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
DARK TOURISM HERE IN THE UK – WHERE GOOD AND EVIL COLLIDE & WHERE FANTASY MEETS REALITY .
TRUE CRIME , MURDERABILIA, WITCHCRAFT, SATANISM AND THE OCCULT …. IT’S ALL HERE AND MUCH MORE ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL, FOREST OF DEAN , GLOUCESTERSHIRE , UK .
ABOVE: Original painting by Gloucestershire artist Paul Bridgman of John Wayne Gacy on display at Littledean Jail .
All of Gacy’s known murders were committed inside his Norwood Park, Illinois home. His victims would typically be lured to this address by force or deception, and all but one victim were murdered by either asphyxiation or strangulation with a tourniquet (his first victim was stabbed to death). Gacy buried 26 of his victims in the crawl space of his home. Three further victims were buried elsewhere on his property, while the bodies of his last four known victims were discarded in the Des Plaines River.
Gacy became known as the “Killer Clown” due to his charitable services at fundraising events, parades, and children’s parties where he would dress as “Pogo the Clown”, a character he devised himself.
BELOW : Various exhibit items to include one of Gacy’s “Pogo The Clown ” suits , handwritten and signed correspondence , a hand painting and various other memorabilia, all of which is on display here at The Crime Through Time Collection , Littledean Jail , Forest of Dean , Gloucestershire, UK .
ABOVE AND BELOW : One of John Wayne Gacy’s original worn clown suits. There are two other known Gacy clown suits on display at The National Museum of Crime , Washington DC , USA .
BELOW: picture of 2 other Gacy clown suits, on display at The National Museum of Crime, Washington DC ….. Previously owned ( not sure if he still owns them ) by Jonathan Davis, lead singer of American Heavy Metal Band “Korn .”
ABOVE: John Wayne Gacy pictured in jail, so say, shortly before his execution by lethal injection
THE LIFE AND DEATH OF A BRUTAL TYRANT – SADDAM HUSSEIN …..
A GREAT MANY WOULD SAY AND FIRMLY BELIEVE THAT SADDAM HUSSEIN SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN DEPOSED BY INTERFERING WESTERN POLITICAL LEADERS AND SHOULD HAVE REMAINED IN POWER ???
POLITE WARNING… WE ARE PREDOMINANTLY A HISTORICAL AND HOPEFULLY EDUCATIONAL MUSEUM OF CRIME, SLEAZE, SCANDAL AND THE TABOO ….THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION, HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL IS NOT SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN OR THOSE EASILY DISTURBED OR OF A SENSITIVE NATURE ….
TRUE CRIME MURDERABILIA, MAIMERABILIA, DISMALABILIA AND MUCH MORE HERE AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL, FOREST OF DEAN, GLOUCESTERSHIRE, UK .
ON DISPLAY WE HAVE A VAST ARRAY OF TRUE CRIME RELATED MEMORABILIA ITEMS COVERING MANY OF THE WORLDS MOST EVIL MEN AND WOMEN, TYRANTS, WARLORD, SERIAL KILLERS, GANGSTERS, CRIMINALS, ETC.
A UNIQUE PRIVATE COLLECTION LIKE NO OTHER
BELOW IS THE GENUINE ORIGINAL TOILET SEAT REMOVED FROM SADDAM HUSSEIN’S BASRA PRESIDENTIAL PALACE AT THE TIME OF LIBERATION IN 2003 BY NEWS OF THE WORLD REPORTER CHRIS BUXTON WHO WAS THERE WITH THE UK’S DESERT RATS ON 7 APRIL 2003 . THIS NOW ON DISPLAY HERE AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL
Below : News Of The World Journalist Chris Buxton pictured at Saddam Hussein’s Basra Palace in Iraq inside the toilet area
BELOW: CLOSE UP OF SADDAM’S TOILET SEAT, UNDOUBTEDLY USED BY SADDAM AND HIS ROYAL FAMILY ON A GREAT MANY OCCASSIONS PRIOR TO THE LIBERATION OF IRAQ AND HIS SUBSEQUENT CAPTURE IN 2003
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti (Arabic: صدام حسين عبد المجيد التكريتي Ṣaddām Ḥusayn ʿAbd al-Maǧīd al-Tikrītī;[2] 28 April 1937[3] – 30 December 2006)[4] was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003.[5][6] A leading member of the revolutionary Iraqi Ba’ath Party, which espoused a mix of Arab nationalism and Arab socialism, Saddam played a key role in the 1968 coup that brought the party to long-term power of Iraq.
As vice president under the ailing General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, and at a time when many groups were considered capable of overthrowing the government, Saddam created security forces through which he tightly controlled conflict between the government and the armed forces. In the early 1970s, Saddam nationalized oil and other industries. The state-owned banks were put under his control, leaving the system eventually insolvent.[7] Through the 1970s, Saddam cemented his authority over the apparatuses of government as oil money helped Iraq’s economy to grow at a rapid pace.[8] Positions of power in the country were filled with Sunnis, a minority that made up only a fifth of the population.
Saddam suppressed several movements, particularly Shi’a and Kurdish movements seeking to overthrow the government or gain independence, respectively.[citation needed] Saddam maintained power during the Iran–Iraq War of 1980 through 1988. In 1990 he invaded and looted Kuwait. An international coalition came to free Kuwait in the Gulf War of 1991, but did not end Saddam’s rule. Whereas some venerated him for his aggressive stance against Israel, including firing missiles at Israeli targets,[9] he was widely condemned for the brutality of his dictatorship.
In March 2003, a coalition of countries led by the U.S. and U.K. invaded Iraq to depose Saddam, controversially citing his weapons of mass destruction and terror links. Saddam’s Ba’ath party was disbanded and the nation made a transition to a democratic system. Following his capture on 13 December 2003 (inOperation Red Dawn), the trial of Saddam took place under the Iraqi interim government. On 5 November 2006, he was convicted of charges related to the 1982 killing of 148 Iraqi Shi’ites and was sentenced to death by hanging. The execution of Saddam Hussein was carried out on 30 December 2006.[10]
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was born in the town of Al-Awja, 13 km (8 mi) from the Iraqi town of Tikrit, to a family of shepherds from the al-Begat tribal group, a sub-group of the Al-Bu Nasir (البو ناصر) tribe. His mother, Subha Tulfah al-Mussallat, named her newborn son Saddam, which in Arabicmeans “One who confronts”; he is always referred to by this personal name, which may be followed by the patronymic and other elements. He never knew his father, Hussein ‘Abid al-Majid, who disappeared six months before Saddam was born. Shortly afterward, Saddam’s 13-year-old brother died of cancer. The infant Saddam was sent to the family of his maternal uncle Khairallah Talfah until he was three.[11]Youth
His mother remarried, and Saddam gained three half-brothers through this marriage. His stepfather, Ibrahim al-Hassan, treated Saddam harshly after his return. At about age 10, Saddam fled the family and returned to live in Baghdad with his uncle Kharaillah Tulfah. Tulfah, the father of Saddam’s future wife, was a devout Sunni Muslim and a veteran from the 1941 Anglo-Iraqi War between Iraqi nationalists and the United Kingdom, which remained a major colonial power in the region.[12] Later in his life relatives from his native Tikrit became some of his closest advisors and supporters. Under the guidance of his uncle he attended a nationalistic high school in Baghdad. After secondary school Saddam studied at an Iraqi law school for three years, dropping out in 1957 at the age of 20 to join the revolutionary pan-Arab Ba’ath Party, of which his uncle was a supporter. During this time, Saddam apparently supported himself as a secondary school teacher.[13]
Saddam Hussein and the Ba’ath Partystudent cell, Cairo, in the period 1959–1963
Revolutionary sentiment was characteristic of the era in Iraq and throughout the Middle East. In Iraq progressives and socialists assailed traditional political elites (colonial era bureaucrats and landowners, wealthy merchants and tribal chiefs, monarchists).[14] Moreover, the pan-Arab nationalism of Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt profoundly influenced young Ba’athists like Saddam. The rise of Nasser foreshadowed a wave of revolutions throughout the Middle East in the 1950s and 1960s, with the collapse of the monarchies of Iraq, Egypt, and Libya. Nasser inspired nationalists throughout the Middle East by fighting the British and the French during the Suez Crisis of 1956, modernizing Egypt, and uniting the Arab world politically.[15]
In 1958, a year after Saddam had joined the Ba’ath party, army officers led by General Abd al-Karim Qasim overthrew Faisal II of Iraq. The Ba’athists opposed the new government, and in 1959 Saddam was involved in the unsuccessful United States-backed plot to assassinate Qasim.[16]
Rise to power
Army officers with ties to the Ba’ath Party overthrew Qasim in a coup in 1963. Ba’athist leaders were appointed to the cabinet and Abdul Salam Arif became president. Arif dismissed and arrested the Ba’athist leaders later that year. Saddam returned to Iraq, but was imprisoned in 1964. Just prior to his imprisonment and until 1968, Saddam held the position of Ba’ath party secretary.[17] He escaped from prison in 1967 and quickly became a leading member of the party. In 1968, Saddam participated in a bloodless coup led by Ahmad Hassan al-Bakr that overthrew Abdul Rahman Arif. Al-Bakr was named president and Saddam was named his deputy, and deputy chairman of the Baathist Revolutionary Command Council. According to biographers, Saddam never forgot the tensions within the first Ba’athist government, which formed the basis for his measures to promote Ba’ath party unity as well as his resolve to maintain power and programs to ensure social stability.
Iraq was a strategic buffer state for the United States against the Soviet Union, and Saddam was often seen as an anti-Soviet leader in the 1960s and 1970s. Some even suggested that John F. Kennedy’s administration supported the Ba’ath party’s takeover.[18] Although Saddam was al-Bakr’s deputy, he was a strong behind-the-scenes party politician. Al-Bakr was the older and more prestigious of the two, but by 1969 Saddam Hussein clearly had become the moving force behind the party.
Political program
Promoting women’s literacy and education in the 1970s
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, as vice chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, formally the al-Bakr’s second-in-command, Saddam built a reputation as a progressive, effective politician.[19] At this time, Saddam moved up the ranks in the new government by aiding attempts to strengthen and unify the Ba’ath party and taking a leading role in addressing the country’s major domestic problems and expanding the party’s following.
After the Baathists took power in 1968, Saddam focused on attaining stability in a nation riddled with profound tensions. Long before Saddam, Iraq had been split along social, ethnic, religious, and economic fault lines: Sunni versus Shi’ite, Arab versus Kurd, tribal chief versus urban merchant, nomad versus peasant.[20] Stable rule in a country rife with factionalism required[dubious – discuss] both massive repression and the improvement of living standards.[20]
Saddam actively fostered the modernization of the Iraqi economy along with the creation of a strong security apparatus to prevent coups within the power structure and insurrections apart from it. Ever concerned with broadening his base of support among the diverse elements of Iraqi society and mobilizing mass support, he closely followed the administration of state welfare and development programs.
At the center of this strategy was Iraq’s oil. On 1 June 1972, Saddam oversaw the seizure of international oil interests, which, at the time, dominated the country’s oil sector. A year later, world oil prices rose dramatically as a result of the 1973 energy crisis, and skyrocketing revenues enabled Saddam to expand his agenda.
Within just a few years, Iraq was providing social services that were unprecedented among Middle Eastern countries. Saddam established and controlled the “National Campaign for the Eradication of Illiteracy” and the campaign for “Compulsory Free Education in Iraq,” and largely under his auspices, the government established universal free schooling up to the highest education levels; hundreds of thousands learned to read in the years following the initiation of the program. The government also supported families of soldiers, granted free hospitalization to everyone, and gave subsidies to farmers. Iraq created one of the most modernized public-health systems in the Middle East, earning Saddam an award from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization(UNESCO).[21][22]
With the help of increasing oil revenues, Saddam diversified the largely oil-based Iraqi economy. Saddam implemented a national infrastructure campaign that made great progress in building roads, promoting mining, and developing other industries. The campaign helped Iraq’s energy industries. Electricity was brought to nearly every city in Iraq, and many outlying areas.
Before the 1970s, most of Iraq’s people lived in the countryside and roughly two-thirds were peasants. This number would decrease quickly during the 1970s as global oil prices helped revenues to rise from less than a half billion dollars to tens of billions of dollars and the country invested into industrial expansion.
Saddam was lucky for the revenue.[23] The Economist described the sentiments, stating that “Much as Adolf Hitler won early praise for galvanising German industry, ending mass unemployment and building autobahns, Saddam earned admiration abroad for his deeds. He had a good instinct for what the “Arab street” demanded, following the decline in Egyptian leadership brought about by the trauma of Israel’s six-day victory in the 1967 war, the death of the pan-Arabist hero, Gamal Abdul Nasser, in 1970, and the “traitorous” drive by his successor, Anwar Sadat, to sue for peace with the Jewish state. Saddam’s self-aggrandising propaganda, with himself posing as the defender of Arabism against Jewish or Persian intruders, was heavy-handed, but consistent as a drumbeat. It helped, of course, that his mukhabarat (secret police) put dozens of Arab news editors, writers and artists on the payroll.”[23]
In 1972 Saddam started developing his chemical weapons program. In 1973 he signed a 15-year Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation with the Soviet Union.
Saddam focused on fostering loyalty to the Ba’athists in the rural areas. After nationalizing foreign oil interests, Saddam supervised the modernization of the countryside, mechanizing agriculture on a large scale, and distributing land to peasant farmers.[13] The Ba’athists established farm cooperatives and the government also doubled expenditures for agricultural development in 1974–1975. Saddam’s welfare programs were part of a combination of “carrot and stick” tactics to enhance support for Saddam. The state-owned banks were put under his thumb. Lending was based on cronyism[7]
Development went forward at such a fevered pitch that two million people from other Arab countries and even Yugoslavia worked in Iraq to meet the growing demand for labor.
Succession
In 1976, Saddam rose to the position of general in the Iraqi armed forces, and rapidly became the strongman of the government. As the ailing, elderly al-Bakr became unable to execute his duties, Saddam took on an increasingly prominent role as the face of the government both internally and externally. He soon became the architect of Iraq’s foreign policy and represented the nation in all diplomatic situations. He was the de facto leader of Iraq some years before he formally came to power in 1979. He slowly began to consolidate his power over Iraq’s government and the Ba’ath party. Relationships with fellow party members were carefully cultivated, and Saddam soon accumulated a powerful circle of support within the party.
In 1979 al-Bakr started to make treaties with Syria, also under Ba’athist leadership, that would lead to unification between the two countries. Syrian President Hafez al-Assad would become deputy leader in a union, and this would drive Saddam to obscurity. Saddam acted to secure his grip on power. He forced the ailing al-Bakr to resign on 16 July 1979, and formally assumed the presidency.
