Our group of writers collaborate to plan and create the cases presented at Crime Scene. They are listed here in alphabetical order.

Spotted in Las Vegas, 2003

Catherine - Writer

Have a question for Catherine? Email her here.

Vitals: MWF, 5'8", hair brown, eyes hazel, corrective lenses needed for driving; mole on left cheek; scar on right breast

Spotted in: San Francisco, Paris, Rome, Istanbul, Dodge City, Manchester, Hilo, Mombasa, Yellowstone, Seville, Las Vegas, Cesky Krumlov; travels compulsively

Education: University of Dublin, Ireland; Columbia University, New York

Influences: David Lynch, Margaret Atwood, James Ellroy, The X-Files, Ruth Rendell, Dashiell Hammett, Dorothy Parker, The Usual Suspects, MFK Fisher, Anais Nin, Bram Stoker, Edgar Allen Poe, Tim Cahill, Hunter S. Thompson, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, In Cold Blood, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Franz Kafka, George Lucas (episodes IV-VI, not I-II), Casablanca, The Blair Witch Project

Crimes: Valerie Wilson; Purity Knight; Macy Lamar; Andrea Stover; Andrew Fine; James Swarthmore

Dottie

Dottie - Writer

What is a sweet, little 70-something doting grandmother of six doing spending all her waking hours plotting murder and mayhem? If you ask Dottie M., she'll tell you she discovered Crime Scene in October 2000, three months after her introduction to computers, and she was hooked. In February 2001 when she spotted Crime Scene's plea for writers, she asked her husband of 51 years what he thought. "After the hundreds of murder mysteries you've read, you should be an expert. Go for it!" So she did.

Dottie marched out the skills honed over years of writing for a multitude of community organizations, and took the plunge. She traded her hours of reading mysteries and watching TV favorites such as Court TV, Forensic Files, and Medical Detectives for writing about murder and the people it involves.

When she and her husband retreat for the summer to their second home in the Eastern Sierras -- a getaway from their Southern California residence -- writing for Crime Scene will join her usual activities of working jigsaw puzzles, reading mysteries, painting in oils, fishing for trout and, of course, doting on grandchildren.

Melissa, sighted at a jazz club in Paris while doing undercover work

Melissa - Forensics

Have a question for Melissa? Email her here.

Melissa Jacob hails from Lake Jackson (or Lack Action, as some of the locals call it) in the great state of Texas. She earned a pharmacy degree from the University of Texas in 1993, and went on to receive a Ph.D. in Pharmacognosy from the University of Mississippi in 1999. She is currently working in antimicrobial drug discovery from natural sources at the National Center for Natural Products Research.

Melissa is insatiably interested in forensics, murder mysteries, and all things "serial killer." Those interests led her to the Crime Scene web site first in 1996 and again in 1999, when she joined the Crime Scene staff. When she isn't manipulating microbes, Melissa dreams of becoming a piano player in a sing-along bar, while writing murder mysteries on the side.

Mick in his studio

Mick - Multimedia

Mick was born in 1962 in a little nowhere town in the Lower Rhine Valley, where he spend his childhood too. After finishing his school years he became a locksmith, worked in a hospital, drove an ambulance and worked in a rehabilitation centre for drug addicts.

In 1985 he settled down in Duisburg. There he studied Political Science and Art at the Gerhard Mercator University. Film was his focus point in art. In his university years he released some short films and started to work with a local theatre group. He did the stage design, the illumination and some work on special effects. In the 90s, he worked on many films in several departments (camera, script/continuity, directors assistance, f/x). Today he works as a Flash developer in an advertising agency in DY¨sseldorf, Germany.

Mick read about Crime Scene in a German internet magazine and became a fan at once. In 1997, he did some graphic work on the Knight and Lamar cases. In February 2000, he visited Oxford MS and spent some nights on Tom's couch. During this time, he did the makeup for the Beauchamp and the Michaelis cases. For the Michaelis and Hitzig cases, Mick created the TINAG and TINAG II games.

