Criminology - The Yorkshire Ripper Part 1

Episode Date: May 26, 2024

Between 1975 and 1980, The Yorkshire Ripper terrorized Northern England. His attacks and murders were reminiscent of Jack The Ripper, who operated in the late 1800s. Letters signed Jack The Ripper and a recording supposedly of the killer's voice only served to taunt the police. Join Mike and Morf as they discuss the crimes of Peter Sutcliffe, aka The Yorkshire Ripper. It took the police some time to piece together the crimes and even more time to figure out who was behind them. The pressure mounted with every attack and murder by the vicious serial killer. You can help support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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We're your go-to podcast for Mysteries with a Motherly Touch. Subscribe now to Moms and Mysteries wherever you get your podcast. If you love chilling mysteries, unsolved cases, and a touch of mom-style humor, Moms and Mysteries is the podcast you've been searching for. Hey guys, I'm Mandy. And I'm Melissa. Join us every Tuesday for Moms and Mysteries, your gateway to gripping, well-researched true crime stories. Each week, we deep dive into a variety of mind-boggling cases as we shed light on everything from heist to who don't it.

We're your go-to podcast for Mysteries with a motherly touch. Subscribe now to Moms and Mysteries wherever you get your podcast. Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised. Hello everyone and welcome to episode 309 of the criminology podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson. And this is Mike Morford. Mr. Morford.

How you doing, buddy? I'm doing good. We're recording this on the day that my kids are going to the school for the last time this year. So pretty excited today in the Morford household. What's new with you? Yeah, we're kind of in the same mode here. not so much with my kids, but with my wife. Today is her last day of school.

So she's looking forward as I think most people do to being done with the school year. I remember when I was young, man, those last couple days and especially that very last day, it was like, bring it on. Summer is about ready to be here. I can't wait. Yeah, something tells me the teachers want to get out of there just as bad as the kids by the end of the year. No, I think for most of them, there is no doubt about it.

So let's go ahead and give our Patreon shoutouts. We had Beatrice Nevis and Lori. So some great new support. We really appreciate it. Thank you so much for that support. It means a lot to us. And for everyone else that helps support the show, thank you. And if anyone out there wants to help support the show, you can do so by going to

patreon.com slash terminology. So it's kind of hard to believe, Morph, but another crime cover. is upon us. This is the last episode that will air before we arrive in Nashville to hang out on podcast row. And we've heard from a lot of people who have reached out to say that they plan to be there. So it should be a lot of fun. Yeah. And just a reminder at everyone that is going to CrimeCon, we'll be having our annual criminology T-Kat meet up on Saturday night, June 1st at 9 p.m. That's going to happen at the fuse bar right there on the premises in the Gay Lord of Opry land. So come by, hang out for a bit. We'd love.

love to see you. Okay, so we have all of that out of the way, which means it's time to jump into this week's case. And we're going across the pond to the UK in order to tackle a big and infamous case, the crimes of Peter Sutcliffe, aka the Yorkshire Ripper. He was convicted of murdering 13 women and attempting to murder seven others between 1975 and 1980. And you and I have profiled many different serial killers over the years, some of whom have targeted sex workers and only sex workers. But that's not the case with Peter Succleb. His victims came from a wide array of backgrounds.

You know, when many people hear about an infamous UK killer targeting. women, especially sex workers, their minds often jump to the infamous Jack the Ripper. The Ripper was responsible for a series of murders in Whitechapel. In 1888, understandably, people there at the time were fearful. And when police received a taunting letter, signed Jack the Ripper from someone claiming to be the killer, the press ran with it. And here we are 136 years later, with that series of murders still unsolved. When another series of murder, murders of women sprang up in Yorkshire County in northern England, almost a century later. The Ripper moniker would once again be in the spotlight.

But one key difference with this Ripper case is that it would eventually be solved and the ripper unmasked. The first attack by the man who would come to be known as the Yorkshire Ripper happened in Keithley on the night of July 5, 1975. 36-year-old Anna Roleskitch was heading down North Queen's street. to see her boyfriend, whom she was angry with. During her walk to his home, she passed a man standing near the boarded-up doorway of a home. He called out to her, do you fancy it, essentially propositioning Anna for sex. Angrily, she said, not on your life. And she picked up the pace

walking to her boyfriends. When she got there, she pounded on his door, but he didn't answer. Angry, she took off her shoe and smashed his window before heading back home. On the way back to her house, Anna once again saw the same bearded man who had propositioned her. It was at this point. She recognized him. She didn't know him, but she had seen him before. Weeks before, she had encountered him near her home on Highfield Lane. He asked if she wanted to have tea before she refused him and headed home.

