A FORMAL STATEMENT FROM ANDY JONES, OWNER & CURATOR OF THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL ……
IT HAD BEEN BROUGHT TO OUR ATTENTION THAT THE HIT CHANNEL 4 TV SERIES – FOUR ROOMS, FIRST BROADCAST AT THE END OF MAY 2011, FEATURED FELLOW CRIME MEMORABILIA COLLECTOR STEWART P EVANS, AUTHOR OF THE 2004 PUBLICATION OF THE BOOK ENTITLED “EXECUTIONER- THE CHRONICLES OF JAMES BERRY VICTORIAN HANGMAN” . HE TOOK ONTO THE SHOW A SO-SAY JAMES BERRY HANGMAN’S NOOSE CLAIMING IT TO HAVE BEEN THE ORIGINAL ONE USED ON BERRY’S FAILED EXECUTION OF JOHN ” BABBACOMBE ” LEE ON JULY 23RD 1885 AT EXETER JAIL .
WE WISH TO MAKE IT ABUNDANTLY CLEAR THAT THIS WAS NOT THE NOOSE USED, AND THAT THE ORIGINAL HANGMAN’S NOOSE , ALONG WITH A PERSONALLY HANDWRITTEN AND SIGNED LETTER FROM JAMES BERRY TO THIS EFFECT,DATED 3 JULY 1897(WRITEN DURING HIS RETIREMENT YEARS ) ARE HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL ON PUBLIC DISPLAY . (SEE ORIGINAL NOOSE AND LETTER PICTURES HERE ABOVE & BELOW FOR REFERENCE )
THESE EXHIBIT ITEMS WERE PURCHASED AT AUCTION BY THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION BACK IN THE YEAR 2000. STEWART HAD ALSO ATTENDED THE AUCTION WITH A VIEW TO PURCHASE BUT WAS SUBSEQUENTLY OUTBID BY OURSELVES .
THE PROPOSED SALE OF THE OTHER NOOSE OWNED BY STEWART P EVANS FAILED TO SELL ON THE CHANNEL 4 TV SERIES “FOUR ROOMS” . THIS WAS PROBABLY DUE TO KNOWLEDGE THAT THE ORIGINAL NOOSE AND LETTER OF PROVENANCE FROM THE EXECUTIONER -JAMES BERRY WERE KNOWN TO BE HERE ON PERMANENT DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL, UK .
ON A PERSONAL LEVEL ANDY JONES WISHES TO ADD IT WAS DISAPPOINTING TO NOTE THAT WITH FELLOW CRIME MEMORABILIA COLLECTOR AND FORMER POLICE OFFICER STEWART EVANS HAVING KNOWINGLY BEEN AWARE OF THESE FACTS, HE STILL SADLY TRIED TO DECEIVE TV SHOW PRODUCERS , THE VIEWING PUBLIC , AND OTHER FELLOW COLLECTORS OF CRIME MEMORABILIA .
REF: ORIGINAL JAMES BERRY CALLING/BUSINESS CARD
FURTHERMORE & FOR THE RECORD WE WOULD WISH TO ALSO ADD THAT WE HAVE HERE ON DIPLAY AN ORIGINAL JAMES BERRY PUBLIC EXECUTIONER CALLING/BUSINESS CARD . ( SEE BELOW)
AS AUTHOR STEWART P EVANS WILL ALSO AGREE AND ACCEPT ANDY JONES OF THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION HAD ORIGINALLY INTRODUCED HIM TO THE FORMER OWNER OF THIS CALLING CARD – JOE MAWSON ( NOW DECEASED FORMER CRIME MEMORABILIA COLLECTOR ) .
JOE HAD, AS RECOMMENDED BY ANDY JONES ,SUBSEQUENTLY PROVIDED WITHOUT CHARGE TO STEWART, AN IMAGE OF THIS CARD FOR HIS BOOK, AS ACKNOWLEDGED WITHIN THE CREDITS OF HIS BOOK. #
HOPEFULLY THIS WILL RESPECTFULLY PUT THE RECORD STRAIGHT ON THESE SAID FRONTS.
ABOVE: An original oil painting by Gloucestershire artist Paul Bridgman of James Berry , here on display at The Crime Through Time Collection , Littledean jail .
Above & below: The original James Berry personally handwritten and signed letter that had been originally acquired alongside his noose, for which Berry clearly states the provenance of this noose as being both the one he had used in his first execution and thereafter the historic failed attempted execution on John “Babbacombe” Lee.
ABOVE & BELOW: AN ORIGINAL JAMES BERRY EXECUTIONER CALLING/BUSINESS CARD AND ORIGINAL LETTER FROM SCOTLAND YARDS BLACK MUSEUM CURATOR BILL WADDELL AKNOWLEDGING SIGHT OF THIS EXTREMELY RARE EXHIBIT PIECE .
THIS CALLING CARD HAVING BEEN PARY OF THE JOE MAWSON ( DECEASED) CRIME MEMORABILIA COLLECTION, LATER ACCQUIRED BY THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION. THIS ITEM ALONG WITH THE OTHERS FEATURED HERE ARE NOW ON PUBLIC DISPLAY AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL .
Below: A rare and unseen personal photograph of fellow crime memorabilia and ephemera collector Joe Mawson who was the previous owner of the exceptionally rare James Berry Executioner calling/business card.
This calling card having been previously featured in the book below and now on permanent display here at the jail.
ABOVE & BELOW: THE BOOK WRITTEN BY STEWART P EVANS ALONG WITH A PERSONAL DEDICATION AND THANK-YOU NOTE TO PREVIOUS OWNER OF THE JAMES BERRY CALLING CARD JOE MAWSON .
A COPY OF ORIGINAL SIGNED PHOTO OF JAMES BERRY – EXECUTIONER AND HANGMAN
NEWSPAPER ARTICLE BACK ON 05TH OCTOBER 2000 RELATING TO THE UPCOMING AUCTION SALE OF THE NOOSE AND HANGMAN’S LETTER …….SUBSEQUENTLY BOUGHT BY THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION, NOW ON DISPLAY AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL
ABOVE: TRUE CRIME MAGAZINE FEATURE ON LITTLEDEAN JAIL INCLUDING A REFERENCE TOO THE ORIGINAL NOOSE USED BY JAMES BERRY ON THE FAILED EXECUTION ON THE MAN THEY COULD NOT HANG ….JOHN ” BABBACOMBE ” LEE. ACQUIRED FROM AUCTION IN THE YEAR 2000 ALONG WITH FIRM LETTER OF PROVENANCE FROM JAMES BERRY STATING THAT NOT ONLY HAD IT BEEN USED ON LEE , THAT IT HAD ALSO BEEN USED FOR HIS FIRST EXECUTION IN 1884 . TO ALL OTHERS THAT CLAIM THEY HAVE THE ORIGINAL NOOSE USED ON LEE ……. SORRY BUT ITS HERE ON DISPLAY AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL ALONG WITH THE HANDWRITTEN AND SIGNED LETTER OF 03RD JULY 1897 FROM JAMES BERRY ‘ ON HIS HOME ADDRESSED LETTER HEADED PAPER
NEWSPAPER ARTICLE FEATURING THE HANGMAN’S NOOSE USED BY JAMES BERRY ON THE FAILED ATTEMPT TO EXECUTE JOHN ” BABBACOMBE” LEE FEATURED IN THE WESTERN DAILY PRESS ON NOVEMBER 21ST 2002
ABOVE: Certificate of inspection of failed trap door
Above: Certificate of John Lee’s prison release
John Henry George Lee (1864 – c. 19 March 1945), better known as John “Babbacombe” Lee or “The Man They Couldn’t Hang”, was an Englishman famous for surviving three attempts to hang him for murder. Born in Abbotskerswell, Devon, Lee served in the Royal Navy, and was a known thief. In 1885, he was convicted of the brutal murder of his employer, Emma Keyse, at her home at Babbacombe Bay near Torquay on 15 November 1884. The evidence was weak and circumstantial, amounting to little more than Lee having been the only male in the house at the time of the murder, his previous criminal record, and being found with an unexplained cut on his arm. Despite this and his claim of innocence, he was sentenced to hang.
Execution attempts and aftermath
On 23 February 1885, three attempts were made to carry out his execution at Exeter Prison. All ended in failure, as the trapdoor of the scaffold failed to open despite being carefully tested by the executioner, James Berry, beforehand. As a result, Home Secretary Sir William Harcourt commuted the sentence to life imprisonment. Lee continued to petition successive Home Secretaries and was finally released in 1907. The only other man in history known to have survived three hanging attempts was Joseph Samuel.
