Crime+Investigation is proud to partner with CrimeCon UK, a new True Crime event, coming to the UK in September 2021. As part of the show, CrimeCon has gathered together leading true crime podcasters in Podcast Row. Here fans will be able to meet the stars of their favourite shows in person.
The Unseen Q&A
Ahead of the event, Crime+Investigation is doing a series of Q&As with some of the podcasters who will be attending CrimeCon in September. In the fourth installment we spoke with Caprice, the host of The Unseen, a podcast dedicated to UK missing people and unresolved cases.
1. How would you describe your podcast in one sentence?
A UK podcast that focuses on forgotten, unsolved cases and missing people told by a Northerner!
2. What makes your podcast stand out from the crowd?
I focus on unsolved cases that get little or no attention from the media or stories that have been forgotten over the years as they have been cold cases for so long. My focus is on those that are missing, unidentified or forgotten and don’t have anyone to advocate for them. Every victim and family deserve someone to tell their stories.
3. What first sparked your interest in true crime?
My family as a whole are all interested in true crime but particularly my Nan who always had Murder she Wrote or Columbo on the TV while I was there during holidays from school!
4. What's your favourite part of the podcasting process?
As many of the cases I cover are older, cold cases or missing people often there is very little information available so research is the biggest part of the process for me. Luckily, it is the part I love the most and finding little details that might not have been talked about before is very satisfying.
5. What do you think your fascination with True Crime has taught you in your personal life?
I would say that reading up on true crime cases has taught me that not everything is as it first appears and that you should always question what you read or hear. There is always another side to a story with all true crime cases and I do try to cover all angles of the story in my episodes for this reason. It’s something I now do in my personal life; not everything ends up being as it first appeared.
6. What's your favourite episode and why?
The episodes that I always feel most proud of are the ones that discuss unidentified people. There are currently 570 unidentified people in the UK and sadly this number is always rising and many of these people have nobody to speak up for them. I try to feature as many of these people from across the country as I can and they are often my favourite episodes to write.
7. Which case that you've featured on the podcast keeps you awake at night?
One case that I covered back in September last year was the murder of Ivy Davies in her own home in Westcliff- On- Sea in 1975. Since I released it, I have been in contact with Ivy’s family about her case and there are so many aspects of it that really bother me; the brutality of her murder, the lack of progress in the police investigation and the several unexplored lines of enquiry just to name a few. It is a case that I would hope to see more investigation in and would love to be solved.
8. What do you now know about podcasting that you wish you knew when you started?
I guess it’s the same in any sort of new venture but at the beginning I was really preoccupied with any negative comments about it that I thought about that more than all the positive ones. Since then I’ve realised that I have so many amazing listeners and that you’re not going to be everyone’s cup of tea which is fine because there are so many great true crime podcasts out there!
9. What's one cold case you would like to see solved?
I would love to see the disappearance of Claudia Lawrence solved. It is such a shame that her father Peter recently died without finding out what happened to her and it feels like a case that can eventually be solved. The fact that she was just going about her day to day life and simply disappeared is so sad and I feel that it just takes that one person coming forward and that one piece of evidence to solve it. I hope it happens.
10. What reforms are needed in the world of policing and the judicial system?
Many of the cases I work on are cold cases and unfortunately, this means that often police have struggled to find leads or have no evidence. This leaves families of victims and of the missing in a constant state of limbo of not knowing. Sadly, from my experience, some families feel unhappy with the communication between themselves and the police and so I think some change to the way that families are kept updated about cases would be appreciated, particularly in older unsolved crimes.
11. What's your favourite True Crime podcast, documentary or TV series and why?
The true crime podcast that I have consistently listened to and enjoyed since it began is Truth and Justice with Bob Ruff. I have listened since the beginning when he first got started and still listen today. I love his investigative style and the depths that he goes to get to the truth in the cases he covers. That is what I admire about the podcast the most.
12. If you didn’t have a True Crime podcast, what type of podcast would you have?
I love learning new things and researching the history of the areas where the crimes happened and setting the scene is one of my favourite parts of the writing process so I think I would probably have a history podcast of some sort.
13. What are you most looking forward to at CrimeCon?
I am so excited to meet all of my fellow podcasters and to take advantage of all the amazing speakers!