Shortly afterwards, he convened an assembly of Ba’ath party leaders on 22 July 1979. During the assembly, which he ordered videotaped (viewable via this reference[24]), Saddam claimed to have found a fifth column within the Ba’ath Party and directed Muhyi Abdel-Hussein to read out a confession and the names of 68 alleged co-conspirators. These members were labelled “disloyal” and were removed from the room one by one and taken into custody. After the list was read, Saddam congratulated those still seated in the room for their past and future loyalty. The 68 people arrested at the meeting were subsequently tried together and found guilty of treason. 22 were sentenced to execution. Other high-ranking members of the party formed the firing squad. By 1 August 1979, hundreds of high-ranking Ba’ath party members had been executed.[25][26]
Saddam was notable for terror against his own people. The Economist described Saddam as “one of the last of the 20th century’s great dictators, but not the least in terms of egotism, or cruelty, or morbid will to power”.[23]
The New York Times described in its obituary how Saddam “murdered as many as a million of his people, many with poison gas. He tortured, maimed and imprisoned countless more. His unprovoked invasion of Iran is estimated to have left another million people dead. His seizure of Kuwait threw the Middle East into crisis. More insidious, arguably, was the psychological damage he inflicted on his own land. Hussein created a nation of informants — friends on friends, circles within circles — making an entire population complicit in his rule”.[29] Others have estimated 800,000 deaths caused by Saddam not counting the Iran-Iraq war.[30] Estimates as to the number of Iraqis executed by Saddam’s regime vary from 300–500,000[31] to over 600,000,[32] estimates as to the number of Kurds he massacred vary from 70,000 to 300,000,[33] and estimates as to the number killed in the put-down of the 1991 rebellion vary from 60,000[34] to 200,000.[32] Estimates for the number of dead in the Iran-Iraq war range upwards from 300,000.[35]
Iraqi society is divided along lines of language, religion and ethnicity; Saddam’s government rested on the support of the 20% minority of Sunnis. The Ba’ath Party was increasingly concerned about potential Shi’a Islamist influence following the Iranian Revolution of 1979. The Kurds of northern Iraq (who are Sunni, but not Arabs) were also permanently hostile to the Ba’athist party’s pan-Arabism. To maintain power Saddam tended either to provide them with benefits so as to co-opt them into the regime, or to take repressive measures against them. The major instruments for accomplishing this control were the paramilitary and police organizations. Beginning in 1974, Taha Yassin Ramadan (himself a Kurd Baathist), a close associate of Saddam, commanded the People’s Army, which was responsible for internal security. As the Ba’ath Party’s paramilitary, the People’s Army acted as a counterweight against any coup attempts by the regular armed forces. In addition to the People’s Army, the Department of General Intelligence (Mukhabarat) was the most notorious arm of the state security system, feared for its use of torture and assassination. It was commanded by Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, Saddam’s younger half-brother. Since 1982, foreign observers believed that this department operated both at home and abroad in their mission to seek out and eliminate Saddam’s perceived opponents.[36]
As a sign of his consolidation of power, Saddam’s personality cult pervaded Iraqi society. Thousands of portraits, posters, statues and murals were erected in his honor all over Iraq. His face could be seen on the sides of office buildings, schools, airports, and shops, as well as on Iraqi currency. Saddam’s personality cult reflected his efforts to appeal to the various elements in Iraqi society. He appeared in the costumes of the Bedouin, the traditional clothes of the Iraqi peasant (which he essentially wore during his childhood), and even Kurdish clothing, but also appeared in Western suits, projecting the image of an urbane and modern leader. Sometimes he would also be portrayed as a devout Muslim, wearing full headdress and robe, praying toward Mecca.
He erected statues around the country, which Iraqis toppled after his fall.[37]
Iraq’s relations with the Arab world have been extremely varied. Relations between Iraq and Egypt violently ruptured in 1977, when the two nations broke relations with each other following Iraq’s criticism of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat‘s peace initiatives with Israel. In 1978, Baghdad hosted an Arab League summit that condemned and ostracized Egypt for accepting the Camp David accords. However, Egypt’s strong material and diplomatic support for Iraq in the war with Iran led to warmer relations and numerous contacts between senior officials, despite the continued absence of ambassadorial-level representation. Since 1983, Iraq has repeatedly called for restoration of Egypt’s “natural role” among Arab countries.
Saddam developed a reputation for liking expensive goods, such as his diamond-coated Rolex wristwatch, and sent copies of them to his friends around the world. To his ally Kenneth Kaunda Saddam once sent a Boeing 747 full of presents — rugs, televisions, ornaments. Kaunda sent back his own personal magician.[38]
Saddam had close relationship with Russian intelligence agent Yevgeny Primakov and apparently Primakov helped Saddam to stay in power in 1991.[39]
Saddam’s only visit to a Western country took place in September 1975 when he met with his friend, Prime Minister Jacques Chirac in Paris, France.[40]
Several Iraqi leaders, Lebanese arms merchant Sarkis Soghanalian and others have told that Saddam financed Chirac’s party. In 1991 Saddam threatened to expose those who had taken largasse from him: “From Mr. Chirac to Mr. Chevènement, politicians and economic leaders were in open competition to spend time with us and flatter us. We have now grasped the reality of the situation. If the trickery continues, we will be forced to unmask them, all of them, before the French public.”[40] France armed Saddam and it was Iraq’s largest trade partner throughout Saddam’s rule. Seized documents show how French officials and businessmen close to Chirac, including Charles Pasqua, his former interior minister, personally benefitted from the deals with Saddam.[40]
Because that Saddam Hussein rarely left Iraq, Tariq Aziz, one of Saddam’s aides, traveled abroad extensively and represented Iraq at many diplomatic meetings.[41] In foreign affairs, Saddam sought to have Iraq play a leading role in the Middle East. Iraq signed an aid pact with the Soviet Union in 1972, and arms were sent along with several thousand advisers. However, the 1978 crackdown on Iraqi Communists and a shift of trade toward the West strained Iraqi relations with the Soviet Union; Iraq then took on a more Western orientation until the Gulf War in 1991.[42]
After the oil crisis of 1973, France had changed to a more pro-Arab policy and was accordingly rewarded by Saddam with closer ties. He made a state visit to France in 1975, cementing close ties with some French business and ruling political circles. In 1975 Saddam negotiated an accord with Iran that contained Iraqi concessions on border disputes. In return, Iran agreed to stop supporting opposition Kurds in Iraq. Saddam led Arab opposition to the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel (1979).
Saddam initiated Iraq’s nuclear enrichment project in the 1980s, with French assistance. The first Iraqi nuclear reactor was named by the French “Osirak“. Osirak was destroyed on 7 June 1981[43] by an Israeli air strike (Operation Opera).
Nearly from its founding as a modern state in 1920, Iraq has had to deal with Kurdish separatists in the northern part of the country.[44] Saddam did negotiate an agreement in 1970 with separatist Kurdish leaders, giving them autonomy, but the agreement broke down. The result was brutal fighting between the government and Kurdish groups and even Iraqi bombing of Kurdish villages in Iran, which caused Iraqi relations with Iran to deteriorate. However, after Saddam had negotiated the 1975 treaty with Iran, the Shah withdrew support for the Kurds, who suffered a total defeat.
In early 1979, Iran’s Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was overthrown by the Islamic Revolution, thus giving way to an Islamic republic led by the Ayatollah Khomeini. The influence of revolutionary Shi’ite Islam grew apace in the region, particularly in countries with large Shi’ite populations, especially Iraq. Saddam feared that radical Islamic ideas — hostile to his secular rule — were rapidly spreading inside his country among the majority Shi’ite population.
There had also been bitter enmity between Saddam and Khomeini since the 1970s. Khomeini, having been exiled from Iran in 1964, took up residence in Iraq, at the Shi’ite holy city of An Najaf. There he involved himself with Iraqi Shi’ites and developed a strong, worldwide religious and political following against the Iranian Government, whom Saddam tolerated. However, when Khomeini began to urge the Shi’ites there to overthrow Saddam and under pressure from the Shah, who had agreed to a rapprochement between Iraq and Iran in 1975, Saddam agreed to expel Khomeini in 1978 to France. However this turned out to be an imminent failure and a political catalyst, for Khomeini had access to more media connections and also collaborated with a much larger Iranian community under his support whom he used to his advantage.
After Khomeini gained power, skirmishes between Iraq and revolutionary Iran occurred for ten months over the sovereignty of the disputed Shatt al-Arabwaterway, which divides the two countries. During this period, Saddam Hussein publicly maintained that it was in Iraq’s interest not to engage with Iran, and that it was in the interests of both nations to maintain peaceful relations. However, in a private meeting with Salah Omar Al-Ali, Iraq’s permanent ambassador to the United Nations, he revealed that he intended to invade and occupy a large part of Iran within months. Later (probably to appeal for support from the United States and most Western nations), he would make toppling the Islamic government one of his intentions as well. Iraq invaded Iran, first attackingMehrabad Airport of Tehran and then entering the oil-rich Iranian land of Khuzestan, which also has a sizable Arab minority, on 22 September 1980 and declared it a new province of Iraq. With the support of the Arab states, the United States, and Europe, and heavily financed by the Arab states of the Persian Gulf, Saddam Hussein had become “the defender of the Arab world” against a revolutionary Iran. The only exception was The Soviet Union, who initially refused to supply Iraq on the basis of Neutrality in the conflict, although in his memoirs, Mikhail Gorbachev claimed that Leonid Brezhnev refused to aid Saddam over infuriation of Saddam’s treatment of Iraqi Communists. Consequently, many viewed Iraq as “an agent of the civilized world”.[45] The blatant disregard of international law and violations of international borders were ignored. Instead Iraq received economic and military support from its allies, who conveniently overlooked Saddam’s use of chemical warfare against the Kurds and the Iranians and Iraq’s efforts to develop nuclear weapons.[45]
In the first days of the war, there was heavy ground fighting around strategic ports as Iraq launched an attack on Khuzestan. After making some initial gains, Iraq’s troops began to suffer losses from human wave attacks by Iran. By 1982, Iraq was on the defensive and looking for ways to end the war.
At this point, Saddam asked his ministers for candid advice. Health Minister Dr. Riyadh Ibrahim suggested that Saddam temporarily step down to promote peace negotiations. Initially, Saddam Hussein appeared to take in this opinion as part of his cabinet democracy. A few weeks later, Dr. Ibrahim was sacked when held responsible for a fatal incident in an Iraqi hospital where a patient died from intravenous administration of the wrong concentration of potassium supplement.
Dr. Ibrahim was arrested a few days after he started his new life as a sacked Minister. He was known to have publicly declared before that arrest that he was “glad that he got away alive.” Pieces of Ibrahim’s dismembered body were delivered to his wife the next day.[46]
Iraq quickly found itself bogged down in one of the longest and most destructive wars of attrition of the twentieth century. During the war, Iraq used chemical weapons against Iranian forces fighting on the southern front and Kurdish separatists who were attempting to open up a northern front in Iraq with the help of Iran. These chemical weapons were developed by Iraq from materials and technology supplied primarily by West German companies as well as [47] theReagan administration of the United States which also supplied Iraq with “satellite photos showing Iranian deployments”[48] and advised Hussein to bomb civilian targets in Tehran and other Iranian cities.[49] France sold 25 billion dollars worth arms to Saddam.[40]
Saddam reached out to other Arab governments for cash and political support during the war, particularly after Iraq’s oil industry severely suffered at the hands of the Iranian navy in the Persian Gulf. Iraq successfully gained some military and financial aid, as well as diplomatic and moral support, from the Soviet Union, China, France, and the United States, which together feared the prospects of the expansion of revolutionary Iran’s influence in the region. The Iranians, demanding that the international community should force Iraq to pay war reparations to Iran, refused any suggestions for a cease-fire. Despite several calls for a ceasefire by the United Nations Security Council, hostilities continued until 20 August 1988.
On 16 March 1988, the Kurdish town of Halabja was attacked with a mix of mustard gas and nerve agents, killing 5,000 civilians, and maiming, disfiguring, or seriously debilitating 10,000 more. (see Halabja poison gas attack)[50] The attack occurred in conjunction with the 1988 al-Anfal campaign designed to reassert central control of the mostly Kurdish population of areas of northern Iraq and defeat the Kurdish peshmerga rebel forces. The United States now maintains that Saddam ordered the attack to terrorize the Kurdish population in northern Iraq,[50] but Saddam’s regime claimed at the time that Iran was responsible for the attack[51] which some including the U.S. supported until several years later. (See also Halabja poison gas attack.)
The bloody eight-year war ended in a stalemate. There were hundreds of thousands of casualties with estimates of up to one million dead. Neither side had achieved what they had originally desired and at the borders were left nearly unchanged. The southern, oil rich and prosperous Khuzestan and Basra area (the main focus of the war, and the primary source of their economies) were almost completely destroyed and were left at the pre 1979 border, while Iran managed to make some small gains on its borders in the Northern Kurdish area. Both economies, previously healthy and expanding, were left in ruins.
Saddam borrowed tens of billions of dollars from other Arab states and a few billions from elsewhere during the 1980s to fight Iran, mainly to prevent the expansion of Shiite radicalism. However, this had proven to completely backfire both on Iraq and on the part of the Arab states, for Khomeini was widely perceived as a hero for managing to defend Iran and maintain the war with little foreign support against the heavily backed Iraq and only managed to boost Islamic radicalism not only within the Arab states, but within Iraq itself, creating new tensions between the Sunni Baath Party and the majority Shiite population. Faced with rebuilding Iraq’s infrastructure and internal resistance, Saddam desperately sought out cash once again, this time for postwar reconstruction.
Tensions with Kuwait
The end of the war with Iran served to deepen latent tensions between Iraq and its wealthy neighbor Kuwait. Saddam urged the Kuwaitis to forgive the Iraqi debt accumulated in the war, some $30 billion, but they refused.[52]
Saddam pushed oil-exporting countries to raise oil prices by cutting back production; Kuwait refused, however. In addition to refusing the request, Kuwait spearheaded the opposition in OPEC to the cuts that Saddam had requested. Kuwait was pumping large amounts of oil, and thus keeping prices low, when Iraq needed to sell high-priced oil from its wells to pay off a huge debt.
Saddam had always argued that Kuwait was historically an integral part of Iraq, and that Kuwait had only come into being through the maneuverings of British imperialism; this echoed a belief that Iraqi nationalists had voiced for the past 50 years. This belief was one of the few articles of faith uniting the political scene in a nation rife with sharp social, ethnic, religious, and ideological divides.[52]
The extent of Kuwaiti oil reserves also intensified tensions in the region. The oil reserves of Kuwait (with a population of 2 million next to Iraq’s 25) were roughly equal to those of Iraq. Taken together, Iraq and Kuwait sat on top of some 20 percent of the world’s known oil reserves; as an article of comparison, Saudi Arabia holds 25 percent.[52]
Saddam complained to the U.S. State Department that Kuwait had slant drilled oil out of wells that Iraq considered to be within its disputed border with Kuwait. Saddam still had an experienced and well-equipped army, which he used to influence regional affairs. He later ordered troops to the Iraq–Kuwait border.
As Iraq-Kuwait relations rapidly deteriorated, Saddam was receiving conflicting information about how the U.S. would respond to the prospects of an invasion. For one, Washington had been taking measures to cultivate a constructive relationship with Iraq for roughly a decade. The Reagan administration gave Saddam roughly $40 billion in aid in the 1980s to fight Iran, nearly all of it on credit. The U.S. also gave Saddam billions of dollars to keep him from forming a strong alliance with the Soviets.[53] Saddam’s Iraq became “the third-largest recipient of U.S. assistance”.[54]
U.S. ambassador to Iraq April Glaspie met with Saddam in an emergency meeting on 25 July 1990, where the Iraqi leader stated his intention to give negotiations only… one more brief chance before forcing Iraq’s claims on Kuwait.[55] U.S. officials attempted to maintain a conciliatory line with Iraq, indicating that while George H. W. Bush and James Baker did not want force used, they would not take any position on the Iraq–Kuwait boundary dispute and did not want to become involved.[56] Whatever Glaspie did or did not say in her interview with Saddam, the Iraqis assumed that the United States had invested too much in building relations with Iraq over the 1980s to sacrifice them for Kuwait.[57] Later, Iraq and Kuwait met for a final negotiation session, which failed. Saddam then sent his troops into Kuwait. As tensions between Washington and Saddam began to escalate, the Soviet Union, under Mikhail Gorbachev, strengthened its military relationship with the Iraqi leader, providing him military advisers, arms and aid.[58]
On 2 August 1990, Saddam invaded Kuwait, initially claiming assistance to “Kuwaiti revolutionaries,” thus sparking an international crisis. On 4 August an Iraqi-backed “Provisional Government of Free Kuwait” was proclaimed, but a total lack of legitimacy and support for it led to an 8 August announcement of a “merger” of the two countries. On 28 August Kuwait formally became the 19thGovernorate of Iraq. Just two years after the 1988 Iraq and Iran truce, “Saddam Hussein did what his Gulf patrons had earlier paid him to prevent.” Having removed the threat of Iranian fundamentalism he “overran Kuwait and confronted his Gulf neighbors in the name of Arab nationalism and Islam.”[45]
When later asked why he invaded Kuwait, Saddam first claimed that it was because Kuwait was rightfully Iraq’s 19th province and then said “When I get something into my head I act. That’s just the way I am.”[23] With Saddam’s seizure of Kuwait in August 1990 an UN coalition led by the United States drove Iraq’s troops from Kuwait in February 1991. The ability for Saddam Hussein to pursue such military aggression was from a “military machine paid for in large part by the tens of billions of dollars Kuwait and the Gulf states had poured into Iraq and the weapons and technology provided by the Soviet Union, Germany, and France.”[45]
Shortly before he invaded Kuwait, he shipped 100 new Mercedes 200 Series cars to top editors in Egypt and Jordan. Two days before the first attacks, Saddam reportedly offered Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak 50 million dollars in cash, “ostensibly for grain”.[59]
U.S. President George H. W. Bush responded cautiously for the first several days. On one hand, Kuwait, prior to this point, had been a virulent enemy of Israel and was the Persian Gulf monarchy that had had the most friendly relations with the Soviets.[60] On the other hand, Washington foreign policymakers, along with Middle East experts, military critics, and firms heavily invested in the region, were extremely concerned with stability in this region.[61] The invasion immediately triggered fears that the world’s price of oil, and therefore control of the world economy, was at stake. Britain profited heavily from billions of dollars of Kuwaiti investments and bank deposits. Bush was perhaps swayed while meeting with British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, who happened to be in the U.S. at the time.[62]
Co-operation between the United States and the Soviet Union made possible the passage of resolutions in the United Nations Security Council giving Iraq a deadline to leave Kuwait and approving the use of force if Saddam did not comply with the timetable. U.S. officials feared Iraqi retaliation against oil-rich Saudi Arabia, since the 1940s a close ally of Washington, for the Saudis’ opposition to the invasion of Kuwait. Accordingly, the U.S. and a group of allies, including countries as diverse as Egypt, Syria and Czechoslovakia, deployed a massive amount of troops along the Saudi border with Kuwait and Iraq in order to encircle the Iraqi army, the largest in the Middle East.
