Nancy Grace

On July 13, 2019, an Oxygen TV channel true crime series began, hosted by Grace and titled “Injustice with Nancy Grace,” with criminal cases being the subject of episodes that seek to bring to light unjust accusations, bungled investigations, arcane evidence, new motives, and shocking sentences.

Grace has been awarded several American Women in Radio & Television Gracie Awards, has been awarded the "Individual Achievement/Best Program Host" honor by that organization, and has been recognized by many other organizations (including, without limitation, the Carole Sund-Carrington Foundation, Crime Victims United of California and The Retreat) for her advocacy work on behalf of victims’ rights.

In June 2017, Grace sat for a reading by purported psychic medium Tyler Henry on his E! TV show, Hollywood Medium with Tyler Henry. Grace believed Henry was communicating with her dead father, as well as murdered fiance, and said she had received closure. After the reading Grace said "there were many things [Henry] said were impossible for him to have gleaned on the internet or even a computer search, speeches I've given, of things that have happened, I find it difficult to believe … I find many of the things he said to be absolutely amazing." In April 2018, Susan Gerbic analyzed the reading, and detailed in Nancy Grace Should be Ashamed of Herself! exactly how Grace had unfortunately been fooled by the usual fraudulent techniques of cold reading and hot reading used by "grief vampires" like Henry to convince people that they have paranormal powers.

Grace has also helped staff a hotline at an Atlanta battered women's center for 10 years. Since January 10, 2017, Grace hosted a daily Podcast on Crime Online called "Crime Stories with Nancy Grace".

On October 13, 2016, at the end of her contract, Grace hosted her last show.

On October 11, 2016, The Jim Norton and Sam Roberts Show had Grace as a guest, on which they accused her of capitalizing on other's tragedy, for her personal gain. They also addressed her handling of The Ultimate Warrior's death, and the Duke lacrosse case. Norton said during the interview that he has disliked her for some time, and she has previously blocked him on Twitter. Grace, in defending herself, stated that she was a crime victim herself, and stating that they didn't ask her one decent question. The next day on The View, Grace addressed the interview, calling Norton and Roberts Beavis and Butt-Head. Grace said she had to hold back tears during the interview and stated, "I don’t really know what it was, but it was hell for me."

In January 2014, she again ignited controversy for her wildly negative depiction of recreational marijuana users. Grace made statements such as users were "fat and lazy" and that anyone who disagreed with her was "lethargic, sitting on the sofa, eating chips" to CNN's news correspondent Brooke Baldwin during a segment covering legalization in Colorado on January 6, 2014.

Following WWE Hall of Famer The Ultimate Warrior's death on April 8, 2014, Nancy Grace invited retired wrestler Diamond Dallas Page on her show to discuss Warrior. Unbeknownst to Page, the subject of the episode was deaths in the sports entertainment industry caused by steroids. Grace claimed that "rumors of steroid and drug use are swirling" in the case of Ultimate Warrior's death, although an autopsy had concluded that Warrior had died of natural causes with neither drugs nor alcohol in his system at his time of death. During the segment, Grace made several mentions to a list of wrestlers who had died young, linking their deaths to drug abuse. The list included wrestlers whose deaths were unrelated to drug abuse.

It is widely acknowledged, by the media and by Grace herself, that the character of Ellen Abbot in the 2014 film Gone Girl is based on Grace. In an interview with actress Missi Pyle, who played Abbot in the film, Grace told pundits she was "very flattered" and that she "laugh[ed] out loud at it," calling Gone Girl her new favorite portrayal.

Most recently, Grace was portrayed by featured player Noel Wells in Season 39, Episode 11. The sketch parodies Grace's reaction to the legalisation of Marijuana in Colorado and features host/musical guest Drake doing an impression of comedian Katt Williams. Much of Grace's dialogue from the sketch was lifted directly from an interview she conducted on January 6, 2013, with Brooke Baldwin on CNN's News Room, in particular the phrase 'I've got a sneaking suspicion that you are pro-pot. And I don't like it.'

On July 2, Medrano doused herself in flammable liquid and set herself on fire. She died of her injuries on July 7. After her death, Medrano's husband and the father of her son said he felt the segment Grace did was cruel and added "The things people said were horrible. It shows that cyberbullying happens to adults, too." Following Melinda Duckett's suicide, this is the second suicide to which Grace has been linked. On January 4, 2012, a lawsuit against CNN brought by Medrano's family was settled, "I can tell you the case was settled in principle two weeks ago," said personal injury attorney Michael Padden. A lawsuit was never formally served but "we resolved the case just by negotiation," he said.

