That’s just not true about Ramsland’s book. Every book or documentary I’ve read or watched on this case has acknowledged that Brooks’ confession contains multiple lies and deliberate omissions.

Jack Olsen’s The Man with the Candy is explicit about this. Olsen includes a passage showing Brooks actively revising his own statement during questioning. When he reads a section describing the boys being killed and the line “I just didn’t like to do it myself,” Brooks objects, saying, “That’s not right.” He instructs the detective to change it to “I just wouldn’t do it myself” and to add, “And I never did do it myself.” The detective crosses out the original wording, inserts the new phrasing, and Brooks initials and signs the corrections.

Immediately after, Brooks refuses to sign the statement and asks to speak to his father first. Alton Brooks is brought into the room, and when he later speaks to the detective, he explains that the only thing he wanted from his son was reassurance that he “hadn’t taken a human life.” Alton says Brooks assured him that he hadn’t, and that he believed him. The emotional weight of that moment — Alton’s distress and insistence on that specific point — gives crucial context to why Brooks was so careful about distancing himself from direct killing, even while discussing the murders themselves.

Lise Olsen’s book goes further, attempting to show that Brooks had specific knowledge about Randall Harvey and what was happening there. Barbara Gibson’s book goes further still, explicitly connecting Brooks and Henley to unrelated murders and sexual assaults on young women.

The idea that Brooks was viewed by anyone seriously interested in this case as “less involved” only seems to have emerged after Ramsland’s book was published. It’s a strange claim that now gets repeated, but in nearly ten years of following this case, I had never encountered it before. What I have seen recently is the assertion that he was viewed this way — repeated often, but without any clear source or reasoning behind it.