Ian Brady & Myra Hindley

[cruororism]

Moors Murderers


Kill Total (5)

Ian and Myra met while working for a chemical company in Hyde, Greater Manchester. She thought he was quite an intellectual as he sat in the canteen reading Mein Kampf in German. As their love blossomed they became more obsessed with Nazi paraphernalia, pornography and sadism. At first they enjoyed shooting pictures of themselves in the buff and in S & M drag. They thought they could crack the local porn market with their pictures but failed. Soon they proved to be more successful in child abduction and murder.


Most of their victims were children whom they sexually molested before killing. These sadist lovebirds liked to document their murderous deeds. They kept an extensive collection of photographs of their victims as well as a recording of the screams of one girl's torturous end. In 1966 they were arrested after Ian bragged about his killings to Myra's brother-in-law. When the brother-in-law doubted his ability to kill, Ian smoked a young man right in front of him. The brother-in-law did not react appropriately. Instead of showing admiration, he went to the cops. Twenty years after their arrest, Ian confessed to four new murders the police had never linked to them.


In December 1995, Hindley, who was in the same jail in northern England as fellow serial killer Rosemary West, gave her first public account of her crime spree, admitting she had been wicked and corrupt but claiming she was now a changed woman. Hindley described herself as a political prisoner who was being used as a scapegoat by politicians and the media. The formerly monstrous killer said: "The majority of people don't want to accept that people like myself can change, They prefer to keep me frozen in time together with that awful mug shot so that their attitudes, beliefs and perceptions can remain intact." On February, 1997, her lawyers made a plea to win her release. However, a London Superior Court decreed that Myra will spend the rest of her life behind bars with no possibility of parole.
On May 21 the High Court announced a judicial review of their 1990 decision of imposing a "whole-life" sentence on the aging neo-Nazi convicted killer.

Hindley's lawyers will argue that the decision did not reflect the views of the judge in the case, Mr. Justice Fenton, who recommended only that she serve "a very long time." According to her lawyers the "whole-life" sentence represented an "irrational leap" from the 30-year period fixed by the Home Office in 1985.
On November 21 supporters of Myra called for a review of sentencing procedures after Jack Straw reaffirmed the decision of his predecessor, Michael Howard, of never releasing Myra from prison. The ruling came under immediate attack from penal reformers and civil liberties campaigners.


Lord Longford, who has lobbied for Hindley's release, expressed "total disgust and contempt" and described her as a "good woman". He told BBC Radio 4's Today show: "I am very sorry indeed that a high-minded man, a Christian socialist like Jack Straw should have taken that decision. Of course it's all as a result of the horrifying pressure exerted by the tabloids." Lord Longford said that Hindley had been a good young woman "until she began to work under a very gifted, but mentally disturbed man, Ian Brady. She was an infatuated accomplice 31 years ago".


On October 7, 1998 Myra concluded a hearing at the Court of Appeals trying to overrule her "whole-life tarriff." In her new attempt at overturning her life sentence and win the right to a parole hearing, Hindley claimed that she can prove that she took part in the Moors murders only because Brady abused her, and threatened to kill her mother, grandmother and younger sister.

Freedom seeking Myra alleges that trigger-happy Ian bit, strangled, whipped, drugged and even blackmailed her into taking part in the murders. He lawyers claim that new material that will be presented to court includes photographs taken by Brady showing her naked with bruises and injuries caused by bites, whips and canes. Then again, they did have a sado-masochistic relationship, and bruises and bite marks are something that goes with the territory.


Brady, 60, now a patient at Ashworth Special Hospital in Merseyside, responded saying that "33 years of duplicity" had driven "her into the realms of psychotic delusion and absurdity". He also claimed that the bruises were faked using lipstick in their attempt at selling pornographic pictures. The cooperative type, Brady has said he would release "sick" letters to the highest bidder that she wrote to him up to six years after they were convicted. Any payment, he added, should go to victims' families.

This latest court action represents the third strategy Hindley has adopted since conviction. At first she stayed silent, and then later revealed evidence of other murders in a fruitless bid to convince the public that she had reformed. Now she is claiming that she took part in the crimes unwillingly.


Brady has condemed Hindley's attempt to blame him for the killings and released a six-page letter he sent to the Home Secretary. Brady wrote: "Hindley, in her usual Barbara Cartland prose, has created a Victorian melodrama in which she portrays herself as being forced to murder serially, by being drugged, blackmailed, whipped, raped, battered, having her family threatened with slaughter, bitten, strangled etc, etc.

"At first I was staggered and appalled, then as the catalogue of feverish crimes mounted to stultification level, I slowly realised that desperation had finally driven her over the top. It appears that the neurosis bred by her own pathological machinations has developed into psychosis. She appears to be suffering from a histrionic personality disorder, adopting manipulative attention seeking behaviour . . . an obsessive-compulsive personality disorder, concealing a strong tendency towards rebellion and acting on impulse."

