The Last Stone

This very carefully researched book was very disturbing and I wish I had not read it. I admire the author for his efforts in telling this awful story. It is a little difficult to follow at times for those of us not familiar with the local geography and the "people" involved are so loathsome that I actually felt sick while reading it. It is a terrible story because of the subject matter, but I have rated it as a 5 because it is so riveting. The story is true but is incomplete because there are pieces that are still unknown and even liberals like me have to question a justice system that allowed this to be "resolved" the way it was.

Thirty years earlier 2 sisters, aged 10 and 12, disappear forever from a shopping mall. The case goes cold, but never leaves the mind of the detective involved and the young journalist who doggedly pursues it. Now, 30 years later, because of a quirk, it again catches the attention of the police and the journalist-turned-author.The book concerns itself mainly with the battle of wits between 4 detectives and an imprisoned pedophile, a compulsive, canny liar. In the process we meet the prisoner's extended family, a passel of mean-spirited, amoral hillbillies. We also meet briefly the girls' parents, who are everything the prisoner's family aren't: warm, caring, pillars of the community.Dave Davis is the main detective; he establishes a seemingly warm, empathic relationship with the prisoner. Over a period of 17 months, during painfully long interviews, Dave and his colleagues, who include 2 women (one of whom is a polygraph expert) and another man, endure endlessly repeated tales from the prisoner, each repetition veering a tiny step closer to the facts. And the facts are horrendous. Without a trace of remorse the prisoner reveals the details, of how the girls were not seen as human, but rather as objects for the pleasure and convenience of the several men.The bare facts were that the girls were drugged, repeatedly raped by several members of the extended family, and finally killed. Unlike fictional police stories, the details remain murky to the end.The book is mostly concerned with the battle of wits between the police and the prisoner. The principal interrogator, Dave, is brilliant at what he does. Despite inner revulsion he establishes a friendship of sorts with the prisoner, who views him as his advocate and buddy. In essence, he and his colleagues facilitate Lloyd (the prisoner) digging his own hole. We see Lloyd as narcissistic, self-deluding, and completely lacking in empathy. His lone purpose is to maintain a facade of injured, misused innocence. And in this he completely fails.Despite my revulsion and nausea at the emerging details I was fascinated by the painstaking, thought-out police work. Baldwin sets about his task with a clear, very human writing style. He lets his police reveal their humanness and their errors, and admires their professionalism. We are always aware that we are dealing with human beings, even to the monstrosity of Lloyd.What I found most fascinating was the interaction between Lloyd and the detectives, and their influence on each other. I could only admire the doggedness of the police, and their willingness to plunge over and over again into the morass that was Lloyd.For me, this was a page-turner. In reading the previous reviews, I'm aware that some people found the book a slog and a bore. Others, like me, were fascinated. It's a very personal decision.

On Easter weekend in 1975, two young sisters - ages 10 and 12 -vanished from a suburban Washington DC-area shopping mall. The girls were never seen again and their bodies were never found. The crimes against them were never solved and the case, which shocked the area, was never closed. It turned into a cold case. Thirty-five years later, the case was dusted off and given new life in the police department.American author Mark Bowden, who had been a reporter on a local paper at the time, remained interested in the case and joined the five detectives who had reopened the case. A clue - missed in the original investigation - soon pointed the way to a man called Lloyd Welch, who was already serving time in Delaware for sexual abuse of a girlfriend's daughter. Bowden's book, "The Last Stone: A Masterpiece of Criminal Interrogation" is the story of the new investigation and conviction of Welch.Most true crime books are not particularly well-written. Good prose does not usually combine with breathy descriptions of murder scenes, philandering spouses, blood spatter, and the rest of the sex and gore of a murder case. "In Cold Blood" by Truman Capote, Norman Mailer's "The Executioner's Song", and Thomas Thompson's books are the only true-crime books I've read that are worth reading for literary merit. Mark Bowden's book, though, is dull. Most of the book is the literal recounting of both the crime and the investigation using the transcripts from the interviews with Lloyd Welch. Bowden does go beyond the interviews and fills in facts the reader can't get from the transcripts, and writes a bit about the larger Welch family, who are a truly disagreeable and frightening crew. The family has its own problems with sexual and physical abuse of its own members, and I can see how Lloyd Welch turned out as he did.I wish I felt more of a connection with Mark Bowden's book. He's a noted writer of non-fiction and I've enjoyed the other books by him I've read. This one, maybe because it's a "masterpiece of criminal interrogation", is hindered by the fact that once the "cleverness" of interrogation wears off for the reader, there's not much of interest.But my review is only the review of one reader. This is the kind of book a potential reader owes it himself to read all the reviews he can. Most people won't feel like I do.

