In the late 2000s, Atlanta’s Nancy Grace’s flame-throwing approach to legal coverage brought her a huge fan base and no shortage of critics. Her blustering ways were parodied on “Saturday Night Live,” and versions of her showed up on episodes of “Law and Order: Criminal Intent” and “Boston Legal.”
Over 12 years, she became the biggest star on HLN, hosting a coveted nightly primetime show at CNN Center. Her coverage of the Casey Anthony trial decision in 2011 drew a record 4.5 million viewers.
But her ratings have slipped off over the years. The former Fulton County district attorney’s office prosecutor left HLN voluntarily in 2016 for fresh pursuits.
Even without that daily presence on basic cable, she remains busy as ever. She quickly landed a daily radio show on SiriusXM, which is now simulcast on Fox Nation, the Fox News streaming service.
“I loved the breaking crime and justice aspect of my HLN show,” she said in a recent interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I still get to do that on Sirius and Fox Nation.”
Grace last year added an Oxygen true crime show “Injustice With Nancy Grace,” which explores murder cases in a more in-depth, narrative fashion than she did on her HLN show or her current radio show. “It’s like preparing myself for trial," she said. “Find me witnesses! Find me discrepancies!”
Season two debuted last Thursday, focused on an Idaho woman, Lori Vallow, whose two children were found dead on a doomsday author’s property in June after they were missing for nine months. Grace derisively dubs Vallow “cult mom," much like she called Casey Anthony “tot mom.”
“Nobody has been charged with murder" regarding these two children, said Grace. Yet people around Vallow like her husband and her brother “have been dropping like flies. Where are the murder charges?"
Grace said finishing the season was a challenge after the pandemic started, often having interview subjects tape themselves when a TV crew couldn’t show up to do it. “We did a lot of driving instead of flying,” she said.
She got directly involved in a 2014 Atlanta case of a young Iraqi war veteran, Chase Massner, who “seemingly vanished into thin air." “It helps to have a friend who has a cadaver dog,” she teased.
Grace also tackles the murder of U.S. Army soldier Vanessa Guillén at the Fort Hood base in Texas in April which received a lot of press attention. “Don’t get me wrong,” Grace said. “I love our military. My father fought in World War II. But what’s happening at Fort Hood is not good. I’m into seeing results, and they’re playing [musical] chairs with the leadership there."
This season of “Injustice” will feature 12 episodes. “There are an overwhelming number of cases that need attention and a spotlight,” she said. “When we first started this show on Oxygen, we were inundated with people asking to look at their cases. That goes on today.”
She also hosts a new syndicated weekend show called “Bloodline Detectives,” which debuted earlier this month and airs in Atlanta on CBS46 (WGCL-TV) at 1:30 a.m. Saturday nights. That show focuses on revived cold cases, thanks to improvements in forensic science.
Credit: Handout
Credit: Handout
And in keeping with her brand, she just released her latest book “Don’t Be a Victim: Fighting Back Against America’s Crime Wave,” which provides pragmatic advice and precautionary tips to avoid becoming the victim of a crime.
The book, she said, is an homage to her murdered fiancé, Keith Griffin, from when she was 19, a trauma that led her into the legal profession instead of becoming an English professor. “It took me two years to write it,” she said. “It is based on every case I’ve ever investigated personally and taken to trial. The same things happen again and again. I can’t just keep reporting it, so I started writing this book.”
Though the book could potentially turn anyone into a paranoid mess, Grace said that isn’t the purpose. “I’m not here to scare anyone,” she said. “It’s 350 pages of practical tips from crime victims and families and experts.” She covers how to watch your back while jogging and shopping, while at concerts or parties, and even while camping, a favorite avocation of hers.
And since she had her twins Lucy Elizabeth and John David, both 12, she has been obsessed with their safety. A good portion of the book is about keeping children from getting kidnapped or bullied or sexually assaulted, be it at school, a park, a shopping mall or the Internet.
Credit: CR: David Linch
Credit: CR: David Linch
Grace, a Macon native, is able to do nearly all her work from her home studio in Midtown Atlanta. She has been married to an investment banker, David Linch, for 13 years, sharing duties to raise their twins.
“They’re joys,” she said, of her kids. “They were remote learning. I loved having them here. I could just run up the stairs from my home studio and see them.”
They are now physically attending school again, and she goes over COVID-19 rules with them every single morning. So far, she feels her school is doing a good job keeping everyone safe. “I did my own investigation of course,” she said, “and I do spot checks every week to make sure the students are wearing masks and being kept six feet apart."
Grace said she is fine raising her kids “in a bubble. I don’t want to live in a constant state of fear. Neither are my children. There are ways to fight back. I know that more than ever.”
She said the quarantine allowed her to hone her cooking skills. “I make a homemade meal every night of the week,” Grace said. “We sit around the table together, and for 30 minutes to an hour, everything is normal. Tonight, I’m making ham pot pie. My daughter is vegetarian, but she smelled the pot pie, and said she’s going to have some anyway."
Credit: Matt Sayles/AP
Credit: Matt Sayles/AP
ON TV
“Injustice With Nancy Grace,” 9 p.m. Thursdays on Oxygen.
“Bloodline Detectives," check local listings. In Atlanta, 1:30 a.m. Saturday nights, CBS46 (WGCL-TV).
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