UPDATE
Ian Brady On Hunger Strike
Brady goes to court to appeal that the Staff at the secure unit, Ashworth Hospital, where he is serving life, do not have the right to force feed him.
The appeal is refused, he is fed.
September 21, 2001 - Moors murderer, Ian Brady, has been given permission to publish his book on serial killers by the hospital for the criminally insane where his is serving his sentence. On September 11, the hospital was granted a court order to obtain a copy of the manuscript and block its publication. After determining that the book, "The Gates of Janus," contained no references to the hospital or Brady's own crimes, a lawyer representing the hospital announced that they were not opposed to the publication of the book.

15th November 2002
Myra Hindley has died in prison of a chest infection aged 60. She died on Friday afternoon at Highpoint Prison in Suffolk. An inquest into her death will be held, this is normal when a prisoner dies in custody. She will be cremated and her ashes scattered at a secret location. Just 24 years old when sentenced to life in 1966, she severed 36 years behind bars, and was only weeks away from a possible release date being set.

[Salem6]

By Peter Gould
BBC News Online

The Moors murderer Ian Brady says he will not co-operate with a police plan to interview some of Britain's most notorious serial killers.

Scotland Yard wants to carry out the interviews in an effort to understand how mass murderers operate.


Brady murdered five children with accomplice Myra Hindley

Detectives hope the information gathered will give them a better chance of catching these dangerous criminals in future.

But Brady, who is now 66, and has written a book on serial killing, has told BBC News Online he wants nothing to do with the research.

"I will not participate in the proposed serial killer interviews," he says in a letter from Ashworth high security hospital.

"Interviewing the few serial killers in UK prisons would only occupy a week! And compared to the professionals in power, they are only amateurs anyway."


Police interviews

Scotland Yard has not said which killers it plans to approach.

But the list is likely to include such notorious figures as Peter Sutcliffe, the so-called "Yorkshire Ripper", who killed prostitutes, and Dennis Nielsen, who murdered homeless young men and disposed of their bodies in the drains of his house.

Given the present day public anxiety over child killers, researchers would also have been likely to want to talk to Brady.

He was jailed for life in 1966 after being convicted with his accomplice Myra Hindley - who died in prison in November 2002 - of the abduction and murder of children in the Manchester area.

"Research conducted by the penal authorities is self-serving... an exercise in pretension and time-serving by the tea and biscuit-munching professional drones" Ian Brady

Four of their five known victims were buried on Saddleworth moor. In the 1980s, Hindley and Brady both agreed to go back to the moors to help the police try to find the graves of missing children.

But today Brady says he is not interested in helping researchers who want to discover more about the motivation and methods of serial killers.

"Research conducted by the penal authorities is self-serving... an exercise in pretension and time-serving by the tea and biscuit-munching professional drones massaging one another's egos," he writes.

"These committee mentalities collectively lack even one positive brain cell or spine. All for show; a hubris of arrogance based on ignorant petty authority and no self-esteem."

Brady says he believes such research is pursued by those looking to profit from lecture fees, book deals and media careers.

"Already a gaggle of the usual suspects are wrestling with one another for TV spots... the second-rate profilers who pop up in studios with their personal banalities padded out by plagiarising research of decades ago.

"Not worth throwing peanuts to, let along communicating with."


Psychologists

The Moors murderer's response may not come as a complete surprise to Scotland Yard, who must be expecting some of the serial killers now behind bars to remain silent.

It remains a matter for conjecture how much they will get out of the murderers who do agree to talk.

Some psychologists think that offenders who have little hope of being released will simply use the opportunity to play games with the police.

Serial killers pose a particular challenge because their victims are often selected at random.


Ian Brady wrote to Peter Gould from Ashworth high security hospital


While a pattern may become apparent as new victims are found, the lack of any obvious connection with the killer makes it one of the most difficult crimes to solve.

Much of the pioneering work on the psychological profiling of serial killers has been done in the United States.

The work of experts at the FBI's Behavioural Science Unit inspired the fictional story of Hannibal Lecter, as portrayed in the film Silence of the Lambs.

Ian Brady recognises the fascination that these terrible crimes hold for some people, and has written on the subject at length in his book The Gates of Janus.

While some people were appalled when an American company decided to publish the book, Brady says his thoughts on serial killing have been welcomed in the academic world.

"The correspondence from university staff and students congratulating me on The Gates of Janus continues," he claims.

"Several lecturers have put it on the official reading list for students. One lecturer stated it was more inspiring than 'ten textbooks by ex-FBI profilers claiming unique insight into the criminal mind and vying with each other for media careers'.

"I didn't even stretch myself with Janus, deliberately omitting particular information."

That is a reference to the fact that while his book discussed a number of particular cases, there was nothing in it about the crimes for which he was convicted.

Brady was transferred from prison to a psychiatric hospital almost 20 years ago, and has been campaigning for the right to starve himself to death.

He is now in the fifth year of a hunger strike, being fed against his wishes, through a plastic tube.

He says he has no reason for living, and his message to the police suggests he wants to take his secrets to the grave.