The
Moors murders were carried out by Ian Brady and Myra Hindley between July 1963 and October 1965, in and around what is now
Greater ManchesterGreater Manchester is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 2.6 million. It encompasses one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and comprises ten metropolitan boroughs: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, and the...
, England. The victims were five children aged between 10 and 17—Pauline Reade, John Kilbride, Keith Bennett, Lesley Ann Downey and Edward Evans—at least four of whom were
sexually assaultedSexual assault is an assault of a sexual nature on another person, or any sexual act committed without consent. Although sexual assaults most frequently are by a man on a woman, it may involve any combination of two or more men, women and children....
. The murders are so named because two of the victims were discovered in graves dug on
Saddleworth MoorSaddleworth Moor is an area of the South Pennines in northern England. It is a sparsely populated moorland and millstone grit divided between the metropolitan boroughs of Oldham and Kirklees, in Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire respectively....
, with a third grave also being discovered there in 1987, over 20 years after Brady and Hindley's trial in 1966. The body of a fourth victim, Keith Bennett, is also suspected to be buried there, but despite repeated searches it remains undiscovered.
The police were initially aware of only three killings, those of Edward Evans, Lesley Ann Downey, and John Kilbride. The investigation was reopened in 1985, after Brady was reported in the press as having confessed to the murders of Pauline Reade and Keith Bennett. Brady and Hindley were taken separately to Saddleworth Moor to assist the police in their search for the graves, both by then having confessed to the additional murders.
Characterised by the press as "the most evil woman in Britain", Hindley made several appeals against her life sentence, claiming she was a reformed woman and no longer a danger to society, but she was never released. She died in 2002, aged 60. Brady was declared criminally insane in 1985, since when he has been confined in the high-security
Ashworth HospitalAshworth Hospital is a high security psychiatric hospital at Maghull in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England.Ashworth is one of only three high-security specialist psychiatric hospitals in England and Wales, along with Rampton and Broadmoor, that exist to work with people who...
. He has made it clear that he never wants to be released, and has repeatedly asked that he be allowed to die.
The murders, reported in almost every English-language newspaper in the world, were the result of what Malcolm MacCulloch, professor of forensic psychiatry at
Cardiff UniversityCardiff University is a leading research university located in the Cathays Park area of Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom. It received its Royal charter in 1883 and is a member of the Russell Group of Universities. The university is consistently recognised as providing high quality research-based...
, called a "concatenation of circumstances", which brought together a "young woman with a tough personality, taught to hand out and receive violence from an early age" and a "sexually sadistic psychopath".
Victims
The full extent of Brady and Hindley's killing spree did not come to light until their confessions in 1985, as both had until then maintained their innocence. Their first victim was 16-year-old Pauline Reade, a neighbour of Hindley's who disappeared on her way to a dance at the British Railways Club in
GortonGorton is an area of the city of Manchester, in North West England. It is located to the southeast of Manchester city centre. Neighbouring areas include Longsight and Levenshulme....
on 12 July 1963. That evening, Brady told Hindley that he wanted to "commit his perfect murder". He told her to drive her van around the local area while he followed behind on his motorcycle; when he spotted a likely victim he would flash his headlight, and Hindley was to stop and offer that person a lift.
Driving down Gorton Lane, Brady saw a young girl walking towards them, and signalled Hindley to stop, which she did not do until she had passed the girl. Brady drew up alongside on his motorbike, demanding to know why she had not offered the girl a lift, to which Hindley replied that she recognised her as Marie Ruck, a near neighbour of her mother. Shortly after 8:00 pm, continuing down Froxmer Street, Brady spotted a girl wearing a pale blue coat and white high-heeled shoes walking away from them, and once again signalled for the van to stop. Hindley recognised the girl as Pauline Reade, a friend of her younger sister, Maureen. Reade got into the van with Hindley, who then asked if she would mind helping to search for an expensive glove she had lost on Saddleworth Moor. Reade said she was in no great hurry, and agreed. At 16, Pauline Reade was older than Marie Ruck, and Hindley realised that there would be less of a hue and cry over the disappearance of a teenager than there would over a child of seven or eight. When the van reached the moor, Hindley stopped and Brady arrived shortly afterwards on his motorcycle. She introduced him to Reade as her boyfriend, and said that he had also come to help find the missing glove. Brady took Reade onto the moor while Hindley waited in the van. After about 30 minutes Brady returned alone, and took Hindley to the spot where Reade lay dying, her throat cut. He told her to stay with Reade while he fetched a spade he had hidden nearby on a previous visit to the moor, to bury the body. Hindley noticed that "Pauline's coat was undone and her clothes were in disarray ... She had guessed from the time he had taken that Brady had sexually assaulted her." Returning home from the moor in the van—they had loaded the motorcycle into the back—Brady and Hindley passed Reade's mother, Joan, accompanied by her son, Paul, searching the streets for Pauline.
Accompanied by Brady, Hindley approached twelve-year-old John Kilbride in the early evening of 23 November 1963 at a market in
Ashton-under-LyneAshton-under-Lyne is a market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Tameside, Greater Manchester, England. Historically a part of Lancashire, it lies on the north bank of the River Tame, on undulating land at the foothills of the Pennines...
, and offered him a lift home on the pretext that his parents would be worried about him being out so late. With the added inducement of a proffered bottle of sherry, Kilbride readily agreed to get into the
Ford AngliaThe 1949 model, code E494A, was a makeover of the previous model with a rather more 1940s style front-end, including the sloped, twin-lobed radiator grille. Again it was a very spartan vehicle and in 1948 was Britain's lowest priced four wheel car....
car that Hindley had hired. Brady told Kilbride that the sherry was at their home, and they would have to make a detour to collect it. On the way he suggested that they take another detour, to search for a glove he said that Hindley had lost on the moor. When they reached the moor Brady took the child with him while Hindley waited in the car. Brady sexually assaulted Kilbride and attempted to slit his throat with a six-inch serrated blade before fatally strangling him with a piece of string, possibly a shoelace.
Twelve-year-old Keith Bennett vanished on his way to his grandmother's house in
LongsightLongsight is an area of Manchester, England, about south of the city centre. Its population is about 16,000.-History:Longsight has been known over the past for its gang related violence, similar to that of nearby Moss Side. Most of the violence came from tensions between 2 gangs; The Longsight...
during the early evening of 16 June 1964, four days after his birthday. Hindley lured him into her Mini pick-up—which Brady was sitting in the back of—by asking for the boy's help in loading some boxes, after which she said she would drive him home. She drove to a lay-by on Saddleworth Moor as she and Brady had previously arranged, and Brady went off with Bennett, supposedly looking for a lost glove. Hindley kept watch, and after about 30 minutes or so Brady reappeared, alone and carrying a spade that he had hidden there earlier. When Hindley asked how he had killed Bennett, Brady said that he had sexually assaulted the boy and strangled him with a piece of string.
Brady and Hindley visited a fairground on 26 December 1964 in search of another victim, and noticed 10-year-old Lesley Ann Downey standing beside one of the rides. When it became apparent that she was on her own, they approached her and deliberately dropped some of the shopping they were carrying close to her, before asking for the girl's help to carry some of the packages to their car, and then to their home. Once inside the house Downey was undressed, gagged, and forced to pose for photographs before being raped and killed, perhaps strangled with a piece of string. Hindley maintained that she went to draw a bath for the child and found the girl dead (presumably killed by Brady) when she returned. In Dr. Chris Cowley's book
Face to Face with Evil: Conversations with Ian Brady, Brady states that it was Hindley who killed Lesley Ann Downey. The following morning Brady and Hindley drove with Downey's body to Saddleworth Moor, where she was buried, naked with her clothes at her feet, in a shallow grave.
On 6 October 1965 Brady met 17-year-old apprentice engineer Edward Evans at
Manchester Central railway stationManchester Central railway station is a former railway station in Manchester City Centre, England. One of Manchester's main railway terminals between 1880 and 1969, it now houses an exhibition and conference centre named Manchester Central.-History:...
and invited him to his home at 16 Wardle Brook Avenue in
HattersleyHattersley is a residential area within the Metropolitan Borough of Tameside, in Greater Manchester, England. It is to the east of Hyde and 6 miles west of the Peak District National Park....
, where Brady beat him to death with an axe.
