New book of murders includes Somerset (From Bridgwater Mercury)

New book of murders includes Somerset

8:43am Wednesday 1st February 2012 in What's On

A NEW book examining murders from around the country has been published.

Scenes of Murder, Then and Now investigates 150 years of murder and presents it through ‘then and now’ comparison photographs which show what the crime scenes looked like at the time compared to the present day.

At least two incidents recorded in the book are from Somerset.

One tells of Sgt Ernest Digby of the Royal Artillery, who was found guilty at Taunton Assizes of battering his baby daughter to death and killing another child the previous year.

The other looks at an execution which took place in Shepton Mallet during World War Two.

Scene-of-crime plans, photographs from police files and press cuttings focus on a wide variety of murders committed between 1812, when a Prime Minister was shot in the House of Commons, to killings on the streets of London in the 1960s.

Extracts from eyewitnesses and investigating officers, original statements taken by police and even descriptions given by executioners are all blended with photographs of the murder scenes as they appear today.

Be warned, though – some of the book’s content isn’t for the faint of heart.

Scenes of Murder, Then and Now is available from bookstores priced £39.95.