Many theories have been advanced as to the cause of the failure, but Home Office papers show that the official report stated that incorrect assembly of the gallows mechanism allowed the trapdoor hinges to rest upon an eighth of an inch of drawbar, preventing them from opening when the doors were weighted. This incident helped lead to a standard gallows design to prevent a recurrence.
Later years and identifications
After his release, Lee seems to have exploited his notoriety, supporting himself through lecturing on his life, even becoming the subject of a silent film. Accounts of his whereabouts after 1916 are somewhat confused, and one researcher even speculated that in later years, there was more than one man claiming to be Lee. It was suspected that he died in the Tavistockworkhouseduring the Second World War. However, one recent piece of research concludes that he died in the United States under the name of “James Lee” in 1945. According to the book The Man They Could Not Hang by Mike Holgate and Ian David Waugh, Lee’s gravestone was found at Forest Home Cemetery, Milwaukee.
ABOVE : Iconic English Folk Rock Band Fairport Convention’ s 1971 album cover entitled “Babbacombe Lee”
Below: The Hanging Song performed by Fairport Convention .
Above & below : One of several handwritten and signed James Berry letters to include close-up image here on display at Littledean Jail
AN EXCEPTIONALLY RARE AND MOST CERTAINALY HISTORICALLY UNIQUE ENGRAVED 1861 HALF PENNY COIN PRESENTED BY JAMES BERRY PUBLIC EXECUTIONER TO J.BREEZE, 25 JULY 1886
ABOVE , Sadly unsure as to the origins and historical significance of this equally historically rare and unique 1861 half penny coin, which is intricately engraved,
” Presented by J. Berry Public Executioner to J Breeze, 25th July 1886″.
This was presented some 17 months after the failed execution by James Berry of John “Babbacombe” Lee on February 23, 1885 .
( If anyone can shed any light on the significance of this coin and whom J Breeze was, please let us know.)
ABOVE AND BELOW: Pictured here are both sides of this rare coin, giving an indication of the actual size.
ABOVE AND BELOW : Here’s a couple of pics of Linda Calvey during one of her private visits to view her exhibition here on display at Littledean Jail .
BELOW: SIGNED COLLAGE PRINT OF LINDA CALVEY, BLACK WIDOW, PERSONALLY SIGNED BY HER. THIS BEING A PRINT OF THE ORIGINAL PAINTING BY PAUL BRIDGMAN , GLOUCESTERSHIRE ARTIST WHICH IS HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE JAIL .
ABOVE: ORIGINAL PERSONALLY SIGNED OIL PAINTING ENTITLED ‘TRANQUILITY’ BY LINDA CALVEY. THIS WAS PAINTED FOR LINDA’S MOTHER WHILST INCARCERATED IN HIGHPOINT PRISON, SUFFOLK IN NOVEMBER 2002 AS CAN BE SEEN ABOVE.
Above : “DEADLY WOMEN” … Here is an intriguing short American produced documentary based on the UK’s infamous Linda Calvey- “The Black Widow”
ABOVE: A PERSONALISED HANDWRITTED AND SIGNED DOODLE SKETCH FROM LINDA INCLUDING HER PRISON NUMBER, HERE ON DISPLAY AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL.
Linda Calvey is a Londoner with stunning good looks and an attraction to gangsters . Her first husband, gangster Mickey Calvey, died in a Police shoot out after a botched armed robbery, and her second husband, Ronnie Cook, received a 16-year prison sentence for armed robbery in 1981.
While Ronnie is incarcerated, Linda fritters away his stash. Fearing her lover’s reaction on his release, she pays a hitman £10,000 to take care of Cook, but “allegedly ” ends up firing the fatal shot herself ???
Linda Calvey has always vehemently denied this claim !!!!!
ABOVE: A RATHER STRIKINGLY PERSONALLY HAND SIGNED SEXY IMAGE OF LINDA CALVEY. PICTURED HERE IN HER PRIME AGED 22 AND PRIOR TO HER ARREST . WOW WHAT A STUNNER !!!(AND STILL A REAL STUNNER TODAY )
ABOVE & BELOW … LINDA CALVEY -THE BLACK WIDOW LEAVES COURT IN A HIGH SECURITY POLICE VEHICLE DURING HER TRIAL AT THE OLD BAILEY , LONDON IN NOVEMBER 1991 . SHE SERVED 18 YEARS IN VARIOUS WOMEN’S HIGH SECURITY PRISONS FOR A MURDER THAT SHE HAS CONSISTENTLY DENIED COMMITTING
SHE WAS OFFERED A LESSER PRISON SENTENCE BY THE HOME OFFICE IF SHE CONFESSED TO THE MURDER AFTER BEING GIVEN A LIFE SENTENCE. .SHE SUBSEQUENTLY REFUSED THIS OFFER OUTRIGHT AS SHE HAS ALWAYS MAINTAINED HER INNOCENCE AND THAT SHE HAD BEEN SET-UP ….. HENCE AS A MATTER OF PRINCIPLE SERVED THE FULL 18 YEAR PRISON TERM .
Original painting by Gloucestershire Artist Paul Bridgman for and on display here at Littledean Jail
ABOVE: LINDA’S WEDDING DAY WORN BASQUE, WHICH SHE WORE WHEN MARRYING CO-ACCUSED MURDERER – DANNY REECE. THE WEDDING TOOK PLACE AT HMP DURHAM, AS CONFIRMED WITH HER HANDWRITTEN LETTER ABOVE, WHICH IS ON DISPLAY HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL
BELOW: TABLOID SENSATIONALISM…. THE SUNDAY PEOPLE IN DECEMBER 2006 AIM TO RIDICULE LINDA CALVEY WHILST SHE IS STILL IN PRISON .
BELOW : LINDA CALVEY (THE BLACK WIDOW) …BRITAIN’S NOTORIOUS FORMER FEMALE ARMED ROBBER, GANGSTER AND ALLEGED MURDERESS….WHO SERVED OVER 20 YEARS IN PRISON (18 YEARS OF THESE FOR A MURDER SHE STILL VEHEMENTLY CLAIMS TO THIS DAY SHE DID NOT COMMIT ) ….. SEEN FILMED HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL HAVING A HEAD AND HANDS CAST FOR DISPLAY ( FOR THE LINDA CALVEY – BLACK WIDOW EXHIBITION ) NOW ON PERMANENT DISPLAY AS PART OF THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION .
THESE CASTS HAVING BEEN MADE BY NICK REYNOLDS , SON OF THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY MASTERMIND – BRUCE REYNOLDS
BELOW: LINDA CALVEY WITH ANDY JONES OF THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION PRESENTING A HANDMADE CUSHION ACQUIRED FROM NOTORIOUS BRITISH SERIAL KILLER ROSE WEST WHILST IMPRISONED TOGETHER AT HMP DURHAM IN 1994 …. NOW ON DISPLAY AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL ALONG WITH VARIOUS OTHER MEMORABILIA ITEMS KINDLY DONATED FOR HISTORICAL DISPLAY AT THE JAIL .
ABOVE & BELOW : IMAGES OF BOTH SIDES OF THIS CARD AS PERSONALLY DISCRIBED BY LINDA HERSELF IN THE HANDWRITEN AND SIGNED PIECE BELOW
ABOVE AND BELOW : A CHRISTMAS CARD FROM MYRA HINDLEY TO LINDA CALVEY WHILST THEY WERE BOTH IN PRISON, ALONG WITH A HANDWRITTEN AND SIGNED LETTER FROM LINDA CONFIRMING THE ABOVE.
BELOW: A FEW IMAGES TAKEN IN FEBRUARY 2018, OF A RECENT CATCH UP WITH LINDA CALVEY AND ANDY JONES OF THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION DURING A PRIVATE VISIT TO HER HOME. WHEREUPON SHE ALSO KINDLY ADDED SOME PERSONALLY HAND SIGNED ANNOTATIONS TO VARIOUS EXHIBIT FEATURES FOR DISPLAY IN HER EXHIBITION AREA HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL .
NEWSPAPER FEATURE ON LINDA CALVEY’S MARRIAGE TO GEORGE CEASAR IN 2009 .
SHE VEHEMENTLY DENIES KILLING HER FORMER LOVER RON COOK WHO WAS SHOT AT POINT BLANK RANGE WITH A SHOTGUN AT THE HOME OF LINDA CALVEY, THE CRIME FOR WHICH SHE SERVED A TOTAL OF 18 YEARS IN PRISON .
SHE CLAIMS SHE WAS AFFORDED THE OPPORTUNITY BY THE HOME OFFICE AUTHORITIES TO SERVE A LESSER SENTENCE OF 7 YEARS IF SHE CONFESSED TO THIS CRIME .
