American screenwriter · credited screenplay, Sudden Impact (1983)
Joseph Stinson (also credited as Joseph C. Stinson) is an American screenwriter whose credits include Sudden Impact (1983), City Heat (1984) and Stick (1985). He holds the sole screenplay credit on Sudden Impact, adapting a story by Earl E. Smith and Charles B. Pierce into a Dirty Harry picture — which makes him the author of record for every line in the film, including this one. But a credit of record is not settled authorship: both Milius and Pierce have been credited with this particular sentence, and of the three claimants Stinson is the one least often argued for by name. Published biographical sources on him are thin; no reliable birth or death dates could be confirmed, so none are asserted here.