Legal Suspense

Did a sweet-faced Amish teenager brutally murder a young woman? To save her career, big-city lawyer Jessica Langdon is determined to defend him against the community's bitter and even violent outrage. Yet without an understanding of Amish culture, Jessica must rely on arrogant businessman Trey Morgan, who has ties to the Amish community and believes in the boy's guilt.

New York, 1888. Gas lamps still flicker in the city streets, but the miracle of electric light is in its infancy. The person who controls the means to turn night into day will make history - and a vast fortune. A young untested lawyer named Paul Cravath, fresh out of Columbia Law School, takes a case that seems impossible to win. Paul's client, George Westinghouse, has been sued by Thomas Edison over a billion-dollar question: Who invented the lightbulb and holds the right to power the country?

Writer, journalist and chronicler of justice as it relates to the rich and famous, Gus Bailey, like the movers and shakers of Los Angeles, is drawn into the vortex of the O. J. Simpson trial. By day, he is a fixture at the lawyers, the journalists, the hangers-on, and even the judge. By night, he is courted by the most celebrated hosts, from Kirk Douglas to Heidi Fleiss, from Elizabeth Taylor to Nancy Reagan, who delight in the hottest news from the corridors of the courtroom.

When three men announce that they are suing the Rosato & DiNunzio law firm for reverse sex discrimination—claiming that they were not hired because they were men—Mary DiNunzio and Bennie Rosato are outraged. To make matters worse, their one male employee, John Foxman, intends to resign, claiming that there is some truth to this case. The plaintiffs’ lawyer is Nick Machiavelli, who has already lost to Mary once and is now back with a vengeance —determined not to not only win, but destroy the firm. It soon becomes clear that Machiavelli will do anything in his power to achieve his end…even after the case turns deadly. The stakes have never been higher for Mary and her associates as they try to keep Machiavelli at bay, solve a murder, and save the law firm they love…or they could lose everything they’ve worked for.

Deputy District Attorney Samantha Kincaid walks into her office in Portland's Drug and Vice Division one morning to find the sergeant of the police bureau's vice unit waiting for her. A 13-year-old girl has been brutally attacked and left for dead on the city's outskirts. Given the lack of evidence, most lawyers would settle for an assault charge; Samantha, unnerved by the viciousness of the crime, decides to go for attempted murder.

On a quiet August morning, Judge Deborah Knott's father, Kezzie, makes a shocking discovery on a remote corner of his farm: the body of a man bludgeoned to death. Investigating this crime, Deborah's husband, Sheriff's Deputy Dwight Bryant, soon uncovers a long-simmering hostility between Kezzie and the slain man over a land dispute. The local newspaper implies that Deborah's family may have had something to do with the murder - and that Dwight is dragging his feet on the case.

Set amid the darker side of Lake Tahoe's glamorous ski resorts, Acts of Malice has Nina taking on the case of Jim Strong, a member of South Lake Tahoe's most prominent families and the owners of the posh Paradise Ski Resort. With his brother Alex recently killed in a headline-making accident that occurred while they were skiing together, Jim fears he may be indicted in the death. When the coroner announces that Alex died from injuries unrelated to the accident, Jim is charged with murder.

At glitzy Lake Tahoe, couples break up every day, but none quite so glamorous or successful as Lindy and Mike Markov. The scenario starts off in the standard way: Mike's met a younger woman and wants out. The problem? Mike and Lindy built a $200-million business together and Mike claims he doesn't owe Lindy a dime since they never married. Ready to fight, Lindy hires Nina Reilly to represent her in her palimony suit.

Assistant D.A. Alexandra Cooper is deeply involved in a high-profile homicide case against defendant Brendan Quillian, a prominent young businessman charged with the brutal strangulation of his beautiful young wife. His conviction is not a certainty: Quillian was conveniently out of town on the day of the killing, and his defense attorney seems to be one step ahead of Cooper's effort to prove Quillian paid a hit man to commit the crime. But halfway through the trial, a major catastrophe alters the course of Cooper's case.

The McCarrans and the Gallaghers, two military families, have been close for decades, ever since Anthony McCarran—now one of the army's most distinguished generals—became best friends with Jack Gallagher, a fellow West Pointer who was later killed in Vietnam. Now a new generation of soldiers faces combat, and Lt. Brian McCarran, the general's son, has returned from a harrowing tour in Iraq. Traumatized by wartime experiences he will not reveal, Brian depends on his lifelong friendship with Kate Gallagher, Jack's daughter, who is married to Brian's commanding officer in Iraq.

At the rooftop bar of the famed Watergate Hotel in Washington, DC, a former vice president is assassinated. Across the Potomac River, a mysterious sniper leaves a .50 caliber rifle on the bed of his hotel room, then disappears. Crime reporter Jane Cole and NYPD cop Robert Warren have clues no one else has. But as they arrive in DC to investigate, they're hit with a series of cover-ups and misdirections. And as they close in on the killer, they realize that they, too, are being tracked.

An ambitious Stanford graduate, David Adams has begun a fast-track career at Austin’s most prestigious law firm. It’s a personal victory for the rising superstar - a satisfying reversal from his impoverished and despairing childhood. Now he has the life he’s always wanted: An extravagant salary, a high-rise condo, a luxury SUV, and no limit to how far he can go in the eyes of the top partners.

When fifteen-year-old Denzel Payton is charged with the murder of a disabled veteran at a homeless camp, he's trapped in a no-win situation: remain silent and risk almost certain conviction, or name the real killer and face the wrath of a monster who terrifies him.

McMurtrie’s old nemesis, Jack Willistone, is found dead on the banks of the Black Warrior River. Willistone had his share of enemies, but all evidence points to a forgotten, broken woman as the killer. At the urging of the suspect’s desperate fourteen-year-old daughter, McMurtrie agrees to take the case.

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.

Two people have died in macabre accidents, one struck by lightning on Tahoe's highest mountain and one mowed down by a hit-and-run driver. In the middle of a controversial procedure to exhume one of the bodies, powerful businessman Quentin de Beers is killed. Charged with murder, Quentin's angry grandson won't talk, even to Nina Reilly, his defense attorney.

Ed Eagle, the six-feet-six, take-no-prisoners Santa Fe attorney, has recovered from his encounters with Mexican organized crime and - more treacherously - his ex-wife, Barbara. Now a mysterious new client has come his way, one who may shed light into some dark corners of Ed's past...and put him in danger once more.

After working to free his father from prison in Fox Is Framed, Leo has now left private practice and is working as a public defender in San Francisco. He and his cocounsel, Jordan Walker, are in the midst of trial, brilliantly defending Randall Rodrigues, a mentally ill homeless man whom they contend falsely confessed to the rape of a young San Francisco socialite. After their client is acquitted, Leo and Jordan fall into an intense relationship - until Jordan is found brutally raped and murdered in her apartment.

Cate Fante is strong and smart, but when she gets appointed a federal judge, even she wonders if she can do the job justice. She's in her 30s, and she feels like she's joining the world's most exclusive retirement village. But Cate keeps her doubts a secret. And, as it happens, much else. For she leads a dark, double life that she hides from everyone.

Janae Simmons left the small town of Kedgewick, Virginia, ten years ago to pursue her legal career and never looked back—until a professional mistake leads her to her grandmother's historic carriage house and to the town where her past threatens to find her. The streets echo with her grandfather's sterling reputation, one that conflicts with fresh questions that claw at Janae, launching her on a reluctant journey to unearth his secrets. When her new job at a local law firm doesn't live up to expectations, she wonders if coming home was the right decision.