Chasing Darkness - Robert Crais

It is fire season, and the hills of Los Angeles are burning. Fire Department personnel rush to evacuate the inhabitants, and find the days-old corpse of a middle-aged recluse who apparently committed suicide. Clutched in his lap is a photo album containing photographs of seven young women who have been murdered, each photograph was taken only moments after the women were killed.
One murder per year for seven years, their bodies found in different parts of the city. LAPD homicide detectives had never connected the seven murders. But now with the discovery of the "death album" these seven murders have been linked, and the news for Elvis Cole is bad...
Only one suspect had been charged in any of those cases, that being for the murder of victim #4. LAPD and the LA County District Attorney had a recorded confession by the suspect and believed him to be the murderer. But, with evidence supplied by Elvis Cole, in the end he walked free. That suspect was the suicide now discovered in the fire, Elliot Martin.
Did Cole's action three years ago free a killer to commit more murders? Did Elvis cost three young women their lives?