May 20, 2024 • 38 mins
In this episode, former Scotland Yard detective inspector, Steve Keogh, explains the procedures detectives go through at the scene of a murder.
If you enjoy these podcasts, you may wish to join the online community at https://steve-keogh.thinkific.com/pages/landing-page where you can meet and talk with fellow authors, take part in regular Q&As with Steve Keogh and make use of the online courses, all designed to help you achieve authenticity in your storytelling.
You can learn more about all of Steve's work at https://stevekeogh.com/ and find out about the two books Steve has published and his TV series, Secrets of a Murder Detective.
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Episode Transcript
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Steve Keogh (00:02):
Welcome to murder investigation for crime Writers, the podcast where we delve
into the dark world of murder to help bringauthenticity to your stories.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, a former ScotlandYard detective inspector.
So grab your notebook, sharpen your pencils,and prepare to embark on a journey into a
world few get to see.
This is murder investigation for crime
(00:23):
writers.
Hello and welcome to episode three of murder
investigation for crime writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keough.
I think you've probably listened to the firsttwo, and I feel like I shouldn't keep
introducing myself as fully as I do, but justbriefly, I'll do it for a couple of episodes
(00:46):
and then maybe change my mind.
I was former police officer, did 30 years in
the police, twelve as murder detective.
So today I'm going to look at what detectives
do when they go to the scene of a murder, whena murder just happened, and local police call
for the murder team to come down and take onthe investigation, essentially.
(01:09):
So at any point of any day in any part of thecountry, there will be teams of detectives who
we use the expression on call.
They're the on call team, and they will
respond to any murders or similar type ofincidents that happen.
(01:29):
And the reason they're on duty and the reasonthey're ready to respond is what we call the
golden hour.
So this principle is it's not an hour, but
it's the time just after a murder whenevidence is most abundantly available.
And it's also the type of evidence that if youdon't get hold of it there and then it could
be lost.
(01:50):
We'll go into that a bit more detail.
But this is why we have teams on call ready torespond.
And unlike most detective units, they havecars that have got blue lights and sirens so
they can get there quickly because of thisgolden hour principle.
So I'll describe what it was like for me whenI was on these teams, and as I'm describing
(02:14):
it, I'll talk about my feelings, my thoughtprocesses, that kind of thing, to give you an
idea of sort of things you might want to writeabout for your own detectives if they're in
that situation.
So let's just start off by saying that when
teams are on call, they're not just sat thereby a phone like the fire brigade waiting to
(02:35):
come out.
I mean, they are in certain way, but they'll
have work they'll be getting on with.
There'll be investigations that are either
unsolved or they're preparing for court, andthere'll be lots of work.
Murder detectives are never short of work todo, so they'll be getting on with that.
And in London, we have a system that's knownas the hat car homicide assessment team.
(02:57):
And so that's the on call team and known asthe hacker.
Around the country, they probably havedifferent expressions for this, but that's
what they used to call us.
And we had what was called the phone.
It was the phone and it was the phone that thecontrol room would call you on when a murder
happened.
And so at any point of the day, you'll have
(03:20):
detectives and they cover 24 hours a day.
So you've got a team of detectives and they'll
split the shift.
So there'll be someone sort of a normal eight
to four day.
Some will come on earlier.
For us, it would be seven till three, thenthere'll be another team on three to eleven,
and then the night duty team will be on elevento seven.
(03:41):
So 24 hours, they would cover it for the sevendays that that team has responsibility for
their on call week.
When I say team, what it will be is one
detective sergeant and maybe two or threedetective constables.
When a call comes in, they will answer thephone.
So you'll be sitting there in the office, youcould be getting on with your work, it might
(04:02):
be lunchtime, it might be your evening meal,you might be out having a bite to eat and the
phone goes off.
And I don't know why.
We always used to have a really annoyingringtone.
It'd be one that nobody on their.
Nobody would have on their own phone.
So you're never going to mistake it.
When this horrible ringtone goes off, it gets
your pulse racing because you're thinking,what is this, a murderer?
Is everything going to have to kick into gear?Are we going to have to grab everything and go
(04:25):
out to a murder scene?As a detective sergeant, when I was on it, I
tended to allow the detective constables tohave it.
Sometimes detective sergeants, each team wouldhave their own different ways of doing it.
But the phone would go off and you'd lookacross to your colleague and you're trying to
gauge fraud, their reaction, whether or notit's a proper job, a murder, or whether it's
(04:48):
someone ringing up for advice, because thatwould often happen.
They would ring up for some virus, they mightbe in a serious assault and they just want a
good steer on the way their investigationshould go from murder detectives.
And you can often pick up, just by looking atyour colleague, their reaction.
And they would sort of like, be bolt up,right?
Like they're kicking into gear now.
(05:10):
They're.
They're going into professional work mode,trying to get the information from the caller,
which would normally be the control room, butit could sometimes be police officers are put
directly through and they will be takinginformation.
And generally you can get a good feel thatthis is a proper job because you can see them,
you can see the way they're acting.
(05:30):
They've suddenly become more serious.
They're really writing down some franticnotes, they're intently listening to what
they're being told.
They would come off the phone and however many
of you there in the office, you're waiting forthem to tell you what's happened, and they
will say, it's a job.
Now, one of the words that I was always a bit
(05:52):
uncomfortable with, that we used was a job.
So every murder was a job.
We got a new job in.
Remember, we were working on that job, which
job you're working on at the moment.
So a murder is referred to as a job.
I was always really conscious that I didn'tuse that expression around family members,
because, yes, to us, it's a job.
(06:15):
And I think that term can conjure up the wrong
impression, because to the family members whohave lost their loved one, not a job, is it?
That's the murder of their loved one.
So I was always really, really conscious not
to use this expression in the presence of afamily.
But that is what murder detectives call eachmurder investigation, a job.
(06:36):
We've got a new job.
So they would say, we've got a new job.
Every detective has a daybook and it's likean.
A four size lined book that they would carrywith them all the time.
Sometimes you'd see on tv programmes,detectives with a pocketbook.
(06:58):
In my experience, pocketbooks are a thing ofthe past.
Certainly in London, you don't have detectivescarrying around pocketbooks, and so you'd get
your daybook out and you'd start writingwhatever information that the detective that
took the call has taken to tell you about thejob that's coming.
(07:19):
And then, as a detective sergeant, you've gotsome decisions to make.
Do we go out to it or do we give advice overthe phone?
If it's a murder, there is no question you goout to it.
Sometimes it might be that a death has beenreported and they're not sure whether or not
it's a murder or not.
And there can be some debate about whether or
not you go out, but for your purposes, wedon't really have to worry about that.
(07:43):
You're going to be writing about crimes,you're going to be writing about murders.
So the decision has to be made.
We're going out.
Before you leave the office, you just need tomake sure.
Is there anything that we can do now that willhelp us when we get down there or anything we
can set into motion, and particularly aroundresearch.
If the phone call included the victim's name,you'd be asking for research to be done by
(08:05):
either detectives that are there in the officeand not going out on the hat car, or for
somebody at one of the intelligence units tostart doing some intelligence cheques on the
victim.
And this all comes back to that same
expression.
To understand how a person died, you have to
understand how they lived.
So even at these very early stages, if you've
(08:27):
got the victim's name, you're going to want tostart building up a picture of who they are
and whether or not there's anything that'sjumping out from the intelligence that the
police have that may indicate why somebody hasmurdered them.
And then also what you need to do is knowwhere you're going.
Now, it may seem obvious there's murder, we goto the murder scene.
(08:47):
But sometimes murders aren't quite as simpleas a dead body's been found, somebody's been
murdered there, and then on that spot, there'sall sorts of nuances.
It could be a deposition site, there could bepeople at a hospital, there could be multiple
scenes.