SHE REFUSED THIS OFFER CLAIMING THAT…. WHY SHOULD SHE CONFESS TO A CRIME SHE NEVER COMMITTED?
INSTEAD THE HOME OFFICE INCREASED THE TARIFF ON TWO OCCASIONS TO A TOTAL 18 YEAR LIFE SENTENCE WHICH SHE SERVED IN FULL AS A MATTER OF PRINCIPLE .
COME VISIT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION AND SEE FOR YOURSELVES WHAT LINDA CALVEY HAS TO SAY IN HER OWN WORDS …
Linda Calvey
Linda Calvey is a female murderer and armed robber jailed for killing her lover Ronnie Cook in 1990. She was known as the “Black Widow” because all of her lovers ended up either dead or in prison.[1]
Previous criminal career
Calvey began her criminal career as a lookout, later becoming a getaway driver and eventually wielding guns herself during robberies.[2]
Murder of Cook
She paid a hitmanDaniel Reece £10,000 to kill Cook. However he lost his nerve at the last minute and Calvey picked up the gun herself shooting the victim at point blank range whilst he kneeled in front of her.[3]
At the time of her release Calvey was Britain‘s longest serving female prisoner. She spent 18 and a half years in prison for the murder of Cook and had also previously served three and a half years for an earlier robbery.[4]
In 2002 a book by Kate Kray detailing Calvey’s life and crimes was published
BELOW ARE A NUMBER OF IMAGES OF SOME OF THE PERSONAL EXHIBIT ITEMS BELONGING TO LINDA CALVEY ON DISPLAY HERE AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , IMAGES OF LINDA PICTURED HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL AND AT VARIOUS EVENTS ETC ETC
Black Widow in freedom bid
ABOVE: Linda Calvey pictured here during a private visit to The Crime Through Time Collection at Littledean Jail in the Forest of Dean , Gloucestershire.
A woman known as the Black Widow who was jailed for life for shooting dead her lover at point-blank range launched a new High Court bid for freedom today.
Lawyers for Linda Calvey asked a judge for permission to challenge Home Secretary David Blunkett’s failure to refer her case to the Parole Board.
Her counsel Alan Newman QC accused Mr Blunkett of acting unlawfully and in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Calvey, 53, who was in court to hear her case argued, has served 12 years of her life sentence and is currently held at Highpoint Prison, Suffolk.
She was convicted in November 1991 of the murder of Ronald Cook.
At her Old Bailey trial the jury was told that Calvey originally hired a hit man, Daniel Reece, for £10,000 to carry out the murder in November 1990.
But he had lost his nerve at the last minute, and she forced Cook to kneel in front of her before carrying out the killing.
Both Calvey and Reece, who was also jailed for life, denied murdering Cook at Calvey’s home in Plaistow, east London, in November 1990.
The trial jury was told Calvey was nicknamed the Black Widow because of her habit of dressing in black after her husband Mickey was shot dead by police in 1978 as he was carrying out an armed robbery.
Today Mr Newman told the court that the trial judge set the minimum period she must serve for retribution and deterrence at seven years – but the then Home Secretary more than doubled the tariff to 15 years in 1993. The tariff was reviewed and reset in 1998.
In November last year, the House of Lords ruled in the case of Anderson that it was incompatible with human rights laws for the Home Secretary to set tariffs for mandatory lifers.
Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights required minimum periods in custody to be set by “an independent and impartial tribunal”.
Following that ruling Ms Calvey asked the Home Office to refer her case to the Parole Board as a matter of urgency, but her request was turned down.
Mr Newman told Mr Justice Jackson, sitting in London, that the Home Secretary’s failure to do so was unreasonable and breached Article 5 of the convention, which guaranteed a prisoner’s right to have their case reassessed if the basis for his or her detention changed.
He said it was “irrelevant” that the Lord Chief Justice had also concluded that the tariff should be 15 years.
Mr Blunkett had taken the view that Ms Calvey would have to wait until she could take advantage of new legislation passing through Parliament dealing with the position of lifers’ tariffs.
But by then she would probably have served the full 15-year tariff, and this would amount to a “cruel punishment” contrary to the 1688 Bill of Rights, said Mr Newman.
He told the judge that the case could affect many other murderers serving life sentences.
Seeking leave to apply for judicial review, he said: “The present application raises important and difficult points of law. Whatever may be the eventual outcome, even if at the end of the day the Secretary of State’s view prevails, this case clearly should be allowed to proceed to a full hearing.”
Would you marry the black widow? Ex-gangster Linda Calvey finds a new fiance
She’s a notorious gangster’s moll and every man who’s fallen for her has ended up dead or in jail. Now she’s finished a 28-year stretch for murder – and found a rich fiance. Has he got more money than sense?
Potentially lethal things, cars. Linda Calvey had a close call with an exploding spark
plug the other day. It left her a little shaken.
‘Afterwards, the guy in the garage told me that I was very lucky the engine did not go up, because I’d have been a gonner,’ she explains, breezy as you like.
Taking a chance: Linda Calvey and husband-to-be George Ceasar, who trusts her implicitly
‘I was telling my friend and she said: “Oh goodness, Linda. It could have been even worse. What if George had been driving and he’d been blown to pieces? You’d have been back inside in no time.” She was right, too. I can see the headlines now: The Black Widow Strikes Again.’
For some reason she seems to find this funny. Even more curiously, George, the man she will marry next year, is rocking with laughter too, tears collecting in his eyes.
Why the hilarity? Surely no sane person — or, at the very least, no lawabiding person — would regard it as funny to be so closely associated with Linda Calvey, behind the wheel or not.
Linda is the stuff of legends
For Linda is the stuff of legends — East End gangster legends, mostly.
In notoriety terms, she is up there with the Krays (indeed, Reggie Kray once proposed to her, which kind of says it all). So did ‘Mad’ Frankie Fraser. In glamour terms, she is in a league of her own.
For most of her adult life she has gone by the name of the Black Widow, dubbed so ever since one police officer with whom she’d had dealings pondered the fact that ‘every man she has ever been involved with is either in prison or dead’.
When Myra Hindley died a few years back, Linda — her prison hairdresser, oddly enough — assumed the title of the longest-serving female prisoner in the country.
That 18-year stint was for blasting a former lover to death with a shotgun. Another lover was her co-defendant in the case, and was sent down, too.
They later married behind bars, although — as is so often the way with Linda — it didn’t last.
Her first husband Micky (the one who taught her to be a career criminal — armed robbery to be precise) met a violent end, too, although this was at the hands of the police, who confronted him mid hold-up. That is quite some history to be trailing up the aisle with poor George, who seems like ever such a nice man.
George’s past is squeaky clean
They will marry in the spring with seven — count them! — bridesmaids in tow. Isn’t that a tad excessive for a 60-year-old grandmother getting hitched for the third time? Perhaps.
But then nothing about Linda Calvey was ever understated.
Four months ago, she was released from prison and into the arms of her new love, whom she met while she was on day release.
George Ceasar is a businessman and a part-time ski instructor, and ‘the farthest thing in the world from a gangster’, according to his future wife, who seems almost surprised by this. He drives a red Rolls-Royce (‘bought rather than nicked,’ she grins). His past is squeaky clean, literally. He used to run a successful bleach factory.
‘We were the first people to put bleach in bottles,’ he tells me, proudly.
He should really be the sort of man who would run a mile from Linda Calvey and the criminal underworld she epitomises.
So why, then, is he gazing adoringly at her and bemoaning the peculiarities of the British parole system, in the way that most men of his background would tut-tut at how you can never find a Post Office when you need one.
Gangster Reggie Kray and “Mad” Frankie Fraser both proposed to Linda Calvey
‘Can’t you poison someone in daylight hours?’
George simply cannot believe that his bride-to-be is still subject to ‘barmy’ parole conditions, which mean she cannot spend the night at his — or their, as it is now — home.
‘They have this mad idea that I am in some danger because of her,’ he says, appalled.
‘The prison officers took me aside when I went to visit her, saying: “Be careful.”
‘They implied she might try to kill me, which is nonsense. Even if it were true, do the authorities really think that they are protecting me by allowing her to be here with me only during the day. Can’t you poison someone in daylight hours?
‘It’s just ludicrous, from all angles. Does she seem dangerous to you?’
Erm, well, no. But then, didn’t Harold Shipman’s patients think he was a darling? I pitch up at George’s sprawling 13-room period house in the Kent countryside, hoping to talk to Britain’s most notorious female gangster, and am taken aback by what I find.
Her demeanour — warm, sparky, surprisingly vulnerable, endlessly entertaining — sets the tone for what will be a truly surreal interview.
