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hey weirdos I'm Elena I am Ash and this is [Music] morbid party party not not this is not
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going to be a party today we're starting a series that a lot of you have asked for for a long long time a long time and
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I've been avoiding it just simply because this is a tough one it's going to be a tough one it's going to be a
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tough one for all of us it's going to be a long long tough one it is it's going to be a little long it's going to be
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tough and we are covering Fred and rosemary West oh so goodness we're going to break this up cuz there's a lot to
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this story uh fair warning right off the bat so many triggers I mean all of them
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all the triggers this is a [ __ ] terrible story they are [ __ ] terrible people and it's a tragedy all the way
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around so just you know just know that up buttercup but I need to start out by recommending a book that was written by
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the West's daughter and Marie West W and it's called out of the Shadows she endured things that no one
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should ever even have to think of in the darkest recesses of their minds and I urge you to get her book and read her
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story from her point of view yeah I feel like that's so important definitely go find it uh we can obviously tell it from
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research and news reports and other books but she lived it so definitely go read her book definitely but let's get
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into this because I don't even have it in me to Banter for this one because it's it's a lot well this happened in
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the so this actually happened in the 9s what it or it kind of ended in the 90s I
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should say I didn't for some reason like in my head it was 607s that it ended I mean it spans over a long period of time
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yeah but it kind of all culminates in the early 90s okay uh in May 1992 Gloucester UK police and I had to look
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this up cuz I was like do you guys say it like we do m chusetts has a Gloucester too we say it Gloucester but
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I was like do you guys say it Glouchester or something you know say so Gloucester UK police received an
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anonymous tip claiming that Fred West had been sexually abusing his 13-year-old daughter Louise and that his
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wife had been physically abusing the girl oh God the tip was the the one thing they needed that initiated an
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investigation into allegations of abuse which soon unfolded into one of truly the most shocking serial murder cases in
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England's history where Fred and Rose West were suspected of killing 13 young women including one of their own
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children I thought that they had killed one of their own children in the months after this tip um investigators would
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eventually exume nine bodies that had actually been buried in the West's own backyard nine bodies in their backyard
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and evidence of several other hor murders committed by Fred some going as far back as the late 60s right I thought
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so so that that's why this spans over such a long period of time so you weren't wrong now let's start this off
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by finding out who the [ __ ] is Fred okay who is this [ __ ] monster of a human
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being so Fred Fred West was born in much marle and that's in I'm going to try to
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say this correctly because I appreciate and respect our UK listeners herfordshire okay herfordshire
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England and I hope I said that right for you guys because you know again we live
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in Massachusetts we also have weird Town names and people get them wrong all the
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time so get it I get it we're trying so Herford sh England on September 29th 1941 what would that make him he's not a
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Virgo right he might Virgo doesn't that end like on the 21st yeah oh no is he a Libra Mikey he might be I'm not positive
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though September 21st September 29th oh he's a Libra he's a Libra yeah I'm sorry
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I'm sorry you share a sign uh but he was the second of eight children born to Walter and Daisy West which Like Walter
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and Daisy sound adorable you know like those names together you know it just feels like Walter and Daisy like I love
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that yeah it sounds like and like you would never know oh you know oh um now two of his siblings actually died in
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childhood wow so um a as a farmer cuz Walter was a farmer as a farmer in a very rural part of the country he was
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kind of struggling to making to make a living for that many children and he was kind of barely able to provide for this
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family that just kept rapidly growing and the West Family often drank whatever unpasteurized milk Walter could bring
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home from the farm that's like a thing right now oh I know raw milk yeah it's not good for you no it's not don't do
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that don't and they got by on fruits and vegetables that they grew in their own garden uh despite living in a actually
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relatively big home at Mor Court Farm uh where Fred was employed the living space
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was cramped because there was so many people yeah um the children were typically kind of like all crammed into
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like one or two bedrooms it was it was tough also bathrooms at the cottage consisted of really nothing more than a
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bucket that had to be emptied oh a lot of times a day that's not sanitary um and when Fred was born it was one year
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after the death of Daisy's firstborn daughter oh wow her name was Violet and she died a few days after her birth
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which is tragic uh Fred was according to his other siblings always their mother's
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favorite child and could do nothing wrong years later Fred's younger brother Doug would tell a reporter that Fred was
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Mam's blue-eyed boy M and in fact in years after that people would comment that at times uh and his mother's
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relationship seemed a little too close yeah it was offputting okay that's all like from the outside point of view they
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were like was just a little unsettling yeah Daisy's sister-in-law Edna Hill said quote Fred came first
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with Daisy even in front of Walter oh and it's just like I I don't know if they should even be in the same same
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category here yeah I don't I know and the answer is they shouldn't yeah maybe because of his closeness to his mother
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Fred really never formed a bond with his father like they did not really have anything and his father was also a very
