Cops: Texas crime novelist tried to hire hit man to murder estranged husband

By: Crimesider Staff
Topics: Daily Blotter

Nancy Mancuso Gelber

(Credit: KBTX)

(CBS/KBTX) BRYAN, Texas - Crime writer Nancy Mancuso Gelber may have penned her last page-turner.

Gelber was arrested Friday after police say she tried to hire a hit man to kill her estranged husband.

Gelber , whose novel "Temporary Amnesia" is published under the name Nance J. Mancuso, allegedly told an undercover sheriff's deputy that he should make the murder look like an accident, reports CBS affiliate KBTX.

Police say Gelber gave the deputy a wedding ring as a down payment for the hit, and told him that once she collected Joseph Richard Gelber, Jr.'s approximately $180,000 life insurance policy, she would give him $60,000. She also allegedly gave the deputy two photo IDs so that he could identify her husband.

According to Bryan-College Station newspaper The Eagle, Gelber told the deputy her husband had other girlfriends and their home was in foreclosure.

Gelber, 53, was charged with solicitation to commit capital murder and is being held on $75,000 bond.

In April, Gelber posted on her Facebook page that she had come home to find her husband cheating. She later posted that they were getting a divorce but still living together.

Brazos County Sheriff Chris Kirk told KBTX that the office tipped off Joseph Gelber last week that his wife might be trying to harm him.

"They were actually estranged. Living in the same house still but estranged and planning for divorce there were a lot of personal issues that she had that she felt like this was what she needed to do to resolve it," said Kirk.

According to Amazon, "Temporary Amnesia" was published in August 2010 and is the story of a man who escapes from prison and commits a series of bank robberies with a gang of prostitutes.

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