‘It is the first time I’ve had a Christmas tree in 18 years. Every year I had Christmas
inside, all I could think of was: “I want my own tree.” George wanted to get an artificial one. I said: “No, George — it has to be real. That’s what I’ve dreamed of.” He said: “Well, whatever you want, my dear, you will have.”’
George was smitten from the start
While I try to get the interview under way — remember that the subject matter is murder, armed robbery and organised crime — they bicker about who will make the tea and whether they are going to see Barry Manilow that evening. She wants to go, but he doesn’t.
I feel as though I have stepped into a rather uneasy cross between a Guy Ritchie film and an Ealing comedy. So, how clever is the woman who has been billed as Britain’s most notorious female gangster? On this evidence, extremely. The other inmates called her Ma in prison, and you can see why.
She is attractive. A little brassy, yes — the lead character in Lynda La Plante’s Widows was apparently based on her — but not overly so. She is tactile, engaging and endearing.
George was smitten from the very start. They met in a Medway town when she was on day release from prison two years ago.
‘I was in a restaurant and it was very busy, so she and her friend shared the table with me. We got chatting, and I thought to myself: “Well, this is a lovely lady here”,’ says George.
‘She said she was on a day out. I said: “Oh, an outing?”
‘She said: “No, a day out from prison.”
‘I said: “Blimey. What did you do? It obviously wasn’t something that bad if you’re in an
open prison.”
‘She said: “The thing I went down for was bad, but the point is I didn’t do it. I am innocent.”’
‘She said she didn’t do it, and I believe her’
George — in his mid-Seventies — has had troubles of his own. He tells me that he, too, has been married twice and that his second wife ‘robbed him blind’.
‘You don’t have to be murdered by a woman to be done over by her,’ he says at one
point. He has grown-up children who he never sees. It sounds as though he was lonely when this captivating creature came into his life. Despite the horrific charge list, he brushes over the gangster stuff — even the bits Linda has admitted to.
‘Yes, she was a naughty girl, but haven’t you done anything wrong?’ he asks disingenuously.
He also claims she is the kindest person he has ever met. They decide between themselves that she’s a much nicer person than he is on the grounds that she once gave a cold stranger her own gloves, while such a thing would never occur to George.
Linda was the longest serving female prisoner in the country
It almost seems churlish to bring up more bloody matters and he sighs when I do so.
‘We’ve talked about it all,’ says George. ‘She’s told me what she did do and what she didn’t do. Yes, she did make mistakes, but she told me that on the big one — killing Ron — she didn’t do it, and I believe her. She was stitched up.
‘She has been completely honest with me. After we’d been out on our first date, I sat her down in the living room and said: “I want the truth. I don’t care whether you did
it or not, but I want to know the truth.” She swore she didn’t, and I believe her.’
Linda has always maintained that she did not kill Ronald Cook. She points out that had she professed some guilt she would have been out of jail years ago.
‘They kept me in because I refused to say I did it. But I’ve always held my hands up to what I’ve done. Armed robbery, yes. I’ve done terrible things, things so bad I can hardly believe it myself. But I did not kill Ron, and I will go to my grave saying it.’
‘Men close to me end up dead or in prison… it’s not my fault’
However, in November 1991, a jury decided that she did, and the evidence presented in court was as chilling as Linda’s current set-up is cosy.
Ron had been her lover for several years, but when he went to prison, she turned to several of his friends — also gangsters — for comfort.
Things got complicated, in the sexual and financial sense.
The court heard that, on Ron’s release, Linda was terrified that he would discover she had been unfaithful and had spent the heist money he had stashed away. She allegedly asked another lover, Daniel Reece, to kill him.
An agreement was put in place. Linda collected Ron from prison and drove him to the home they shared. Reece was waiting, but lost his nerve at the crucial moment, leaving Linda to take the shotgun off him and finish the task herself.
Surreally enough, we find ourselves in George’s kitchen when this horrific chapter is broached.
Both are standing as Linda tells her version, effectively re-enacting aspects of that day as she describes how she cowered in a corner as a gunman — the real killer, she says — fired at pointblank range.
The pair of them talk, quite matter-of-factly, about it as Linda puts the kettle on, saying that the Black Widow tag is quite unfair.
‘OK, men close to me came a cropper, but that’s because I associated with gangsters. They end up dead or in prison. That’s life. It’s not my fault.’
‘I liked the lifestyle’
What she fails to do, however, is convey any real sense of remorse — even for the fact that a man she professed to love died in such a manner. Cold-blooded? Barking mad? Or has she just been removed from law-abiding society for so long that she finds such complete moral detachment easy?
What’s interesting is that the only man she talks about with genuine affection is her first husband, Micky — shot dead by armed officers in a botched robbery.
‘I was from a respectable family, no hint of trouble there,’ she says of their meeting.
‘Micky was trouble, but oh so charming with it. Even my mother said: “I can see why you have fallen for him.” He worshipped me, my Micky. He gave me the world. I
didn’t know — honest I didn’t — that most of it was nicked.’
Micky robbed at gunpoint. His team’s jobs were mostly planned in their kitchen, with her making tea and sandwiches, listening in. Learning. She maintains that she got involved in the hard stuff only when Micky died.
‘I kind of just slid in. I started doing some of the driving, then getting more involved. I had children to feed. I liked the lifestyle. Yes. I wasn’t evil, though. I wasn’t.’
She even insists, after a moment’s hesitation, that the guns she carried weren’t even loaded.
Linda Calvey poses for a photo at a Holloway prison party
Tougher than the rest
She clearly hates the police and blames The Establishment, whatever that is, for the death of Micky. But she isn’t nearly as bitter as you might expect about her time in prison.
Again she talks dispassionately about how she survived: it seems to have boiled down to being tougher than all the rest, but never appearing to be tough. Black humour stalks every sentence.
‘When I went to Durham, I said I wouldn’t talk to anyone who had killed a child. The wardens said: “Well, you’ll not be talking to many people here then. They are all
murderers.” ’
She struck up a bizarre relationship with Myra Hindley. She says they weren’t friends, but they were close enough that Linda dyed Hindley’s hair regularly. She clearly
doesn’t put herself in the same criminal, morally deficient class, though.
‘Myra never regretted what she had done. I was often shocked by her. I remember when I was working in the prison library she came in and asked to order a book, but she wanted me to put it in the name of another girl, who never came into the library. I asked what book. It was The Devil And His Works. She got it, too.
George looks on — fascinated rather than horrified — as she chats away about somehow finding herself in the same prison wing as one of the most notorious female killers of our time.
‘I missed seeing my grandchildren grow up’
Is there remorse on her part? Yes, undoubtedly so — although mostly for herself and her loved ones.
‘I did not kill Ron and should not have done that sentence, but I know full well that it was my lifestyle that put me in prison for that murder, and that is a terrible thing to live with.
‘All my grandchildren were born when I was inside. I haven’t seen any of them grow up, and they never had a granny.
‘One day, one of them had to write in school about what they did at the weekend. My granddaughter wrote: “We went to see Granny and I got tickled by the policeman and
then we went swimming.” She meant she’d been frisked coming to the prison to see me. That floors you, you know.’
‘Mate, she saw you coming’
She seems close to tears. George pats her arm and talks about how they could put another Christmas tree in the hallway, if she wants.
I wonder if her realizes that most people will look at him and conclude that George, with his red Rolls-Royce, his big empty house and his ability to see the best in people and conclude: ‘Mate, she saw you coming.’
Have they considered a prenuptial agreement?
‘I’ve said I would sign one,’ Linda says sharply, but George shakes his head in distaste.
‘You can’t go into a marriage thinking like that. You have to trust people. Life’s a gamble, but if you lose trust, what have you got? So, she might kill me. Well, hell, I’ll
take the chance.’
Next spring — “If I last that long,” quips George — those wedding bells will ring. Linda is already thinking about flowers and cakes.
As I leave, she skips off to fetch me some of the cake decorations she learned to make in prison.
They are truly remarkable: tiny flowers, berries and leaves, made out of icing, but impossible to tell from the real thing, even up close.
The woman has a rare, impressive — and deeply disturbing — talent for leaving you wondering what is real and what is fake.
DAILY MAIL NEWS REPORT 6 SEPTEMBER 2016 ….
Has the curse of the Black Widow struck again? Notorious gangster’s moll Linda Calvey is single once more after third husband, 84, dies in Spanish hospital
George Ceasar passed away over the weekend, leaving Calvey a widow
Policeman once mused all Calvey’s husbands end up dead or behind bars
But Ceasar was confident his younger wife was not going to ‘bump him off’
Friend says Calvey is concerned people may not think she is a gold-digger
A killer known as the Black Widow is single again following the death of her third husband – but a close friend has insisted it has nothing to do with her infamous track record for losing spouses.
