Indholdsfortegnelse for Real Crime Couples Who Kill i Real Crime Couples Who Kill

In 1970, Leonard Kastle wrote and directed The Honeymoon Killers. The movie starred Shirley Stoler as the incurably romantic, yet heavily overweight, Martha Beck, and Tony Lo Bianco as the sleazy conman-turned-killer, Raymond Fernandez. Described as a ‘weirdly timeless love story with a body count’, the film was initially sold as an early exploitation film but quickly gained the status of a cult classic and was even remastered on Blu-ray in 2015. Far from putting viewers off, the paltry production budget with its balsa wood props and blood-filled condom explosions only seemed to add to the popularity of the movie. Twenty-six years later, Mexican director Arturo Ripstein attempted to tell the tale, this time winning numerous awards that included eight Ariel awards and an Honourable Mention in the Latin American…

As the post-war leisure class emerged, technology became easily accessible for ordinary working class folk. Ian Brady made use of cameras, reel-toreel recording equipment and 45s. Like many serial killers, these would provide grim souvenirs allowing the Moors Murderers to relive their crimes in the form of Proustian reverie. Hindley would describe the graves as “marked by photographs and not headstones.” When it was time to kill or just after a ‘happening’, as Brady referred to it, 45s were purchased for Hindley to mark the event. After they killed Pauline Reade, Brady selected Ken Thorne and His Orchestra’s number four hit ‘Theme from The Legion’s Last Patrol’ to mark the occasion. On Boxing Day 1964, hours before they killed Lesley Ann Downey, Brady gave Hindley Sandy Shaw’s single ‘Girl Don’t…

Myra Hindley spent the rest of her life in various British prisons, dreaming of freedom. The idea of redemption became her one shot at salvation, if only in the eyes of her God, rather than the British public and the families of the victims. Over the years, she was attacked by newspapers whenever they got wind of her activities, for example when she obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree in Humanities in January 1980, when she expressed remorse (complicated at times by an astonishing lack of self-awareness and the fact she kept schtum about Reade and Bennett for over 20 years), when she was allowed occasional walks on Hampstead Heath as part of a rehabilitation programme and during her legal battles against her life tariff. From 1965 until her death…

When asked why Brady had never revealed where Keith Bennett was buried Dr Keightley made a startling revelation. “He told them it was three miles into Shinnybrook – you could bet it to the inch with Brady. But when he took them to Shinybrook they couldn’t find it because of the movement of the peat.” Dr Keightley confirmed that he had disclosed the information Brady gave him to Greater Manchester Police during their multiple attempts to find the body, but suggested that the search did not “go far enough” in their endeavours to locate Bennett’s remains. When speaking to us, Dr Keightley said, “I asked him ‘did you really try to find Keith Bennett’s body?’ and he said ‘Yes.’ He told me he spent a whole day looking for where…

Growing up in poverty-stricken Manchester in the 1960s, Tommy Rhattigan recalls how, despite the hard times, communities were close, residents didn’t feel the need to lock their doors and children felt little need to be wary of strangers. Just seven years old, Tommy went home with what he thought was an “ordinary” young couple that had offered him a slice of bread and jam to stave off his hunger. Unaware that the man and woman stood only a few feet away from him were child killers Ian Brady and Myra Hindley – the couple who would a few years later be dubbed the ‘Moors Murderers’ – Tommy agreed to go home with them. But as he sat at their table in the home they shared with Hindley’s grandmother, he knew…

Detective Sergeant Terence Onions: Let’s talk about the sort of girl she was in terms of personality. Rose West: Quiet, liked to be different to everybody else. She tried to do the opposite of everybody else. TO: Was she a problem in the house? RW: She didn’t go along with what the rest were doing… Rose became hostile when pressed about the bank account she said she used to withdraw money for her daughter. TO: As regards the bank account, we would like to find out if there’s some fact in your story. £600 is a lot of money. If it was me, considering that was a really stressful time for me, my first one moving away, and then I went to the bank to make sure she had some money,…

During the trials, investigators watched to see how the couple worked, and their theory that Coleman was the domineering partner proved correct. Despite the threat of the death penalty, Debra Brown remained loyal to her psychotic lover. “She was highly protective of him. She was extremely reluctant, which is unusual for many defendants, to tell her story,” Dr Helen Morrison, a forensic psychiatrist, told documentary makers on the USA’s Wicked Attraction TV series. “Whereas, on the other hand, Alton Coleman just saw her as a disposable piece of property. He had no emotional attachment to her. And would have killed Debra Brown at any point in time when he felt she was not going to be at his beck and call.” The same expert said Brown became a murderer because…

