“48 Hours: Murder They Wrote, The End of the Dream”

Tomorrow at 10 p.m. on WCBS/Ch. 2

HI. My name is Linda and I’m a junkie. No, not drugs – not even shopping. I’m a true-crime junkie. I love to read true-crime books, and in fact, I used to live for Sunday nights when the Movie of the Week would always be the cheesiest and most grisly movie about the cheesiest and most grisly true crime.

Then, a few years ago, some network genius in a suit decided that we – the American watching public – didn’t care to see murderous moms, clergymen who kill and con men who strangle lovesick widows after sleeping with them. Wrong.

The suits at HBO knew better.

I just don’t know what I would have done if HBO hadn’t come along to rescue Sunday nights with fake murder, crazy sex and funeral parlor humor.

Anyway, in a brilliant move, CBS decided to get back into the true crime biz, in a documentary sort of way, with”48 Hours,” which began a Friday- night series called, “Murder They Wrote.”

Each week, the show documents true-crime stories, taken from the books of the great true-crime writers of our day.

Oh shut up! Just because true-crime writers still use punctuation – which is counter to the way show-off fiction writers have been writing recently – doesn’t mean they’re not good. (Yes, I’ve noticed all books that are reviewed as “literature” these days inevitably are books written without quotation marks.)

This Friday’s “48 Hours” is a clear indication of just why God invented true-crime books. My favorite true-crime writer, Ann Rule, narrates tomorrow night’s show, which is based on one of her books, “The End of the Dream.” (I love Ann Rule so much, I just handed over to her agents a manuscript of a book I wrote!)

Since some of the best things about true-crime books are the photographs, in a TV version of a book, you get a double treat – there’s video as well as still photos. Too much true crime is never enough true crime, I always say.

“The End of the Dream,” with reporter Susan Spencer – who is awfully good, by the way – details the crazy life of hunk/bank robber (now dead hunk/bank robber) Scott Scurlock, a.k.a., “Hollywood,” an incredibly ingenious guy who lived in an elaborate tree house in Olympia, Wash., (complete with hot tub, and gourmet kitchen) and enjoyed a Robin Hood lifestyle. (Well, if Robin Hood needed $20,000 a week to keep up his lifestyle).This “48 Hours” does do justice to the story – getting in all the juicy bits, so it’s worth the watch.

Coming up in the next few weeks: Twins who murder; a woman who killed her two sons – or maybe not; a man who killed his girlfriend, had his other girlfriend videotape it and was acquitted because there was no proof – even though the tape turned up after the trial; and murdered prostitutes in Spokane.

What does all this prove? For one thing, stay out of the freaking state of Washington. There are weirdoes out there.