Linda Calvey – who was given her nickname after after one police officer mused ‘every man she has ever been involved with is either in prison or dead’ – is mourning the passing of Goerge Ceasar, 84, in a Spanish hospital this weekend.
The couple had been married five years and, despite Ceasar’s advanced age and ill-health, Calvey is said to be bracing herself for an adverse reaction from critics
PICTURED HERE ABOVE IS LINDA’S FIRST HUSBAND MICKY WHO WAS SHOT DEAD BY A POLICE MARKSMAN
The friend said: ‘She dreads imagining the wrong conclusions people will now leap to, especially as cynics warned when she married him it was for his money, which wasn’t true.
‘The reality is that despite being a tough old boy, George simply passed away from a combination of illness and old age. Linda had nothing to do with his death.
‘It’s sad but that’s life.’
Calvey’s first husband was shot dead by police marksman, and the second, who she divorced, is serving life for murder, see below
Above: Second husband : marrying Danny Reece in Durham’s prison chapel in 1995 . He is still serving a life sentence
She served 18-and-a-half years in jail – the longest time behind bars by any woman in Britain – after shooting a former lover dead.
But Ceasar, who was 17 years her senior, seemed unworried by her reputation.
At his and Calvey’s lavish white wedding five years ago, the law abiding tycoon joked of his willingness to take a chance on ‘Linda not bumping me off’.
However, it is said he recently told friends that ‘marrying Linda was the worst mistake of my life’ – while Calvey hinted at a possible divorce.
‘Unlike George she wasn’t prepared to sit around at home in God’s waiting room day in day out. She spent a third of her life locked-up and when she was released she needed to be out and about,’ said the friend.
Ceasar, who left the UK to live in Spain for health reasons last winter, had spent a month in hospital near Benidorm, Costa Blanca, surrounded by Calvey’s family and friends.
The former ski instructor – who was given the last rites by a priest last week – left instructions for his ashes to be scattered on his favourite mountainside in Switzerland.
But Calvey was not at his side when he passed away as she is still subject to parole orders including travel restrictions, lives in Basildon, Essex.
Calvey, who rejected marriage proposals from villains Reggie Kray and ‘Mad’ Frankie Fraser between husbands, was immortalised in the hit TV series, apltly named ‘Widows,’ by Lynda La Plante but she scoffed at claims she had made £1million from her crimes.
Her first husband Micky was shot dead by the Flying Squad in a bungled raid on a London supermarket in 1978.
She later wed hitman Danny Reece, who helped her kill her then boyfriend, Ronnie Cook in 1990.
Then, while Reece was still in jail for the murder, she asked him for a divorce to wed George.
They had first met by chance in a crowded pub in Canterbury, Kent, close to the prison where she was being prepared for release.
Ceaser asked her if she was enjoying a shopping trip in town, to which she replied: ‘Yes, but I’m from the jail down the road.’
Above: Linda with her boyfriend Ronnie Cook who she was alleged to have shot dead in cold blood .
As their friendship blossomed, he regularly visited her at HMP East Sutton Park and she confessed to him hat while she had ‘done many bad things in life’ she was not a murderer – despite the Old Bailey’s damning verdict.
Calvey has always maintained she was innocent, but jurors heard how she snatched the shotgun from Reece after he had bungled Cook’s killing, and finished him off herself.
On jail visit before her release in 2008, a concerned prison officer took besotted George aside and warned him: ‘Beware, she kills her men, you know..’
But the friend said this week: ‘Okay, the men close to Linda always came croppers but that’s because she associates with gangsters. Yes, they end up dead or in jail but it isn’t her fault.’
The friend said that she was braced for a backlash over George’s death from doubters who claimed she had only wed him for his bank balance.
Calvey had spent so long in jail that when she left her cell, her State pension amounted to only 11p a week.
‘Despite their differences, Linda greatly respected George, who was the kindest man she had ever known. She will miss him but she was never a gold digger.
HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL AND THROUGH OUR BUSINESS FACEBOOK WE TRY AND PROVIDE A BALANCED AND EDUCATIONAL INTERACTIVE INSIGHT INTO WHAT MANY DEEM TO BE TABOO SUBJECT MATTERS .
PLEASE DO BE AWARE THAT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , IT’S OWNER , OR ANY OF IT’S STAFF HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL HAVE NO AFFILIATION , CONNECTION OR INVOLVEMENT WITH ANY EXTREMIST , POLITICALLY MOTIVATED OR OTHERWISE MOVEMENTS WHATSOEVER …… WE SIMPLY EXHIBIT AND TOUCH UPON A GREAT MANY POLITICALLY INCORRECT AND TABOO SUBJECT MATTERS THAT NO OTHER VISITOR ATTRACTIONS DARE COVER IN THE WAY WE CHOOSE TO DO HERE. …. “IT’S ALL HISTORY FOR GOODNESS SAKE”….EVEN IF ON OCCASIONS, SENSITIVE , THOUGHT PROVOKING SUBJECT MATTERS THAT INCITE STRONG DEBATE .
WIDELY REGARDED TO BE BLACK RACISM MOVIES MANY OF THESE NOW BANNED KU KLUX KLAN MOVIE POSTERS WERE DEEMED TO BE A GLORIFICATION TOOL AND USED FOR RECRUITMENT OF NEW MEMBERS INTO THIS WHITE EXTREMIST HOODED ROBE MOVEMENT
HERE BELOW IS A BRIEF PICTORIAL INSIGHT INTO SOME OF THE KKK MEMORBILIA ITEMS HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE JAIL
Movies about the Ku Klux Klan (KKK)
Ever since the release of legendary director D.W. Griffith’s controversial epic The Birth of the Nation (1915), based on Thomas F. Dixon Jr.’s (play and) novel titled The Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan and featuring silent star Lillian Gish and future Oscar winner Donald Crisp (among others), classic Hollywood seems to have avoided taking on the KKK to expose its wicked acts or its members’ ignorant beliefs in any substantive way. Though there are several dramas which incorporate it – or at least Klan-like organizations – peripherally, classic films that feature any real detail about its beginnings, longevity, charters, or even insight into its leaders and/or their motivations etc. are surprisingly absent. Maybe the studios felt that real evil and its practitioners were being adequately portrayed in their gangster and war pictures, or perhaps there were fears that a movie about the Klan wouldn’t make good at the box office (particularly in the South)?
The Warner Bros.’s Storm Warning (1951) wasn’t very specific about the KKK’s prejudices, though much of the film’s dialogue (from prosecutor Ronald Reagan and the miscast Ginger Rogers character) does deliver the requisite indictment of the organization and its members: too scared to act without the courage of numbers or show their faces (hence the hoods). But the twist is that the Grand Dragon’s real motivation for leading the clandestine group is financial – there’s real money for him in the dues and the paraphernalia he sells to its members – such that he comes off as a corrupt union boss, or worse a capitalist;-) In the end, the leader’s true self centered (versus “all for one”) nature is revealed and the enraged and disillusioned group wises up and runs for cover from the law. Warner’s Black Legion (1937), starring Humphrey Bogart and featuring a plot plausible enough to earn Robert Lord his second Best Writing-Original Story AA nom, did a better job of exploring the roots of hatred and xenophobia that can seduce one to join such an organization. Since I wrote about MGM’s Stars in My Crown (1950) in my earlier Films about Faith essay, I’ll not include any more text about it here other than to mention that actor Ed Begley (Sr.) seemed to have excelled in portraying angry racist characters. The WB’s (and producer-director Mervyn LeRoy’s) overlong drama The FBI Story (1959), a veritable paean to the organization’s squeaky clean agents and the stout leadership of J. Edgar Hoover, warrants barely a mention except that one of its storylines includes the infiltration of the KKK by the film’s principal character, played by James Stewart.
Which brings me to The Mating Call (1928), produced by Howard Hughes and including titles written by future Oscar winner Herman J. Mankiewicz. The Klan-like organization in this one is named “The Order” and its purpose is to enforce a morality code within its community: black hooded individuals tie a wife beater to a cross and whip him for abusing his spouse. But the primary sin herein is adultery. Upon returning home a hero after serving his country during World War I, Leslie Hatton (Thomas Meighan) finds that his wartime marriage to Rose (Evelyn Brent, playing a sexually aggressive man-eater) was annulled by her parents. But even though he’s (somehow) not interested in having an affair with his former bride, Hatton’s accused of fooling around with Rose by her current husband Lon, a hypocrite that’s having extramarital relations of his own (with a judge’s daughter, no less). Lon uses The Order to threaten the war hero to leave his wife alone. Hatton’s solution to avoid future visits and further scrutiny from these local self-appointed moral authorities includes his going to Ellis Island and marrying a French girl (Renee Adoree, The Big Parade (1925)) whose parents want to immigrate to the United States. However, a subsequent scandal affecting the aforementioned characters (and others) leads The Order to become involved in Hatton’s life again.