Initial report
The attack on Edward Evans was witnessed by Hindley's 17-year-old brother-in-law, David Smith, the husband of her younger sister Maureen. The Hindley family had not approved of Maureen's marriage to Smith, who had several criminal convictions, including actual bodily harm and housebreaking, the first of which, wounding with intent, occurred when he was aged eleven. Throughout the previous year Brady had been cultivating a friendship with Smith, who had become "in awe" of the older man, something that increasingly worried Hindley, as she felt it compromised their safety.
On the evening of 6 October 1965 Hindley drove Brady to Manchester Central Station, where she waited outside in the car while he selected their victim; after a few minutes Brady reappeared in the company of Edward Evans, to whom he introduced Hindley as his sister. After they had driven back home and relaxed over a bottle of wine, Brady sent Hindley to fetch her brother-in-law. When they got back to the house Hindley told Smith to wait outside for her signal, a flashing light. When the signal came Smith knocked on the door and was met by Brady, who asked if he had come for "the miniature wine bottles". Brady led Smith into the kitchen and left him there, saying that he was going to collect the wine. A few minutes later Smith heard a scream, followed by Hindley shouting loudly for him to come and help. Smith entered the living room to find Brady repeatedly striking Evans with the flat of an axe, and watched as he then throttled Evans with a length of electrical cord. Evans' body was too heavy for Smith to carry to the car on his own—Brady had sprained his ankle in the struggle—so they wrapped it in plastic sheeting and put it in the spare bedroom.
Smith agreed to meet Brady the following evening to dispose of Evans' body, but after returning home he woke his wife and told her what he had seen. Maureen told him that he must call the police. Three hours later the couple cautiously made their way to a public
phone boxA telephone booth, telephone kiosk, telephone call box or telephone box is a small structure furnished with a payphone and designed for a telephone user's convenience. In the USA, Canada and Australia, "telephone booth" is used, while in the UK and the rest of the Commonwealth it is a "telephone...
in the street below their flat, Smith taking the precaution of arming himself with a screwdriver and a kitchen knife to defend them in the event that Brady suddenly appeared and confronted them. At 6:07 am Smith made an
emergency services999 is an official emergency telephone number in a number of countries which allows the caller to contact emergency services for urgent assistance....
call to the police station in nearby
HydeHyde is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Tameside, Greater Manchester, England. As of the 2001 census, the town had a population of 31,253. Historically part of Cheshire, it is northeast of Stockport, west of Glossop and east of Manchester....
and told his story to the officer on duty. In his statement to the police Smith claimed that:
Arrest
Early on the morning of 7 October, shortly after Smith's call, Superintendent Bob Talbot of the
Cheshire PoliceCheshire Constabulary is the territorial police force responsible for policing the English unitary authorities of Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Halton and Warrington. The force is responsible for policing an area of with a population of roughly 1 million.The Chief Constable of the...
arrived at the back door of 16 Wardle Brook Avenue, wearing a borrowed baker's overall to cover his uniform. Talbot identified himself to Hindley as a police officer when she opened the door, and told her that he wanted to speak to her boyfriend. Hindley led him into the living room, where Brady was sitting up in a
divanA divan is a piece of couch-like sitting furniture; or in the UK, a box-spring based bed....
writing a note to his employer explaining that he would not be able to get into work because of his ankle injury. Talbot explained that he was investigating "an act of violence involving guns" that was reported to have taken place the previous evening. Hindley denied that there had been any violence, and allowed police to look around the house. When they came to the upstairs room in which Evans' body was stored the police found the door locked, and asked Brady for the key. Hindley claimed that the key was at work, but after the police offered to drive her to her employer's premises to retrieve it, Brady told her to hand the key over. When they returned to the living room the police told Brady that they had discovered a trussed up body, and that he was being arrested on suspicion of murder. As Brady was getting dressed, he said "Eddie and I had a row and the situation got out of hand."
Hindley was not arrested with Brady, but she demanded to go with him to the police station, accompanied by her dog Puppet, to which the police agreed. Hindley was questioned about the events surrounding Evans' death, but she refused to make any statement beyond claiming that it had been an accident. As the police had no evidence that Hindley was involved in Evans' murder she was allowed to go home, on condition that she return the next day for further questioning. Hindley was at liberty for four days following Brady's arrest, during which time she went to her employer's premises and asked to be dismissed, so that she would be eligible for unemployment benefits. While in the office where Brady worked she found some papers belonging to him in an envelope that she claimed she did not open, which she burned in an ashtray. She believed that they were plans for bank robberies, nothing to do with the murders. On 11 October Hindley was charged as an accessory to the murder of Edward Evans and was remanded at Risley.
Initial investigation
Brady admitted under police questioning that he and Evans had fought, but insisted that he and Smith had murdered Evans between them; Hindley, he said, had "only done what she had been told". Smith told police that Brady had asked him to return anything incriminating, such as "dodgy books", which Brady then packed into suitcases. Smith had no idea what else the suitcases contained or where they might be, but he mentioned in passing that Brady "had a thing about railway stations". The police consequently requested a search of all Manchester's left-luggage offices for any suitcases belonging to Brady, and on 15 October
British Transport PoliceThe British Transport Police is a special police force that polices those railways and light-rail systems in Great Britain for which it has entered into an agreement to provide such services...
found what they were looking for at
Manchester Central railway stationManchester Central railway station is a former railway station in Manchester City Centre, England. One of Manchester's main railway terminals between 1880 and 1969, it now houses an exhibition and conference centre named Manchester Central.-History:...
—the left-luggage ticket was found several days later in the back of Hindley's prayer book. Inside one of the suitcases were nine pornographic photographs taken of a young girl, naked and with a scarf tied across her mouth, and a 13-minute tape recording of her screaming and pleading for help. Ann Downey, Lesley Ann Downey's mother, later listened to the tape after police had discovered the body of her missing 10-year-old daughter, and confirmed that it was a recording of her daughter's voice.
Police searching the house at Wardle Brook Avenue also found an old exercise book in which the name "John Kilbride" had been scribbled, which made them suspicious that Brady and Hindley might have been involved in the unsolved disappearances of other youngsters. A large collection of photographs was discovered in the house, many of which seemed to have been taken on Saddleworth Moor. One hundred and fifty officers were drafted to search the moor, looking for locations that matched the photographs. Initially the search was concentrated along the
A628 roadThe A628 is a major road in the north of England connecting Greater Manchester and South Yorkshire by crossing the Pennine chain of hills by way of the Woodhead Pass through the Peak District National Park. The height and the exposure of the road often creates problems during poor weather in winter...
near Woodhead, but a close neighbour, 11-year-old Pat Hodges, had on several occasions been taken to the moor by Brady and Hindley and she was able to point out their favourite sites along the
A635 roadThe A635 is a main road that runs between Manchester and Doncaster running east–west through Stalybridge, Saddleworth Moor, Holmfirth and Barnsley....
. On 16 October police found an arm bone sticking out of the peat; officers presumed that they'd found the body of John Kilbride, but soon discovered that the body was that of Lesley Ann Downey. Ann Downey—later Ann West after her marriage to Alan West—had been on the moor watching as the police conducted their search, but was not present when the body was found. She was shown clothing recovered from the grave, and identified it as belonging to her missing daughter.
Detectives were able to locate another site on the opposite side of the A635 from where Downey's body was discovered, and five days later they found the "badly decomposed" body of John Kilbride, whom they identified by his clothing. That same day, already being held for the murder of Evans, Brady and Hindley appeared at Hyde Magistrate's Court charged with Lesley Ann Downey's murder. Each was brought before the court separately and remanded into custody for a week. They made a two-minute appearance on 28 October, and were again remanded into custody.
The search for bodies continued, but with winter setting in it was called off in November. Presented with the evidence of the tape recording Brady admitted to taking the photographs of Lesley Ann Downey, but insisted that she had been brought to Wardle Brook Avenue by two men who had subsequently taken her away again, alive. Brady was further charged with the murder of John Kilbride, and Hindley with the murder of Edward Evans, on 2 December. At the committal hearing on 6 December Brady was charged with the murders of Edward Evans, John Kilbride, and Lesley Ann Downey, and Hindley with the murders of Edward Evans and Lesley Ann Downey, as well as with harbouring Brady in the knowledge that he had killed John Kilbride. The prosecution's opening statement was held
in cameraIn camera is a legal term meaning "in private". It is also sometimes termed in chambers or in curia.In camera describes court cases that the public and press are not admitted to...
