True Crime: What Was Said in the Jail Cell

“Catch the Devil

 

By Pamela Colloff

 

Knopf, 320 pages, $32

 

Jim Dailey, who was convicted of the brutal 1985 murder of 14-year-old Shelly Boggio around Indian Rocks Beach, Fla., has languished on death row for nearly 40 years. In her bracing debut, "Catch the Devil," Pamela Colloff mounts a convincing case for his innocence.

 

While her portrayal of Dailey is agonizing, Ms. Colloff's rendering of Paul Skalnik, a career criminal and the other man at the center of the book, is chilling. The testimony of Skalnik, who claimed that Dailey had confessed to the homicide while they were both detained in Pinellas County Jail, helped prosecutors secure Dailey's conviction.

 

As the author scrupulously details, Skalnik was a con artist and unrepentant liar whose long rap sheet included the sexual assault of a child. In and out of detention for years, he was also, in Ms. Colloff's words, "one of the most prolific, and most effective, jailhouse witnesses in American history." While at Pinellas County Jail, he testified against or volunteered information on more than two dozen defendants in exchange for lenience from prosecutors.

 

Skalnik generally stuck to the same story for each case. He would claim that he'd be passing by the accused's cell and strike up a conversation, and before long the fellow prisoner would be unburdening himself. The scenario, improbable to begin with, was especially unlikely given that Skalnik was widely known to be an informant. The author describes cases in which defendants would listen incredulously while Skalnik -- whom they had never met before -- swore in court that they had admitted their crimes to him.

 

Ms. Colloff, a ProPublica reporter and New York Times Magazine staff writer, has written a propulsive narrative full of memorable details. She describes how Dailey, ever hopeful of being exonerated, stayed fit with the help of an improvised dumbbell made by stuffing a pillowcase with his copious legal paperwork. He is now 80 years old.

 

After meeting Skalnik, Ms. Colloff thought the grifter would acknowledge his duplicity, before she came to believe that he simply saw her as his latest mark. In the end she feels revulsion for Skalnik and "the entire apparatus that enabled and encouraged him." It's unconscionable that Dailey continues to await execution. Equally disturbing are the failings of the justice system that keep him on death row.

 

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Ms. Spindel reviews books frequently for the Journal.

 

(See related article: "Without The Cover Of Night" -- WSJ July 11, 2026)” [1]

 

1. REVIEW --- Books -- Shortcuts: True Crime: What Was Said in the Jail Cell. Spindel, Barbara.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 11 July 2026: C10.