Saddam’s officers looted Kuwait, stripping even the marble from its palaces to move it to Saddam’s own palace.[7]
During the period of negotiations and threats following the invasion, Saddam focused renewed attention on the Palestinian problem by promising to withdraw his forces from Kuwait if Israel would relinquish the occupied territories in the West Bank, the Golan Heights, and the Gaza Strip. Saddam’s proposal further split the Arab world, pitting U.S.- and Western-supported Arab states against the Palestinians. The allies ultimately rejected any linkage between the Kuwait crisis and Palestinian issues.
Saddam ignored the Security Council deadline. Backed by the Security Council, a U.S.-led coalition launched round-the-clock missile and aerial attacks on Iraq, beginning 16 January 1991. Israel, though subjected to attack by Iraqi missiles, refrained from retaliating in order not to provoke Arab states into leaving the coalition. A ground force consisting largely of U.S. and British armoured and infantry divisions ejected Saddam’s army from Kuwait in February 1991 and occupied the southern portion of Iraq as far as the Euphrates.
On 6 March 1991, Bush announced:
“
What is at stake is more than one small country, it is a big idea — a new world order, where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind: peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law.
”
In the end, the over-manned and under-equipped Iraqi army proved unable to compete on the battlefield with the highly mobile coalition land forces and their overpowering air support. Some 175,000 Iraqis were taken prisoner and casualties were estimated at over 85,000. As part of the cease-fire agreement, Iraq agreed to scrap all poison gas and germ weapons and allow UN observers to inspect the sites. UN trade sanctions would remain in effect until Iraq complied with all terms. Saddam publicly claimed victory at the end of the war.
Postwar period
Iraq’s ethnic and religious divisions, together with the brutality of the conflict that this had engendered, laid the groundwork for postwar rebellions. In the aftermath of the fighting, social and ethnic unrest among Shi’ite Muslims, Kurds, and dissident military units threatened the stability of Saddam’s government. Uprisings erupted in the Kurdish north and Shi’a southern and central parts of Iraq, but were ruthlessly repressed.
The United States, which had urged Iraqis to rise up against Saddam, did nothing to assist the rebellions. The Iranians, despite the widespread Shi’ite rebellions, had no interest in provoking another war, while Turkey opposed any prospect of Kurdish independence, and the Saudis and other conservative Arab states feared an Iran-style Shi’ite revolution. Saddam, having survived the immediate crisis in the wake of defeat, was left firmly in control of Iraq, although the country never recovered either economically or militarily from the Gulf War. Saddam routinely cited his survival as “proof” that Iraq had in fact won the war against the U.S. This message earned Saddam a great deal of popularity in many sectors of the Arab world. John Esposito, however, claims that “Arabs and Muslims were pulled in two directions. That they rallied not so much to Saddam Hussein as to the bipolar nature of the confrontation (the West versus the Arab Muslim world) and the issues that Saddam proclaimed: Arab unity, self-sufficiency, and social justice.” As a result, Saddam Hussein appealed to many people for the same reasons that attracted more and more followers to Islamic revivalism and also for the same reasons that fueled anti-Western feelings. “As one U.S. Muslim observer noted: People forgot about Saddam’s record and concentrated on America … Saddam Hussein might be wrong, but it is not America who should correct him.” A shift was, therefore, clearly visible among many Islamic movements in the post war period “from an initial Islamic ideological rejection of Saddam Hussein, the secular persecutor of Islamic movements, and his invasion of Kuwait to a more populist Arab nationalist, anti-imperialist support for Saddam (or more precisely those issues he represented or championed) and the condemnation of foreign intervention and occupation.”[45]
Saddam, therefore, increasingly portrayed himself as a devout Muslim, in an effort to co-opt the conservative religious segments of society. Some elements of Sharia law were re-introduced, and the ritual phrase “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great”), in Saddam’s handwriting, was added to the national flag. Saddam also commissioned the production of a “Blood Qur’an“, written using 27 litres of his own blood, to thank God for saving him from various dangers and conspiracies.[63]
Relations between the United States and Iraq remained tense following the Gulf War. The U.S. launched a missile attack aimed at Iraq’s intelligence headquarters in Baghdad 26 June 1993, citing evidence of repeated Iraqi violations of the “no fly zones” imposed after the Gulf War and for incursions into Kuwait.
The United Nations sanctions placed upon Iraq when it invaded Kuwait were not lifted, blocking Iraqi oil exports. This caused immense hardship in Iraq and virtually destroyed the Iraqi economy and state infrastructure. Only smuggling across the Syrian border, and humanitarian aid ameliorated the humanitarian crisis.[64] On 9 December 1996 the UN allowed Saddam’s government to begin selling limited amounts of oil for food and medicine. Limited amounts of income from the United Nations started flowing into Iraq through the United Nations Oil for Food program.
U.S. officials continued to accuse Saddam of violating the terms of the Gulf War’s cease fire, by developing weapons of mass destruction and other banned weaponry, and violating the UN-imposed sanctions. Also during the 1990s, President Bill Clinton maintained sanctions and ordered air strikes in the “Iraqi no-fly zones” (Operation Desert Fox), in the hope that Saddam would be overthrown by political enemies inside Iraq. Western charges of Iraqi resistance to UN access to suspected weapons were the pretext for crises between 1997 and 1998, culminating in intensive U.S. and British missile strikes on Iraq, 16–19 December 1998. After two years of intermittent activity, U.S. and British warplanes struck harder at sites near Baghdad in February 2001.
Saddam’s support base of Tikriti tribesmen, family members, and other supporters was divided after the war, and in the following years, contributing to the government’s increasingly repressive and arbitrary nature. Domestic repression inside Iraq grew worse, and Saddam’s sons, Uday and Qusay Hussein, became increasingly powerful and carried out a private reign of terror.
Iraqi co-operation with UN weapons inspection teams was intermittent throughout the 1990s.
Saddam continued involvement in politics abroad. Video tapes retrieved after show his intelligence chiefs meeting with Arab journalists, including a meeting with the former managing director of Al-Jazeera, Mohammed Jassem al-Ali, in 2000. In the video Saddam’s son Uday advised al-Ali about hires in Al-Jazeera: “During your last visit here along with your colleagues we talked about a number of issues, and it does appear that you indeed were listening to what I was saying since changes took place and new faces came on board such as that lad, Mansour.” He was later sacked by Al-Jazeera.[65]
In 2002 Austrian prosecutors investigated Saddam government’s transactions with Fritz Edlinger that possibly violated Austrian money laundering and embargo regulations.[66] Fritz Edlinger, president of the General Secretary of the Society for Austro-Arab relations (GÖAB) and a former member of Socialist International‘s Middle East Committee, was an outspoken supporter of Saddam Hussein. In 2005 an Austrian journalist revealed that Fritz Edlinger’s GÖAB had received $100,000 from an Iraqi front company as well as donations from Austrian companies soliciting business in Iraq.[67]
In 2002, a resolution sponsored by the European Union was adopted by the Commission for Human Rights, which stated that there had been no improvement in the human rights crisis in Iraq. The statement condemned President Saddam Hussein’s government for its “systematic, widespread and extremely grave violations of human rights and international humanitarian law“. The resolution demanded that Iraq immediately put an end to its “summary and arbitrary executions … the use of rape as a political tool and all enforced and involuntary disappearances”.[68]
In the United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme, Saddam was supposed to trade oil for food. In practice, the program benefitted political parties, politicians, journalists, companies, and individuals around the world.
The Russian state was the largest beneficiary.[69]
Satellite channels broadcasting the besieged Iraqi leader among cheering crowds as U.S.-led troops push toward the capital city.[70]
4 April 2003.
The international community, especially the U.S., continued to view Saddam as a bellicose tyrant who was a threat to the stability of the region. After the September 11 attacks, Vladimir Putin began to tell the United States that Iraq was preparing terrorist attacks against the United States.[71] In his January 2002 state of the union address to Congress, President George W. Bush spoke of an “axis of evil” consisting of Iran, North Korea, and Iraq. Moreover, Bush announced that he would possibly take action to topple the Iraqi government, because of the threat of its weapons of mass destruction. Bush stated that “The Iraqi regime has plotted to develop anthrax, and nerve gas, and nuclear weapons for over a decade … Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror.”[72][73] Saddam Hussein claimed that he falsely led the world to believe Iraq possessed nuclear weapons in order to appear strong against Iran.[74]
With war looming on 24 February 2003, Saddam Hussein took part in an interview with CBS News reporter Dan Rather. Talking for more than three hours, he expressed a wish to have a live televised debate with George W. Bush, which was declined. It was his first interview with a U.S. reporter in over a decade.[75] CBS aired the taped interview later that week.
The Iraqi government and military collapsed within three weeks of the beginning of the U.S.-led 2003 invasion of Iraq on 20 March. By the beginning of April, U.S.-led forces occupied much of Iraq. The resistance of the much-weakened Iraqi Army either crumbled or shifted to guerrilla tactics, and it appeared that Saddam had lost control of Iraq. He was last seen in a video which purported to show him in the Baghdad suburbs surrounded by supporters. When Baghdad fell to U.S-led forces on 9 April, marked symbolically by the toppling of his statue by iconoclasts,[76] Saddam was nowhere to be found.
Photograph taken by American soldiers during Saddam’s capture.
Saddam shortly after capture by American forces, and after being shaved to confirm his identity
In April 2003, Saddam’s whereabouts remained in question during the weeks following the fall of Baghdad and the conclusion of the major fighting of the war. Various sightings of Saddam were reported in the weeks following the war, but none was authenticated. At various times Saddam released audio tapes promoting popular resistance to his ousting.
Saddam was placed at the top of the U.S. list of “most-wanted Iraqis“. In July 2003, his sons Uday and Qusay and 14-year-old grandson Mustapha were killed in a three-hour[77] gunfight with U.S. forces.
On 13 December 2003, Saddam Hussein was captured by U.S. forces at a farmhouse in ad-Dawr near Tikrit in a hole in Operation Red Dawn. Following his capture on 13 December Saddam was transported to a U.S. base near Tikrit, and later taken to the U.S. base near Baghdad. The day after his capture he was reportedly visited by longtime opponents such as Ahmed Chalabi.[citation needed]
On 14 December 2003, U.S. administrator in Iraq L. Paul Bremer confirmed that Saddam Hussein had indeed been captured at a farmhouse in ad-Dawr near Tikrit.[78] Bremer presented video footage of Saddam in custody.
Saddam was shown with a full beard and hair longer than his familiar appearance. He was described by U.S. officials as being in good health. Bremer reported plans to put Saddam on trial, but claimed that the details of such a trial had not yet been determined. Iraqis and Americans who spoke with Saddam after his capture generally reported that he remained self-assured, describing himself as a “firm, but just leader.”[citation needed]
British tabloid newspaper The Sun posted a picture of Saddam wearing white briefs on the front cover of a newspaper. Other photographs inside the paper show Saddam washing his trousers, shuffling, and sleeping. The United States Government stated that it considers the release of the pictures a violation of the Geneva Convention, and that it would investigate the photographs.[79][80] During this period Hussein was interrogated by FBI agent George Piro.[81]
The guards at the Baghdad detention facility called their prisoner “Vic,” and let him plant a little garden near his cell. The nickname and the garden are among the details about the former Iraqi leader that emerged during a 27 March 2008 tour of prison of the Baghdad cell where Saddam slept, bathed, and kept a journal in the final days before his execution.[82]
On 30 June 2004, Saddam Hussein, held in custody by U.S. forces at the U.S. base “Camp Cropper“, along with 11 other senior Baathist leaders, were handed over legally (though not physically) to the interim Iraqi government to stand trial for crimes against humanity and other offences.
A few weeks later, he was charged by the Iraqi Special Tribunal with crimes committed against residents of Dujail in 1982, following a failed assassination attempt against him. Specific charges included the murder of 148 people, torture of women and children and the illegal arrest of 399 others.[83][84]
Saddam and his lawyers’ contesting the court’s authority and maintaining that he was still the President of Iraq.[85]
The assassinations and attempts on the lives of several of Saddam’s lawyers.
The replacement of the chief presiding judge, midway through the trial.
On 5 November 2006, Saddam Hussein was found guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced to death by hanging. Saddam’s half brother, Barzan Ibrahim, and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, head of Iraq’s Revolutionary Court in 1982, were convicted of similar charges. The verdict and sentencing were both appealed, but subsequently affirmed by Iraq’s Supreme Court of Appeals.[86] On 30 December 2006, Saddam was hanged.[10]
Saddam was hanged on the first day of Eid ul-Adha, 30 December 2006, despite his wish to be shot (which he felt would be more dignified).[87] The execution was carried out at Camp Justice, an Iraqi army base in Kadhimiya, a neighborhood of northeast Baghdad.
The execution was videotaped on a mobile phone and his captors could be heard insulting Saddam. The video was leaked to electronic media and posted on the Internet within hours, becoming the subject of global controversy.[88] It was later claimed by the head guard at the tomb where his body remains that Saddam’s body was stabbed six times after the execution.[89]
Not long before the execution, Saddam’s lawyers released his last letter. The following includes several excerpts:
“
To the great nation, to the people of our country, and humanity,Many of you have known the writer of this letter to be faithful, honest, caring for others, wise, of sound judgment, just, decisive, careful with the wealth of the people and the state … and that his heart is big enough to embrace all without discrimination.You have known your brother and leader very well and he never bowed to the despots and, in accordance with the wishes of those who loved him, remained a sword and a banner.This is how you want your brother, son or leader to be … and those who will lead you (in the future) should have the same qualifications.Here, I offer my soul to God as a sacrifice, and if He wants, He will send it to heaven with the martyrs, or, He will postpone that … so let us be patient and depend on Him against the unjust nations.
Remember that God has enabled you to become an example of love, forgiveness and brotherly coexistence … I call on you not to hate, because hate does not leave a space for a person to be fair and it makes you blind and closes all doors of thinking and keeps away one from balanced thinking and making the right choice.
I also call on you not to hate the peoples of the other countries that attacked us and differentiate between the decision-makers and peoples. Anyone who repents — whether in Iraq or abroad — you must forgive him.
You should know that among the aggressors, there are people who support your struggle against the invaders, and some of them volunteered for the legal defence of prisoners, including Saddam Hussein … some of these people wept profusely when they said goodbye to me.