, and the defence asked for a similar stipulation, but was refused. The proceedings continued in front of three magistrates in Hyde over an 11-day period during December, at the end of which the pair were committed for trial at
ChesterChester Castle is an area around the castle in Chester. It was historically an extra-parochial area and today remains a civil parish,although with no inhabitants....
AssizesThe Courts of Assize, or Assizes, were periodic criminal courts held around England and Wales until 1972, when together with the Quarter Sessions they were abolished by the Courts Act 1971 and replaced by a single permanent Crown Court...
.
Many of the photographs taken by Brady and Hindley on the moor featured Hindley's dog Puppet, sometimes as a puppy. Detectives arranged for the animal to be examined by a veterinary surgeon to determine its age, from which they could date when the pictures were taken. The examination involved an analysis of the dog's teeth, which required a general anaesthetic from which Puppet did not recover, as he suffered from an undiagnosed kidney complaint. On hearing the news of her dog's death Hindley became furious, and accused the police of murdering Puppet, one of the few occasions detectives witnessed any emotional response from her. In a letter to her mother shortly afterwards Hindley wrote:
Trial
The trial was held over 14 days beginning on 19 April 1966, in front of Mr Justice Fenton Atkinson. Such was the public interest that the courtroom was fitted with security screens to protect Brady and Hindley. The pair were each charged with three murders, those of Evans, Downey, and Kilbride, as it was considered that there was by then sufficient evidence to implicate Hindley in Kilbride's death. The prosecution was led by the
Attorney GeneralHer Majesty's Attorney General for England and Wales, usually known simply as the Attorney General, is one of the Law Officers of the Crown. Along with the subordinate Solicitor General for England and Wales, the Attorney General serves as the chief legal adviser of the Crown and its government in...
, Frederick Elwyn Jones. Brady was defended by the
LiberalThe Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...
Member of ParliamentA Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
Emlyn Hooson, and Hindley was defended by Godfrey Heilpern,
recorderA Recorder is a judicial officer in England and Wales. It now refers to two quite different appointments. The ancient Recorderships of England and Wales now form part of a system of Honorary Recorderships which are filled by the most senior full-time circuit judges...
of Salford from 1964—both experienced
QCQueen's Counsel , known as King's Counsel during the reign of a male sovereign, are lawyers appointed by letters patent to be one of Her [or His] Majesty's Counsel learned in the law...
s. David Smith was the chief prosecution witness, but during the trial it was revealed that he had entered into an agreement with a newspaper that he initially refused to name—even under intense questioning—guaranteeing him £1,000 (equivalent to about £ as of ) for the syndication rights to his story if Brady and Hindley were convicted, something the trial judge described as a "gross interference with the course of justice". Smith finally admitted in court that the newspaper was the
News of the WorldThe News of the World was a national red top newspaper published in the United Kingdom from 1843 to 2011. It was at one time the biggest selling English language newspaper in the world, and at closure still had one of the highest English language circulations...
, which had already paid for a holiday in France for him and his wife and was paying him a regular income of £20 per week, as well as accommodating him in a five-star hotel for the duration of the trial.
Brady and Hindley pleaded not guilty to the charges against them; both were called to give evidence, Brady for over eight hours and Hindley for six. Although Brady admitted to hitting Evans with an axe, he did not admit to killing him, arguing that the pathologist in his report had stated that Evans' death was "accelerated by strangulation". Under cross-examination by the prosecuting counsel, all Brady would admit was that "I hit Evans with the axe. If he died from axe blows, I killed him." Hindley denied any knowledge that the photographs of Saddleworth Moor found by police had been taken near the graves of their victims.
The tape recording of Lesley Anne Downey, on which the voices of Brady and Hindley were clearly audible, was played in open court. Hindley admitted that her attitude towards the child was "brusque and cruel", but claimed that was only because she was afraid that someone might hear Downey screaming. Hindley claimed that when Downey was being undressed she herself was "downstairs"; when the pornographic photographs were taken she was "looking out the window"; and that when the child was being strangled she "was running a bath".
On 6 May, after having deliberated for a little over two hours, the jury found Brady guilty of all three murders and Hindley guilty of the murders of Downey and Evans. The Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act had come into force during the time that Brady and Hindley were held in prison, abolishing the death penalty for murder, and therefore the judge passed the only sentence that the law allowed: life imprisonment. Brady was sentenced to three concurrent life sentences and Hindley was given two, plus a concurrent seven-year term for harbouring Brady in the knowledge that he had murdered John Kilbride. Brady was taken to
Durham PrisonHM Prison Durham is a local Category B men's prison, located in the Elvet area of Durham in County Durham, England. The prison is operated by Her Majesty's Prison Service.-History:...
and Hindley was sent to
Holloway PrisonHM Prison Holloway is a closed category prison for adult women and Young Offenders, located in the Holloway area of the London Borough of Islington, in north and Inner London, England...
.
In his closing remarks Mr Justice Atkinson described the murders as a "truly horrible case" and condemned the accused as "two sadistic killers of the utmost depravity". He recommended that both Brady and Hindley spend "a very long time" in prison before being considered for
paroleParole may have different meanings depending on the field and judiciary system. All of the meanings originated from the French parole . Following its use in late-resurrected Anglo-French chivalric practice, the term became associated with the release of prisoners based on prisoners giving their...
but did not stipulate a
tariffIn England and Wales, life imprisonment is a sentence which lasts until the death of the prisoner, although in most cases the prisoner will be eligible for parole after a fixed period set by the judge. This period is known as the "minimum term"...
. He stated that Brady was "wicked beyond belief" and that he saw no reasonable possibility of reform. He did not consider that the same was necessarily true of Hindley, "once she is removed from [Brady's] influence". Throughout the trial Brady and Hindley "stuck rigidly to their strategy of lying", and Hindley was later described as "a quiet, controlled, impassive witness who lied remorselessly".
Later investigation
In 1985 Brady allegedly confessed to
Fred HarrisonFred Harrison is a British author, economic commentator and corporate policy advisor, notable for his stances on land reform and belief that an over reliance on land, property and mortgage weakens economic structures and makes companies vulnerable to economic collapse...
, a journalist working for
The Sunday People, that he had also been responsible for the murders of Pauline Reade and Keith Bennett, something that the police already suspected, as both children lived in the same area as Brady and Hindley and had disappeared at about the same time as their other victims. The subsequent newspaper reports prompted the
Greater Manchester PoliceGreater Manchester Police is the police force responsible for law enforcement within the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester in North West England...
(GMP) to reopen the case, in an investigation headed by Detective Chief Superintendent Peter Topping, who had been appointed Head of GMP's
Criminal Investigation DepartmentThe Crime Investigation Department is the branch of all Territorial police forces within the British Police and many other Commonwealth police forces, to which plain clothes detectives belong. It is thus distinct from the Uniformed Branch and the Special Branch.The Metropolitan Police Service CID,...
(CID) the previous year.
On 3 July 1985 Topping visited Brady, then being held at Gartree Prison, but found him "scornful of any suggestion that he had confessed to more murders". Police nevertheless decided to resume their search of Saddleworth Moor, once more using the photographs taken by Brady and Hindley to help them identify possible burial sites. Meanwhile, in November 1986 Winnie Johnson, Keith Bennett's mother, wrote a letter to Hindley begging to know what had happened to her son, a letter that Hindley seemed to be "genuinely moved" by. It ended:
Police visited Hindley, then being held in
Cookham WoodHM Prison Cookham Wood is a male juveniles' prison and Young Offenders Institution in the village of Borstal in Kent, England. The prison is operated by Her Majesty's Prison Service.-History:...
, a few days after she had received the letter, and although she refused to admit any involvement in the killings, she agreed to help by looking at photographs and maps to try to identify spots that she had visited with Brady. She showed particular interest in photographs of the area around Hollin Brown Knoll and Shiny Brook, but said that it was impossible to be sure of the locations without visiting the moor. The security considerations for such a visit were significant; there were threats made against her should she visit the moors, but
Home SecretaryThe Secretary of State for the Home Department, commonly known as the Home Secretary, is the minister in charge of the Home Office of the United Kingdom, and one of the country's four Great Offices of State...
