Question: The murderer in The Journalist and the Murderer was convicted in what year?

Context paragraphs:
Mumia Abu-Jamal: Mumia Abu-Jamal (born Wesley Cook; April 24, 1954) is a convicted murderer, American activist and journalist who became involved in black nationalism in his youth and was a member of the Black Panther Party until October 1970.  He left the party and became a radio reporter, eventually becoming president of the Philadelphia Association of Black Journalists.  He was convicted and sentenced to death in 1982 for the murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner.  After numerous appeals, his sentence was commuted in 2001 to life imprisonment without parole.

Eric Nenno: Eric Charles Nenno (April 13, 1961 – October 28, 2008), was a convicted sex offender who was executed for the 1995 rape and murder of seven-year-old Nicole Benton.  He was executed in 2008 in Huntsville, Texas, becoming the 1128th murderer to be executed in the United States since 1976.  He was the 13th murderer executed in Texas in 2008 and the 418th murderer executed in Texas since 1976.

Alfred Rouse: Alfred Arthur Rouse (6 April 1894 – 10 March 1931) was a British murderer known as the Blazing Car Murderer who was convicted and subsequently hanged at Bedford Gaol for the November 1930 murder of an unknown man in Hardingstone, Northamptonshire in a murder case which became known as the "Blazing Car Murder".

Jeffrey R. MacDonald: Jeffrey Robert MacDonald (born October 12, 1943) is an American medical doctor who was convicted in 1979 of murdering his pregnant wife and two daughters in February 1970.

Christopher Scarver: Christopher J. Scarver (born July 6, 1969) is an American convicted murderer who also killed serial killer and cannibal Jeffrey Dahmer at Columbia Correctional Institution, Portage, Wisconsin, in 1994.  Scarver used a 20-inch (51 cm) metal bar he removed from a piece of exercise equipment in the prison weight room to beat Dahmer and another convicted murderer, Jesse Anderson.  Both Dahmer and Anderson died later from their injuries.  Scarver was sentenced to two further life sentences for the killings.

Leslie Van Houten: Leslie Louise Van Houten (born August 23, 1949) is an American murderer serving a life sentence in relation to the 1969 killings of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca, when Van Houten was 19 years old.  She was arrested weeks later, and convicted at the main Charles Manson trial in 1971, at which she repeatedly sabotaged her own defense, and tried to exculpate Manson.  She was convicted and became the youngest woman ever sentenced to death in California.  However, executions were halted in the state in 1972 after the California Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional in "The People of the State of California v. Robert Page Anderson", 493 P.2d 880, 6 Cal.  3d 628 (Cal.  1972).  She was granted a new trial at which her defense to the charge of first degree murder was diminished responsibility, but the jury could not agree on a verdict.  At a third trial, she was convicted and sentenced to life in prison, although with a possibility of parole.  In relation to her case, high courts, parole boards, and the state governor have said that an inexplicable or racial motive for murder could merit exemplary punishment and outweigh any evidence of subsequent reform.

The Postcard Killers: A young American couple is murdered while vacationing in Europe.  The young woman’s father Jacob Kanon, a New York City police investigator travels to Europe to hunt down the murderer.  Other young couples in France, Germany, Denmark and Sweden have since then been killed and the evidence points in the same direction.  Kanon joins up with Scandinavian journalist Dessie Larsson to find the murderer.  Kanon and Larsson must work against time since every murder is preceded by a postcard to a regional daily.

The Journalist and the Murderer: The Journalist and the Murderer is a study by Janet Malcolm about the ethics of journalism, published by Alfred A. Knopf/Random House in 1990.  It is an examination of the professional choices that shape a work of non-fiction, as well as a rumination on the morality that underpins the journalistic enterprise.  The journalist in question is Joe McGinniss; the murderer is the former Special Forces captain Dr. Jeffrey R. MacDonald, who became the subject of McGinniss' 1983 book "Fatal Vision".

Jesse Anderson: Jesse Michael Anderson (May 3, 1957 – November 30, 1994) was a convicted American murderer who was murdered in prison, along with serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, by fellow inmate and convicted murderer Christopher Scarver.

Randy Roth: Randy Roth is a convicted murderer and thief from Washington.  He was convicted of the 1991 murder of his fourth wife, Cynthia Baumgartner Roth.  He was suspected but never tried for murdering his second wife, Janis Roth, in 1981.  In both deaths he was the only witness, he claimed the activity that led to the death was the idea of his deceased wife, and the bodies were cremated as quickly as could be arranged.  He was also convicted of stealing in the form of defrauding insurers and the Social Security Administration and was sentenced to one year for theft and 50 years for first degree murder in 1992.  At least two true crime books are based on Roth's crimes, "A Rose for Her Grave" by Ann Rule and "Fatal Charm" by Carlton Smith.

Supporting paragraphs: The Journalist and the Murderer Jeffrey R. MacDonald
Answer: 1979