The Cases That Haunt Us

Rating:
Summary: Another great book from top profiler John E. DOUGLAS
Review: As die-hard true crime buff I have read most of FBI top profiler John E. DOUGLAS' books, so THE CASES THAT HAUNT US was mandatory reading for me.
This time, he revisits some of the most shocking and infamous crimes of the last 120 years, and takes a new approach towards them utilizing modern criminal behavioral analysis and profiling. The book offers a vast array of cases in chronological order, starting with the notorious prostitue killer Jack the Ripper in 1889 's London's Eastend, and encompassing 1892's Lizzie BORDEN case (BORDEN was tried for murdering her father and stepmother with an axe, but aquitted), the tragic case of the LINDBERG kidnapping and the horrifying deeds of the Zodiac killer, a Californian serial killer of the late 1960ies/early 1970ies, up to the murder of six-year old JonBenet RAMSEY on Christmas Eve 1996 (the only case in the book in which DOUGLAS was personally involved).
It is true that several cases were never solved with no perpetrator brought to justice, and it is impossible to prove DOUGLAS's conclusions one way or another. Often decades have passed, and none of the people involved in the crime are alive. However DOUGLAS' conclusions are based on experiences and knowledge gained in a long career in law enforcement as profiler and head of the FBI's Investigative Support Unit (ISU). His observations and conclusions are absolutely convincing. Needless to say that they often contradict popular perceptions of particular cases. Take for example the Jack the Ripper case - I don't want to repeat here what the authors have to say (and hereby spoil your reading pleasure), but unsurprisingly the killer in DOUGLAS' view is NOT the type of "glamourous" murder (like Prince Eddie, the Duke of Clarence, supported by some kind of fancy conspirators) so often found in books and films about this haunting crime.
DOUGLAS'in-depth analysis of the cases with meticulous attention to details makes for fascinating reading.
My favorite chapters are the ones on Jack the Ripper and the horrible murder of JonBenet RAMSEY.
There are some pictures in the books, but with the exception of some maps I did not find them very helpful or interesting.
The book is well-written.
If you are a true crime fan like me, you will dig it!

Rating:
Summary: Very Disappointing
Review: This book was a major disappointment for me, although that should not have come as a surprise since the quality of Mr. Douglas's books has declined steadily since the first one I read, Mind Hunter. The premise is a good one--he uses his modern "profiling" techniques to provide insights into some older, well-known murders. But his performance here is mediocre & this book proves to be his weakest yet.

The first four chapters deal in detail with Jack the Ripper, Lizzie Borden, the Lindbergh kidnapping, & the Zodiac killer. While the overviews are decent & his analysis more or less sound, of necessity he relies heavily on the writings & research of others & there is really nothing in these chapters that you could not find more extensively in a book devoted exclusively to any of those cases. The next chapter includes three more famous cases (the Black Dahlia, Bambi Bembenek, & the Boston Strangler) & the same criticisms that apply to the first chapters apply to this one except that his descriptions & analyses of the cases are much sketchier.

The book really falls apart though, in the last full chapter, which covers JonBenet Ramsey. Douglas has ties to the Ramsey family & their lawyers &, while he makes a couple of good points in favor of the "intruder" theory, his allegiance is obvious & he often does not play fair with his readers. His attempts to defend the Ramseys from any & all allegations are fairly pathetic & seriously call into doubt his objectivity. As an example, he makes a big deal out of the fact that the Ramseys submitted to having samples of their hair, etc. taken saying that if they were guilty they would never have done so. But this is disingenuous--the crime scene was the Ramsey house which would have been full of their hair & DNA so matching their samples up with something found in the house would really be meaningless. On the other hand, the Ramseys have consistently refused to be interviewed by the police--interviews which, if they were guilty, would be very dangerous for them. Douglas also belittles the fact that the Ramseys hired lawyers right after the crime saying that any potential suspect would have done so. While true, it was this "lawyering up" that prevented the police from having contact with the Ramseys & from properly investigating the crime. While one could understand a suspect refusing to talk with the police even if he were innocent, it is much more difficult to understand the motivation of a parent whose daughter had just been brutally murdered to impede the investigation of the crime in such a substantial way. Interviewing & clearing the Ramseys, or using the information they provided to match up with other leads, could have focused on some other suspect & possibly solved the case. Regardless of who committed this crime, & it could very well have been an intruder, Douglas's tortured excuse making for the Ramseys pretty much ruins this book & his credibility in general.

For someone who has never read anything on the crimes discussed in the early chapters, this book will provide a decent overview & reference for further reading. But the contents are nothing special &, in the case of the JonBenet chapter, are much less than that. Two stars.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating. A good read.
Review: This is a fascinating read.

The idea behind this book is that John Douglas and Mark Olshanker look at some of the unsolved cases through out history that have continued to be of interest to the public. Through the evidence and accounts of each crime, they try to apply the FBI behavioral science that has been developed since these crimes as a way to 'solve' each crime.

Beginning with Jack the Ripper and ending with the Jon Benet-Ramsey murder with a wide variety of unsolved, famous crimes in between this book is just plain fascinating. They begin with a description of the crime, the crime scene and the people involved. Then they begin to explain and catagorize what they can learn from the known facts on hand. They explore possible solutions that have been provided by other authors and try to decide if these solutions fit the crime through a behavioral science point of view. They then provide what they think might be the appropriate solution.

One thing I appreciated about this book was that these authors constantly stress that they can not prove their solution is correct, only that it fits what they know to be facts and the behavior science views. They do not belittle other authors or police, in fact, they are constantly praising the good job the police have done in each case. The stress that this is an exact science at best due to it being a behavioral science and a people science.

Another thing I appreciated about this book was that it was peppered with a variety of cases that the author had personally worked on and stories of criminal the author had personally interviewed. Rather than being distracting, these short stories only support his theories and go a long ways to explaining exactly what the authors are talking about.

I rated this a four mainly for one reason: I find that many of the sentences are long and convoluted. I find that I have to go back to reread a sentence at times to be sure I understand what the sentence was saying. Maybe others won't find this to be an issue, but it occurs just often enough that it disturbs me.

Overall, this is a very fascinating read.