A Cold-Blooded Business: Love, Adultery, and Murder in a Small Kansas Town
I am very glad to have been given the opportunity to review this book. Living smack-dab in the middle of the Bible Belt myself, the story told is a perfect example of how Evil can be perpetrated by those who seemingly hold themselves above it –and above everyone else. Author Marek Fuchs puts in writing the outrageous slap in the face to Justice and the road to finally closing a case that remained open much too long. But, this story is not a one-sided indictment of religion. The facts have been presented quite objectively. This is a story of a murder that went unpunished for decades. It is also the story of how one religious organization’s power served to obstruct justice in the case for 23 years. While no one ever faced any real consequences for delaying and interfering with the investigation, the murder was eventually solved and the case was finally closed. Was justice served? That is for you to decide –and I hope you will read the book and make your own decision. For me, it was a hard book to put down once I cracked it open.
Olathe, Kansas is probably best known as the locale of the infamous murders of the Clutter family chronicled by Truman Capote in his chilling book, In Cold Blood
The two had planned to bludgeon David Harmon in his sleep. The young male plotter, Mark Mangelsdorf, was David’s best friend. The female, Melinda Harmon, –his own wife. They carried out their plan on February 28, 1982. The graphic details of the crime are painted almost too vividly in Fuchs book. However innocent and Christian these two appeared to their friends and family was contrasted ever so starkly by the vicious and callous actions the two engaged in to carry out their plan. The paragraphs within this book show just how "cold-blooded" this business really was.
The book also tells the story of how those within the Nazarene organization closed ranks and fought off Justice. Investigators cannot accomplish much when the authorities are afraid of offending the family and friends of the offenders. Mark Mangelsdorf was young and athletic. He was also the student body president of then MidAmerica Nazarene Bible College. Melinda Harmon worked in various capacities for MidAmerica Nazarene Bible College. Her father, Dr. J. Wilmer Lambert, was a very powerful man within the Nazarene community — a fact which she often expressed to her associates. With a DA seeking votes and a powerful organization on their side, Melinda and Mark simply left the crime in their past and moved on to bigger things –until their actions finally caught up with them over two decades later.
Melinda went on to marry Mark Raisch, a Columbus, Ohio dentist. Instead of a prison cell, she was now a soccer-mom and a member of the PTA. Mark went on to Harvard, acquiring an MBA and becoming a tremendously successful player in the corporate world.
There is so much more to this story, and the book does a very good job of examining the evidence and the investigation. You can follow along as the case, seemingly forgotten, regains new life. Seeing that Justice, however late, actually comes rapping at the doors of the two killers, is very satisfying. The book includes transcripts of love letters, cryptically displaying the repression of those brought up within the critical eye of Christian conservatism. There are photographs, too –though there is no picture quite as chilling as Fuchs words describing the crime scene and the investigators frustrated efforts to catch those responsible.
A Cold-Blooded Business is a compelling read and I highly recommend it to those interested in true crime. As one who has personally seen the power that certain religious organizations wield in an effort to prevent their own from meeting with Justice, this book has provided a certain amount of insight and understanding of the motivations and machinations within such groups.
–Chris
MAREK FUCHS covered the David Harmon murder case for three years in The New York Times’s National, Metro and Westchester sections. He wrote the paper’s “County Lines” column for six years, and speaks regularly about journalism and finance on NPR and at venues like the annual meeting of the Society for American Business Editors and Writers. Currently, he writes the "The Business Press Maven" column for TheStreet.com, which is syndicated on Yahoo! Finance. Fuchs was named the nation’s best critic of business journalism by the University of North Carolina’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication, and currently teaches journalism at Manhattan College. Fuchs, who lives in a loud house with his wife and three children in Westchester County, New York, is a volunteer fireman. Visit www.marekfuchs.com for more information.
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