TRUE CRIME IS MESSY

by Robert Lopresti

Last week I wrote about a theft that our library experienced. This week, if you can stand a little more, I’m going to write about some of the reactions to the experience.

Let’s start with the obvious. The classic phrase about being robbed is “I feel violated.” Yeah, you do. And in some ways this was worse than, say, when my bicycle got stolen, because this was public property. I was partly responsible for protecting it. I had locked up the most obvious candidates for theft a decade before, but I obviously hadn’t been nearly pessimistic enough.

So there was also anger, embarrassment, and grief. At the time there was a new show on TV called “Hustle,” about a bunch of mostly young , charming con men. After the theft I couldn’t watch it anymore. I wanted each of those of beautiful crooks to be hit by a bus.

One of the things I have always liked best about Dick Francis’s novels is that his characters are endlessly amazed by theft. Put that back! It doesn’t belong to you. How could someone have trouble with such a simple concept?

When the news hit the fan

There is an old saying that people who enjoy laws and sausages should not watch them being made. I would like to add “news stories” to that category. This was my first experience being part of a news event and it was fascinating to see all the creative ways reporters found to get things wrong. For someone who sees their name in the paper all the time it must be a sort of schizophrenic experience. Who are they talking about and why do are they using my name?

Several reports said that I was the one who noticed the theft. As I said last week, that was another library staffer, Julie Fitzgerald. One report said that we had found eleven possible matches for our missing pages on the suspect’s site. If we had found only eleven we would have never gone after him. That number was simply how many possible matches were on sale at eBay when the cops went for the court order; the total had been over one hundred.

But my favorite goof was the TV reporter who announced that, for security reasons, the library had locked up all books with illustrations. Now that’s a project to stop your heart.

Steve Twomey did a great job in the Smithsonian. Of course, he had the help of a factchecker. (I loved it when the factchecker sent me the photograph they had decided to use in the article and asked: “Is that you?” No, I’m younger and thinner.) American Libraries did a nice piece, too. Of course, the author (and I’m sorry I don’t have her name available at this computer) had the advantage of knowing more about libraries before we started talking than the other reporters did when we finished.

And speaking of reporting errors, my piece last week was subject to misinterpretation. I complained about how hard it was to get any government agency to move on the case. I should have added that since December, when several government organizations committed themselves, they have been working like troupers. In no way do my gripes apply to what has happened since the Montana raid in December.

Finally, let me note that not a blessed one of the reporters noticed or bothered to mention that the librarian involved in the mystery writes mysteries. Honestly, wouldn’t that have been your lead?

Fourteen and counting …

When my home town paper wrote about the mess I got a lot of kind words from friends, and even some from strangers. One person I have never met called up and offered to make dinner for my wife and me. A checkout clerk congratulated me on “the bust.” And a librarian I worked with 25 years ago called me up.

But what I heard the most was a variation on the inevitable question: …

“Is this going to be in a short story?” Probably not. If I wrote about it directly it wouldn’t be fiction, would it? But some elements of it are likely to show up in a story – especially the emotions. I’ll pry out some of my feelings and attached them to some character in other circumstances.

“Will you write a book about this?” I hope not. I’ve spent hundreds of hours on this thing and I have no desire to donate thousands more. If someone is going to write a book I would prefer it to be Steve Twomey, who wrote the article for Smithsonian. I will probably write an article for the library press, to give my brothers and sisters some hints.

And then I hope to go back to — whoops! I think my fifteen minutes are up.