Dear faithful people, I say goodbye to you, but I will be with the merciful God who helps those who take refuge in him and who will never disappoint any faithful, honest believer … God is Great … God is great … Long live our nation … Long live our great struggling people … Long live Iraq, long live Iraq … Long live Palestine … Long live jihad and the mujahedeen.
Saddam Hussein President and Commander in Chief of the Iraqi Mujahed Armed Forces
Additional clarification note:
I have written this letter, because the lawyers told me that the so-called criminal court — established and named by the invaders — will allow the so-called defendants the chance for a last word. But that court and its chief judge did not give us the chance to say a word, and issued its verdict without explanation and read out the sentence — dictated by the invaders — without presenting the evidence. I wanted the people to know this.[90]
”
— Letter by Saddam Hussein
A second unofficial video, apparently showing Saddam’s body on a trolley, emerged several days later. It sparked speculation that the execution was carried out incorrectly as Saddam Hussein had a gaping hole in his neck.[91]
Saddam was buried at his birthplace of Al-Awja in Tikrit, Iraq, 3 km (2 mi) from his sons Uday and Qusay Hussein, on 31 December 2006.[92]
Saddam married his first wife and cousin Sajida Talfah (or Tulfah/Tilfah)[93] in 1958[94] in an arranged marriage. Sajida is the daughter of Khairallah Talfah, Saddam’s uncle and mentor. Their marriage was arranged for Hussein at age five when Sajida was seven. They were married in Egypt during his exile. The couple had five children.[93]
Uday Hussein (18 June 1964 – 22 July 2003), was Saddam’s oldest son, who ran the Iraqi Football Association, Fedayeen Saddam, and several media corporations in Iraq including Iraqi TV and the newspaper Babel. Uday, while originally Saddam’s favorite son and raised to succeed him he eventually fell out of favour with his father due to his erratic behavior; he was responsible for many car crashes and rapes around Baghdad, constant feuds with other members of his family, and killing his father’s favorite valet and food taster Kamel Hana Gegeo at a party in Egypt honoring Egyptian first lady Suzanne Mubarak. He became well known in the west for his involvement in looting Kuwait during the Gulf War, allegedly taking millions of dollars worth of Gold, cars, and medical supplies (which was in short supply at the time) for himself and close supporters. He was widely known for his paranoia and his obsession with torturing people who disappointed him in any way, which included tardy girlfriends, friends who disagreed with him and, most notoriously, Iraqi athletes who performed poorly. He was briefly married to Izzat Ibrahim ad-Douri‘s daughter, but later divorced her. The couple had no children.
Qusay Hussein (17 May 1966 – 22 July 2003), was Saddam’s second — and, after the mid-1990s, his favorite — son. Qusay was believed to have been Saddam’s later intended successor, as he was less erratic than his older brother and kept a low profile. He was second in command of the military (behind his father) and ran the elite Iraqi Republican Guard and the SSO. He was believed to have ordered the army to kill thousands of rebelling Marsh Arabs and was instrumental in suppressing Shi’ite rebellions in the mid-1990s. He was married once and had three children.
Raghad Hussein (born 2 September 1968) is Saddam’s oldest daughter. After the war, Raghad fled to Amman, Jordan where she received sanctuary from the royal family. She is currently wanted by the Iraqi Government for allegedly financing and supporting the insurgency and the now banned Iraqi Ba’ath Party.[95][96] The Jordanian royal family refused to hand her over.
Rana Hussein (born c. 1969), is Saddam’s second daughter. She, like her sister, fled to Jordan and has stood up for her father’s rights. She was married to Saddam Kamel and has had four children from this marriage.
Hala Hussein (born c. 1972), is Saddam’s third and youngest daughter. Very little information is known about her. Her father arranged for her to marry General Kamal Mustafa Abdallah Sultan al-Tikriti in 1998. She fled with her children and sisters to Jordan.
Saddam married his second wife, Samira Shahbandar,[93] in 1986. She was originally the wife of an Iraqi Airways executive, but later became the mistress of Saddam. Eventually, Saddam forced Samira’s husband to divorce her so he could marry her.[93] There have been no political issues from this marriage. After the war, Samira fled to Beirut, Lebanon. She is believed to have mothered Hussein’s sixth child.[93] Members of Hussein’s family have denied this.
Saddam had allegedly married a third wife, Nidal al-Hamdani, the general manager of the Solar Energy Research Center in the Council of Scientific Research.[97]
Wafa el-Mullah al-Howeish is rumoured to have married Saddam as his fourth wife in 2002. There is no firm evidence for this marriage. Wafa is the daughter of Abdul Tawab el-Mullah Howeish, a former minister of military industry in Iraq and Saddam’s last deputy Prime Minister.
In August 1995, Raghad and her husband Hussein Kamel al-Majid and Rana and her husband, Saddam Kamel al-Majid, defected to Jordan, taking their children with them. They returned to Iraq when they received assurances that Saddam would pardon them. Within three days of their return in February 1996, both of the Kamel brothers were attacked and killed in a gunfight with other clan members who considered them traitors.
In August 2003, Saddam’s daughters Raghad and Rana received sanctuary in Amman, Jordan, where they are currently staying with their nine children. That month, they spoke with CNN and the Arab satellite station Al-Arabiya in Amman. When asked about her father, Raghad told CNN, “He was a very good father, loving, has a big heart.” Asked if she wanted to give a message to her father, she said: “I love you and I miss you.” Her sister Rana also remarked, “He had so many feelings and he was very tender with all of us.”[98]
HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION, LITTLEDEAN JAIL , FOREST OF DEAN , GLOUCESTERSHIRE, UK, WE HAVE THE LARGEST PRIVATE COLLECTION OF WHAT IS DEEMED TO BE POLITICALLY INCORRECT MURDERABILIA , MAIMERABILIA, TRUE CRIME, SLEAZE ,SCANDAL, THE TABOO AND BEYOND EXHIBIT MATERIAL ON VIEW TO THE PUBLIC.
HERE BELOW IS A BRIEF INSIGHT INTO ONE OF THE MANY SERIAL KILLERS THAT WE FEATURE HERE .
WE HOPE THAT THIS PROVIDES A HISTORICALLY INTRIGUING AND EDUCATIONAL INSIGHT INTO THE WORLD OF TRUE CRIME AND BEYOND .
THIS VISITOR ATTRACTION IS NOT SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN OR THOSE EASILY OFFENDED , DISTURBED, OR OF A SENSITIVE NATURE….
CRIME IN ITSELF AN UNPLEASANT SUBJECT MATTER TO COVER … AND AS SUCH IS NOT PRESENTED HERE IN A PLEASANT WAY EITHER
Below are a few personally signed pieces, other exhibit items on display along with a brief interactive background insight into the the life and crimes of former lesbian prostitute and serial killer Aileen Wuornos who was executed October 9, 2002 by Lethal Injection in Florida .
Original painting by Paul Bridgman , Gloucestershire Artist,
ABOVE IS A BRIEF PICTORIAL INSIGHT INTO VARIOUS HANDWRITTEN AND SIGNED MURDERABILIA ITEMS FROM AILEEN WUORNOS HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL
56th murderer executed in U.S. in 2002
805th murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
10th female murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
2nd murderer executed in Florida in 2002
53rd murderer executed in Florida since 1976
2nd female murderer executed in Florida since 1976
Summary:
Between December 1989 and September 1990, the bodies of several men were found murdered along the highways of northern and central Florida, including Richard Mallory, Dick Humphreys, Troy Burress, David Spears, Walter Gino Antonio, Peter Siems, and Charles Carskaddon. Items belonging to Mallory and Antonio were pawned near Daytona Beach and the alias names used were traced to Wuornos through thumbprints left on the pawn shop cards. Wuornos confessed to the murder of all six men, claiming that she was picked up by the men when she was working as a highway prostitute, and shot them in self defense after they attempted to sexually assault her. Wuornos was convicted of the murder of Richard Mallory after a jury trial in Volusia County and was sentenced to death. At trial, the State was allowed to introduce similar crimes evidence about Wuornos’ commission of several other murders. While on death row, it was discovered that Mallory had previously served time for Attempted Rape. Wuornos pleaded no contest to the murders of the other 5 men and was sentenced to death in each case.
Within two weeks of her arrest, Wuornos and her attorney had sold movie rights to her story. Investigators in her case did likewise. The case resulted in several books and movies, and even one opera on the life of “America’s first female serial killer.” Wuornos’s father, Leo Dale Pittman, was a child molester and a sociopath who was strangled in prison in 1969. Wuornos was pregnant at age fourteen. Shortly thereafter, she dropped out of school, left home and took up hitchhiking and prostitution. Wuornos had a prior conviction for armed robbery in 1982.
Final Meal:
Wuornos declined the traditional last meal, which could have been anything she wanted for under $20, and instead was given a cup of coffee.
Final Words:
“I’d just like to say I’m sailing with the rock, and I’ll be back like Independence Day, with Jesus June 6. Like the movie, big mother ship and all, I’ll be back.”
Aileen Wuornos, nicknamed the Damsel of Death, spent 10 years on death row in Florida, after being convicted of killing six men when she worked as a prostitute on Florida’s highways in 1989 and 1990.
ABOVE IS A BRIEF INTERACTIVE INTERVIEW FOOTAGE OF HITCH-HIKING LESBIAN PROSTITUTE AND MAN HATER … AILEEN WUORNOS …. PRIOR TO HER EXECUTION…..INSANE?
ABOVE IS A BRIEF PICTORIAL INSIGHT INTO VARIOUS HANDWRITTEN AND SIGNED MURDERABILIA ITEMS FROM AILEEN WUORNOS HERE ON DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , LITTLEDEAN JAIL
US-born highway hooker and serial man-killer Aileen Wuornos was put to death for a nine-month killing spree spanning north and central Florida.
The trail started on 1 December 1989 when a policeman found Richard Mallory’s abandoned vehicle. Just 12 days later the shop-owner’s bullet-ridden body was found in the undergrowth in a secluded wood.
Below is a brief interactive background insight into the the life and crimes of former lesbian prostitute and serial killer Aileen Wuornos who was executed October 9, 2002 by Lethal Injection in Florida .
‘Damsel of Death’ executed
Wuornos said she “seriously hates human life”
A woman serial killer convicted of the murder of six men has been executed in Florida’s state prison.Aileen Wuornos, 46, died at 0947 local time (1347GMT) in the prison at Starke, after being injected with a lethal cocktail of drugs, according to a spokeswoman for Florida Governor Jeb Bush.
Governor Jeb Bush ordered the execution
Wuornos, nicknamed the Damsel of Death, spent 10 years on death row in Florida, after being convicted of killing six men when she worked as a prostitute on Florida’s highways in 1989 and 1990.
Her killings began with Richard Mallory on 13 December 1989, and ended in January 1991 when she was arrested in Daytona Beach, Florida.
She is thought to have killed eight men in total.
Wuornos originally claimed she had killed in self-defence, after being raped.
Several years later, she admitted planning the murders with robbery as her motive.
At her 1992 trial, State Attorney John Tanner described her as “a homicidal predator”.
“She was like a spider on the side of the road, waiting for her prey – men,” he said.
Rejecting appeals
In April this year Wuornos refused to go along with another appeal.
“I would prefer to cut to the chase and get on with an execution,” she wrote.
“Taxpayers’ money has been squandered, and the families have suffered enough.”
Wuornos became a celebrity, and books, a film and an opera were written about her case.
Last week, Governor Bush lifted a stay on her execution when a team of psychiatrists ruled that she was sane.
‘Election ploy’
Wuornos was abandoned by her mother as an infant, and her father was a convicted child molester who committed suicide in jail.
She became pregnant at 14, but had to give up the child.
In April, she wrote to the authorities: “I have hate crawling through my system.
“I’m one who seriously hates human life and would kill again.”
She is only the second woman to be executed in Florida after the re-introduction of the death penalty in 1976.
Opponents of the death penalty say her execution, and that of Rigoberto Sanchez-Velasco last week, are being used by Governor Bush to help his re-election prospects in next month’s poll for the post of governor.
Aileen Wuornos
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Aileen Wuornos
Aileen Wuornos mug shot
Background information
Birth name
Aileen Carol Pittman
Also known as
[1] Sandra Kretsch
Susan Lynn Blahovec
Lee Blahovec
Cammie Marsh Greene
Lori Kristine Grody
Aileen Wuornos (29 February 1956 – 9 October 2002) was an Americanserial killer who killed seven men in Florida between 1989 and 1990, claiming theyraped or attempted to rape her while she was working as a prostitute. She was convicted and sentenced to death for six of the murders and executed bylethal injection on October 9, 2002.
Childhood
Early Life
Wuornos was born as Aileen Carol Pittman in Rochester, Michigan, on 29 February 1956.[2] Her mother, Diane Wuornos, was 15 years old when she married Aileen’s father, Leo Dale Pittman on 3 June 1954. Less than two years later, and two months before Wuornos was born, Diane filed for divorce. Aileen had an older brother named Keith, who was born in February 1955. Wuornos never met her father, because he was in prison for the rape and attempted murder of an eight-year-old boy[2] when she was born. Leo Pittman was considered to be a schizophrenic, who was convicted of sex crimes against children,[3] was in and out of prison, and hanged himself in prison in 1969.[1][4] In January 1960, when Aileen was almost 4 years old, Diane abandoned her children, leaving them with their maternal grandparents, Lauri and Britta Wuornos, who legally adopted Keith and Aileen on 18 March 1960.[4]
At age 12, Wuornos engaged in sexual activities in school in exchange for cigarettes, drugs, and food. Aileen had also engaged in sexual activities with her own brother.[3] Wuornos claimed that she was sexually assaulted and beaten as a child by her grandfather. Aileen’s grandfather was an alcoholic. Before beating her, he would force her to strip out of her clothes.[3] In 1970, at age 14, she became pregnant,[5] having been raped by a friend of her grandfather.[3]Wuornos gave birth at a home for unwed mothers, and the child was placed for adoption.[4] A few months after her baby was born, Aileen dropped out of school[3] as her grandmother died of liver failure; and Aileen and her brother became wards of the court. When she was 15, her grandfather threw her out of the house; and she began supporting herself as a prostitute and living in the woods near her old home.[4]
In 1976, Wuornos hitchhiked to Florida, where she met 69-year-old yacht club president Lewis Gratz Fell. They married that same year, and the announcement of their nuptials was printed in the society pages of the local newspaper. However, Wuornos continually involved herself in confrontations at their local bar and eventually went to jail for assault. She also hit Fell with his own cane, leading him to get a restraining order against her. She returned to Michigan[7][8] where, on 14 July 1976, Wuornos was arrested in Antrim County, Michigan, and charged with assault and disturbing the peacefor throwing a cue ball at a bartender’s head.[9] On July 17, her brother Keith died of esophageal cancer and Wuornos received $10,000 from his life insurance. Wuornos and Fell annulled on July 21 after nine weeks of marriage.[10]
On 20 May 1981, Wuornos was arrested in Edgewater, Florida, for the armed robbery of a convenience store. She was sentenced to prison on 4 May 1982, and released on 30 June 1983.[11] On 1 May 1984, Wuornos was arrested for attempting to pass forged checks at a bank in Key West. On 30 November 1985, she was named as a suspect in the theft of a revolver and ammunition in Pasco County.[11]
On 4 January 1986, Wuornos was arrested in Miami and charged with grand theft auto, resisting arrest, and obstruction by false information for providing identification with her aunt’s name. Miami police officers found a .38-caliber revolver and a box of ammunition in the stolen car.[12] On 2 June 1986, Volusia County, Florida deputy sheriffs detained Wuornos for questioning after a male companion accused her of pulling a gun, in his car, and demanding $200. Wuornos was found to be carrying spare ammunition, and a .22 pistol was discovered under the passenger seat she had occupied.[13]
Around this time, Wuornos met Tyria Moore, a hotel maid, at a Daytonagay bar. They moved in together, and Wuornos supported them with her prostitution earnings.[14] On 4 July 1987, Daytona Beach police detained Wuornos and Moore at a bar for questioning regarding an incident in which they were accused of assault and battery with a beer bottle.[15] On 12 March 1988, Wuornos accused a Daytona Beach bus driver of assault. She claimed that he pushed her off the bus following a confrontation. Moore was listed as a witness to the incident.[15]
After seeing Wuornos on television prior to her first trial, a 44-year-old born-again-Christian woman named Arlene Pralle felt compelled to contact Aileen. She claimed Jesus told her to do so. Pralle quickly became an outspoken advocate of Wuornos, speaking with her daily and claiming her innocence
Richard Mallory,[1] age 51, 30 November 1989—Electronics store owner in Clearwater, Florida. Wuornos’ first victim was a convicted rapist whom she claimed to have killed in self-defense. Two days later, a Volusia County, Florida, Deputy Sheriff found Mallory’s abandoned vehicle. On December 13, Mallory’s body was found several miles away in a wooded area. He had been shot several times, but two bullets to the left lung were found to have been the cause of death. It was on this murder that Wuornos would eventually be condemned.