Scott - Writer

Thomas Scott McKenzie was raised on a thoroughbred horse farm in Bourbon County, Kentucky. Since receiving a master's degree in Creative Writing from The University of Mississippi, he has lived in the Washington, D.C. area. He has been published in Articulate, The Panhandler, The Aethlon: Journal of Sport and Literature, The Dead Mule, and others.

Stephen

Stephen - Past Head Writer, Current Writer

Have a question for Stephen? Email him here.

Over two hundred and fifty of Stephen's stories and poems have been selected to appear in more than a hundred publications. He teaches Mystery Short Stories for Writers College and writes the bi-monthly column, "Murder Ink," for Writing World.

For more information, you can visit his website at www.stephendrogers.com.

Suzanne - Head Writer

Have a question for Suzanne? Email her here.

Suzanne has been an avid mystery fan since she first learned to read, cutting her teeth on Nancy Drew books and later expanding her horizons to include such authors as Agatha Christie, Michael Connelly, Patricia Cornwell's Kay Scarpetta series, Sue Grafton's Kinsey Millhone series, Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series, and a myriad of other equally well-known and lesser-known fiction writers, plus many other books on police procedure, criminal profiling, true crime, and so forth. She typically reads 50+ books -- fact or fiction crime/mystery and other genres -- each year, so she's always looking for new and interesting books and authors. When she's not reading or working on Crime Scene cases, Suzanne can often be found watching crime-based television, both factual (Autopsy, Forensic Files, New Detectives, etc.) and fictional (CSI, Crossing Jordan, all the Law & Order series, etc.).

After visiting the Crime Scene site for about a year as a viewer, Suzanne joined the Crime Scene staff in 1999 as Head Writer. In the ensuing years, she has worked on more than 15 Crime Scene cases as a writer, an editor or both, and looks forward to continuing to do so in the future.

Todd

Todd - Past Head Writer

Have a question for Todd? Email him here.

From a tour de force through wealthy suburbia’s wholesome appearances and sordid realities to tanks and infantry, from mystery to military, Award-winning Author and screenwriter T.A. (Todd) Stone has made his mark on the print and e-book worlds. Stone is the author of the “profiling procedural” and 2002 Digital Literature Institute Best of Fiction Winner, 2002 INDIE Mystery Winner, and 2002 EPPIE finalist CLOSE TO HOME (Hard Shell Word Factory) and the NY Times Review of Books acclaimed military techno thriller KRIEGSPIEL (Lyford Books/Presidio Press). His second military thriller THE BEST DEFENSE was published in May 2003 by NovelBooks Inc. He is a member of the Author's Guild, Mystery Writers of America, EPIC (the Electronically Published Internet Connection), the National Writers' Union, the Crime Writers’ Guild, and is a graduate of his local Citizens Police Academy.

When not writing fiction, Stone writes marketing communications materials for a major telecommunications manufacturer, teaches copywriting at a local community college, and presents at writers’ conferences throughout the Midwest.

An avid motorcyclist, Stone is a former Army Airborne/Ranger Infantry officer whose military assignments included duty as an Assistant Professor at the United States Military Academy at West Point. He has his undergraduate degree from Indiana University and his MA in English from Northwestern University. He lives with his family in a perfectly normal suburb outside Chicago, IL. He can be reached through his web sites www.closetohome.org or www.tntstone.com, or by e-mail at todd@crimescene.com

Tom

Tom - Crime Scene Creator

Have a question for Tom? Email him here.

Tom Arriola was raised in Montana and received an M.F.A. in theatre directing from the University of Mississippi in 1994. After graduation, Tom began the Crime Scene on January 15, 1995. The success of the site led to a job offer to create one of the internet's first interactive soap operas, Ferndale. This wacky story was set in a mountain retreat, where a fictional psychological experiment placed patients in front of an internet audience.

In 1997, Tom returned to Oxford, Mississippi to continue the Crime Scene's development. Tom currently lives in Phoenix, Arizona, where he enjoys spending time with his teenage daughter.  Since 1995, he has staged nearly 30 murders. He is the nicest mass murderer you'll ever meet.

Tom credits the success of Crime Scene to the excellent staff who toil behind the scenes to create the cases. Their hard work to makes these cases seem realistic and the Crime Scene could not exist without their dedication and skill.