Part 1 – ‘Securing the Scene’ with Graham Bartlett and Kate Bendelow

Learn with the Crime Experts
22 April 7.30pm

Tickets: http://bit.ly/SecureTheScene

The CWA minds behind February’s Blending Fact and Fiction have put together a thrilling three-part series: Walking Through A Crime Scene.

Accuracy underpins plausibility in any novel, and in crime fiction, it’s imperative not to make any mistakes. The CWA’s bestselling author Sam Blake and Crime Fiction PhD student Luke Deckard are bringing an ex-senior police officer, a CSI officer, a forensic expert and a pathologist to a screen near you to describe their role and answer your questions.

Wherever you are in your writing career, discover up-to-the-minute techniques that will inspire and guide you in this fascinating series. Research is crucial to writing believable crime, and in this series, the CWA bring you the experts who can help make that easier.

At this open discussion and Q&A you will learn who’s involved, who’s responsible for what, and crucially, what can go wrong at a crime scene!

Graham Bartlett and Kate Bendelow join forces to show you exactly what happens at a crime scene, who is involved, who is responsible for what, and the series of events that transpire from that 999 call and the first officer arriving on the scene. Who does what when? And crucially, what can go wrong?

Graham Bartlett was a UK police officer in Sussex for thirty years. He mainly policed the city of Brighton and Hove, rising to become its police commander. On the way, he was a homicide senior investigating officer and led on managing dangerous offenders, sexual offences, domestic violence, child protection and hate crime. He was a qualified strategic firearms and public order commander, leading the policing of many armed operations, large scale protests and sporting events.

Since retiring, he has become a police procedural and crime advisor helping scores of authors and TV writers (including Peter James, Mark Billingham, Elly Griffiths and Dorothy Koomson) achieve authenticity alongside their drama. He works flexibly with authors at all stages of their writing career and adopts an ethos of ‘creativity with credibility.’ Graham runs a series of hugely popular online courses and workshops under the banner of ‘Crime Writing: Making it Real’. He is also a best-selling crime writer, with two non-fiction books – Death Comes Knocking and Babes in the Wood – to his name, and a crime novel in the pipeline.

Kate Bendelow is a serving Crime Scene Investigator with 18 years of experience. She has worked on thousands of crime scenes including rapes, robberies and murders. Kate can provide you with an insight into what really goes on behind the crime scene tape. She can tell you who is allowed access, how evidence types are recovered and how long DNA, fingerprints and toxicology samples take to be analysed.

Kate can share what it is really like to work with death and come face to face with some of the most heinous criminals – from the practical to the emotive. She is also a writer and the author of The Real CSI: A Forensic Handbook for Crime Writers and has a novel out in May 2021.
Hosted by Sam Blake and Luke Deckard.

Tickets £5.00 per session. (Spaces are limited)

CWA members are entitled to free tickets. For your promo code, see details in News & Events in the members section or contact Admin.

Next events in the series are 20 May & 24 June

Part 2 – Murder Under the Microscope with Dr Jim Fraser
20 May 7.30pm – Tickets: http://bit.ly/MurderUnderMicroscope

Part 3 – Pathology Opened Up with Dr Marie Cassidy
24 June 7.30pm – Tickets: http://bit.ly/pathologyopenedup