Douglas HurdDouglas Richard Hurd, Baron Hurd of Westwell, CH, CBE, PC , is a British Conservative politician and novelist, who served in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major between 1979 and his retirement in 1995....
agreed with Topping that it would be worth the risk. Writing in 1989, Topping said that he felt "quite cynical" about Hindley's motivation in helping the police. Although the letter from Winnie Johnson may have played a part, he believed that Hindley's real concern was that, knowing of Brady's "precarious" mental state, she was afraid that he might decide to co-operate with the police, and wanted to make certain that she, and not Brady, was the one to gain whatever benefit there may have been in terms of public approval.
Hindley made the first of two visits to assist the police search of Saddleworth Moor on 16 December 1986. Four police cars left Cookham Wood at 4.30 am. At about the same time, police closed all roads onto the moor, which was patrolled by 200 officers, 40 of them armed. Hindley and her solicitor arrived by helicopter from an airfield near
MaidstoneMaidstone is the county town of Kent, England, south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the centre of the town linking Maidstone to Rochester and the Thames Estuary. Historically, the river was a source and route for much of the town's trade. Maidstone was the centre of the agricultural...
, touching down at 8:30 am. Wearing a donkey jacket and balaclava, she was driven, and walked around the area. It was difficult for Hindley to make a connection between her memories of the area and what she saw on the day, and she was apparently nervous of the helicopters flying overhead. At 3:00 pm she was returned to the helicopter, and taken back to Cookham Wood. Topping was criticised by the press, who described the visit as a "fiasco", a "publicity stunt", and a "mindless waste of money". He was forced to defend the visit, pointing out its benefits:
Topping continued to visit Hindley in prison, along with her solicitor Michael Fisher and her spiritual counsellor, the Reverend Peter Timms, who had been a prison governor before resigning to become a minister in the
Methodist ChurchMethodism is a movement of Protestant Christianity represented by a number of denominations and organizations, claiming a total of approximately seventy million adherents worldwide. The movement traces its roots to John Wesley's evangelistic revival movement within Anglicanism. His younger brother...
. She made a formal confession to police on 10 February 1987, admitting her involvement in all five murders, but news of her confession was not made public for more than a month. The tape recording of her statement was over 17 hours long; Topping described it as a "very well worked out performance in which, I believe, she told me just as much as she wanted me to know, and no more". He also commented that he "was struck by the fact that she was never there when the killings took place. She was in the car, over the brow of the hill, in the bathroom and even, in the case of the Evans murder, in the kitchen." Topping concluded that he felt he "had witnessed a great performance rather than a genuine confession".
Police visited Brady in prison again and told him of Hindley's confession, which at first he refused to believe. Once presented with some of the details that Hindley had provided of Pauline Reade's abduction, Brady decided that he too was prepared to confess, but on one condition: that immediately afterwards he be given the means to commit suicide, a request that was impossible for the authorities to comply with.
At about the same time, Winnie Johnson sent Hindley another letter, again pleading with her to assist the police in finding the body of her son Keith. In the letter, Johnson was sympathetic to Hindley over the criticism surrounding her first visit. Hindley, who had not replied to the first letter, responded by thanking Johnson for both letters, explaining that her decision not to reply to the first resulted from the negative publicity that surrounded it. She claimed that, had Johnson written to her 14 years earlier, she would have confessed and helped the police. She also paid tribute to Topping, and thanked Johnson for her sincerity. Hindley made her second visit to the moor in March 1987. This time, the level of security surrounding her visit was considerably higher. She stayed overnight in Manchester, at the flat of the police chief in charge of GMP training at Sedgley Park, and visited the moor twice. She confirmed to police that the two areas in which they were concentrating their search—Hollin Brown Knoll and Hoe Grain—were correct, although she was unable to locate either of the graves. She did later remember, though, that as Pauline Reade was being buried she had been sitting next to her on a patch of grass and could see the rocks of Hollin Brown Knoll silhouetted against the night sky.
In April 1987 news of Hindley's confession became public. Amidst strong media interest
Lord LongfordFrancis Aungier Pakenham, 7th Earl of Longford KG, PC , known as the Lord Pakenham from 1945 to 1961, was a British politician, author, and social reformer...
pleaded for her release, writing that her continuing detention to satisfy "mob emotion" was not right. Fisher persuaded Hindley to release a public statement, in which she explained her reasons for denying her complicity in the murders, her religious experiences in prison, the letter from Johnson, and that she saw no possibility of release. She also exonerated David Smith from any part in the murders, except that of Edward Evans.
Over the next few months interest in the search waned, but Hindley's clue had directed the police to focus their efforts on a specific area. On the afternoon of 1 July 1987, after more than 100 days of searching, they found a body lying in a shallow grave 3 foot (0.9144 m) below the surface, only 100 yards (91.4 m) from the place where Lesley Ann Downey had been found. Brady had been co-operating with the police for some time, and when news reached him that Reade's body had been discovered he made a formal confession to Topping. He also issued a statement to the press, through his solicitor, saying that he too was prepared to help the police in their search. Brady was taken to the moor on 3 July, but he seemed to lose his bearings, blaming changes that had taken place in the intervening years, and the search was called off at 3:00 pm, by which time a large crowd of press and television reporters had gathered on the moor.
Topping refused to allow Brady a second visit to the moors, and a few days after his visit Brady wrote a letter to BBC television reporter Peter Gould, giving some sketchy details of five additional murders that he claimed to have carried out. Brady refused to identify his alleged victims, and the police failed to discover any unsolved crimes matching the few details that he supplied. Hindley told Topping that she knew nothing of these killings.
On 24 August 1987 police called off their search of Saddleworth Moor, despite not having found Keith Bennett's body. Brady was taken to the moor for a second time on 1 December, but he was once again unable to locate the burial site. Keith Bennett's body remains undiscovered as of , although his family continues to search the moor, over 40 years after his disappearance.
Although Brady and Hindley had confessed to the murders of Pauline Reade and Keith Bennett, the
Department of Public ProsecutionsThe Director of Public Prosecutions of England and Wales is a senior prosecutor, appointed by the Attorney General. First created in 1879, the office was unified with that of the Treasury Solicitor less than a decade later before again becoming independent in 1908...
(DPP) decided that nothing would be gained by a further trial; as both were already serving life sentences no further punishment could be inflicted, and a second trial might even have helped Hindley's case for parole by giving her a platform from which to make a public confession.
In 2003 the police launched Operation Maida, and again searched the moor for the body of Keith Bennett. They read statements from Brady and Hindley, and also studied photographs taken by the pair. Their search was aided by the use of sophisticated modern equipment, including a US satellite used to look for evidence of soil movement. The BBC reported on 1 July 2009 that Greater Manchester Police had officially given up the search for Keith Bennett, saying that "only a major scientific breakthrough or fresh evidence would see the hunt for his body restart". Detectives were also reported as saying that they would never again give Brady the attention or the thrill of leading another fruitless search on the moor where they believe Keith Bennett's remains are buried. Donations from members of the public funded a search of the moor for Bennett's body by volunteers from a Welsh search and rescue team that began in March 2010.
Ian Brady
Ian Brady was born in
GlasgowGlasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...
as Ian Duncan Stewart on 2 January 1938 to Maggie Stewart, an unmarried 28-year-old tea room waitress. The identity of Brady's father has never been reliably ascertained, although his mother claimed he was a reporter working for a Glasgow newspaper, who died three months before Brady was born. Stewart had little support, and after a few months was forced to give her son into the care of Mary and John Sloan, a local couple with four children of their own. Brady took their name, and became known as Ian Sloan. His mother continued to visit him throughout his childhood. As a young child he took pleasure in torturing animals; he broke the hind legs of one dog, set fire to another, and decapitated a cat. Aged nine, Brady visited
Loch LomondLoch Lomond is a freshwater Scottish loch, lying on the Highland Boundary Fault. It is the largest lake in Great Britain by surface area. The lake contains many islands, including Inchmurrin, the largest fresh-water island in the British Isles, although the lake itself is smaller than many Irish...
with his family, where he reportedly discovered an affinity for the outdoors, and a few months later the family moved to a new
council houseA council house, otherwise known as a local authority house, is a form of public or social housing. The term is used primarily in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. Council houses were built and operated by local councils to supply uncrowded, well-built homes on secure tenancies at...
on an
overspill estateAn overspill estate is a housing estate planned and built for the rehousing of people from decaying inner city areas usually as part of the process of slum clearance....
at
PollokPollok is a large district on the south-western side of the city of Glasgow, Scotland. It was built to house families from the overcrowded inner city...
