“I hope this Special Issue of the Oxford American, in some little way least, brings into focus something of the true horror and size of America’s crime problem. Much of what we examine in these pages is nightmarish, but when you look at crime . . . you don’t get it any other way.” — Editor’s Letter

Features by Sister Helen Prejean, Donna Tartt, Julia Reed, Paige Williams, and more.

Fiction by Clyde Edgerton, Tom Paine, and Brad Watson. End Piece by Steve Yarbrough, and more.