Tom Jackman The Washington Post

The disappearance of 5-year-old Melissa Brannen from a Christmas party in 1989 horrified the Washington, D.C., area and set off a search for her that came up empty. A groundskeeper at her Fairfax County, Virginia, apartment complex was later convicted of abducting Melissa and served nearly 30 years in prison. For many, that was the end of the case.

The death of 14-year-old DeWitt Duckett was historically horrible. Walking down the hallway of his Baltimore middle school one afternoon in November 1983, he was accosted and shot for his Georgetown University jacket. He was the first student ever killed in a Baltimore school. The pressure to solve the case was intense, and early on Thanksgiving Da...

No doubt about it, crime has gotten harder at a time when surveillance cameras are everywhere. But maybe those cameras have made it easier to have a conscience. Monday morning, a man walked into a music school and store in Richmond, Virginia, and when no one was looking, he swiped both a clarinet and a cellphone, Richmond police said. A camera behi...

A former defense and intelligence contractor who sold classified documents to the Chinese government, and then claimed that he was actually working a reverse sting to expose Chinese spying methods, was sentenced Friday to 20 years in prison for delivering U.S. secrets to a foreign government.

When Larry Smith came across the scruffy, bearded nomad on the Appalachian Trail last month, he dubbed him the "fight angel."

Even in a new town, with new friends and new stories, 12-year-old crime reporter Hilde Kate Lysiak knew her rights. And when she was pursuing a story in the small town of Patagonia, Arizona, last week, she stood firm and shot video of the town police chief telling her, "If you put my face on the internet, it's against the law."

Robert Maheu was such a colorful character that it's widely believed the television show "Mission: Impossible" was based on him and his private investigative agency. As an ex-FBI agent, the CIA asked him to handle jobs it wanted to steer clear of, such as lining up prostitutes for a foreign president or hiring the mafia to kill Fidel Castro

The horrific rampage of former Marine Jorge Torrez began in a park in his hometown of Zion, Illinois, when he was just 16 years old.

A man with a vendetta against an Annapolis, Maryland, newspaper fired a long gun through the newsroom's glass doors and at its employees, killing five and injuring two others Thursday in a targeted shooting, according to police.

Just before Christmas, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pulled up to the massive Richard J. Donovan Correctional Center, a California state prison complex in the desert outside San Diego that holds nearly 4,000 inmates. Kennedy was there to visit Sirhan B. Sirhan, the man convicted of killing his father, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, nearly 50 years ago.

The website Backpage.com was taken down Friday and seized by federal law enforcement authorities, according to a notice posted online.

In her 34 years, Summer Thyme Creel has passed a lot of bad checks, taken a lot of drugs and borne a lot of children (seven). After her sentencing Thursday in federal court in Oklahoma, her involvement with checks and drugs will stop at least temporarily, but she will never have another baby. That's because the judge in her case suggested, in writi...

At least two Las Vegas police officers and two armed private security officers were on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel during the time that Stephen Paddock was firing down into a concert crowd, killing 58 and wounding hundreds, according to a statement from the hotel's owners, MGM Resorts International.

Federal authorities say Larry Ripple chose a life behind bars over another minute at home with the wife.

Reporter Hilde Kate Lysiak got the tip early Saturday afternoon that there was heavy police activity on Ninth Street. She hustled over with her pen and camera, as any good reporter would, and soon she posted something short online, beating her competitors. Then, working the neighbors and the cops, she nailed down her scoop with a full-length story ...

The disappearance of 5-year-old Melissa Brannen from a Christmas party in 1989 horrified the Washington, D.C., area and set off a search for her that came up empty. A groundskeeper at her Fairfax County, Virginia, apartment complex was later convicted of abducting Melissa and served nearly 30 years in prison. For many, that was the end of the case.

The death of 14-year-old DeWitt Duckett was historically horrible. Walking down the hallway of his Baltimore middle school one afternoon in November 1983, he was accosted and shot for his Georgetown University jacket. He was the first student ever killed in a Baltimore school. The pressure to solve the case was intense, and early on Thanksgiving Da...

No doubt about it, crime has gotten harder at a time when surveillance cameras are everywhere. But maybe those cameras have made it easier to have a conscience. Monday morning, a man walked into a music school and store in Richmond, Virginia, and when no one was looking, he swiped both a clarinet and a cellphone, Richmond police said. A camera behi...

A former defense and intelligence contractor who sold classified documents to the Chinese government, and then claimed that he was actually working a reverse sting to expose Chinese spying methods, was sentenced Friday to 20 years in prison for delivering U.S. secrets to a foreign government.

When Larry Smith came across the scruffy, bearded nomad on the Appalachian Trail last month, he dubbed him the "fight angel."

Even in a new town, with new friends and new stories, 12-year-old crime reporter Hilde Kate Lysiak knew her rights. And when she was pursuing a story in the small town of Patagonia, Arizona, last week, she stood firm and shot video of the town police chief telling her, "If you put my face on the internet, it's against the law."

Robert Maheu was such a colorful character that it's widely believed the television show "Mission: Impossible" was based on him and his private investigative agency. As an ex-FBI agent, the CIA asked him to handle jobs it wanted to steer clear of, such as lining up prostitutes for a foreign president or hiring the mafia to kill Fidel Castro

The horrific rampage of former Marine Jorge Torrez began in a park in his hometown of Zion, Illinois, when he was just 16 years old.

A man with a vendetta against an Annapolis, Maryland, newspaper fired a long gun through the newsroom's glass doors and at its employees, killing five and injuring two others Thursday in a targeted shooting, according to police.

Just before Christmas, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pulled up to the massive Richard J. Donovan Correctional Center, a California state prison complex in the desert outside San Diego that holds nearly 4,000 inmates. Kennedy was there to visit Sirhan B. Sirhan, the man convicted of killing his father, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, nearly 50 years ago.

The website Backpage.com was taken down Friday and seized by federal law enforcement authorities, according to a notice posted online.

In her 34 years, Summer Thyme Creel has passed a lot of bad checks, taken a lot of drugs and borne a lot of children (seven). After her sentencing Thursday in federal court in Oklahoma, her involvement with checks and drugs will stop at least temporarily, but she will never have another baby. That's because the judge in her case suggested, in writi...

At least two Las Vegas police officers and two armed private security officers were on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel during the time that Stephen Paddock was firing down into a concert crowd, killing 58 and wounding hundreds, according to a statement from the hotel's owners, MGM Resorts International.

Federal authorities say Larry Ripple chose a life behind bars over another minute at home with the wife.

Reporter Hilde Kate Lysiak got the tip early Saturday afternoon that there was heavy police activity on Ninth Street. She hustled over with her pen and camera, as any good reporter would, and soon she posted something short online, beating her competitors. Then, working the neighbors and the cops, she nailed down her scoop with a full-length story ...