Charles Carskaddon,[1] age 40, 31 May 1990—Part-time rodeo worker. On 6 June 1990, his body was found in Pasco County, Florida. He had been shot nine times with a small-caliber weapon.
Peter Siems,[1] age 65—In June 1990, Siems left Jupiter, Florida, for New Jersey. On 4 July 1990, his car was found in Orange Springs, Florida. Moore and Wuornos were seen abandoning the car, and Wuornos’ palm print was found on the interior door handle. His body was never found.
Troy Burress,[1] age 50—Sausage salesman from Ocala, Florida. On 31 July 1990, he was reported missing. On 4 August 1990, his body was found in a wooded area along State Road 19 in Marion County, Florida. He had been shot twice.
On 4 July 1990, Wuornos and Moore abandoned Peter Siems’s car after they were involved in an accident. Witnesses who had seen the women driving the victims’ cars provided police with their names and descriptions, resulting in a media campaign to locate them. Police also found some of the victims’ belongings in pawnshops and retrieved fingerprints matching those found in the victims’ cars. Wuornos had a criminal justice record in Florida, and her fingerprints were on file.[4]
On 9 January 1991, Wuornos was arrested on an outstanding warrant at The Last Resort, a biker bar in Volusia County.[17] Police located Moore the next day in Scranton, Pennsylvania. She agreed to elicit a confession from Wuornos in exchange for prosecutorial immunity.[18] Moore returned with police to Florida, where she was put up in a motel. Under police guidance, Moore made numerous telephone calls to Wuornos, pleading for help in clearing her name. Three days later, on 16 January 1991, Wuornos confessed to the murders. She claimed the men had tried to rape her and she killed them in self-defense.[19][20]
On 14 January 1992, Wuornos went to trial for the murder of Richard Mallory. Prior bad acts are normally inadmissible in criminal trials; but, under Florida’s Williams Rule, the prosecution was allowed to introduce evidence related to her other crimes to show a pattern of illegal activity.[1] On 27 January 1992, Wuornos was convicted of Richard Mallory’s murder with help from Moore’s testimony. At her sentencing, psychiatrists for the defense testified that Wuornos was mentally unstable and had been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. Four days later, she was sentenced to death.[20][21]
On 31 March 1992, Wuornos pleaded no contest to the murders of Dick Humphreys, Troy Burress, and David Spears, saying she wanted to “get right with God”.[1] In her statement to the court, she stated, “I wanted to confess to you that Richard Mallory did violently rape me as I’ve told you; but these others did not. [They] only began to start to.”[1] On 15 May 1992, Wuornos was given three more death sentences.[1]
In June 1992, Wuornos pleaded guilty to the murder of Charles Carskaddon; in November 1992, she received her fifth death sentence.[1] The defense made efforts during the trial to introduce evidence that Mallory had been tried for intent to commit rape in Maryland and that he had been committed to a maximum security correctional facility in Maryland that provided remediation to sexual offenders.[22] Records obtained from that institution reflected that, from 1958 to 1962, Mallory was committed for treatment and observation resulting from a criminal charge of assault with intent to rape and received an over-all eight years of treatment from the facility. In 1961, “it was observed of Mr. Mallory that he possessed strong sociopathic trends”.[22] The judge refused to allow this to be admitted in court as evidence and denied Wuornos’ request for a retrial.[20][22][23]
In February 1993, Wuornos pleaded guilty to the murder of Walter Gino Antonio and was sentenced to death again. No charges were brought against her for the murder of Peter Siems, as his body was never found. In all, she received six death sentences.[1]
Wuornos told several inconsistent stories about the killings. She claimed initially that all seven men had raped her while she was working as a prostitute but later recanted the claim of self-defense. During an interview with filmmaker Nick Broomfield, when she thought the cameras were off, she told him that it was, in fact, self-defense, but she could not stand being on death row—where she had been for 12 years at that point—and wanted to die.[24]
Wuornos’ appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court was denied in 1996. In 2001, she announced that she would not issue any further appeals against her death sentence. She petitioned the Florida Supreme Court for the right to fire her legal counsel and stop all appeals, saying, “I killed those men, robbed them as cold as ice. And I’d do it again, too. There’s no chance in keeping me alive or anything, because I’d kill again. I have hate crawling through my system…I am so sick of hearing this ‘she’s crazy’ stuff. I’ve been evaluated so many times. I’m competent, sane, and I’m trying to tell the truth. I’m one who seriously hates human life and would kill again.”[25] A defense attorney argued that she was in no state for them to honor such a request.[26]
Florida GovernorJeb Bush instructed three psychiatrists to give Wuornos a 15-minute interview. The test for competency requires the psychiatrist(s) to be convinced that the condemned person understands that she will die and for which crime(s) she is being executed. All three judged her mentally fit to be executed.
Wuornos later started accusing the prison matrons of abusing her. She accused them of tainting her food, spitting on it, serving her potatoes cooked in dirt, and her food arriving with urine. She also claimed overhearing conversations about “trying to get me so pushed over the brink by them I’d wind up committing suicide before the [execution]” and “wishing to rape me before execution”. She also complained of strip searches, being handcuffed so tightly that her wrists bruised any time she left her cell, door kicking, frequent window checks by matrons, low water pressure, mildew on her mattress and “cat calling … in distaste and a pure hatred towards me”. Wuornos threatened to boycott showers and food trays when specific officers were on duty. “In the meantime, my stomach’s growling away and I’m taking showers through the sink of my cell.”
Her attorney stated that “Ms. Wuornos really just wants to have proper treatment, humane treatment until the day she’s executed”, and “If the allegations don’t have any truth to them, she’s clearlydelusional. She believes what she’s written”.[27]
During the final stages of the appeal process she gave a series of interviews to Broomfield. In her final interview shortly before her execution she claimed that her mind was being controlled by “sonic pressure” to make her appear crazy and described her impending death as being taken away by angels on a space ship.[28] Wuornos said to Broomfield, “You sabotaged my ass, society, and the cops, and the system. A raped woman got executed, and was used for books and movies and shit.”[29] Her final words in the on-camera interview were “Thanks a lot, society, for railroading my ass.”[30]Broomfield later met Dawn Botkins, a childhood friend of Wuornos’, who told him, “She’s sorry, Nick. She didn’t give you the finger. She gave the media the finger, and then the attorneys the finger. And she knew if she said much more, it could make a difference on her execution tomorrow, so she just decided not to.”[31]
Wuornos was executed by lethal injection on October 9, 2002.[32] She was the tenth woman in the United States to be executed since the Supreme Court lifted the ban on capital punishment in 1976,[33] and the second woman ever executed in Florida. She declined a last meal and instead was given a cup of coffee. Her final statement before the execution was “Yes, I would just like to say I’m sailing with the rock, and I’ll be back, like Independence Day with Jesus. June 6, like the movie. Big mother ship and all, I’ll be back, I’ll be back.”[1]
After her execution, Wuornos was cremated. Her ashes were taken by Dawn Botkins to her native Michigan and spread beneath a tree. She requested that Natalie Merchant‘s song “Carnival” be played at her funeral. Natalie Merchant commented on this when asked why her song was played during the credits of the documentary Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer:
When director Nick Broomfield sent a working edit of the film, I was so disturbed by the subject matter that I couldn’t even watch it. Aileen Wuornos led a tortured, torturing life that is beyond my worst nightmares. It wasn’t until I was told that Aileen spent many hours listening to my album Tigerlily while on death row and requested “Carnival” be played at her funeral that I gave permission for the use of the song. It’s very odd to think of the places my music can go once it leaves my hands. If it gave her some solace, I have to be grateful.[34]
Broomfield later stated:
I think this anger developed inside her. And she was working as a prostitute. I think she had a lot of awful encounters on the roads. And I think this anger just spilled out from inside her. And finally exploded. Into incredible violence. That was her way of surviving. I think Aileen really believed that she had killed in self-defense. I think someone who’s deeply psychotic can’t really tell the difference between something that is life threatening and something that is a minor disagreement, that you could say something that she didn’t agree with. She would get into a screaming black temper about it. And I think that’s what had caused these things to happen. And at the same time, when she wasn’t in those extreme moods, there was an incrediblehumanity to her.[35]
56th murderer executed in U.S. in 2002
805th murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
10th female murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
2nd murderer executed in Florida in 2002
53rd murderer executed in Florida since 1976
2nd female murderer executed in Florida since 1976
Summary:
Between December 1989 and September 1990, the bodies of several men were found murdered along the highways of northern and central Florida, including Richard Mallory, Dick Humphreys, Troy Burress, David Spears, Walter Gino Antonio, Peter Siems, and Charles Carskaddon. Items belonging to Mallory and Antonio were pawned near Daytona Beach and the alias names used were traced to Wuornos through thumbprints left on the pawn shop cards. Wuornos confessed to the murder of all six men, claiming that she was picked up by the men when she was working as a highway prostitute, and shot them in self defense after they attempted to sexually assault her. Wuornos was convicted of the murder of Richard Mallory after a jury trial in Volusia County and was sentenced to death. At trial, the State was allowed to introduce similar crimes evidence about Wuornos’ commission of several other murders. While on death row, it was discovered that Mallory had previously served time for Attempted Rape. Wuornos pleaded no contest to the murders of the other 5 men and was sentenced to death in each case.
Within two weeks of her arrest, Wuornos and her attorney had sold movie rights to her story. Investigators in her case did likewise. The case resulted in several books and movies, and even one opera on the life of “America’s first female serial killer.” Wuornos’s father, Leo Dale Pittman, was a child molester and a sociopath who was strangled in prison in 1969. Wuornos was pregnant at age fourteen. Shortly thereafter, she dropped out of school, left home and took up hitchhiking and prostitution. Wuornos had a prior conviction for armed robbery in 1982.
Final Meal:
Wuornos declined the traditional last meal, which could have been anything she wanted for under $20, and instead was given a cup of coffee.
Final Words:
“I’d just like to say I’m sailing with the rock, and I’ll be back like Independence Day, with Jesus June 6. Like the movie, big mother ship and all, I’ll be back.”
TRUE CRIME , MURDERABILIA AND MUCH , MUCH MORE , HERE AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL …..
Albert DeSalvo – The Boston Strangler
The Boston Strangler operated in the Boston, Mass. area during a two-year span in the early 1960s. The “Silk Stocking Murders” is another epithet given to the same series of crimes. Though Albert DeSalvo confessed to the murders, many experts and investigators have doubts as to his involvement in the crimes.
POLITE WARNING……. THIS PAGE CONTAINS GRAPHIC IMAGE OF ONE OF THE VICTIMS
ABOVE IS ARE A FEW IMAGES OF A HAND MADE NECKLACE MADE BY ALBERT De SALVO , THE BOSTON STRANGLER WHILST IN WALPOLE PRISON, USA AND NOW ON PERMANENT DISPLAY AT THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION , HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL ALONG WITH OTHER HANDWRITTEN AND SIGNED LETTERS ETC.
The Boston Strangler is a name attributed to the murderer (or murderers) of several women in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, in the early 1960s. Though the crimes were attributed to Albert DeSalvo after his confession to the murders was revealed in court during a separate case,[1]parties investigating the stranglings have since suggested the murders (sometimes known as the silk stocking murders) were not committed by one person.
The initial sobriquet for the perpetrator or perpetrators of the crimes was “The Mad Strangler of Boston”[2] The July 8, 1962 edition of the Sunday Herald, in an article entitled “Mad Strangler Kills Four Women in Boston,” declared in its opening paragraph, “A mad strangler is loose in Boston.”[3]The killer (or killers) also was known initially as “The Phantom Fiend”[4] or “The Phantom Strangler”[5] due to the uncanny ability of the perpetrator (or perpetrators) to get women to allow him into their apartments. By the time DeSalvo’s confession was aired in open court, the name “The Boston Strangler” had become part of crime lore.
Anna E. Slesers, 55, sexually molested with unknown object and strangled with the cord on her bathrobe; found on June 14, 1962 in the third-floor apartment at 77 Gainsborough St., Back Bay (source: Boston Globe Archives)
Mary Mullen, 85, died from a heart attack, but in the confession was said to have collapsed as the strangler grabbed her; found on June 28, 1962
Nina Nichols, 68, sexually molested and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on June 30, 1962
Paula Lepro, 57, sexually molested with a table paddle and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on June 22, 1962 in her apartment in Stoughton, Mass.
Helen Blake, 65, sexually molested and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on June 30, 1962 in her apartment at 73 Newhall Street, Lynn, Mass.
Ida Irga, 75, sexually molested and strangled; found on August 21, 1962 at 7 Grove Street in Boston
Jane Sullivan, 67, sexually assaulted and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on August 30, 1962 at 435 Columbia Road, Dorchester
Albert Henry DeSalvo (September 3, 1931 – November 25, 1973) was a criminal in Boston, Massachusetts who confessed to being the “Boston Strangler“, the murderer of 13 women in the Boston area. DeSalvo was not imprisoned for these murders, however, but for a series of rapes. His murder confession has been disputed, and debate continues regarding which crimes DeSalvo actually committed.
DeSalvo was born in Chelsea, Massachusetts to Frank and Charlotte DeSalvo. His father was of Italian ancestry and his mother was of Irish ancestry. His father was a violent alcoholic who at one point beat all of his wife’s teeth out and bent her fingers back until they broke. He also forced his children to watch him have sex with prostitutes he brought home. DeSalvo tortured animals as a child and began shoplifting and stealing in early adolescence, frequently crossing paths with the law.[edit]Early life
In November 1943, the 12-year-old DeSalvo was first arrested for battery and robbery. In December of the same year he was sent to the Lyman School for Boys. In October 1944, he was paroled and started working as a delivery boy. In August 1946, he returned to the Lyman School for stealing an automobile. After completing his second sentence, DeSalvo joined the Army. He was honorably discharged after his first tour of duty. He re-enlisted and, in spite of being tried in a court-martial, DeSalvo was again honorably discharged.
Between June 14, 1962, and January 4, 1964, 13 single women between the ages of 19 and 85 were murdered in the Boston area; they were eventually tied to the Boston Strangler. Most of the women were sexually assaulted in their apartments, and then strangled with articles of clothing. The eldest victim died of a heart attack. Two others were stabbed to death, one of whom was also badly beaten. Without any sign of forced entry into their dwellings, the women were assumed to have either known their killer or voluntarily allowed him into their homes.
Gainsborough Street site of the first murder attributed to The Boston Strangler
The police were not convinced all of these murders were the work of a single individual, especially because of the wide gap in the victims’ ages; much of the public believed the crimes were committed by one person, however.
On October 27, 1964, a stranger entered a young woman’s home in East Cambridge posing as a detective. He tied his victim to her bed, proceeded to sexually assault her, and suddenly left, saying “I’m sorry” as he went. The woman’s description led police to identify the assailant as DeSalvo and when his photo was published, many women identified him as the man who had assaulted them. Earlier on October 27, DeSalvo had posed as a motorist with car trouble and attempted to enter a home in Bridgewater, Massachusetts. The homeowner, future BrocktonPolice Chief Richard Sproles, became suspicious and eventually fired a shotgun at DeSalvo.
