Every Town - The Masked Beast of Jersey - A True Crime Look Into The Terrifying Crimes of Edward Paisnel

Episode Date: October 6, 2023

The movies feed our fears with masked serial killers like in “Scream,” “Halloween,” “Friday the 13th,” “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” and many others…And for good reason..because a masked psycho is  terrifying. And whats even scarier then that is, when a real person wears a mask to commit heinous crimes, on an island, where no one can escape. Edward Paisnel, wa a sadistic person…and he wreaked havoc on the Channel Island of Jersey, an archipelago in the English Channel, off the French Coast of Normandy. From 1957 to 1971, he committed a series of crimes, each time wearing a homemade mask and wig.💥 Watch On Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/scarymysteries🎧 Our Other Podcast: https://scarymysteries.buzzsprout.com💥 Exclusive Podcasts: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1235579/subscribe 💀 Follow Our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scarymysteries 💀 Follow Our Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andrew.fitzg👁 Follow Our TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@andrewfitzgerald💥 Follow Our Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scarymysteriesofficial🗣 Business Inquiries: [e-mail] Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you love true crime, grab your favorite mug and pour yourself a dose of creepy true crime every single morning with a morning cup of murder. This short daily show is the perfect podcast to incorporate into your morning routine, because in less than 15 minutes, you'll hear about a true crime that took place on a day's date in history. Each day's dark history lesson will kickstart your morning with intriguing tales of murder, abduction, serial killers, cults, and everything in between. With over 20 million downloads, Morning Cup of Murder has something for every true crime lover. One listener describes the show as a small package with a powerful punch of crime.

Another writes that the show is an absolute delight in the morning. Support yourself a piping hot cup of murder every single morning with Morning Cup of Murder. Find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Every town has a dark side. The movies feed our fears with mass serial killers, like in Scream, Halloween, Friday the 13th, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and many others, and for good reason, because a mass psycho is terrifying. What's even scarier than that is when a real person wears a mask to commit heinous crimes on an island where no one can escape.

Edward Pasnell was a sadistic person, and he reads. wreaked havoc on the Channel Island of Jersey, an archipelago in the English Channel off the French coast of Normandy. From 1957 to 1971, he committed a series of crimes each time wearing a homemade mask and wig. I'm Andrew, and welcome back to another episode of Everytown where we cover this insane story, where the perpetrator always seemed to give his community just enough time in between attacks for them to let their guard down, only. to have him strike again in the dead of night. This is the real-life story of a man

who has become known as the Beast of Jersey. Edward Paznell from the UK was born in 1925 to an upper-class family. By all accounts, everything in his life growing up in regards to his family life is normal. However, when he was barely a teenager in 1939, the United Kingdom declared war against Germany. He saw a different and darker side

the world during the war, and tried to help out where he could. Record show he was imprisoned briefly for stealing food to give to starving families, which was a noble crime. He only blemish, if you want to call it that, to his name. By all accounts and appearances, he would grow up to be a loving family man, living on the remote Channel Island of Jersey with his wife, a daughter, and two stepchildren. He worked as a building contractor throughout the island and was well-liked. Joan, his wife, ran a foster home called Le Preference, and it actually met Edward when he was there working as a handyman. Ed was always happy to help orphans. In fact, the children there knew him simply as Uncle Ted, the man who always had candy and small gifts.

He played games to help entertain them and dressed up as Santa Claus every year to hand out presents. So almost too good to be true. And as often is the case with Twixt. individuals, these kindly outward appearances are often created as ways to mask their dark truths. So they are not being nice out of the kindness of their hearts, but in order to hide the monsters they really are. Edward is a great example of this because between 1957 and 71, when he was between the ages of 32 to 46, Jersey was being terrorized by a freakish-looking masked figure. This anonymous intruder put the island community on high alert

as he had abducted, tortured, and assaulted more than 13 people, most of whom were women and children. And for years, no one knew that the beast behind this creepy story was actually Edward Pasnell. Wearing a frazzled wig, rubber mask, and homemade cloth bracelets with nails sticking out of them, Edward would attack vulnerable people, often at remote bus stop.

before taking them out into fields to have his way with them. In early 1957, a young nurse who finished her shift was waiting for a bus at the Monte Elab area of the island. This was to be the beast's first victim, though it was before he had perfectly crafted his entire outfit, and so he simply wrapped a scarf around his face when he approached her with a rope in hand. There was no conversation.

He snuck up behind and wrapped it around her neck before dragging her away into some more secluded bushes nearby where he raped her. Once done, he left her there and vanished off into the night. Now with a taste, he would go on to repeat this tactic a couple more times and in relatively quick succession. At March, Edward got his second victim when he assaulted a 20-year-old woman in the exact same manner. She was waiting for a bus at night. No one else was around, and so he pounced.

