But a recently murdered one once wrote a plausible crime novel.
Seventeen years ago, Robert Gorham Fuller Jr., a high-powered, Ivy League-educated Maine lawyer and former Navy captain in the Judge Advocate General Corps, wrote a serviceable, self-published detective novel about a man who was shot to death by a single bullet to the head. Most likely, the book was read by the author’s family and friends, who probably found copies under the Christmas tree.
Then, on February 14, 2026, Fuller, now 87 and retired, was shot to death by a single bullet to the head at his senior-living facility in Potomac, Maryland. In a shocking example of life imitating art, Fuller’s heretofore forgotten vanity project, Unnatural Deaths, became the subject of media scrutiny and public curiosity.
Immediately after the murder, a law-enforcement officer called the situation “the mystery of the mystery writer.” The actual crime could be fodder for another novel. Video surveillance at Fuller’s residence showed a person of interest — what looked to be a man poorly disguised as a woman in a plaid coat and scraggly, long-haired wig — leaving the scene. A week later, a 22-year-old Baltimore man, Maurquise Emillo James, was arrested following a traffic stop (his silver Infiniti sedan had no license plates), during which he allegedly fired at police in an attempt to flee. The recovered 9mm shell casing matched that of the gun used to kill Fuller…