What is battered person syndrome? It’s a constant feeling of dread and, at worst, a fear for your life if you don’t do anything your abuser wants. What they want changes every day, so what is considered acceptable one day results in abuse the next. They belittle and manipulate you, isolate you from others, and control every aspect of your life. It makes you question everything you ever believed about yourself and you will agree to do things even against your will or values. How does it feel? It depends how long the abuse has been going on. It is a vicious cycle. The lows are followed by highs and promises that it will never happen again, and those highs become addictive. When you are abused you really can’t…

19 FEBRUARY, AM Nathan Matthews and Shauna Hoare let themselves into the house at 18 Crown Hill where Becky Watts is alone. Becky is killed sometime between 11.03am and 12.45pm, and her body moved to the boot of the couple’s car. 19 FEBRUARY, PM Having spent the afternoon with Matthews’ mother and stepfather, the couple drive to their home at 14 Cotton Mill Lane where they order a takeaway and watch TV. Later that night, Becky’s body is moved from the boot of their car to the bathroom. 20 FEBRUARY After texting his boss to say he has car trouble and will not be at work, Matthews drives to a convenience store to buy two bottles of drain cleaner and then to a local B&Q where he purchases an electric…

“WHEN RAYMOND TOLD MARTHA OF HIS SCAM, HE FOUND HER NOT ONLY ACCEPTING OF THE SITUATION, BUT EAGER TO HELP” It was a sensational tale of perverted sex, deceit and murder, produced by the media in lurid detail and gobbled up by a fascinated public. The story was shocking, and the trial a spectacle, but the beginning was unquestionably pathetic. INSATIABLE FOR FOOD AND SEX Martha Jule Seabrook was a pitiful creature. Born in Milton, Florida in 1919, she developed a glandular condition at an early age, which caused her to mature much faster than her peers and also gain weight. By the age of 10, she had developed a grown woman’s body and a voracious sex drive to match that unnerved other children. The more they shunned her, the…

Historically speaking, men have always been seen as the strong protectors of the family while the women are seen as the nurturers. As primary caregivers, certain characteristics have been attributed to females and when couples kill the media will, more often than not, treat each sex differently. Such a reaction is known as the Double Deviance Theory. Clearly both people have behaved abnormally, having resorted to murder, but the female has not only deviated from the moral and legal stance of society, but also from the accepted norms of her gender, hence ‘Double Deviance’. Women will often be vilified by the press, giving them ghastly names or reproducing particularly unflattering photographs that only serve to prove their point. Martha’s case is a prime example. Although both partners killed, it was…

It has been said that the Starkweather crime spree was the first killing spree in the TV era. What role do you feel television may have played in this crime? The Starkweather crimes were covered extensively in the true crime magazines of the time, and they struck a chord with readers for several reasons: first and foremost, this was the time period when anxiety and fear about juvenile delinquency and youthful criminality was running high in the nation, just after World War II. As the first wave of the baby boomers hit adolescence in the late 1950s, law enforcement authorities began to warn of a coming crime wave, as it was understood even then that younger people tended to commit more crimes. 18-year-old Starkweather and his 14-year-old girlfriend, Caril Ann…

The schoolgirl had vanished. It must be okay, thought her mother, Juanita Wheat. Her new boyfriend was with her eldest child. He seemed charming, normal and had taken her nine-year-old daughter, Vernita, to pick up a stereo after returning from a carnival. But the evening grew late and, by 11pm on that late-spring day in 1984, Juanita was desperate to find her girl. She dashed out onto the streets in her Midwest hometown of Kenosha, Wisconsin, looking frantically for little Vernita and the man she knew as Robert Knight. After an hour of searching, knocking on doors and calling friends, she decided that she had to phone the police. They asked about her new boyfriend. She described him as magnetic, handsome and nice. Police crews were dispatched. They searched the…

Her plea – guilty of the charges of manslaughter – saw Karla sent to prison where she was kept away from the general prison population for her own safety. She had a larger room and access to a university degree course in Sociology. Karla’s plea bargain was used to buy her co-operation to testify against her husband, a rapist whose crimes were proved by DNA evidence. The use of the blonde, beautiful ‘battered wife’ may have helped to convince the jurors of Paul’s misdeeds by creating a narrative that could be construed as a realistic indication of the couple’s own turbulent relationship and, by extension, an indicator of how terribly Paul might react to women he was not supposed to love. Paul would be seen as a monster of proportions…

