12/04/2002

By KRISTA VASQUEZ and DOUG IRVING, KGW Staff

A true-crime author working on a book about accused killer Christian Longo helped convince a Lincoln County court to release the transcript of a four-hour interview with him.

Carlton Smith, a former Willamette Week writer, filed papers two weeks ago asking for the records of Longo’s interview with police. He plans to use the transcript, along with dozens of interviews, for an in-depth book on Longo’s life.

In the interview, Longo describes his family’s final days as desperate and humiliating. His wife and three young children were living in cheap hotels and eating ramen noodles.

Christian Longo appears by video at an earlier court appearance. (KGW Photo)

St. Martin’s Press asked Smith to write the book shortly after Longo’s arrest for the deaths of his wife MaryJane and their children. Smith said Longo’s story is different from the others he has written about.

“Often times, in these cases in which a family is annihilated… the perpetrator kills themselves in the process because of the psychological trauma that’s caused all this,” he said. “This was a little bit unusual. Mr. Longo went to Mexico to scuba dive, have fun in the sun.

Smith said his book will focus more on Longo’s life, his mental state and what lead to the family’s transient lifestyle. The San Francisco-based author traveled to Newport, Michigan, Ohio and South Dakota.

He also wrote to Longo, asking for an interview. Longo’s attorneys declined his request.

“I don’t think you always need to have the person’s side of the story to write the book,” he said. “If you agreed to that, you’d be giving Mr. Longo veto power to write the book or not, and that’s not appropriate.”

Smith has yet to title the book, but hopes to write it before the trial in March. The book will come out in late summer or early fall.