. He was accepted for
Shawlands AcademyShawlands Academy is a non-denominational secondary school on the southside of Glasgow, Scotland.-Admissions:It has a roll of approximately 1,250 pupils and 90 teachers...
, a school for above average pupils. As he grew older Brady's "brutality escalated", and soon he was hurting children smaller than himself. At Shawlands his behaviour worsened; as a teenager he twice appeared before a juvenile court for housebreaking. He left the academy aged 15, and took a job as a tea boy at a
Harland and WolffHarland and Wolff Heavy Industries is a Northern Irish heavy industrial company, specialising in shipbuilding and offshore construction, located in Belfast, Northern Ireland....
shipyard in
GovanGovan is a district and former burgh now part of southwest City of Glasgow, Scotland. It is situated west of Glasgow city centre, on the south bank of the River Clyde, opposite the mouth of the River Kelvin and the district of Partick....
. Nine months later he began working as a butcher's messenger boy. He had a girlfriend, Evelyn Grant, but their relationship ended when he threatened her with a flick knife after she visited a dance with another boy. He again appeared before the court, this time with nine charges against him, and shortly before his 17th birthday a court put him on probation on the condition that he went to live with his mother, who had by then moved to Manchester and married an Irish fruit merchant named Pat Brady, who got him a job as a fruit porter at Smithfield Market.
Within a year of moving to Manchester, Brady was caught with a sack full of lead seals he had stolen and was trying to smuggle out of the market. Because he was still under 18, he was sentenced to two years in
borstalA borstal was a type of youth prison in the United Kingdom, run by the Prison Service and intended to reform seriously delinquent young people. The word is sometimes used loosely to apply to other kinds of youth institution or reformatory, such as Approved Schools and Detention Centres. The court...
for "training". He was initially sent to Hatfield but after being discovered drunk on alcohol he had brewed he was moved to the much tougher unit at
HullKingston upon Hull , usually referred to as Hull, is a city and unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It stands on the River Hull at its junction with the Humber estuary, 25 miles inland from the North Sea. Hull has a resident population of...
. Released on 14 November 1957 Brady returned to Manchester, where he took a labouring job, which he hated, and was dismissed from another job in a brewery. Deciding to "better himself", Brady obtained a set of instruction manuals on book-keeping from a local public library, with which he "astonished" his parents by studying alone in his room for hours. In January 1959, Brady applied for and was offered a clerical job at Millwards Merchandising, a wholesale chemical distribution company based in
GortonGorton is an area of the city of Manchester, in North West England. It is located to the southeast of Manchester city centre. Neighbouring areas include Longsight and Levenshulme....
. He was regarded by his work colleagues as a quiet, punctual, but short-tempered young man. He read books such as
Teach Yourself German, and
Mein KampfMein Kampf is a book written by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler. It combines elements of autobiography with an exposition of Hitler's political ideology. Volume 1 of Mein Kampf was published in 1925 and Volume 2 in 1926...
, as well as works on Nazi atrocities. He rode a
Tiger Cub motorcycleThe Triumph Tiger Cub is British motorcycle made by Triumph Motorcycles at their Meriden factory. Designed by Edward Turner and launched at the Earls Court show in November 1953 the Tiger Cub competed well against the other small capacity motorcycles of the time such as Villiers...
, which he used to visit the
PenninesThe Pennines are a low-rising mountain range, separating the North West of England from Yorkshire and the North East.Often described as the "backbone of England", they form a more-or-less continuous range stretching from the Peak District in Derbyshire, around the northern and eastern edges of...
.
Myra Hindley
Myra Hindley was born on 23 July 1942 and raised in Gorton, then a working class area of Manchester. Her parents, Nellie and Bob Hindley (the latter an
alcoholicAlcoholism is a broad term for problems with alcohol, and is generally used to mean compulsive and uncontrolled consumption of alcoholic beverages, usually to the detriment of the drinker's health, personal relationships, and social standing...
), beat her regularly as a young child. The small house the family lived in was in such poor condition that Hindley and her parents had to sleep in the only available bedroom, she in a single bed next to her parents' double. The family's living conditions deteriorated further when Hindley's sister, Maureen, was born in 1946. Shortly after the birth, Hindley, then aged five, was sent by her parents to live with her grandmother, who lived nearby.
Hindley's father had fought in North Africa, Cyprus, and Italy during the Second World War, and had served with the Parachute Regiment. He had been known in the army as a "hard man" and he expected his daughter to be equally tough; he taught her how to fight, and insisted that she "stick up for herself". When Hindley was aged 8, a local boy approached her in the street and scratched both of her cheeks with his fingernails, drawing blood. She burst into tears and ran into her parents' house, to be met by her father, who demanded that she "Go and punch him [the boy], because if you don't I'll leather you!" Hindley found the boy and succeeded in knocking him down with a sequence of punches, as her father had taught her. As she wrote later, "at eight years old I'd scored my first victory".
Malcolm MacCulloch, professor of
forensic psychiatryForensic psychiatry is a sub-speciality of psychiatry and an auxiliar science of criminology. It encompasses the interface between law and psychiatry...
at
Cardiff UniversityCardiff University is a leading research university located in the Cathays Park area of Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom. It received its Royal charter in 1883 and is a member of the Russell Group of Universities. The university is consistently recognised as providing high quality research-based...
, has suggested that the fight, and the part that Hindley's father played in it, may be "key pieces of evidence" in trying to understand Hindley's role in the Moors murders:
One of her closest friends was 13-year-old Michael Higgins, who lived in a nearby street. In June 1957 he invited her to go swimming with friends at a local disused reservoir. A good swimmer, Hindley chose not to go and instead went out with a friend, Pat Jepson. Higgins drowned in the reservoir, and upon learning of his fate Hindley was deeply upset, and blamed herself for his death. She collected for a funeral wreath, and his funeral at
St Francis's MonasteryThe Church and Friary of St Francis, known locally as Gorton Monastery, is a 19th century former Franciscan friary in Gorton, in east Manchester, England. The Franciscans arrived in Gorton in December 1861 and built their friary between 1863 and 1867. The foundation stone for the church was laid in...
in Gorton Lane—the church where Hindley had been baptised a Catholic on 16 August 1942—had a lasting effect on her. Hindley's mother had only agreed to her father's insistence that she be
baptisedIn Christianity, baptism is for the majority the rite of admission , almost invariably with the use of water, into the Christian Church generally and also membership of a particular church tradition...
a Catholic on the condition that she was not sent to a Catholic school, as her mother believed that "all the monks taught was the
catechismA catechism , i.e. to indoctrinate) is a summary or exposition of doctrine, traditionally used in Christian religious teaching from New Testament times to the present...
". Hindley was increasingly drawn to the Catholic Church after she started at Ryder Brow Secondary Modern, and began taking instruction for formal reception into the Church soon after Higgins's funeral. She took the confirmation name of Veronica, and received her first communion in November 1958. She also became a
GodparentA godparent, in many denominations of Christianity, is someone who sponsors a child's baptism. A male godparent is a godfather, and a female godparent is a godmother...
to Michael's nephew, Anthony John. It was also at about this time that Hindley first began bleaching her hair.
Hindley's first job was as a junior clerk at a local electrical engineering firm. She ran errands, made tea, and typed. She was well liked at the firm, enough so that when she lost her first week's wage packet, the other girls had a collection to replace it. She had a short relationship with Ronnie Sinclair from Christmas 1958, and became engaged aged 17. The engagement was called off several months later; Hindley apparently thought Sinclair immature, and unable to provide her with the life she envisaged for herself.
Shortly after her 17th birthday she changed her hair colour, with a pink rinse. She took
judois a modern martial art and combat sport created in Japan in 1882 by Jigoro Kano. Its most prominent feature is its competitive element, where the object is to either throw or takedown one's opponent to the ground, immobilize or otherwise subdue one's opponent with a grappling maneuver, or force an...
lessons once a week at a local school, but found partners reluctant to train with her, as she was often slow to release her grip. She took a job at Bratby and Hinchliffe, an engineering company in Gorton, but was dismissed for absenteeism after six months.
