FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FEBRUARY 19, 2006
NOTED CRIME AUTHOR TO
TAKE ON SULLIVAN
MURDER CASE
By Heath Lake
Chronicle Staff Writer
WILLIMANTIC—Morbidity aside, murder sells.
The uglier and nastier the details, the harder it seems for someone to put down the newspaper, magazine or book recounting the drama play by tragic play.
One murder involving a Willimantic native in New Hampshire will soon be the topic of a book written by a noted crime author.
“People in rural America, in the suburbs, are fascinated by the fact that their next door neighbor that they wave to every day while they are raking their lawn could be a serial murderer,” said author M. William Phelps, who is from Connecticut.
This Spring Phelps will embark on the story behind the murder of Jeanne Dominico, the Nashua, N. H., woman killed Aug. 6, 2003, by Willimantic resident William “Bill” Sullivan.
Phelps has previously written Sleep in Heavenly Peace, about a Pennsylvania woman who killed three of her babies, wrapped them in plastic, then hid them for decades, and Perfect Poison, about a Massachusetts woman who lived a double life as a serial killer and a veterans hospital employee.
Sullivan, at 18, was convicted of murdering Dominico, 43, the mother of his then 16-year-old girlfriend, Nicole Kasinskas, whom he met online.
Phelps said, “One of the most compelling aspects of the story for him is the love triangle. From one perspective, you have a mother and daughter who friends and family say loved each other deeply, and, from the other, a sociopath boyfriend whose selfishness, jealousy and rage tore all their lives apart.”
Sullivan, a Willimantic resident, was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to murder after a July 2005 trial for brutally stabbing and bludgeoning Dominico to death in her home. He saw her as standing between him and her daughter.
He is serving life in prison without the chance of parole. Kasinskas was subsequently sentenced to 40 years for helping to plot her mother's murder after she testified against Sullivan.
She is expected to serve 35 of them.
Phelps said the story has all the makings of a bestseller. “The murder of Jeanne Dominico has all the essential elements I look for when choosing a case to explore in a book form: love, loss, betrayal, quality law enforcement and compelling people involved in the incredibly dark aspects of life.”
The book, to be titled Because You Loved Me, promises to combine Phelps' knack for investigative journalism with his “ability to expose exclusive details” previously unknown.
“Those details,” he said, “would make the story unrecognizable for many readers compared with accounts of the murder leading up to and lasting throughout the trial.”
“I am going to get the whole package,” Phelps said.
“Because of who Jeanne Dominico was as a person, people are going to bond with her in the book. I'm going to spend a tremendous amount of time talking about her life not just her death.”
He said the most unique aspect of the story for him was Sullivan's ability to manipulate Kasinskas.
“I don't feel that Nicole, before she met this guy, would ever have thought of this,” Phelps said.
“Billy would have murdered someone. Nicole was not that kind of a person.”
Phelps said he has already been in contact with Kasinskas and, although he has yet to contact Sullivan, he is confident he will want to be involved.
“I have no doubt in my mind he's going to be all over this because he's a sociopath,” Phelps said.
“No one interviewed for the story will receive monetary compensation,” Phelps said.
As for his research, Phelps said he doesn't usually attend trials because the books aren't about the trials, but the lifetimes leading up to the events that brought the individuals into the courtroom.
Phelps is hoping people in the Willimantic community, including Sullivan's old classmates, will help him ferret out the details of the convicted man's youth.
“There have always been people no one has spoken to,” Phelps said, using as an example his upcoming book Murder in the Heartland, which chronicles the murder of 23-year-old Bobbie Jo Stinnett in Skidmore, MO, who was murdered for her 8‚month-old baby.
That book will be released in June before the trial begins.
“I dug up a lot of stuff about Lisa Montgomery (the confessed murderer). I am always looking for the story that wasn't publicized.”
Because You Loved Me is expected to be released by Fall 2007.
For more information or to contact Phelps, check out his Web site at www.mwilliamphelps.com.