DeSalvo was not initially suspected of being involved with the murders. Only after he was charged with rape did he give a detailed confession of his activities as the Boston Strangler under hypnosis induced by William Joseph Bryan and sessions not induced by hypnosis with Assistant Attorney General John Bottomly. He initially confessed to fellow inmate George Nassar; he then reported to his attorney F. Lee Bailey, who took on DeSalvo’s case. Though there were some inconsistencies, DeSalvo was able to cite details which had not been made public. However, there was no physical evidence to substantiate his confession. As such, he stood trial for earlier, unrelated crimes of robbery and sexual offenses. Bailey brought up the confession to the murders as part of his client’s history at the trial as part of an insanity defense, but it was ruled as inadmissible by the judge.
The motive for DeSalvo confessing to the crimes remains the same whether he actually committed them or not. He believed that he would be spending the rest of his life in jail for the Green Man attacks and wanted to use the confession to raise money to support his wife and children. Plus, to a braggart like DeSalvo, being the notorious Boston Strangler would make him world famous. Dr. Robey testified that “Albert so badly wanted to be the Strangler.”[1]
For the 1967 trial, DeSalvo was mentally evaluated by Dr. Harry Kozol, also of Eugene O’Neill and Patty Hearst fame.[2]
Bailey engaged a plea bargain to lock in his client’s guilt in exchange for the lack of a death penalty and a desire for an eventual insanity verdict.[3] With the jury decision of life in prison, Bailey was very angry: “My goal was to see the Strangler wind up in a hospital, where doctors could try to find out what made him kill. Society is deprived of a study that might help deter other mass killers who lived among us, waiting for the trigger to go off inside them.”[4]
DeSalvo was sentenced to life in prison in 1967. In February of that year, he escaped with two fellow inmates from Bridgewater State Hospital, triggering a full scale manhunt. A note was found on his bunk addressed to the superintendent. In it, DeSalvo stated he had escaped to focus attention on the conditions in the hospital and his own situation. The day after the escape, he turned himself in to his lawyer in Lynn, Massachusetts.[5] Following the escape, he was transferred to the maximum security prison known at the time asWalpole where he was found murdered six years later in the infirmary. Robert Wilson, who was associated with the Winter Hill Gang was tried for the murder of DeSalvo, but the trial ended in a hung jury. No one was ever found guilty of the murder.
In 1971, the Texas legislature unanimously passed a resolution honoring DeSalvo in an April Fool’s Day joke made by Waco Representative Tom Moore, Jr.. Moore admitted to the joke–made to prove his colleagues were not putting due diligence into researching legislation they were passing–and withdrew the resolution.[6]
Lingering doubts remain as to whether DeSalvo was indeed the Boston Strangler. At the time he confessed, people who knew him personally did not believe him capable of the crimes. It was also noted the women allegedly killed by “The Strangler” were of widely varying ages, social strata and ethnicities, and that there were different modi operandi.
Susan Kelly, an author who has had access to the files of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts‘ “Strangler Bureau”, argues the murders were the work of several killers rather than a single individual.[7] Another author, former FBIprofilerRobert Ressler, said “You’re putting together so many different patterns [regarding the Boston Strangler murders] that it’s inconceivable behaviorally that all these could fit one individual.”[8]
In 2000, Elaine Whitfield Sharp, an attorney specializing in forensic cases based in Marblehead, Massachusetts, represented the DeSalvo family and the family of Mary A. Sullivan. Sullivan was publicized as being the final victim in 1964, although other murders occurred after that date. Former print journalist Whitfield Sharp assisted the families in their media campaign to clear DeSalvo’s name, to assist in organizing and arranging the exhumations of Mary A. Sullivan and Albert H. DeSalvo, in filing various lawsuits in attempts to obtain information and trace evidence (e.g., DNA) from the government, and to work with various producers to create documentaries to explain the facts to the public. Whitfield Sharp pointed out various inconsistencies between DeSalvo’s confessions and the crime scene information (which she obtained). For example, Whitfield Sharp observed, contrary to DeSalvo’s confession to Sullivan’s murder, there was no semen in her vaginaand she was not strangled manually, but by ligature. Forensic pathologist Michael Baden observed DeSalvo also got the time of death wrong — a common inconsistency with several of the murders pointed out by Susan Kelly. Whitfield Sharp continues to work on the case for the DeSalvo family.[9]
In the case of Mary Sullivan, murdered January 4, 1964 at age 19, DNA and other forensic evidence — and leads from Kelly’s book — were used by the victim’s nephew Casey Sherman to try to determine her killer’s identity. Sherman wrote about this in his book A Rose for Mary (2003) and stated DeSalvo was not responsible for her death. For example, DeSalvo confessed to sexually penetrating Sullivan, yet the forensic investigation revealed no evidence of sexual activity. There are also suggestions from DeSalvo himself he was covering up for another man.[citation needed]
The results of a 2001 forensic investigation has cast doubts over whether DeSalvo was the Boston Strangler. The investigation raised the possibility the real murderer could still be at large. The investigation revealed DNA evidence found on Sullivan does not match DeSalvo. James Starrs, professor of forensic science at George Washington University, told a news conference DNA evidence could not associate DeSalvo with the murder. Sullivan’s and DeSalvo’s bodies were exhumed as part of the efforts by both their families to find out who was responsible for the murders. Professor Starrs said an examination of a semen-like substance on her body did not match DeSalvo’s DNA.[10]
George Nassar, the inmate DeSalvo reportedly confessed to, is among the suspects in the case.[11] He is currently serving a life sentence for the 1967 shooting death of an Andover, Massachusetts gas station attendant. In February 2008, the Massachuetts Supreme Judicial Court denied Nassar’s appeal of his 1967 conviction.[citation needed] Claudia Bolgen, Nassar’s attorney, said Nassar, 75 at the time, denied involvement in the murders.[citation needed] In 2006, Nassar argued in court filings he could not make his case in a previous appeal because he was in federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas in the 1980s and therefore did not have access to Massachusetts legal materials.[citation needed] The court noted Nassar was back in Massachusetts in late 1983 and did not inquire about the case then or for more than two decades.[citation needed] Bolgen said she was disappointed in the decision, but said Nassar had a pending motion for a new trial inEssex County that she was confident would be granted.[citation needed]
Ames Robey, a former prison psychologist who analyzed both DeSalvo and Nassar, has said Nassar was a misogynistic, psychopathic killer who was a far more likely suspect than DeSalvo.[11]Some followers of the case said Nassar was the real strangler and fed DeSalvo details of the murders so DeSalvo could confess and gain notoriety or through Nassar get the reward money to help support DeSalvo’s family of wife and two children.[11] In a 1999 interview with The Boston Globe, Nassar denied involvement in the murders, but said the speculation killed any chance he had for parole. “I had nothing to do with it,” he said. “I’m convicted under the table, behind the scenes.”[citation needed]
Nassar had previously been convicted of the May 1948 murder of a shop owner. Nassar was sentenced to life in prison in that case, but through his friendship with a Unitarian minister he was paroled in early 1961, less than a year before the Boston Strangler murders were believed to have begun.[12]
As his name suggests, the serial killer known as Boston Strangler operated in Boston, Massachusetts area and murdered his victims by strangulation. He is believed to have murdered as many as 13 women, even though there are still many unanswered questions and guesses. It is possible that only (if you can really use that word) 11 women were actually murdered by the Boston Strangler. The killing started with strangulation of a 55 year old Anna Slesers on June 14, 1962 who was sexually molested by vaginal insertions of foreign objects and then strangled to death with her bathrobe cord. The last victim of Boston Strangler was murdered on January 4, 1964, which means he only operated for one and half year. Her name was Mary Sullivan – she was 19 year old and she is the woman in the crime scene photo above.
Mary Sullivan was found naked, bloodied with a broom inserted up her vagina. Boston Strangler left a Happy New Year card by her feet. She was strangled with her own stocking.
Is Albert DeSalvo Boston Strangler
One year after murder of Mary Sullivan a man named Albert DeSalvo came forth and confessed that he was the murderer known as Boston Strangler. Albert DeSalvo was a convicted rapist who was serving time at Bridgewater State Hospital. His confession remains questionable and many forensic specialists doubt that he was the real Boston Strangler. While he provided many accurate details regarding all Boston Strangler murders, there were also many serious inconsistencies. For example in case of above pictured Mary Sullivan, Albert DeSalvo confessed to raping her and strangling her manually. However forensic evidence proves that Mary Sullivan was strangled by ligature and there were no signs of sexual intercourse taking place anytime before or after she was strangled to death. Albert DeSalvo also got date of her murder wrong and there was no semen, nor other DNA evidence that would link him to this murder.
Albert DeSalvo died in 1973. He was murdered by fellow inmates at Walpole State Prison. The Boston Strangler case has never been officially closed and the more evidence is brought forth, the more it becomes doubtful that Albert DeSalvo committed any of the Boston Strangler murders. Now, half century later, it is possible we will never know who the real murderer responsible for atrocious killings of 13 women, including Mary Sullivan seen in photo above was.
1960’S REVISITED AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL – CHRISTINE KEELER & THE PROFUMO AFFAIR
Our many diverse collections here also includes an insight into our endless array of Politicians behaving badly, caught with their trousers down and of course as always …apparently on the fiddle with their expenses etc.
On display here we have various personally signed ephemera , memorabilia etc pieced together within an intriguing montage from the likes of John Profumo, Christine Keeler , Mandy Rice-Davies and Stephan Ward .
See more interactive video footage below relating to one of Britain’s most infamous scandals
Christine Keeler—the iconic Lewis Morley image, taken in May 1963, became an instant national talking point when a stolen copy was published by the Sunday Mirror, adding yet more fuel to the fire under Profumo. As the scandal intensified, it was endlessly republished.[1]
In the early 1960s, Profumo was the Secretary of State for War in Harold Macmillan‘s Conservative government and was married to actress Valerie Hobson. In 1961, Profumo met Christine Keeler, a London call girl,[2] at a house party at Cliveden, the Buckinghamshire mansion owned by Lord Astor. Many years later Profumo would claim, in discussion with his son, David, that he had met Keeler previously at a night club in London called Murray’s and “probably had a drink with her.”[3] Also present at the Cliveden party were Profumo’s wife and the fashionable osteopath, Dr Stephen Ward, a long-standing acquaintance of Keeler. The relationship with Keeler lasted only a few weeks before Profumo ended it. However, rumours about the affair became public in 1962, as did the allegation that Keeler had also had a relationship with Yevgeny “Eugene” Ivanov, a senior naval attaché at the Sovietembassy in London. Given Profumo’s position in the government and with the Cold War at its height, the potential ramifications in terms of national security were grave, and this, along with the adulterous nature of Profumo’s relationship with Keeler, quickly elevated the affair into a public scandal.
Exposure of the affair
In 1962, Keeler became involved in an altercation with her former live-in lover Johnny Edgecombe. When she announced the end of their relationship, a confrontation followed 10 days before Christmas 1962. Edgecombe attempted to force his way into Stephen Ward’s flat where Keeler was staying and fired several shots at the doorlock. Meanwhile, Keeler had become involved with a Jamaican drug dealer named Aloysius “Lucky” Gordon. When that relationship ended Gordon attacked her with an axe and held her hostage for two days. Keeler turned to Edgecombe for help and in the ensuing fight between him and Gordon, the latter received a knife wound to his face. Fearful of reprisals from Gordon, Edgecombe asked Keeler to help him find a solicitor so that he could turn himself in. She refused and instead told him that she intended to give evidence against Edgecombe in court for wounding Gordon. As a result of her refusal, Edgecombe hatched a plot to murder Keeler. Three months later, when she failed to turn up in court for Edgecombe’s trial, previous press suspicions boiled over and the affair became front page news with headlines like “WAR MINISTER SHOCK”.[4]
Announcement in Parliament
In March 1963, Profumo stated to the House of Commons that there was “no impropriety whatever” in his relationship with Keeler and that he would issue writs for libel and slander if the allegations were repeated outside the House.[5] (Within the House, such allegations are protected by Parliamentary privilege.) However, in June, Profumo confessed that he had misled the House and lied in his testimony and on 5 June, he resigned his Cabinet position, as well as his Privy Council and Parliamentary membership.
Peter Wright, in his autobiography Spycatcher,[6] relates that he was working at the British counter-intelligenceagencyMI5 at the time and was assigned to question Keeler on security matters. He conducted a fairly lengthy interview and found Keeler to be poorly educated and not well informed on current events, very much the “party girl” described in the press at the time. However, in the course of questioning her, the subject of nuclear missiles came up, and Keeler, on her own, used the term “nuclear payload” in relation to the missiles. This alerted Wright’s suspicions. According to Wright, in the very early 1960s in Britain, the term “nuclear payload” was not in general use by the public, and even among those who kept up with such things, the term was not commonly heard. For a young woman with such limited knowledge to casually use the term was more than suspicious. In fact, Wright came away convinced that at the very least there had been an attempt by the Soviet attaché (perhaps through Stephen Ward) to use Keeler to get classified information from Profumo.
Lord Denning released the government’s official report on 25 September 1963, and, one month later, the prime minister, Harold Macmillan, resigned on the grounds of ill health, which had apparently been exacerbated by the scandal. He was replaced by the Foreign Secretary, the Earl of Home, who renounced his title to become Sir Alec Douglas-Home. However, the change of leader failed to save the Conservative Party’s place in government; they lost the general election to Harold Wilson’sLabour a year later.
Stephen Ward was prosecuted for living on the immoral earnings of prostitution and he committed suicide in August. He was defended by James BurgeQC (who was later the basis for John Mortimer‘s character Rumpole of the Bailey). Keeler was found guilty on unrelated perjury charges and was sentenced to nine months in prison.[7] Profumo died on 9 March 2006.
The Profumo Affair in film and theatre
The relationship between a senior politician and a prostitute[2] caught the public imagination and led to the release of a number of films and documentaries detailing the event. The Danish film The Keeler Affair[8] was released in 1963 followed in 1989 by the British film Scandal. The musical A Model Girl premiered at The Greenwich Theatre on 30 January 2007.[9] In theatre Hugh Whitemore‘s playA Letter of Resignation, first staged at the Comedy Theatre in October 1997, dramatises the occasion when Harold Macmillan, staying with friends in Scotland, received a political bombshell, a letter of resignation from Profumo, his war minister. Edward Fox portrayed Macmillan. [10][11]
The Profumo Affair in popular music
The Song “Christine” by “Miss X” (a pseudonym of Joyce Blair) in 1963 is said to be about Christine Keeler and the Profumo Affair.[12][citation needed]
Adam Ant referenced the Profumo scandal in a song called “High Heels In High Places”.
American folk singer Phil Ochs wrote and recorded a song about the affair, “Christine Keeler”, in 1963. It is available on The Broadside Tapes 1, released in 1989.[13]
MICHAEL JACKSON BEING RUSHED FROM HIS RESIDENCE TO HOSPITAL ON JUNE 25TH 2009 AFTER COLLAPSING
He didn’t even have time to close his eyes: The final indignity for Jacko as jury at doctor’s trial sees shocking deathbed picture
Jackson’s personal physician Dr Conrad Murray is charged with involuntary manslaughter
Prosecutor shows jury photo of singer on gurney after his death and plays disturbing audio of him slurring a month before death
Accuses Dr Murray of delaying call to 911 as he tries to revive Jackson
Defence claims that Jackson killed himself
First witness, choreographer Kenny Ortega, says Jackson ‘wasn’t right’ during rehearsals
Tour manager Paul Gongaware says Dr Murray initially demanded $5million a year to care for performer
Jackson’s parents and siblings Janet, La Toya, Tito, Randy and Jermaine in court
Woman stopped as she rushes towards Dr Murray in courthouse corridor
Millions around the world expected to watch trial
The highly anticipated trial into the death of Michael Jackson opened with an extraordinary moment yesterday as the prosecutor started his opening remarks by displaying a photo of the singer’s dead body.
As Dr Conrad Murray appeared before the jury charged with involuntary manslaughter over Jackson’s death more than two years ago, deputy district attorney David Walgren displayed the picture that appeared to show tape or tubing over Jackson’s face.
But the doctor’s attorney Ed Chernoff told the jury it was the singer who caused his own death by swallowing a ‘perfect storm’ of drugs.
‘He died so fast he did not even have time to close his eyes.’ he said.