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strict disciplinarian and didn't like that Daisy was was said to coddle especially their eldest son at the time
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yeah now despite being prioritized and adored at home Fred's reputation pretty much everywhere else was uh not great
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okay yeah not well [ __ ] yeah not well [ __ ] at at home loved him they loved him or excuse me his mother loved him
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yeah but everywhere else no according to author Howard soon Fred's classmates looked at him as being uh dim dirty and
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always in trouble because of his slovenly performance slovenly performance yep slovenly performance and
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he was dim and dirty dim is such a [ __ ] like way to tell someone they're dumb yeah it really is it's just like you're
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really dim like when somebody says like don't be dim it's like o it's kind of like on the same same level as like
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dingbat it really is because it's because to me it gives the it gives the visual of like a light bulb that's just
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about to burn out so they're like you're [ __ ] dim you know like you're you're you're barely hanging on yep to that one
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little piece of light poor are you but Daisy would have to defend her son against you know the things that the
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teachers would say the teachers would be like he's not doing anything like he's really not moving forward he's sloly
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he's kind of just like hanging out he's a sloth this guy he's a sloth and his mother Daisy would have to defend him
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and that kind of only made things worse because then he was labeled at school as
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a mummy's boy and he was mocked and bullied at school which is sad yeah which for the kid sad right uh as he got
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older Fred only really became more isolated on the farm he didn't really have a lot of friends or acquaintances
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to pass the time with so he would just kind of help his father out on the farm and he would you know work with his
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brothers like that kind of thing yeah and despite like hanging out together all the time and doing stuff on the farm
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and really just being in a cramped space together Fred's relationship with his brothers JN and Doug was kind of
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strained and there was a lot of arguments that always almost always escalated into physical fights with
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little provocation on Fred's part um like like Fred could get provoked very easily he snap and Doug told reporters
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after Fred's death because Fred is dead I'll give you that in the beginning Fred's gone bye Fred bye um so that's
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you're least little little piece of like okay at least he's not around anymore right um so Doug told his brother told
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reporters after Fred had died I know it sounds rich now but I disliked Fred from
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the outset so he's like I know cuz he's dead sounds a little wild but like and I
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know because we all that we know about him I realize this sounds like right I didn't like him from the first place but
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he's like I truly did not like my brother from me out he sucked like his own brother is like I didn't like this
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kid from the mhm and although Fred was the um was like kind of like the biggest of the boys like he was and he was the
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one that was provoked the easiest he was also kind of bullied by his younger brother JN really um and Doug recalled
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JN used to beat the hell out of Fred and so like they really got into it damn and
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they were usually like the fights would get broken up by their dad who unfortunately depending on his mood at
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that time would punish them by whipping them with a belt oh my God now by the time he reached 15 years old it was
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pretty clear that Fred had really no interest in school or learning he wasn't succeeding at all academically so he
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dropped out and began working alongside his father as a general laborer at Mor Court Farm okay while it's clear that
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Fred's intellectual development was definitely somewhat stunted there's also a question as to whether he was stunted
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in other areas like Social Development particularly with regard to sex later okay follow his arrest he told Fred told
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interviewing officers that his mother and this is a trigger warning for sexual abuse there's going to be a lot of that
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in this please know that up front it's I'm going to try to warn you when it comes but it's going to it's all over
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the place it happens and it's [ __ ] awful um he told officers once he was arrested later as an adult he said that
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his mother had sexually abused him beginning when he was 12 years old wow and he said quote his father had sex
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with underage girls and had taught him to have sex with sheep what that's what he told officers
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when he was arrested oh my God mhm you said sheep I said sheep okay yep years later in an
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interview though and this is that remember that came from Fred right right I want to be clear that Fred West is not
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a reliable source of information yeah he's a [ __ ] demon and it's like so don't cuz Doug West and again none of us
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were there I don't know what happened in that house I'm not saying anybody's right here we're just giving you all the
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I want to give you all the what what they all have to say because it's important because nobody wants you know
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he's he's not the most credible source of that family for sure but Doug West the brother in an interview years later
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very much denied any of his claims okay he told the documentary crew in 2014 none of us was ever abused in any way by
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anybody as far as M and Fred and Dad and animals that was just Fantasy by somebody H and that's what he has to say
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about it yeah and he lived in the house so I'm just you know that's that's what both of them say yeah both sides should
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be represented and Doug chocked up these and other claims as just exaggerations and lies and he said we all know what a
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fantasizer Fred is which we will 100% truth right so whether Fred's more wild claims about sex were true or not by his
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mid teen years he had developed a very strong interest in women and girls okay um though the interest was rarely if
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ever returned yeah according to soon when the boys would go into town to socialize quote Fred was always chatting
