100 Facts About Peter Sutcliffe

Peter William Sutcliffe, known as Peter Coonan, was an English serial killer who was convicted of murdering thirteen women and attempting to murder seven others between 1975 and 1980.

Peter Sutcliffe was dubbed in press reports as the Yorkshire Ripper, an allusion to the Victorian serial killer Jack the Ripper.

Peter Sutcliffe initially attacked women and girls in residential areas, but appears to have shifted his focus to red-light districts because he was attracted by the vulnerability of prostitutes and the perceived ambivalent attitude of police to prostitutes' safety.

Peter Sutcliffe confessed to being the perpetrator, saying that the voice of God had sent him on a mission to kill prostitutes.

The search for Peter Sutcliffe was one of the largest and most expensive manhunts in British history.

West Yorkshire Police faced heavy and sustained criticism for their failure to catch Peter Sutcliffe despite having interviewed him nine times in the course of their five-year investigation.

Peter Sutcliffe was transferred from prison to Broadmoor Hospital in March 1984 after being diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.

Peter Sutcliffe died in hospital from diabetes-related complications while in prison custody in 2020.

Peter William Sutcliffe was born in Shipley, West Riding of Yorkshire, on 2June 1946, to a working-class family who lived in Bingley.

Peter Sutcliffe's parents were John William Sutcliffe and his Irish wife, Kathleen Frances Coonan, a native of Connemara.

Peter Sutcliffe's mother was Catholic while his father was a member of the choir at the local Anglican church of St Wilfred's; their children were raised in their mother's Catholic faith, and Peter Sutcliffe briefly served as an altar boy.

Peter Sutcliffe's mother was the victim of domestic abuse by his father, making it likely she struggled through her pregnancy under great emotional stress.

Peter Sutcliffe was born prematurely, having to spend two weeks in hospital.

Peter Sutcliffe's father was a heavy drinker who once smashed a beer glass over Peter Sutcliffe's head for sitting in his chair at Christmas dinner.

In 1970, Peter Sutcliffe's father posed as his wife's lover in order to lure her to a local hotel, taking along Peter Sutcliffe and two of his siblings to witness him expose her infidelity.

When Peter Sutcliffe's mother arrived, his father pulled out a negligee from her purse as her children watched.

Between November 1971 and April 1973, Peter Sutcliffe worked at the Baird Television factory on a packaging line.

Peter Sutcliffe left this position when he was asked to go on the road as a salesman.

On 5March 1976, Peter Sutcliffe was dismissed from this employment for the theft of used tyres.

Peter Sutcliffe reportedly hired prostitutes as a young man, and it has been speculated that he had a bad experience during which he was conned out of money by a prostitute and her pimp.

On 14 February 1967, Peter Sutcliffe met 16-year-old Sonia Szurma, the daughter of Ukrainian and Polish refugees from Czechoslovakia, at the Royal Standard pub on Manningham Lane in Bradford's red-light district; they married on 10August 1974.

When she completed the course in 1977 and began teaching, she and Peter Sutcliffe used her salary to buy a house at 6 Garden Lane in Heaton, into which they moved on 26September 1977, and where they were living at the time of Peter Sutcliffe's arrest in 1980.

Peter Sutcliffe's first documented assault was of a female prostitute, whom he had met while searching for another woman who had tricked him out of money.

Peter Sutcliffe left his friend Trevor Birdsall's minivan and walked up St Paul's Road in Bradford until he was out of sight.

When he returned, Peter Sutcliffe was out of breath, as if he had been running; he told Birdsall to drive off quickly.

Peter Sutcliffe said he had followed a prostitute into a garage and hit her over the head with a stone in a sock.

Peter Sutcliffe admitted he had hit her, but claimed it was with his hand.

Peter Sutcliffe committed his second assault in Keighley on the night of 5July 1975.

Peter Sutcliffe attacked 36-year-old Anna Rogulskyj, who was walking alone, striking her unconscious with a hammer and slashing her stomach with a knife.

Disturbed by a neighbour, Peter Sutcliffe left the scene without killing her.

Peter Sutcliffe then disarranged Smelt's clothing and slashed her lower back with a knife.

Again Peter Sutcliffe was interrupted and left his victim badly injured but alive.

Peter Sutcliffe ran off when he saw the lights of a passing car, leaving his victim requiring brain surgery.

Peter Sutcliffe was not convicted of the attack but confessed in 1992.

Peter Sutcliffe committed his next murder in Leeds on 20January 1976, when he stabbed 42-year-old Emily Monica Jackson fifty-two times.

