Marla Bernard
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A former police sergeant, Marla Bernard is a passionate victim’s rights advocate, author, and public speaker.
She received her Master of Arts with honors from Baker University. She serves as adjunct faculty for a national university where she has written several criminal justice courses and has been a contributor to national law enforcement publications. She and her husband were recently filmed for an upcoming true crime series in the United Kingdom for an episode based on her first book, Through the Rain. Her work has been published in two volumes of Chicken Soup for the Soul. She is currently writing her third book, a collection of short stories about individuals whose positive influences made a significant impact on her life. Marla and her husband retired Sgt. David Bernard, reside in the Midwest near the loves of their lives – their two children and three grandchildren. |
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By the Side of the Road
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True Crime
On an early morning in March 1989, a young girl walked from her front door to the end of her driveway to wait for the school bus. Within minutes, she was grabbed from the curb and forced into a stolen vehicle, leaving her belongings stacked by the side of the road. Two convicted felons had spent the prior evening driving the city’s southeast side in search of auto parts to steal and sell for drug money, taking them directly down the road that led them to their next crime – a violent, unspeakable assault on a child, her family, and the community that embraced them. Before the story is over, the convicted killers will sit on death row for over two decades, one will escape jail briefly, a judge will be removed from the case, the executions will be scheduled, then stayed multiple times, and a glimpse of what life is like for Missouri death row inmates is revealed. The criminal justice system appears to be just that – for the criminals – with Lady Justice’s scales unbalanced. There is no justice. Only retribution. 
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