Criminal Acts 1: The Canadian True Crime Annual

Steven R. Hewitt teaches history at the University of Saskatchewan.

These two volumes, covering the period 1993–95, are sleazy
contributions to the true-crime genre. The litany of Canadian crimes,
both sensational and mundane, served up here were culled mainly from
newspaper accounts. While Criminal Acts 1 points out that the Canadian
murder rate has remained stable for several years (and was, in fact,
lower in 1992 than in 1975), the author makes no attempt to explain why
fear of crime among Canadians has risen. Nor is an effort made in either
volume to provide explanations for the crimes. Underlying many of them
are problems of drug and alcohol addiction, childhood abuse, and
patriarchy. Except for cursory mentions, the authors ignore these
factors. Their books should similarly be ignored.