The saying goes that life imitates art. But that's the last thing you want when you write crime fiction. You never want to see the things you write about mirrored back to you in real life.

It has been 20 years since best-selling crime writer Patricia Cornwell began work on her first novel in the series chronicling the cases of forensic analyst Dr. Kay Scarpetta.

Tracy Rodriguez of Houston, Texas, is not a trained private investigator or police officer. But with a gentle tap on her iPhone screen, the mother of three can access information revealing the sex offenders who live within a 10-mile radius of where her children practice sports or watch movies. The information, provided by an iPhone app called Offender Locator, helps Rodriguez make more informed choices, she says. When the app pops open on her phone, there is an eerie sketch ...

Police found nine human heads and nine headless bodies in the Mexican state of Guerrero on Sunday, and some of the remains were of soldiers, officials said. The heads were found in Chilpancingo, the state's capital, and the bodies were found at a different location in Chilpancingo, officials said. Information on whether the heads belonged to the bodies wasn't available. Police identified eight soldiers and one high-ranking former police officer among the victims, Zeferino Torre-Blanca, governor of Guerrero ...

A French filmmaker who recently finished a documentary about a violent street gang in El Salvador was found shot dead in the town of Tonacatepeque, about 10 miles northeast of the capital city of San Salvador, authorities said. Christian Poveda, 52, was shot at least four times in the face, according to local reports. Poveda's documentary, "La Vida Loca," which follows the lives of members of the Mara 18 street gang, had been screened at a handful of film festivals ...

A Georgia man allegedly slapped a toddler at a Walmart store because she wouldn't stop crying, authorities said. Roger Stephens, 61, was arrested Monday and charged with first-degree cruelty to children. An incident report obtained from police in Gwinnett County indicated Stephens did not know the 2-year-old girl he stands accused of hitting. The confrontation happened shortly before noon at the Walmart in Stone Mountain, a suburb of Atlanta. According to the arresting officer, the child's mother said her daughter ...

Police say the foster parents of a missing 5-year-old California boy with cerebral palsy are suspects in what is now being called a homicide investigation. Jennifer Campbell and Louis Ross, who are engaged, told police in Oakland, California, that Hasanni Campbell disappeared on August 10 while Ross was dropping him off at the shoe store where his fiance worked. Police arrested the two as suspects, but released them this week pending further investigation, Lt. Jeff Thomason said. "We had nothing ...

The attorney for Nancy Garrido, charged in the Jaycee Lee Dugard abduction case, expressed concern Wednesday that intense media coverage may prejudice his client's ability to get a fair trial. "There have been some misstatements made in the media, and possibly very innocent misstatements like, you know, 'She's charged with 29 counts, she was there, therefore she must be culpable,' " Gilbert Maines told CNN's "American Morning" on Wednesday. "That's good speculation, but any good prosecutor will tell you that ...

Katie Callaway Hall trembled for four hours when she heard Phillip Garrido was arrested. His name sent a flurry of emotion running through her mind. "I screamed," she told CNN's Larry King on Monday night. "I started screaming 'Oh my god, Oh my god, it's him.' " She has thought about him every day since November 22, 1976 when he asked her for a ride at a supermarket in California, before handcuffing her, binding her and taking her to a ...

At least 1,000 prisoners are on death row in Iraq, which now has one of the highest rates of execution in the world, the human rights group Amnesty International says in a report being released Tuesday. The courts that sentence people to death do not meet international standards, the report charged, and Iraqi authorities "provide very little information on executions, and some have been carried out secretly." It criticizes the Central Criminal Court of Iraq and the Supreme Iraqi Criminal ...