Dead Like You By Peter James

Peter James, international best-selling crime thriller novelist, screen writer and producer, is co-patron of Sussex Crimestoppers. His new novel, Dead Like You, released on 27 May 2010 went straight to No 1 in the Sunday Times bestseller list.

Peter explains to Crimestoppers what inspired him to write Dead Like You, the sixth novel in his popular Roy Grace series.

In Dead Like You, a woman is raped after a New Year’s Eve ball at a smart hotel in Brighton, and the perpetrator takes her shoes. Detective Superintendent Roy Grace starts to wonder if there might be a connection with an unsolved case he worked on, as a young Detective Sergeant, twelve years ago. A serial rapist, dubbed Shoe Man, took his victims’ shoes as trophies, terrorized women through the city of Brighton and Hove, and almost certainly killing his last victim. When a second woman is raped now, and her shoes are taken, too, Roy Grace becomes increasingly certain that either a copycat is at work or, more likely, Shoe Man has begun offending again – and if he has killed once, he will kill again.

Inspired by a true story

The inspiration for the book came from a true story - I was at a lecture given by the Senior Investigating Officer on a chilling rape case: In 1987 a man in South Yorkshire, dubbed The Rotherham Shoe Rapist brutally raped a series of women in the Rotherham and Barnsley area.  He would strike late at night as they were leaving pubs or nightclubs, truss them up, and after he had finished, would take their shoes as trophies. Suddenly, he stopped offending, and the trail went cold.

In 2003 a woman in the Rotherham area was stopped for drink-driving and as is standard procedure, her DNA was taken. There was a familial – partial – match with the rapist. The police went to see her and asked her if she had a brother. She replied that she did, James Lloyd, but he could not possibly be their man as he was a very successful and respectable businessman. When the police had gone she phoned her brother and told him about this strange visit. That night he tried to hang himself in his garage.

James Lloyd was manager of a large printing company, a freemason, and generally a pillar of his community. When the police raided his office the next day, they found a trapdoor beneath the carpet, under which was a cache of 126 stiletto heeled shoes in cellophane.

I was captivated by this story – the violence, the eroticism, but most of all, I’ve always been fascinated by how the most seemingly normal people often are the most monstrous criminals.  The UK’s worst ever serial killer, Dr Harold Shipman, being a classic example, but there are many more. James Lloyd fitted this mould exactly. I was also interested to explore how attitudes in the police toward rape have changed dramatically in the past decade, yet still rape has an appalling clear-up rate, largely because so few victims actually report it. The clear-up rate for murder in the UK is 98%, for rape it is just 6%.

References Crimestoppers

I have endeavoured to put Crimestoppers into Dead Like You in a number of places. For example, information passed to Crimestoppers is referred to by Roy Grace at a briefing. An article in the local Sussex newspaper, The Argus, also includes a line asking members of the public to contact Crimestoppers anonymously. Furthermore, Dee Burchmore, a Brighton socialite who is an intended rape victim, also attends a Crimestoppers charity event.

Finally, in one chapter Roy Grace's colleague, DS Glenn Branson, is speaking to a convicted burglar who is out on licence. The burglar has information that could lead the police to the rapist but he acquired this information as result of a burglary. He is worried if he tells the police he will himself be arrested. So Branson advises him to call Crimestoppers! The burglar then worries he won't get the reward.

‘Dead Like You’ by Peter James is published by Macmillan at £18.99. Read more about Peter James on his website.