Phoebe Judge

Jacek Robleski learned that Christian Bala had published a mock in 2003, several years after Darius had been murdered, and not long before Jacek began investigating the case.

Jacek decided to get a copy.

The fact that Darius' cell phone had been sold on an internet auction site had never been made public.

Detective Jacek Robleski decided to make copies of Christian Bala's novel and hand them out to his detective squad.

He assigned everyone chapters and asked them to look for more similarities between the plot and Darius Januszewski's murder.

I'm Phoebe Judge.

This is Criminal.

David Grand says Christian Bala's novel didn't get very much attention when it was first published.

And out of the people who did read it, some who knew Christian were surprised.

David says once, after the book came out, an interviewer asked Christian, Some authors write only to release their Mr. Hyde, the dark side of their psyche.

Do you agree?

Christian responded, I know what you were driving at, but I won't comment.

It might turn out that Christian Bala is the creation of Chris, not the other way around.

Christian had also posted excerpts of the book on his blog and would respond to reader comments under the name Chris.

But David says Christian would dismiss suggestions that parts of the book had been drawn from his own life.

Still, as the detectives combed through the novel, they found more similarities.

In the novel, the narrator, Chris, gets drunk one night with a friend and they decide to steal a figurine of St.

Anthony from a church.

Jacek Robleski discovered that Christian Bala had once been caught by the police doing the exact same thing.

The friend he'd been with had told a judge they stole the statue because, quote, we wanted a third person to drink with.