In the Summer of 1972, 14-year-old Judith Roberts took off for a bike ride within the vicinity of her Staffordshire home. Her body was discovered after a three-day manhunt, concealed from view in a thick privet having been brutally attacked. The community of Tamworth was rocked by the news of her death and an outcry for justice ensued. Within weeks of her murder, an impressionable and troubled soldier, based in the nearby barracks, 17-year-old Andrew Evans, walked into a police station and confessed to the killing. Relentlessly interviewed for hours on end without representation or an appropriate adult present, Andrew was swiftly charged with Judith's murder. Despite attempting to recount his statement and a legal defense at trial that defied the prosecution's arguments that Andrew Evans was guilty, a judge sentenced him to life behind bars. He was eventually acquitted in 1997 in what was, at the time, Britain's longest miscarriage of justice. While Andrew Evans fought for his freedom, another man drove up and down England undetected: Peter William Sutcliffe. Eventually proven capable of inflicting unimaginable horror at any given opportunity, an independent inquiry dubbed him likely responsible for more murders than the 13 he was convicted of and the seven others he attempted between 1975 and 1980. In The Murder of Judith Roberts, Chris Clark and Tanita Matthews examine evidence that concludes that Sutcliffe, whose violent criminal history dates back as far as 1969, was the real culprit responsible for Judith's murder. With never before-published dialogue from Andrew Evans' police interviews showing the grave miscarriage of justice, the case file of the five-decade cold case is examined under a new light.

本書は単なる事件記録ではない。そこにあるのは、無垢な少年が国家の歯車に飲み込まれていく悲劇と、真実を求める執念が織りなす「沈黙の告発」だ。著者は初公開の供述録を紐解き、冤罪という名のもう一つの殺人がいかにして完成したのかを、冷徹かつ情熱的な筆致で白日の下に晒していく。 真犯人の影に潜むシリアルキラーの存在と、制度の欠陥が招いた暗部が交錯する様は、一級のミステリーを凌駕する重厚な緊張感を放つ。失われた少女の命と、二十五年もの歳月を奪われた少年の魂を鎮魂する本作は、読者の正義感を激しく揺さぶり、隠蔽された真実の重みを突きつけてくるだろう。