00:00:05
-London, England. On March 10, 1993, a man rang
a national newspaper to declare that
he'd just killed somebody.
00:00:19
The victim, 45-year-old
Peter Walker, had been suffocated to death
with a plastic bag
00:00:26
during a sadomasochistic
sex session. -He's not just killed
his victim, he's humiliated him, as well.
00:00:36
-The killer was 38-year-old
Colin Ireland, a man with a singular obsession. -He gives himself a New Year's
resolution in January 1993,
00:00:48
that he will become
a serial killer. -Determined to get credit
for his cold-blooded crimes,
00:00:55
he even called
and taunted the police. By June 12th, four more men
would be dead across London.
00:01:13
-He killed three men in a week. No, that's just unbelievable. It just -- just hadn't happened
in -- in my experience.
00:01:20
-Colin Ireland had finally
attained the attention he craved and became one of the world's
most evil killers.
00:01:28
♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ London, England, 1993. The capital's gay community
was terrified by a spate of killings
that had torn through the city.
00:02:04
When 39-year-old Colin Ireland confessed to the murder
of five men over four months
in the spring of 1993,
00:02:12
the nation was in shock. The man the press were calling
"The Gay Slayer" had dreamt of becoming
a serial killer
00:02:21
and after carrying out
his twisted self-prophesy, he gave himself up, just as
the police were closing in.
00:02:29
Former crime correspondent
for the "Independent" newspaper, Terry Kirby,
remembers Ireland's brief
00:02:36
but brutal killing spree. -It all happened in quite
an intense period, obviously,
00:02:40
in the early part of 1993 and there was
this sort of sequence of -- of murders
and the gradual realization
00:02:47
that they were connected and police
beginning to join the dots. I mean, part of the problem
at the outset
00:02:54
was that different murders
were being investigated by different teams of detectives
00:02:59
and in different parts
of London. Then when it became clear,
as time moved on, that the police were looking
for a serial killer, obviously,
00:03:07
there was -- there was a huge
amount of interest in the story. -It was a case that frustrated
the Metropolitan Police.
00:03:14
The investigator who finally
gathered the crucial evidence
that led to Ireland's conviction
00:03:20
was Detective Inspector
Albert Patrick. -Colin Ireland was a man
who was possessed
00:03:26
at becoming a serial killer. Ireland was a bit of a churl. He picked on easy victims.
00:03:32
He would play with them,
he would, uh, tie them up and handcuffs, thinking they were
going to have sex
00:03:37
and then suddenly, he got
a rope 'round their throat and then strangled them
and then release the strangle
00:03:42
and say,
almost watched their fate, "Well, how are you feeling
now?," and then eventually pull
on the cord to kill 'em.
00:03:48
The pain they must've been
going through, a heinous person, wasn't he? He was just an evil, bad man.
00:03:54
-This killer's story
begins over 60 years ago. Colin Ireland was born
in Dartford, Kent,
00:04:01
on the 16th of March 1954. His mother was just
17 years old. -His parents were
unmarried teenagers.
00:04:10
His father disappeared,
his mother struggled. To call it dysfunctional
would be to compliment it.
00:04:18
Ireland's upbringing
was horrible. There is no other word to use. -Ireland's mother struggled
to settle down
00:04:27
and by the age of 10,
he'd changed schools 6 times. They had also changed home
nine times,
00:04:35
including a short spell
in a homeless shelter for women and children. -And then, she met
a new husband.
00:04:43
They had a child together and they made the decision
that it was too hard to raise
00:04:49
both these children
in the same household. And so, he was sent away
and put in a home.
00:04:55
And the message that gets sent
when a parent does that, is you're just baggage. You're not a part of my future.
00:05:03
I don't love you. I'll dispose of you
when and as I see fit. -And this is a really
crucial time
00:05:11
for our development as children. Our relationships
with our parents are absolutely fundamental
at this point in time.
00:05:19
And when you have an interrupted
or a disrupted attachment, particularly with your mother,
00:05:24
that has a real impact
on your ability to form attachments with other
people throughout your life.
00:05:30
So, you've got all
of the ingredients for at least a problematic life, but unfortunately, it's not just
problematic, it's becomes fatal.
00:05:39
-Constantly on the move,
Ireland regularly found himself as the new boy
at yet another school.
00:05:46
-Witnesses that we spoke
to told us that he was picked on at school and, uh, he was
a bit of a loner, really.
