24/11/96 - Yorkshire Ripper
'has admitted more attacks'
Sophie Goodchild
Independent on Sunday
The so-called Yorkshire Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe,
who is serving life for murdering 13 women, could have
committed another 20 vicious crimes, including killings,
according to West Yorkshire's Chief Constable, Keith Hellawell.
He says Sutcliffe hasalready admitted from prison to further
attacks for which he has not been charged.
Mr Hellawell has revealed that he has spent the past 10
years secretly reinvestigating at least 20 unsolved attacks
and murders of women across Britain. His conclusion, he
says, is that they bear all the hallmarks of Sutcliffe,
who was jailed in 1981for 13 murders and seven attempted
murders.
His findings form part of a Network First documentary
called "Silent Victims: The Untold Story of the
Yorkshire Ripper" to be broadcast by Yorkshire
Television on 10 December.
He says in the film that he believes these further
attacks were by Sutcliffe, a lorry driver from Bradford,
because of three factors. First, many of the victims
were initally followed by their attacker who then chatted
to them; second, they were (insome cases) battered with
a ball-pein hammer; and third, those victims who survived
have described their attacker as being swarthy with
a dark beard, which fits Sutcliffe's appearance.
Mr Hellawell says that these 20 victims, including
students and nurses, were not linked to Sutcliffe at
the time because police were convinced that he was targeting
prostitutes.
One victim, Tracy Browne, was 14 when she was attacked
with a hammer by a man who followed her home. Mr Hellawell
says he interviewed Sutcliffe in prison about the attack.
He says: "He got to one stage where he said to
me, `You're right: it sounds as ifI've done them. The
description is of me. It's in the right time-scale.
The way that the person killed or attemped to kill is
the way that I operated. Therefore it must be me.'"
Sutcliffe eventually admitted to attacking Ms Browne
as well as to two attempted murders on Mr Hellawell's
list, but the Director of Public Prosecutions ruled
that it was not in the public interest to take him back
to court. Mr Hellawell says: "He[Sutcliffe] related,
all those years on, detailed circumstances of those
attempted murders that only the criminal would know.
He also remembered he put her [Ms Browne] over a fence.
That hadn't been disclosed. We hadn't made that public
at all. So onlyhe would know that.
"I believe that there are others. And I have this
feeling that he will one day tell me the truth."
One unsolved murder that he links with Sutcliffe is that
of Debbie Schlesinger who was murdered in 1977 in Leeds,
aged 18. No one has ever been charged with her killing.
|