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up the girls but his manner was crude and they considered him borish and unpleasant oh no these teenagers ridicu
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fued Fred as a country bumpkin that's not nice Fred's Behavior didn't do anything to endear himself
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doesn't sound like it the source says if Fred saw a girl he liked at the club or
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a local dance he simply grabbed at her it did not matter to Fred whether she was interested in him or not sir Get
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Your Filthy paws off of us he was he's just gross he's gross and entitled evidently very entitled and aggressive
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mhm all of the above now among the few things that did interest young Fred was motorcycles and he loved going to the
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motorcycle shops off of High Street and nearby ladbury and to him the vehicles were kind of like this Freedom they were
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like powerful you know all that stuff probably felt like it made him look cool he kind of felt like he was like
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oppressed on the farm by his parents they were very strict he felt like his mom was kind of like all over him all
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the time so he looked at motorcycles as like this like I can just go out in the open road kind of at first Daisy was of
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course not okay with Fred getting a bike but she did really eventually and he agreed to sell it if he ever got in an
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accident or got hurt okay so on the evening of November 28th 1958 Fred was on his way back to the farm riding his
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motorcycle that he had got and was just a few hundred yards from home when he collided with a local girl who was
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riding a bicycle in the opposite direction oh no the details are not super clear but it's and it's kind of
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unclear what actually caused the accident but it was significant enough to attract the attention of a local
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farmer who came to run for help and the man first helped the girl who looked like luckily she had only suffered a few
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minor scrapes and cuts she was she was okay but then they turned to Fred and he was in way worse condition oh no he was
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Motionless in a large flu of blood when the ambulance arrived his condition was considered very serious and he needed
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complex care so they took him to one of the instead of going to the local hospital they went to uh 14 miles away
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to uh Herford Hospital which was like a bigger hospital um Fred was unconscious at that hospital for several days and as
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everyone grew more and more concerned that he might never wake up imagine I know like obviously that would have been
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a loss for the family at that point in time exactly but imagine what could have been avoided but on the seventh day he
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regained Consciousness and slowly regained the ability to speak to move um an experience he later said was like
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coming back from the dead while his parents were relieved that he had woken up he was pretty beat up and he was
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covered in cuts and scrapes and had several broken bones including a broken nose arm and one leg that had been so
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badly damaged he had to wear a metal brace until it healed wow um he also suffered a significant head injury the
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crash he actually fractured his skull oh oh my gosh um it's unclear whether there
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was additional brain damage suffered by this like particular injury but is recovery process was slow and it was
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very painful and not great and I'm sure it had it didn't do anything positive for him no and he ended up having a fear
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of hospitals that he had for the rest of his life oh wow now despite the injuries
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and the slow healing process Fred did go out still while he was healing and you know went to clubs and pubs around
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ladbury and it was at this time that people began to notice a very significant change in Fred's Behavior
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which is what makes me think that they're head absolutely some head some brain damage um he used to be he was
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aggressive with girls in the sense of like you know grabbing at them and all that [ __ ] but he was also pretty
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avoidant of most people when he was out like he wasn't like a party animal before and he wasn't like getting into
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fights out and about he get in fights with his you know Brothers but like out and about socializing he was pretty like
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a he nobody really noticed him to be quite honest but now he seemed much less restrained when it came to aggression
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like hungry for a fight before when other boys would like mock or make fun of him or try to like start [ __ ] with
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him he would just sh like sh he would shrink away and kind of let his brothers take care of it because his brothers
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would stand up for him yeah CU they're just they his brothers Brothers after the accident though he would respond
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very aggressively and he would start fights like he was it was a very noticeable change that people saw and
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the changes in Fred's personality and behavior might have had something to do with the accident but I think they were
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also compounded with him getting more and more discontented living at home I could see that that makes sense
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obviously the the head trauma is a magnificent part of this but like that that is I think he was very discontented
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at home he was going into like Teen Angst years all of that combining I think was just a really bad storm MH and
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in the late 1950s Fred complained to one of his friends that he was deeply unhappy living at the farm and that he
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couldn't live under his parents rules and restrictions anymore now in 1960 Fred met 16-year-old Katherine Costello
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while the two were at a dance at at Memorial Hall she was actually known as Reena to friends and family and she was
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staying with some relatives in the area because she had moved from Scotland a short time earlier after uh what was
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what was said to be her defiant attitude and behavior had become too much for her
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single father father to handle okay from a very earlye Reena had been uh what they said about her a difficult child MH
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um she was in trouble a lot for a lot of petty offenses like theft and fighting like just always kind of in trouble
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always getting into stuff uh which had resulted in her being shuttled around a lot to various relatives various schools
