In 1975, a shadowy predator stalked the streets of northern England, murdering 13 women in a spree of violence that shocked the nation. Over the span of five years, fear rapidly grew as he evaded capture, striking again and again while police struggled to stop him.
When he was finally arrested in 1981, detectives uncovered a chilling account of how he justified his crimes. Hiding in plain sight as a husband and a lorry driver in a close-knit community was Peter Sutcliffe, the serial killer known as the “Yorkshire Ripper”.
Who is Peter Sutcliffe?
Peter William Sutcliffe was born in Shipley, West Yorkshire, on June 2, 1946, to parents John William Sutcliffe and Kathleen Coonan and was one of six siblings. According to The Standard: “Sutcliffe’s parents had an exceptionally unhappy marriage.
“His father was a violent man and a drunkard, who once smashed a glass over Sutcliffe’s head on Christmas for sitting in his chair. Sutcliffe was five at the time.”
Due to this, Peter greatly admired his mother. Kathleen was raised in Connemara, Ireland, and was a Roman Catholic. She raised her children in the faith, and Peter even served as an altar boy.
At 15, Peter left school and worked a series of jobs in the Bradford area, including two stints as a gravedigger, ITV News reported. In a report shared on Gov.UK, during the years of his admitted crimes, Peter was first employed as a tyre fitter and then as a heavy goods vehicle driver, and finally as a lorry driver.
He married Sonia Szurma on 10 April 1974. The pair initially lived at her parents’ home in Clayton before moving on September 26, 1977, to a detached house he bought in Heaton, Bradford.
Speaking on Channel 5’s documentary series, Crimes That Shook Britain (2013), his brother Carl described him growing up as a “really nice guy”, much like a “father-figure.” He then went on to say: “We used to socialise, not too often because there was a big age gap between us.
“Occasionally, I would go grab a pint with him, and he would take me around seedy bars in Bradford, always having his eye open for other women, which was quite bizarre as he hadn’t been married very long, and he was always trying to look out for the girls, but he never mentioned doing anything violent to them. He used to say ‘she’s a bit of alright’ like most, I suppose, blokes do.”
According to ITV, Peter’s violence began in Bradford in 1969, when he struck a sex worker with a stone concealed in a sock. She survived and chose not to press charges. Six years later, he attacked Anna Rogulskyj with a hammer, slashing her abdomen, and fled only after being disturbed by a neighbour.
In 1975, he assaulted two more victims, including 14-year-old Tracy Browne, who was left needing brain surgery. Later that year, he carried out his first murder.
Horrifying murders
In 1975. Peter had claimed his first two victims, Wilma McCann and Emily Jackson, in Chapeltown, then known as Leeds’ main red-light district, reported the BBC.
Peter’s attacks were brutal; he used a variety of tools and methods, though he almost always began his attacks by striking victims from behind with a hammer to incapacitate them.
Wilma McCann, a mother of four, was struck on the head with a hammer and stabbed multiple times on a football field just 90 metres from her home. She was discovered the next morning by a milkman. Three months later, Emily Jackson was found dead in a factory field in the same city, with multiple stab wounds.
He was first dubbed the “prostitute killer” by police, who thought the serial killer was only after sex workers. This then changed after the death of 16-year-old Jayne MacDonald.
On June 26, 1977, in Leeds, Jayne was walking home from a night out when Sutcliffe followed her to a local playground on Reginald Street. He struck her three times on the head with a hammer, causing her to collapse, then dragged her about 20 yards into the darkness of the playground.
There, he stabbed her over 20 times in the chest and back. According to Crime and Investigation, the timeline of murders is as follows:
30 October 1975: Wilma McCann, 28, Leeds 20 January 1976: Emily Jackson, 42, Leeds 11 February 1977: Irene Richardson, 28, Leeds 23 April 1977: Patricia Atkinson, 32, Bradford 26 June 1977: Jayne MacDonald, 16, Leeds 1 October 1977: Jean Jordan, 20, Manchester 21 January 1978: Yvonne Pearson, 21, Bradford 31 January 1978: Helen Rytka, 18, Huddersfield 16 May 1978: Vera Millward, 40, Manchester 4 April 1979: Josephine Whitaker, 19, Halifax 2 September 1979: Barbara Leach, 20, Bradford 20 August 1980: Marguerite Walls, 47, Leeds 17 November 1980: Jacqueline Hill, 20, Leeds Horrifying explanation
According to The Guardian: “Sutcliffe escaped justice for so long owing to a mixture of bad luck and incompetent policing, with many early clues missed. A total of 40,000 interviews were conducted during the hunt, and Sutcliffe was interviewed at least five times by the police. But he lied his way out of trouble each time.”
On January 2, 1981, Sutcliffe was arrested after a police officer spotted him with a woman and discovered fake license plates. Initially using the name Peter Williams, Sutcliffe was detained overnight. His blood group B and resemblance to the Ripper profile raised suspicion.
A couple of days later, on January 4, Sutcliffe confessed to his crimes in a 15-hour statement. He claims that back when he was a 20-year-old gravedigger, the voice of God had ordered him to kill prostitutes, as reported by Crime and Investigation.
“After his arrest and confession, he claimed he felt he was on a ‘divine mission’ to eliminate sex workers and that ‘everything was in God’s hands’. He told his brother Carl: ‘I were just cleaning up the streets’,” detailed The Guardian.
When arrested, Sutcliffe hoped claims of insanity would reduce his sentence, but a jury convicted him of 13 murders and seven attempted murders, sentencing him to 20 life terms with a minimum of 30 years.
Diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia in 1984, he was transferred to Broadmoor Hospital, where he retained eccentric habits, including wearing a velvet suit in the visiting room.
In 2009, the High Court ruled he should never be released, a decision upheld on appeal the following year. However, in 2020, at the age of 74, the serial killer passed away after contracting COVID-19.
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