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Peter Sutcliffe - Criminal career

Peter Sutcliffe - Victims

Sutcliffe was convicted for murdering the following 13 victims:

• 30 October 1975: Wilma McCann, 28, Leeds
• 20 January 1976: Emily Jackson, 42, Leeds
• 5 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

Peter Sutcliffe - 1975

The first known assault by Sutcliffe was in Keighley on the night of July 5, 1975. He attacked Anna Rogulskyj (aged 36), who was walking alone, striking her unconscious with a ball-peen hammer and slashing her stomach with a knife. Disturbed by a neighbour, he left before killing her. Anna Rogulskyj survived after extensive medical attention. Later she would meet Sutcliffe's father, encouraging him to probe his fingers into the two indents that still remain in the back of her head. Sutcliffe attacked Olive Smelt (aged 46) in Halifax in August with the same MO and again was disturbed and left his victim badly injured. Later in August he attacked Tracy Browne (aged 16) in Silsden. She was struck from behind and hit on the head five times while walking in a country lane. Sutcliffe was not convicted of this attack, but later confessed to it.

His next victim, Wilma McCann of Leeds (aged 28) and a mother of four, was killed on October 30. He struck her twice with a hammer before stabbing her fifteen times. An extensive inquiry, involving 150 police officers and 11,000 interviews, did not uncover Sutcliffe.

Peter Sutcliffe - 1976

He did not kill again until January 1976, stabbing Emily Jackson (aged 42) 51 times in Leeds.

Due to repeated absenteeism, Sutcliffe lost his first driving job in March 1976 and did not find another until October. He attacked Marcella Claxton (aged 20), another prostitute, in Roundhay Park in Leeds on May 9. He struck her with a hammer and left her with 25 stab wounds.

Peter Sutcliffe - 1977

The next murder took place in February 1977. He attacked Irene Richardson (aged 28), another Chapeltown prostitute, in Roundhay Park, this time killing her with a series of weighty hammer blows, followed by a post-mortem stabbing. Tyre tracks left near the murder scene resulted in an enormous list of possible suspect vehicles.

Two months later he killed Patricia "Tina" Atkinson (aged 32), a Bradford prostitute, at her flat, where police found a bootprint on the bedclothes. It was another two months later that Sutcliffe moved up a gear with a vicious murder in Chapeltown. Jayne MacDonald (aged 16) was not a prostitute, and in the public perception, her death suddenly made every woman a potential victim. He seriously assaulted Maureen Long (aged 42) in Bradford in July; interrupted, he left her for dead. He was seen by a witness, but the make of his car was misidentified. The police had over 300 officers working the case and amassed 12,500 statements and checked thousands of cars, without result.

Sutcliffe killed a Manchester prostitute, Jean Jordan (aged 20) in October. Her body was not found for ten days, but had obviously been moved several days after death. The recovery of her handbag offered a valuable piece of evidence. Sutcliffe had given the woman £5. The note was new and was traced to banks in Shipley and Bingley and from there into the wages of 8,000 local employees. Over three months the police interviewed 5,000 men, including Sutcliffe, but did not connect him. Sutcliffe had known the note could expose him: he had returned to the body a week after the killing to locate it and, unable to find the handbag, had tried to remove Jordan's head with a broken pane of glass and a hacksaw. Chillingly, he had undertaken this event after hosting a family party at his home. Jordan's body was discovered by Bruce Jones, who later went on to play the part of Les Battersby in the long-running TV soap opera Coronation Street.

Sutcliffe attacked another Leeds prostitute, Marilyn Moore (aged 25) in December. She survived and offered another reasonable description of her attacker, and tyre tracks found matched those of an earlier attack.

Peter Sutcliffe - 1978

Despite this, the police withdrew their intensive search for the person who received the £5 in January 1978. Sutcliffe was interviewed about the £5 note, but not investigated further; he would ultimately be contacted, and disregarded, by the Ripper Squad many more times. In that month Sutcliffe killed again, attacking a Bradford prostitute, Yvonne Pearson (aged 21), this time hiding the body under a discarded sofa so that it was not found until March. He killed a Huddersfield prostitute, Helen Rytka (aged 18), in late January; her body was uncovered three days later.

After a two month hiatus Sutcliffe killed again, attacking Vera Millward (aged 40) in the car park of the Manchester Royal Infirmary on May 16.

Peter Sutcliffe - 1979

Almost a year passed before he struck again; during this time his mother died. On April 4, 1979, he killed Josephine Whitaker (aged 19), a bank clerk, in Halifax; he assaulted her on the town moor as she was walking home. Despite new forensic clues, the police efforts were diverted for several months into a fruitless search for a man with a Wearside accent, which was pinned down to the Castletown area of Sunderland, following a hoax tape message taunting Superintendent George Oldfield, who was leading the search. The same hoaxer had sent two letters to the police boasting of his crimes in 1978 signed "Jack The Ripper" and claimed a murder (that of 26-year-old Joan Harrison) in Preston in November 1975. On October 20, 2005, John Humble, an unemployed alcoholic and long-time resident of the Ford Estate area of Sunderland (a mile away from Castletown), was charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice in response to the sending of the hoax letters and tape, and remanded in custody. It is expected that he will also be questioned in connection with the Harrison murder.

Sutcliffe killed Barbara Leach (aged 20), a Bradford student, in September, his sixteenth attack. Yet again the murder of a woman who was not a prostitute aroused the public and prompted an expensive publicity campaign, which unfortunately pushed the Wearside connection. Even with this false lead, Sutcliffe was re-interviewed on at least two occasions in 1979 but, despite matching several forensic clues and being on the list of just 300 names in connection with the £5 note, he was not strongly suspected. In total, Sutcliffe was interviewed by the police on nine occasions.

Peter Sutcliffe - 1980

In April 1980 he was arrested for drunken driving. While awaiting trial on this charge he killed two more women, Marguerite Walls (aged 47) in August and Jacqueline Hill (aged 20) in November 1980. He also attacked two other women who survived – Upadhya Bandara (aged 34) in Leeds and Theresa Sykes (aged 16) in Huddersfield. Following the November murder, one of Sutcliffe's friends reported him to the police as a suspect; this information vanished into the enormous volumes already created.