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other authorities like she was always like it sounds like they were trying to get it in check yeah they were trying to
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Fred who'd never traveled further than ladbury at the time or the farm mhm so it is a little bit it's reminiscent of
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edin at this moment a little bit you know it very much is but her life seemed very adventurous and like wow she's so
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worldly and she's like she's rebellious and all that so he was immediately smitten from the moment they got
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together though their relationship was tumultuous Fred was immediately very demanding when it came to sex especially
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and Reena who had experienced very little affection or positive attention in her life because she would always
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always been known as a problem kind of thing she just kind of like gave in to his demands all the time was really sad
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uh soon wrote the relationship became so intense that Reena tattooed friend's name Fred's name on her arm using a
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sewing needle in Black Ink commitment yeah perhaps because it was so intense and the fact that she had been staying
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out most nights Reena was eventually asked to leave her relatives home and began sharing a room with a friend at an
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inn in ladbury I think the relative were like this is too much you just carved his name into your arm yeah this isn't
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going anywhere good unfortunately that whole thing with her friend and ladbury ended quickly because both of them were
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a were asked to leave after being said that they were disruptive and Reckless and were irritating the other guests at
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the end at the end they're like you guys are a lot you got to get it together but
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without any other options for housing Reena packed her bags and returned to Scotland and that ended her relationship
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with friend oh wow with Reena gone Fred shifted his uh very much unwanted attention back to the younger girls at
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the youth center um one evening in the fall of 1960 Fred was standing on the second floor Landing of the building's
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fire escape and attempted to grab a girl who was standing near him in response this girl turned and hit Fred
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sending him over the railing and falling one story to the ground below that girl's an icon violence is
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never the answer of course but but don't grab that girl yeah don't grab that girl
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you you uh what is it you stupid games you win stupid prizes don't put your hands on her yeah and the distance of
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the Fall hadn't been more than 10 feet but Fred hit his head on the concrete again yeah and for the second time in
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just a few years he was unconscious and a needed medical treatment oh that's not
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good Fred um regained Consciousness the following day but this time there was almost certain ly brain damage done
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almost immediately family members started noticing changes in his personality now he was I mean a split
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second away from anger lashing out aggression I mean it took nothing to set him off now before it would it was
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little provocation now nothing what is that when you get like too many head injuries it's called something like it
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happens to football players sometimes yeah CTE CTE that's exactly what I'm thinking of uh chronic traumatic
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andypath yeah yeah so yeah you're it might be similar to something like that Wonder well I wonder if like he
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eventually had that like had CT honestly you wonder that it's a very valid thing
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yeah I'm not armchair diagnosing I'm just like maybe just saying like the behavior does line up now beginning in
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1961 Fred's unusual behavior became more apparent and problem IC M he was very directionless at this time he had very
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little to occupy his time wasn't really doing a whole lot yeah cuz apparently like CTE gets worse over time yeah so
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I'm like and I mean he definitely got worse over time oh I also never understand these people why like they
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have kids but then they are so [ __ ] put out by kids and then like the other parent will be like well I'm going to
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take the kids and leave and they're like you're not taking my kids you leave and
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it's like you're put out by those kids why just let those kids go with someone who actually wants to take care of such
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an ego thing it's so [ __ ] up yeah so beginning in 1961 his kind of problematic Behavior
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really went up a notch because he was super directionless at this moment sounds he wants to get out of the farm
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but he's not making any moves to do it he's dropped out of school he's not really endearing himself to people
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around him he doesn't have a lot to occupy his time at this moment right so he starts shoplifting oh that will help
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everything that will help yeah that will that will give you Direction and in April he had to make his first
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appearance in court because of it oh wow um the shoplifting while very frustrating to his parents would turn
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out to honestly be the least of Fred's troubles that year cuz in June just a few months after the arrest for
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shoplifting Fred's 13-year-old sister Kitty disclosed to their mother and again a trigger warning oh no 13 years
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old that Fred had been sexually abusing her for months and that she'd become pregnant oh oh my God yes oh my God yeah
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I told you this is really bad really bad case Daisy the mother took the girl to be examined by a doctor in that
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initiated an investigation and Fred was soon arrested yeah now how the [ __ ] does
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he make it out of that the family was horrified and obviously horrified humiliated sh all
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the things Fred didn't understand why anyone was upset with him and that does make you concern it definitely concern
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about his claims for sure according to soon he was quote belligerent with police answering their questions as
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though they were completely unimportant what in fact the more that investigators asked Fred about the in
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allegations and interviewed him the clearer it became that his attitudes and interests around sex were were far from
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normal or average yeah it sounds very very abnormal attitudes about it Fred acknowledged and and was like yeah I
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have he said he had been molesting and assaulting young girls young girls multiple for