HUNTLEY STRIKES Huntley sees the girls walking towards the house and entices them in, perhaps using Carr as bait. She is away visiting family, but Chapman and Wells don’t know this. GIRLS MISLED Huntley leads them into the dining room, and police speculated that he may have told them Carr was upstairs feeling unwell. HOLLY DROWNED Their killer is not a big guy, but the ten-year-olds would have stood little chance when he decided to attack them. He claimed in court Holly drowned in the bath and Jessica was smothered. JESSICA STRANGLED Huntley told his mother he’d murdered Jessica by strangulation when she discovered Holly had been killed in the bathroom. She had tried to telephone her mum, in a panic. A KILLER’S REASONING Huntley explained: “I was telling her…

Perhaps it was Inessa’s most horrific killing – her own goddaughter. In 2010 Inessa lay in wait at the house of an old friend that she believed had an antique collection of rifles. His daughter was Inessa’s goddaughter. Instead of the man, the two girls came home – Inessa surprised them and killed them both, torturing them and gouging out their eyes. In court she tried to blame Roman for the deaths of the girls but admitted the torture and eye gouging, though she gave no reasons as to why she felt the need to do this to the two innocent teenage girls. Inessa claimed at her trial that she never killed any children – perhaps not, but it seems she felt no compunction about torturing her own goddaughter and…

Dear Sadie I think you should know that Ian has been cheating on you for over a year. He’s been having an affair with me since returning from Camp Suisse in August 2013. By his own admission, Ian is not in love with you, never has been and never will be… We have been sleeping together and everything else that goes with it, week in and week out for some considerable time now. Have a look around the house, there’s plenty of my things around the place. Has he even changed the sheets since we were last in there?… The sex is unbelievably fantastic, the best he’s ever had by a really, really long way. We have never been able to get enough of each other. It satisfied a need…

15 SEPTEMBER 2017 Hey (name omitted) how are you? Does your au pair have any friends that would like to come and work for us? I’m all out of options and would rather have one person that I can develop into the role. They will get travel opportunities and great benefits (smile emoji) (heart emoji) Hi hun, I’m afraid no and I don’t have a nanny anymore she’s back to France honey give you advice pls pls pls don’t let your little (name omitted) with any stranger please everything can wait! Tc lots of love (heart emoji) (heart emoji) (heart emoji) (angel emoji) (angel emoji) (angel emoji) (angel emoji) Hey honey, sound like it didn’t end well then (:/emoji) I wanted someone to cook, clean, tidy, walk dog and feed…

“THE ‘REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE’ PERSONA WAS ONE THAT GAVE HIM SOME DEGREE OF CONTROL IN HIS LIFE” Few killing sprees have endured in the same way the Starkweather-Fugate murders have in the American media. There are many reasons for this morbid public fixation on the killings. First, the murderous spree was one of the first to be broadcast via television. Second, the brutality of the crimes took place in an unlikely place and time – in the solemn Midwest of the USA in the bitter cold of the winter. The crimes began in the same year that Sputnik was launched and when Bobby Fischer became America’s chess champion. America was attempting to wrestle with its identity on the world stage, while rock-and-roll music was upsetting the social balance and…

17-year-old David Smith’s unfortunate involvement in the last of the killings reads as a cautionary tale about the perils of doing the right thing. He was in the living room of 16 Wardle Brook Avenue when Ian Brady battered Edward Evans to death with an axe, hitting him 14 times in the head and torso. He also helped clean up the murder scene. But what he did next was not what Brady and Hindley imagined. After going home and breaking down in front of his wife, Maureen, Hindley’s younger sister, they went to straight to the police. Convinced that Ian and Myra were going to appear at any moment, Smith carried a screwdriver and kitchen knife to the station. What he told the police seemed far-fetched. That sort of thing…

Brady was a very well read individual both in and out of captivity. From poems to literary classics, he was very opinionated and extremely literate. The Russian author Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment was a personal favourite of Brady’s for many years. He also read A Christmas Carol every Christmas and enjoyed the works of William Blake. But what about the infamous books the media reported for decades as being central to the murders? According to Sir Elwyn Jones, the attorney general during their trial, the French writer Marquis de Sade was a “major influence” on Brady due to his introduction of sadism into sexuality. Brady dismissed this as “nonsense,” recalling how he had read it but was “bored rigid” by parts of it. For decades the press has reported how…

