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Average customer rating:

Landmark Case Gets First-Class Treatment
A must-read for fans of 'Forensic Files'
Chilling
Solid Detective Story - and True
True Story Of The First Murders In The World Solved By DNA

The Blooding
Joseph Wambaugh
Manufacturer: Bantam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback

Criminology | Crime & Criminals | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

True Crime | True Accounts | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0553282816
Release Date: 1989-11-01

Book Description

Fifteen-year-old Lynda Mann's savagely raped and strangled body is found along a shady footpath near the English village of Narborough. Though a massive 150-man dragnet is launched, the case remains unsolved. Three years later the killer strikes again, raping and strangling teenager Dawn Ashforth only a stone's throw from where Lynda was so brutally murdered. But it will take four years, a scientific breakthrough, the largest manhunt in British crime annals, and the blooding of more than four thousand men before the real killer is found.

Customer Reviews:

Landmark Case Gets First-Class Treatment.......2006-04-03

In 1983, a rapist and killer struck in Leicestershire, England, leaving a dead girl in a wooded pathway near an insane asylum. A year later, in another part of the same county, Dr. Alec Jeffreys uncovered something called a genetic fingerprint, of which no two are alike unless they belong to identical twins.

With that, the biological leftovers of the killer's attack became evidence that could theoretically put him away, if he can first be persuaded to take a voluntary test.

Joseph Wambaugh's 1989 true-crime story "The Blooding" is perhaps the author's most accomplished book, as he delves headlong into a strange netherworld where science and crime intersect, both in terms of genetic fingerprinting of which this case provided the first working model, and of the psychopathic mind of the killer, whom Wambaugh studies at length in the book's second half.

"The Blooding" captures a small British community in a state of terror, and details a frustrating, often misguided investigation that gets its man only after much confusion. "As with many police investigations the secret ways of people often produced peripheral mysteries as baffling as the one in question," Wambaugh writes, and to his credit he follows at least a couple of them at such length you think you are about to discover the killer at last before hitting a dead end.

Say this for Wambaugh: No one else makes police investigation seem so thrilling and comprehensible, and at the same time so worthy of respect. Here he is working far away from his California home base, but the differences in culture and police technique only seem to serve to sharpen his focus. He even manages to delineate a few of the key investigators, though here, unlike his more famous "The Onion Field", Wambaugh's interest remains firmly on the case at hand, however absorbingly he may portray certain indescribable emotions, like that of a father called upon to identify the body of his daughter, "the cruelest, most ravaging sight this world has to offer," he writes.

As Wambaugh notes at another point, "murder annihilates privacy," and in this case this means not only the agony of a murder victim's parents but the ethical question of mass-collecting DNA samples for possible use against a suspect. For it is clear without this innovation of Dr. Jeffreys' and its employment by the Leicestershire constabulary, a killer would have gone free, perhaps while an innocent man was put away.

Humane, electric, alive both to individual moments large and small as well as to the overall significance of the case, "The Blooding" is so good you may close it as I did feeling guilty you enjoyed a book so given the circumstances that produced it.

A must-read for fans of 'Forensic Files'.......2005-10-28

I'm a big fan of the forensic programs on Court TV, and I always check the date of the featured crime (almost always murder and/or rape) to see if it occurred before or after DNA testing became common in the United States. If it occurred after 1992, the perp is usually doomed. Even decades-old cases can be solved if blood/semen/saliva samples were properly stored from the crime scene. According to a prophecy in the weekly "New Scientist," there will soon be kits available that will allow police to process DNA samples in less than two hours.

In "The Blooding," former policeman, Joseph Wambaugh writes about the first serial killer who was caught and convicted through the use of DNA testing: two teenage girls in the English village of Narborough were brutally raped and murdered in 1983 and 1986, and it took four years, a scientific breakthrough, and the blood of 5,000 men to capture the killer, Colin Pitchfork. DNA testing also freed the suspect that police had already jailed for the crime.