So you need to understand where you're going
and then you make the decision.
We're going out, we're going out, we're
(09:08):
getting in the car, we're going to drive towherever it is.
But before you go, you need to make sureyou've got some things with you.
Now, we used to call it a spin bag.
Spin.
Spin bag.
And that comes from the term that you would
use when you execute a warrant.
So if I'm executing a warrant in a place,
we're doing a spin, we're doing an earlymorning spin, we're executing a warrant, we're
(09:30):
going to go and search premises.
And in order to do that, you would have to
have certain bits of equipment with you.
So, for instance, exhibit bags.
If you're going to seize any exhibits, youneed to be putting them into bags, sometimes
boxes to exhibit things like knives orfirearms, the fall barrier clothing.
So the paper suits, the overshoes, gloves,masks, etcetera.
(09:54):
All things that you would need in order todeal with a crime scene properly would be in
this bag.
We've got the spin bag.
We know where we're going, let's go.
Go down to the police car park, get in the car
and off you go.
Blue lights and sirens on your way to this
murder scene.
Now, I don't want to play down the
(10:14):
professionalism of the role that we play, butdriving on blue lights and sirens is quite
good fun and it does get the adrenaline going.
And you're driving through, particularly in
London, you're driving through some busytraffic, blue lights and sirens, you're
jumping red lights, you're going on the wrongside of road, you're going fast.
It does get the adrenaline going, but that canbe an issue, because when you've got
(10:38):
adrenaline surging through your body, itdoesn't lend itself to doing things in a calm
and methodical manner.
So you have to really try and calm yourself
down, train yourself to think about theprocess that you're going to start to put into
place when you get there.
I would genuinely have been the senior officer
(10:59):
in the car, whether I was a detectivesergeant, detective inspector, and I would
start thinking about the processes that I willgo through when I get to the scene, thinking
about the questions I need to ask, thinkingabout the actions I need to set into motion.
And when you're going to a crime scene, one ofthe things that is on your mind is actually in
(11:25):
your mind all the way through any sort ofmurder investigation.
But certainly this early stages is, I can'tget it wrong.
When you're investigating murder and you'regoing to the scene of a crime, you're going to
be making decisions.
Often you're making decisions on not a lot of
information, you're making decisions in whatis, quite often, you walk into a chaotic
(11:48):
situation.
You're conscious that, right, I need to be
really focused, I need to think about what I'mdoing.
Because what happens is that everything youdo, all the decisions you make, you know, at
some point down the line, they're going to bepored over by solicitors, lawyers, barristers
(12:08):
are going to be looking at what you do, thedecisions you make, looking for reasons they
can undermine what you've done, to try andpick apart your actions, all to do with
getting their client off at court.
Everything you do now is going to come under a
microscope later on, so that adds anotherlayer of pressure.
(12:32):
It increases your adrenaline.
So as much as you're trying to get your
adrenaline down, you're trying to stay calm,you don't want to turn up panicked, but you're
flying through the streets of London, loads ofnoise, blue lights, and, you know, you're
heading into a situation where later on,months down the line, you could be stood in
the old Bailey trying to justify why you didwhat you did.
(12:53):
All of this doesn't lend itself to being calm,but you've got to force yourself, you have to
be calm, you have to be seen to be in controlwhen you get there, even if inside you're like
the proverbial swan.
On the surface, it's smooth.
Underneath, you're kicking away like hell.
So you get in there.
And also, one thing you know is that havingdone this dozens of times, once you do get
(13:17):
there, there's a very good chance you're goingto walk into chaos.
Sometimes not sometimes it's under control.
The local officers have got everything done
under control, but quite often you'll walkinto absolute chaos and carnage and you've got
to try and bring order to that chaos.
So as you go in here, you've got all these
pressures that are being put on you, all thisadrenaline that's pumping through you.
(13:39):
What detectives use is what's known as thefive building blocks.
It's a system that when you turn up, if you gothrough in your mind, you're going to minimise
the chances of making mistakes, but you'realso going to maximise the chances of getting
the evidence you need.
So these are the five building blocks that
(14:00):
officers should.
They won't all be doing this, but what they
should be running through in their mind whenthey turn up to the scene of a murder.
And they are.
Preservation of life, preservation of scene,
securing of evidence, identification of victimand identification of suspect.
I'll go through them in a bit.
So you're there.
It could take 15 minutes, half an hour.
(14:22):
Depending on parts of London.
It could take you the best part of an hour toget to the crime scene.
Depending on where you're going from and to.
When you go into these scenes, there's a good
chance that you've never been there before.
You might know the general area, but you're
probably not going to know the specificstreet.
So as you're nearing it, you know, you're kindof getting close to where you need to be.
(14:44):
And the first thing you always see in thedistance, you'll see some blue lights and as
you get closer, you'll see police cars parkedup, you'll see people standing around the blue
tape, the cordon tape, you know where you needto go.
You pull up the car next to the cordon tape.
And what I would be doing as the senior
officer from the murder investigation teamthere at that time, the first thing I would
(15:08):
want to do, the first person I'd want to speakto, is the person that can give me the best
information about what has happened and whatactions police have taken.
Because in order for me to make the bestdecisions, I need good information.
I need information that I can make sounddecisions on.
(15:30):
Now, that person may be the local policeinspector, it may be a sergeant, but it could
be a constable, it could be the first personon scene.
So the first question I ask when I get thereis who is in charge and who can give me the
best information about what has happened andwhat actions police have taken.
And then I'll go and speak to that person.
(15:52):
And with me, I'll have.
We used to call them a scribe.
It would be a DC.
I designate a DC to stand with me with theirdaybook so they can make notes about
everything that is told to me, any questions Iask of them, and importantly, any decisions I
make there and then.
(16:13):
Now, what I don't want to be doing when I'm
talking to somebody and trying to getinformation from them is writing down, looking
up, writing down missing bits, not writingfully, because I'm trying to speak and write
at the same time.
So that's why it's important that I'd ever
note, take or ascribe to write down importantbits that are said, important decisions that
are made.
So I'm speaking to the officer there and it's
(16:38):
those two things I want to know what hashappened and what have you done about it?
So what has happened?What information have we got?
What do we know about the crime?What do we know about the victim?
What do we know about the suspects?What witnesses have we got?
What evidence have we got?What have we got here that I can use to try
and build a picture of the murder?Because the investigation has started now.
(17:03):
For me, the investigation for the murderstarted as soon as the police arrived.
Those initial uniform officers, they're partof the investigation, that initial bit.
But for me, I am now investigating this murderand I want to know as much information as I
can at this early stage so I can ensure thatevidence isn't being lost, that we're not
(17:24):
going to make any mistakes.
And that's where I'll start to go through
those building blocks.
So the first thing I'm going to want to know
about is preservation of life.
That may not be a hard one to answer.
We've got one victim and they've beenpronounced dead, or the expression we use in
the police is life pronounced extinct.
(17:45):
I think every day people would say, been
pronounced dead.
But in the police, it's life pronounced
extinct.
And the exact time, I would want to know.
So they would say to me, something along thelines of, the ambulance service were here, and
they pronounced life extinct at 1904.
But what you can't do is just take it for
granted that we've got one victim.
(18:07):
Now, this is particularly important.
If you're in a house, for instance, you gothere as the murder team.
There's a victim in the front room beingstabbed, life pronounced extinct.
But what we can't do is just assume thatthere's only one victim.
Just imagine if there was somebody upstairs,another victim, and they were bleeding out and
(18:29):
police hadn't gone up there just to make surethere was nobody up there, no other victims,
nobody else being injured.
So that would be a question I'd ask, have we
checked upstairs, or do we know for sure thereare no other victims?
Do we know there are no other casualties?Because it could be that the suspect has
sustained some injuries and we're bound byduty of care to the suspect as well as any
(18:51):
victims.