Peter Sutcliffe picked up Jackson, who was soliciting outside the Gaiety pub on Roundhay Road, then drove about half a mile to some derelict buildings on Enfield Terrace in the Manor Industrial Estate.

Peter Sutcliffe hit Jackson on the head with a hammer, dragged her body into a rubbish-strewn yard, then used a sharpened screwdriver to stab her in the neck, chest and abdomen.

Peter Sutcliffe stamped on her thigh, leaving behind an impression of his boot.

Peter Sutcliffe required multiple, extensive brain operations and suffered from intermittent blackouts and chronic depression.

Once she was dead, Peter Sutcliffe mutilated her corpse with a knife and then arranged her body by neatly placing her knee-length boots over the back of her thighs.

Peter Sutcliffe then stabbed her six times in the stomach with a knife.

Peter Sutcliffe missed the last bus home and went back to a friend's house to wait for his sister to bring her home.

Long was leaving a nightclub when Peter Sutcliffe offered her a lift home.

Long stopped to urinate and Peter Sutcliffe struck her on the head, knocking her out.

Peter Sutcliffe lost his balance whilst delivering a blow to Moore with a hammer, allowing Moore to escape with severe head injuries.

The resulting photofit bore a strong resemblance to Peter Sutcliffe, as had those from other survivors, and Moore provided a good description of Peter Sutcliffe's black Sunbeam Rapier, which had been seen in red-light areas.

That month, Peter Sutcliffe killed Yvonne Ann Pearson, a 21-year-old prostitute from Bradford, on 21January 1978.

Peter Sutcliffe repeatedly bludgeoned her about the head with a ball-peen hammer, then jumped on her chest before stuffing horsehair into her mouth from a discarded sofa, under which he hid her body near Lumb Lane.

Peter Sutcliffe picked up Millward and drove her to the parking compound of the Manchester Royal Infirmary in Chorlton-on-Medlock.

Peter Sutcliffe was slashed across the stomach and stabbed repeatedly with a screwdriver through the same wound in her back.

Peter Sutcliffe was struck three times on the head, probably with a hammer, according to Professor David Gee, who examined her at Leeds General Infirmary.

In 1992, Peter Sutcliffe confessed to the attack on Rooney, as well as the 1975 attack on Tracy Browne.

Peter Sutcliffe hit Whitaker from behind with his ball-peen hammer and hit her again as she lay on the ground.

Peter Sutcliffe then proceeded to stab her with a screwdriver twenty-one times in the chest and stomach and six times in the right leg before thrusting the screwdriver into her vagina.

Peter Sutcliffe was remanded in custody and on 21March 2006 was convicted and sentenced to eight years in prison.

Peter Sutcliffe dragged her to the backyard of 13 Back Ash Grove, behind a low wall into an area where dustbins were kept, before pulling up her shirt and bra to expose her breasts and unfastening her jeans and partially pulling them down.

Peter Sutcliffe then stabbed her with the same screwdriver that he had used to kill Whitaker.

Peter Sutcliffe covered Leach's body with an old piece of carpet and placed stones on top of it.

Peter Sutcliffe incapacitated her with a hammer blow to the back of her head as he continued to strike her while yelling "filthy prostitute" beside a driveway.

Peter Sutcliffe partially covered the body with grass and leaves before he left.

Peter Sutcliffe struck her on the head, rendering her unconscious, then, when he was startled, dragged her along the street with a rope around her neck and fled.

Peter Sutcliffe suffered from significant wounds, including a puncture hole to the back of her skull, a fractured skull, a fractured cheekbone, a broken jaw and numerous scratches and bruises.

Sykes was going to a shop in Oakes when Peter Sutcliffe hit her from behind.

Peter Sutcliffe's boyfriend heard her screams and ran out, scaring off Sutcliffe.

Hill was returning home to her students' hall of residence in Headingley when Peter Sutcliffe delivered a blow to her head before removing her clothes and stabbing her repeatedly in the chest and once in the eye with a screwdriver.

In total, Peter Sutcliffe had been questioned by the police on nine separate occasions in connection with the Ripper enquiry before his eventual arrest and conviction.

On 2January 1981, Peter Sutcliffe was stopped by police with 24-year-old prostitute Olivia Reivers in the driveway of Light Trades House on Melbourne Avenue, Broomhill, Sheffield, South Yorkshire.

When Peter Sutcliffe was stripped at Dewsbury police station, he was found to be wearing an inverted V-necked jumper under his trousers.

Peter Sutcliffe's trial lasted two weeks, and despite the efforts of his counsel, James Chadwin QC, Peter Sutcliffe was found guilty of murder on all counts and was sentenced to twenty concurrent sentences of life imprisonment.

