‘Let’s assume for now,’ Helen began, ‘that our killer is a prostitute, murdering men who pay for sex. This is not something that’s happened by accident – there’s no evidence they tried to rape her or that there was a struggle – so she deliberately lured these men to out-of-the-way places and then killed them. This is something that’s been brewing inside her, that she’s been planning. There’s nothing to suggest that she works in a team, so we are looking for a highly disturbed, highly dangerous individual who’s probably been the victim of violence or rape, who may have a history of mental health problems and who clearly has a violent hatred of men. We should check out the hospitals, drop-in clinics, refuges, hostels, and see if anyone’s presented there in the last twelve months who fits the bill. Also let’s go through HOLMES2 to see if there are any unsolved rapes or sexual assaults recently. Something must have set her off. However prone to violence she is, something must have triggered this terrible rage. Check also for crimes that she may have committed – assaults, stabbings that may have been her flexing her muscles before she decided to kill. DC Sanderson, can you run this, please?’
‘On it, boss.’
‘So who are we looking for?’ Helen continued. ‘She obviously knows her way around the scene – Empress Road, Eling Great Marsh – so she’s probably been an active prostitute recently. Her misspellings of both the word “Evill” and the Matthewses’ postal address suggest she may be ill-educated, even dyslexic, but she is clearly not stupid. She leaves virtually no trace wherever she goes – forensics pulled a black hair from Reid’s car, but it is synthetic, probably from a wig – and she possesses plenty of courage. She walked in and out of Zenith Solutions without anyone noticing anything about her. To risk capture in that way suggests that she is a woman on a mission. Someone with a point to prove.’
Silence from the team, as Helen’s words sank in.
‘So our prime focus is current or recent prostitutes. We should check out every rung on the ladder – high-class prostitutes, student escorts, illegals, the junkies giving it away at the docks – but with special focus on the lower end of the market. Matthews’ and Reid’s tastes seem to have been for the grubbier, nastier, cheaper girls. We need to cover the whole city, but I’m going to focus most of our manpower in the north. Bevois Valley, Portswood, Highfield, Hampton Park. Our killer picks up her clients in areas not covered by CCTV, but we have managed to track Matthews’ and Reid’s cars via traffic cameras. It looks like she picked up Matthews on the Empress Road and Reid somewhere near the Common. She’s probably picking these places because they are close to home, because she knows them, because they are “safe”. So let’s not rule anything out, but my guess is that she lives or works in the north of the city. DC McAndrew will lead our efforts in this area.’