So the first question you'll be covering is
that preservation of life, then you look atpreservation of seeing it.
And essentially what we're first looking at,there are cordons.
Where are the cordons?What area has been cordoned off?
And importantly, why?Why have you chosen these areas as a cordon?
(19:14):
Why?Often came across was a situation where the
cordon has been put in place around a deadbody.
But this happened to me on a number ofoccasions.
As I'm standing there talking to the officers,getting a briefing of what they've done, I
look down and I can see blood on the floor.
I'm essentially standing in blood.
(19:35):
I should not be standing in blood.
The cordons are in the wrong place.
If I'm standing in blood numerous times, I hadto stop what we were doing.
I'd look down, I see the blood, right?Can we please just stop?
Can we extend the cordons so that we'recovering every area that has got blood, so
we're not standing in and destroying evidence.
(19:57):
Hopefully, that's not the case.
But too many times it was.
Then it's like, well, where.
Why have you put a cordon around this deadbody?
That's where they were found.
Is this where the attack took place?
And that's a question that I would wantanswered, because in many of the crime scenes
I attended, the place where the victim haddied wasn't the place where they attacked.
(20:20):
They could have walked, run people can getstabbed and can go quite a considerable
distance before their heart gives out.
So I need to ascertain exactly with the
information we've got wired according to here.
Is this where the attack took place?
Are there any other crime scenes that we needto preserve?
What I tended to do was err on the side ofcaution and make the cordon areas as wide as
(20:44):
possible.
So once they're wide, once you're satisfied
that there are no crime scenes within thatcordon, no spots of blood, no weapons
discarded, no evidence that could be lost, youcan slowly bring the cordons in to make them
smaller and less impactful on the people thatlive and are travelling through these areas.
(21:06):
But start wide and come in.
So that would be preservation of scene.
Then you've got securing of evidence.
What evidence is there now that I need to
secure here and now so it doesn't get lost?What I'm not talking about is things like
taking fingerprints or full CCtv or house tohouse.
What I'm talking about is evidence that can belost here and now and often.
(21:28):
That would be something like witnesses.
If you don't get hold of a witness here and
now that's at the scene that's willing tospeak to you, there's a chance that you will
never see them again.
They'll get home and they'll think, you know
what?I don't really want to get involved in this.
And if you've made arrangements for them tocome in and see you another time, they may not
(21:49):
do that, or they may give you the wrong name,or they may not give you any name at all
because they're not duty bound.
So if there's a witness at this scene that has
seen something that's important, we get holdof them here and now and we get a statement
from them.
Now, a proviso to this might be if it's, for
instance, someone who's close to the victim,witnessed what happened, and they're really
(22:11):
upset, and obviously, in a situation wheresomeone's really upset, it might be
counterproductive to get a statement from themthere and then.
But in general terms, if someone's seensomething that's important, I don't want them
going anywhere.
In case we never see them again on a different
episode, we will cover how we deal withwitnesses, but there's one particular type of
witness who we class as significant witnesses.
(22:35):
And significant witnesses, essentially, are
people that have seen the attack, part of theattack, or can give information that's really
crucial to it and those people will be takenoff to a police station and they should be
having their statements taken on camera or thevery least, being audibly recorded.
But it could be other things.
(22:56):
For instance, suspects do discard weapons,
they drop things, they discard their clothing.
So is there any evidence within here that
needs to be secured?And one of the best ways of doing that is to
have a police dog come down.
Police dogs in the UK are trained to track
human scent, not specific human scent, as inputting a bit of cloth under a dog's nose and
(23:21):
saying, there, boy, go and find them.
But human scent in general, that can be used
in certain controlled circumstances to followa suspect, but generally in a built up area
where people have moved around and gone acrosswhere the suspect may have walked.
You're not likely to be able to follow thetrail of a suspect, but what these dogs can be
(23:42):
good at is identifying any discarded items,such as a weapon, clothing, mobile phone,
stolen property, etcetera.
So you would get these dogs down and they
would sweep the area to make a quick search ofthings that would take proper days, many days
to do by hand.
So that would be something else you'd be
(24:03):
thinking about, let's get a dog down, put adog through and see if it can find any
discarded items.
There might be some quick wings in terms of
CCTV, so we'll cover it in a second aboutidentifying suspects.
But if I'm stood there at a crime scene, asI'm talking to people, I'm going to be looking
around and trying to see if there are any CCTVcameras.
(24:26):
And one technique that I found most useful asa detective, and it may sound simple, but
you'll be surprised how many detectives don'tdo this, is just stand still.
Stand still and look around.
Take in the environment around you.
(24:47):
Looking at windows, looking at places whereitems could be discarded, looking for CCTV
camera, looking for places where witnessescould be, looking for routes the suspects
could have gone, buses that are coming pastwith CCTV, looking up, down, all around,
(25:08):
trying to take in that environment and findand identify any potential areas where
evidence could be found.
It's particularly evidence that could be lost
if it's not got hold of there.
And then.
And for your characters, that should besomething I would just write in for them.
Just stand there.
Just stand and look and take in, look up, look
(25:32):
above you, look at the floor, look at thewalls, look all around you and just see if
there's anything there that could help yourinitial investigation at this early stage.
And you'll be surprised how many detectivesdon't do that.
A lot of it comes back to what I was talkingabout when they're in the car and that
adrenaline's going, when your adrenaline'sgoing and you're under pressure and you know
(25:56):
that the decisions you make are going to belooked at under a microscope months later,
people questioning you and you've got all thatpressure from when you turn up on the faces of
the police officers.
It's stressful for them, too, those ones that
initially turn up, and they'll be looking foryou to take over responsibility, to take that
(26:19):
pressure off of their shoulders.
So it can be quite difficult to centre
yourself, to make yourself calm and bethinking about all these things.
And that's why I say quite often, you seedetectives and they're sort of running around,
(26:39):
they're doing their best, but there's a littlebit of excitement in them.
And excitement in you doesn't lead to youbeing calm and considerate about what you're
doing.
So just make a conscious effort.
Just leave me alone for a minute.
I just need to stand here and look.
And I found that such a useful exercise andmore times than I can count, it led to me
(27:05):
seeing opportunities that we could capturethere and then.
So that's something I would just incorporateinto your writing.
If your detective is turning up at a crimescene when all this chaos is going on, get
them to just to say to people, just leave mealone for a minute.
I'm just going to stand here and justbasically do a 360 degree move over this side.
(27:26):
Have a look around there.
Just have a look around the crime scene and
just see if there's any opportunities thatcould be missed if you're not being observant.
And then we come to the fourth of the fivebuilding blocks.
Identification of victim.
There are numerous ways in which you can
identify a victim at a crime scene.
It might be simple.
Someone may say to you, oh, that's.
(27:46):
That's Joe bloggs there.
Yeah, I know him.
It may be as simple as that, or it may be that
the police officers know the victim.
It may be that there's something obvious in or
around them that identifies them.
But you're going to want to identify your
victim as soon as possible.
One way of doing that if they haven't been
dead for too long is there's mobilefingerprint machines, so you can put your
(28:10):
victim's fingers on them.
And if they've got a criminal record, it'll
come back quite quickly with their identity.
Obviously, that's dependent on them having a
criminal record.
If I haven't got that.
That won't work.
One thing you're going to want to do, but you
won't do straight away, is look inside theirpossessions, look in their pockets, look
(28:30):
inside the things they've got on them to seeif there's any identification that can give
you a quick win as to who they are.
And the reason why you're not going to do that
straight away is what you don't want to do.
You need to balance the need to identify the
victim with the forensic evidence that couldbe in and on and around them.
It's very easy to destroy evidence, introduceyour own DNA into the situation, transfer DNA
(28:56):
if you're not dealing with this properly.
