Eye of the Beast: The True Story of Serial Killer James Wood (St. Martin's True Crime Library)

For a serial killer, his style is unique. No elaborate rituals. No predetermine victims. Just an instant, uncontrollable urge to kill.

On a summer afternoon in 1993, an eleven-year-old girl sets out through her familiar neighborhood to collect payments on her paper route. In one home she meets a harmless-looking stranger. Driven by an unstoppable desire, James Wood will make this route her last.

The grisly murder of Jeralee Underwood was the final crime in James Wood's lifetime career of armed robbery, kidnapping, rape, and murder. Not until the Underwood case, which brought terror to a close-knit Idaho community, did crime experts begin to piece together a detailed profile of Wood's depraved personality and successfully hunt him down. Unlike other serial killers, Wood acted purely on impulse, to strike out the instincts of a bloodthirsty predator. Based on four years of meticulous researched by the detective who captured Wood, and other forensic experts on the case, this is the true story of how a sociopath is bred-and what it takes to trap him at his own deadly game.

With eight pages of startling photos!

"Jim, I need to know where that little girl is. I need to know."

"I can't tell you," Wood said, putting his elbows in his knees and resting his head in his hand.

"Can't or won't?"

"I can't," Wood said. "If I did, nobody would understand me. They wouldn't understand what I did."

"Jim," Shaw said, "I understand you. I'm not gonna judge you, I won't think any less of you. But I need to know what happened."

"If I tell you, you'll think I'm the scum of the earth," he said, beginning to sob. "You won't be nice to me anymore."

"Jim, she's dead, isn't she?"

Wood's hands were in his lap, clenched. He seemed to be making an effort to maintain his composure. He looked straight ahead and took a deep breath. He nodded.

"Jim, I already knew that. Why was it so hard to tell me what happened?"

"Because I'm evil," Wood said, staring up at the wall behind Shaw's desk. "Because I'm an evil monster and I'm an animal."

--Excerpted from Eye of the Beast. All rights reserved.