Yes, 5 stars, but I would never read again. Opens the reader's eyes to deprivation beyond understanding and confirms some social situations as existing. Beautiful writing expressing true sadnessAuthor conveys how painfully tedious the investigation evolves. Small mistakes, misunderstanding, or impulsive decisions become teeth grinding setbacksWho should read this. Everyone

Above all I was impressed by the dedication and painstaking work undertaken by the police team. The author manages to convey the atmosphere of the multiple interviews with the suspect, and condense hundreds of hours of recordings without losing a single piece of vital information. You sense the tedium without being subjected to it, and feel the detestation that the interrogation team had for the man they were coaxing into telling them the dreadful story. Every twist and turn, each small admission followed by a larger lie is followed through, although even at the end you feel there is very definitely more to know.I can understand some of the other reviewers' repulsion at the gruesome evidence that is revealed. There is no getting around it. What happened was dreadful, and it stands in contrast to the calm structured almost academic discussions that the cold case team have with the suspect. You are not reading about an Agatha Christie style drawing room murder-as-entertainment, but you are reading a very worthwhile book about how eventually a small measure of justice was achieved.

Absolutely addictive reading. Mark Bowden has used the original interviews carried out by detectives who spent many man hours using different techniques to try to get Lloyd Welcher to confess to a heinous crime committed against two children. I agree with other reviewers that Bowden’s style of writing immerses the reader and you’re gripped by the questions aimed at this lying freak called Lloyd Welcher. Welcher, who told Mark Bowden that he must never use his name, was a member of a clan who lived life on the edges of society. His dialect, which is part of the clan culture reads like a character out of the Beverly Hilly Billies but without the humour. Instead it is dark and depressing - “He drug it (the bag) over from the car“. It took a while to understand what Welcher was saying.. But the style of language used puts you right there in that room and you’re with the detectives every step of the way wanting Welcher to confess and understanding the frustration of the police and their desperate attempts to get him to open up. But he never truly does open up because of his clan culture which is insular and inherently guarded. My own opinion (for what it’s worth) is that Uncle Dick Welcher, the Security Guard at the mall, was key to the 2 children going off with strangers. I agree with Kate, the detective who interviewed Lloyd Welcher, that he didn’t have the capacity to commit this crime alone but the uncle, dressed up in uniform, was more likely to have lured the children away from the mall with some cock and bull story about their parents looking for them. The IBM worker who saw a young girl bound and gagged in the back of a car should have followed it or taken the registration number.The detective named Kate had a lot of experience in child abuse and looked at the possibility that their abduction may have had links to high powered people involved in child trafficking. How strange that the police officers who were digging in the hills where they thought they may find the bodies, found a tooth. They took the tooth to the police station and the next day when they went to get it to do tests on it, it had disappeared. It really all does make you wonder.

The story is fascinating and the interviews of the killer of this "cold case", are interesting. However, at the same time, they are exhausting. What was desperately needed here was a tough editor. The book therefore, plods and at times is almost unbearable. Which is a pity as it had potential to really be a "masterclass".Instead it becomes repetitive and tedious.

After reading this book I am sure that Lloyd Welch knows more than he's said over all the interviews. It must have been so hard on all the detectives trying to get the truth. I can imagine they are still haunted by Lloyd Welch. I hope that eventually someone will find the girls burial sites. This book was hard going but the story was told very well. If you like true crime stories I completely recommend this book.

An amazing insight into police interrogation techniques and the mind of a truly evil and manipulative person. Horrible though the crime was and the details related, this book is difficult to put down and to stop reading.