So as a detective, one of the people that
you're going to be waiting for to attend thatscene is the crime scene manager.
And we're going to have whole episodededicated to crime scene manager, because it's
such a huge and important role in a murderinvestigation.
But you're not going to start looking throughthe pockets of this victim until the crime
(29:20):
scene managers come down.
And you'll do it in liaison with them, and
you'll only do it when you're wearing thatfull barrier clothing of the oversuit, the
gloves, the shoes, the mask.
One of the reasons why you want to identify
the victim as soon as possible will come backto that same thing.
The victimology, the identification of them,will lead to you being able to build up a
(29:44):
picture of their life.
And once you build up a picture of their life,
there may be something within that which givesan indication of why they died.
And you'll be wanting to do that as soon aspossible.
Another reason is to do with the familyliaison side of things.
Now, that would be making sure that the nextof kin are informed as soon as possible.
Now, there's a complication that happens atcrime scenes when it comes to families.
(30:09):
It's one of the most difficult things that canhappen when you're there, and that is a family
member turns up.
It can be really traumatic for you and for
them.
Imagine if you have just learned that someone
you love, your son, your daughter, yourparent, brother, sister, has just been
murdered and they're just over there, just onthe other side of that blue tape.
(30:32):
You're going to want to go and see them.
First off.
You're going to want to make sure it is them,because you're going to be in denial at first.
It can't be them.
It's not them.
I've just said goodbye to them.
It can't be them.
It's not, you made a mistake, it's somebodyelse.
So they're going to want to see their lovedone, want to know for themselves that it's
definitely them.
(30:52):
And also, there's a good chance what they're
going to want to do, and quite understandably,you understand why, is just give them a
cuddle.
If it is them to say goodbye, just hold them.
Just cuddle them that one last time.
Now, the problem is, as much as you want them
to be able to do that, you've got a job to do.
And the job is, if they've been murdered, to
(31:15):
identify who it is that's murdered them andgather the evidence so that they can
ultimately face justice and can be convictedfor their crime.
A family member, cuddling a loved one, holdinga loved one is going to get in the way of
that.
And that is really difficult.
You're trying to explain to them that youcan't.
(31:37):
And I've had to physically, literally,physically restrain family members from trying
to get to their loved one and trying to getclose enough to identify them and trying to
get close enough to cuddle them, both of whichare likely to cause issues.
Imagine if you did allow them to be closeenough to identify them.
What's stopping them just suddenly making abig surge and getting hold of them, cuddling
(32:01):
them.
Now, just imagine if that family member and
this does happen.
Imagine if that family member is a suspect.
They suddenly now got the victim's blood onthem and it's explainable.
Could the police let me cuddle them?Or if they, even if they're not the suspect,
they introduce their own DNA.
They transfer DNA from someone else to the
victim.
(32:21):
Supposing the suspect had left a hair on the
victim, the family member cuddling them.
That hair is then transferred onto the family
member.
We never get to see that.
The forensic examinations won't get to itbecause it's gone.
So as hard as it is and as traumatic as it is,when you've got a screaming mother saying, I
just want to hold my baby, my baby, thesewords I'm telling you now is what?
(32:45):
Something happened to me.
A mother screaming at me, it's my baby, it's
my baby.
I want to hold my baby.
And I'm physically holding her, restrainingher and stopping her.
She's not listening to me.
But I'm trying to explain why you can't.
It's really traumatic.
It's really, really difficult.
And that's something that can happen at acrime scene.
Can happen at the crime scenes.
You're writing about then we've got
(33:05):
identification of suspect.
And this is really important because the
sooner you identify a suspect, the sooner theycan be arrested.
Just imagine the evidence you can get from asuspect that's just committed a murder.
They may have the victim's blood on them, thevictim's DNA on them, they may have stolen
property they've taken from the victim, theymay have the murder weapon on them, they're
(33:27):
wearing the clothing they were wearing at thetime of the attack.
If you get hold of them within minutes of themurder, there's a good chance that this
evidence is going to be preserved.
But the longer it takes to get to a suspect,
the more chance it is that this evidence isgoing to be lost.
If they've got a murder weapon, they will dumpit somewhere.
(33:49):
Clothing, they will change it.
They may burn their clothing, wash their
clothing.
If they've got blood on their hands, they may
wash that.
If they've got injuries themselves, they will
begin to start to heal.
So the sooner you get to a suspect, the better
chance you've got of solving the crime.
So you'll be doing things like speaking to
(34:10):
witnesses.
Is there anybody here that can tell us who the
killer was?Or killers?
Do we have any CCTV that can give us thosequick wins?
CCTV that shows the attack, CCTV that showsthe suspect and or the victim going to where
the murder happened, CCTV of the suspectleaving.
(34:30):
Did they get into a car?If so, do we have a registration number?
Do we know their name?If so, let's start to put into motion the
arrest.
The sooner we get to a suspect, the better
chance we have of convicting them.
So they're the five things I would be going
through in my mind at this initial call to acrime scene I've just turned up.
(34:56):
I'm now in charge.
This is our murder investigation.
It's our investigation.
And these are the kind of steps I'll be going
through now.
Every single murder scene I went to, I went to
dozens.
And they're all different.
They all had their own challenges, their ownnuances.
But if you follow that kind of pattern, youreally do minimise the chances of making
(35:20):
mistakes.
And it doesn't come easily at first, but that
training yourself to be calm, to bemethodical, to not get caught up in your own
emotions, to not let that adrenaline get inthe way of you doing a good job, forcing
yourself to stand still, forcing yourself tolook around and see what opportunities there
(35:48):
are for identifying the victim, identifyingthe suspect, retrieving evidence that usually
comes with experience of attending these crimescenes, of attending, even before you get on a
murder team, you sort of build up that whenyou're in a local police station you're
attending, you could be attending murderscenes, but you're also attending serious
(36:08):
assaults, serious sexual assaults.
So over the course of your career, for me, I
didn't start investigating murder till 18years.
In as with everything that you learn in thepolice, the journey that you're on to become a
murder detective, you reach that point whereyou can deal with the most serious of crimes
(36:28):
and you can deal with them effectively andefficiently.
So this is the kind of thought process thatyou should be thinking about for your lead
detective or detectives, the kind ofpriorities they will have in their mind, the
issues they could face, forcing themselves tobe calm.
(36:49):
Because I think it's very easy when you lookat detectives and just assume them to be
robots, that they don't make mistakes, theydon't have feelings, they don't have fears,
they don't have anxieties.
They do.
They're just the same as anybody else.
And these fears, emotions and anxieties can
(37:10):
get in the way of you doing a good job.
But if you follow these five steps, the
chances are you're probably going to do a goodjob, you're probably not going to make
mistakes, and you're going to capture theevidence you need, right?
So I hope that's been useful as an exercise toget you thinking about your detectives when
(37:31):
they're turning up to these murder scenes.
There's more I could talk about, and there's
more we will talk about in other episodes.
As always, if you've got any questions, if
you're part of the community, put them inthere.
I'm always open to questions.
If you're on Instagram, you can dm me on
there, send me emails.
I'm always contactable through stevekio.com.
(37:53):
As I say, I hope you've enjoyed that.
I hope you found it helpful.
But any questions, anything that's come fromthat, please do reach out.
I've been Steve Keogh.
This is murder investigation for crime
writers.
Thank you for joining me on another episode of
Murder Investigation for Crime Writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keough, and it's been a
pleasure delving into the world of murderinvestigation with you.
(38:13):
Authenticity is key for crime writers, and Ihope this podcast has provided you with
valuable insights and inspiration for yourstories telling journey.
If you found value in what you've heard today,I encourage you to share this podcast with
your fellow authors.
Together, we can elevate the standards of
crime fiction and bring realism to theforefront.