She hadn't seen him since. Now he was standing in front of Anna. He asked her once again, do you fancy? and she again told him no. She walked off and only made it a few feet before being attacked from behind. The bearded man hit Anna in the head with a ball peen hammer with multiple powerful blows. When she fell to the ground, he pulled up her shirt and using a knife slashed at her stomach before leaving her for dead. At 2.20 a.m., local resident on his way home found Anna near death, an unconscious in a pool of blood.

he summoned police in an ambulance. Fortunately, Anna survived, but required a 12-hour brain surgery, and she suffered from long-lasting effects. Understandably, Anna wasn't in good shape following her attack, and she could recall very little for investigators about the man that attacked her. On Friday, August 15th, just over a month after the attack on Anna and 12 miles south of Keithley, 46-year-old Olive Smelt, was walking in Halifax after,

after a night out with friends. It was just before midnight, 1145, to be exact, when she was approached by a bearded man who said something to her about the weather. Without warning, the man pulled the ball peen hammer and struck Olive in the back of the head twice, and she fell to the ground. The man started to disrobe her and slashed at her backside with a blade of some sort inflicting two wounds above her buttocks. It was then that the headlights of her.

an approaching car, shined on the scene, and the attacker fled. Olive survived her attack and described for police that her assailant had thick, dark hair, a beard, and a very distinct Yorkshire accent. The mention of a Yorkshire accent was an important clue because Yorkshire apparently had its own accent, and it was 50 miles northeast of Halifax. Unfortunately, police didn't check that lead out closely. or reach out to police in Yorkshire to see if they had any similar cases, this lack of follow-through would prove to be a key mistake in the investigation.

Just over one week later on August 27th, 14-year-old Tracy Brown in Silsden, 40 miles north of Halifax, was attacked. That night, Tracy and her twin sister, Mandy, had been allowed to stay out a half hour later than normal. As they started to leave their friend's house, Tracy got distracted and kept talking. but Mandy headed home. Realizing she had lost track of time, Tracy started walking home, hoping to catch up with her sister, but it was of no use. She was too far behind, and she was already late for her curfew. Her feet were hurting her, so since she was already going to be in

trouble for staying out too late, she stopped and sat down to take off her shoes. While she was doing this, a man stared at her for a moment before he passed her, walking ahead of her. Soon after this, Tracy started walking, eventually catching up with the man, who she had never seen before. He made small talk with Tracy for a while until they saw her home in the distance. The lights were on, probably her parents waiting up for her to get home. Before she could say goodbye to the man, he ambushed her from behind, hitting her in the head with a hammer. The attack was brutal, with five blows to her head. The headlights from an oncoming car scared the man away.

He threw her over a barbed wire fence before he ran off. Tracy survived and like Anna required extensive brain surgery. She later told the mirror UK, we had walked together for a must-a-mile for about 30 minutes, and I never once felt intimidated or in danger. Police investigated the area where Tracy had been attacked and found a few clues. One of those clues was a hippie-style bracelet made from wooden beads. Another item found was a handkerchief. Police felt that the attacker suffered from hayfif.

Fever. Tracy helped police create a sketch of the attacker using an old school photo fit or identity kit tool. He was described as having a mustache and beard, staring eyes and a thin face. The description went out to local papers, but no one came forward to ID the assailant. One witness did say that they had seen a similar looking man that night in the area standing next to a white Ford car. But in the end, the lead did. didn't go anywhere. And you think about that description morph in the 1970. I feel like a lot more men wore be beards back then. I could be mistaken about that, but it's not much to go on, right? A mustache, beard, thin face. Okay, you're going to have a lot of people in an area who probably fit that

description. Yeah. Overall, it is a pretty general description to your, point that would probably match a lot of people, but it's, it's not much to really go on, like you said, for the police. And I think at this point, as we're talking about it, we can see the similarities here between these different attacks, but the police didn't seem to immediately put them together because although they were in the Yorkshire County area, they weren't all in the same exact town. So just the dots weren't being connected at this point that this was going on. And I think it's easy to

to kind of bash the police, bash the investigation, right? You can do that in almost every case. When you look back at what they did or didn't do, you know, we mentioned it. One of the victims said that her attacker

had a very distinct Yorkshire accent and that police didn't really reach out to that area to see if they had similar attacks or anything like that. Well, obviously, that would have been a good thing to do. Now, would it have led to the capture of this person? There's no way to know that, but it's pretty easy to pick out the flaws in an investigation

after the fact. But one thing that I really want to talk about is these three attacks, you know, they were very similar. they happened in a period of just over about a month's time. They were all very vicious attacks. I mean, when you think about the particulars that we described, being hit in the head with a ball peen hammer, that would be just on its own so horrific.

But then this attacker takes it a step further, cuts these women, slashes them, and essentially leaves them for dead, but all three survived. Now, unfortunately, that wouldn't be the case for, you know, many victims to follow. So my question is, you know,

is this a burgeoning serial killer who is trying to figure out how to do things? Yeah, I do have that question in a lot of serial killer cases. The fact that initial victims live, is that accidental? Is it because the person doesn't know exactly what they're doing? They're trying to figure out, you know,

how to go about doing what they want to do. I know it's macabre to think about, but I do think it's an interesting question. Yeah, you almost wonder if this is some kind of learning curve that this fledgling predator doesn't know how to navigate, and he's not very proficient at killing these women, assuming that would be what he wants to do, because to bash somebody's head in and stab them,

what other alternative could there be? It seems like murdering them is the thing he's trying to accomplish, yet three times in a row that doesn't happen. After Tracy Brown escaped with her life, the attack stopped for a month. Maybe the killer needed to rethink his approach since he had been scared off three times in a row. But on October 30th, 1975, he struck once again. He found 28-year-old Wilma Mary McCann, who would become the Ripper's first known murder victim.

