1. Michelle Eileen McNamara was an American true crime author.
14 Facts About Michelle McNamara
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Michelle McNamara was the author of the true crime book I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer, and helped coin the moniker "Golden State Killer" of the serial killer who was identified after her death as Joseph James DeAngelo.
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Michelle McNamara had four older sisters and one older brother.
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Michelle McNamara's parents were Irish Americans, and she was raised Catholic.
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Michelle McNamara earned an MFA in creative writing from the University of Minnesota.
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Michelle McNamara had a long-standing fascination with true crime originating from the unsolved murder of Kathleen Lombardo that happened two blocks from where she lived when she was young.
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Michelle McNamara became interested in the crimes of the unidentified rapist and murderer known as the East Area Rapist, Original Night Stalker and the Visalia Ransacker, among other epithets.
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Michelle McNamara penned articles for Los Angeles magazine about the serial killer in 2013 and 2014.
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Paul Holes, an investigator for the Contra Costa County district attorney's office, stated that Michelle McNamara's dogged persistence and trustworthiness with sensitive information about GSK cases earned her an unusual level of cooperation from law enforcement officials.
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Michelle McNamara then signed a book deal with HarperCollins and began to work on a book about the case.
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Oswalt stated that authorities' use of the killer's nickname that Michelle McNamara coined was "proof of the impact of her work".
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Michelle McNamara met her future husband, Patton Oswalt, one evening in 2002 when she went to a comedy club.
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Michelle McNamara particularly enjoyed his set, in which he described Irish women as "kryptonite".
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In June 2020, Oswalt and I'll be Gone in the Dark director Liz Garbus acknowledged that Michelle McNamara had been addicted to opioids.