Police: We care deeply for Ripper's victims

Detectives criticised over language in investigation

Twelve of the thirteen victims of Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper. Top row (left to right) Wilma McCann, Emily Jackson, Irene Richardson, Patricia Atkinson, Jayne McDonald and Jean Jordan. Bottom row: Yvonne Pearson, Helen Rytka, Vera Millward, Josephine Whitaker, Barbara Leach and Jacqueline Hill. Pictures: PA 

Retired police officers who worked on the Yorkshire Ripper inquiry have insisted they cared deeply about all the victims despite widespread criticism that misogynistic attitudes clouded the investigation.

Peter Sutcliffe, infamously known as the Yorkshire Ripper and Britain's most notorious killer of the 20th century, died in hospital today aged 74.

Sutcliffe was serving a whole-life tariff for murdering 13 women across Yorkshire and the North West between 1975 and 1980 and had brutally attacked at least seven more, who survived.

Once the most feared man in the country, he died at the University Hospital of North Durham after being transferred there from maximum security HMP Frankland, where he was an inmate. He had tested positive for Covid-19 and was suffering from underlying health conditions including diabetes, heart trouble and obesity. According to reports he had turned down medical treatment for the virus.

Peter William Sutcliffe, the 'Yorkshire Ripper', died in hospital at the age if 74.

Detectives have been criticised alongside journalists and even the attorney general who prosecuted Sutcliffe for dismissing many of those who died as prostitutes. And senior officers' preoccupation that the Ripper was only targeting sex workers is seen as one of the many crucial wrong turns taken in the flawed 1970s investigation.

Richard McCann, the son of Wilma McCann who was murdered by Sutcliffe in 1975, asked West Yorkshire Police for an apology for the language used to refer to his mother 45 years ago.

Mr McCann said that when 16-year-old Jayne MacDonald was killed in 1977, officers referred to her as the first "innocent" victim.

Mr McCann said: "My mum was completely innocent and deserved to live."

At Sutcliffe's trial, prosecutor Michael Havers, who was the attorney general at the time, said: "Some were prostitutes but perhaps the saddest part of the case is that some were not. The last six attacks were on totally respectable women."

Retired detective Roger Parnell, who worked on the Ripper inquiry, rejected accusations the officers "did not care less" about prostitute victims. He told BBC Radio 5Live: "We certainly did, I can assure you we did. These ladies were wives, they were mothers, they were sisters. And the inquiry did not change at the murder of Jayne MacDonald.

"We were all determined from the beginning to catch the perpetrator of all these murders."

Current serving police officers said Sutcliffe was a "monster" who should "rot in hell" after hearing he had died.

Brian Booth, chairman of West Yorkshire Police Federation, said: "On hearing of the death of Peter Sutcliffe today, I feel: good riddance.

The monster who murdered so many innocent women in and around West Yorkshire should rot in hell. He is the very reason most people step to the plate and become police officers — to protect our communities from people like him.

McCann was five when his mother was murdered by Sutcliffe in 1975.

He was left terrified after his mother's killing was followed by that of Jayne MacDonald, who lived in his street. Mr McCann said: "I was convinced as a child, having had no therapy of any description, that he was out there and that he was going to kill me."

He added: "It really affected me. I was ashamed of being associated with Sutcliffe and all his crimes and, possibly to do with the way that lots of people in society looked down, and the police and some of the media — describing some of the women as innocent and some not so innocent.

"I've had to live with that shame for all these years.

"There's only one person that should have felt any shame, although I doubt that he did, and that was Peter Sutcliffe."

Marguerite Walls, the 12th murder victim of Peter Sutcliffe.

Former detective Bob Bridgestock said he was one of the first on the scene when Josephine Whitaker was murdered in 1979.

He told BBC Radio 4: "Peter Sutcliffe wasn't a very intelligent killer, he was just brutal.

"It fits, in my mind, into the likes of [Myra] Hindley and [Ian] Brady and the likes of Robert Black — serial killers who will be detested way after they've gone.

"I've walked with my dog this morning and people have said 'Good news, good riddance', and that's what a lot of people will be thinking about [it]."

He said senior detectives "wore blinkers" while leading the cumbersome inquiry, which got side-tracked by a cruel hoaxer.

It's the victims that served the life sentence and then the victims' families that really serve the true life sentences.

"For them today, they will have some kind of closure."

One of his surviving victims said she was still suffering from the effects of his attack in Leeds, 44 years on.

Marcella Claxton told Sky News: "I have to live with my injuries, 54 stitches in my head, back and front, plus I lost a baby, I was four months pregnant.

"I still get headaches, dizzy spells, and blackouts."

John Apter, chairman of the Police Federation, urged people to remember Sutcliffe's victims.

He tweeted: "The 13 women he murdered and the seven who survived his brutal attacks are in my thoughts."