In August 2000, Jesse James Hollywood and four accomplices kidnapped 15-year-old Nicholas Markowitz in an attempt to intimidate Nicholas’s half-brother into repaying a drug-related debt, then knocked him into a shallow grave and killed him. Hollywood fled to Brazil, where he was able to escape justice until 2005—after various bureaucratic delays, including a dispute over the original prosecuting attorney’s consultant work on the film Alpha Dog (based loosely on the crime), the trial began in May of this year, and Hollywood was found guilty of kidnapping and first-degree murder. He received a life sentence, without the possibility of parole, yesterday—and now Nicholas’s mother, Susan Markowitz (far left), has revealed that she’s sold a memoir about “[her] nine-year journey to learn how to keep her marriage strong, rebuild her relationship with her stepson, face down her son’s killers… get sober, and get strong.” Because You Were Mine: The Nick Markowitz Story, co-written with journalist Jenna Glatzer (near left), is the fourth significant true crime purchase Berkley‘s Shannon Jamieson Vazquez has made in the past four months; the agent on the deal was Sharlene Martin—it’s the fourth true crime tale she’s placed with Vazquez since last October.
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