As a couple
In 1961, the 18-year-old Myra Hindley joined Millwards as a typist. She soon became infatuated with Brady, despite learning that he had a criminal record. She began a diary and, although she had dates with other men, some of the entries detail her fascination with Brady, whom she eventually spoke to for the first time on 27 July 1961. Over the next few months she continued to make entries, and grew increasingly disillusioned with him, until 22 December when Brady asked her on a date to the cinema, where they watched the biblical epic
King of Kings. Their dates together followed a regular pattern; a trip to the cinema, usually to watch an
X-ratedIn some countries, X is or has been a motion picture rating reserved for the most explicit films. Films rated X are intended only for viewing by adults, usually legally defined as people over the age of 17.-United Kingdom:...
film, and then back to Hindley's house to drink German wine. Brady then gave her reading material, and the pair spent their work lunch breaks reading aloud to one another from accounts of Nazi atrocities. Hindley began to emulate an ideal of Aryan perfection, bleaching her hair blonde and applying thick crimson lipstick. She expressed concern at some aspects of Brady's character; in a letter to a childhood friend, she mentioned an incident where she had been drugged by Brady, but also wrote of her obsession with him. A few months later she asked her friend to destroy the letter. In her 30,000-word plea for parole, written in 1978 and 1979 and submitted to
Home SecretaryThe Secretary of State for the Home Department, commonly known as the Home Secretary, is the minister in charge of the Home Office of the United Kingdom, and one of the country's four Great Offices of State...
Merlyn ReesMerlyn Rees, later Merlyn Merlyn-Rees, Baron Merlyn-Rees, PC was a Welsh-born Labour party Member of Parliament from 1963 until 1992, having served as Home Secretary...
, Hindley said:
Hindley began to change her appearance further, wearing clothing considered risqué such as high boots, short skirts, and leather jackets, and the two became less sociable to their work colleagues. The couple were regulars at the library, borrowing books on
philosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
, as well as crime and torture. They also read works by the
Marquis de SadeDonatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...
, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky's
Crime and PunishmentCrime and Punishment is a novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It was first published in the literary journal The Russian Messenger in twelve monthly installments during 1866. It was later published in a single volume. This is the second of Dostoyevsky's full-length novels following his...
. Although she was not a qualified driver (she passed her test on the third attempt, late in 1963), Hindley often hired a van, in which the two planned bank robberies. Hindley befriended George Clitheroe, the President of the Cheadle Rifle Club, and on several occasions visited two local shooting ranges. Clitheroe, although puzzled by her interest, arranged for her to buy a .22 rifle from a gun merchant in Manchester. She also asked to join a pistol club, but she was a poor shot and allegedly often bad-tempered, so Clitheroe told her that she was unsuitable; she did, though, manage to purchase a
WebleyWebley Inc. is a company providing speech-driven unified communications solutions.Webley is privately held and headquartered in Bannockburn, IL....
.45 and a Smith and Wesson .38 from other members of the club. Brady and Hindley's plans for robbery came to nothing, but they became interested in photography. Brady already owned a
Box BrownieBrownie is the name of a long-running and extremely popular series of simple and inexpensive cameras made by Eastman Kodak. The Brownie popularized low-cost photography and introduced the concept of the snapshot. The first Brownie, introduced in February, 1900, was a very basic cardboard box camera...
, which he used to take photographs of Hindley and her dog, Puppet, but he upgraded to a more sophisticated model, and also purchased lights and
darkroomA darkroom is a room that can be made completely dark to allow the processing of light sensitive photographic materials, including photographic film and photographic paper. Darkrooms have been created and used since the inception of photography in the early 19th century...
equipment. The pair took photographs of each other that, for the time, would have been considered explicit. For Hindley, this demonstrated a marked change from her earlier, more shy nature.
As murderers
Hindley claimed that Brady began to talk about "committing the perfect murder" in July 1963, and often spoke to her about
Meyer LevinMeyer Levin was a Jewish-American novelist, known for works on the Leopold and Loeb case and the Anne Frank case.-Leopold and Loeb case:...
's
Compulsion, published as a novel in 1956 and adapted for the cinema in 1959. The story tells a fictionalised account of the
Leopold and LoebNathan Freudenthal Leopold, Jr. and Richard Albert Loeb , more commonly known as "Leopold and Loeb", were two wealthy University of Michigan alumni and University of Chicago students who murdered 14-year-old Robert "Bobby" Franks in 1924 and were sentenced to life imprisonment.The duo were...
case, two young men from well-to-do families who attempt to commit the perfect murder of a 12-year-old boy, and escape the death penalty because of their age.
By June 1963, Brady had moved in with Hindley at her grandmother's house in Bannock Street, and on 12 July 1963 the two murdered their first victim, 16-year-old Pauline Reade. Reade had attended school with Hindley's younger sister, Maureen, and had also been in a short relationship with David Smith, a local boy with three criminal convictions for minor crimes. Police could find nobody who had seen Reade before her disappearance, and although the 15-year-old Smith was questioned by police he was cleared of any involvement in her death. Their next victim, John Kilbride, was killed on 23 November 1963. A huge search was undertaken, with over 700 statements taken, and 500 "missing" posters printed. Eight days after he failed to return home, 2,000 volunteers scoured waste ground and derelict buildings.
Hindley hired a vehicle a week after Kilbride went missing, and again on 21 December 1963, apparently to make sure the burial sites had not been disturbed. In February 1964, she bought a second-hand
Austin TravellerThe Austin Motor Company was a British manufacturer of automobiles. The company was founded in 1905 and merged in 1952 into the British Motor Corporation Ltd. The marque Austin was used until 1987...
, but soon after traded it for a
MiniThe Mini is a small car that was made by the British Motor Corporation and its successors from 1959 until 2000. The original is considered a British icon of the 1960s, and its space-saving front-wheel-drive layout influenced a generation of car-makers...
van. On 16 June 1964, 12-year-old Keith Bennett disappeared. His stepfather, Jimmy Johnson, became a suspect; in the two years following Bennett's disappearance, Johnson was taken for questioning on four occasions. Detectives searched under the floorboards of the Johnsons' house, and on discovering that the houses in the row were connected, extended the search to the entire street.
Maureen Hindley married David Smith on 15 August 1964. The marriage was hastily arranged and performed at a
register officeA register office is a British term for a civil registry, a government office and depository where births, deaths and marriages are officially recorded and where you can get officially married, without a religious ceremony...
. None of Hindley's relatives attended; Myra did not approve of the marriage, and her mother was too embarrassed—Maureen was seven months pregnant. The newlyweds moved into Smith's father's house. The next day, Brady suggested that the four take a day-trip to
WindermereWindermere is the largest natural lake of England. It is also a name used in a number of places, including:-Australia:* Lake Windermere , a reservoir, Australian Capital Territory * Lake Windermere...
. This was the first time Brady and Smith had met properly, and Brady was apparently impressed by Smith's demeanour. The two talked about society, the distribution of wealth, and the possibility of robbing a bank. The young Smith was similarly impressed by Brady, who throughout the day had paid for his food and wine. The trip to the Lake District was the first of many outings. Hindley was apparently jealous of their relationship, but became closer to her sister.
In 1964 Hindley, her grandmother, and Brady were rehoused as part of the post-war slum clearances in Manchester, to 16 Wardle Brook Avenue in the new overspill estate of
HattersleyHattersley is a residential area within the Metropolitan Borough of Tameside, in Greater Manchester, England. It is to the east of Hyde and 6 miles west of the Peak District National Park....
. Brady and Hindley became friendly with Patricia Hodges, an 11-year-old girl who lived at 12 Wardle Brook Avenue. Hodges accompanied the two on their trips to
Saddleworth MoorSaddleworth Moor is an area of the South Pennines in northern England. It is a sparsely populated moorland and millstone grit divided between the metropolitan boroughs of Oldham and Kirklees, in Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire respectively....
to collect
peatPeat is an accumulation of partially decayed vegetation matter or histosol. Peat forms in wetland bogs, moors, muskegs, pocosins, mires, and peat swamp forests. Peat is harvested as an important source of fuel in certain parts of the world...
, something that many householders on the new estate did to improve the soil in their gardens, which was full of clay and builder's rubble. She remained unharmed; living only a few doors away, her disappearance would have been easily solved.
