XENIA — In January of 1946, two young Cincinnati misfits decided to go on a joyride, seeking nothing more than fun and romance. The love and adventure, however, was quickly replaced with crime, punishment and a precedent-setting murder case in which a three-judge panel determined the fate of two naive youngsters.
Jeff John, a Wright State journalism professor and former Xenia Daily Gazette reporter, documents this tale of ambiguous justice in A Bird in Your Hand, a book he co-authored with Frank L. Johnson, the son of the murder trial’s presiding judge. The book is the culmination of three to four years of meticulous research and historical investigation. For John, A Bird in Your Hand represents an exercise in forensic journalism, a form of reporting that is employed when a body has been found, but questions remain.
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