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years but he wasn't ashamed of his behavior he was really just kind of perplexed as to why everyone was making
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a big deal out of it he was even quoted as saying well doesn't every one do it oh okay see yeah no matter what
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something's very wrong here very wrong like very wrong now the arrest and allegations caused honestly nearly
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everyone in the family to distance themselves from Fred yeah um some disowned him completely like some just
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were like no thank you you can very much understand that decision um he was briefly held in a Cell following his
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arrest but was unable to or he was able to make bond so he ended up being released what the [ __ ] the problem was
00:26:33
that no one wanted him to come to the family home any longer so he was sent to live with his aunt Violet and he was
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going to stay with her pending the outcome of the trial now in the following months however and this is
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just really sad kitty grew kind of reticent about testifying in court and when the time came for her to testify
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she didn't want to participate in I mean you can understand that would she's a young girl humiliating exactly and so
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the trial did fall apart kind of and the charges were dismissed now by the summer
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of 1962 Walter and Daisy West appeared to have gotten over their feelings of Shame and
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humiliation about Fred and his behavior um and despite protests from his other siblings they welcomed him back into the
00:27:20
family home I don't understand yep what that's like months after this happened this
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poor girl now in the meantime Reena the girl he had been dating MH had found life in Scotland to be much more
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difficult than she imagined it was worse than when she had left it the first time
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she was bar barely at this point managing to keep herself afloat and she was having to resort to like what she
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didn't want to do which was sex work and petty theft to get herself just even by
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just floating above the water um so she was tired of this whole thing she was tired of the cycle that she was
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Finding herself in so she ended up coming back to England in the summer of 1962 and immediately they started dating
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again okay so just before she left Scotland Reena did have a brief relationship with a man and she had
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become pregnant okay now when Fred learned that she was pregnant he was angry and he was angry and at first
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you're like what do you like you weren't together yeah you know like that that's
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none of you you know like you can't be angry for her for what she did when you were not together yeah she's in a
00:28:32
completely different place but he was angry because he was racist and this man was Asian so he was angry that she was
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pregnant with what would be a half asian baby oh my God so he insisted that she terminate the pregnancy are you [ __ ]
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kidding me and actually tried to forcibly do it himself oh my God but luckily he tried to do it in the woods
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in ladbury but fortunately the whole thing drew the attention of local police they intervened and he had to stop his
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plan but nothing happened to him after this what like no charges no nothing that's the thing I'm like what and it
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gets worse because they decided to get married after this and the baby was born okay so in November they were
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married they had like very small secretive ceremony they kept it away from their families and Fred ended up
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moving out of his parents house and he and Reena got an apartment in coatbridge which is a small town about eight or
00:29:34
nine miles outside Glasgow uh City Center where Reena actually grew up now the change in scenery was definitely
00:29:42
like a big Improvement for Reena like she felt like okay this is a new this is a new place I can start like meeting
00:29:48
people you know like all this yeah but Fred found it very challenging he hadn't spent much time outside of where he had
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grown up in this like kind of jarring change CU he was from a very rural place like this is Glasgow like right City and
00:30:03
so this was very jarring to him and it made him feel uncomfortable and he got more and more irritable and aggressive
00:30:09
and they have a new baby too which is a stresser and he also was getting more and more aggressive about sex oh um
00:30:16
according to soon his love making was short and brutal and he wanted sex at the most inappropriate times oh that's
00:30:22
so disturbing which is really unsettling and she's recovering from having a baby
00:30:27
like yeah well in either it's just horrible no matter what oh but his behavior soon turned kind of like
00:30:35
sadistic like he was [ __ ] up um and he would honestly like do all of this against Reena like she was he was
00:30:42
physically abusing her physically harming her and at the same time he had become extremely controlling and
00:30:48
demanded at the time that Reena go back to sex work in order to support them as a couple what the [ __ ] but while he
00:30:56
often bragged about how he quote made a lot of money from being a pimp he would also complain about how much trouble her
00:31:06
working in sex work would cause them but you put her in that position forced her
00:31:11
into it right so less than a year into their marriage his personality was transforming rapidly I mean getting
00:31:19
worse and worse he was insatiable he demanded sex constantly he was brutal he was violent he was awful he was [ __ ]
00:31:27
awful awful a nightmare and she was not allowed to refuse she could not refuse and he was often people like said that
00:31:34
he would slap her in the head and the face like he was really awful that's really sad and it honestly took very
00:31:41
little to send him into a rage and like it all it really took was something very
00:31:45
minor and he would get physically aggressive now in March 1963 is when Reena actually gave birth to a baby girl
00:31:52
named Charmaine and that's the baby that we're talking about um but it Fred and Reena knew that everyone could tell that
00:32:00
this was not Fred's child and so like that would normally not you know why would you care like this you know I mean
00:32:08
like this isn't but Reena was worried that the West Family might be kind of awful about this okay which I mean I
00:32:17
don't blame her for thinking that yeah I don't either so they told Fred's family
00:32:21
that Reena had miscarried but because they still wanted a baby they had adopted a baby of Asian descent toot
00:32:28
take its place uhhuh even worse was that Fred immediately took a dislike to this
00:32:34
baby oh no because he said it didn't resemble him at all and so he didn't want anything to do with this why the
00:32:41
[ __ ] would the baby resemble you it's not your baby it's not your baby that's kind of how that works so poor charmain
00:32:47
took like immediately was the the bane of his existence just as a baby just coming into the world oh God and in the
00:32:56
years that followed her birth Fred's abusive behavior only worsened and he honestly would never form any kind of
00:33:04
bond with Charmaine at all uh neighbors said of Reena later quote as far as we were concerned she was just a single
00:33:11
parent we never saw a man at the house at all wow um during this period Fred was driving an ice cream truck that's