If you have a moment, I'd also appreciate ifyou could leave a review on your favourite
(38:36):
podcast platform.
Your feedback helps others discover the
podcast and join our community of passionatecrime writers.
Thank you for listening.
Until next time, keep writing, keep
investigating, and keep bringing your storiesto life.
I've been Steve Keough.
Welcome to murder investigation for crime Writers, the podcast where we delve
into the dark world of murder to help bringauthenticity to your stories.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, a former ScotlandYard detective inspector.
So grab your notebook, sharpen your pencils,and prepare to embark on a journey into a
world few get to see.
This is murder investigation for crime
(00:23):
writers.
Hello and welcome to episode three of murder
investigation for crime writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keough.
I think you've probably listened to the firsttwo, and I feel like I shouldn't keep
introducing myself as fully as I do, but justbriefly, I'll do it for a couple of episodes
(00:46):
and then maybe change my mind.
I was former police officer, did 30 years in
the police, twelve as murder detective.
So today I'm going to look at what detectives
do when they go to the scene of a murder, whena murder just happened, and local police call
for the murder team to come down and take onthe investigation, essentially.
(01:09):
So at any point of any day in any part of thecountry, there will be teams of detectives who
we use the expression on call.
They're the on call team, and they will
respond to any murders or similar type ofincidents that happen.
(01:29):
And the reason they're on duty and the reasonthey're ready to respond is what we call the
golden hour.
So this principle is it's not an hour, but
it's the time just after a murder whenevidence is most abundantly available.
And it's also the type of evidence that if youdon't get hold of it there and then it could
be lost.
(01:50):
We'll go into that a bit more detail.
But this is why we have teams on call ready torespond.
And unlike most detective units, they havecars that have got blue lights and sirens so
they can get there quickly because of thisgolden hour principle.
So I'll describe what it was like for me whenI was on these teams, and as I'm describing
(02:14):
it, I'll talk about my feelings, my thoughtprocesses, that kind of thing, to give you an
idea of sort of things you might want to writeabout for your own detectives if they're in
that situation.
So let's just start off by saying that when
teams are on call, they're not just sat thereby a phone like the fire brigade waiting to
(02:35):
come out.
I mean, they are in certain way, but they'll
have work they'll be getting on with.
There'll be investigations that are either
unsolved or they're preparing for court, andthere'll be lots of work.
Murder detectives are never short of work todo, so they'll be getting on with that.
And in London, we have a system that's knownas the hat car homicide assessment team.
(02:57):
And so that's the on call team and known asthe hacker.
Around the country, they probably havedifferent expressions for this, but that's
what they used to call us.
And we had what was called the phone.
It was the phone and it was the phone that thecontrol room would call you on when a murder
happened.
And so at any point of the day, you'll have
(03:20):
detectives and they cover 24 hours a day.
So you've got a team of detectives and they'll
split the shift.
So there'll be someone sort of a normal eight
to four day.
Some will come on earlier.
For us, it would be seven till three, thenthere'll be another team on three to eleven,
and then the night duty team will be on elevento seven.
(03:41):
So 24 hours, they would cover it for the sevendays that that team has responsibility for
their on call week.
When I say team, what it will be is one
detective sergeant and maybe two or threedetective constables.
When a call comes in, they will answer thephone.
So you'll be sitting there in the office, youcould be getting on with your work, it might
(04:02):
be lunchtime, it might be your evening meal,you might be out having a bite to eat and the
phone goes off.
And I don't know why.
We always used to have a really annoyingringtone.
It'd be one that nobody on their.
Nobody would have on their own phone.
So you're never going to mistake it.
When this horrible ringtone goes off, it gets
your pulse racing because you're thinking,what is this, a murderer?
Is everything going to have to kick into gear?Are we going to have to grab everything and go
(04:25):
out to a murder scene?As a detective sergeant, when I was on it, I
tended to allow the detective constables tohave it.
Sometimes detective sergeants, each team wouldhave their own different ways of doing it.
But the phone would go off and you'd lookacross to your colleague and you're trying to
gauge fraud, their reaction, whether or notit's a proper job, a murder, or whether it's
(04:48):
someone ringing up for advice, because thatwould often happen.
They would ring up for some virus, they mightbe in a serious assault and they just want a
good steer on the way their investigationshould go from murder detectives.
And you can often pick up, just by looking atyour colleague, their reaction.
And they would sort of like, be bolt up,right?
Like they're kicking into gear now.
(05:10):
They're.
They're going into professional work mode,trying to get the information from the caller,
which would normally be the control room, butit could sometimes be police officers are put
directly through and they will be takinginformation.
And generally you can get a good feel thatthis is a proper job because you can see them,
you can see the way they're acting.
(05:30):
They've suddenly become more serious.
They're really writing down some franticnotes, they're intently listening to what
they're being told.
They would come off the phone and however many
of you there in the office, you're waiting forthem to tell you what's happened, and they
will say, it's a job.
Now, one of the words that I was always a bit
(05:52):
uncomfortable with, that we used was a job.
So every murder was a job.
We got a new job in.
Remember, we were working on that job, which
job you're working on at the moment.
So a murder is referred to as a job.
I was always really conscious that I didn'tuse that expression around family members,
because, yes, to us, it's a job.
(06:15):
And I think that term can conjure up the wrong
impression, because to the family members whohave lost their loved one, not a job, is it?
That's the murder of their loved one.
So I was always really, really conscious not
to use this expression in the presence of afamily.
But that is what murder detectives call eachmurder investigation, a job.
(06:36):
We've got a new job.
So they would say, we've got a new job.
Every detective has a daybook and it's likean.
A four size lined book that they would carrywith them all the time.
Sometimes you'd see on tv programmes,detectives with a pocketbook.
(06:58):
In my experience, pocketbooks are a thing ofthe past.
Certainly in London, you don't have detectivescarrying around pocketbooks, and so you'd get
your daybook out and you'd start writingwhatever information that the detective that
took the call has taken to tell you about thejob that's coming.
(07:19):
And then, as a detective sergeant, you've gotsome decisions to make.
Do we go out to it or do we give advice overthe phone?
If it's a murder, there is no question you goout to it.
Sometimes it might be that a death has beenreported and they're not sure whether or not
it's a murder or not.
And there can be some debate about whether or
not you go out, but for your purposes, wedon't really have to worry about that.
(07:43):
You're going to be writing about crimes,you're going to be writing about murders.
So the decision has to be made.
We're going out.
Before you leave the office, you just need tomake sure.
Is there anything that we can do now that willhelp us when we get down there or anything we
can set into motion, and particularly aroundresearch.
If the phone call included the victim's name,you'd be asking for research to be done by
(08:05):
either detectives that are there in the officeand not going out on the hat car, or for
somebody at one of the intelligence units tostart doing some intelligence cheques on the
victim.
And this all comes back to that same
expression.
To understand how a person died, you have to
understand how they lived.
So even at these very early stages, if you've
(08:27):
got the victim's name, you're going to want tostart building up a picture of who they are
and whether or not there's anything that'sjumping out from the intelligence that the
police have that may indicate why somebody hasmurdered them.
And then also what you need to do is knowwhere you're going.
Now, it may seem obvious there's murder, we goto the murder scene.
(08:47):
But sometimes murders aren't quite as simpleas a dead body's been found, somebody's been
murdered there, and then on that spot, there'sall sorts of nuances.
It could be a deposition site, there could bepeople at a hospital, there could be multiple
scenes.
So you need to understand where you're going
and then you make the decision.
We're going out, we're going out, we're
(09:08):
getting in the car, we're going to drive towherever it is.
But before you go, you need to make sureyou've got some things with you.
Now, we used to call it a spin bag.
Spin.
Spin bag.
And that comes from the term that you would
use when you execute a warrant.