On September 10, 1984, at nearby Leicester University, Dr. Alec Jeffreys (now Sir Alec) discovered that each human being (except for identical twins) has a unique genetic profile. At first, his DNA profiling technique was used to sort out immigration cases. Then the Leicestershire constabulary became familiar with DNA 'fingerprinting' and collected blood from over 5,000 men in the ultimately successful search for their murderer.

(By 2004, the UK had a national database of 2.5 million genetic profiles from convicted criminals. Statistics show that 38% of all crimes are detected where DNA has been loaded onto the UK national database, compared with a 24% detection rate overall. And 48% of burglaries are detected where DNA has been loaded onto the database, compared with a 14% detection rate for burglaries overall.

Nowadays, even British bus drivers are issued DNA testing kits to help catch passengers who spit at them.)

Wambaugh does not spend much time exploring the scientific aspects of the Narborough Village murders. He tells the interwoven stories of the victims, their families, the murderer, and most especially the policemen who were involved in the hunt.
From the shadowy paths that wound past the grounds of the local psychiatric hospital to the ancient, smoke-filled pubs where the villagers spent their free hours, this author will have you living and breathing the horror of these crimes. There are a few of the patented Wambaugh belly laughs as the Leicestershire police invent their own techniques for 'blooding' the local men. One of my favorite scenes takes place after Colin Pitchfork is apprehended, and he insists on telling his bored interrogators his whole life story before he will confess to his crimes.

Everyone comes to life in a Wambaugh story, but most especially the policemen.

I have never been able to pick up one of this author's books without reading it through to the end, and "The Blooding" is no exception.

Chilling.......2005-10-02

This isn't a novel as such, but rather a factual account of the hunt to find the murderer of two teenaged girls in 1983, in the small English village of Narborough, in Leicestershire. It's also the story of the first time that DNA was used in solving a crime. The girls were killed four years apart, both being young and both virgins. The killer raped and sodomised the girls before strangling them, merely pulling their bodies off the beaten village pathway. It's not a pretty story but the true account of the extraordinary effort by the police to find the killer, eventually using the new method of DNA testing from blood and semen samples given by thousands of local men and boys, and called by the police "blooding". The staggering thing is that the killer was, and is, a sociopath who has absolutely no conscience or feeling that what he did was in any way wrong, and that while he wasn't labeled as criminally insane, even with these horrific crimes, he is simply a vile man whose mind is wired in this way. He received a double life sentence but without any specific time put on his detention. I hope that he is still in jail.

Solid Detective Story - and True .......2005-08-09

This gripping narrative details the first use of DNA fingerprinting in a murder case. In 1984 British authorities found the raped and strangled body of teenager Lynda Mann in the woods near Narborough, England. With a possible suspect in custody, a local scientist named Alec Jeffreys persuaded detectives to let him use the suspect's blood in a new DNA procedure that could certify the young man's guilt. Authorities quickly agreed, but to everybody's surprise the results showed the suspect to be innocent. When young Dawn Ashworth was found similarly brutalized three years later, DNA testing showed that the same fiend had committed both crimes. Scotland Yard then ordered every male in the district to submit a blood sample in a massive (and ultimately successful) search for the killer.

Author Joseph Waumbaugh applies his straightforward, readable style in THE BLOODING. He teaches us about the two crimes, the British legal system, the false leads that are part of detective work, and initial skepticism toward DNA fingerprinting. Wambaugh also shows how this now-common technique helped authorities clear an innocent suspect and eventually catch a brutal killer.

True Story Of The First Murders In The World Solved By DNA.......2004-12-02

This excellent book details the true story in England of the first murder case solved by DNA. There was no DNA database at the time. Yet the detectives step by step used DNA to exclude suspects until the murderer was "left standing." There was a DNA dragnet with much suspense which the murderer managed to avoid until the very end. This is the true story of the first DNA conviction.

