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Murder Investigation Team: Jack the Ripper: A 21st Century Investigation
London, 1888, and one-man's brutal campaign of violence has taken the lives of unsuspecting victims, cut the city to the core and carved his name into history. Well, not his name, exactly. Whomever this man was, remains a mystery but there are few people who haven't heard of his Jack the Ripper.
The same is true for those said to have died at his hands. If Polly Nicholls, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes and Mary Jane Kelly had not fallen to his knife, their names would have been lost to history. Instead, they themselves are as much a part of the folklore as their killer. Then there are those who investigated the the ordinary men, doing their jobs as best they could, who will always be associated with the failed attempts to catch this monster.
But if those crimes had happened today, how would they be investigated and how would the approach differ? There is no doubt, how detectives work has changed dramatically over those 130 years. Although, in many senses, things are very much the same. Solving murders relies on an understanding of people, be that the victims, the witnesses and, most importantly, the killers themselves.
In Murder Investigation Jack the Ripper, while journeying through these infamous murders, through meticulous contemporary research, witness statements and reporting, ex-detective Steven Keogh will revisit the crimes that were committed, why these lives were taken, and attempt to discover just who was Jack the Ripper? Applying modern-day investigative approaches to the 19th century investigation, and with ground-breaking insight from one of the UK's leading criminal profilers, Pippa Gregory, join Steven on a gruesome and incredible journey of discovery into one of the most infamous crimes in British history.
The same is true for those said to have died at his hands. If Polly Nicholls, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes and Mary Jane Kelly had not fallen to his knife, their names would have been lost to history. Instead, they themselves are as much a part of the folklore as their killer. Then there are those who investigated the the ordinary men, doing their jobs as best they could, who will always be associated with the failed attempts to catch this monster.
But if those crimes had happened today, how would they be investigated and how would the approach differ? There is no doubt, how detectives work has changed dramatically over those 130 years. Although, in many senses, things are very much the same. Solving murders relies on an understanding of people, be that the victims, the witnesses and, most importantly, the killers themselves.
In Murder Investigation Jack the Ripper, while journeying through these infamous murders, through meticulous contemporary research, witness statements and reporting, ex-detective Steven Keogh will revisit the crimes that were committed, why these lives were taken, and attempt to discover just who was Jack the Ripper? Applying modern-day investigative approaches to the 19th century investigation, and with ground-breaking insight from one of the UK's leading criminal profilers, Pippa Gregory, join Steven on a gruesome and incredible journey of discovery into one of the most infamous crimes in British history.
412 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 20, 2023
14 people are currently reading
102 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
August 11, 2024
Content warnings: murder, graphic descriptions of dead bodies/injuries/murders, blood
3.5 stars
An interesting insight into the Ripper case and how it would be investigated today. But at the same time, I wish I'd read it with more of a gap in between this and Keogh's original Murder Investigation Team book, as there is a LOT of overlap in terms of the way that modern forensic and investigative procedures are discussed and I kind of felt like I'd read chunks of it before.
3.5 stars
An interesting insight into the Ripper case and how it would be investigated today. But at the same time, I wish I'd read it with more of a gap in between this and Keogh's original Murder Investigation Team book, as there is a LOT of overlap in terms of the way that modern forensic and investigative procedures are discussed and I kind of felt like I'd read chunks of it before.
December 21, 2023
This book started out quite interesting and in the beginning I thought it would be a hard to put down book, however the further I read the more disappointing it turned out.
The book in general ended up being very dull. Besides the dullness there were quite a lot of repetitions.
Moreover a lot of the statements were quite obvious.
This would definitely not be my first pick if I should recommend a JTR book. It’s kind of annoying as I was so excited about the release of this book.
*this review is shared on more social media platforms.
The book in general ended up being very dull. Besides the dullness there were quite a lot of repetitions.
Moreover a lot of the statements were quite obvious.
This would definitely not be my first pick if I should recommend a JTR book. It’s kind of annoying as I was so excited about the release of this book.
*this review is shared on more social media platforms.
December 24, 2023
I am not a Ripperologist by any means, so I'm no expert here. Part One gets off to a good start but then gets repetitive. I could have skipped Part Two altogether. Parts Three and Four are essential but the Epilogue is bizarre. In other words, this book is all over the place. Am I glad I read it?? I don't even know.