00:05:53
-He was not a popular child
at school. He was bullied by others and when you have that sense
of isolation from your peers
00:06:02
and that inability
to form those relationships, you do really turn
in on yourself
00:06:08
and you become very insular,
very isolated. And your reaction to others'
behavior towards you
00:06:15
is maladaptive, it's abnormal. So, he would react
by being violent, he would react
by setting fire to things,
00:06:22
so there's some real
warning signs here of a very, very troubled
individual, indeed.
00:06:28
-In 1966, 12-year old Ireland
found himself a summer job in his hometown of Dartford.
00:06:36
-At one point, he was working
a fairground and -- and a man
propositioned him with --
00:06:41
with gifts if he --
if he had sex with him. We can only with hindsight say that
that may well have shaped his --
00:06:48
his view of gay men. -And often, sexual predators
will prey on people like him, so they would've picked up
on those vulnerabilities.
00:06:57
They would've picked up
on the fact that he was the odd one out,
that he didn't have
00:07:00
much of a support network
around him and -- and targeted him
for these advances.
00:07:06
-You have in this Petri dish
of adolescence all these things added together,
abandoned,
00:07:13
mother struggling in poverty,
school to school, bullied, an extraordinary conflation
of ingredients
00:07:23
that might make a serial killer. And slowly but surely,
that reality began to emerge.
00:07:31
-As Ireland grew up,
life didn't get any easier. He often found himself
on the wrong side of the law.
00:07:39
-By the time he was
in his late 20s, he'd already accumulated a -- a fairly substantial
criminal record.
00:07:45
He'd been in and out of prison
for things like robbery, theft, deception-type offenses.
00:07:51
And he became interested
in survivalism. -At the same time, Ireland, who would become obsessed
with gay men,
00:08:00
seemed to have little trouble
in meeting women. In 1981, he met his first wife
at a survivalist meeting
00:08:08
and they married
the following year. -He may well have been gay throughout
this period of his life.
00:08:14
I think Ireland felt deeply
ashamed of his homosexuality and struggled against them
00:08:24
throughout most
of his adult life. -Known by their friends
as a gentle giant, Ireland became stepfather
to her 5-year-old daughter.
00:08:35
-Not uncommon to see
this kind of double life. He got involved
with stepchildren
00:08:40
and taking care of them. He was a caretaker, he was kind, he was all the things
you'd expect from a gentleman.
00:08:47
-However, five years later
in 1987, Ireland's marriage
ended in divorce after he cheated on his wife.
00:08:56
He then moved to Devon
in the southwest of England intending to spend time
on the moors as a survivalist.
00:09:03
Once there, he met
a pub landlady in 1989. Three months later, in 1990,
they got married.
00:09:11
-Here was a man, I think,
who was living a lie and was angry with himself
for living it
00:09:17
and was determined, in the end, to take revenge on people
who tempted him. -Just four months
after the wedding,
00:09:26
the relationship fell apart. Ireland emptied
his wife's bank account and headed to
Southend-on-Sea in Essex.
00:09:34
By 1991, Ireland had found work
there in a homeless shelter, where he went on
to become a deputy manager.
00:09:42
-I mean, in a way,
Ireland's failed marriages really mirrored his childhood and people coming
from broken homes
00:09:49
do tend to have difficulty
forming relationships and you can certainly
see the pattern here.
00:09:55
-Ever more isolated,
38-year-old Colin Ireland became obsessed with a book
about serial killers.
00:10:02
-The inspiration that
Colin Ireland talks about for his -- his killing,
for his murders, he says that --
00:10:08
that it's a book
by a former FBI profiler. And Ressler gives quite a lot
of details
00:10:14
about investigations into
serial murder, about the -- the way that the FBI
investigated particular crimes.
00:10:22
And I think Colin Ireland
would've spent a lot of time reading about these individuals
who inflict harm on others,
00:10:28
time and time and time again. -On January 1, 1993, Colin Ireland
made a stunning decision.
00:10:39
-He gives himself a New Year's
resolution in January 1993, that he will become
a serial killer.
00:10:47
But not just a serial killer,
a serial killer of gay men. -Earl's Court, London, 1993.
00:10:58
Still living in Southend-on-Sea,
his hunting grounds were a 45-minute train
ride away in West London.
00:11:08
-The gay community were
incredibly stigmatized still, at this time, and they weren't as part of
the mainstream as they are today
00:11:16
and as such, they become
an ideal group of victims for a killer like Colin Ireland.
00:11:21
-And the timing couldn't be
any better for Ireland. His choice of victims, gay men
who practiced sadomasochism,
00:11:29
were already under the scrutiny
of the general public and the subject of a controversial police
investigation
00:11:36
called Operation Spanner. -It was a big control list
at the time. It'd become a big civil liberty,
civil rights issue,
00:11:42
as to whether consensual
sexual practices in the privacy
of their own homes should be the subject
of criminal prosecution.
