Jackie Malton
The Real Prime Suspect

Electric Palace, King’s Quay Street, Harwich, CO12 3ER
Tickets: £10 / £8 concessions (Students, Under 27s and Unwaged)
Box Office: Online or Mercury Theatre 01206 573948

The Real Prime Suspect is a jaw-dropping, gritty memoir from Jackie Malton (with Helene Mulholland). Former DCI, Malton, is the inspiration for legendary TV detective Jane Tennison in Lynda La Plante’s Prime Suspect starring Helen Mirren.

Jackie will be taking a frank look at her prolific career and the challenges she faced as a gay woman working within The Metropolitan Police.

Part of A Criminally Good Weekend

Join us for some fabulous criminally good author talks and events plus our very first silent film screening at one of Essex’s leading cultural venues and the one of oldest of its kind in the UK, Harwich’s Electric Palace.

A Criminally Good Ticket Deal

Buy a ticket to 3 events, get the 4th event free:

Sat 3rd 1.30pm – Jackie Malton
Sat 3rd 3.00pm – Lady Unchained
Sat 3rd 5.00pm – Ruth Ware
Sun 4th 11.30am – James Naughtie

Discount automatically applied at checkout when tickets for all 4 events are booked.

About the book

The Real Prime Suspect is a jaw-dropping, gritty memoir from Jackie Malton, former DCI and the inspiration for legendary TV detective Jane Tennison in Lynda La Plante’s Prime Suspect.

Jackie Malton was a no-nonsense girl from Leicestershire who joined the police force when women were kept apart from the men. Feisty and determined, Jackie worked in CID and the famous flying squad before rising to become one of only three female detective chief inspectors in the Metropolitan Police.

Malton describes the struggles she faced as a gay woman in the Metropolitan Police, where sexism and homophobia were rife. She dealt with rapists, wife beaters, murderers, blackmailers and armed robbers but it was tackling the corruption in her own station that proved the most challenging. Ostracised and harassed by fellow officers furious that she reported the illegality of some colleagues, Malton turned to drink.

A chance meeting with writer Lynda La Plante five years later changed the course of her life. Together they worked on shaping Jane Tennison, one of TV’s most famous police characters, in the ground-breaking series Prime Suspect. Jackie has spent her life working in crime. Now she’s ready to share her story.

‘Jaw-dropping’ Val McDermid

About the author
Jackie Malton was a police officer for 28 years. During her career she worked in the drugs squad, CID, the flying squad, fraud squad and as a hostage negotiator.

Jackie has acted as an adviser on some of the most successful British crime dramas,including Prime Suspect, The Bill, Cracker, Life on Mars, Ashes to Ashes, Trial and Retribution and Murder Investigation Team. She appeared in Steve McQueen’s BAFTA-award-winning documentary Uprising about the New Cross Fire.

Follow Jackie Malton on Twitter: @thursley