00:33:18
horrific and is that the worst thing you've ever heard for the walls company and spent many of his nights off at the
00:33:25
pub just drinking and bragging and lying about what he was doing saying he was connected to organized crime like no no
00:33:33
in 1964 Reena became pregnant again and eventually gave birth to a second daughter they named an Marie um unlike
00:33:41
his relationship or lack thereof with Charmaine Fred really doted on Anna and would like fuss over her yeah and he
00:33:48
would just completely neglect and ignore Charmaine well and I'm sure it was almost a way for him to to mess with
00:33:54
charmain to punish her exactly and of course needed like a bigger place to live at this point cuz they're expanding
00:34:00
their family so Fred and Reena moved to a larger apartment that and this one had
00:34:04
a large garden and while the other neighbors would kind of plant small gardens or grow you know some vegetables
00:34:10
here and there he kept his plot just Rak over and he would tell n CU neighbors would be like what you doing over there
00:34:17
like why why don't you have like an actual Garden yeah and he said I'm keeping it for something special oh I
00:34:23
hate that yeah cuz I don't know what his definition of special is and I don't know that I want to know after a while
00:34:30
he would spend nights out in the garden and would take girls he'd picked up on his rote there to have sex oh yeah and
00:34:41
what's really frustrating is that this particular area eventually got demolished to make a way for a highway
00:34:47
system so it's kind of impossible to dig up and that means it's unknown whether some of Fred's victims could be buried
00:34:55
in this particular Garden feel like it's pretty known yeah now as they entered 1965 it seemed that there was really no
00:35:03
hope that this relationship was going to get any better it was just getting worse
00:35:07
right um and it turned out that they were kind of bound to get worse and worse as we go at one point during the
00:35:13
first half of the Year Fred was driving his ice cream van in the Glasgow suburbs
00:35:18
and he accidentally hit a small boy and left him dying in the road yeah and a crowd had gathered and
00:35:28
Fred was brought into the local police station where he was interviewed and was released after investigators determined
00:35:34
that it really was a tragic accident and the child had been excited seeing the ice cream truck and had ran in front of
00:35:40
the truck oh that's so sad but who really knows if that's the case exactly and what we know now what we know now an
00:35:48
you accidentally get into collisions with two people yeah I don't know what are what are the odds of that yeah but
00:35:54
despite having been cleared of any wrongdoing the neighborhood definitely turned on Fred um he was pretty much
00:36:00
shunned by everyone so he couldn't make any money locally so he decided it was time to return to England where they
00:36:07
could be closer to friend Fred's family okay now the couple's relationship continued to get worse and worse and
00:36:14
worse and by 1965 Fred was carrying on affairs with several women not trying to hide anything from Reena he was just
00:36:20
doing it right out in the open and by that time Fred was barely home anyways and when he was he was just an abusive
00:36:26
piece of [ __ ] yeah probably preferable that he wasn't home so Reena was responsible for raising two small
00:36:31
children on her own which would be hard for anyone and working supporting the family cuz he's not working and
00:36:37
sometimes when she I mean she rarely got time by herself but when she did she would go to one of the local cafes and
00:36:44
that's where she met Issa mcneel um who was a young woman with whom she'd been kind of like casually friendly now Issa
00:36:51
had recently lost her job at a clothing Factory and was kind of desperate for more work so Reno was like why don't you
00:36:58
come on as a nanny and you can help me with Charmaine and Anna in exchange for Roman board oh and she was like sure it
00:37:05
didn't take long for uh McNeil to begin to notice the strange and very tense Dynamic that was in the west house that
00:37:14
would be terrifying to walk into that she said when Fred was home the girls were left on the bottom bunk of a bunk
00:37:20
bed where they were essentially kept penned in by metal bars and would only be allowed to be out when he left what
00:37:27
the [ __ ] yeah and of course there was a horribly abusive relationship between Reena and Fred um and they didn't he
00:37:36
didn't hide this at all he did it right out in the open wow and despite all of this um Issa introduced the West to her
00:37:43
friend Anna McFall who was a teenager with a history full of tragedies and Trauma kind of like Reena that's s um
00:37:51
she had very little familiar familial or social supports around her and Anna began spending a lot of her time at the
00:37:58
West department and soon became kind of a regular presence around the home yeah now after the accident Fred had told
00:38:05
like the accident with the little boy Fred had told Reena they needed to move back to England where he would be able
00:38:09
to make a living again but seeing it as an opportunity probably to get away from
00:38:14
her abusive husband Reena was like no I'm not going with you but Fred took the girls and return to much Markle in the
00:38:22
spring of 1965 so he took the girls this is what I mean I don't understand when people like he obviously doesn't
00:38:30
want to be a father no in the in the sense that you should want to be a father it's a way to punish Reena but
00:38:36
he's just like taking these children like what so you can abuse and neglect them like what it doesn't make any sense
00:38:43
to me and again I don't know why he was allowed to take those children I don't know how any of that all happened but of
00:38:51
course Reena immediately began stressing and missing her children so she went back to England to live in Fred's
00:38:56
parents' home she really just wanteded to be around the kids yeah to probably protect them
00:39:01
yeah the and now of course this living situation at the West became very uncomfortable it's very crowded they're
00:39:07
with his parents that's a lot so Fred and Reena moved with their children to the Willows which was a caravan site
00:39:13
near much marle now at first things like seemed like they might be like at least
00:39:17
plateauing you know like getting a little better I guess Reena found a job serving tea at a local cafe Fred got a
00:39:25
job driving a truck for a Lo um uh for like a local company but their relationship was still very tumultuous
00:39:33
and very unstable yeah and Reena was spending a lot of time away with her family in Scotland and on one of her
00:39:38
trips to Glasgow she ran into Issa mcneel and suggested that the young woman return to England and stay with
00:39:44
her since she had been having trouble with her parents at the time too and Issa agreed and also brought Anna McFall
00:39:51
with her since Anna was also unhappy in Scotland and was looking for new opportunities again so she was like why
00:39:57
don't you guys just come back and live with us like it worked out before I guess kind of no it didn't take long for
00:40:03
Isa and Reena to kind of regret that decision with four adults and two children the Caravan was very very
00:40:10
cramped and very uncomfortable and it was just making all the tension worse and the shift from Glasgow to the much
00:40:17
more rural much markal was a very tough adjustment especially for ISSA and um Anna yeah they were both struggling to
00:40:25
find work they were spending a lot of their time just watching the girls for Fred and Reena and just kind of like
00:40:30
hanging out doing nothing so after a couple of months with Fred and Reena the situation became so bad and so tense and
00:40:37
so uncomfortable that Reena sent a letter to her former boyfriend John mlin okay or mlin I think it was and asked
00:40:46
that he come pick up Issa and Anna and bring them back to Glasgow okay so JN agreed I'm like take the girls too I
00:40:54
know and Reena and John had actually coordinated things so that John and his friend would arrive while Fred was at
00:41:00
work and he would actually take Issa Anna and the two children back to Scotland so that did end up being part
00:41:08
of the plan I'm like take Reena too everybody just run away exactly now strangely though Fred arrived home
00:41:15
unexpectedly while they were all packing and the scene just exploded no and it was like At first everybody was like how
00:41:23
the why did he show up in the middle of the day but Howard soon the who we will link his uh his sources
