning, someone would be dead. The victim was Jonah Keller, forty-two, respected real estate consultant, married, no criminal history. He was found seated at his kitchen table, hands folded neatly, a single glass of water untouched beside him. No signs of struggle. No blood. No forced entry. Just silence. Detective Mara Ilyas knew immediately this case would be a problem. Crimes without chaos always were. The medical examiner confirmed the cause of death within hours. A rare toxin. Colorless. Tasteless. Deadly in small doses. It stopped the heart as gently as sleep. “Poison,” Mara muttered. “Someone planned this.” The question was why. Jonah Keller had no enemies. At least none that showed up on paper. His colleagues described him as polite. His neighbors said he waved every morning. His wife, Rachel, collapsed into tears so convincing that even the most cynical officer felt uncomfortable doubting her. But Mara doubted everyone. Especially the quiet ones. Jonah’s phone revealed nothing suspicious. No threatening messages. No secret affairs. His finances were clean. Too clean. People rarely died in kitchens without leaving a mess behind, emotional or otherwise. Then Mara found the voicemail. It was old. Nearly a year back. Jonah’s voice sounded tired. “I did what you asked,” he said. “Please stop calling.” The number was unregistered. That was the crack in the perfect surface. Mara dug deeper, requesting sealed records and forgotten complaints. Eventually, she uncovered a civil case buried under layers of legal dust. A zoning dispute. Jonah’s company had pushed a redevelopment project that displaced dozens of low income families. The case never went to trial. It had been settled quietly. One of the complainants stood out. Elias Monroe. Former schoolteacher. Divorced. Son died during the eviction when their apartment caught fire from faulty wiring. The city blamed outdated infrastructure. The company blamed the city. No one blamed themselves. Elias disappeared shortly after. Until now. Security footage from a pharmacy two blocks away showed a man buying bottled water the night Jonah died. He wore a cap low over his face, but his posture told a story. Straight back. Careful movements. A man used to control. Mara recognized the walk. Elias Monroe had returned. They found him in a small rented room above a closed bookstore. No resistance. No surprise. He sat on the bed as if he had been waiting. “I didn’t hate him,” Elias said during interrogation. “I needed him to understand.” Mara leaned forward. “Understand what?” “That silence is violence,” Elias replied. “And people like him profit from it.” Elias explained everything calmly. He had studied chemistry online. Learned how to extract toxins from common plants. Tested doses on rodents. Documented every step. This was not a crime of passion. It was a message. “I sat with him,” Elias continued. “I made him drink the water. I watched him realize what was happening. I wanted him afraid, just for a moment. The way my son was.” Mara felt a chill crawl up her spine. “Why turn yourself in?” she asked. Elias smiled faintly. “I didn’t. You came to me.” He was right. The city arrested Elias within hours. Headlines exploded. Protesters gathered. Some called him a monster. Others called him a symbol of justice. Jonah Keller’s name slowly disappeared from public sympathy. Investigations reopened. Documents leaked. It turned out Jonah had known about the faulty wiring. Emails proved it. He had approved delays to save money. Rachel Keller stopped answering calls. The trial was swift. The evidence overwhelming. Elias Monroe was sentenced to life in prison without parole. As the verdict was read, he showed no reaction. Later, Mara visited him one last time. “Do you regret it?” she asked. Elias thought carefully. “I regret that it took a death for people to listen.” That night, Mara walked through the city streets. Neon lights flickered. Cars passed. Life continued, loud and careless. But beneath it all, something had shifted. The city had learned that the most dangerous crimes don’t announce themselves. They arrive quietly. They sit at your table. They ask you to drink. And by the time you notice them, it’s already too late. Months later, the case became required reading in criminology classes. Professors debated motive versus morality. Students argued late into the night about whether intent mattered more than outcome. Some insisted Elias was evil. Others claimed the system had created him. Mara followed the discussions from a distance. She never joined. She had seen Elias’s eyes. They were not empty. They were heavy. The city council quietly passed new safety regulations. Developers were forced to disclose risks. Inspectors were no longer optional. No one publicly connected the reforms to Jonah Keller’s death, but everyone understood the cause. Rachel Keller sold the house. Neighbors said she moved like a ghost during her final days there, avoiding eye contact, flinching at sudden sounds. Guilt, like poison, worked slowly. Elias wrote letters from prison. Not appeals. Not apologies. Explanations. He sent them to lawmakers, journalists, and families still fighting eviction notices. Some letters were published. Others were ignored. None were answered by the man himself. Mara kept one letter locked in her desk. It ended with a sentence she could never forget. “I chose a crime that would be remembered,” Elias had written, “because quiet suffering is never archived.” Years passed. New crimes took over the news cycle. Louder crimes. Bloodier crimes. Easier crimes to understand. But every time Mara stood in a silent kitchen, she remembered Jonah Keller’s folded hands and untouched glass. She remembered how easy it was to miss responsibility becoming guilt. And she remembered that justice is often decided long before police arrive. Always.
By Muhammad Mehran4 days ago in Criminal
The Epstein Files: Power, Silence, and the Paper Trail That Refused to Disappear
The phrase “Epstein Files” doesn’t point to a single document or dramatic reveal. Instead, it refers to a sprawling collection of court records, depositions, flight logs, emails, and unsealed testimonies connected to financier Jeffrey Epstein and his network. Together, these files form a disturbing paper trail—one that exposes how wealth, power, and silence collided for decades before the truth began leaking into public view.
By Story Prism5 days ago in Criminal
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