Legal Suspense Thrillers

In The 13th Juror, Dismas Hardy, lawyer/investigator, undertakes the defense of Jennifer Witt, accused of murdering her husband and their eight-year-old son as well as her first husband, who had died nine years earlier from an apparent drug overdose. While preparing his case, Hardy learns that both of Jennifer's husbands had physically abused her. But Jennifer refuses to allow a defense that presumes her guilt. She is not guilty, she claims. Hardy is now driven to seek an alternative truth a jury can believe.

A battalion of Serbs has been senselessly murdered in Kosovo, and the Green Berets stand accused. Now, Major Sean Drummond, a top Army lawyer, is assigned to investigate this unspeakable atrocity. But of course, no one saw anything. Drummond gets consistently suspicious depositions from all of the Green Berets: Supposedly pursued by Serb soldiers, they left the engagement with wounded Serbs firing at them, and no one can explain the number of deaths.

Legal investigator Finley O’Sullivan has had a difficult year in the wake of her husband’s murder. But in her line of work, there’s no time to grieve. Her job is to protect the firm’s clients and defend their innocence through grueling investigative work. Ellen Winthrop is a force to be reckoned with in the financial world. In a male-dominated industry, she shattered the glass ceiling by empowering and promoting women. But now her husband is dead, killed in the Winthrop family home—and she stands accused of his murder.

Deputy District Attorney Samantha Kincaid is back at work after an attempt on her life and a promotion into the Major Crimes Unit. When the husband of a Portland city judge reports his wife missing, Samantha is assigned the case. She assumes her only job is to make the district attorney look good until the judge turns up. When the police discover evidence of foul play, Samantha finds herself unearthing secrets that were meant to stay hidden.

Criminal defense attorney Mitch Turner loves a challenge and is always determined to see that justice is done. He also has more cases than he can handle, but when the mysterious and grief-stricken Penny Moyer enters his office one afternoon, right as he is in the middle of working on a tight deadline, the story she tells intrigues him. With her husband murdered just the night before and his business associate Mason Harwood now charged for the crime, Penny is convinced Mason was set up for the job by the manipulative Vivian Fuger, another business partner.

Mary DiNunzio gets a terrifying telephone call while she's working late, then goes home to find a shadow lurking at her front door. When a lawyer close to her turns up dead, Mary begins to suspect that the case she's been working on, involving the suicide of an Italian-American in an internment camp during World War II, may not be ancient history after all.

In the rural parishes of Louisiana's French Triangle, young women are disappearing one by one, only to turn up on the banks of the bayou, strangled and cast aside where they are sure to be found. But there is one trophy the killer prizes above all others, one woman who must be silenced forever.... Attorney Laurel Chandler did not come back to Bayou Breaux to seek justice. That once-burning obsession had destroyed her credibility, her career, her marriage - and nearly her sanity. But when a ruthless predator strikes too close to home, she's lured into a perverse game from which there may be no escape.

Amid the pulsating beats of an upscale strip club in San Francisco's historic North Beach, a chilling crime unfolds. Ex-cop César Ochoa stands accused of brutally stabbing the club's star dancer, Chloe Carson. The evidence is damning, but César maintains his innocence. In a desperate bid for justice, César turns to Public Defenders Mike Daley and Rosie Fernandez.

A thriving law practice and a happy marriage are almost enough to convince solicitor Eric Ward he has overcome his painful past and started a new life. All it takes is the wrong client for it all to unravel. An investigative journalist beaten to a pulp. A crooked Newcastle businessman living the high life in France. A woman from a half-forgotten past. Former police officer-turned-solicitor Eric Ward represents Eddie Stevens, an investigative reporter on the trail of a hot story.

