As I continue to work on the revision of the first draft of Murder in a Small Town: The Tragic Death of Stacey Burns, I keep running across references to time periods which no longer apply. What follows is an example to illustrate this point.

From Chapter Twelve, pages 105-106: ” . . . The necessary interviews carried out by the battery of homicide detectives stretched into seven days. Questioning, interrogation, fact-finding, grilling, debriefing . . . No matter what the term or technique, the police are searching for just one thing- the truth. The methodologies used to satisfy this search are known, on occasion, to push the ethical boundaries by which most people live, but the truth can be as illusive and ephemeral as a wispy cloud scudding across the sky on a warm summer day. The impossible to settle philosophical question certainly applies to this situation: Does the end justify the means? When does injury to the innocent supersede the quest for the truth? Almost three years after the crime, the circle of innocent people affected continues to expand with each passing day.”

That paragraph obviously was originally written over a year and half ago. What a shame that it still applies today and will apply for who knows how much longer into the future before Stacey’s killer is arrested and convicted?

Duke