She was last seen alive walking past the Prince Philip playing fields in Leeds at around 7.30 p.m., not far from her home. She had been struck in the back of the head twice with a hammer, before being stabbed in the throat, chest, and abdomen. A milkman making his rounds discovered Wilma's body and reported it to police. Wilma was a mother of four, and in an effort to get attention for her case and humanize her in the eyes of the public. A group vote over kids was taken, shown them holding their toys. No strong leads came in, and the children were sent to live in a group home, before

eventually going to live with their strange father, who was said to be abusive. Police theorized that Wilma was a sex worker, but it was never proven. after this murder, the Ripper seems to have laid low until the new year, 1976. So I think we need to pause here and address the fact that Wilma was possibly a sex worker, as were some of the others we'll talk about in the rest of the episode. At that time, during 1975, 1976, the U.K., much like the U.S., was in the midst of an awful recession. There was a looming oil crisis, and to try and save resources,

sources and energy, the U.K. resorted to a three-day work week for many people. There was also a huge minor strike and many layoffs. All of this combined to put a great burden on many families in the UK. As a result, people struggled to pay their bills or even put food on the table for their children. Faced with the possibility of their children starving, many women in desperation turned to sex work in order to bring in whatever they could. We talked. We talked. We talked. We talked. We often about sex work being a dangerous line of work. It always has been and still is, but with this financial crisis, it caused many more women to be on the streets and in harm's way. As 1975 turned to 1976, police in various locations were trying to solve the crimes they were tasked with.

And during this period, the killer continued to stalk for his next victim. 42-year-old Emily Monica Jackson, who lived in Cherwell, a suburb of Leeds, had, like some of the women we mentioned, turned to sex work to make ends meet. She felt secure, however, because she was accompanied by her husband, Stanley, who was an out-of-work roofer with a van. While Stanley would go to a local pub, Emily would bring her clients back to the van for sex, knowing that Stanley was in a nearby pub and that she was in her own van, made Emily feel safe. but despite her mind being at ease, on January 20th, 1976, she would become the killer's next victim. When Stanley ended his night in the pub and came to the van at about 10.30, he was surprised to find it empty with no sign of Emily. He waited for a bit, but thought Emily may be out looking for a client. So he left the van there for her and caught a taxi home.

The next morning, a motorist in the area of Manor Street and Round Hay Road discovered Emily's lifeless body and summoned help. When police arrived, they were greeted by a gruesome scene. Emily's clothes were pulled away from her and her breasts were exposed. She had suffered multiple blows to the head with a hammer and she had 52 stab wounds inflicted on her neck, chest and stomach by what was thought to be a Phillips head screwdriver. police found one very compelling clue, a boot print on Emily's thigh. Her killer had stomped on Emily so hard that an impression of a boot print determined to be a Dunlop Warwick size 7 or 8 was stamped into her thigh. They also found a similar print nearby.

Not yet putting together that there was a serial predator targeting women in the Yorkshire area, police focused on Emily's husband Stanley and assumed, that her murder was a crime of passion. They reportedly found a similar boot belonging to Stanley during a search of his home. But pretty quickly, the police moved off of Stanley as a suspect in his wife's death. So again, a very gruesome, vicious attack. The thought that 52 stab wounds were inflicted on this woman's body with a Phillips head screwdriver. That really stuck in my mind.

One thing that jumped out to me was that the police seemed to think that Stanley was responsible for his wife's murder, despite going with her and waiting at the pub and being there to give her some peace of mind. They still thought he might have had something to do with it, which, you know, that's logical. Police work is to start with people closest to the victim and work your way out there because most victims of a murder are killed by. someone they know, not by a total stranger. So I think the police were right to look at him

early on, but they quickly moved on from him. 20-year-old Marcella Claxton was walking home from party alone in Leeds on May 9, 1976, when a man driving a white Ford Corsair offered her a ride. Marcella thought the man seemed friendly and charming, so she accepted the offer. He pulled over so that Marcella could stop and urinate on the side of the road. During the stop, the man attacked her suddenly, hitting her in the back of the head eight to nine times. Reports differ with some saying that the man used a hammer. Others say he used a spanner, which is like a wrench.

No matter what the weapon was, it severely injured Marcella. According to Marcella, the man stood over her and masturbated as she faded in and out of consciousness. When he was done, he reportedly put a five-pound note in her hand and warned her not to call the police before you drove off. Marcella somehow was able to get to her feet, and despite blood streaming down her face, managed to stumble to a nearby phone booth to call. Security program on spreadsheets, new regulations piling up, and audit dread?