So if I'm executing a warrant in a place,
we're doing a spin, we're doing an earlymorning spin, we're executing a warrant, we're
(09:30):
going to go and search premises.
And in order to do that, you would have to
have certain bits of equipment with you.
So, for instance, exhibit bags.
If you're going to seize any exhibits, youneed to be putting them into bags, sometimes
boxes to exhibit things like knives orfirearms, the fall barrier clothing.
So the paper suits, the overshoes, gloves,masks, etcetera.
(09:54):
All things that you would need in order todeal with a crime scene properly would be in
this bag.
We've got the spin bag.
We know where we're going, let's go.
Go down to the police car park, get in the car
and off you go.
Blue lights and sirens on your way to this
murder scene.
Now, I don't want to play down the
(10:14):
professionalism of the role that we play, butdriving on blue lights and sirens is quite
good fun and it does get the adrenaline going.
And you're driving through, particularly in
London, you're driving through some busytraffic, blue lights and sirens, you're
jumping red lights, you're going on the wrongside of road, you're going fast.
It does get the adrenaline going, but that canbe an issue, because when you've got
(10:38):
adrenaline surging through your body, itdoesn't lend itself to doing things in a calm
and methodical manner.
So you have to really try and calm yourself
down, train yourself to think about theprocess that you're going to start to put into
place when you get there.
I would genuinely have been the senior officer
(10:59):
in the car, whether I was a detectivesergeant, detective inspector, and I would
start thinking about the processes that I willgo through when I get to the scene, thinking
about the questions I need to ask, thinkingabout the actions I need to set into motion.
And when you're going to a crime scene, one ofthe things that is on your mind is actually in
(11:25):
your mind all the way through any sort ofmurder investigation.
But certainly this early stages is, I can'tget it wrong.
When you're investigating murder and you'regoing to the scene of a crime, you're going to
be making decisions.
Often you're making decisions on not a lot of
information, you're making decisions in whatis, quite often, you walk into a chaotic
(11:48):
situation.
You're conscious that, right, I need to be
really focused, I need to think about what I'mdoing.
Because what happens is that everything youdo, all the decisions you make, you know, at
some point down the line, they're going to bepored over by solicitors, lawyers, barristers
(12:08):
are going to be looking at what you do, thedecisions you make, looking for reasons they
can undermine what you've done, to try andpick apart your actions, all to do with
getting their client off at court.
Everything you do now is going to come under a
microscope later on, so that adds anotherlayer of pressure.
(12:32):
It increases your adrenaline.
So as much as you're trying to get your
adrenaline down, you're trying to stay calm,you don't want to turn up panicked, but you're
flying through the streets of London, loads ofnoise, blue lights, and, you know, you're
heading into a situation where later on,months down the line, you could be stood in
the old Bailey trying to justify why you didwhat you did.
(12:53):
All of this doesn't lend itself to being calm,but you've got to force yourself, you have to
be calm, you have to be seen to be in controlwhen you get there, even if inside you're like
the proverbial swan.
On the surface, it's smooth.
Underneath, you're kicking away like hell.
So you get in there.
And also, one thing you know is that havingdone this dozens of times, once you do get
(13:17):
there, there's a very good chance you're goingto walk into chaos.
Sometimes not sometimes it's under control.
The local officers have got everything done
under control, but quite often you'll walkinto absolute chaos and carnage and you've got
to try and bring order to that chaos.
So as you go in here, you've got all these
pressures that are being put on you, all thisadrenaline that's pumping through you.
(13:39):
What detectives use is what's known as thefive building blocks.
It's a system that when you turn up, if you gothrough in your mind, you're going to minimise
the chances of making mistakes, but you'realso going to maximise the chances of getting
the evidence you need.
So these are the five building blocks that
(14:00):
officers should.
They won't all be doing this, but what they
should be running through in their mind whenthey turn up to the scene of a murder.
And they are.
Preservation of life, preservation of scene,
securing of evidence, identification of victimand identification of suspect.
I'll go through them in a bit.
So you're there.
It could take 15 minutes, half an hour.
(14:22):
Depending on parts of London.
It could take you the best part of an hour toget to the crime scene.
Depending on where you're going from and to.
When you go into these scenes, there's a good
chance that you've never been there before.
You might know the general area, but you're
probably not going to know the specificstreet.
So as you're nearing it, you know, you're kindof getting close to where you need to be.
(14:44):
And the first thing you always see in thedistance, you'll see some blue lights and as
you get closer, you'll see police cars parkedup, you'll see people standing around the blue
tape, the cordon tape, you know where you needto go.
You pull up the car next to the cordon tape.
And what I would be doing as the senior
officer from the murder investigation teamthere at that time, the first thing I would
(15:08):
want to do, the first person I'd want to speakto, is the person that can give me the best
information about what has happened and whatactions police have taken.
Because in order for me to make the bestdecisions, I need good information.
I need information that I can make sounddecisions on.
(15:30):
Now, that person may be the local policeinspector, it may be a sergeant, but it could
be a constable, it could be the first personon scene.
So the first question I ask when I get thereis who is in charge and who can give me the
best information about what has happened andwhat actions police have taken.
And then I'll go and speak to that person.
(15:52):
And with me, I'll have.
We used to call them a scribe.
It would be a DC.
I designate a DC to stand with me with theirdaybook so they can make notes about
everything that is told to me, any questions Iask of them, and importantly, any decisions I
make there and then.
(16:13):
Now, what I don't want to be doing when I'm
talking to somebody and trying to getinformation from them is writing down, looking
up, writing down missing bits, not writingfully, because I'm trying to speak and write
at the same time.
So that's why it's important that I'd ever
note, take or ascribe to write down importantbits that are said, important decisions that
are made.
So I'm speaking to the officer there and it's
(16:38):
those two things I want to know what hashappened and what have you done about it?
So what has happened?What information have we got?
What do we know about the crime?What do we know about the victim?
What do we know about the suspects?What witnesses have we got?
What evidence have we got?What have we got here that I can use to try
and build a picture of the murder?Because the investigation has started now.
(17:03):
For me, the investigation for the murderstarted as soon as the police arrived.
Those initial uniform officers, they're partof the investigation, that initial bit.
But for me, I am now investigating this murderand I want to know as much information as I
can at this early stage so I can ensure thatevidence isn't being lost, that we're not
(17:24):
going to make any mistakes.
And that's where I'll start to go through
those building blocks.
So the first thing I'm going to want to know
about is preservation of life.
That may not be a hard one to answer.
We've got one victim and they've beenpronounced dead, or the expression we use in
the police is life pronounced extinct.
(17:45):
I think every day people would say, been
pronounced dead.
But in the police, it's life pronounced
extinct.
And the exact time, I would want to know.
So they would say to me, something along thelines of, the ambulance service were here, and
they pronounced life extinct at 1904.
But what you can't do is just take it for
granted that we've got one victim.
(18:07):
Now, this is particularly important.
If you're in a house, for instance, you gothere as the murder team.
There's a victim in the front room beingstabbed, life pronounced extinct.
But what we can't do is just assume thatthere's only one victim.
Just imagine if there was somebody upstairs,another victim, and they were bleeding out and
(18:29):
police hadn't gone up there just to make surethere was nobody up there, no other victims,
nobody else being injured.
So that would be a question I'd ask, have we
checked upstairs, or do we know for sure thereare no other victims?
Do we know there are no other casualties?Because it could be that the suspect has
sustained some injuries and we're bound byduty of care to the suspect as well as any
(18:51):
victims.
So the first question you'll be covering is
that preservation of life, then you look atpreservation of seeing it.
And essentially what we're first looking at,there are cordons.
Where are the cordons?What area has been cordoned off?
And importantly, why?Why have you chosen these areas as a cordon?
