Case studies

Victim’s son encouraged by new focus on Nude Murders case

I was surprised and delighted to be contacted recently by Frank Quinn, the son of one of victims in the Hammersmith Nude Murders case. This was, of course, the unsolved serial-killer investigation from the 1960s that I cover occasionally on this blog, having first written about it in The Hunt for the 60s’ Ripper. Frank is the son of Frances Brown, who was the fifth of six women to be murdered. The killer, who successfully eluded what was then the […]

Hammersmith Nude Murders 0 3 min read

Murder by the Sea: Louisa Merrifield

Of the six cases featured in the latest Murder by the Sea series, Louisa May Merrifield’s is the one I would most like to research further. The Blackpool Poisoner was the final episode on CBS Reality’s British series last week, and it is fascinating. In 1953 Louisa went to work as a housekeeper for a rather cranky old gal called Sarah Ricketts, aged 79. As I point out during the programme, Louisa was something of a dodgy character, having had […]

Television 0 3 min read

Murder by the Sea: Barry Rogers and Penelope John

It is hard not to feel great sympathy for Rhianne Morris, who appeared on this week’s Murder by the Sea. She was the girlfriend of Barry Rogers, who, with his mother Penelope John, went to jail in 2018 for murdering his grandmother, Betty Guy. It is clear Rhianne is still haunted by her time with Rogers, who was abusive to her. She would later come to discover that while they were together, Rogers and his mother concocted their callous plot […]

Television 0 1 min read

Hatton Garden ITV

ITV’s Hatton Garden drama has been engrossing. The language is ripe and the cast – including Timothy Spall and Kenneth Cranham – is excellent. The Diamond Wheezers who burgled the underground safe-deposit company in London’s jewellery district in 2015 is a fascinating true-crime story. While pulling off this shocking theft, the veteran lags are also gasping, collapsing, falling asleep and taking plenty of toilet breaks. That light-hearted side is excellently done, scripted by Jeff Pope and Terry Winsor. Pope in […]

Books 0 1 min read

An Inconvenient Death

Just finished Miles Goslett’s account of the Dr David Kelly affair and it is a disconcerting read. Dr Kelly was the British scientist and weapons expert who was caught up in the controversy over whether Iraq really had missiles that could threaten Britain with mass destruction in 45 minutes. This claim was used to help justify the West’s attack on the country. Officials in Tony Blair’s government exposed Dr Kelly as a potential source for the news story that ignited […]

Books 0 1 min read

Murder by the Sea: David Ellis

The CBS Reality series continued to rake through the dark side of our seaside towns this week. This time it was the sad case of Swansea landlord Alec Warburton, who was murdered by his callous tenant, David Ellis. Ellis had a number of grubby convictions behind him, including sexual offences against a girl. He was also a liar and seems to have lied about his financial situation to convince Mr Warburton to rent a room to him. Swansea is a […]

Television 0 1 min read

Murder by the Sea: Mamie Stuart

The third episode of Murder by the Sea on CBS Reality is about a case that is 100 years old. The murder of Mamie Stuart was all made all the more unhappy because this was a crime in which the killer escaped justice. Mamie, a 26-year-old chorus dancer, disappeared in 1919. She had married to a man called George Shotton in 1918. They met soon after Mamie had finished a tour on stage and she had returned home to Sunderland. […]

Television 0 2 min read

Jack the Ripper – The Case Reopened BBC1

When I was on the last day of filming for BBC4’s Dark Son back in August, the film’s presenter and top criminologist David Wilson was chatting about the Jack the Ripper documentary he had just made with Emilia Fox. He was talking about how the programme shed new light on the case. Let’s face it, the Ripper industry of books, conventions and fansites can be tawdry. Many new publications are boring and often exploitative. However, having read David’s A History […]

Geographic profiling 1 1 min read

The Yorkshire Ripper Files

I remember as a student being woken by the radio alarm to news that police had finally arrested the Yorkshire Ripper – after long six years of hunting him. That was 1981. Big news. The murderer had spread fear across the North of England with his cowardly, obscene hammer attacks on women. The media had started by loyally reporting police efforts to catch the culprit, but this switched to doubts and criticism. Politicians turned on the police. The Reclaim the […]

Serial killer 3 1 min read

The Innocent Man by John Grisham

I started watching the Netflix true-crime series, but decided to switch to John Grisham’s book to better absorb these events. The author says in the series that you could not write this story as fiction because no one would believe it. It’s a really shocking tale of a vicious miscarriage of justice. It involves a rotten police investigation, lamentable courtroom failures and a prosecutor apparently hellbent on enacting his own prejudices. The town you probably want to avoid in Oklahoma […]

Books 0 1 min read

Please take a look at my Substack – www.personsunkown.net – for in-depth features on true crime and non-fiction books on the subject

Available from Amazon
Watch out for Murder by the Sea volume 1, being published in July 2022
The Hunt for the 60s' Ripper

Available from Amazon

***** Breakaway Reviewers
‘A fascinating piece of work… His writing is fluid and engaging, providing page after page of detail, analysis and understanding on this intriguing case’
Crime Traveller
‘This book is meticulously researched’
***** CrimeSquad
‘… achieves what all great non-fiction crime books set out to do: be impeccably researched, highly readable and show sensitivity towards the victims. Highly recommended

About me

Why do people commit crimes? How are they caught? Or not caught? These are questions I think we are all interested in to some degree. I'm a journalist and author delving into cases old and recent, as well as a contributor to documentaries such as Murder by the Sea, Voice of a Killer, The Real Prime Suspect and Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer. I'm currently working on a book about corruption and how the hit BBC drama Line of Duty echoes real-life wrongdoing in the police.