WillemHolleeder was one of the most notorious criminals inAmsterdam. He was convicted of murdering five people including one of his accomplices in the infamous kidnapping of Alfred “Freddy” Heineken. Holleeder may never have been sentenced to life in prison if it wasn’t for his sister Astrid’s cooperation with the authorities.
“He would go after me and I would go after him,” she told journalist Patrick Radden Keefe. “I’m not going to sit around and wait while he is killing everybody.”
Keefe tells Astrid’s story and more in “Rogues: True Stories of Grifters, Killers, Rebels and Crooks.” It’s a collection of 12 stories he’s written for The New Yorker over the past 12 years.
It includes a profile of infamous Mexican drug lord Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera or “El Chapo.” He asked Keefe to ghostwrite his memoir.
Keefe includes a retrospective on the career of television producer Mark Burnett who’s credited with launching former President Donald Trump’s television career through “The Apprentice.”
We talk to Keefe about those who live on the fringes.
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