Well worth reading if you have an interest in forensics and criminalistics.

A page-turner from start to finish... Highly recommended.

An informative and well-written book, which gives an insight into the work of SOCO. Recommended.

I'm a fan of series such as CSI and found the book particularly interesting because here we have for a change the crime scene in London.
The author was a crime scene examiner in various parts of what I would see as Greater London between the early 70s to early 90s.
As it is the book is also an interesting document of the political situation and the structure of the police force at the time.
The author's writing comes across as honest, his accounts are gripping and also at times entertaining.

The title explains exactly what the book is about. A very well written account of the author's experiences as a Scenes of Crime officer in London. It makes for good reading and I would recommend this book. Thank you Net Galley for my copy. I reviewed on Amazon and Goodreads.

This was like being taking back in a time machine to an era of policing that I would imagine and hope is far removed from today's procedures and polices. We are talking here of the real "Life on Mars" and "the Sweeny". This is the memoirs of Larry Henderson who was a Scenes of Crime Officer (SOCO) for London’s Metropolitan Police during a period from the seventies to nineties attending various crime scenes from murder, blackmail and robbery. His career entailed working for various departments which included becoming the head of the Flying Squad’s forensic team during a period where bank and post office raids were a common occurrence together with the Friday factory wages snatch. The nature of crime was far different then.

The book is divided into a number of concise readable chapters that in chronological order links Larry's career with the cases that he attended to. You can easily dip in out as you please. A number of famous people including politicians I'm sure will be familiar to the reader are encountered.

This book not only gives a fascinating insight into the world of forensics before the advent of DNA testing but also shows how the jealousy and obstructionist behaviour of the long established fingerprint personnel led to the constant thwarting of Larry's career. The internal corrosive politics of the time and the embittered policemen that Larry encountered is a constant theme of the book.

This book certainly gives an insight into the stress and frustrations that came with such a role as you at times were not only faced with difficult colleagues, ruthless criminals but also the vagaries of the legal system. An interesting aspect of the book was the presence in the background of the faceless security services and what role they may have had in the politics of the time. That they were certainly bugging the prime minister of the early period of the book Harold Wilson is alluded to here.

Although strangely Larry was not technically a policeman but a civil servant his book is a great reference if you not only would like to know about the forensics aspects of policing but also an historic document that covers some of the famous cases of the time. I enjoyed this book immensely and would recommend it to those who have an interest in the subject.

Fun, informative and eye opening, it's a really good read and I loved it.

Machine guns, safe-blowers, sadomasochists, pythons and flesh-eating viruses, all in a day’s work for Scenes of Crime Officer (SOCO) Larry Henderson who, in 999 CSI provides an unforgettable insight into a life dedicated to forensics.

Larry, whose career with London’s Metropolitan Police started in 1971, a time when police officers were more than a little sceptical of science, soon proved his worth and attended every kind of crime scene, from terrorism to rape and from blackmail to murder - before he became the head of the Flying Squad’s forensic team during the busiest and most dangerous period of the legendary outfit’s existence. Soon, Larry was caught up in shoot-outs, pavement ambushes, record-breaking drug deals and tiger kidnappings, confronting some of the UK’s most terrifying villains along the way.

Larry’s groundbreaking work features some of the UK’s most notorious crimes - a key piece of forensic evidence from one of Larry’s murder cases is displayed at Scotland Yard’s infamous Crime Museum. At turns breathtaking, fascinating, hilarious and tragic, 999 CSI opens up a truly astonishing world that most people never get to see, a world filled with cruelty, matched only by the courage of those who work tirelessly for justice

My thoughts:
This book definitely deserves the five stars I give it, because it shows what the author himself went through and how he wasn't afraid of going out and helping his fellow police officers , it shows how hard not just the CSI's work but the police as well, while there was a serious touch to the book there was also so some cases that made me laugh. I can definitely see Larry Henderson on a TV channel like Descovery Id talking about his cases, and the groundbreaking work he and his fellow offers did.other thing I love about this book is how the different chapters are broken down by the years the cases took place.With that said I would love to say thinks to NetGalley for giving me a chance at reading what turned out to be a really great book.

999 CSI" is a memoir about Larry Henderson's years working as a Scenes of Crime Officer in London. He worked as a SOCO from 1972 to 1994 in various districts (Sutton, Wimbleton, New Malden, BatterSea, Royal A District) plus the Metropolitan Police Forensic Science Laboratory and the Flying Squad. He talked about some of the cases he was involved in as a crime scene examiner (grouped by district) as well as the people he worked with and some of how the work affected his home life. He covered a great variety of cases: robbery, burglary, fatalities of various sorts, bomb threats, blackmail, rape, bestiality, drug raids, arson, kidnapping, protests, riots, and more.

For each case, he briefly described what he did at the scene and his interactions with the victim if he thought it was interesting. Since he didn't want to teach criminals how to get away with a crime, he didn't give much detail about the techniques used to catch them. Combine that with most of the cases being robberies and burglaries, and you don't need to worry about gory descriptions (though you get the feeling that it's there). He did detail his grievances with some of his bosses, though. This is the second British policing book that I've read, and both seem to feel that politics within the police/detective/forensics system is preventing that system from working well.

It was interesting to see how the scene examiners worked during those years and what the author contributed to how future generations will do that job. It was also interesting to see how a variety of crimes were handled. However, since we only get the evidence collection aspect of the job for much of the book, it did get a little repetitive. I found the Flying Squad part more interesting because he had to think about the bigger picture as he coordinated multiple people. Plus he was often on the scene when the action happened. Overall, I'd recommend this interesting memoir.