Outside the Los Angeles courthouse, fans of the King of Pop faced supporters of Dr Murray waving placards and banners at each other and passers-by. Inside, the whole Jackson family made their way into court for what has been billed as the trial of the century.
This photo of Michael Jackson stretched out on a gurney was shown to the jury on the opening day of the trial. His personal physician, Dr Conrad Murray, is charged with involuntary manslaughter
The trial of Dr Murray, right, will be followed by millions around the globe and TV bosses are expecting the biggest ever ratings for a court hearing
Later, the prosecution played a tape of a healthy-looking Jackson giving his last ever performance – a rehearsal of his hit Earth Song – recorded a day before he died.
The lights in the courtroom were turned off and the singer was shown on a screen performing the track at rehearsals at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, just hours before he passed away.
Jackson’s mother appeared to be in tears watching the clip.
‘Michael Jackson’s death was a homicide,’ Los Angeles deputy district attorney David Walgren told the jury in opening statements.
‘The evidence will show that Michael Jackson literally put his life in the hands of Conrad Murray… Michael Jackson trusted his life to the medical skills of Conrad Murray.
‘The evidence will show that misplaced trust had far too high a price to pay… it cost Michael Jackson his life.’
But Dr Murray’s defence attorney Mr Chernoff told the jury that the singer caused his own death.
Dr Murray wiped tears from his eyes as Mr Chernoff said that the evidence will show that the singer swallowed eight, 2mg pills of Lorazepam and injected himself with a dose of propofol.
This ‘created a perfect storm in his body that killed him instantly,’ Mr Chernoff said.
Mr Chernoff said that Jackson, who was frustrated because he could not sleep and frustrated because his doctor refused to give him a drug that he wanted, ‘did an act that caused his own death’.
Emotional: The prosecution showed the court Jackson’s last performance, a rehearsal of Earth Song, which appeared to bring his mother to tears
Comparison: Prosecutors showed pictures of the singer before and after his death on June 25 2009
Visibly upset: Dr Murray breaks down and has to wipe away tears with a tissue as his defence attorney speaks
Hearing: Dr Murray sits in the courtroom as he hears the evidence put forward in his trial
Disturbing audio: The prosecutor played a recording taken from Dr Murray’s iPhone of the singer slurring and rambling over a month before his death
DR MURRAY’S DEFENCE MISSPELL MICHAEL JACKSON’S NAME
Enlarge As Dr Murray’s defence attorney presented his opening statement, he put up a poster board with Michael Jackson’s name misspelt.
‘How did Micheal Jackson get to this point?’ read the first question on the chart shown behind Ed Chernoff.
The prosecution also made their own spelling mistake on the opening day of the trial. On a slide the word ‘pronounced’ was spelt without the second ‘n’.
‘He died so fast he did not even have time to close his eyes.’ Mr Chernoff said.
Jackson’s parents, his siblings Janet, La Toya, Tito, Randy and Jermaine were all at the courthouse in LA for the opening statements in the trial of the singer’s personal physician, who was the last person to see him alive.
In the prosecution’s opening statements, Mr Walgren insisted that the evidence will show that the ‘acts and omissions of Michael Jackson’s personal doctor Conrad Murray directly led to his premature death at the age of 50’.
Murray ‘repeatedly acted with gross negilience, repeatedly denied appropriate care to his patient Michael Jackson and that is was Dr Murray’s repeated incompetent and unskilled acts that led to Michael Jackson’s death on June 25, 2009,’ Mr Walgren said.
The prosecutor played disturbing audio recorded on Dr Murray’s iPhone of Jackson apparently under the influence of propofol a month before his death.
On the tape, Jackson sounded slurred and confused as he mumbled: ‘We have to be phenomenal… When people leave this show, when people leave my show, I want them to say, “I’ve never seen nothing like this in my life. Go. Go.”‘
Mr Walgren said the audio was evidence that Dr Murray knew what was happening to Jackson and should have discontinued ordering propofol.
Resting place: The bed where the singer was found dead
Protests: Demonstrators gather outside Los Angeles Superior Court during the opening day of Dr Murray’s trial in the death of the pop star
Mr Walgren attempted to paint a picture of the days leading up to the singer’s death.
On June 19 ‘Michael showed up for his rehearsal and he was not in good shape, he was not in good shape at all,’ Mr Walgren said.
‘He had chills, he was trembling… he was rambling.’
Kenny Ortega, the choreographer of Jackson’s proposed This Is It tour, expressed concerns about Jackson, but Dr Murray allegedly told him and others that Jackson was ‘physically and emotionally fine’.
‘Don’t let it be your concern, I am the doctor,’ Dr Murray allegedly said.
The prosecutor also laid out the order of events from inside Jackson’s house on the night that he died.
Mr Walgren accused Dr Murray of failing to call 911 as soon as he realised that there was something wrong with Jackson.
Dr Murray listens intently as his trial gets under way
He said that an emergency call was not made until 12:20pm, at least 24 minutes after Dr Murray is believed to have discovered Jackson unconscious.
The prosecutors claimed that phone records showed that Jackson was left unattended for too long.
‘It will be clear that Conrad Murray abandoned Michael when he needed help,’ Mr Walgren said.
‘It was Conrad Murray’s gross negligence, it was Conrad Murray’s unskilled hands and his desire to obtain this lucrative contract of $150,000 a month that led Dr Murray to not only abandon his patient, but to abandon all principles of medical care.’
Singer Janet Jackson and Randy Jackson arrive at the courthouse holding hands
On trial: Dr Murray arriving for the first day of the LA hearing
MEDIC WAS ‘ADORED BY JACKSON CHILDREN PRINCE AND PARIS’
He is the man accused of neglecting and killing their father. But Prince Michael and Paris Jackson actually thought that Conrad Murray was a ‘godsend’ who really cared for him, it has been claimed.
It is thought Prince could be called to the stand to give evidence. Sources quoted by U.S. gossip website RadarOnline said the 14 and 13 year-old had a high opinion of Murray before he alleged killed Michael Jackson.
Only later did they change their mind and come to the conclusion he was a bad man. If there is evidence to back this up it could hamper the testimony that the boys reportedly want to give.
‘Prince and Paris adored Murray and thought he was a godsend for their father,’ the source said. ‘It was only after their father’s death that they formed a subsequent opinion of him. Both Prince and Paris could take the stand and wind up providing evidence which supports the doctor.’
Should Prince give evidence he will tell the jury of the moment he saw his father lying dead on his bed as Murray tried to revive him. But he will also be open to cross examination by the doctor’s defence team who could seek to look back at instances in the past where they got on.
Mr Walgren also showed images of Jackson’s bedroom to show how medical monitoring devices typically used when someone is under anesthesia were not there or appeared unused.
A blood pressure cuff was still in a box and an oxygen tank had no oxygen, Mr Walgren said.
But as the defence made their opening statements, Murray wiped away tears as Mr Chernoff described the doctor and Jackson as ‘friends first’.
‘Dr Murray is no celebrity doctor. He is a cardiologist. He literally saves lives. That’s who he is,’ Mr Chernoff said.
He said that on the day he died, Jackson had told Murray that he not slept for 10 hours and that if he did not sleep he would not be able to rehearse and would disappoint his fans.
Dr Murray agreed to give him a 25 mg injection of propofol mixed with lidocaine.
Mr Chernoff said that such a small dose would ‘dissipate in ten minutes’.
He said that the amount found in Jackson’s body, more than 100 mgs, was consistent with major invasive surgery and was administered by Jackson himself.
Jackson ‘self-administered an additional dose of propofol and it killed him like that, there was no way to save him,’ said Mr Chernoff.
His death was a tragedy, he added, but Murray is not responsible. Murray is ‘not perfect… but in this criminal court, we believe he is not guilty,’ he added.
The evidence:
Choreographer Kenny Ortega says Jackson ‘wasn’t right’ at rehearsals
‘Not stable’: Choreographer Kenny Ortega told the court Jackson was not right physically or mentally a week before his death
Jackson’s choreographer and friend Kenny Ortega, the first witness called, testified that the singer was in bad shape physically and mentally less than a week before his death.
He said he sent an email to Randy Phillips, producer of the ‘This Is It’ concert, telling him that Jackson was ill, should probably have a psychological evaluation and was not ready to perform.
‘It’s important for everyone to know he really wants this,’ he wrote. ‘It would shatter him, break his heart if we pulled the plug. He’s terribly frightened it’s all going to go away.’
In response to the email, said Ortega, a meeting was called at Jackson’s house where Ortega clashed with Murray, who told him to stop playing amateur psychiatrist and doctor.
‘He [Murray] said Michael was physically and emotionally capable of handling all his responsibilities for the show,’ said Ortega. ‘I was shocked. Michael didn’t seem to be physically or emotionally stable.’
Within a few days, he said, Jackson had recouped his energy and was full of enthusiasm for the show.
On June 25, Ortega received a phone call from producer Paul Gongaware saying an ambulance had taken Michael to the hospital.
Gongaware called later and told Ortega: ‘We lost him.’
Dr Murray demanded $5million a year to be Jackson’s physician
Paul Gongaware, who was managing Jackson’s This Is It tour, said Dr Murray initially demanded $5million a year to be the singer’s personal physician.
Gongaware, who worked with Jackson on his Dangerous and History tours, told prosecutors the singer made the specific request to have Dr Murray brought on board.
‘He wanted to hire Dr Murray,’ said Gongaware who is AEG Live’s Co-CEO, adding that Jackson called his body a ‘machine’ that needed to be taken care of.
Demands: Tour manager Paul Gongaware said Dr Murray initially wanted $5m to be Jackson’s physician
Gongaware told the court: ‘I didn’t know Dr Murray at all – and we were going to London. My preference would have been to hire someone who was licensed there. Who knew what was going on.
‘I called Dr Murray – to try to make a deal with him. He wanted to do it. I asked him what he wanted. He said that he had four clinics that he had to close, in Houston, Las Vegas, San Diego and Hawaii; that he would have to lay off people – so he said he needed $5million a year to do that.
‘I told him there was no way that was going to happen. Michael couldn’t afford it. I ended the negotiations.’
Jackson then brought up the issue again. His assistant, Michael Amir Williams, called Gongaware to tell him.
‘I heard Michael Jackson in the car saying, “Offer him 150, offer him 150.”‘ Gongaware took that to mean $150,000 a month.
‘I called Dr Murray. I said to him I’m authorised to offer you 150 a month,’ Gongaware said. ‘He said, “No I really couldn’t do it for that”. I cut him off mid-sentence and said, “That offer comes directly from the artist.” Without missing a beat he said, “I’ll take it.”‘
Gongaware also revealed that there were so many fans clamouring for O2 tickets that Jackson could have sold out his 50-concerts in London twice over.
Gongaware said Jackson was initially contracted to play 31 dates at the arena, a number chosen because of his long-time rivalry with the artist Prince.
‘Prince did 21 shows at the O2 and Michael wanted to do ten more,’ said Gongaware.
He said 10 shows were initially put on sale and they ‘sold out instantly.’ The number of concerts was eventually re-contracted for 50.
‘More than 250,000 people were still in the queue after the 50 shows sold out. That would have been enough to sell out another 50 shows.’
Tape of Jackson’s slurred and confused words
Prosecutors played an audio recording of the pop superstar slurring his words and talking about his upcoming concerts.
Prosecutor David Walgren told jurors the audio from May 10 2009, over a month before Jackson’s death, was retrieved from Dr Conrad Murray’s cell phone.
Jackson’s voice was unrecognisable on the recording. He was speaking slowly and Walgren described the singer as highly under the influence during the conversation.
It was the first time the audio was disclosed or played in public.
‘We have to be phenomenal… When people leave this show, when people leave my show, I want them to say, “I’ve never seen nothing like this in my life. Go. Go,”‘ Jackson is heard saying.
‘”It’s amazing. He’s the greatest entertainer in the world. I’m taking the money, a million children, children’s hospital, the biggest in the world, Michael Jackson’s Children’s Hospital,”‘ the singer is heard rambling.
Walgren used the audio to bolster his point that Murray should have known better than to continue giving Jackson the powerful anaesthetic propofol, which was cited as a cause of Jackson’s death.
Propofol: ‘The drug that killed Jacko’
Central to the prosecution’s case is that Dr Conrad Murray administered a lethal dose of the drug propofol to Michael Jackson on the night he died and then left the room, during which time the singer stopped breathing.
They charge that Murray gave the star a lethal dose of the sedative, which the singer frequently used as a sleeping aid, calling it his ‘milk’ which he needed for his nightly battle with insomnia. But prosecutor David Walgren told the jury that propofol is ‘not a sleep aid or a sleep agent, it is a general anaesthetic’.
He continued: ‘It’s a wonderful drug if used by someone who knows what he is doing, who knows the dangers as well as the benefits.’ It should under no circumstances be given outside a hospital setting.
Dr Conrad Murray did not mention propofol to emergency room doctors at UCLA Medical Centre when asked what pop star Michael Jackson had been given, according to the prosecution.
Prosecutors allege that Murray gave the star a lethal dose of the sedative, which the singer frequently used as a sleeping aid, calling it his ¿milk¿ which he needed for his nightly battle with insomnia
In his opening statement, Mr Walgren told the jury that between 6 April, 2009, and the day of Jackson’s death on June 25, Murray ordered enough propofol to give Jackson 1,937 milligrams a day.
The prosecution then focused on the uses and settings for which propoful should be used, noting that it is an ‘improper treatment of insomnia’. Mr Walgren mentions the correct equipment that should be utilised when administering propofol – which is done intravenously – and the complications that can arise when this does not happen.
District deputy attorney David Walgren gives his opening statement for the prosecution
Defence lawyers claim Murray had been trying to wean Jackson off propofol and gave him only a minimal dosage.
They claim the singer, desperate for sleep, swallowed an additional dose of the drug when his doctor was out of the room.
Their theory is based on evidence that a trace amount of propofol was found in Jackson’s stomach.
Medical witnesses may be asked to explain how it could have been found in his stomach, as ingesting it orally is almost unheard of.
The drug is used to reduce anxiety and tension, and promotes relaxation and sleep or loss of consciousness. Propofol provides loss of awareness for short diagnostic tests and surgical procedures, sleep at the beginning of surgery, and supplements other types of general anaesthetics. Long-term use of the drug can result in addiction. The steep dose-response curve of the drug makes potential misuse very dangerous without proper monitoring.
Side effects of the drug include: difficulty breathing, wheezing, fast heartbeat, palpitations, seizures, uncontrollable muscle spasm and swelling or extreme pain at the injection site.
Jackson’s final hours
Prosecutors say that Murray made a number of phone calls between 10:20 and 11:51am the morning of Jackson’s death. He is believed to have discovered the star unconscious at about 11.56am but he did not tell anyone to call 911 until 12.20pm.
During his last phone call – to a cocktail waitress who Murray regarded as his girlfriend – he suddenly became silent and the phone went dead.
‘This is likely the time Conrad Murray first noticed Michael Jackson’s lifeless body,’ prosecutor David Walgren said.
The cocktail waitress made a statement that Murray stopped responding to her and then five minutes later the phone went dead.
The court was shown pictures from inside Jackson’s home. The central image shows the last jacket he wore lying on his bathroom floor
It was not until 12.12pm that Murray called Jackson’s personal assistant Michael Williams and left a message saying: ‘Call me right away, please. Please call me right away. Thank you.’ When Mr Williams immediately called Murray back he told him: ‘Get here right away Mr Jackson had a bad reaction, he had a bad reaction’, according to prosecutors.
He had yet to call 911 at this point.
Mr Williams then called security guard Albert Alvarez to go and investigate and he said that when he entered Jackson’s room, he was lying on the bed and Dr Murray was administering CPR.
According to the prosecution, Murray then ordered the security guard to grab a bag while he started grabbing vials and a saline bag hanging from the IV stand to put inside the bag.
That bag was later found inside Jackson’s home.
The rented Los Angeles home where the singer was found unconscious
Prosecutors also say the doctor ordered someone to clean up signs that Jackson had been receiving a variety of medications, including propofol, and that he improperly monitored Jackson’s vital signs, performed inadequate CPR and did not inform emergency medical personnel that he had given the singer propofol.
