Publisher's Synopsis
Every cop has a case that dug its claws in and would not let go. For veteran detective Ron Iddles, it was the 1980 murder of single mother Maria James at the back of her Melbourne bookshop. He never managed to solve it. Maria's two sons, Mark and Adam, have lived in a holding pattern longer than Rachael Brown has been alive. When the investigative journalist learned that a crucial witness's evidence has never seen daylight, the case would start to consume her - just as it had the detective nearly four decades prior - so she asked for his blessing, and that of the James brothers, to review Maria's case. In her exhaustive and exhausting 16-month investigation for the ABC podcast Trace, Rachael reviewed initial suspects, found one of her own, and prompted devastating revelations about a forensic bungle and possible conspiracies that led to calls for the coroner to hold a new inquest.
