The Kiss Nightclub, a popular venue in the college town of Santa Maria in southern Brazil, was filled with a boisterous, happy crowd in the wee hours of Sunday morning on January 27, 2013. About 1,200-1,300 people packed the club. A fire, believed to have been started by sparks from a pyrotechnic display, tore through the club, killing more than 200 people.

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Artist Anji Marth, who has painted a series of striking serial killer portraits, spoke to Crime Library about her work, her favorite true crime stories and why she’s fascinated by the dangerous and depraved.

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On his 2005 album Illinoise, Detroit-born indie singer Sufjan Stevens pays tribute to the best and the worst of the 21st state. The fourth track, titled John Wayne Gacy Jr. is a melancholy tune that visits the life of infamous Chicago serial killer John Wayne Gacy.

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From famous brothels to serial killers who target those in the sex trade — a comprehensive look at prostitution in your city.

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At 16 years old, Paula Cooper became the youngest person on death row in America. She, along with three other teenage girls, was convicted of killing 78-year-old bible study teacher Ruth Pelke in 1985.

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If you only find children tolerable when they’re asleep, you probably shouldn’t be running a daycare out of your home.

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In China, a person can be sentenced to death for crimes ranging from theft, to drug offenses, to murder. In a show that aired weekly on the Henan Legal Channel for six years, host Ding Yu conducted interviews with condemned criminals preparing to be executed for murder. Below is a segment from BBC’s This World focusing on the Chinese show, titled simply Interviews Before Execution.

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Max Factor heir Luster fled to Mexico when conviction for drugging, raping and videotaping young women seemed imminent. He was tried and convicted in absentia. Ultimately he was tracked down and collared on June 18, 2003, by famous bounty hunter Duane ‘Dog’ Chapman.

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July 11, 2011, was the first and last day that little Leiby Kletzky would try all alone to walk the 7 blocks from his day camp at Yeshiva Boyan Tiferes Mordechai Shlomo to his home on 15th Avenue. Leiby had practiced the walk with his parents, yet he got lost. Borough Park is one of Brooklyn’s safest neighborhoods — still, a child disappeared from its streets and lost his life.

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He was a criminology student living in a red-light district. Then, Stephen Griffiths killed three prostitutes and proudly declared himself England’s “Crossbow Cannibal.”

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