He struck again in July. and then again in October of 59. They said he wore a rope or cord around his waist, his tools for his encounters, which he used to restrain them by tying their hands up. He always wrapped a rope around their necks in order to control them and used whatever fields or brush nearby

where he could get more privacy. At this point, either he started to feel like the townsfolk and authorities were catching on, after all words spread fast in a place like Jersey, or perhaps his confidence grew after getting away with it so many times, that he decided to try a more intimate and dangerous tactic. He was done with the bus stops,

and instead began casing and entering homes at night. Having studied his targets obsessively, he knew their routines and movements, and when the right time to strike would be. He would go on to attack more women, but girls and even young boys were thrown in the mix, and he even used that access to the children's foster, her home to feed his depravity. A true wolf in sheep's clothing on Valentine's day of 1960,

a 12-year-old boy woke up in the middle of the night. When he opened his eyes, there the beast stood, fully masked, as if something leather face would wear. And terrified, Edward put his hand over the boy's mouth before dragging him outside to a field where he assaulted him. Just a month later, he attacked a woman who had asked him for a ride. Shortly after that, he invaded a four. He invaded a 43-year-old woman's remote cottage. Before entering, he made sure to cut her phone lines, and now he could do whatever he wanted because there was no outside world contact. No neighbors close enough to hear any noise. At 1.30 a.m., the woman awoke from a sound. She could hear somebody creeping around the kitchen.

To reach for the phone, I attempted to call the coughs, but of course the line was dead. Before she could figure out what to do next, the beast opened the bedroom door. She screamed in a violent confrontation ensued and he got the best of her. Now, knowing she couldn't stop him, she ran out of the house to get help as fast as she could, but in doing so, she had to leave behind her 14-year-old daughter. He was going to do what he came for. So, knowing full well what was going to happen to her daughter, her only option was to try and find someone to help before it was too late.

By the time help came, though, the worst had happened. The young girl suffered the same attack as her mother. The beast had vanished off into the night and gotten away. By the early 1960s, Pasnell had started to exclusively target children. In April, a 14-year-old girl woke up to find the beast watching her from the corner of the room. She let out a blood-curdling scream so loud, though, but it was enough to get him to run away. An eight-year-old boy in July, though, wasn't so lucky.

He was snatched from his room in the dead of night and brought to a nearby field where he was assaulted, only to have the beast himself walking back home to make sure he got back okay. Clearly, there was a serious problem happening on the island. People didn't feel safe and demanded answers. So the police decided to start with anyone living on the island with a criminal record, going door to door to question them. These people were asked to give fingerprints,

which most did, however, 13 of them, including Edward, refused to provide him. This narrowed down their list a bit, but they got sidetracked when the rumblings about an eccentric local fishermen permeated through the streets. It was a witch hunt. We got out that Alfonso Legistellos was most likely the one responsible, even though the only quote-unquote evidence was that the guy was known as being a bit weird. He would go on to be arrested, but eventually released because of lack of any real evidence. But the public wasn't buying it. They were panicking, and in their eyes, the police had the one responsible and then let him go.

So in an act of vigilante justice, in order to get this guy out of their town, but Gastelois's cottage was intentionally burnt down. Fearing for his life, he fled to a small group of islands called Leia Cruz, where he would spend the next 14 years in a self-imposed exile, living off the land and scabbage lobsters. Leggis had left the island for good. The townsfolk breathed a sigh of relief, but it was a short-lived one.

The beast attacks continued. They had accused the wrong man and three more children were then assaulted by the mask-wearing psychopath by April of 1961. Meanwhile, Edward was volunteering at community homes with children under his care. Him and his wife even took some of the kids into their heart. home to raise them, but it was talk around the area that Mr. Pasnell may have been abusing both the staff at those centers, as well as the children he cared for. Now, none of this was officially reported. There were enough rumblings to make Edward realize he needed to chill out. On top of that,

the island was seeking help from the higher authorities of Scotland Yard to assist in the investigation of the Beast of Jersey, and so soon all the attacks just stopped. But, you know, the It was only temporary until things cooled down. Scotland Yard had their profile laid out. The Beast was estimated to be between 40 and 45 years old. At the time, Edward was 36. The man stood around 5 feet, 6 inches tall, would always wear a mask or scarf during their attacks.