On the evening before Thanksgiving, Hal Chase, a guard in the San Francisco County Jail, drives to the airport to pick up his step-brother for the weekend. When they return, Hal’s wife, Katie, has disappeared without a clue. By the time Dismas Hardy hears about this, Katie has been missing for five days. The case strikes close to home because Katie had been seeing Hardy’s wife, a marriage counselor. By this time, the original Missing Persons case has become a suspected homicide, and Hal is the prime suspect.

Thaddeus Murfee is pursued by the Mob now that he has helped put a godfather behind bars. He decides to file suit on behalf of certain survivors of the Mob’s latest murder. He is pursued relentlessly and runs west, where he seeks refuge while he pursues his case against a godfather and attempts to take away his toys in hopes that will end their struggle in this legal thriller.

Known to locals as the “Christmas Guy,” Nick Whittaker has delighted his neighbors with an elaborate holiday light show and his uncanny resemblance to Santa Claus. A bit of a loner, Nick has found his place and his calling as a mall Santa in the quaint Northern Michigan town of Helene. He’s the last person anyone would have suspected in the brutal beating of a local politician. But when the bloodied murder weapon turns up in his trash and surveillance video puts him at the crime scene, Nick finds himself on trial for his freedom.

There’s a hurricane brewing over Beaufort, South Carolina. And in the calm before the storm, big-city lawyer Dean Lincoln finds himself defending Haley Finch, a beautiful young woman accused of murdering her older boyfriend. Her supposed motive? He’d just won big on the lottery—and then changed his will in her favor. In the South, with Haley’s estranged husband suspiciously missing for the past two years and their marital funds dwindling fast, that’s motive enough.

Corporate litigator Mia Shaw suffers the shock of her life when she finds her colleague and friend brutally murdered. Grief-stricken and furious, Mia vows that she will do anything to seek justice and make the killer pay. The man accused of the murder is a friend of security tech guru Noah Ramirez, but the evidence just doesn't add up. To save his former ATF partner, Noah needs to convince Mia that the real killer is still on the loose. Mia soon has more than the criminal prosecution to worry about, however.

The woman gives her name as Betty. No last name. No phone number. Just a meeting place - a deserted, wooded park on the outskirts of Lake Tahoe. The one condition - come alone. San Francisco attorney Kali O'Brien understands client confidentiality, but something about Betty's urgent request has her a little spooked. The moment Betty meets with Kali, she's shot and killed by a sniper, and Kali barely escapes with her life. She's left with more questions than answers.

Texas attorney and former Texas Ranger Billy Bob Holland has many secrets. Among them is Vernon Smother's son, Lucas, a now-teenaged boy about whom few know the truth - Lucas is really Billy Bob's illegitimate son. When Lucas is arrested for murder, Billy Bob must confront the past and serve as the boy's criminal attorney. Billy Bob knows the propensity of the town, Deaf Smith, Texas, to make scapegoats out of the innocent and to exploit and sexually use the powerless.

A mix of slick and seamy, South Lake Tahoe, California, is the perfect setting for adventurers, criminals—and lawyers. In addition to coping with her demanding, sometimes creepy, clients, Nina Reilly is dealing with prickly personal issues involving her sixteen-year-old son Bob, his estranged father, and her investigator, confidante, and sometimes lover Paul van Wagoner. Then, in walks disaster.....

Searching for case-law for a present matter, an attorney is eerily drawn to a 1890's gold-rush paternity litigation. Mid-trial, he realized he is essentially retrying a haunted spirited complicated case of injustice.

An old house, a new lover, a fresh life for Dominick - or will the faith-driven doom it all? The past just won't go away. Dominick likes to idle there in history's comfortable remove, but when his mother dies and he meets the half sister he never knew he had, the past becomes more personal - and the present more dangerous. Dominick's perpetual peregrinations are interrupted by a visit to his newfound sibling's historic Hudson Valley estate, which is also home to a Wiccan coven.

In this work Horace Rumpole returns to delight us with seven new cases. We find our hero jousting with the Devil, being wooed by a beautiful violin player, and even up before the Disciplinary Tribunal of the Bar Council.