Lee Lofland
Lee Lofland is the author of Police Procedure and Investigation, A Guide For Writers, a 2008 Macavity Award nominee for best non-fiction mystery. Lee is a nationally acclaimed expert on police procedure and crime-scene investigation with two decades of law-enforcement and crime-solving experience as a police detective. He was in charge of major felony cases, including homicide, narcotics, rape, kidnapping, ritualistic and occult crimes, fraud, and robbery.
Lee received advanced certifications from the U.S. Department of Justice, Virginia State Police Academy, and the DEA, and he maintained certificates in Crime Scene Management and Crime Scene Investigations. He also supervised a Street Crimes Unit, and a Tactical Entry Team for high-risk search warrants. During most of his career, Lee served as a police academy instructor and instructor trainer for defensive tactics, interview and interrogation, firearms, and officer survival.
As a police detective, Lee saw the toughest parts of law enforcement first hand. He had to shoot and kill an armed bank robber - something every police officer hopes he never has to do. Lee also witnessed the execution of one of the country's worst serial killers who Patricia Cornwell's bestselling book, Postmortem was based upon. The execution was the first in the U.S.A resulting from a verdict based on the use of DNA.
For his conduct during the bank robbery shootout, Lee was awarded the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police Medal of Valor—the state's highest award for police officers. He also received the General Nathaniel Greene Medal for Courageous Conduct Against an Armed Robber.
Lee is a popular conference, workshop, and motivational speaker. He writes freelance articles for publications, such as The Writer magazine, and for newspapers and newsletters across the country. Lee has appeared on CNN, the BBC, and on NPR’s Talk of the Nation, and he has consulted for many bestselling authors, newspapers, online magazines, and for television and film writers. Lee writes and maintains the wildly popular blog site The Graveyard Shift.
The Graveyard Shift
http://www.leelofland.com/wordpress/
Verna Dreisbach is an author, educator and literary agent. Her work has been featured in books, literary journals, magazines, and newspapers. Her Seal Press anthology, Why We Ride: Women Writers on the Horse in their Lives, is due for release May 2010. Through her agency, Dreisbach Literary Management, Verna represents both fiction and non-fiction authors, although with thirteen years of law enforcement experience, she has a particular interest in mystery, thriller and true crime. Verna worked in California for the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Department as well as the California Highway Patrol. She travels throughout the U.S. and Canada to various writers’ conferences where she is a frequent speaker and workshop presenter. President and Founder of Capitol City Young Writers, Verna strives to educate today’s youth on the craft and business of writing.
ATF Special Agent Rick McMahan has worked in federal law enforcement for over sixteen years. During the first six years of his career, Rick worked as a civilian Special Agent for the Air Force Office of Special Investigations where he worked a wide range of person and property crimes.
As an ATF agent, Rick has investigated extremist militias, violent street gangs as well as outlaw motorcycle gangs. In addition, he’s a firearms instructor and has served as an on-the-job trainer for new agents. In his free time, Rick enjoys writing, and he’s had short stories appear in anthologies such as---TECHNO NOIRE, LOW DOWN & DERBY and the Mystery Writer’s of America DEATH DO US PART edited by Harlan Coben.