(19:14):
Why?Often came across was a situation where the
cordon has been put in place around a deadbody.
But this happened to me on a number ofoccasions.
As I'm standing there talking to the officers,getting a briefing of what they've done, I
look down and I can see blood on the floor.
I'm essentially standing in blood.
(19:35):
I should not be standing in blood.
The cordons are in the wrong place.
If I'm standing in blood numerous times, I hadto stop what we were doing.
I'd look down, I see the blood, right?Can we please just stop?
Can we extend the cordons so that we'recovering every area that has got blood, so
we're not standing in and destroying evidence.
(19:57):
Hopefully, that's not the case.
But too many times it was.
Then it's like, well, where.
Why have you put a cordon around this deadbody?
That's where they were found.
Is this where the attack took place?
And that's a question that I would wantanswered, because in many of the crime scenes
I attended, the place where the victim haddied wasn't the place where they attacked.
(20:20):
They could have walked, run people can getstabbed and can go quite a considerable
distance before their heart gives out.
So I need to ascertain exactly with the
information we've got wired according to here.
Is this where the attack took place?
Are there any other crime scenes that we needto preserve?
What I tended to do was err on the side ofcaution and make the cordon areas as wide as
(20:44):
possible.
So once they're wide, once you're satisfied
that there are no crime scenes within thatcordon, no spots of blood, no weapons
discarded, no evidence that could be lost, youcan slowly bring the cordons in to make them
smaller and less impactful on the people thatlive and are travelling through these areas.
(21:06):
But start wide and come in.
So that would be preservation of scene.
Then you've got securing of evidence.
What evidence is there now that I need to
secure here and now so it doesn't get lost?What I'm not talking about is things like
taking fingerprints or full CCtv or house tohouse.
What I'm talking about is evidence that can belost here and now and often.
(21:28):
That would be something like witnesses.
If you don't get hold of a witness here and
now that's at the scene that's willing tospeak to you, there's a chance that you will
never see them again.
They'll get home and they'll think, you know
what?I don't really want to get involved in this.
And if you've made arrangements for them tocome in and see you another time, they may not
(21:49):
do that, or they may give you the wrong name,or they may not give you any name at all
because they're not duty bound.
So if there's a witness at this scene that has
seen something that's important, we get holdof them here and now and we get a statement
from them.
Now, a proviso to this might be if it's, for
instance, someone who's close to the victim,witnessed what happened, and they're really
(22:11):
upset, and obviously, in a situation wheresomeone's really upset, it might be
counterproductive to get a statement from themthere and then.
But in general terms, if someone's seensomething that's important, I don't want them
going anywhere.
In case we never see them again on a different
episode, we will cover how we deal withwitnesses, but there's one particular type of
witness who we class as significant witnesses.
(22:35):
And significant witnesses, essentially, are
people that have seen the attack, part of theattack, or can give information that's really
crucial to it and those people will be takenoff to a police station and they should be
having their statements taken on camera or thevery least, being audibly recorded.
But it could be other things.
(22:56):
For instance, suspects do discard weapons,
they drop things, they discard their clothing.
So is there any evidence within here that
needs to be secured?And one of the best ways of doing that is to
have a police dog come down.
Police dogs in the UK are trained to track
human scent, not specific human scent, as inputting a bit of cloth under a dog's nose and
(23:21):
saying, there, boy, go and find them.
But human scent in general, that can be used
in certain controlled circumstances to followa suspect, but generally in a built up area
where people have moved around and gone acrosswhere the suspect may have walked.
You're not likely to be able to follow thetrail of a suspect, but what these dogs can be
(23:42):
good at is identifying any discarded items,such as a weapon, clothing, mobile phone,
stolen property, etcetera.
So you would get these dogs down and they
would sweep the area to make a quick search ofthings that would take proper days, many days
to do by hand.
So that would be something else you'd be
(24:03):
thinking about, let's get a dog down, put adog through and see if it can find any
discarded items.
There might be some quick wings in terms of
CCTV, so we'll cover it in a second aboutidentifying suspects.
But if I'm stood there at a crime scene, asI'm talking to people, I'm going to be looking
around and trying to see if there are any CCTVcameras.
(24:26):
And one technique that I found most useful asa detective, and it may sound simple, but
you'll be surprised how many detectives don'tdo this, is just stand still.
Stand still and look around.
Take in the environment around you.
(24:47):
Looking at windows, looking at places whereitems could be discarded, looking for CCTV
camera, looking for places where witnessescould be, looking for routes the suspects
could have gone, buses that are coming pastwith CCTV, looking up, down, all around,
(25:08):
trying to take in that environment and findand identify any potential areas where
evidence could be found.
It's particularly evidence that could be lost
if it's not got hold of there.
And then.
And for your characters, that should besomething I would just write in for them.
Just stand there.
Just stand and look and take in, look up, look
(25:32):
above you, look at the floor, look at thewalls, look all around you and just see if
there's anything there that could help yourinitial investigation at this early stage.
And you'll be surprised how many detectivesdon't do that.
A lot of it comes back to what I was talkingabout when they're in the car and that
adrenaline's going, when your adrenaline'sgoing and you're under pressure and you know
(25:56):
that the decisions you make are going to belooked at under a microscope months later,
people questioning you and you've got all thatpressure from when you turn up on the faces of
the police officers.
It's stressful for them, too, those ones that
initially turn up, and they'll be looking foryou to take over responsibility, to take that
(26:19):
pressure off of their shoulders.
So it can be quite difficult to centre
yourself, to make yourself calm and bethinking about all these things.
And that's why I say quite often, you seedetectives and they're sort of running around,
(26:39):
they're doing their best, but there's a littlebit of excitement in them.
And excitement in you doesn't lead to youbeing calm and considerate about what you're
doing.
So just make a conscious effort.
Just leave me alone for a minute.
I just need to stand here and look.
And I found that such a useful exercise andmore times than I can count, it led to me
(27:05):
seeing opportunities that we could capturethere and then.
So that's something I would just incorporateinto your writing.
If your detective is turning up at a crimescene when all this chaos is going on, get
them to just to say to people, just leave mealone for a minute.
I'm just going to stand here and justbasically do a 360 degree move over this side.
(27:26):
Have a look around there.
Just have a look around the crime scene and
just see if there's any opportunities thatcould be missed if you're not being observant.
And then we come to the fourth of the fivebuilding blocks.
Identification of victim.
There are numerous ways in which you can
identify a victim at a crime scene.
It might be simple.
Someone may say to you, oh, that's.
(27:46):
That's Joe bloggs there.
Yeah, I know him.
It may be as simple as that, or it may be that
the police officers know the victim.
It may be that there's something obvious in or
around them that identifies them.
But you're going to want to identify your
victim as soon as possible.
One way of doing that if they haven't been
dead for too long is there's mobilefingerprint machines, so you can put your
(28:10):
victim's fingers on them.
And if they've got a criminal record, it'll
come back quite quickly with their identity.
Obviously, that's dependent on them having a
criminal record.
If I haven't got that.
That won't work.
One thing you're going to want to do, but you
won't do straight away, is look inside theirpossessions, look in their pockets, look
(28:30):
inside the things they've got on them to seeif there's any identification that can give
you a quick win as to who they are.
And the reason why you're not going to do that
straight away is what you don't want to do.
You need to balance the need to identify the
victim with the forensic evidence that couldbe in and on and around them.
It's very easy to destroy evidence, introduceyour own DNA into the situation, transfer DNA
(28:56):
if you're not dealing with this properly.
So as a detective, one of the people that
you're going to be waiting for to attend thatscene is the crime scene manager.
And we're going to have whole episodededicated to crime scene manager, because it's
such a huge and important role in a murderinvestigation.
But you're not going to start looking throughthe pockets of this victim until the crime
(29:20):
scene managers come down.