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To her horror as she was talking to the dispatcher, her assailant drove by her, looking at her, and she feared he would come over and finish her off. But instead, the man drove off. The attack caused Marcella, who was four months, pregnant at the time to suffer a miscarriage. But she survived, though not without more than 50 stitches to her head. She would go on to have multiple brain surgeries. She continued to experience depression and memory issues due to her injuries. Despite her injuries, Marcella was able to tell police about her attacker. He was driving a white Ford Coursera with a red interior. She also described her

attacker as a man in his 20s with a Yorkshire accent. He had dark hair and a beard. A sketch was made of the assailant but never circulated. Years later, when the killer was finally caught, the sketch would be proven to be eerily accurate. Sherlock Holmes has never met a villain so clever and so lethal as he finally met his match. The Shaw Festival presents Sherlock Holmes and the Miss of the human heart. This gripping new play is filled with enough twists to leave even Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, guessing what happens next.

Sherlock Holmes at the Shaw. For best seats of best prices, go to Shawfest.com. And with these last two attacks, Morph, to me, it's very obvious that there was a sexual component to the attacks, you know, with Emily, she was found with her breasts exposed. And now you have Marcella who said that the man masturbated over her as she went in and out of consciousness. We didn't know with some of those early attacks, whether or not there was a sexual component

to them. And maybe that's just because the details weren't there. Or maybe it's because there was. no sexual component to them. Not really sure, but I think it's obvious now that part of the motivation on the part of this predator is sexual in nature. And one thing that I realized about Marcella's attack and it makes me wonder about the thinking of this predator is after he's brutally bludgeoned her leaving her for dead. He takes the time to put money in her hand, a five pound note and tells her not to call the police. You know, who does that? You would think that if he's

beat her that bad, his intention is not to have her alive to be a witness. But here he gives her money afterwards and then goes on his way. And it's just a very odd interaction for me. Well, let's examine that for a minute. You know, my first thought, because it does seem very unusual for a killer or perpetrator to, you know, leave money in the hand of a victim, is that this person is thinking something along the lines of, you know, I paid for this. I had the right to do this. And I'm not sure my words are coming out correctly, but.

I'm trying to get into the head of this person. Did they believe or were they justifying this act in their mind by the fact that they had paid money? I know it sounds strange, but maybe there's something to it. Yeah, I think you might be right because it just defies logic that somebody one second can beat someone in the head so bad that they need 50 stitches, but then turn around. and feel they need to pay money, so it's hard to square that away. It seems that police brushed off Marcella's attack, perhaps because they assumed she was a sex worker and that she had been roughed up by her pimp or a client. She also happened to be black, and her race may have contributed to the police not taking her case more serious.

As Marcella recovered, she continued to check in with police to see if they had any new leads, and she was brushed off. Marcella was sure in her mind that the man who attacked her would attack someone else and needed to be caught. To add insult to injury, Marcella tried to submit a claim to receive benefit payments from the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board, but was refused in 1977

because the board falsely believed Marcella had brought the attack on herself due to their belief she was a sex worker. Eventually in 1981, after it was proven that Marcella was a victim of the man who would become known as the Yorkshire Ripper. she was awarded the sum of 17,500 pounds. But in collecting it, she had to forfeit her social security benefits.

She struggled for years with bad headaches, depression, and blackouts. And there's no doubt more if that the Yorkshire Ripper was a nasty, sadistic killer. But to this point in the story, it is kind of amazing that so many women have survived. these brutal attacks, you know, what we don't often get to talk about is what happens or what victims have to live with for the rest of their lives as the result of an attack. And here we have quite a bit of information regarding what some of these women went through. You know, you talk about Marcella, it completely changed her life. I don't think there's any doubt about that. And I think with each one of these attacks, as it got out to the news and word got out on the street,

I think women of all types, whatever their profession or their backgrounds were, were probably afraid, whether they were sex workers, housewives, whatever they were, to go out at night, they probably were looking over their shoulder and were probably worried about walking around at night. And when we see these kinds of cases where there's a whole series of attacks going on, you can't blame them for being nervous and looking over their shoulder and maybe trying to take some extra precautions. But I've always thought that that is part of what fuels some of these predators as well. You have the individual attacks and those are terrible. But then, you know, in the bigger picture, it's almost as if they're terrorizing the larger population.

And I just wonder how much of that plays in to it with certain people. Do they get a thrill or some type of satisfaction from knowing that they're scaring this huge part of the population? And I'm sure there were many women who decided, okay, I won't go out after dark. There were probably sex workers who said, I'm only going to go with certain clients. or I'm going to stay in certain areas where there's other sex workers around who can help me feel safe. But despite those precautions, there was no way to make it 100% safe. And that's why there were additional victims. After the attack on Marcella, several months passed with no attacks, the various attacks that had happened in the Yorkshire area were finally being linked and

reported in the news. But as time passed, with no more attacks, people, began to let their guard down. And on February 5th, 1977, the killer struck again. 28-year-old Irene Richardson was walking in Roundhay Park on her way to Tiffany's, a disco and pub and leads. She was seen heading there around 11, 15 p.m. Her body was found in the park the next morning by a jogger. Irene had been killed by multiple blows to her head from a hammer, and her body was stabbed in the neck, throat, and stomach, and then mutilated. It seems that it was after Irene's attack that the press began to use the Yorkshire Ripper moniker.

