British Criminals

Jack the Ripper was anl unidentified serial killer who predominantly targeted female prostitutes living and working in the ghetto of the East End of London. Since the murders were never solved, Jack the Ripper became infamous folklore in England. The murders were so cleverly done that the authorities were not even able to ascertain the killer's gender.

Ronald Kray was a British criminal involved in organized crime in the East End of London in the 1950s and 1960s. Along with his twin brother, Reggie, he ran a gang that was notorious for committing murders, armed robberies, and arson among other criminal activities. The brothers were arrested in 1968 and sentenced to life imprisonment.

Blackbeard was a notorious English pirate who struck fear into the hearts of his opponents during the early 18th century. His life has inspired several video games, TV miniseries, and films. Tim Powers' novel On Stranger Tides houses a fictionalized version of Blackbeard; the novel was later adapted into a film titled Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.

English serial killer Peter Sutcliffe was dubbed the Yorkshire Ripper as he was likened to the infamous unidentified serial killer, Jack the Ripper, by the press. Convicted of killing 13 women and injuring nine other, Peter Sutcliffe was sentenced to life imprisonment. In 2000, ITV aired a crime drama miniseries based on Peter Sutcliffe's murders titled This Is Personal.

One of history’s most infamous serial killers, Harold Shipman was a British GP who is believed to have killed over 200 patients before being nabbed by the police. He was ultimately sentenced to life imprisonment for 15 murders but later committed suicide in prison. The case led to grave concerns about powers and the responsibilities of the Britain’s medical community.

Former bare knuckle boxer Charles Salvador, also known as Charles Bronson, is also a highly infamous criminal, who was once convicted for an armed robbery. Known for his violent temper, he later penned several books, one of them on fitness. He is also a talented painter and poet.

Mary Ann Cotton was an English serial killer who was convicted for the murder of her stepson. Cotton is believed to have killed 11 of her children and three of her husbands for their insurance policies. Mary Ann Cotton was sentenced to death and was executed by hanging. 

Henry Every was an English pirate who was active during the mid-1690s. Nicknamed The King of Pirates, Every is remembered as one of the few major pirate captains to have escaped with his loot without being killed or arrested. Despite operating as a pirate for only two years, Every caught the public's imagination and inspired others to take up piracy.

Amelia Dyer was an English serial killer who killed infants over a 30-year period. She exercised the practice of baby farming and murdered children after taking them under her care. Amelia Dyer's killings inspired a murder ballad. Her case also led to stricter laws for child protection and adoption in the UK.

Derek Bentley was 19 when he was hanged for murdering a policeman during a burglary attempt. An illiterate, he had the mental age of 11 and also suffered from epilepsy. The controversial case led to a 45-long battle for a posthumous pardon, which was granted, and then a reversal of the murder charge.

Fred West was a serial killer who derived pleasure from acts, such as voyeurism, sexual assaults, murder, and various sexual fetishes that pushed his victims beyond their sexual limits. He committed murders and sexual assaults along with his wife Rose, who worked as a prostitute at their residence. Fred committed suicide at HM Prison Birmingham in 1995.

Robert Maudsley is an English serial killer currently serving life imprisonment at Wakefield Prison, England. He committed three of his four murders in prison, forcing the authorities to keep him in solitary confinement. Maudsley's case was sensationalized as it was claimed that he had eaten part of the brain of one of his victims, although the PCC refuted such claims.

Calico Jack was a British pirate captain who operated in Cuba and in the Bahamas during the early 18th century. Active towards the end of the Golden Age of Piracy, Calico Jack is best remembered for having two female pirates, including his lover Anne Bonny, as part of his crew. 

Beverley Allitt is an English serial child killer, convicted ,of murdering four children and grievously injuring several others. Previously employed as a State Enrolled Nurse, she attacked 13 children over a 59-day period, out of which four died. She received 13 life sentences for the crimes and is detained at Rampton Secure Hospital in Nottinghamshire.