00:41:31
in our show notes he thinks that Anna actually told Fred about the plan a few days earlier what a why now both Issa
00:41:40
and John McLaughlin apparently now believed that Anna had told Fred of their scheme and she had apparently she
00:41:48
had become very friendly with Fred in the recent weeks and in the end Fred refused to let the children go oh and
00:41:55
Anna told very calmly told everyone that she was going to stay on as Fred's nanny
00:42:00
so they could all go what the [ __ ] so John mlin loaded up a few of reena's stuff and you know he
00:42:07
and his friend and Reena and Issa all left for Glasgow oh my God if I was Reena I would be livid yeah there's no
00:42:14
way I could leave it's also like take your kids like well it's like I couldn't leave I don't know though I've never
00:42:20
been in that situation so I'm not going to sit here and judge anybody but it was
00:42:23
only later after Issa had returned to Scotland that it became clear what had been happening between Fred and Anna
00:42:30
yeah in letters to Issa Anna told her friend that she was quote unquote infatuated with Fred and the two had
00:42:37
been carrying on an affair during the periods that Reena was away in Glasgow Yeah Anna had led very like I said led a
00:42:44
very troubled life up until this point and naively believed Fred was going to give her a better life oh and at one
00:42:51
point she even wrote to her mother that the two were going to be married okay ignoring that little inconvenience fact
00:42:57
that Fred was already married to Reena right um well it seems pretty unlikely that Fred was going to go through with
00:43:03
this whole thing he did give the impression that he might um not long after Reena and Issa had fled the
00:43:09
Caravan Park Fred just placed both his children in the care of Social Services in the summer of 1966 you might as well
00:43:16
have just let their mother take them didn't allow their mother to take them and just put them into Social Services
00:43:21
that's in absolutely Bonkers now when Reena learned this she returned to England to get her children and began
00:43:29
living at a different Caravan Park a few a little ways away from this one and although she was happy to have her
00:43:34
children back Reena was surprised that she was kind of irritated and feeling a little jealous over Fred's relationship
00:43:42
with Anna I mean regardless I mean that's on trauma it makes sense and Fred had engaged in clearly many Affairs in
00:43:49
the past that she knew of but they were all like in her in her eyes they were like at least out of sight out of mind
00:43:56
she didn't know you know and they were never serious in her eyes that's different when you bring on somebody to
00:44:00
literally care for your children and that I can't imagine no and his relationship with Anna was like it
00:44:06
seemed like she was being replaced yeah too like as like the mother of like you know the wife and mother right so for
00:44:13
nearly a year after her return to England Reena Fred and Anna were in this like weird like love triangle that was like
00:44:21
this tense fighting trying to like he was trying to tell both of them that he was going to be with them kind of thing
00:44:28
and after suffering a great deal of abuse from Reena obviously Anna moved out and found lodging somewhere else
00:44:35
okay but Reena remained pretty ambivalent and continued splitting her time between the Caravan park with Fred
00:44:42
and her family's home in Glasgow so things were just still going on this roller coaster of just [ __ ] drama things
00:44:49
took a turn for the worse in the spring of 1967 when Anna announced that she was
00:44:54
pregnant with Fred's child okay by then Anna was still serving as a nanny for the West children and saw her own
00:45:02
pregnancy as an opportunity to convince Fred to divorce Reena and marry her uhhuh this is all so [ __ ] up it is and
00:45:10
Fred was not interested in marrying Anna in fact he was pretty uncomfortable with
00:45:15
the arrangement since Reena found out about his fair and was now worried that which none of this is going to make
00:45:21
logical sense cuz nobody's logical in this situation but now he's worried that if Reena found out about the pregnancy
00:45:27
she was going to leave him for good suddenly he cares well he he enjoys toying with multiple women at the same
00:45:34
time ex he doesn't like that it's going to be disrupted here and that Reena can take the power and say like [ __ ] you I'm
00:45:39
gone exactly but that April very pregnant Anna McFall disappeared from the Caravan Park oh no and she was never
00:45:49
seen alive again oh no Anna no one ever reported Anna missing no one investigated it no one looked into it
00:45:58
that's so sad that she didn't have anybody that like looked after her to care her own mother didn't report her
00:46:03
missing that's so messed up it was only it was uh later after Fred's arrest in 1994 that details of her whereabouts
00:46:12
were actually learned throughout his multiple interrogations and interviews Fred repeatedly denied killing Anna he
00:46:19
said nope I didn't do it but weirdly he had no trouble directing them right to a
00:46:26
corn field where she was buried uhhuh he couldn't have known she was there unless he at the very least played
00:46:35
a part in putting her there right while investigators were never able to conclusively prove that he killed Anna
00:46:44
pretty likely there were also rumors that he had admitted it to cellmates during his incarceration in 1994 telling
00:46:50
them that he stabbed her one evening after they got in an argument oh God now despite having been given a general
00:46:57
sense of where the body was buried it actually took authorities nearly 2 months to find her uh and when they did
00:47:04
finally exume Anna from her grave in the M Markle cornfield 27 years after she was murdered her remains were entirely
00:47:13
skeletal as were the remains of her unborn child right he killed not only her but their baby as well the body had
00:47:19
been dismembered and there was a dressing gown type cord wrapped around her neck
00:47:25
and wrists and then t died under the ribs as though she had been restrained oh my God also found in the grave were
00:47:32
two large plastic bags with several pieces of Blood Stained clothing and that what was either a large floral
00:47:38
print sheet or curtain that's horrific absent from the body though were several small hand and foot bones but no one can
00:47:48
tell where they went or why they weren't there interesting so now it's like did he
00:47:56
torture her yeah did someone torture her and remove fingers and toes oh man because
00:48:06
he's a brutal [ __ ] yeah we will find out and she was restrained right so it's like I mean I
00:48:14
entirely possible that he did something awful I can't think of another explanation yeah now in the weeks after
00:48:22
Anna disappeared co-workers and others who knew him recalled that Fred became very irritable very anxious very easily
00:48:30
distracted noticeable difference yeah paranoid that changed a short time later when Reena returned happy to find that
00:48:36
Fred and Anna's relationship had ended cuz she had no idea what happened right and they started living together again
00:48:42
and took the children out of you know completely cuz she was able to claim her children in Social Services but they
00:48:48
weren't entirely taken out oh yeah I don't know how that all works so I'm not going to speculate but they did take
00:48:54
their children out eventually okay um and basically at this point Reena looked at it as like maybe we can
00:49:02
start over Okay maybe all this can start over maybe it can actually work we can be a family it's so sad that she had
00:49:08
that hope cuz I think it's hard to understand from the outside how she possibly could but again we've never
00:49:14
been in a situation like that so you I mean hope must be really the only thing that you do have truly truly now not
00:49:21
long after Reena returned to living with Fred he found a new job as a laborer he
00:49:26
was working at a local grain mill near the cart Caravan Park where they lived and at the same time he was still
00:49:32
spending all his nights at a pub at cafes and um he was spending it at mostly at this place called the Poppin
00:49:40
Cafe which is a very seedy bar in Gloucester known to attract unsavory customers and Petty
00:49:47
thieves now according to soon it was the kind of place where quote pornographic photographs were circulated and stolen
00:49:54
goods changed hands when the owner was not looking interesting now it was at this Cafe that
00:50:00