Also, this reader suggests you read the new book "Bloodsworth."
This is the true story of the first DNA exoneration in the USA. These two cases are linked in a very important way.

The Blooding of the Guns: The Everard Naval Series: Volume One

Average customer rating:

my review
The First of a Great Series
Slow starting, a lot of characters, ends in great action!
Review - The Blooding Of The Guns
Magnificent High- Seas Action

The Blooding of the Guns: The Everard Naval Series: Volume One
Alexander Fullerton
Manufacturer: Soho Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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A Share of Honour (Fullerton, Alexander, Nicholas Everard WWII Saga)

ASIN: 1569473137

Book Description

On the last day of May 1916, one hundred and fifty British ships, manned by sixty thousand sailors, confronted the German High Sea Fleet of one hundred ships and forty five thousand men in the icy North Sea at the epic battle of Jutland. Young Nicholas Everard distinguishes himself and wins a DSC. This is naval warfare, as close as one can get without actually having been there.

Customer Reviews:

my review.......2005-08-22

Good action story. The personal lives story was a bit contrived, and boring. Fortunately very little of the book concerns this. Once the battle begins hold on. The battle sequences are very accurate. I gave this book to a retired naval destroyer commander, and he loved it.

The First of a Great Series.......2005-08-09

At first blush, the Everard family doesn't look like much on which to base a series of heroic sailors. Hugh, drummed out of the service before the war in some unnamed scandal but pulled back in because of the emergency, is in love with his brother John's wife. John, a general in the army in France, does not make an appearance, but his sons Nick and David do. Nick is feckless and irresponsible, just one step ahead of being drummed out of the Royal Navy himself, while David is more professional if somewhat dull. That in the course of the book, one's opinion of everyone changes 180 degrees is a tribute to the author's skill at both showing character development and also at revealing a character's past layer by layer, like peeling an onion.

The criticism commonly made about this book merely shows the inability of some critics to appreciate the intent of the book they are reviewing. Yes, the book is choppy and yes, it is hard to follow the course of the action. One's initial impulse is to wish for maps and an appendix, but then you realize that this is the whole point. Fullerton's goal is to present to the reader exactly how fighting the Battle of Jutland felt to those who were there. Jutland was a confusing battle and it was many days before those who were there had the foggiest notion of the sequence of events. Fullerton has studied the battle carefully and everything that happened in real life happens here at exactly the same time. But you can't construct a coherent whole out of the narrative, just as even Lord Jellicoe wasn't able to do so. For that, you need to consult another book (I would recommend Rules of the Game by Andrew Gordon, which is not only the finest description of the battle, but one of the finest works of military history), but do it after you read this book, so that you get the full flavor of the writer's intent.

Very few writers capture the fog of war as well as Fullerton does.

Slow starting, a lot of characters, ends in great action!.......2003-10-30

The Blooding of The Guns is a historical/fiction story about the biggest sea battle of World War I, The Battle of Jutland. The main character is Nick Everard who is a sub-lieutenant in the Royal Navy (not a submarine LT; about the same rank as an American LTjg (junior grade) aboard the DD Lanyard. Nick has several family members who are also in the service. Nick's brother David, is the Navigating Officer on the CA Bantry. Nick's uncle, Hugh, is the Captain of the BB Nile. Also, Nick's Dad is a Brigadier General in the army.

75% of the story was boring to me. It starts out slow, and slowly starts to build up to the Battle. The last 3-4 chapters is full of excitement. While in the middle of this book, I was under the personal belief that I would not purchase the next book in this nine book series. However, with the last 3-4 chapters, it made me think twice about my overall view. This book is full of great details of describing the different stations aboard the ships that the main characters are on. The descriptions of the battle and of battle damage is really good. The main draw back to the story is the number of people in this story. There are three main ships in this story; Nile, Lanyard, and Bantry. Trying to keep up with the story and trying to remember who is on what ship was so difficult that I had to start a list of personal for the three ships to help me keep track. The author does not tip you off when the action goes from one ship to the next. So that is where my personal list came in handy. Just one example of the number of names aboard just one ship is as follows. Aboard the DD Lanyard, the ship that Nick is on, there are several LT's mentioned including 2 sub-LT's, with one being the Navigator. There is a Captain, Surgeon, several Petty Officers, a few Chiefs including a Chief Engineer, a Leading Seaman, a gunner, a Leading Signalman, and a steward. Not to mention a few that I left out. The BB Nile and CA Bantry has even more personal. That's a lot of names to keep track of!