In 2012, Grace's show wrongly reported that DNA evidence linked Michael Skakel to the Murder of Martha Moxley. HLN retracted and settled a lawsuit in October 2013.

In early April 2012, Grace appeared on the last two episodes of the second season of the TV show Raising Hope playing herself.

Grace had been covering the Casey Anthony story for years. After the controversial verdict finding Casey Anthony not guilty, her Nancy Grace show on HLN had its highest ratings ever in the 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. hour slots on Tuesday, July 5, 2011.

In a 2011 New York Times article, David Carr wrote, "Since her show began in 2005, the presumption of innocence has found a willful enemy in the former prosecutor turned broadcast judge-and-jury". He criticized her handling of the kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart, the Duke lacrosse case, the Melinda Duckett interview and suicide, and the Caylee Anthony case. George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley told Carr that Grace, as an attorney and reporter, "has managed to demean both professions with her hype, rabid persona, and sensational analysis. Some part of the public takes her seriously, and her show erodes the respect for basic rights."

On November 22, 2011, Toni Annette Medrano accidentally killed her 3-week-old son, Adrian Alexander Medrano, while she was sleeping on the couch with him. According to the criminal complaint, Medrano told police she had consumed almost an entire fifth of vodka the night before her son died and fell asleep with him on a couch. The following morning, she woke up and found her infant son unresponsive and cold to the touch. While Grace was covering the case, she infamously dubbed Medrano "Vodka Mom". During one of her shows, Grace brought a bottle of vodka onto her set and poured shots to demonstrate how much Medrano had drunk the night of her son's death. In June 2012, Medrano was charged with two counts of second-degree manslaughter.

Grace was a contestant on the thirteenth season of Dancing with the Stars, which began airing on September 19, 2011. She was partnered with pro-dancer Tristan MacManus. The couple lasted for 8 weeks and placed 5th overall in the competition before being eliminated on November 8, 2011, just one week shy of the semi-finals.

While still hosting Nancy Grace, Grace also hosted Swift Justice with Nancy Grace which premiered September 13, 2010, and ran until May 2011. Grace left the show due to productions moving from Atlanta to Los Angeles. In September 2011, Judge Jackie Glass, who is known for presiding over the O. J. Simpson robbery case, took over Grace's place. The show continued for one more season and ceased production in 2012.

On November 8, 2010, Grace reached a settlement with the estate of Melinda Duckett to create a $200,000 trust fund dedicated to locating Trenton. This settlement was reached a month before a jury trial was scheduled to start. According to the agreement, if the young boy is found alive before he turns 13, the remaining proceeds in the trust will be administered by a trustee – Trenton's great-aunt Kathleen Calvert – until he turns 18 and the funds are transferred for his use. If Trenton is not found by his 13th birthday, or if he is found but is not alive, the funds will be transferred immediately to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. "We are pleased the lawsuit has been dismissed. The statement speaks for itself," a spokeswoman for CNN said.

Grace’s first book, Objection!: How High-Priced Defense Attorneys, Celebrity Defendants, and a 24/7 Media Have Hijacked Our Criminal Justice System, was published in 2005 by Hyperion and became a New York Times bestseller. Her first work of fiction, The Eleventh Victim, also published by Hyperion, was released on August 11, 2009. The mystery thriller follows a young psychology student, Hailey Dean, whose fiancé is murdered just weeks before their wedding. She goes on to prosecute violent crime and is forced to reckon with what she left behind. Publishers Weekly described it as "less than compelling;"however, it was also a New York Times bestseller and became the foundation for the Hailey Dean Mysteries series of, thus far, nine movies on the Hallmark Movies & Mysteries channel. A third New York Times bestselling novel, Death on the D-List, was published by Hyperion on August 10, 2010, followed by Murder in the Courthouse published by BenBella Books in 2016.

From 2008 to 2011, the Caylee Anthony disappearance and the prosecution, trial, and acquittal of her mother Casey Anthony on charges of murder of the child were a regular feature of the Nancy Grace show. She would reveal every new detail of the story. Her program is cited as having "almost single-handedly inflated the Anthony case from a routine local murder into a national obsession".

In February 2005, she began hosting a regular primetime legal analysis show called Nancy Grace on CNN Headline News (now HLN) in addition to her Court TV show. On May 9, 2007, Grace announced that she would be leaving Court TV to focus more on her CNN Headline News Program and charity work. She did her last show on Court TV on June 19, 2007.

