E18: Warming Up Cold Cases

The conversation reveals cold-case investigation not as a self-contained event, but as a continuing process shaped by time, technology, professional judgement and the enduring experiences of victims’ families.

Former UK Detective Inspector Howard Atkin explains why an unsolved case does not simply stop when the original investigation ends. They explore the relationship between active investigation and independent review, how limited resources affect which cases are revisited, and why evidence, records and human memory become more difficult to recover as time passes.