So now to conclude: Yes, this book had a very strong ending. However, I'm not planning on following up with this series. In my view, having 50 different people to remember is too much!!!

Review - The Blooding Of The Guns.......2003-06-21

Action aplenty. Alexander Fullarton writes with authority,knows his subject and has an eye for history.It is without a doubt the best narrative of The Battle Of Jutland by any author or historian in the business.

Magnificent High- Seas Action.......2002-12-31

I just finished Alexander Fullerton's "The Blooding of the Guns" and my heart is still beating faster than it should. This is an outstanding work of naval fiction. Fullerton follows three men, the Everards(each on separate ships), during the Battle of Jutland. Swiftly shifting from one vessel to the next, the author manages to convey some of the confusion and "fog of battle" that plagued both the British and the Germans during this, the greatest naval battle of WWI. Fullerton's knowledge of nautical terms and early 20th century Royal Navy practices and customs creates a staggeringly realistic action novel. For readers tired of the stodgy, plodding works of Patrick O'Brian, or the gee-whiz gimmicks of Ludlum and Dale Brown, or who simply prefer dreadnoughts over wood and sails, Fullerton is a rare and welcome addition to the short list of truly authentic war novelists.

Average customer rating:

Bloody good read!
X Certificate Henty - A Ripping Yarn of the 7 Years war

The Blooding of Jack Absolute
C.C. Humphreys
Manufacturer: Orion
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Historical | Genre Fiction | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0752857053

Customer Reviews:

Bloody good read!.......2006-01-30

Excellent book! Even Better than the sequel "Jack Absolute", which is great too. Very powerful characters and exciting story line which begins with Jack as a school boy and leads on to his role in the British siege of Quebec. It has a good balance of historical fact and thrilling fiction with war, rivalry and romance you will find it hard to put down.

X Certificate Henty - A Ripping Yarn of the 7 Years war.......2005-08-11

GA Henty wrote historical novels for boys based on incidents in military history such as "With Peterborough in Spain" and "Cornet of Horse". The usual pattern was some misfortune caused a young lad to have to leave home and join the forces where, after giving an educational spectator view of great men and great events and surviving many escapades he returned made good.

This book follows that basic outline, but, unlike Henty would not make a Sunday School prize. Jack Absolute is a teenage scholar at Westminster School whose extra mural activities are drinking, gambling and wenching. He falls foul of the noble patron of his mistress and has to join the army in North America, where the war with French and their native allies is at a low ebb, to escape the consequences.

There he is present at the Siege of Quebec with General Wolfe. Later he is captured by Red Indians and survives the famous St Francis raid by the American Rangers only to have to spend a harsh winter in a cave with only a Mohawk warrior, a dead bear and a copy of Hamlet for company.

The story is told with great verve and humour and the narrative powers along. Despite the somewhat grim subject matter it is a fun read. A great breadth of subjects is covered, but nothing is skimped - the author is to be commended for his research. That I am eager to start on the sequel "Jack Abolute" must say something.

In summation daring escapades, interesting historical and geographical background, wicked villains and just enough humour. BUT not for the innocent...