On May 22, 2007, Grace appeared in the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Screwed" the season 8 finale, playing herself opposite Star Jones.

In April 2007, Grace married David Linch, an Atlanta investment banker, in a small private ceremony. The two had met while she was studying at Mercer University in the 1970s. Grace, who had given up on marriage after the death of her fiancé, said, "We've been in touch all these years, and a lot of time, we were separated by geography and time. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision to get married. I told my family only two days before the wedding."

On June 26, 2007, an emotional Grace announced on her HLN talk show that her life had "taken a U-turn" in that she was pregnant and expecting twins due in January 2008. Lucy Elizabeth and John David were born in November 2007.

In response to Keith Olbermann's claims in a March 2007 Rolling Stone interview in which he was quoted as saying, "Anybody who would embellish the story of their own fiancé's murder should spend that hour a day not on television but in a psychiatrist's chair," Grace stated, "I did not put myself through law school and fight for all those years for victims of crime to waste one minute of my time, my energy, and my education in a war of words with Keith Olbermann, whom I've never met nor had any disagreement. I feel we have X amount of time on Earth, and that when we give in to our detractors or spend needless time on silly fights, I think that's abusing the chance we have to do something good."

Grace received her Juris Doctor from the Walter F. George School of Law at Mercer, where she was a member of the law review. She went on to earn a Master of Laws in constitutional and criminal law from New York University. She has written articles and opinion pieces for legal periodicals, including the American Bar Association Journal. She worked as a clerk for a federal court judge and practiced antitrust and consumer protection law with the Federal Trade Commission. She taught litigation at the Georgia State University College of Law and business law at GSU's School of Business. As of 2006, she is part of Mercer University's board of trustees and adopted a section of the street surrounding the law school.

In July 2006, Grace interviewed Smart, who was promoting a legislative bill. Grace repeatedly asked her for information regarding her abduction. Smart told her she didn't feel comfortable discussing it, despite Grace's persistence in the matter. Finally, Grace stopped when Smart said she "didn't appreciate [Grace] bringing all this up."

Grace took a vehemently pro-prosecution position throughout the 2006 Duke University lacrosse case, in which Crystal Mangum, a stripper and North Carolina Central University student, falsely accused three members of Duke University's men's lacrosse team of raping her at a party. Prior to Duke suspending its men's lacrosse team's season, she sarcastically noted on the air, "I'm so glad they didn't miss a lacrosse game over a little thing like gang rape!" and "Why would you go to a cop in an alleged gang rape case, say, and lie and give misleading information?" After the disbarment of District Attorney Mike Nifong, Attorney General Roy Cooper pronounced all three players innocent of the rape charges made by Mangum and Nifong. On the following broadcast of her show, Grace did not appear and a substitute reporter, Jane Velez-Mitchell, announced the removal of all charges.

In September 2006, 22-year-old Melinda Duckett committed suicide following an interview conducted by Grace concerning the disappearance of Duckett's 2-year-old son Trenton. Grace interviewed Duckett less than two weeks after the child went missing, questioning her for her alleged lack of openness regarding her son's disappearance, asking Duckett "Where were you? Why aren't you telling us where you were that day?" Duckett appeared confused and was unable to answer whether or not she had taken a polygraph test. When Grace asked her why she could not account for specific details, Duckett began to reply, "Because I was told not to," to which Grace responded, "Ms. Duckett, you are not telling us for a reason. What is the reason? You refuse to give even the simplest facts of where you were with your son before he went missing. It is day twelve." According to the CNN transcript, Duckett replied, "(INAUDIBLE) with all media. It's not just there, just all media. Period." Grace then moved on to a psychologist who asserted that Duckett was "skirting around the issue."

On November 21, 2006, The Smoking Gun exposed pending litigation on behalf of the estate of Melinda Duckett, asserting a wrongful death claim against CNN and Grace. The attorney for the estate alleges that, even if Duckett did kill her own son, Grace's aggressive questioning traumatized Duckett so much that she committed suicide. She also argues that CNN's decision to air the interview after Duckett's suicide traumatized her family. Trenton has never been found.

In March 2006, an article in the New York Observer suggested that in her book Objection!, Grace had embellished the story of her college fiancé's 1979 murder and the ensuing trial to make it better support her image. Grace has described the tragedy as the impetus for her career as a prosecutor and victims' rights advocate, and has often publicly referred to the incident. The Observer researched the murder and found what it submitted to be contradictions between the events and Grace's subsequent statements, including the following:

Griffin's murderer, Tommy McCoy, received ten years for aggravated assault and life imprisonment for murder, but was released on parole from the Georgia Department of Corrections on December 5, 2006.

On Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Grace has also been comparedto a character named Faith Yancy (Geneva Carr) who hosts a similar talk show (Inside American Justice) that sensationalizes whatever case the main characters are working on and makes it difficult for them to gain access to key witnesses. Although, the character could be based on any number of individuals with this type of show. The character has appeared on the episodes "In the Wee Small Hours" (original air date November 6, 2005), "Masquerade" (original air date October 31, 2006), "Albatross" (original air date February 6, 2007), "Neighborhood Watch" (original air date August 10, 2008), and "Lady's Man" (original air date June 28, 2009).

Sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live has parodied Grace, both in and out of the context of her show, a number of times since her rise to prominence. Originally Grace was portrayed by SNL cast member Amy Poehler. Her impression featured in a parody of the Nancy Grace show during Saturday Night Live's 32nd season (In episode 7.). The sketch parodied Grace's reactions to Michael Richards' infamous Laugh Factory appearance, the O.J. Simpson trial and her own parking fines. During the sketch, host Matthew Fox portrays a parking attendant whom Grace's staff have brought off the street, where he was giving Grace a parking ticket. Poehler also voiced Grace, on May 21, 2005, as part of the show's Saturday TV Funhouse segment in a Divertor sketch. During this appearance, Grace says little more than "[Name of celebrity in question] should fry."

During the 2002 Elizabeth Smart kidnapping case, when suspect Richard Ricci was arrested by police on the basis that he had a criminal record and had worked on the Smarts' home, Grace immediately and repeatedly proclaimed on Court TV and CNN's Larry King Live that Ricci was guilty, although there was little evidence to support this claim. She also suggested publicly that Ricci's girlfriend was involved in the cover-up of his alleged crime. Grace continued to accuse Ricci, though he died while in custody. It was later revealed that Smart was kidnapped by Brian David Mitchell and Wanda Barzee, two individuals with whom Ricci had no connection.

During the trial of David Westerfield in 2002 for the kidnap and murder of Danielle Van Dam, Grace made it clear on Larry King Live that she thought he was guilty, but she got some facts wrong. For example, she said he had steam-cleaned his RV, but no evidence was introduced that he had. Dr. Henry Lee pointed out that if he had done so, they wouldn't have found the fingerprints and the bloodstain on the carpet. David Westerfield was convicted of kidnapping and murdering Danielle Van Dam.

While a prosecutor, Grace was reprimanded by the Supreme Court of Georgia for withholding evidence and for making improper statements in a 1997 arson and murder case. The court overturned the conviction in that case and found that Grace's behavior "demonstrated her disregard of the notions of due process and fairness and was inexcusable." As well, a 2005 federal appeals opinion by Judge William H. Pryor, Jr. found that Grace "played fast and loose" with core ethical rules in a 1990 triple murder case, including the withholding of evidence and allowing a police detective to testify falsely under oath. The 1990 murder conviction was upheld despite Grace's prosecutorial misconduct.

After leaving the Fulton County prosecutors' office, Grace was approached by and accepted an offer from Court TV founder Steven Brill to do a legal commentary show alongside Johnnie Cochran. When Cochran left the show, Grace was moved to a solo trial coverage show on Court TV, she hosted Trial Heat from 1996-2004, then Closing Arguments from 2004-2007, replacing Lisa Bloom and James Curtis, both of whom were hosting Trial Heat at that point.

Grace graduated from Macon's Windsor Academy in 1977. She attended Valdosta State University, and later received a B.A. from Mercer University. As a student, Grace was a fan of Shakespearean literature, and intended to become an English professor after graduating from college. But after the murder of her fiancé Keith Griffin when she was 19, Grace decided to enroll in law school and went on to become a felony prosecutor and a supporter of victims' rights.

Nancy Ann Grace (born October 23, 1959) is an American legal commentator and television journalist. She hosted Nancy Grace, a nightly celebrity news and current affairs show on HLN from 2005 to 2016, and Court TV's Closing Arguments from 1996 to 2007. She also co-wrote the book Objection!: How High-Priced Defense Attorneys, Celebrity Defendants, and a 24/7 Media Have Hijacked Our Criminal Justice System. Grace was also the arbiter of Swift Justice with Nancy Grace in the syndicated courtroom reality show's first season.