A legendary female pirate of the early eighteenth century, Mary Read took to piracy when her ship was seized by Jack Rackham in West Indies. By then, she had started dressing as a man and had served in the military, which might have helped her to become a successful buccaneer. Captured in 1720, she died in prison five months later.  

Ruth Ellis began her career as a nightclub hostess as a teen and was also a nude model for a while. She later also worked as an escort. She became the last woman in the UK tot be hanged after she shot and killed her lover, race-car driver and affluent socialite David Blakely.

Henry Morgan was a Welsh privateer who later served as lieutenant governor of Jamaica. He is best remembered for raiding settlements on the Spanish Main. From the wealth acquired through his raids, Morgan became a plantation owner, buying three large sugar plantations in the Caribbean. His life and career inspired several films, such as Captain Blood and Morgan, the Pirate.

John Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan was an English peer who disappeared on 8 November 1974 after being suspected of murder. Lucan's personal problems, gambling losses, and mounting legal expenses had a dramatic effect on his life. In 1974, the nanny of Lucan's children, Sandra Rivett, was bludgeoned to death and Lucan went missing, never to be seen again.

Charles Vane was an English pirate who was active during the dusk of the Golden Age of Piracy. Renowned for his cruelty, Vane often tortured and killed the sailors from the ships that he captured. Charles Vane and his crew have been portrayed in films and video games like Treasure of Pirate's Point and Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag. 

Best known as the villain Dirty Den from the BBC soap EastEnders, Leslie Grantham initially worked as a soldier with the Royal Fusiliers of the British Army. Convicted of the murder of a cab driver in Germany, he spent a decade in prison. He later attempted suicide as aftermath of a sex scandal.

Known as the Acid Bath Murderer, John George Haigh was Known for shooting or beating his victims to death and then dissolving them in sulphuric acid. To his friends, he seemed to be a wealthy man of culture. Though he initially got away with 5 murders, he was caught after his 6th murder.

John Billington was an Englishman best remembered for his voyage to the New World on the famous Mayflower. He was one of the co-creators and signers of the Mayflower Compact. John Billington murdered another white settler named John Newcomen. He was tried by a jury in September 1630 and executed at the age of 40.

Bruce Reynolds was a British criminal who was the mastermind behind the Great Train Robbery in 1963. Although he was sentenced to 25 years in prison in 1969, Reynolds was released in 1978 post which he published three books and became a popular public figure, performing alongside Alabama 3. His life and career have inspired several films and TV series.

British drug dealer Dale Cregan had started dealing in cannabis soon after high school. He was later convicted of killing 2 female police officers, the first case in the UK in which 2 female cops were killed on duty. He was also known as One Eye because of his missing left eye.

Better known as the A6 Murderer, James Hanratty was one of the last people to be executed before capital punishment was abolished. He was convicted of murdering scientist Michael Gregsten and raping and shooting Gregsten’s mistress, Valerie Storie. The controversial case led to a motion to prove his innocence.

Alfred Rouse was a British murderer who killed an unknown hitchhiker after rendering him unconscious inside his car and setting the car on fire in an attempt to fake his own death. The crime was dubbed the Blazing Car Murder and the identity of the victim remains unknown. Rouse was convicted and executed for the murder of an unknown man!

Constance Kent was an English woman who murdered her half-brother, Francis Saville Kent. She was only 16 years old when she killed her three-year-old half-brother. The murder inspired several works of art, including films and novels.

Myra Hindley was an English murderer accused of raping and killing five children aged between 10 and 17 along with her partner, Ian Brady. The killings, which were carried out between July 1963 and October 1965, were dubbed the Moors murders. The killings and its aftermath were dramatized and adapted into an award-winning TV film titled Longford.

The last person to be executed in Guernsey, John Tapner was convicted of the murder of Elizabeth Saujon, who was knocked unconscious and left to die in a burning house. He was executed in front of a 200-stong audience who had bought tickets to watch him die.

