Jackie Malton

Former Detective Chief Inspector Metropolitan Police and role model for award winning series Prime Suspect.

Jackie joined the police service in Leicestershire in 1970, later transferring to the Metropolitan Police. Jackie served most of her service in the Criminal Investigation Department, investigating all aspects of crime including armed robberies, rape, murder, fraud, arson, blackmail etc and is a trained hostage negotiator. She served on The Flying Squad, as the only female in her squad, investigating armed robberies. 

Since leaving the Police Service, Jackie has been employed working as a story consultant on many of the major police drama’s seen on TV screens, including the Prime Suspect series which was based on her experiences as a senior detective in the Metropolitan Police Service. She has an MA in Creative Writing and her first play’ Be Mine’ was transmitted on Radio 4 Play for Today.

In addition, Jackie has an MSc in Addiction Psychology and has been in recovery from alcoholism since 1992. For the last 17 years she has voluntarily facilitated weekly addiction groups at HMP Coldingley which is a men’s prison. Jackie also voluntarily facilitates as a clinician 1-1 sessions with prisoners who ask for help with addiction to drink, drugs, crime, love and sex, and gambling. Most of this work looks at adverse child experiences and core social motives relating to their social identity and addiction. 

Jackie has also been awarded an honorary Doctor of the University by London South Bank University to celebrate her continued work in Criminology.

Her programme ‘The Real Prime Suspect’ was launched in September 2020 on CBS Reality, and examined in detail sixteen murders and the subsequent investigations by detectives and other experts. The series reflects the professionalism, tenacity and the emotional impact on detectives and uniformed officers, and the evolution of DNA and forensic science.

Jackie then went on to publish her memoir 'The Real Prime Suspect' in August 2022.