Diamond Doris: The True Story of the World's Most Notorious Jewel Thief

by Doris Payne, Zelda Lockhart

Overview

Soon to be a Major Motion Picture

In the ebullient spirit of Ocean’s 8, The Heist, and Thelma & Louise, a sensational and entertaining memoir of the world’s most notorious jewel thief—a woman who defied society’s prejudices and norms to carve her own path, stealing from elite jewelers to live her dreams.

Growing up during the Depression in the segregated coal town of Slab Fork, West Virginia, Doris Payne was told her dreams were unattainable for poor black girls like her. Surrounded by people who sought to limit her potential, Doris vowed to turn the tables after the owner of a jewelry store threw her out when a white customer arrived. Neither racism nor poverty would hold her back; she would get what she wanted and help her mother escape an abusive relationship.

Using her southern charm, quick wit, and fascination with magic as her tools, Payne began shoplifting small pieces of jewelry from local stores. Over the course of six decades, her talents grew with each heist. Becoming an expert world-class jewel thief, she daringly pulled off numerous diamond robberies and her boyfriend fenced the stolen gems to Hollywood celebrities.

Doris’s criminal exploits went unsolved well into the 1970s—partly because the stores did not want to admit that they were duped by a black woman. Eventually realizing Doris was using him, her boyfriend turned her in. She was arrested after stealing a diamond ring in Monte Carlo that was valued at more than half a million dollars. But even prison couldn’t contain this larger-than-life personality who cleverly used nuns as well as various ruses to help her break out. With her arrest in 2013 in San Diego, Doris’s fame skyrocketed when media coverage of her astonishing escapades exploded.

Today, at eighty-seven, Doris, as bold and vibrant as ever, lives in Atlanta, and is celebrated for her glamorous legacy. She sums up her adventurous career best: “It beat being a teacher or a maid.” A rip-roaringly fun and exciting story as captivating and audacious as Catch Me if You Can and Can You Ever Forgive Me?—Diamond Doris is the portrait of a captivating anti-hero who refused to be defined by the prejudices and mores of a hypocritical society.

 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062918017
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	09/17/2019
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	276
Sales rank:	348,681
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Doris Payne is the daughter of a coal miner and the youngest of six siblings. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia.

Table of Contents

Prologue: Mined

April 1956 3

Part I Color

1 I Wasn't Born a Jewel Thief 11

2 Greed 17

3 My Declaration of War 25

4 Mr. Benjamin 33

Part II Clarity

5 Trickster in Practice 43

6 Finding My Way Out 48

7 My First Big Heist 61

8 Hot Ice, Cold Feet 68

9 Making Good on My Crimes 77

10 Taking Things to the Next Level 88

11 Racial Backfire 104

12 It's Who You Know, but You Don't Own Me 115

13 Family Ties and Known Associates 125

Part III Cut

14 Going International 137

15 Diamond Fever 156

16 Returning to Baby Jesus 174

17 Fault Line 181

18 Off My Game 186

19 Throwing Dust at Disaster 199

Part IV Carat

20 Snared 209

21 Telling People What They Want to Hear 223

22 Tokyo Diamonds and the Mohair Coat 229

23 The Long Game 235

24 Dry Snitches 249

25 Reckoning 254

Epilogue: DVVS

December 2018 265

Acknowledgments 267

Editorial Reviews

Payne's storytelling voice is easy and intimate…You want to cheer for Payne when she pulls off her first major theft…And by the time she's on a plane flying from Paris to Rome with a $55,000 Van Cleef & Arpels watch in her luggage, she's stolen yet another thing. Your heart.

The New York Times Book Review - Marilyn Stasio

Payne’s personal charm is clearly evident on every page. Engaging reading about an elegant modern-day Robin Hood.” — Kirkus Reviews

“This astonishing memoir by a daring and prolific African American jewel thief reads like a thrilling caper novel, even as it reveals hard truths. . . . At the core of this incredible tale, a sassy catch me-if-you-can told from a Black female’s perspective, is a defiant and relentless woman who will do anything to go against what is dictated by her skin color and socioeconomic status.” — Booklist (starred review)

“Payne’s storytelling voice is easy and intimate. . . .You want to cheer for Payne.  . . . She’s stolen yet another thing. Your heart.” — New York Times

 “Payne’s story has made her life irresistible.”  — Atlanta Journal-Constitution

From the Publisher

Payne’s story has made her life irresistible.” 

