Names are important to writers. Especially crime writers. You want to set the right tone, especially if you’re talking about a low-level criminal with an IQ lower than Barbaro’s post position in the Derby.
For the moron who perpetrated a mistaken home invasion (and killed Laura Cardinal’s parents) I came up with a name I thought would fit: Ricky Lee Worrell. This is the kind of guy who does all his food shopping (and robbing) at a convenience store.
Recently, in a syndicated “News of the Weird” column we get in the local paper, they named “Wayne” as the middle name most likely to be used by a criminal, followed by a host of real-life miscreant monickers. They had names like Ricky Wayne Dobbs, or Allen Wayne Hobbs, or Donny Wayne Cobb.
In my experience, the three best middle names for small-time criminals are:
Wayne
Ray
Lee
So the perfect criminal name is:
Wayne Ray Lee.
Well, it would be perfect, except it sounds kind of Asian, which throws the whole thing off.
See, the thing is, even when you have a formula, it sometimes doesn’t work out in real life.
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