Linda Fairstein Might Get Even With You in Riveting New Novel, "Hell Gate"

It was a great morning to have Linda Fairstein on the show, and not just because her latest novel “Hell Gate” is out this week. As the former chief of the Sex Crimes Unit in the Manhattan District Attorney’s office, Fairsten was well-equipped to address many pressing news items, which may or may not be a good sign.

A few years ago, Fairstein, who has written more than a dozen novels, realized she had never used political scandal in a storyline. Suddenly, New York was rife with them, from Eliot Spitzers hooker-laden downfall to the discovery that former New York Congressman Vito Fossella had a secret second family in Washington.

“The scandals just kept on coming!” Fairstein exclaimed. “I could not keep up in fiction with what was happening in the world. I just had to use my imagination to tell my own story.”

In “Hell Gate,” the crime is human trafficking, which Fairstein called “a pretty ugly circumstance” where men usually wind up as agricultural laborers and women become sex slaves. Fairstein also hinted that some funny business goes down at Gracie Mansion, the residence for New York City’s mayor that is presently unoccupied because Mayor Michael Bloomberg lives in his own bigger, better mansion.

While he had a sex crimes expert on set, Imus wondered if sex rehab actually works. Presuming he was talking about Tiger Woods’s predicament, Fairstein said she wouldn’t bet that sort of treatment would change Tiger’s behavior in the long term.

“I was taking about Charles’s problem, but if you want to talk about Tiger, we can,” Imus said.

While she’s not confident in the results of sex rehab, Fairstein does believe sexual addiction is a problem akin to drug or alcohol addiction. Also similarly, rehab will work well for some people, less well for others.

A former prosecutor, Fairstein is disturbed by accusations that New York Governor David Paterson asked the State Police to intervene in a violent domestic dispute involving one of his closest aides.

“That is going to keep so many women from picking up the phone to call, when they think the police force and the government is really telling them to stay back,” she said. “That’s the part that offends me.”

Luckily, Fairstein has a very Imus-like way of getting back at offensive people. Asked if any public figure would recognize themselves in a “Hell Gate” character, she said coyly, “Probably a few people. I like to put those who have crossed me in the book.”

No wonder she fits right in on this show.

-Julie Kanfer