The Cases That Haunt Us: From Jack the Ripper to JonBenet Ramsey, the FBI’s Legendary Mindhunter Sheds Light on the Mysteries That Won’t Go Away

John E. Douglas · Mark Olshaker

Nov 2016 · Blackstone Audio Inc. · Narrated by Malcolm Hillgartner

About this audiobook

Violent, provocative, shocking. Call them what you will ... but don’t call them open and shut.

Did Lizzie Borden murder her own father and stepmother? Was Jack the Ripper actually the Duke of Clarence? Who killed JonBenet Ramsey? America’s foremost expert on criminal profiling and twenty-five-year FBI veteran John Douglas, along with author and filmmaker Mark Olshaker, explores those tantalizing questions and more in this mesmerizing work of detection.

With uniquely gripping analysis, the authors reexamine and reinterpret the accepted facts, evidence, and victimology of the most notorious murder cases in the history of crime, including the Lindbergh baby kidnapping, the Zodiac Killer, and the Whitechapel murders. Utilizing techniques developed by Douglas himself, they give detailed profiles and reveal chief suspects in pursuit of what really happened in each case.

The Cases That Haunt Us not only offers convincing and controversial conclusions, it deconstructs the evidence and widely held beliefs surrounding each case and rebuilds them—with fascinating, surprising, and haunting results.

Ratings and reviews

I really enjoyed this book. The tone is very casual and easy for listening. The only thing that I didn’t like as much was going off and trying to research more of John Douglas’s additional reports on the crimes. He seemed to contradict himself between the book and the other publications. Not sure which came before or after but still.

Very interesting.

About the author

John Douglas, the legendary FBI criminal profiler and veteran author of true crime books, has spent over twenty-five years researching and culling the stories of America’s most disturbing criminals. A veteran of the United States Air Force, he has directly worked and/or had overall supervision in over 5,000 violent crime cases over the past 48 years. He is currently chairman of the board of the “Cold Case Foundation.” One of the foremost experts and investigators of criminal minds and motivations, he currently lives in the Washington, D.C. area. Mark Olshaker is an Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker and author of ten nonfiction books and five novels, including Einstein’s Brain and The Edge. His books with former FBI Special Agent and criminal profiling pioneer John Douglas, beginning with Mindhunter and, most recently, Law & Disorder, have sold millions of copies and have been translated into many languages. Mindhunter is now a dramatic series on Netflix, directed by David Fincher. He and his wife Carolyn, an attorney, live in Washington, D.C.

Mark Olshaker is an Emmy Award–winning filmmaker and a New York Times bestselling nonfiction author. His seven books with former FBI Special Agent and criminal profiling pioneer John E. Douglas, beginning with Mindhunter, have sold millions of copies, been translated into many languages, and along with his Emmy-nominated PBS film Mind of a Serial Killer, made Olshaker a sought-after speaker and consultant on law enforcement–related issues.

Malcolm Hillgartner has narrated over 175 audiobooks. He was named an AudioFile Best Voice of 2013. His work ranges from children's titles such as On the Blue Comet (AudioFile Best of 2011, Earphones), and Neal Stevenson's sci-fi epic REAMDE (Audible.com Best of 2011) to the biographies Kissinger (AudioFile Best of 2013, Earphones) and Cheever (AudioFile Best of 2009, Earphones). He is also an accomplished actor, writer, and musician. With his wife and partner, Jahnna Beecham, he has written over 130 books for teens and young readers, as well as the musicals Chaps! and The Best Christmas Pageant Ever Musical, which have been produced in the U.S. and Canada.