A shocking or sensational crime.
A journal or broadsheet printing such reports.
A shocker: a report of a crime written in a provokingly lurid style.
Dreadfully.
Genuinely horrific, awful, or alarming; dangerous, risky.
Unpleasant, awful, very bad (also used as an intensifier).
An act that constitutes the crime of first-degree murder.
The criminal offence of murder in a form considered by law to be the most serious; the precise distinction may vary by jurisdiction but typically involves premeditation, or the choice of victim or other circumstances being regarded as especially blameworthy.