Irene was attacked in almost the very spot that Marcel Claxton had been attacked in nine months earlier. Homeless and penniless, Irene had turned to sex work just in order to survive. Irene's crime scene provided police with one of their best clues in the form of tire tracks. The tracks were determined to have been made by two different India Auto Way brand tires, a Newmant and an S.O. 110 all cross-ply. The vehicle the killer used had a rear track width of between four feet one and a half inches and four feet two and a half inches.

Although it was a tantalizing clue, finding the car that left the tracks would be like finding a needle in a haystack. The number of vehicles that could have left those tracks was 26, including Ford Corsairs, which was a car that had been reported multiple times by this point. A whopping 100,000 vehicles in West Yorkshire would have to be checked if police hoped to find the killer. And that was assuming he didn't change out his tires.

And I think you see this so often in many cases. What you would think is a really good clue. And here, I think this is one. You find out that it really doesn't narrow things down. very much at all. You know, combing through 100,000 vehicles in the 1970s, you know, that's not an easy proposition. Yeah, especially because things probably weren't computerized and everything had to be done manually, I would think. Two months later, 32-year-old sax worker Patricia Atkinson Mitra, known as Tina, was killed in her flat in Bradford. She had been bludgeoned

with four hammer strikes to the head and stabbed in the stomach six times. Investigators found a boot print on her bed sheet. That print matched the one found on Emily Jackson's thigh. Despite the similarities in M.O., the matching print and the fact both women were sex workers. Investigators were at odds with each other as to whether Tina Mitra was a Ripper victim. This was because she was found in her own home. whereas all the other victims were attacked outside. Eventually, police agree that she was indeed a Ripper victim.

Two months after Tina Mitter's murder, 16-year-old Jane Michelle McDonald was walking home from her friend's house. She had gone out with friends to Hopper House in Leeds and ended up missing the final bus that night. So she went home with them and tried to get a ride. Almost an hour later, she ended up deciding to walk home alone. At around 2 a.m. on a playground on Reginald Street, she was attacked. Children found her body the next morning at around 9.45 a.m. on June 26. She had been bludgeoned at least three times with a

hammer and stabbed multiple times in the chest and back. It appeared that a bottle had also been broken over her body. Pieces of a broken bottle were found in her chest. While police had investigated the Ripper murders, to this point, they hadn't really gone into depth in their investigation of the victims. They're thinking. was that most of the victims were possibly sex workers. But Jane McDonald, at 16, was viewed with more sympathy as an innocent, and her case was given more attention. This demonstrated that it wasn't only police that treated victims differently if they were believed to be sex workers. It was also the press. And unfortunately, Morph, I mean, this is something that we've seen

in so many different cases. You know, if you just look at it from the police point of view, throughout the years, it seems pretty evident that in many cases where sex workers are victims, they're viewed differently, have been viewed differently in many instances. And, you know, to me, that's wrong. Whether you agree with that type of work or not, it's still a person. Yeah, I think it's a twofold situation of why that happens. one, they may be viewed as not as important as, say, a housewife or a mom or someone that vanishes from an upper-class neighborhood, but also because I think in the backs of the minds of the police, it's a harder

crime to solve because there are so many possible suspects because sex workers come into contact with so many different people. So I think it's a two-part problem that the police, you know, they may not view them in some cases as important, but also because it's just that much harder to solve when it is a sex worker. On July 10th, just one month after Jane McDonald's murder, 43-year-old Maureen Long was walking home alone from a nightclub in Bradford when a man pulled up and offered her a ride like Marcella Claxton. Maureen had to urinate on the drive, so he pulled over for her after she got out. The man hid her in the back of the head, causing her to lose consciousness. She was found still alive the next morning, but badly injured, and suffering from hypothermia. A nine-week hospital stay was required.

Once again, the man was described as driving a white corsair. The Ripper, perhaps worried that he had allowed another victim to leave. live didn't strike again for six weeks. On the night of October 1st, 1977, 20-year-old Jean Bernadette Jordan, a married mother of two living in Manchester, left her home saying she was going out for some fresh air. She was never seen alive again. It was rumored that she was a sex worker and trying to keep it under wraps, but it hasn't been verified.

Her mutilated body was found eight days later on October 9th. She had been struck in the head at least 10 times with a hammer. Her body had apparently been moved to the spot where it was found sometime after Jean was killed. A five-pound note was found in a hidden pocket in her purse, and police believed that Jean's killer had given it to her. Authorities were able to trace the bill, which was brand new, back to Midland Bank, but they still had to narrow down which branch it came from. Police felt that this five-pound note was a very important clue that would greatly reduce the amount of suspects, and they were going to be going to be. to work hard to find out who it belonged to. On December 14th,

25-year-old sex worker Marilyn Moore was picked up by a customer in the Scott Hall area of Leeds. They pulled over to a secluded spot and Marilyn began to climb into the backseat. Without warning, the man attacked her, beating her in the head. As she escaped the car,

he swung a hammer very hard at her head, but missed. And she ran off screaming into the night, before getting help. Marilyn suffered multiple scalp lacerations and a depressed fracture of the skull. But she was able to describe her attacker as a man with a neatly trimmed beard.

