Finally Laid To Rest: The Work of a Real UK ?Cold Case? Review Team

This book was written by a former Detective Chief Inspector who, after retirement, became one of the founding members of the Essex Police Major Crime Review Team (UK). It describes the day-to-day work of the team as it conducted formal reviews of current unsolved major crimes, especially offences of murder and 'stranger rape'. Their cases included the reviews of the murders of retired Clacton Traffic Warden, Jean Dicker, and a Chelmsford grandmother, Violet Dunderdale. Both were savagely beaten to death with hammers, in their respective homes. It also includes some 'cold case' reviews, like that of the 1978 rape and murder of Rochford shopkeeper Norah Trott. The author details the original police investigation and describes the review, 25 years later, that finally led to the conviction of her killer. The author also describes the work carried out in respect of missing persons (MISPERS), especially those who disappeared in mysterious circumstances and who are or were believed to have been murdered. Those MISPER reviews include one into the disappearance of teenager Dinah McNicol, who went missing whist hitch hiking home from a music festival. She would have made it home had she not been picked up by serial killer Peter Tobin, who initially escaped justice. The review led to a re-investigation of Dinah's disappearance and to her body being found buried in the back garden of a house in Margate. This was also where missing Scottish schoolgirl Vicky Hamilton was found buried. There are also unusual cases; like that of Maurice Sams who allegedly committed suicide in his Maldon caravan more than 50 years ago. His son later retrieved some private papers causing him to question whether or not his father's death really was suicide. The subsequent review of this death almost read like an Agatha Christie novel! Then there was the case of the elderly woman who believed she had been kidnapped as a baby, and brought up in a different family, by a woman who had accidentally smothered her own baby. If this lady's story was true, a baby's body had been secretly buried somewhere; and another family was still mourning the loss of their own baby. The book also covers reviews of unsolved 'cold case stranger rapes', like that of a schoolgirl attacked one evening whilst walking home from a school concert. Ironically, it was not the rapist's own misdeeds that later helped us to identify him, but a separate crime committed by another member of his family. These are just some of the stories recounted in this book which was written as tribute to the victims, their families and all those who tried to secure justice for them.