Early on
Boxing DayBoxing Day is a bank or public holiday that occurs on 26 December, or the first or second weekday after Christmas Day, depending on national or regional laws. It is observed in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and some other Commonwealth nations. In Ireland, it is recognized as...
1964, Hindley left her grandmother at a relative's house and refused to allow her back to Wardle Brook Avenue that night. On the same day, 10-year-old Lesley Ann Downey disappeared from a
funfairA funfair or simply "fair" is a small to medium sized travelling show primarily composed of stalls and other amusements. Larger fairs such as the permanent fairs of cities and seaside resorts might be called a fairground, although technically this should refer to the land where a fair is...
in
AncoatsAncoats is an inner city area of Manchester, in North West England, next to the Northern Quarter and the northern part of Manchester's commercial centre....
. Despite a huge search she was not found. The following day Hindley brought her grandmother back home. By February 1965 Patricia Hodges had stopped visiting 16 Wardle Brook Avenue, but David Smith was still a regular visitor. Brady gave Smith books to read, and the two discussed robbery and murder. On Hindley's 23rd birthday, her sister and brother-in-law, who had until then been living with relatives, were rehoused in Underwood Court, a block of flats not far from Wardle Brook Avenue. The two couples began to see each other more regularly, but usually only on Brady's terms.
During the 1990s, Hindley claimed that she took part in the killings only because Brady had drugged her, was
blackmailIn common usage, blackmail is a crime involving threats to reveal substantially true or false information about a person to the public, a family member, or associates unless a demand is met. It may be defined as coercion involving threats of physical harm, threat of criminal prosecution, or threats...
ing her with pornographic pictures he had taken of her, and had threatened to kill her younger sister, Maureen. In a 2008 television documentary series on female
serial killerA serial killer, as typically defined, is an individual who has murdered three or more people over a period of more than a month, with down time between the murders, and whose motivation for killing is usually based on psychological gratification...
s broadcast on
ITV3ITV3 is an entertainment television channel in the United Kingdom that is owned by ITV Digital Channels Ltd, a division of ITV plc. The channel was launched on 1 November 2004. ITV3 is the second largest UK multi-channel, second only to ITV2.-History:...
, Hindley's
solicitorSolicitors are lawyers who traditionally deal with any legal matter including conducting proceedings in courts. In the United Kingdom, a few Australian states and the Republic of Ireland, the legal profession is split between solicitors and barristers , and a lawyer will usually only hold one title...
, Andrew McCooey, reported that she had said to him:
Brady
Following his conviction, Brady was moved to
Durham prisonHM Prison Durham is a local Category B men's prison, located in the Elvet area of Durham in County Durham, England. The prison is operated by Her Majesty's Prison Service.-History:...
, where he asked to live in solitary confinement. He spent 19 years in mainstream prisons before he was declared criminally insane in November 1985 and sent to the high-security
Ashworth Psychiatric HospitalAshworth Hospital is a high security psychiatric hospital at Maghull in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England.Ashworth is one of only three high-security specialist psychiatric hospitals in England and Wales, along with Rampton and Broadmoor, that exist to work with people who...
; he has since made it clear that he never wants to be released. The trial judge had recommended that his life sentence should mean life, and successive
Home SecretariesThe Secretary of State for the Home Department, commonly known as the Home Secretary, is the minister in charge of the Home Office of the United Kingdom, and one of the country's four Great Offices of State...
have agreed with that decision. In 1982, the Lord Chief Justice
Lord LaneGeoffrey Dawson Lane, Baron Lane AFC PC QC was a British Judge who served as Lord Chief Justice of England from 1980 to 1992. The later part of his term was marred by a succession of disputed convictions...
said of Brady: "this is the case if ever there is to be one when a man should stay in prison till he dies".
In contrast to the common belief that serial killers often continue with their crimes until they are caught, Brady claimed in 2005 that the Moors murders were "merely an
existentialExistentialism is a term applied to a school of 19th- and 20th-century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief that philosophical thinking begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual...
exercise of just over a year, which was concluded in December 1964". By then, he went on to claim, he and Hindley had turned their attention to armed robbery, for which they had begun to prepare by acquiring guns and vehicles. In 2001 Brady wrote
The Gates of Janus, which was published by
Feral HouseFeral House is a book publisher owned and operated by Adam Parfrey. The publisher itself describes the books it sells as "pure information", and says the topics of the books are "forbidden"....
, an underground US publisher. The book, Brady's analysis of serial murder and specific serial killers, sparked outrage when announced in Britain.
Winnie Johnson, the mother of undiscovered victim, 12-year-old Keith Bennett, received a letter from Brady at the end of 2005 in which, she said, he claimed that he could take police to within 20 yards (18.3 m) of her son's body but the authorities would not allow it. Brady did not refer directly to Keith by name and did not claim he could take investigators directly to the grave, but spoke of the "clarity" of his recollections. In early 2006, prison authorities intercepted a package addressed to Brady from a female friend, containing 50
paracetamolParacetamol INN , or acetaminophen USAN , is a widely used over-the-counter analgesic and antipyretic . It is commonly used for the relief of headaches and other minor aches and pains and is a major ingredient in numerous cold and flu remedies...
pills, a potentially lethal dose, hidden inside a hollowed-out crime novel.
The death, in November 2007, of
John StraffenJohn Thomas Straffen was a British serial killer who was the longest-serving prisoner in British legal history. Straffen killed two young girls in the summer of 1951. He was found to be unfit to plead and committed to Broadmoor Hospital; during a brief escape in 1952 he killed again. This time he...
, who had spent 55 years in prison for murdering three children meant that Brady became the longest serving prisoner in England and
WalesWales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
. As of , he remains incarcerated in Ashworth. After Brady began a
hunger strikeA hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance or pressure in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke feelings of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most hunger strikers will take liquids but not...
in 1999 he was
force-fedForce-feeding is the practice of feeding a person or an animal against their will. "Gavage" is supplying a nutritional substance by means of a small plastic tube passed through the nose or mouth into the stomach, not explicitly 'forcibly'....
, fell ill, and was transferred to another hospital for tests. He recovered, and in March 2000 asked for a
judicial reviewJudicial review is the doctrine under which legislative and executive actions are subject to review by the judiciary. Specific courts with judicial review power must annul the acts of the state when it finds them incompatible with a higher authority...
of the decision to force-feed him, but was refused permission.
Hindley
Immediately following the trial, Hindley lodged an unsuccessful appeal against her conviction. Brady and Hindley corresponded by letter until 1971, when she ended their relationship. The two remained in sporadic contact for several months, but Hindley had fallen in love with one of her prison officers, Patricia Cairns. A former assistant governor claimed that such relationships were not unusual in Holloway at that time, as "many of the officers were gay, and involved in relationships either with one another or with inmates". Hindley successfully petitioned to have her status as a
category AThere are four prisoner security categories in the United Kingdom used to classify every adult prisoner for the purposes of assigning them to a prison. The categories are based upon the severity of the crime and the risk posed should the person escape....
prisoner changed to category B, which enabled Governor Dorothy Wing to take her on a walk round
Hampstead HeathHampstead Heath is a large, ancient London park, covering . This grassy public space sits astride a sandy ridge, one of the highest points in London, running from Hampstead to Highgate, which rests on a band of London clay...
, part of her unofficial policy of reintroducing her charges to the outside world when she felt they were ready. The excursion caused a furore in the national press and earned Wing an official rebuke from the then Home Secretary
Robert CarrLeonard Robert Carr, Baron Carr of Hadley, PC is a British Conservative politician.Robert Carr was educated at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge where he read Natural Sciences, graduating in 1938....
. With Cairns' assistance and the outside contacts of another prisoner, Maxine Croft, Hindley planned a prison escape, but it was thwarted when impressions of the prison keys were intercepted by an off-duty policeman. Cairns was sentenced to six years in jail for her part in the plot. While in prison, Hindley wrote her autobiography, which remains unpublished.
Hindley was told that she should spend 25 years in prison before being considered for parole. The Lord Chief Justice agreed with that recommendation in 1982, but in January 1985 Home Secretary Leon Brittan increased her tariff to 30 years. By that time, Hindley claimed to be a reformed Roman Catholic. Ann West, the mother of Lesley Ann Downey, was at the centre of a campaign to ensure that Hindley was never released from prison, and until West's death in February 1999, she regularly gave television and newspaper interviews whenever Hindley's release was rumoured.