She remembered that he said his name was Dave. And he drove a corsair, but she was unsure of the color. Tire tracks found at the scene, matched tracks found at Irene Richardson's crime scene, linking them together. And to me, Morf, it would be very hard at this point not to link these attacks together. I mean, there have been a number of women who were attacked but escaped and lived.

Pretty much all of them said that this guy had a beer. Fresh air, longer days, a chance to reset. This season let therapy be part of your spring cleaning. Clearing mental clutter, shaking off stuckness and building something better, grow, therapy helps you get there. Whether it's your first time in therapy or your 15th, Grow makes it easier to find a therapist who fits you, not the other way around. They connect you with thousands of independent licensed therapists across the U.S., offering both virtual and in-person sessions, nights and weekends. You can search by what matters, like insurance, specialty,

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obviously you have these women being hit with a hammer and many of them being stabbed or slashed. That alone seems to link these attacks. But then when you have the boot prints, you have the tire tracks and you are able to start to match some of that stuff up, well, it just strengthens that argument. Yeah, I think the attacks alone seem to make it pretty obvious that the attacker is the same person. I mean, how many different people are running around beating women in the head with hammers? So I think on the surface, it's clear to me that he would be responsible. But then when you start adding those other things like tire tracks, the same core, the beard, the same descriptions,

then it really starts to demonstrate just how much stuff they're collecting throughout the this crime spree. The other thing that that crossed my mind was that unlike some of the cases that we've profiled, quite a few women were able to get away from this attacker. Now, they didn't get away unscathed. They were hurt. They suffered long lasting effects, but they survived and were able to get away. On January 21st, 1978, just over a month, month after the attack on Marilyn Moore, the Ripper struck again when he killed 21-year-old Yvonne Anne Pearson in Bradford. She left her kids with a babysitter that night and headed out. She never came home. Two months after she vanished, her body was found discarded under an old

sofa. A ball-peen hammer had been used to hit her in the head multiple times. Her chest was stomped on, and horsehair from the sofa was shoved in her mouth. Police initially didn't consider Yvonne's murder to be a Ripper killing due to slightly different injuries and the fact her killer had hidden her body. But eventually they did conclude that she was a victim in the Ripper series. The Ripper attacks began to occur with more frequency. On January 31st, just 10 days after Yvonne Pearson was killed, 18-year-old Elena Ritka, a sex worker who went by Helen, was picked up by a client in the Red Light District of Huddersfield. Her body was found a few days later on February 3rd, near a railway arch in Huddersfield.

She had been struck in the head multiple times with a hammer, partially disrobed, and stabbed in her chest. Police were desperate by this point. They had a serial predator, stalking women in many towns around Yorkshire, and there was no telling where he might strike next. They needed him to slip up and give them a clue that might help. them to catch it. But that meant that another woman would have to be attacked. And I think this is something you see in many cases. Police don't have enough evidence to work with. And as much as you don't want another attack to occur, it's most likely what's going to lead to additional evidence. Now, it's not like the police are just sitting around waiting for an,

attack, but unfortunately, that is sometimes what it takes. Ezraal conundrum for investigators to know that the more crimes this guy commits, the better chance there is to catch him. But again, that means more victims and more panic from the public. And with that panic, you know that the pressure had to have been mounting on the part of authorities to catch this guy. Just as police were plotting their next move, on March 8th, a letter was postmarked in Sunderland and sent a detective George Oldfield. It read,

Dear sir, I am sorry I cannot give my name for obvious reasons. I am the Ripper. I've been dubbed the maniac by the press, but not by you. You call me clever, and I am. You and your mates having a clue that photo in the paper gave me fits, and that bit about killing myself no chance. I've got things to do. My purpose to rid the streets of them sluts.

My one regret is that young Lassie, McDonald, did not know. Cause change routine that night. Up to number eight now. And you say seven. But remember, Preston, 75. Get about you know. You're right, I travel a bit. You probably look for me in Sunderland.

Don't bother. I am not daft. Just posted letter there on one of my trips. Not a bad place compared with Chapel Town. and Manningham and other places. Worn horrors to keep off streets, because I feel it coming on again. Sorry about young Lassie. Yours respectfully, Jack the Ripper.

Might write again later. I am not sure last one really deserved it. Hors getting younger each time. Old slut next time, I hope. Huddersfield, never again. Too small. Close called. Last one.

