The crime of conspiracy is a limitation on free speech in the united states. Merely talking about, in fine detail, a crime can get one charged with conspiracy.
It is slightly more complicated than that, for a conviction, but the point is, this chills free speech and makes it very difficult and is a deterrent for a fiction writer to get the details necessary for accuracy to allow for the suspension of disbelief
How does one hash out their ideas for the elaborate crimes in their book or any other expressive medium, with peace of mind?
Answer
Not online.
- Try a writer's group, where it is absolutely and explicitly clear that you are discussing this in the service of a story, and where other folks are discussing things just as potentially problematic.
- One writer I work with is writing a crime story and actually paid a retired detective as a consultant to make sure she got her details right. She interviewed him extensively and went over her story bit by bit to make sure it was feasible.
- You also might find true-crime books (or blogs?) to be useful, where someone else has already put down the details you need, and you can adapt as necessary.
John Rogers, one of the creators of the late and much-lamented Leverage, sometimes jokes on his blog that the things he'd had to research online probably have him on every government watch list in existence, because Leverage was about five master criminals acting as Robin Hoods — committing elaborate cons and crimes to help innocent people.
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