Ellen worked in the entertainment business for 15 years, developing film projects at Universal, 20th Century Fox, Paramount and Columbia Pictures. She oversaw Original Movies at H.B.O. and was given her own production company at Disney. Like many people who endured more than a decade in Hollywood, she began her career with the inimitable Roger Corman.
She left entertainment for Crime Analysis in South Central, where she was surprised to find fewer crooks than in Hollywood. Her first essay, "The L.A.P.D. Teaches Creative Writing" has been excerpted in multiple textbooks, translated into 12 languages and is widely used as a teaching tool in police departments and academies across the country. She is always available to speak to law enforcement agencies.
Though she now writes full time, Ellen is a long-time teacher in men's maximum security prisons and the occasional university. It would be impolitic to admit she prefers convicts to undergrads.
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