Some other dramas that feature the KKK or like-minded groups are: Legion of Terror (1936), The Burning Cross (1947), Another Part of the Forest (1948), The Klansman (1974), Places in the Heart (1984), which earned writer (director) Robert Benton (Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)) his third Oscar, and Mississippi Burning (1988); plus, it’s hard to forget the hilarious scene in Mel Brooks’ western spoof Blazing Saddles (1974) in which Cleavon Little (accompanied by Gene Wilder) dons a white rob and hood
DEEMED TO BE A BRUTISH CRIME MUSEUM, TOUCHING UPON TRUE CRIME , MURDERABILIA, MAIMERABILIA, POLITICAL INCORRECTNESS, SLEAZE, SCANDAL, THE BIZARRE AND THE TABOO …….
WHAT ON EARTH DO VISITORS EXPECT TO SEE HERE ON DISPLAY ANYWAY?
CONTRARY TO SOME PEOPLES PERCEPTION ……THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL DOES NOT GLORIFY OR CONDONE THE MANY EVIL MONSTERS WE TOUCH UPON AND FEATURE HERE . FURTHERMORE WE HOPEFULLY PROVIDE VISITORS WITH A PSYCHOLOGICAL AND EDUCATIONAL INSIGHT INTO THE MINDS OF ALL THOSE THAT WE FEATURE HERE ON DISPLAY
THE CONTENT WE FEATURE IS IN THE MAIN HORRIFIC, GRAPHIC, AND EXPLICIT AND TOUCHES UPON A GREAT MANY SENSITIVE SUBJECT MATTERS AND AS SUCH IS NOT, AND SHOULD NOT BE PRESENTED IN A PLEASANT WAY EITHER.
AS WE REPEATEDLY SAY TO ALL POTENTIAL VISITORS …… PLEASE DO AVOID IF EASILY OFFENDED, DISTURBED OR OF A SENSITIVE NATURE .
WHILST WE DO ALLOW CHILDREN INTO OUR ESTABLISHMENT… THIS IS SOLELY AT THE DISCRETION OF THEIR PARENTS OR GUARDIANS . WE ARE AN X-RATED ATTRACTION AND DO NOT ENCOURAGE CHILDREN BUT CANNOT STOP THEIR GUARDIANS FROM BRINGING THEM WITH THEM IF THEY SO WISH
A unique original hand drawn and signed charcoal self portrait by Peter Sutcliffe – The Yorkshire Ripper , drawn whilst incarcerated at Broadmoor Hospital . It is signed PWS , which is initials for Peter William Sutcliffe . On display at The Crime Through Time Collection , Littledean Jail , Gloucestershire , UK
Peter Coonan (born Peter William Sutcliffe, 2 June 1946) is an English serial killer who was dubbed the “Yorkshire Ripper” by the press. In 1981, Sutcliffe was convicted of murdering thirteen women and attempting to murder seven others.Sutcliffe had regularly used the services of prostitutes in Leeds and Bradford. His outbreak of violence towards them seems to have occurred because he was swindled out of money by a prostitute and her pimp but he claimed, when interviewed by authorities, that the voice of God had sent him on a mission to kill prostitutes.Sutcliffe carried out his murder spree over five years, during which the public were especially shocked by the murders of women who were not prostitutes. After his arrest for driving with false number plates in January 1981, the police questioned him about the killings and he confessed that he was the perpetrator.At his trial, he pleaded not guilty to murder on grounds of diminished responsibility, owing to a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia; but the defence was rejected by a majority of the jury. He is serving twenty concurrent sentences of life imprisonment. Following his conviction, Sutcliffe began using his mother’s maiden name and became known as Peter William Coonan
ABOVE AND BELOW … ORIGINAL PAINTING BY GLOUCESTERSHIRE ARTIST PAUL BRIDGMAN
Below :A unique original oil painting on canvas dated and signed in 1993 by Peter Sutcliffe – The Yorkshire Ripper , painted by him whilst incarcerated at Broadmoor Hospital . It is signed PWS , which is initials for Peter William Sutcliffe . On display at The Crime Through Time Collection , Littledean Jail , Gloucestershire , UK
BELOW ARE VARIOUS IMAGES OF PETER SUTCLIFFE INCLUDING A RECENT 2015 IMAGE TAKEN AT BROADMOOR , WHERE HE IS STILL IMPRISONED .
Above and below: A brief psychological insight into the mind of British serial killer Peter Sutcliffe AKA ” The Yorkshire Ripper ” through his handwritten poetry
PETER SUTCLIFFE 2015
THE SUN ON SUNDAY 02ND SEPTEMBER 2012 FEATURES THE YORKSHIRE RIPPER EXHIBITION AS ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL.
AN EXHIBITION THAT SIMPLY PROVIDES A GLIMPSE INTO THE CUSHY LIFE OF LUXURY AND PASTIME PLEASURES ENJOYED BY ONE OF THE UK’S MOST EVIL MONSTERS … PETER SUTCLIFFE
—————————————————————————————————-THE DAILY MAIL ALSO FEATURES THE EXHIBITION IN THEIR ONLINE EDITION ON THE 03RD SEPTEMBER 2012
Chilling insight into the Yorkshire Ripper’s world: Never before seen prison possessions of killer Peter Sutcliffe go on public display
PUBLISHED: 00:06, 3 September 2012 | UPDATED: 10:29, 3 September 2012
They offer a chilling glimpse into the dark world of Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe – and a insight into the mind of his twisted admirer.
Unseen personal collection of prison possessions belonging to the notorious serial killer have been put on public display for the first time – including handwritten love-letters from a besotted female pen-pal.
The items present a bizarre and pathetic picture of a killer scribbling desperate love-letters to his hypnotherapist and stripper pen pal, Sandra Lester, listening to 1980’s Eurythmics songs such as ‘Better to have Lost in Love’ and ‘I Can’t Stand it’, and reggae classic love songs.
Besotted: Sandra Lester sent this photograph to Peter Sutcliffe with a handwritten note asking the killer to ‘please accept my apologies for the delay’
Smut: The personal items includes a business card of Sandra Lester that she sent to killer Peter Sutcliffe which is now on display at Littledean Jail in Gloucestershire
Sutcliffe’s letters to Lester, who was also an escort girl and glamour model, were written from May 1993 to September that year.
The correspondence only ended, according to Lester – after Sutcliffe asked her to marry him and she rejected him.
The beast referred to their correspondence as his ‘Cloud nine’ letters and Lester as his ‘Sweet Potato’.
Pen pals: The illustrated letters from Peter Sutcliffe to his friend and confident Sandra Lester for part of the collection of personal items on display
Ramblings of a serial killer: Sutcliffe started this letter ‘Dearest Sandra’ and went on to thank her for her ‘enjoyable letter, sweetheart’ in the long, rambling correspondence
Revelations: According to his letters Sutcliffe’s favourite colours were: ‘turquoise, purple, emerald green and yellow. I like red but only in small amounts…as in large quantities it can be overpowering’
Flattery: Sutcliffe was complimentary about Sandra saying in this letter how she was ‘endearingly funny’
The cold-hearted killer joked about building a helicopter and ‘weaving a magic carpet’ to fly away on.
The letters also reveal how he fantasised about Lester and him running away together and living on a desert island or flying on a balloon over Africa’s tallest mountain, Kilimanjaro.
Sutcliffe told Lester that he had turned his hospital room into to a shrine to her, with pictures of her on display.
Sutcliffe appeared to encourage Lester’s attempts to introduce him to hypo-therapy via video tape recordings: ‘I played both videos (you sent me) over and over again, they’re a big help. I can feel a change for the better.’
Among the unseen items are cassette tapes showing the murderer’s feel-good musical tastes, a gloomy landscape oil painting signed with the initials PWS (Peter William Sutcliffe), a prison radio and desk lamp are all now displayed at the crime museum at Little Dean Jail, Gloucestershire.
After a 1970’s reign of terror in northern English cities including Leeds and Bradford, monster Sutcliffe was arrested and finally convicted in May 1981 of murdering 13 women, many of them sex workers, using a rope, knife and hammer – and attacking a further seven female victims.