He smelled bad, so it was likely a more blue-collar type of worker, if they worked at all. In other words, not someone from high society. although that was already assumed. He attacked at night, anywhere between the hours of 10 p.m. and 3 a.m. He invaded homes through bedroom windows that he cased and always used a flashlight in order to be able to bring his victims outside into those fields. Despite the profile, though, without any new cases coming in,

it was hard to pin down the perp, and eventually things settled down and life went back to normal. But in 1963, after two years of unusual silence and inactivity, the beast was back. In April, his next victim was a nine-year-old boy who was snatched from his room and dragged out into the woods before being attacked. After, he was brought back to his home by the masked man. In November, the next victim was an 11-year-old boy. In July and August of 64, a 10-year-old girl and boy were also attacked in their homes, and then once again silence. In 1966, though, something new happened. A letter showed up at the Jersey police station.

It was from the Beast. And in it, he taunted authorities and bragged about his crimes. It read, My dear sir, I think that it is just the time to tell you that you are just wasting your time. As every time I've done what I always intended to do, and remember, it will not stop. at this. But I will be fair to you and give you a chance. I've never had much out of this life,

but I tend to get everything I can now. I've always wanted to do the perfect crime. I have done this, but this time let the moon shine very bright in September because this time it must be perfect, not one, but two. I'm not a maniac by a long shot, but I like to play with you, people. You will hear from me before September, and I'll give you all the clues, just to see if you can catch me. Yours very sincerely, wait and see. That August, a 15-year-old girl was snatched from her home and brutally assaulted,

only something about this one was different. Her body was covered in long, scratches that were meticulously dispersed in perfect parallel lines. The same thing happened to a 13-year-old boy was abducted from his house and attacked in August of 1970. After the assault, the boy offered the now common description of what had happened and said his attacker had black spiky hair and wore a terrifying mask. This boy also had some strange scratches on his face and body like those found on the previous victim. The beast was spacing out his attacks just far enough where it seemed people had let their

guards down, thinking it was all over. Unfortunately, it was all coming to an end. When Edward, who was 46 years old by this time, was pulled over for running a red light in a stolen car in the St. Helier District on July 10th of 1970. Edward floored it, the police chased him through the streets at speeds of up to 75 miles per hour before his car eventually crashed through a fence and into a tomato field. He ditched the car and took off running, but was eventually tackled by cops and cuffed. When they searched him, he was wearing wristband studded with short, sharp nails. On the shoulders of his coat were foam rubber pads, also fitted with nails, and in his pocket it was a rubber face mask, a wig, two pieces of rope, and a pajama waistband.

When questioned by police about what all this stuff was for, he told them, I'm going to a sex party. In custody, authorities started to realize who they actually may have caught. It's not every day you try to pull someone over and they flee. And when you do get to them, they have such weird items. So, police went and searched his home, hoping they would find more evidence, and they certainly did. Yeah, they found a secret room. Inside it was his twisted dungeon.

There were several items of altered clothing, including a blue track suit, a nail-studded raincoat, homemade wigs and hats and false eyelashes. There was a camera hanging on a hook and several photographs lying about of houses that he was, of course, casing. There was black magic paraphernalia and a homemade black magic altar consisting of an alcove covered by a red curtain. It was a sizable library about the occult and black magic rituals and a very large, curved wooden sword hanging on the wall above a glass chalice. A report in a newspaper said, When confronted with a crossmaid of Raffia, Asnel's eyes bulged.

His face turned red and he started shaking and chuckling. He was alleged to have said, "'Our master would love very long and hard at this. I'm not afraid of the cross. There's a much more powerful emblem than that. Our cocoon is getting larger. Your world is shrinking. Edward's trial began on November 29th of 1970

in just a matter of 38 minutes, the jury ended in their verdict. Guilty on 13 counts of rape and sexual assault against six of his victims. After the trial, wife Joan wrote the book, The Beast of Jersey. all about her own experience and living with the man who was committing crimes she knew nothing about. Edward never explained what motivated him to go out and commit the terrifying and savage attacks that he did,

and when questioned about anything, he always gave nonsensical answers that descended into talks of curses, covens, and black magic. The letter sent to police it was decided had come from him, after his wife recognized the handwriting, but Edward himself never spoke about it. For his beastly axe, Mr. Paisnal was sentenced to 30 years in prison, which he unsuccessfully appealed over the years. Somewhat unbelievably, though, in 1991 he was released on good behavior. Following his release from prison, Edward moved away due to the fact that the community didn't much like him being around. He would go on to die of a heart attack at the age of 68, the Isle of Ride, in 1994.

And that ended a terrifying run from an evil man. The Beast of Jersey is now gone. So that's it for this week's episode of Every Town. Hope you enjoyed it. Go check out this episode in video form over on our YouTube channel called Scary Mysteries. And for more podcasts from us, check out the Scary Mysteries podcast. Thank you guys so much for tuning in. Please come back next week for another episode filled with Scary Strange and Mysterious Stories.

Because you never know. Your town could be next.