As police puzzled over the letter and whether it was from the Yorkshire Ripper. A second one came in postmarked March 13th, also in Sunderland. That letter read, Dear Sir, I have already written to Chief Constable George Oldfield, a man I respect concerning the recent Ripper murders. I told him, and I am telling you, to warn them horrors, I'll strike again. And soon, when heat cools off. About the McDonald lassie, I didn't know that she was decent. And I am sorry, I changed my routine.

that night. Up to murder eight now. You say seven, but remember Preston 75. Easy picking them up. Don't even have to try. You think they'll learn, but they don't. Most are young lassies. Next time try older one, I hope. Police haven't a clue yet, and I don't leave any. I am very clever and don't look for me up there in Sunderland because I'm not stupid. Just pass through the place. not a bad place compared with Chapel Town and Manningham can't walk the streets for them whores Don't forget, warn them I feel it coming on again If I get chance, sorry about Lassie, I didn't know.

Yours respectfully Jack the Ripper. Might write again after another week. Gone maybe Liverpool or even Manchester again. Too hot here in Yorkshire. Bye. I have given advance warning, so it's yours and their fault. So I think it's important to break down these letters, assuming that they came from the real Yorkshire Ripper, there are some things that you can dissect. Number one for me, it was kind of the grammar.

It wasn't great. Not all of the sentences were complete. So can you make something out of that as far as intelligence or education? or education level. I'm sure it's something that would be evaluated. He seems to, in both letters, express regret about Jane McDonnell, calling her a young lassie.

Basically, I got the impression that he didn't realize she was as young as she was, or that he found out later that she wasn't a sex worker, and so he felt bad about that. And then I think the other thing is, you know, he's throwing out a lot of town names. Don't look for me here. Not a bad place compared with these other two.

You know, is he trying to throw the police off? Or is he just trying to mess with them? I think the police have to really walk a fine line with these letters because they may be an important clue from the real killer that's going to help lead to his dad. downfall, but at the same time, they could be a hoax or who's just looking for attention. And the police could be spinning their wheels, putting too much time and effort into trying to find clues in these letters.

Yeah. And we've seen that in a lot of cases. I never understand it. You know, if there's this serial predator out there attacking women doing very horrible things, why would someone who's sitting at home, let's say, reading. about it in the paper or seeing it on TV, want to jump into the fray and start writing letters claiming to be this Ripper. I'll never understand that. Police took these letters seriously and believed that they were indeed from the real Ripper. And if the letters were from the Ripper,

it meant that he was writing and not killing. It bought the detective's time. But then another murder happened. Forty-year-old sex worker, Bera Evelyn Millward, left her house, in home, Manchester at around 10 p.m. on May 16th, 1978, to meet a client who was a regular of hers. She went to the spot where she normally met this client, but on this night he didn't show up. Instead, the Yorkshire Ripper did. Vera jumped in his car, and he drove her to a secluded spot near the Manchester Royal Infirmary. Apparently during their trist, Vera sensed something was wrong and tried to get out of his car. Vera had been dealing with multiple illnesses. She multiple operations recently and suffered from chronic pain and she only had one lung.

So sadly, Beir was no match for the hammer-wielding killer. She was struck with several blows to the head and then dragged to a fence where she was stabbed. The next morning, landscapers working in the area discovered Vera's body. Police canvassed the area and found one witness who had heard a scream during the time Beirr was killed, but thought that it was coming from one of the patients at the hospital. Vera Milward's murder was one of the most brutal in the series. Reportedly, brain matter and blood was found all over and around her body. The killer, for whatever reason, had been very aggressive.

Police feared that the aggressive nature meant that more victims might be coming and quickly. But that didn't happen. Instead, things quieted down. And then there was a long period with no attacks. at least no attacks contributed to the Ripper. But there would be another letter sent to George Oldfield, dated March 23rd, 1979, postmark from Sunderland. The letter read, Dear officer, sorry I haven't written, about a year to be exact,

but I haven't been up north for quite a while. I wasn't kidding last time I wrote saying the whore would be older this time, and maybe I'd strike in Manchester for a change. You should have took heed. That bit about her being in hospital. Funny the lady mentions something about being a hospital before I stopped her, whoring ways. The lady won't worry about hospitals now, will she?

I bet you'd be wondering how come I haven't been to work for ages. Well, I would have been if it hadn't been for your cursed coppers. I had the lady just where I wanted her and was about to strike. When one of you cursing police cars stopped right outside the lane, he must have been a dumb copper because he didn't say anything. He didn't know how close he would. was to catching me. Tell you the truth, I thought I was collared. The lady said, don't worry about the coppers. Little did she know that bloody copper saved her neck. That was last month, so I don't know when

I will get back on the job, but I know it won't be Chapel Town, too bloody hot there, maybe Bradford's Manningham. Might write again if up north. Jack the Ripper. P.S., did you get a letter I sent to Daily Mirror in Manchester. And there's one thing more that that really jumped out at me about this letter. And that's that he kept referring to what he was doing as his job. You know, at one point saying, I will get back on the job. Almost as if killing is his vocation. And for me, I hear some Jack the Ripper tones in some of the writing too, which makes

me wonder, is this writer trying to sound or imitate some of the Jack the Ripper letters? Or is this just a coincidence? But one way or another, the Jack the Ripper, the real one from the 1800s comes to my mind when I read these letters. A week and a half after this most recent letter was received, the Ripper finally struck again. On April 4, 1979, 19-year-old Josephine Ann Whitaker was walking home from her job as a clerk in Halifax. The Ripper must have been roaming the area that night because he saw her and hit her in the head from behind with a ball peen hammer. Her skull was completely shattered.

She was stabbed 21 times in the chest and abdomen and another six times in the right leg. A screwdriver was inserted into her vagina. Police found witnesses, including a man who was walking his dog. He tried his best to describe. a man he saw walking with Josephine. Another witness heard some unusual sounds while they were cutting through a shortcut in the area, but wasn't sure of the source. Pressure to apprehend the Ripper was immense for police. Detectives were under fire from their superiors to solve the case. The media and family members of the victims hounded them for answers, answers which they couldn't give. On June 17,

In 1979, an audio cassette tape was sent to Assistant Chief Constable, George Oldfield, the same person that the letters had been sent to. On the tape, a voice calling himself Jack, began to taunt the constable. I'm Jack. I see you are still having no look cutting me. I have the greatest respect for you, George. Good Lord. You are no need of touching me now.

And four years ago when I started. I let me know bones. I'll let me down, George. They call me much good. And then. Police believe that the letter writer was the Ripper and that he now had sent a tape. Police could hear that the man on the tape had a whereside accent, leading to the nickname Werside Jack. This was at odds with previous witness statements indicating that the Ripper had a Yorkshire accent.

Police believed that the letters and audio tape was the key to solving the case. They were wrong. Two and a half months after the last Ripper attack, he would strike again. Not long after midnight on Sunday, September 2nd, 1979, 20-year-old Barbara Janine Leach, also known as Babs, was walking near Bradford University, where she was a third-year psychology student. She had been out with some friends before they all went their separate ways. Barbara never turned up back at her room, and her roommates became concerned.

When she still hadn't shown up by Sunday night, the roommates called police and reported her missing. A Monday, September 3rd, just before 4 p.m., a police constable searching the area, found Barbara's body. It had been hidden behind a rock wall, just 200 yards from where her friends had last seen Barbara. The killer covered her with a piece of carpet and some stones. Her shirt and bra had been pulled up and her pants pulled down. She had been beaten with a hammer and stabbed with a screwdriver. This latest attack put even more pressure on the police to solve the case. But as police scrambled to ID the predator killing Yorkshire's women,

the Ripper murders seemed to stop. But this was only temporary. There would be more victims, which we'll talk about in part two of our Yorkshire Ripper coverage. So, no doubt more, if we have a lot more to come, in the second part of our coverage on the Yorkshire Ripper, I think as we wrap up this first part of it, you know,

there are a number of things that, that jump out at me. Number one, as we've said, is just how horrific some of these attacks and murders were. You know, the fact that there were a number of women who survived. these brutal attacks is kind of amazing to me.

I think those survivors were able to give police a lot of helpful information. But as we've talked about, the police didn't always run with that information. Sometimes they doubted its accuracy. And sometimes that was due to maybe them thinking that the victim may have been a sex worker and therefore her account of what happened might not be accurate or important. Yeah, I think that's a good question in this case. You know, how much importance did the police put on some of these murders if they thought that the victims were sex workers or attacks where the victim survived?

It's really tough for me not to put these attacks and murders together. You know, the implements used are so very specific. You know, ball peen hammer, many of them involved stabbings, which is not unusual. But what is unusual is that sometimes, or a lot of times it was done with a like a screwdriver, a Phillips head screwdriver. I just don't think you see that very often as a tool of murder. Yeah. Another interesting thing was that the only commonality amongst all the victims,

where they were lone females walking at night. They were different ages, different backgrounds, different occupations. Some were students. So just no real rhyme or reason about those victims other than they were lone females in the night. But what it gives me is a real sense of a predator, you know, out stalking, looking for his next victim. And it's always a very scary thought that. that there's a person out there, let's say, driving around, scanning, looking at women as they, you know, walk down the street. And then there's a selection process in their mind.

To me, that's just a very scary thought. And I think just a little bit of a preview of what we'll talk about in the next episode, some of the same things that we're seeing will continue. And we'll see some new things and also some criticisms that were fair of the police and what was done in regards to the investigation. And then obviously how they ultimately identified and caught this predator. But that's it for our part one on the Yorkshire Ripper. If you love the show, I haven't done so yet, take a minute, go out, give us a five-star rating. You can leave a review. Also, keep telling your friends. Word of mouth about the podcast really helps us out. If you want to find us on social media, we're on X with the handle at Criminology Pod.

You can also find us on Facebook by going to Facebook.com slash criminology podcast. And you can join our Facebook discussion group, criminology podcast discussion in the fans. So that's it for another episode of criminology. But Morp and I will be back with all of you next Saturday night with another episode of criminology. So for Mike and Morph, we'll talk to you next week. Take care of everyone. One of the biggest decisions for a new parent is who you trust with your child's health care. We chose Salis Health. They're the only place in L.A. that pairs an incredible concierge pediatrician with 24-7 urgent and emergency care for your child, all with the same trusted medical team.

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