Average customer rating:

First murder/rape case solved by DNA

Blooding, The
Joseph Wambaugh
Manufacturer: Bantam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Criminology | Crime & Criminals | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Murder & Mayhem | True Accounts | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 055376330X
Release Date: 1995-03-01

Customer Reviews:

First murder/rape case solved by DNA.......2005-10-20

I'm a big fan of the forensic programs on Court TV, and I always check the date of the featured crime (almost always murder and/or rape) to see if it occurred before or after DNA testing became common in the United States. If it occurred after 1992, the perp is usually doomed. Even decades-old cases can be solved if blood/semen/saliva samples were properly stored from the crime scene. According to a prophecy in the weekly "New Scientist," there will soon be kits available that will allow police to process DNA samples in less than two hours.

In "The Blooding," former policeman, Joseph Wambaugh writes about the first serial killer who was caught and convicted through the use of DNA testing: two teenage girls in the English village of Narborough were brutally raped and murdered in 1983 and 1986, and it took four years, a scientific breakthrough, and the blood of 5,000 men to capture the killer, Colin Pitchfork. DNA testing also freed the suspect that police had already jailed for the crime.

On September 10, 1984, at nearby Leicester University, Dr. Alec Jeffreys (now Sir Alec) discovered that each human being (except for identical twins) has a unique genetic profile. At first, his DNA profiling technique was used to sort out immigration cases. Then the Leicestershire constabulary became familiar with DNA 'fingerprinting' and collected blood from over 5,000 men in the ultimately successful search for their murderer.

(By 2004, the UK had a national database of 2.5 million genetic profiles from convicted criminals. Statistics show that 38% of all crimes are detected where DNA has been loaded onto the UK national database, compared with a 24% detection rate overall. And 48% of burglaries are detected where DNA has been loaded onto the database, compared with a 14% detection rate for burglaries overall.

Nowadays, British bus drivers are issued DNA testing kits to help catch passengers who spit at them.)

Wambaugh does not spend much time exploring the scientific aspects of the Narborough Village murders. He tells the interwoven stories of the victims, their families, the murderer, and most especially the policemen who were involved in the hunt.

From the shadowy paths that wound past the grounds of the local psychiatric hospital to the ancient, smoke-filled pubs where the villagers spent their free hours, this author will have you living and breathing the horror of these crimes. There are a few of the patented Wambaugh belly laughs as the Leicestershire police invent their own techniques for 'blooding' the local men. One of my favorite scenes takes place after Colin Pitchfork is apprehended, and he insists on telling his bored interrogators his whole life story before he will confess to his crimes.

Everyone comes to life in a Wambaugh story, but most especially the policemen.

I have never been able to pick up one of this author's books without reading it through to the end, and "The Blooding" is no exception.

Average customer rating:

Creepy
Not something I'd recommend
Bloody boring
It was good... sort of.
One of the best things i've read

The Blooding
Patricia Windsor
Manufacturer: Scholastic
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback

General | Ages 9-12 | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0590433083

Book Description

Maris' summer job as an au pair in England starts out well. But when she discovers the truth about her employer, the truth about his transformations and his plans for her, Maris must make the most terrifying decision of her life.

Customer Reviews:

Creepy.......2007-03-12

Maris would do nearly anything to get away from her mother, who is constantly criticizing everything Maris does and making her feel terrible about herself. So when she has a chance to go and work as an au pair in England for two small children, she jumps at the opportunity. Vicky and Adam, four and six years old, are cute and friendly and seem to be wise beyond their years. It is obvious they are keeping some sort of secrets.

Barb, the kids' mother, says she has a disease called Tired All The Time, or TATT. She sometimes can't get up out of bed, and she often looks pale and sickly. Derek, the kids' father, scares Maris a bit with his intensity and the callous way he treats Barb. Even Vicky and Adam sometimes seem nervous around him.

Slowly, though, Derek becomes more appealing to Maris. When tragedy strikes the family, she feels like she might have the opportunity to become even closer to Derek. But does she really know what she's getting herself into?