July 16, 2025
Never read a book quite like this before - a bit repetitive at times and bogged down with jargon but still interesting
June 9, 2024
This is a strange book which has nothing new to tell us about the Whitechapel Murders and rather too much to say about the most tedious aspects of modern murder investigations. It is incredibly repetitive and badly in need of an editor.
Each murder is described in a fictionalised account seemingly based on witness reports. This is entirely out of place in a book which purports to be looking at the murders with the detached, analytical eyes of modern policing. It's impossible to tell what in these accounts is based on what was actually said and what is pure fantasy.
Keogh appears to have no historical understanding whatsoever and there are no history books referred to in the endnotes. He has consulted a small number of Ripper books but notably missing is Hallie Rubenhold's 'The Five' which has important things to say about the widely-held belief that all the victims were sex workers. He says that he did not want to be influenced by others' theories of who the murderer was and so did not read anything along those lines. However, he has taken this too far and failed to do adequate research into the wider circumstances of the crimes and the world in which they took place. Keogh's reticence about the history and his assumption that things in 1888 were much the same as they were when he worked in Whitechapel in the twenty-first century undermines his conclusions. The premise of the book is itself anachronistic but he takes this to extremes, at one point suggesting that Mary Jane Kelly would have had a fridge. God knows what he thinks it would have been plugged into in 1888, had such a thing even been invented.
Most grating is Keogh's anachronistic criticism of the original police investigation. He repeatedly berates them for not photographing the crime scenes, and for not using his preferred layout for public appeal notices. He claims that these things are 'obvious' but, of course, they are only obvious to him because he was trained and worked in a police force in which they were standard practice.
One is left wondering if his own investigations would stand up to the scrutiny of police officers in 130 years' time if they failed to take into account that they had more than a century's experience and research available to them that he didn't have?
Each murder is described in a fictionalised account seemingly based on witness reports. This is entirely out of place in a book which purports to be looking at the murders with the detached, analytical eyes of modern policing. It's impossible to tell what in these accounts is based on what was actually said and what is pure fantasy.
Keogh appears to have no historical understanding whatsoever and there are no history books referred to in the endnotes. He has consulted a small number of Ripper books but notably missing is Hallie Rubenhold's 'The Five' which has important things to say about the widely-held belief that all the victims were sex workers. He says that he did not want to be influenced by others' theories of who the murderer was and so did not read anything along those lines. However, he has taken this too far and failed to do adequate research into the wider circumstances of the crimes and the world in which they took place. Keogh's reticence about the history and his assumption that things in 1888 were much the same as they were when he worked in Whitechapel in the twenty-first century undermines his conclusions. The premise of the book is itself anachronistic but he takes this to extremes, at one point suggesting that Mary Jane Kelly would have had a fridge. God knows what he thinks it would have been plugged into in 1888, had such a thing even been invented.
Most grating is Keogh's anachronistic criticism of the original police investigation. He repeatedly berates them for not photographing the crime scenes, and for not using his preferred layout for public appeal notices. He claims that these things are 'obvious' but, of course, they are only obvious to him because he was trained and worked in a police force in which they were standard practice.
One is left wondering if his own investigations would stand up to the scrutiny of police officers in 130 years' time if they failed to take into account that they had more than a century's experience and research available to them that he didn't have?
October 17, 2023
I thought this book was great. Keogh didn't try to go down the standard Ripperologist route of solving the case and identifying Jack the Ripper. Instead, reading about the case through the lens of modern-day policing and investigative tools was fascinating. The NCA BIA assessment was incredibly interesting and thought-provoking. Overall, the book really made me re-think my view on the case and I came out the other side with some changes of opinion that I didn't expect going into it. I would thoroughly recommend this book to anyone interested in the case, as it's a refreshing change from a lot of the Ripper literature of today.
November 19, 2023
Wasn't too bad but I found some of the 'logic' a little too logical, and the endless details on the now and then of police work, although for some may be interesting, wanting really to hear Steven's findings, and who he thought killed the women, was a little long for the wait, and then, not as satisfying as one would like, although the 'women' angle, and who he thought Jack killed, was an interesting new angle. If you want to read this in order to find out 'who dunnit', then don't bother, but if you want to hear a new take on the murders, then this is the book for you - or if you want to be a criminal investigator.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews