The Lost Boy is hardly a new book: originally published in 2007, it was republished in 2008; a second edition appeared in 2013; and now a third edition is available in 2025.

The continuous publication of this journalistic inquiry into the activities of Brady and Hindley represents the slow, and sometimes accidental, release of material from various sources.

The new and instructive edition of The Lost Boy accompanies a BBC documentary, in several parts, on the same subject which was shown in the early part of 2025.

What is new now? In short, with access to the collections of papers that have been missing for decades, Duncan Staff has been able to develop the general understanding of the case.

Hindley’s solicitor appears to have retained in an attic at his office all the witness statements and exhibits disclosed to the defence, as well as books of photographs. The solicitor died many years ago and, apparently without compromising any enduring duty of confidentiality, these papers were passed by his successors to the author of the book.

There is reference to the ‘statements’, in truth probably instructions, that Hindley gave to the instructed solicitor, but the full contents are not reproduced. As a documentary maker, Duncan Staff had previous dealings with the authorities and the police, and met with many people who had been concerned in the case. It is to be recalled that the Moors Murderers were convicted for the murder of three children, but it is said that the police always knew there were five victims: locating the remains was difficult.

Brady and Hindley had their own system – one that was understood by officers at the time – by which they used photographs to record where all their victims were buried. While central to the national consciousness for years, the trial itself seems to have been regarded generally then as the end of the whole matter. For many members of the public it was a travesty that Brady and Hindley missed, by days, the death penalty, as legislation had coincidentally been introduced to substitute life imprisonment.

The apparent historical indifference to the crimes became obvious when it was discovered that authorities had destroyed, to save space, the original transcript of trial.

However, the solicitor’s papers have been found to include a whole transcript so that a glaring omission of an objective, historical record of the evidence at the trial has been secured.

A further set of papers now available is that in the possession of the widow of the man who had become Brady’s  biographer. These included tape recordings, personal reminiscences and letters from Brady.

This new edition of the facts and circumstances of Brady and Hindley and their extreme crimes and the results for others of their activity is something approaching an overall narrative.

In the long run, the case of Brady and Hindley may illustrate the development of the politics of victimhood: the brother of Keith Bennett has assiduously pursued the relevant issue of discovery, as did their mother for many years before her death.

Duncan Staff’s understandable dismay at the depressive nature of these crimes and long-term consequences, which he has been studying for years, suggests, very much in his favour, that he now pursues the subject almost as a matter of duty.

The Lost Boy by Duncan Staff. Published by Transworld, 432pp, £12.99.