This story was very slow. Just looking at the cover and the description, you can tell what secret the family is hiding. It is infuriating, the way Maris fails to connect the dots and remains ignorant for so long. The worst part of the story, though, was the incredibly creepy start of a relationship between Maris and Derek. This book ended up being just a terrible cliche--married man hits on the babysitter--with a twist.

Not something I'd recommend.......2006-06-03

"The Blooding" by Patricia Windsor starts out fine. Maris is a teenager who wants to escape her mother, and when a chance to be an au pair in England pops up, she takes it. She soon finds out that all is not what it appears to be. This is a depressing book, and includes suicide. The mother of the children seems ignored and put down by her husband. The father shows way more interest in Maris then he should. (And out of nowhere she returns that interest.) He 'bloods' her- making her a wolf like him.

It goes downhill from there and this story does not end happily. I would NOT recommend this book.

Bloody boring.......2006-01-28

I wanted to like Maris, really I did. She's a teenager whose mother should never be allowed anywhere near an impressionable child. She's told Maris over and over again how worthless she is (never outright but by dismissing her and her abilities). The slightest mistake Maris makes is held up as the failing of a lifetime and something she should be flogging herself over for years to come. The one big mistake she makes truly is a bad one, but I can understand why it happened, what put her in that position. I can understand Maris completely; I just can't like her.

I thought I could through the first few chapters. She wasn't fleshed out and neither were any of the other characters, but I thought that might change and I'd grow to like her and the others. She seemed like a good kid in a bad situation, going from the emotionally abusive, overbearing mother into an au pair job where the parents screamed and yelled behind closed doors and made the whole atmosphere oppressive. I wanted to feel for her and the children under her care. But none of the characters were ever anything more than two-dimensional, and it's hard to care much about cardboard, even when it talks.

And then suddenly Maris turns into a Lolita. Out of nowhere she's fantasizing about Derek, a guy who's nearly twice her age, and he seems to be watching her in turn. That's just creepy in a bad way.

Then Barb, the mother, dies, and it gets much, much worse. Suddenly Maris wants to stay in England any way she can, even by spreading malicious gossip about Barb when she really doesn't understand anything that's going on. Her attraction to Derek goes into overdrive, which makes absolutely no sense when she's previously been frightened by him and thought that he was a jerk. Which he is. Emotionally abusive, controlling and, as it turns out, a bit homicidal.

I guess, Maris a teenager, I really shouldn't have expected her to think beyond her hormones and make a decision based on actual information instead of her own hopes and desires. But I had hoped that I'd be wrong, that she wouldn't go and do something stupid and then, worse, mope around and wangst about it. But she does. Constantly. For pages. When she's not throwing little tantrums about not going out hunting. Oy.

At least, in the end, she's not so self-centered and whiny that she can't do the right thing. Saving one life at the expense of another isn't such a bad thing, in this case, and I'm glad she could do that. But by that point I didn't care enough about her or any of the other characters to get too happy about it.

There is no good resolution in this book, which makes sense in Maris' case. She made her choice and she's going to have to learn to be an adult and live with it. However, we never did know what happened to the children, and that's a big oversight. But by that point in the book, I was so anxious for it to be over with that I really didn't care all that much.

The story just drags and drags and the characters are never developed, so they wind up as dull as the prose. There is a time or two when it actually threatens to be exciting, where something truly scary might just happen...but then it dies and you're left with more wangst and illogic courtesy of teenage hormones.

There are enough moments of interest to stop me from giving this one star, but not nearly enough to make me even consider giving it three. If there were half star options, this would probably be a 1.5 rating. Don't waste your money here and unless it's the only book left in the library, give this one a miss.

It was good... sort of........2004-05-28

The Blooding is an interesting book, although sometimes it's little else. The story is interesting but a little jerky sometimes. The writing style got to me a little. I don't really know why, but I think it was kind of the attempt (it seemed to me) to combine 3rd and 1st person. I read it on a very long bus ride, so I had little better to do. Besides, the plot did manage to progress fast enough to keep me interested. The opening immediately applies a sort of creepy feel to the text. It's good, but probably not something I'd read twice.

