Family: Born June 27, 1933, in Brooklyn, NY; s. Sidney and Helen (Holland) K.; m. Beverly Gerstel, Sept. 22, 1957; children: Stephen Lee, Jonathan Howard. Education: Brooklyn Coll.1951-53. :Positions held: photojournalist, filmmaker, United Hias Service, NYC 1953-57.; writer Am. Cancer Soc. N.Y.C.1958-63; UN, NYC and Rome, 1963-64; self-employed writer since 1964. Career-related: vis. prof. investigative journalism U. Calif. at Santa Cruz, 1986-92; lectr. various univs. Fellow Guggenheim 1970- ; fellow, Adlai E. Stevenson Coll ; U. Calif,1986-92; grantee Am. Council Learned Socs., 1971; recipient Laceno d"Oro (best screenplay), Neorealist Film Festival, Avellino, Italy,1983. Author: Death in Rome, 1967, Black Sabbath, 1969, The Fall of the House of Savoy, 1971, Days of Wrath, 1980 (Pulitzer Prize nomination 1981), Love is Colder Than Death, 1987, Naked by the Window, 1990, Dossier Priebke, 1997, The Battle for Rome, 2003; author 3 novels, 10 screenplays.

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WRITINGS

• Death in Rome, Macmillan, 1967.
• Black Sabbath: A Journey through a Crime against Humanity, Macmillan, 1969.
• The Fall of the House of Savoy, Macmillan, 1971.
• A Giant in the Earth, Stein & Day, 1973.
• The Cassandra Crossing, Ballantine, 1976.
• Ziggurat, Houghton, 1977.
• The Spoils of Ararat, Houghton, 1978.
• Days of Wrath:The Ordeal of Aldo Moro, the Kidnapping, the Execution, the Aftermath, Doubleday, 1980.
• Il caso Moro (with G. Ferrara and A. Balducci) , Pironti, 1987.
• Love is Colder than Death: The Life and Times of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Random House, 1987.
• Naked by the Window: The Fatal Marriage of Carl Andre and Ana Mendieta, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1990.
• Dossier Priebke, Rizzoli, 1997.
• The Battle for Rome: the Germans, the Allies, the Partisans and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944, Simon & Schuster, 2003.

Contributor to anthologies What If? 2: Eminent Historians Imagine What Might Have Been, edited by Robert Cowley, Putnam, 2001.and The Jews of Italy Under Fascist and Nazi Rule, 1922-1945, edited by Joshua Zimmerman, Cambridge University Press, 2006. Contributor of articles, essays, and book reviews to various publications, including American Film, Esquire, Washington Post, New York Times Book Review, and New York Times.

Author of screenplays "Massacre in Rome" (based on his book Death in Rome), 1973, "The Cassandra Crossing" (based on his book of the same title), 1977, "La Pelle," 1981, "The Salamander," 1983, "Kamikaze 1989," 1983, "Hotel Colonial," 1983, "Il caso Moro" (based on his book Days of Wrath), 1986, and "Blood Ties" (story only), 1986;(click to see complete Filmography); author of sound recording "The Great Population Explosion Hoax," Pacifica Tape Library, 1973. Former consultant to PrimeTime Live, American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. (ABC), 60 Minutes, Columbia Broadcasting
System, Inc. (CBS), The History Channel, and Italian television's RAI networ news magazine, Mixer.

Katz encountered legal difficulties with the release of the film Massacre in Rome, based on his best-seller Death in Rome. The book aroused international religious and political controversy; the film brought the controversy to court, culminating in a two-year criminal trial. Katz was ultimately convicted and sentenced to fourteen months in prison for defaming the memory of Pope Pius XII.  The verdict was overturned on appeal and later the case was dismissed by Italy’s Supreme Court

Katz recounts a true-life fatal incident involving a famous sculptor and his artist wife in the book Naked by the Window: The Fatal Marriage of Carl Andre and Ana Mendieta. Andre claimed that his wife fell out of their apartment window in New York during an argument, but police charged him with her murder. He was later acquitted in a non-jury trial even in the face of damaging evidence that his wife was terrified of heights and avoided windows and that Andre's body had been severely scratched. Genevieve Stuttaford, writing in Publishers Weekly, called the book a "shocking police procedural."

In The Battle for Rome: The Germans, the Allies, the Partisans, and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944, the author chronicles a turbulent nine months following the downfall of Italian dictator Mussolini at the end
of World War II. As the Nazi forces took control, Italian resistance soon
followed. The author recounts how people within the Vatican helped some resisters while going against the directives of the pope, who saw Russian occupation as a more dangerous threat. A Kirkus Reviews contributor wrote: " An episodic reconstruction, complete with a dazzling dramatis personae." Brian K. DeLuca, writing in the Library Journal, commented that "this is an excellent work." In a review of the book under its English title of Fatal Silence: The Pope, the Resistance, and the German Occupation of Rome, New Statesman contributor Peter Stanford commented that the author "has a novelist's gift for narrative" and added that "this is popular history at its best."

• Catholic Historical Review, July, 2004, Brian R. Sullivan, review of The Battle for Rome: The Germans, the Allies, the Partisans, and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944, p. 566.
• Contemporary Review, March, 2004, review of Fatal Silence: the Pope,
  the Resistance and the German Occupation of Rome, p. 187
• Independent, July 19, 2000, Michael Mewshaw, "The Silence of the Critics."
• Kirkus Reviews, July 1, 2003, review of The Battle for Rome, p. 894
• Library Journal, April 15, 2003, review of The Battle for Rome, p.
  64; August, 2003, Brian K. DeLuca, review of The Battle for Rome, p. 101
• New Republic, March 22, 2004, IstvAn DeAk, review of The Battle for
  Rome, p. 30.
• New Statesman, October 13, 2003, Peter Stanford, review of Fatal Silence, p. 49
• New York Times Book Review, August 31, 1969, review of Black Sabbath: A Journey Through a Crime against Humanity, p. 6; April 8, 1973, review of A Giant in the Earth, p. 30; June 12, 1977, Newgate Callendar, review of Ziggurat, p. 32; August 6, 1978, Newgate Callendar, review of The Spoils of Ararat: A Novel, p. 33; May 18, 1980, Flora Lewis, review of Days of Wrath: The Ordeal of Aldo Moro, the Kidnapping, the Execution, the Aftermath, p. 12; May 17, 1987, William J. Harding, review of Love Is Colder than
  Death: The Life and Times of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, p. 51; June 10, 1990, Vincent Patrick, review of Naked by the Window: The Fatal Marriage of Carl Andre and Ana Mendieta, p. 24.
• Publishers Weekly, March 20, 1990, Genevieve Stuttaford, review of Naked by the Window, p. 4723333014421687
• Times Literary Supplement, January 1, 1970, review of Black Sabbath, p. 6; July 11, 1980, Caroline Moorehead, review of Days of Wrath, p. 777.
• Washington Post Book World, May 27, 1980.

Marquis publications: Who's Who in the World, Who’s Who in Entertainment ^®;Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2003, http://www.galenet.com/servlet/BioRC