Insight: The display includes items used by Peter Sutcliffe while at Broadmoor Secure Mental Hospital
Marked by a killer: The Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe clearly marks his music tapes – including Reggae Love Songs, left, and the Eurythmics’ Feminine Touch album, right – with his initial P.W.S
Mix tape of a serial killer: Cassette tapes reveal the murderer’s musical tastes
Sentenced to life imprisonment and sent to Broadmoor high security hospital for Britain’s most disturbed patients where he still languishes there half-blind thanks to repeated attacks by fellow inmates – this previously unseen collection of items sheds new light on how killer Sutcliffe has spent his time in captivity.
According to his letters Sutcliffe’s favourite colours were: ‘turquoise, purple, emerald green and yellow. I like red but only in small amounts…as in large quantities it can be overpowering.’
Sutcliffe’s letters showed he had a love of wildlife programmes. The murderer and rapist revealed his fondness for bee keeping, referring to them as ‘marvellous wee creatures.’
Ostriches were ‘absolutely beautiful wonderful creatures.’ His favourite dog was a spaniel as they were: ‘a good natured dog and so very loyal.’
The nightmare images of 16th century Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch, which depicts people being graphically tortured in hell, were ‘weird…but fascinating’ according to Sutcliffe.
He repeatedly requested Lester to send his pictures by surrealist painter Salvador Dali.
Sutcliffe’s favourite classical music was produced by legendary German composer Wolfgang Mozart and he described the music of Mozart’s symphony 41 as ‘pure genius’.
Crude: An oil painting by Peter Sutcliffe has his signature PWS on the bottom right corner
Looking for laughter: Sutcliffe was obviously a fan of Hancokck’s Half Hour, adding some of the comedian’s BBC’s shows to his collection of tapes
Prison art: An oil painting by Sutcliffe is signed with the initials PWS (Peter William Sutcliffe)
Keeping in contact: Serial killer Peter Sutcliffe had this old Roberts radio to maintain contact with the outside world
Possessive: Sutcliffe put his initials on nearly all his belongings – including inside his prized Roberts radioDespite complaining of being ‘drugged’ by members of staff at Broadmoor Hospital, Sutcliffe showed off his physical prowess to Lester, declaring that he completed 15miles on the communal exercise bike each day and had a body, ‘as strong as stainless steel’.
He even penned a threat to one female psychiatrist when complaining of how lethargic the medicines she was prescribing for Sutcliffe’s schizophrenia, saying he would tell her about it: ‘when I seize her – tee hee (sic).’
On show: An old Roberts radio used by Peter Sutcliffe after he changed his name to Peter Coonan is now displayed at Littledean Jail, Gloucestershire
At the end of his letters to Lester, Sutcliffe would sign off by gushing his gratitude across the page: ‘Thank you dearly for your soopa doopa exquisitely utopian lovely letter.’
Other items include Sutcliffe’s radio, a cassette of radio legend Tony Hancock’s hugely popular comedy sketch show, ‘Hancock’s Half Hour’.
The Crime through Time Museum at Little Dean Jail, Gloucestershire is home to memorabilia relating to some of Britain’s most notorious murderers and criminals.
Crime through Time curator Andy Jones said: ‘We are Britain’s most politically incorrect visitor attraction.’
‘The museum contains material that is unsuitable for families, including taboo and very scandalous subjects.
‘We do not glorify crime or murder and none of the items are collected for profit through sales.
‘We take great care to inform all potential visitors of what to expect to see.
‘It is not for families and people who are easily offended, disturbed or of a sensitive nature are strongly advised not to visit.’
All items on display have been authenticated by Sutcliffe’s brother, Carl Sutcliffe.
Glimpse into Sutcliffe’s cell: An old lamp used by Peter Sutcliffe while at Broadmoor Secure Mental Hospital is now displayed at Littledean Jail, Gloucestershire
Signed: The old lamp bears Sutcliffe’s initials and name, his prisoner number and ward name
TRUE CRIME , MURDERABILIA, MAIMERABILIA, DISMALABILIA, SERIAL KILLERS, DEBAUCHERY, SLEAZE, SCANDAL , THE TABOO, GANGSTERS, VILLAINS, WITCHCRAFT, SATANISM, THE OCCULT, PARANORMAL AND MUCH MORE …. IT’S ALL HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL, FOREST OF DEAN, GLOUCESTERSHIRE, UK.
Dennis Nilsen -British serial killer
Original painting of Dennis Nilsen by Gloucestershire artist Paul Bridgman on display at Littledean Jail .
Dennis Andrew Nilsen (born 23 November 1945) is a British serial killer and necrophiliac, also known as the Muswell Hill Murderer and the Kindly Killer, who murdered at least 12young men in a series of killings committed between 1978 and 1983 in London, England. Convicted of six counts of murder and two of attempted murder at the Old Bailey, Nilsen was sentenced to life imprisonment on 4 November 1983, with a recommendation that he serve a minimum of 25 years.0He is currently incarcerated at HMP Full Sutton maximum security prison in Full Sutton in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England.
Above and below: An array of handwritten , typed and signed rhymes on display at the jail . Also worth noting are Nilsen’s personalised address labels that he tends to attach to his various correspondence that he sends from his prison cell .
All of Nilsen’s murders were committed in two North London addresses in which he alternately resided throughout the years he is known to have killed. His victims would be lured to these addresses through guile and all were murdered by strangulation, sometimes accompanied by drowning. Following the murder, Nilsen would observe a ritual in which he bathed and dressed the victims’ bodies, which he would retain for extended periods of time, before dissecting and disposing of the remains via burning upon a bonfire, or flushing the remains down a lavatory.
Nilsen became known as the Muswell Hill Murderer as his later murders were committed in the Muswell Hill district of North London; he also became known as the Kindly Killer, in reference to his belief that his method of murder was the most humane. Owing to the similar modus operandi of the murderers, Nilsen has been described as the “British Jeffrey Dahmer“.
Personal artwork incorporating his own finger prints and hand signed on display at the jail
Above and below: Examples of Dennis Nilsen handwritten, typed and signed letters.Also a Christmas card on display at the Jail
CRIME SCENE PICTURE TAKEN AT 23 CRANLEY GARDENS, ONE OF NILSEN’S VICTIMS
Above and below: Crime scene photos taken at scene of crime along with murder weapons
Original painting by Gloucestershire artist Paul Bridgman… on display at The Crime Through Time Collection , Littledean Jail , along with various other handwritten and signed memorabilia from Jeffery Dahmer .
TRUE CRIME, MURDERABILIA, MAIMERABILIA, THE TABOO AND BIZZARE ARE ALL HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL, UK
HERE ARE SOME MORE HISTORICALLY INTERACTIVE DETAILS, PHOTO GALLERY (VERY GRAPHIC IN PARTS) …. AND VIDEO DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE TOUCHING UPON ONE OF THE WORLDS MOST DEBAUCHED AND EVIL KILLERS – JEFFREY DAHMER .
FROM THE HANDS OF DEATH …
Jeffrey Dahmer handwritten return address on envelope officially stamped by Wisconsin Prison System
HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL , FOREST OF DEAN , GLOUCESTERSHIRE, UK….. WE HAVE HANDWRITTEN AND SIGNED LETTERS FROM JEFFREY DAHMER AND OTHER NOTORIOUS AMERICAN AND BRITISH SERIAL KILLERS , PROVIDING AN INTRIGUING AND DISTURBING INSIGHT INTO THE MINDS OF THESE MONSTERS FROM HELL .
AS A POLITE WARNING TO ALL POTENTIAL VISITORS HERE, TO OUR FACEBOOK PAGE OR TO THE MUSEUM ….. PLEASE DO AVOID A VISIT TO LITTLEDEAN JAIL IS EASILY DISTURBED, EASILY OFFENDED OR OF A SENSITIVE NATURE .AS WE ALWAYS SAY … CRIME IN ITSELF IS AN UNPLEASANT SUBJECT MATTER TO COVER AND AS SUCH IS NOT PRESENTED HERE IN A PLEASANT WAY EITHER .
Handwritten and signed (Jeff) letter sent by Jeffrey Dalmer on the 26 May 1993
CERTAINLY NOT SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN EITHER
Jeffrey Dahmer was one of the most notorious American serial killers. Between 1978 and 1991, Dahmer killed 17 boys and men, many of whom were of Asian or African descent. However it wasn’t the body count that made him such a notorious serial killer. It was the way he tortured and raped his victims before death found them. It was also about how he dismembered his victims and practiced necrophilia and cannibalism on them.