In 1990, then Home Secretary
David WaddingtonDavid Charles Waddington, Baron Waddington, GCVO, DL, QC, PC , is a British politician. A member of the Conservative Party, he served as a Member of Parliament in the House of Commons from 1968 to 1990, and was then made a life peer...
imposed a
whole life tariffThis is a list of prisoners who have received a whole life tariff through some mechanism in jurisdictions of the United Kingdom.Eight of these prisoners have since died in prison, while three of them have had their sentences reduced on appeal, meaning that there are currently at least 48 prisoners...
on Hindley, after she confessed to having a greater involvement in the murders than she had previously admitted. Hindley was not informed of the decision until 1994, when a Law Lords ruling obliged the Prison Service to inform all life sentence prisoners of the minimum period they must serve in prison before being considered for parole. In 1997, the
Parole BoardThe Parole Board for England and Wales was established in 1968 under the Criminal Justice Act of 1967. It became an independent executive non-departmental public body on 1 July 1996 under the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. The Parole Board's role is to make risk assessments about...
ruled that Hindley was low risk and should be moved to an
open prisonAn open prison is an informal description applied to any penal establishment in which the prisoners are trusted to serve their sentences with minimal supervision and perimeter security and so do not need to be locked up in prison cells...
. She rejected the idea and was moved to a medium security prison; the House of Lords ruling left open the possibility of later freedom. Between December 1997 and March 2000, Hindley made three separate appeals against her life tariff, claiming she was a reformed woman and no longer a danger to society, but each was rejected by the courts.
When in 2002 another life sentence prisoner challenged the Home Secretary's power to set minimum terms, Hindley and hundreds of others, whose tariffs had been increased by politicians, looked likely to be released from prison. Hindley's release seemed imminent and plans were made by supporters for her to be given a new identity. Lord Longford, a devout Roman Catholic, campaigned to secure the release of "celebrated" criminals, and Myra Hindley in particular, which earned him constant derision from the public and the press. He described Hindley as a "delightful" person and said "you could loathe what people did but should not loathe what they were because human personality was sacred even though human behaviour was very often appalling". Home Secretary
David BlunkettDavid Blunkett is a British Labour Party politician and the Member of Parliament for Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough, having represented Sheffield Brightside from 1987 to 2010...
ordered Greater Manchester Police to find new charges against her, to prevent her release from prison. The investigation was headed by Superintendent Tony Brett, and initially looked at charging Hindley with the murders of Pauline Reade and Keith Bennett, but the advice given by government lawyers was that because of the DPP's decision taken 15 years earlier, a new trial would probably be considered an
abuse of processAbuse of process is a cause of action in tort arising from one party making a malicious and deliberate misuse or perversion of regularly issued court process not justified by the underlying legal action.It is a common law intentional tort...
.
Aftermath
David Smith became "reviled by the people of Manchester", despite having been instrumental in bringing Brady and Hindley to justice. While her sister was on trial, Maureen—eight months pregnant—was attacked in the lift of the building in which she and David lived. Their home was vandalised, and hate mail was regularly posted through their letterbox. Maureen feared for her children: "I couldn't let my children out of my sight when they were little. They were too young to tell them why they had to stay in, to explain why they couldn't go out to play like all the other children."
After knifing another man during a fight, in an attack he claimed was triggered by the abuse he had suffered since the trial, Smith was sentenced to three years in prison in 1969. That same year his children were taken into the care of the local authority. His wife Maureen moved from Underwood Court to a single-bedroom property, and found work in a department store. Subjected to
whispering campaignsA whispering campaign or whisper campaign is a method of persuasion in which damaging rumors or innuendo are spread about the target, while the source of the rumors seeks to avoid being detected while spreading them...
and petitions to remove her from the estate where she lived, she received no support from her family—her mother had supported Myra during the trial. On his release from prison, David Smith moved in with the girl who became his second wife and won custody of his three sons. Maureen managed to repair the relationship with her mother, and moved into a council property in Gorton. She divorced Smith in 1973, and married a lorry driver, Bill Scott, with whom she had a daughter.
Maureen and her immediate family made regular visits to see Hindley, who reportedly adored her niece. In 1980 Maureen suffered a brain haemorrhage; Hindley was granted permission to visit her sister in hospital, but she arrived an hour after Maureen's death. Sheila and Patrick Kilbride, who were by then divorced, were present at Maureen's funeral, believing that Hindley might make an appearance. Patrick Kilbride mistook Bill Scott's daughter from a previous relationship, Ann Wallace, for Hindley and tried to attack her before being knocked to the ground by another mourner; the police were called to restore order. Shortly before her death at the age of 70 Sheila Kilbride said: "If she [Hindley] ever comes out of jail I'll kill her." It was a threat repeated by her son Danny, and Ann West.
In 1972, David Smith was acquitted of the murder of his father, who had been suffering from an incurable cancer. Smith pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to two days' detention. He remarried and moved to Lincolnshire with his three sons, and was exonerated of any participation in the Moors murders by Hindley's confession in 1987.
Joan Reade, Pauline Reade's mother, was admitted to Springfield Mental Hospital in Manchester. She was present, under heavy sedation, at the funeral of her daughter on 7 August 1987. Five years after their son was murdered, Sheila and Patrick Kilbride divorced. Ann West, mother of Lesley Ann Downey, died in 1999 from cancer of the liver. Since her daughter's death, she had campaigned to ensure that Hindley remained in prison and doctors said that the stress had contributed to the severity of her illness. Winnie Johnson, mother of Keith Bennett, continues to visit Saddleworth Moor, where it is believed that the body of her son is buried.
The house in which Brady and Hindley lived on Wardle Brook Avenue, and where Edward Evans was murdered, was demolished by the local council.
Hindley died from bronchial pneumonia caused by heart disease, at the age of 60, on 15 November 2002. Cameras "crowded the pavement" outside, but none of Hindley's relatives were among the congregation of six who attended a short service at Cambridge crematorium, as they were living anonymously in Manchester under assumed names. Such was the strength of feeling more than 35 years after the murders that a reported 20 local undertakers refused to handle her cremation. Four months later, Hindley's ashes were scattered by a former lover, a woman she had met in prison, less than 10 miles (16.1 km) from Saddleworth Moor in
StalybridgeStalybridge is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Tameside in Greater Manchester, England, with a population of 22,568. Historically a part of Cheshire, it is east of Manchester city centre and northwest of Glossop. With the construction of a cotton mill in 1776, Stalybridge became one of...
Country Park. Fears were expressed that the news might result in visitors choosing to avoid the park, a local beauty spot, or even in the park being vandalised. Less than two weeks after Hindley's death, on 25 November 2002, the Law Lords agreed that judges, not politicians, should decide how long a criminal spends behind bars, and thus stripped the Home Secretary of the power to set minimum sentences.
A 1977 BBC television debate discussed arguments for and against Myra Hindley's release, with contributions from the parents of some of the murdered children. The case has been dramatised on television twice: in
See No Evil: The Moors Murders and
LongfordLongford is a 2006 drama television film directed by Tom Hooper and written by Peter Morgan.The film centres on Labour Party peer Lord Longford and his campaign for the parole of Moors Murderer Myra Hindley....
(both 2006).
Lasting notoriety
Hindley "shouldered the greater public outrage" because of her gender, and she was popularly assumed to be "the devil incarnate". The photographs and tape recording of the torture of Lesley Ann Downey, demonstrated in court to a disbelieving audience, and the cool responses of Brady and Hindley, helped to ensure the lasting notoriety of their crimes. Brady, who says that he does not want to be released, is rarely mentioned in the news, but Hindley's repeated insistence on her innocence, and attempts to secure her release from prison, resulted in her becoming a figure of hate in the national media. Retribution was a common theme amongst those who sought to keep her locked away, and even Hindley's mother insisted that she should die in prison—although out of fear for her daughter's safety, and the desire to avoid the possibility that one of the victims' relatives might kill her. Some commentators expressed the view that of the two, Hindley was the "more evil". In 1987 she admitted that the plea for parole she had submitted to the Home Secretary eight years earlier was "on the whole [...] a pack of lies", and to some reporters her co-operation in the searches on Saddleworth Moor "appeared a cynical gesture aimed at ingratiating herself to the parole authorities".
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