And you'll do it in liaison with them, and
you'll only do it when you're wearing thatfull barrier clothing of the oversuit, the
gloves, the shoes, the mask.
One of the reasons why you want to identify
the victim as soon as possible will come backto that same thing.
The victimology, the identification of them,will lead to you being able to build up a
(29:44):
picture of their life.
And once you build up a picture of their life,
there may be something within that which givesan indication of why they died.
And you'll be wanting to do that as soon aspossible.
Another reason is to do with the familyliaison side of things.
Now, that would be making sure that the nextof kin are informed as soon as possible.
Now, there's a complication that happens atcrime scenes when it comes to families.
(30:09):
It's one of the most difficult things that canhappen when you're there, and that is a family
member turns up.
It can be really traumatic for you and for
them.
Imagine if you have just learned that someone
you love, your son, your daughter, yourparent, brother, sister, has just been
murdered and they're just over there, just onthe other side of that blue tape.
(30:32):
You're going to want to go and see them.
First off.
You're going to want to make sure it is them,because you're going to be in denial at first.
It can't be them.
It's not them.
I've just said goodbye to them.
It can't be them.
It's not, you made a mistake, it's somebodyelse.
So they're going to want to see their lovedone, want to know for themselves that it's
definitely them.
(30:52):
And also, there's a good chance what they're
going to want to do, and quite understandably,you understand why, is just give them a
cuddle.
If it is them to say goodbye, just hold them.
Just cuddle them that one last time.
Now, the problem is, as much as you want them
to be able to do that, you've got a job to do.
And the job is, if they've been murdered, to
(31:15):
identify who it is that's murdered them andgather the evidence so that they can
ultimately face justice and can be convictedfor their crime.
A family member, cuddling a loved one, holdinga loved one is going to get in the way of
that.
And that is really difficult.
You're trying to explain to them that youcan't.
(31:37):
And I've had to physically, literally,physically restrain family members from trying
to get to their loved one and trying to getclose enough to identify them and trying to
get close enough to cuddle them, both of whichare likely to cause issues.
Imagine if you did allow them to be closeenough to identify them.
What's stopping them just suddenly making abig surge and getting hold of them, cuddling
(32:01):
them.
Now, just imagine if that family member and
this does happen.
Imagine if that family member is a suspect.
They suddenly now got the victim's blood onthem and it's explainable.
Could the police let me cuddle them?Or if they, even if they're not the suspect,
they introduce their own DNA.
They transfer DNA from someone else to the
victim.
(32:21):
Supposing the suspect had left a hair on the
victim, the family member cuddling them.
That hair is then transferred onto the family
member.
We never get to see that.
The forensic examinations won't get to itbecause it's gone.
So as hard as it is and as traumatic as it is,when you've got a screaming mother saying, I
just want to hold my baby, my baby, thesewords I'm telling you now is what?
(32:45):
Something happened to me.
A mother screaming at me, it's my baby, it's
my baby.
I want to hold my baby.
And I'm physically holding her, restrainingher and stopping her.
She's not listening to me.
But I'm trying to explain why you can't.
It's really traumatic.
It's really, really difficult.
And that's something that can happen at acrime scene.
Can happen at the crime scenes.
You're writing about then we've got
(33:05):
identification of suspect.
And this is really important because the
sooner you identify a suspect, the sooner theycan be arrested.
Just imagine the evidence you can get from asuspect that's just committed a murder.
They may have the victim's blood on them, thevictim's DNA on them, they may have stolen
property they've taken from the victim, theymay have the murder weapon on them, they're
(33:27):
wearing the clothing they were wearing at thetime of the attack.
If you get hold of them within minutes of themurder, there's a good chance that this
evidence is going to be preserved.
But the longer it takes to get to a suspect,
the more chance it is that this evidence isgoing to be lost.
If they've got a murder weapon, they will dumpit somewhere.
(33:49):
Clothing, they will change it.
They may burn their clothing, wash their
clothing.
If they've got blood on their hands, they may
wash that.
If they've got injuries themselves, they will
begin to start to heal.
So the sooner you get to a suspect, the better
chance you've got of solving the crime.
So you'll be doing things like speaking to
(34:10):
witnesses.
Is there anybody here that can tell us who the
killer was?Or killers?
Do we have any CCTV that can give us thosequick wins?
CCTV that shows the attack, CCTV that showsthe suspect and or the victim going to where
the murder happened, CCTV of the suspectleaving.
(34:30):
Did they get into a car?If so, do we have a registration number?
Do we know their name?If so, let's start to put into motion the
arrest.
The sooner we get to a suspect, the better
chance we have of convicting them.
So they're the five things I would be going
through in my mind at this initial call to acrime scene I've just turned up.
(34:56):
I'm now in charge.
This is our murder investigation.
It's our investigation.
And these are the kind of steps I'll be going
through now.
Every single murder scene I went to, I went to
dozens.
And they're all different.
They all had their own challenges, their ownnuances.
But if you follow that kind of pattern, youreally do minimise the chances of making
(35:20):
mistakes.
And it doesn't come easily at first, but that
training yourself to be calm, to bemethodical, to not get caught up in your own
emotions, to not let that adrenaline get inthe way of you doing a good job, forcing
yourself to stand still, forcing yourself tolook around and see what opportunities there
(35:48):
are for identifying the victim, identifyingthe suspect, retrieving evidence that usually
comes with experience of attending these crimescenes, of attending, even before you get on a
murder team, you sort of build up that whenyou're in a local police station you're
attending, you could be attending murderscenes, but you're also attending serious
(36:08):
assaults, serious sexual assaults.
So over the course of your career, for me, I
didn't start investigating murder till 18years.
In as with everything that you learn in thepolice, the journey that you're on to become a
murder detective, you reach that point whereyou can deal with the most serious of crimes
(36:28):
and you can deal with them effectively andefficiently.
So this is the kind of thought process thatyou should be thinking about for your lead
detective or detectives, the kind ofpriorities they will have in their mind, the
issues they could face, forcing themselves tobe calm.
(36:49):
Because I think it's very easy when you lookat detectives and just assume them to be
robots, that they don't make mistakes, theydon't have feelings, they don't have fears,
they don't have anxieties.
They do.
They're just the same as anybody else.
And these fears, emotions and anxieties can
(37:10):
get in the way of you doing a good job.
But if you follow these five steps, the
chances are you're probably going to do a goodjob, you're probably not going to make
mistakes, and you're going to capture theevidence you need, right?
So I hope that's been useful as an exercise toget you thinking about your detectives when
(37:31):
they're turning up to these murder scenes.
There's more I could talk about, and there's
more we will talk about in other episodes.
As always, if you've got any questions, if
you're part of the community, put them inthere.
I'm always open to questions.
If you're on Instagram, you can dm me on
there, send me emails.
I'm always contactable through stevekio.com.
(37:53):
As I say, I hope you've enjoyed that.
I hope you found it helpful.
But any questions, anything that's come fromthat, please do reach out.
I've been Steve Keogh.
This is murder investigation for crime
writers.
Thank you for joining me on another episode of
Murder Investigation for Crime Writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keough, and it's been a
pleasure delving into the world of murderinvestigation with you.
(38:13):
Authenticity is key for crime writers, and Ihope this podcast has provided you with
valuable insights and inspiration for yourstories telling journey.
If you found value in what you've heard today,I encourage you to share this podcast with
your fellow authors.
Together, we can elevate the standards of
crime fiction and bring realism to theforefront.
If you have a moment, I'd also appreciate ifyou could leave a review on your favourite
(38:36):
podcast platform.
Your feedback helps others discover the
podcast and join our community of passionatecrime writers.
Thank you for listening.
Until next time, keep writing, keep
investigating, and keep bringing your storiesto life.
I've been Steve Keough.
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