Atlanta Journal-Constitution

This astonishing memoir by a daring and prolific African American jewel thief reads like a thrilling caper novel, even as it reveals hard truths. . . . At the core of this incredible tale, a sassy catch me-if-you-can told from a Black female’s perspective, is a defiant and relentless woman who will do anything to go against what is dictated by her skin color and socioeconomic status.

Booklist (starred review)

Payne’s storytelling voice is easy and intimate. . . .You want to cheer for Payne.  . . . She’s stolen yet another thing. Your heart.

New York Times

 “Payne’s story has made her life irresistible.” 

Atlanta Journal-Constitution

This astonishing memoir by a daring and prolific African American jewel thief reads like a thrilling caper novel, even as it reveals hard truths. . . . At the core of this incredible tale, a sassy catch me-if-you-can told from a Black female’s perspective, is a defiant and relentless woman who will do anything to go against what is dictated by her skin color and socioeconomic status.

Booklist (starred review)

Narrator Robin Miles enlivens this memoir of Doris Payne, a notorious African-American jewel thief who was active for more than 50 years. Miles rises to the level of Southern charm exhibited by Payne—which is a remarkable feat. Filled with brashness and boldness, her story, which reads like a novel, will likely remind listeners of recent, and not so recent, “jewel heist” films. Payne, no stranger to segregation, prejudice, and poverty, resolved to raise her level of abundance, and so she did. Miles’s on-point performance closes any distance between writer and narrator. This personal story does not shy away from examining international attitudes toward racial issues. W.A.G. © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine

NOVEMBER 2019 - AudioFile

Narrator Robin Miles enlivens this memoir of Doris Payne, a notorious African-American jewel thief who was active for more than 50 years. Miles rises to the level of Southern charm exhibited by Payne—which is a remarkable feat. Filled with brashness and boldness, her story, which reads like a novel, will likely remind listeners of recent, and not so recent, “jewel heist” films. Payne, no stranger to segregation, prejudice, and poverty, resolved to raise her level of abundance, and so she did. Miles’s on-point performance closes any distance between writer and narrator. This personal story does not shy away from examining international attitudes toward racial issues. W.A.G. © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine

NOVEMBER 2019 - AudioFile

2019-07-15
An ex-jewel thief's account of her more than 50-year career stealing fabulously expensive gems from some of the world's most exclusive stores.

Born to an African American coal miner father and his Native American wife in the West Virginia community of Slab Fork, Payne grew up with a keen awareness of social injustice. She knew from childhood that "greedy coal mining companies made a ton of money" on poor families by skimping on housing and mine safety. Though her family lived decently, she and her mother sometimes became victims of her father's violence. Determined to stay independent of men and help her mother get away from her father, Payne employed a talent for theft that she accidentally discovered while trying on watches at a jewelry store. She began her criminal career in her early teens stealing food from the market and money from school for her family. As her confidence grew, so did her desire to live in the luxury denied people of color. By her late teens, Payne used her beauty and charm to entice store jewelry store clerks into showing her the expensive jewelry she took with ease. Later, she became involved with a married Jewish businessman who introduced her to the black market underworld and helped her score major thefts all over the country. After his death, Payne set her sights on international heists at stores like Cartier and Bulgari. She served one light jail sentence late in her career for a minor theft, yet neither the FBI nor international police were ever able to definitively prove her guilt. Payne's personal charm is clearly evident on every page, but what makes her book especially provocative is her righteous anger at a (largely white) diamond trade built on the backs of poor Africans and her belief that she was "notorious on purpose."

Engaging reading about an elegant modern-day Robin Hood.

Kirkus Reviews