Nancy Grace, Ruling for The Viewer

"I guess I was naive, thinking justice would remain blind," she says on-air, on the day of the verdict. She scolds the jury foreman, Paul Rodriguez.

"You got a grown man sleeping with little boys," she says. "Hell- oooooo !"

"Yes, but -- ," Rodriguez says.

"How do you explain this guy's sleeping with a 13-year-old boy 365 nights in their underwear?" she asks.

Rodriguez tries to explain the notion of "reasonable doubt," but Grace dismisses this.

Grace, 44, was a prosecutor for 10 years in Atlanta before moving to Court TV in 1997. Television seems to be her perfect medium. For one thing, it allows her to interrupt guests as much as she likes. For another, she gets to emote in close-up. Under that nostalgic cotton-candy froth of hair, her face is a fabulous mosaic of glares, sneers and pained squints. When expressing righteous indignation, which is a great deal of the time, Grace does her imperious queen face, flaring her nostrils or shouting, pausing between each word for emphasis. She did this a lot during the Jackson trial, saying things like, "WEARING. HIS. PAJAMAS!"

Grace's fiance was murdered in a botched robbery in 1980. In her book, she explains how that caused her to change her mind about being a schoolteacher, and to become a prosecutor of violent crime instead. These days, she tends to see the world in terms of black and white, good and evil, victims and villains. Her show on Headline News is reminiscent of the populist, do-it-yourself crime-solving of "America's Most Wanted." Viewers are urged to be careful, to be on the lookout, to call law enforcement with tips. The show also has its own "injustice" hotline. Once in a while, Grace has fun with a subject like the "incredible stories" of psychic detectives.

Crusading on behalf of vanished innocents -- the Chandra Levys, Jennifer Wilbankses and Laci Petersons -- Grace conjures a world in which dark forces lurk behind every corner, and young women are constantly in danger of being snatched or slain.

"A dangerous alert tonight, for all of you planning a summer vacation," she announced during her first show about Natalee Holloway, the 18-year-old from Alabama who disappeared in Aruba. Night after night in recent weeks, Grace has revisited Holloway's disappearance, quizzing the CNN reporter in Aruba for the slightest incremental advances in the story. ("Bring us up-to-date, friend.") Producers display photos of the blond girl while Grace says again and again that Holloway "looks like a beauty queen." She peers deep into the camera and says soulfully, "Natalee. Where. Are. You?" Then Grace shakes her head sadly.

Since "Nancy Grace" debuted in February, it has averaged half a million viewers. That's great for Headline News, which last year was averaging less than half that during its 8 p.m. time slot. (Over on Fox News, Bill O'Reilly still eclipses Grace with well over 2 million viewers.) Meanwhile, "Objection!" debuted at No. 7 on the New York Times bestseller list.

Occasionally, the many friends of Nancy Grace get a glimpse of how tightly wound she is. One day, during a discussion about Jackson, a psychotherapist guest mildly remarks that "it is possible for children to falsely accuse adults of sexual abuse."

"What are you doing here?" Grace asks her, her face stony with betrayal. "Why did you say that?"