A recorded conversation that Murray had two days after Jackson’s death was played where Murray can be heard saying that he gave his patient a small dose of propofol and then left him for 15 minutes to go to the bathroom.
‘Then I came back to his bedside and was shocked because he wasn’t breathing,’ he says in the audio recorded on June 27. Prosecutors allege that he was gone for a lot longer.
At 12.30, paramedics arrived at his home and treated Jackson for 42 minutes before transporting him to nearby Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.
He arrived at 1.14pm and a team of doctors tried for more than an hour to resuscitate him. He was declared dead at 2.26pm with members of his family by his side.
Jackson ‘killed himself after doctor tried to wean him off drugs’
Dr Murray’s attorney alleges that Jackson had given himself the propofol that killed him
Dr Murray’s defence attorney said that Michael Jackson gave himself the drugs that killed him because the doctor refused.
Ed Chernoff told the jury that Jackson did not die because of Murray’s treatment, but because ‘Dr Murray stopped’ giving him the drugs he demanded.
He said that when Murray started working for Jackson, the singer was already using propofol and said he could only sleep if he was given it.
Jackson said he had always taken what he called ‘his milk’ while on tour.
The defence attorney said that Murray had administered the drug because he was concerned about the drug and believed that the singer would find a way to get it anyway.
He said that Murray was trying to wean Jackson off propofol at the time of he death and that he had refused to give it to the singer on the day he died because it was the third day of the weaning off process.
Mr Chernoff said that Jackson swallowed 8, 2 mg pills of Lorazepam and injected himself with a dose of propofol, while Murray was out of the room.
This ‘created a perfect storm in his body that killed him instantly,’ Mr Chernoff said.
Outside court: People both for and against Dr Murray gathered by the courthouse in Los Angeles
Fans: Michael Jackson impersonator Goward Horton poses for the media outside the courthouse
Millions of people around the world are expected to watch as the trial gives a glimpse into final days of the King of Pop.
Crowds of people gathered at the Los Angeles Superior Court where there was a lottery drawn for seats for the opening statements.
Supporters of both Dr Murray, 57, and Jackson are outside the courthouse with signs including, ‘Fair trial for Dr Murray’ and ‘Doctors are expected to heal not kill’.
A woman had to be stopped by court officers as she rushed towards Dr Murray as he walked in a courthouse corridor. She reportedly said she just wanted to speak to the doctor, it is not clear if she has been detained.
The list of potential witnesses includes his eldest children Prince Michael and Paris, who have reportedly said that they want to take to the stand to testify.
Sister: La Toya Jackson arrives with a sunflower during the opening day of Dr Conrad Murray’s trial
Relatives: The Jackson Family, including mother Katherine Jackson and father Joe Jackson, arrive at the Criminal Courts Building in Downtown Los Angeles
Brother: Jermaine Jackson arrives during the opening day of Dr Conrad Murray’s trial
RATINGS WINNER: MILLIONS TO WATCH TRIAL ACROSS GLOBE
People around the world are expected to watch as the public hears for the first time from Dr Murray what happened in the events leading to Michael Jackson’s death.
The trial is expected to be attended by Jackson’s high-profile family, including his parents and sisters Janet and La Toya, and stars such as High School Musical choreographer Kenny Ortega, who is expected to be the first witness to be called.
Cable news networks are hoping that the court proceedings will be a repeat of the Casey Anthony trial, which proved a ratings success.
News network HLN, which saw record ratings during the trial of the Florida mother, is planning similarly exhaustive coverage of the case, including analysis from Nancy Grace, who has been thrust into the spotlight.
Medical examiners have determined Jackson’s death at the age of 50 on June 25 2009, at his rented Los Angeles mansion was due to an overdose of the powerful anaesthetic propofol and sedatives.
Prosecutors say Murray caused Jackson’s death by giving him propofol as a sleep aid, and failing to monitor him properly.
Murray denies the charge of involuntary manslaughter but faces a prison sentence of up to four years if convicted.
His defence team is expected to argue that Jackson was addicted to various painkillers and sedatives and gave himself the fatal dose of propofol, possibly by swallowing it.
Ed Chernoff, the lead attorney for Murray, said in closed-door arguments on Monday that Jackson, 50, was ‘desperate’ around the time of his death.
‘We think that Michael Jackson was involved in certain acts that ended his own life,’ Chernoff said, according to a court transcript.
The trial is expected to hear testimony from the paramedics who transported Jackson to the hospital, medical experts, Jackson’s choreographer and Murray’s girlfriends.
Celebrity attorney Mark Geragos, who once represented Jackson and has closely watched the criminal case against Murray, said that Jackson’s 13-year-old daughter Paris might also be called to testify, in what would likely be one of the most dramatic moments of the trial.
Defence: Dr Conrad Murray’s attorney J Michael Flannigan arrives at the Los Angeles Superior Court during the opening day of Murray’s trial
Their say: Paris and Prince Jackson, pictured with younger brother Blanket at their father’s memorial service, want to give their account of the day their father died
Trial: Supporters at the late pop star Michael Jackson hold signs outside Los Angeles Superior Court
WHO IS DR CONRAD MURRAY?
The 57-year old physician, who was the last person to see Michael Jackson alive, has been charged with the involuntary manslaughter of the singer on June 25 2009.
The doctor was hired by Jackson for a reported fee of $150,000 as he prepared for his 50 date concert series in London.
The Grenada-born cardiologist, who was educated in the U.S., first met Jackson in 2006 when he treated one of the singer’s children in Las Vegas.
In May 2009, he took leave from his practice and wrote a letter to his patients saying he was leaving ‘because of a once in a lifetime opportunity’.
Murray declined to offer public comment following the death of Jackson, but in August last year posted a YouTube video in which he said ‘truth will prevail’.
‘She not only has things to say, but she can say it in a compelling way,’ Mr Geragos said. Paris Jackson was at the house when the singer stopped breathing.
Jackson’s children, Prince Michael, 14, and Paris, 13, have both reportedly told their grandmother Katherine of their desire to want to testify.
But a source close to the Jackson family revealed to RadarOnline that the children have warm recollections of the medic, which could help the jury clear the doctor.
They wrote: ‘Prince and Paris adored Dr Murray and thought he was a godsend for their father.
‘It was only after their father’s death that they formed a subsequent opinion of him. Both Prince and Paris could take the stand and wind up providing evidence which supports the doctor.’
What could be even more damaging to prosecutors, however, is if the children are cross-examined about their father’s long-term drug use.
‘Prince and Paris knew their dad relied on Dr Murray to survive and knew their father adored him,’ the source said.
‘Their comments could save him from jail because it would work well in the eyes of a jury.’
The insider told RadarOnline that Prince, if he testifies, will tell the court what he saw when he walked into his father’s bedroom in the middle of his doctor’s doomed attempts to revive him.
Worldwide interest: Journalists position themselves outside the courthouse as the trial begins in Los Angeles
Crowds: Demonstrators for and against make their case as the involuntary manslaughter trial for Dr Conrad Murray
Murray has insisted Prince Michael and Paris were bundled from the room after the star’s daughter burst into tears and screamed ‘Daddy’.
Their aunt LaToya, who believes her brother was unlawfully killed, has said it would be good for the children to, ‘Get what is inside them, out of them.’
‘She feels it is a way for them to release the hurt,’ the source told RadarOnline. ‘She believes her brother was murdered and what Prince Michael and Paris could tell the jury, would inevitably help convict the doctor.’
Prince Michael, Paris and Blanket were all included on a potential witness list passed out to the jurors in an attempt to ascertain their familiarity with the family.
Death: Jackson was preparing for a 50 date concert at the O2 in London when he died
Home: Jackson went into cardiac arrest at this rented house in LA
First on the stand: High School Musical director Kenny Ortega, who was choreographing Jackson’s ‘This is it’ tour is expected to be called today
Also listed were siblings Janet, LaToya, Jermaine, Marlon, Rebbie, Tito and Randy as well as parents Katherine and Joe Jackson.
The case is one of a small but growing number of U.S. criminal prosecutions of doctors for alleged malpractice.
Mr Geragos said he believes prosecutors could have a difficult time winning a conviction – and that a hung jury with no conviction or acquittal is more likely.
‘Jurors are loathe to convict doctors in this type of a situation,’ Mr Geragos said, adding that many times jurors don’t want to second-guess doctors.
The responses of the 12-person jury to written questionnaires made public last week shows that none of them reported having a negative experience with doctors.
At the time of his death, Jackson was readying himself for 50 planned shows in London called ‘This Is It.’
The first prosecution witness is expected to be High School Musical director Kenny Ortega, the choreographer who was hired to stage the London shows and who was conducting rehearsals with Jackson in Los Angeles.
THE 12 PEOPLE THAT WILL DECIDE WHAT REALLY HAPPENED TO JACKSON
Juror No. 1: Mexican male, 51, U.S. Postal Service letter carrier, married father-of-five. A Michael Jackson fan who said he finds law enforcement officers, firefighters and doctors ‘always believable’.
Juror No. 2: Spanish female, 57, unemployed. Has served on five previous juries and closely followed the O.J. Simpson trial but said it did not affect her opinion of the criminal justice system. She does not consider herself a Jackson fan.
Juror No. 3: American male, 45, a partner in a management consulting firm. His wife is a former registered nurse, and both his brother-in-law and cousin are physicians. He has served on two previous juries, including a murder case in 1994.
Juror No. 4: American male, 32, part-time bookseller and cashier. He served as a U.S. Army National Guard specialist as a telecom operator. His primary source of news is the Internet.
Juror No. 5: American female, 48, paralegal. She watched the Casey Anthony murder trial ‘on and off’ because family members were interested was very interested but said it did not affect her opinion of the criminal justice system.
Juror No. 6: Cuban/Mexican male, 39, associate director of product management. He is an occasional reader of various Internet news and gossip sites. He considers himself a Jackson fan and owns various Michael Jackson, Jackson 5 and Janet Jackson CDs.
Juror No. 7: Mexican American female, 57, relocation representative in office management/customer service. She followed the Casey Anthony case and believes people of wealth or fame are treated differently in the court system.
Juror No. 8: Mexican male, 42, school bus driver. He believes Hollywood celebrities get away with crimes because of their status. He does not consider himself a fan of Michael Jackson but has a positive opinion of him.
Juror No. 9: African American male, 54, television technical director. A Michael Jackson fan, he has served on two criminal juries and one civil jury.
Juror No. 10: English female, 43, international marketer but previously worked as a pathology/medical technician in a biochemistry lab.
Juror No. 11: Hispanic female, 36, customer service representative. She reads People magazine and TMZ.com and watches reality television. She was shot in a drive-by shooting in 1993.
Juror No. 12: American male, 54, retired animator now working as a teacher. He considers Michael Jackson a ‘gifted performer’ and has owned Jackson CDs and albums since he was a teenager.
Key players: The figures at the centre of the trial
Dr Conrad Murray, defendant
A 58 year-old cardiologist who practiced in Las Vegas and Houston, Murray was hired as Jackson’s $150,000 a month personal physician roughly a month before the pop superstar’s death in June 2009.
Authorities contend Murray, who had financial difficulties before the singer’s death, administered a lethal dose of the anesthetic propofol mixed with other sedatives.
The doctor, who was never paid, has pleaded not guilty and faces up to four years in prison and will lose his medical license if convicted.
Ed Chernoff, defence attorney
A Houston-based defense attorney working his first high-profile case, Chernoff has been Murray’s primary defense attorney since shortly after Jackson’s death. He represented the doctor during a meeting with police during which Murray disclosed that he had given Jackson propofol. Prosecutors plan to use the statements against Murray during trial.
Chernoff has maintained that Murray did not administer anything to Jackson that should have killed him.
David Walgren, prosecutor
A deputy district attorney in the major crimes division, Walgren is the lead prosecutor in the Murray case.
He has painted Murray as an incompetent doctor who initially tried to conceal that he had been giving the singer the anesthetic propofol without proper lifesaving equipment.
He was previously responsible for the district attorney’s effort to return director Roman Polanski to Los Angeles for sentencing in a three-decades old rape case. Switzerland eventually refused to extradite Polanski, which placed the case on hold.
Michael Jackson
Jackson’s death at age 50 in June 2009 stunned the world and gave the entertainer, posthumously, what he wanted – a comeback.
Hundreds of millions of dollars in debt at the time of his death and his reputation still tarnished by unproven child molestation accusations, Jackson’s estate has gone on to earn more than $310 million.
Jurors won’t hear about his shaky finances or references to his alleged drug abuse, but they will see footage of some of the singer’s final rehearsals and hear from some of the people were with him in his final days.
J Michael Flanagan, defence attorney
A Los Angeles criminal defence attorney who specialises in drunk driving cases, Flanagan also has the distinction of winning an acquittal for a nurse accused of improperly giving propofol to a patient who died.
He represented Britney Spears in a driver’s license case that was dropped after a jury deadlocked on the case, and has dealt with numerous scientific and testing issues related to Murray’s defense.
Judge Michael Pastor
A well-respected Los Angeles Superior Court Judge since 1983, Pastor is one of several judges who presides over the most serious criminal cases in Los Angeles.
He has previously handled a drunken driving case against actor Jason Priestly and a case against a man accused of stalking Olympic gold medalist Shawn Johnson.
He has consistently that Murray’s trial will focus on Jackson’s final days and hours and has prohibited the doctor’s lawyers from introducing evidence about the singer’s addiction or financial woes.
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Emotional: The prosecution showed the court Jackson’s last performance, a rehearsal of Earth Song, which appeared to bring his mother to tears
Comparison: Prosecutors showed pictures of the singer before and after his death on June 25 2009
Visibly upset: Dr Murray breaks down and has to wipe away tears with a tissue as his defence attorney speaks
Disturbing audio: The prosecutor played a recording taken from Dr Murray’s iPhone of the singer slurring and rambling over a month before his death
Resting place: The bed where the singer was found dead
Protests: Demonstrators gather outside Los Angeles Superior Court during the opening day of Dr Murray’s trial in the death of the pop star
Dr Murray listens intently as his trial gets under way
Singer Janet Jackson and Randy Jackson arrive at the courthouse holding hands
On trial: Dr Murray arriving for the first day of the LA hearing
‘Not stable’: Choreographer Kenny Ortega told the court Jackson was not right physically or mentally a week before his death
Demands: Tour manager Paul Gongaware said Dr Murray initially wanted $5m to be Jackson’s physician
Prosecutors allege that Murray gave the star a lethal dose of the sedative, which the singer frequently used as a sleeping aid, calling it his ¿milk¿ which he needed for his nightly battle with insomnia
District deputy attorney David Walgren gives his opening statement for the prosecution
The court was shown pictures from inside Jackson’s home. The central image shows the last jacket he wore lying on his bathroom floor
The rented Los Angeles home where the singer was found unconscious
Dr Murray’s attorney alleges that Jackson had given himself the propofol that killed him
Fans: Michael Jackson impersonator Goward Horton poses for the media outside the courthouse
Brother: Jermaine Jackson arrives during the opening day of Dr Conrad Murray’s trial
Defence: Dr Conrad Murray’s attorney J Michael Flannigan arrives at the Los Angeles Superior Court during the opening day of Murray’s trial
Their say: Paris and Prince Jackson, pictured with younger brother Blanket at their father’s memorial service, want to give their account of the day their father died
Trial: Supporters at the late pop star Michael Jackson hold signs outside Los Angeles Superior Court
The 57-year old physician, who was the last person to see Michael Jackson alive, has been charged with the involuntary manslaughter of the singer on June 25 2009.
Worldwide interest: Journalists position themselves outside the courthouse as the trial begins in Los Angeles
Crowds: Demonstrators for and against make their case as the involuntary manslaughter trial for Dr Conrad Murray
Death: Jackson was preparing for a 50 date concert at the O2 in London when he died
Home: Jackson went into cardiac arrest at this rented house in LA
First on the stand: High School Musical director Kenny Ortega, who was choreographing Jackson’s ‘This is it’ tour is expected to be called today
THE CRIME THROUGH TIME COLLECTION .... HERE AT LITTLEDEAN JAIL, FOREST OF DEAN , GLOUCESTERSHIRE, UK 