Fred likely met 15-year-old waitress Mary basol 15 on the evening of January 6th 1968 Mary had plans to meet her
00:50:10
boyfriend Tim Merritt who lived about 5 miles from her home and she was last seen waiting for the bus on Bristol Road
00:50:16
at about 7:15 p.m. waiting at the bus stop at the other end Tim was surprised when the first bus stopped and Mary did
00:50:25
not get off and then he became alarmed when the second bus came and went and Mary was nowhere to be found so Tim
00:50:32
asked a friend to drive him to Mary's house and he was like okay maybe she just went home and we got our L like you
00:50:39
know our wires crossed and she didn't realize she was supposed to meet me so he was like he went to her home but when
00:50:46
he went there he was kind of shocked and very alarmed when he found out that no one there had seen her either and they
00:50:51
were like I thought she was meeting you so The Disappearance was very out of character for her she was very
00:50:58
responsible girl yeah this this just wasn't her she wasn't floating around like right not knowing where she was so
00:51:04
Tim immediately called the police and reported her missing now especially back then even now police have met reports of
00:51:14
Miss missing teenagers with a little bit of like run away yeah they don't really
00:51:18
want to expand expend their valuable resources on searching for someone just to learn that they'd run away right um
00:51:25
or going to stay with like friends and they're going to come back and that's kind of the that's usually what what we
00:51:30
get in these situations but here luckily they did take it very seriously because
00:51:36
oh wow I guess because Mary I mean everyone in her life was like this literally isn't her she's never done
00:51:43
this that's um it's just it's a gamble like you never know what you're going to get in a situation you don't that's the
00:51:49
thing and you don't cuz there's some situations where the whole family is sitting there being like she's never
00:51:53
done this she wouldn't do this and they're like I bet she did though so it's like this one just happened to be
00:51:58
one that worked out where they immediately started looking uh Chief Constable hdj Smith told reporters were
00:52:05
very concerned for the girl and I think part of this like I think part of this is just like honestly it's like a kind
00:52:13
of like 5050 shot of what you're going to get from them in this situation but also it did help the case here that
00:52:21
unfortunately several local girls at the time had been assaulted in the area over
00:52:26
last several months and years and detectives were like okay this could be in the same vein so they did like jump
00:52:34
at this because they wanted to stop it before it happened again makes sense which is a good thing but obviously it's
00:52:39
awful that it was going on at the time so the search continued for several days for Mary and with more than 125 officers
00:52:47
combing the city he and like all out for this but there were no clues no leads they couldn't find anything on where she
00:52:54
had gone so they were very frustrated and at this point local police called on Scotland Yard for assistance and two
00:53:01
detectives from the yard were assigned to the case the sudden assignment of yard detectives caused many to speculate
00:53:07
that the case was now being investigated as a murder because that's like a big switch but Chief Inspector Kenneth
00:53:14
Barker attempted to stop those rumors during a press conference on January 9th he said the position is still not
00:53:20
changed and we are still investigating a missing person but obviously it could change to something else and it is
00:53:26
better that the yard be informed at this stage time is going on nothing has been
00:53:31
discovered right so he was basically just saying like we're not investigating it as a murder yet but it's better to
00:53:37
enter this stage and have Scotland Yard enter than to wait for it to become a problem I'd rather them be in this and
00:53:45
be looking for a alive person right than do it too late sense good job I know due
00:53:51
diligence we love to see it now despite the assistance of Scotland Yard detectives and the use of military
00:53:56
search and rescue helicopter weeks passed and nothing no sign of Mary no clues of where she could have gone this
00:54:04
must have been so frustrating yeah after two weeks nothing had changed in the investigation investigators told
00:54:11
reporters at that point they were quote waiting for something to turn up and the
00:54:16
possibility canot be discounted that Mary might have gone off on her own accord cuz at this point they're like
00:54:21
maybe she doesn't want to be found I don't know now of course Mary had not gone off on her own accord and
00:54:28
unfortunately her body would not be found ever in 1998 Fred's son Steven West told reporters he was convinced his
00:54:37
father had killed Mary basol he said his father had boasted in prison how her body and others would remain
00:54:44
undiscovered oh God Fred had always denied killing Mary and while they strongly suspected he was very much
00:54:52
responsible for her disappearance investigators were never able to formally connect him right without a
00:54:57
body it's like impossible yeah but Steven claims his father admitted several other crimes to him in the
00:55:02
months before his death and alluded to the fact that Mary was one of those victims during one visit Fred allegedly
00:55:09
told his son quote they are not going to find them all you know never and I believe his son I do too of
00:55:18
course how are you that evil he's he's bottom tier I mean bottom tier even in death too to go to the grave not
00:55:27
ever admitting the full scope of everything he didn't give a [ __ ] and when Steven asked if Mary was among
00:55:34
those people Fred replied I'll never tell anyone where she is oh God and he didn't that's so evil a 15-year-old girl
00:55:43
that was just waiting on a bus stop probably now following his arrest Fred frequently made references to other
00:55:49
victims but he was intentionally vague and he would never give details or names just reference them kind of like hint at
00:55:57
them he loved that [ __ ] and years later Fred's defense attorney um Howard Ogden
00:56:03
told police that Fred claimed to have picked Mary up at the bus stop that night that she went missing and after
00:56:09
killing her he quote buried her in village in the village of Bishop's cleave near cheltonham
00:56:16
although this is consistent with other references that Fred has made had made to Mary's death in the past without any
00:56:24
more specific location or details can just dig up the whole area yeah there was no way that they could really go
00:56:30
about trying to find her and she remains missing to this day oh that's awful which is [ __ ] awful like that kind of
00:56:38
[ __ ] I can't like going to your grave and not giving closure I'm just like damn but it's your last you're the your
00:56:46
last power play yeah now in the year that followed Mary's disappearance Fred continued a very sharp spiral downward
00:56:54
was arrested several times for for petty thefts other minor minor offenses and during this time Fred was also um let go
00:57:02
from his job at the Mill when the owners became suspicious that he'd actually been stealing money from them so now
00:57:08
he's out of work he's desperate for money and so he worked a few months driving a septic truck before landing a
00:57:14
full-time position driving a delivery truck for a local bakery to not deliver the by baked goods his the wholesome
00:57:21
jobs that he was holding at times I'm like I hate that yeah it's like a being a babysitter and
00:57:29
unfortunately it was through this job that Fred met Rose setting him on a even worse path somehow that would end up
00:57:40
with him killing himself him killing himself mhm and we're going to end part one there wait
00:57:48
he killed himself yeah he killed himself in prison what yeah oh man yeah all right all right so
00:57:58
that's where we're going to end part one um okay it's going to get bad I just need I
00:58:05
need everybody to really understand that you mean worse it's going to get much worse okay uh I'm going to do my best to
00:58:14
I'm going to give you I'm going to give you what happened but yeah but tast I'm going to do my best to to
00:58:20
not you know get too into the nitty-gritty that's not helping anybody but I'm we're here so are it's an awful story
00:58:30
it's awful for everyone involved well with all that yeah we hope you keep listening and we hope you keep it weird
00:58:38
oh got to tell you I know it almost I couldn't even get that weird out like Oh weird weird
00:58:46
[Music]