Jeffrey Dahmer Biography
Born as Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer on May 21, 1960 in West Allis, Wisconsin to Lionel Herbert Dahmer and Joyce Annette (née Flint), Jeffrey Dahmer grew up to be a normal child. However as the relationship between his parents grew cold, so did his feelings of neglect and withdrawal. His family moved to Bath, Ohio when he was 8 year old. Uninterested in social interactions with other children from the neighborhood he was new into, Jeffrey rode around on his bicycle, collecting dead animals for dissection. Some he brought back home (like a good household cat), some he played with in the woods. At one point, he impaled a dog’s head on a stake.
When he became a teenager, Jeffrey Dahmer started to abuse alcohol. Tension between his parents escalated resulting in bitter divorce which only strengthened the boy’s feeling of abandonment. His mother took Jeffrey’s younger brother and left without a trace, leaving vulnerable Dahmer to stay with his father who left the family long time ago. Having no means to contact his mother or brother, Jeffrey felt lost and rejected.
By the time of his high school graduation, Jeffrey Dahmer was an alcoholic. He dropped out of the Ohio State University after one quarter, having failed to attend most of his classes because he was constantly drunk. Since giving him education didn’t go over so well, Jeffrey’s father enlisted his son in the army. He was a decent soldier (army medic), but his excessive alcoholism resulted in a discharge after two years in service. He felt no emotional connection to his father, so after his discharge in 1981, Jeffrey Dahmer headed for Miami, Florida to avoid living in cold weather. He continued drinking and was arrested a few months later for drunk and disorderly conduct.
Jeffrey moved in with his grandmother Shari Dahmer in 1982. She said Jeffrey was a gentle person but when he got drunk (which was often), it took four policemen to hold him down. In 1982 and 1986, Jeffrey Dahmer was arrested for indecent exposure, the latter involving masturbation in front of two boys.
Jeffrey Dahmer’s Murders
Jeffrey Dahmer committed his first murder when he was 18 years old. It was shortly after his parent’s divorce – his mother and his brother moved out and his father was on a business trip. Having the house in Bath Township, Ohio all for himself and feeling alone, Jeffrey picked up a hitchhiker named Stephen Hicks, took him to the house and killed him with a barbell because the guest wanted to leave. Once Stephen Hicks was dead, Jeffrey Dahmer smashed his bones with a hammer and buried the body in the backyard. He wouldn’t kill again for 9 years.
His second victim was 24 year old Steven Toumi. Jeffrey met him in a gay bar in 1987. Gay bars offered great settings where he could approach young homosexual or bisexual males, ask them to come over to his place for beers or offer them money to pose for photos, drug them into a deep sleep with spiked drinks, strangle or stabbed them while they were out and unleash his sexual fantasies on the cadaver. When he was done having anal sex with fresh corpses, he would dismember them with a hacksaw, usually keeping their genitalia and heads as trophies. Lean muscles would be stored in a freezer to be eaten as food. Whatever was left was boiled with acids and/or other chemicals and flashed down the drain. Sometimes, if his victim did not die instantly, he would drill a hole in the victim’s skull and paralyze the brain with boiling water or hydrochloric acid. The victim would remain alive for several days, but in a zombie like state.
While staying with his grandmother, Jeffrey Dahmer continued collecting dead animals and dissecting them in her basement which caused foul smell throughout the house. Coupled with his strange behavior and late nights, the grandmother asked him to move out. On September 25, 1988, while employed as a worker at the Ambrosia Chocolate Factory, Jeffrey moved into an apartment in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. One day later, he was arrested for drugging and sexually exploiting a 13 year old Laotian boy named Somsack Sinthasomphone. That made him a registered sex offender and landed him with one year in a work release camp and five years probation. He was released on a parole two months early, moved into a new apartment and began his most prolific string of murders. The apartment’s address is now infamous (though the building has been torn down):
Oxford Apartments
924 North 25th Street
Apartment 213
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
After his scuffle with the above mentioned 13 year old boy Somsack Sinthasomphone which landed Jeffrey Dahmer with 10 months long incarceration and a registration as a sex offender, Jeffrey took a hold of Somsack’s younger brother, now 14 year old Konerak Sinthasomphone and brought him home for another one of his fantasy butt sex sessions from hell. Heavily drugged and bleeding profusely out of his ass after a little rectal massage from Jeffrey Dahmer’s stiffy, Konerak Sinthasomphone escaped and was discovered wandering down the street naked in the early morning hours of May 27, 1991 by 18 year old Sandra Smith and her cousin of the same age – Nicole Childress. The teens called 911, as even though the Asian boy could not speak any English, the state he was in sent strong signals that something was not right.
Dahmer, who was 31 at the time, chased the boy down the street and got to him before the police arrived. The girls who alerted the police got in the way and halted the escort until the police arrived. Dahmer told them that the boy was his 19 year old boyfriend, that they were drinking and got in an argument so he walked out of his apartment naked and under influence. The police failed to verify the boy’s age and run a background check on Dahmer which would have revealed that he was a registered child molester still under probation. Instead, they swallowed Dahmer’s story and took both men back to Dahmer’s apartment – despite protests from the girls who called 911. The police noted strange smell when they walked inside Dahmer’s apartment, but did nothing to investigate it. As became clear later, the smell was caused by the corpse of Tony Hughes – Dahmer’s previous victim whose decomposing body he still kept in the bedroom. Had the police done their due diligence, Konerak Sinthasomphone as well as four subsequent victims would not have been murdered.
Jeffrey Dahmer’s Arrest
Encouraged by the success with Konerak Sinthasomphone whom he strangled to death, dismembered and beheaded to keep his skull as a trophy, Jeffrey Dahmer went on a killing spree almost averaging one victim per week. He killed Matt Turner on June 30, 1991, then Jeremiah Weinberger on July 5, 1991, then Oliver Lacy on July 12, 1991 and finally Joseph Brandehoft on July 19, 1991. His next victim was to be 32 year old Tracy Edwards, whom he lured into his apartment on July 22, 1991. With this bad boy things didn’t go quite the way Jeffrey would have liked, though.
When Robert Rauth and Rolf Mueller, the cops from the Milwaukee police department drove through the neighborhood where Dahmer lived, they noticed a dazed black male wandering around with one handcuff on his hand, they knew something wasn’t right. They asked Tracy Edwards what happened to him and were told that he was invited into an apartment of some weird dude with whom he watched movies, but was then drugged and the weird dude tried to handcuff him. He resisted and slipped away, so the dude threatened him with a knife. Tracy Edwards retracted to the bedroom where he saw the wall covered with Polaroid pictures of mangled bodies. There was a large blue barrel by the wall from which a horrible smell was coming out. Wielding a large butcher knife, the weird dude tried to attack him, but Tracy Edwards fought back, punched him in the face and kicked him in the stomach, affording himself a way to escape from there, though still wearing a handcuff on one wrist.
Tracy Edwards lead the police to the apartment where they were greeted by friendly acting Jeffrey Dahmer. He told them that he just lost the job at the chocolate factory (which was true) and the stress it caused made him lose temper and overreact. The police asked him to get the key from the handcuffs so they could be removed from Tracy Edwards’ hand. Jeffrey went to his bedroom, but was followed by one of the cops who noticed all the Polaroid photos of dismembered bodies all over the wall and was overwhelmed by the stench of rotting flesh coming out of the room. He proceeded to further inspect the apartment and had his attention caught by a fridge covered with more gruesome Polaroid photos. The shock came when he opened said fridge. There was a severed human head on the shelf. The officer screamed at his partner to which Jeffrey Dahmer responded by fighting his way out of there. He was restrained and apprehended.
Thorough inspection revealed three more heads and human flesh in the freezer. Several hands and a penis were found in a stockpot in a closet. Two gray-painted boiled skulls were found on a shelf in a bedroom closet. More penises were found preserved in formaldehyde. But most of all – there were hundreds of gory photos of his victims which Jeffrey Dahmer photographed while they were alive, while they were being murdered, and after they were dead. In his closet, the police also discovered an altar of human skulls and candles. Jeffrey Dahmer allegedly planned to use the skulls to build a shrine.
Jeffrey Dahmer’s Trial
Dahmer admitted to every crime he had committed. He made no excuses and blamed nobody but himself. He was indicted on 17 murder charges, but found guilty on 15. He entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity but the court rejected his plea on February 17, 1992 and sentenced him to 15 life terms in jail, which would add up to 957 years behind bars. The state of Wisconsin does not have capital punishment.
Jeffrey Dahmer’s Murder
Jeffrey Dahmer served his long sentence at the Columbia Correctional Institution in Portage, Wisconsin. He was murdered on November 28, 1994 while serving his time by inmate Christopher Scarver who attacked him and another inmate named Jesse Anderson with a broom stick, killing both. Christopher Scarver said he was acting on God’s command to kill Dahmer.
Christopher Scarver Handwritten envelope sent to Kenneth G Karnig , with his return address in top left corner