John Felton was a British soldier who served as a lieutenant in the British Army. He is best remembered for assassinating George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham on 23 August 1628. Buckingham was unpopular due to his incompetence and corruption and his murder was rejoiced in England. In 1844, the murder was fictionalized in Alexandre Dumas' novel, The Three Musketeers.

Tommy Robinson is a British anti-Islam, far-right activist. The co-founder of an Islamophobic organization called the English Defence League, Robinson has been convicted on multiple counts of fraud and violence as well as other crimes. From 2017 to 2018, he also contributed as a writer for a Canadian far-right political website called Rebel News.

Jihadi John was a Kuwaiti-born British militant who is believed to have been the person seen in several ISIL videos that showcased the beheadings of numerous hostages in 2014 and 2015. In November 2015, officials from the US reported that John was hit by a drone strike and his death was confirmed in 2016 by the extremist group ISIL.

Levi Bellfield is an English sex offender, serial killer, rapist, burglar, and kidnapper. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2008 after he was found guilty of the murders of Amélie Delagrange and Marsha McDonnell. Levi Bellfield is currently imprisoned at HM Prison Frankland. The investigation that led to Levi Bellfield's arrest was dramatized in a TV drama titled Manhunt.

Called the ‘white widow’, British national Samantha Lewthwaite is one of the most wanted terrorists in the world. She has been linked to the Somali terrorist group Al Shabaab and was reportedly involved in the 2013 Nairobi Westgate shopping mall terror attack. She is the widow of one of the four suicide bombers who carried out the July 2005 London subway terror attacks.

Not many suspected physician John Bodkin Adams of being a serial killer till it was revealed that his name had appeared in the wills of at least 132 of his patients who had died, while 163 died in coma. Though never convicted of the killings, he faced punishment for forgery.

John Christie was a British serial killer who was active during the 1940s and early-1950s. He killed at least eight people and was sentenced to death for the murder of his wife Ethel. The killings were dramatized in the 1971 film 10 Rillington Place, in which Christie was played by Richard Attenborough. Christie's murders also inspired other works of art.   

Rosemary West is a British serial killer Who torturing and killing at least nine women between 1973 and 1987. She committed the crimes along with her husband Fred West. She also mudered her eight-year-old stepdaughter in 1971. She was convicted of 10 murders in 1995 and was sentenced to life imprisonment. Rosemary West is currently serving her sentence at HM Prison New Hall.

Known for the Ossett murder case, Michael Taylor initially came across as a gentleman and worked as a butcher. He went through an exorcism since he felt an evil spirit within him. He later murdered his wife, tearing her face with his bare hands, and then killed their pet poodle.

Known by nicknames such as Pretty Boy and Mean Machine, boxer Roy Shaw was once imprisoned for a violent robbery but escaped by stealing the prison doctor’s car and then fought under the pseudonym Roy West. He eventually spent 18 years in prison for robbery. He also experimented with the property business.

Reginald Kray was an English gangster who was one of the leading perpetrators of organized crime in the East End of London along with his twin brother Ronald Kray. Along with their gang, which came to be known as The Firm, the identical twin brothers were involved in armed robbery, murder, arson, and protection rackets from the late-1950s to 1967.

Donald Neilson was a British armed robber, murderer, and kidnapper. He murdered three men between 1971 and 1974. In January 1975, Neilson killed his kidnap victim Lesley Whittle. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1976 and remained in prison until his demise in 2011. Donald Neilson's life inspired the 1977 film The Black Panther.

English spree killer John Martin Scripps, also known as The Garden City Butcher, posed as a tourist and befriended other tourists before killing them and then chopped their bodies into pieces. He was also the first British citizen to be hanged in Singapore since the country’s independence.

Buck Ruxton was an Indian-born British physician and murderer best remembered for killing his common-law wife Isabella Ruxton and their housemaid Mary Jane Rogerson. These killings came to be known as the Jigsaw Murders as the bodies of his victims were severed into many pieces. The case is remembered for the forensic techniques employed to distinguish and identify the victims.