We’ll All Be Murdered in Our Beds: the Shocking History of Crime Reporting in Britain is a colourful history of crime reporting since 1700 by bestselling author Duncan Campbell. For our April presentation, Duncan – former crime correspondent for The Guardian – will talk about the new edition (2021), which discloses new threats to reporting. The coverage of crime and corruption in the media is being challenged as never before through a combination of targeting of brave journalists in Malta, Mexico, Saudi Arabia and India, the use of libel laws and ‘cancellation’ elsewhere, not to mention the current attempt to make journalists divulge their sources in the UK, as with Chris Mullin, the former MP and investigative journalist.

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Duncan will also discuss the new edition (2019) of Underworld: the definitive history of Britain’s organised crime, which looks at how crime has moved from bank robberies and hijacking security vans to cybercrime, drugs and sex trafficking. The old family firms of criminals are becoming the new international consortiums, as shown by the recent cases in Spain and the UK, where criminals have been found to communicate internationally via modified phones using EncroChat networks.