Cold Cases: Astonishing investigations from The Green River Killer to JonBenét Ramsey

by Charlotte Greig

There's nothing more chilling than an unsolved crime, particularly one involving direct harm to human life; be it murder or rape, these are the crimes whose effects extend furthest and cause most pain to how much worse when they go unsolved and, as such, unpunished?

Such crimes, so-called 'cold cases', are all too common, especially in the big cities where hundreds if not thousands of such incidents remain on file. After the initial furore of questioning suspects and analyzing motives has died down, investigators are often left with no leads, and the uneasy knowledge that a dangerous person is still on the loose, possibly preparing to strike again.

But there is hope. With the development of science, and the continuing improvements in detection techniques, the re-examination of old, unsolved crimes is yielding positive results, often decades after the cases originally went 'cold'. This book documents the most fascinating of these cases, and

The murdered heiress, Helen Brach
Albert Fish, child killer
The Green River killer, Gary Leon Ridgway
Gerald Parker, the 'Bedroom Basher'
The woman in a box
The bone breaker, Joe Clark
Frank Bender, forensic sculptor
Dennis Rader, the 'Bind, Torture, Kill' killer

Genres: Nonfiction, True Crime

258 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[Deanne · Rating 2 out of 5]

All the makings of a good book, but there are instances where the author makes statements which don't make sense. Why would forensics be worried about damaging DNA in 1981, The first time it was used in a criminal case was after the murder of Dawn Ashworth in 1987 near Leicester.
There were cases which were interesting and could probably cover more than 4 pages.

[Amelia Hill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honestly, I thought this book would just be about cases that have gone unsolved for years and then suddenly re-opened but surprisingly it excluded a lot more than just that; DNA profiling, murderers, body farm etc; it was amazing just reading a semi behind the scenes book

[Kristin · Rating 1 out of 5]

I picked this up because I have a bit of morbid curiosity about things like this. However, it was one of the more disappointing books I've ever read. It seemed like it was written at a 5th or 6th grade level, although I rather hope most 5th graders aren't reading about serial killers and such too often. There were some fairly glaring editing errors, and instead of simply sticking with presenting the facts of the cases, the author made sure to include her own personal thoughts on all the cases and the accused were included.

[pages.with.jayden]

This unfortunately was a dnf for me. I love anything to do with true crime and was excited to dive in to this one but the cases had little information about them and I would have preferred more of an in depth look in to these cases.

[Aleksandra Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoy this kind of books, but I would have preferred more in depth approach to these cases.

[Charlotte Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting how some of the cases they kept the DNA for that long and still catch the killer 20 plus years down the line

[Angèle Hatton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative, easy to follow, and a bit boring. Exactly what I expected to be honest. The stories of some of these cases are quite interesting though, so I would pick this up if you’re interested in true crime.

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was interesting and informative. In contains information about many different ‘Cold Cases’ (crimes that have been re-investigated years after the crime occurred).

The book is split into five chapters:
In Cold Blood - Murders that were especially shocking.
Cold Comfort - Crimes which made the front page of the newspapers and raised controversial issues.
Cold-steel Killers - Serial killers.
Cool Heads - Crimes solved with a variety of detection methods.
Cold Sweat - Crimes solved with DNA technology.

Each chapter contains details of several cases. For each case we learn about the crime, the detection, how it was solved, and how the criminal was finally brought to justice. There are also several black and white pictures for each case.

This book was very easy to read and understand, as all of the technical terms are clearly described. A good introductory book for anyone interested in crime solving methods.

[Rose]

Alright book, but Greig is a bit confused about DNA.

"From Elise's DNA, which was the same as her mother's...they matched the blood on the handle."

"The slide sample had been untouched in 1981, for fear of damaging the DNA cells on it."

[Shootsie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good book for quick interesting stories.