“Dear Mr Rattigan, Re your letter of March. I’m afraid you are mistaken in believing you encountered us in the past. I’ve had dozens of letters from people mistaken in this belief. The peculiar thing is, of all the strangers we met on our many travels, not one remembers, or, if they do, have dismissed the idea as too fantastic as we were quite ordinary and not dripping blood. As for Hindley’s latest absurd allegations and protestations, I’ve already rebutted them publicly and it has appeared in all the media. All coverage of her latest desperate attempt to gain freedom had been dismissive of her allegations, which it took her over 30 years to dream up. Yours sincerely, I Brady”…

What was your reaction to the discovery of human remains at 25 Cromwell Street? My initial reaction… was that it was just another story. I was a reporter and this was what I did. It was an unusual murder story with macabre aspects, but that is attractive to a journalist, and I enjoyed the excitement of breaking the full extent of the story in the Sunday Mirror. It was the following week that I began to understand that it was one of the biggest murder cases in British history, a story that could only properly be told in a book, and researching and writing Fred & Rose became the exciting part of it all for me. I then worked on the story more or less full-time for the next 21…

Jeremy Thompson, the Sky News reporter, likes to say how he tipped off the cops about Maxine Carr’s use of the past tense in their now-famous television interview. Yet he began his line of questioning in the past tense. “What were they like?” he asked Carr in a broadcast during the search for the missing ten-year-old girls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman. She simply followed his lead. Other journalists too, such as Nathan Yates in his book Beyond Evil (2005), noted the use of past tense without seeming to realise Thompson had started off in such a vein. Yet for some, this usage proved beyond a doubt that she knew the girls to be dead and is crucial evidence of her guilt. The cynical British press sought to aggrandise her…

On the morning of Thursday 19 February 2015, 16-year-old Bristol teenager Becky Watts seemed to suddenly vanish from the face of the earth. Her disappearance made no sense at all. She had spent the previous night enjoying a sleepover at the house of a friend, playing video games, watching films, eating fish and chips and sending loving text messages to her boyfriend of four months, Luke Oberhansli. Returning to the home at 18 Crown Hill that she shared with her father and stepmother, she spent the rest of the morning playing music and had planned to take a shower before meeting up with Luke (who had spent the morning at the dentist) in the afternoon. At 11.03am, Luke sent a text to say he was back home and Becky replied…

“The night is dark” and “full of terrors” are the lines from Game Of Thrones that Sarah and Kitt took to heart in preparation for the murder. Sarah claimed she was reading the second book in George RR Martin’s fantasy drama series A Song Of Ice And Fire, on which Game Of Thrones is based, on the evening that Sadie Hartley was killed, but the connection runs deeper. Kitt stated that Sarah idolised the show’s character Melisandre – the Red Woman – a priestess who plays on her sexual allure to ingratiate men in order to control them. It has been reported that Kitt and Sarah engaged in a game where Sarah would draw a knife along Kitt’s throat, with Kitt ‘playing’ Sadie being intimidated or killed. At one of…

Why might the couple have used fruit in the tableau incorporating a victim’s severed head? Since The Bible, fruit in the West has represented transgression, with side orders of sexuality, fertility and nourishment. Putting fruit with a severed head contrasts the brutality of murder with sexualised symbolism of growth and nurture – perhaps like Renaissance memento mori. ‘Memento mori’ translates as ‘remember you will die’, and like the couple’s grotesque tableau, these artworks placed death in the midst of life. Renaissance masters like Hals and Holbein incorporated skulls into their portraits, either openly held by their sitters or (as in The Ambassadors) unexpectedly confronting the viewer when the painting is seen from an angle. Even if it wasn’t intentional, there’s some intense cultural symbolism going on here. Evidence found included…

MEDOUNI: Sit properly. You needn’t be scared. OK? KOUIDER: Exactly! OK? Because, earlier on, you were crying and said to me, “I did something very serious, and I am very ashamed of myself”. That’s what you told me. Yes, or no? MEDOUNI: And what’s that? KOUIDER: Is it lie? MEDOUNI: What’s that? KOUIDER: Is it a lie? LIONNET (sounding scared and maybe in tears): I was scared! KOUIDER: You were scared? You were scared? You lie as you breathe, because… why did I scare you? Did I scare you?” LIONNET: I was scared. KOUIDER: What were you scared of? Scared of what? Scared of what? Because I was very, very, very nice to you! I was very, very, very, very, very nice to you! MEDOUNI: Stop shouting like this! Go on!…