Justice Boreham stated that Peter Sutcliffe was beyond redemption and hoped he would never leave prison.

Peter Sutcliffe recommended a minimum term of thirty years to be served before parole could be considered, meaning Sutcliffe would have been unlikely to be freed until at least 2011.

Peter Sutcliffe was interviewed nine times, but all information police had about the case was stored in paper form, making cross-referencing difficult, compounded by television appeals for information, which generated thousands more documents.

Byford found Oldfield's focus on the hoax tape wanting, and that Oldfield had ignored advice from survivors of Peter Sutcliffe's attacks, from several eminent specialists, from the FBI in the United States and from dialect analysts Stanley Ellis and Jack Windsor Lewis, that "Wearside Jack" was a hoaxer.

Indeed, the investigation had used the hoax tape as a point of elimination, rather than as a line of enquiry, allowing Peter Sutcliffe to avoid scrutiny as he did not fit the profile of the sender of the tape or letters.

An index card was created on the basis of the letter and a policewoman found Peter Sutcliffe already had three existing index cards in the records.

Amongst other things, the Byford Report asserted that there was a high likelihood of Peter Sutcliffe having claimed more victims both during and before his known killing spree.

In 1969, Peter Sutcliffe, described in the Byford Report as an "otherwise unremarkable young man," came to the notice of police on two occasions over incidents with prostitutes.

The report said that it was clear Peter Sutcliffe had on at least one occasion attacked a Bradford prostitute with a cosh.

Peter Sutcliffe had confessed to the murder under intense questioning, having been told that he would be allowed to see a solicitor if he did so.

Peter Sutcliffe did not confess to Wilkinson's murder at his trial, and Steel was already serving time for the murder.

Peter Sutcliffe was known to have been acquainted with Wilkinson and to have argued violently with her stepfather over his advances towards her.

Peter Sutcliffe was familiar with the council estate where she was murdered and regularly frequented the area.

In February 1977, only months before the murder, Peter Sutcliffe was reported to police for acting suspiciously on the street where Wilkinson lived.

Furthermore, earlier on the day of the murder, Peter Sutcliffe had gone back to mutilate Jordan's body before returning to Bradford, showing he had already gone out to attack victims that day and would have been in Bradford to attack Wilkinson after he returned from mutilating Jordan.

Yallop continued to put forth the theory that Peter Sutcliffe was the real killer.

In 2015, former detective Chris Clark and investigative journalist Tim Tate published a book, Yorkshire Ripper: The Secret Murders, which supported the theory that Peter Sutcliffe had murdered Wilkinson, pointing out that her body had been posed and partially stripped in a manner similar to the Ripper's modus operandi.

In 2017, West Yorkshire Police launched Operation Painthall to determine if Peter Sutcliffe was guilty of unsolved crimes dating back to 1964.

Peter Sutcliffe began his sentence at HM Prison Parkhurst on 22May 1981.

In March 1984, Peter Sutcliffe was sent to Broadmoor Hospital under Section 47 of the Mental Health Act 1983.

Peter Sutcliffe's wife obtained a separation around 1989 and a divorce in July 1994.

On 23February 1996, Peter Sutcliffe was attacked in his room in Broadmoor's Henley Ward; Paul Wilson, a convicted robber, asked to borrow a videotape before attempting to strangle Peter Sutcliffe with the cable from a pair of stereo headphones.

Kay admitted trying to kill Peter Sutcliffe and was ordered to be detained in a secure mental hospital without limit of time.

In 2003, it was reported that Peter Sutcliffe had developed diabetes.

Peter Sutcliffe was accompanied by four members of the hospital staff.

On 4August 2010, a spokeswoman for the Judicial Communications Office confirmed that Peter Sutcliffe had initiated an appeal against the decision.

The hearing for Peter Sutcliffe's appeal began on 30November 2010, at the Court of Appeal.

Peter Sutcliffe was reported to have been transferred from Broadmoor to HM Prison Frankland in August 2016.

Peter Sutcliffe died at University Hospital of North Durham, at the age of 74, on 13 November 2020, from COVID-19 and diabetes-related complications, after having previously returned to HM Prison Frankland following treatment for a suspected heart attack at the same hospital two weeks prior.

Peter Sutcliffe had a number of underlying health problems, including obesity.

In February 2022, Channel 5 released a 60-minute documentary entitled The Ripper Speaks: The Lost Tapes, which recounts interviews, and Peter Sutcliffe speaking about life in prison and in Broadmoor Hospital, as well as crimes he had committed but that had not been seen or treated as "a Ripper killing".