One of the best things i've read.......2003-12-31

This is one of the best books I've ever read. Yes, its some-what slow, but if you read it thouroghly (sorry my spelling is so bad!) you can undetstand why. Its one of those -young-girl-meet-older-guys-and-falls-in-love type of thing, but it only adds to it. Maris changes her mind frequently, which is a little irritating, but all in all, its a good read.

Blooding at Great Meadows: Young George Washington and the Battle That Shaped the Man

Average customer rating:

Blooding at Great Meadows: Young George Washington and the Battle That Shaped the Man
Alan Axelrod
Manufacturer: Running Press Book Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0762427698

Average customer rating:

Blooding Mister Naylor
Chris Boyce
Manufacturer: Dog & Bone
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 1872536042

The Blooding: True Story of the Narborough Village Murders

Average customer rating:

Everyone comes to life in a Wambaugh story

The Blooding: True Story of the Narborough Village Murders

Manufacturer: Bantam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Criminology | Crime & Criminals | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

True Crime | True Accounts | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0553176978

Customer Reviews:

Everyone comes to life in a Wambaugh story.......2007-01-03

I'm a big fan of the forensic programs on Court TV, and I always check the date of the featured crime (almost always murder and/or rape) to see if it occurred before or after DNA testing became common in the United States. If it occurred after 1992, the perp is usually doomed. Even decades-old cases can be solved if blood/semen/saliva samples were properly stored from the crime scene. According to a prophecy in the weekly "New Scientist," there will soon be kits available that will allow police to process DNA samples in less than two hours.

In "The Blooding," former policeman, Joseph Wambaugh writes about the first serial killer who was caught and convicted through the use of DNA testing: two teenage girls in the English village of Narborough were brutally raped and murdered in 1983 and 1986, and it took four years, a scientific breakthrough, and the blood of 5,000 men to capture the killer, Colin Pitchfork. DNA testing also freed the suspect who police had already jailed for the crime.

On September 10, 1984, at nearby Leicester University, Dr. Alec Jeffreys (now Sir Alec) discovered that each human being (except for identical twins) has a unique genetic profile. At first, his DNA profiling technique was used to sort out immigration cases. Then the Leicestershire constabulary became familiar with DNA 'fingerprinting' and collected blood from over 5,000 men in the ultimately successful search for their murderer.

(By 2004, the UK had a national database of 2.5 million genetic profiles from convicted criminals. Statistics show that 38% of all crimes are detected where DNA has been loaded onto the UK national database, compared with a 24% detection rate overall. And 48% of burglaries are detected where DNA has been loaded onto the database, compared with a 14% detection rate for burglaries overall.

Nowadays, even British bus drivers are issued DNA testing kits to help catch passengers who spit at them.)

Wambaugh does not spend much time exploring the scientific aspects of the Narborough Village murders. He tells the interwoven stories of the victims, their families, the murderer, and most especially the policemen who were involved in the hunt.

From the shadowy paths that wound past the grounds of the local psychiatric hospital to the ancient, smoke-filled pubs where the villagers spent their free hours, this author will have you living and breathing the horror of these crimes. There are a few of the patented Wambaugh belly laughs as the Leicestershire police invent their own techniques for 'blooding' the local men. One of my favorite scenes takes place after Colin Pitchfork is apprehended, and he insists on telling his bored interrogators his whole life story before he will confess to his crimes.

Everyone comes to life in a Wambaugh story, but most especially the policemen.

I have never been able to pick up one of this author's books without reading it through to the end, and "The Blooding" is no exception.

The Blooding of Jethro (Linford Western Library)

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The Blooding of Jethro (Linford Western Library)
Frank Fields
Manufacturer: Linford
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Literature & Fiction | Large Print | Formats | Books
ASIN: 0708954936

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the Blooding
William Darrid
Manufacturer: Bantam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
ASIN: B000MMJ502

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