00:11:50
And it was endlessly debated
in the media and there were arguments
on both sides.
00:11:55
And it may well be
that that influenced, um, uh, Ireland's choice of victims,
because obviously,
00:12:03
men who enjoyed being kind
of subjected to pain, being tied up,
being bound and gagged
00:12:09
would obviously put themselves
in a vulnerable position to someone who wanted to
exploit 'em with violent ends.
00:12:15
-At the time the --
the gay men who engaged in -- in sadomasochistic sex were breaking the law,
so his choice of victims
00:12:24
is absolutely
no accident whatsoever. He knows that this group
of people are one that the police
perhaps don't care about,
00:12:31
that society as a whole,
doesn't care about, and as such, are easier
to target and kill.
00:12:37
-Ireland had studied how to be
a serial killer with meticulous precision. -He created a murder kit,
a rucksack,
00:12:46
which he filled
with rope and gloves. He was at least
forensically aware. -The fact that he's carrying
gloves with him
00:12:55
is indicative of the fact
that he knows that the fingerprints can be
traced back to individuals.
00:13:00
He's somebody who --
who went to great lengths to clean up at the crime scenes where his murders
were committed.
00:13:06
So, here's an individual who -- who knows how to cover
his tracks and he's got that in mind
from the outset.
00:13:14
-He was not a teenager or a --
an aggressive young man at 22. He was a man who had thought out
what was going to happen.
00:13:23
And what was going to happen
was a spree of killings that was to send shivers down the spine
of the gay community in London.
00:13:32
-As well as a type of victim, Ireland had identified
a hunting ground, a gay pub in the Earl's
Court District of London
00:13:40
called the Coleherne Arms. He was confident he'd be able
to entice his prey. -He'd gone from this kind of
skinny youth
00:13:49
to being quite a burly,
well-built, big guy. He was quite tall,
a sort of imposing presence.
00:13:57
Obviously, in -- in that sense, that sort of
sadomasochistic thing, he might've appealed
to a certain type of man
00:14:02
who wanted to be dominated
by another man. -With everything in place, Ireland was ready to kill
for the first time.
00:14:10
On the night of March 8, 1993,
he met his unsuspecting victim. -Peter Walker was a 45-year-old
theater director
00:14:20
that Ireland met
in the Coleherne Arms. They went back to Walker's flat. -Peter Walker has two dogs,
00:14:27
a Labrador
and a German shepherd. They shut the dogs
in the living room and proceed into the bedroom.
00:14:36
Peter accepts that sadomasochism
is part of the routine that he likes to play,
part of the role,
00:14:47
and therefore, allows Ireland
to tie him to the bed. -And Ireland whipped him
and he held a plastic bag
00:14:58
over his head
and suffocated him. -With plastic bag asphyxia,
you're looking at a situation
00:15:04
where it's lack of oxygen
that causes you to die, rather than lack of blood
flow to your brain.
00:15:10
That is a much more prolonged and much more unpleasant
feeling. Anyone who's kept their head
under a swimming pool
00:15:19
for a bit longer
than they normally would, will know that "air hunger," as it's called,
that desire to breathe,
00:15:26
and knowing that that's not
going to be allowed, would be a terrible way to die.
00:15:31
-After killing Peter Walker, Ireland created a bizarre
spectacle at the scene. -He drapes condoms
over his victim's face.
00:15:41
He poses two teddy bears
in the oral sex position. And this is demeaning
to his victim.
00:15:49
So, he's not just
killed his victim, he's humiliated him, as well. Uh, and this is something
that --
00:15:55
that Ireland is doing to say,
hey, everybody, look at me. This isn't just a murder,
this is more than just a murder.
00:16:01
-And Ireland's cruelty
didn't end there. -He set fire to his pubic hair. He said later,
"To see what it smelled like."
00:16:12
The poor man was already dead. Why humiliate his body any more? -Ireland didn't flee
Peter Walker's flat
00:16:21
with any urgency. He spent the night there
cleaning up any evidence that he may have left behind
00:16:27
before disposing
of the murder kit on the morning train
back to Southend. -He was throwing cuffs
in the Thames
00:16:35
or out of the train window and disposed of every
single murder weapon, uh, that he used to kill
or strangle him.
00:16:43
-So, clearly, evidence that
would be on that, his own DNA, fingerprints,
evidence from the bodies
00:16:52
are not going to be available
to the police to link that item
to that killer, to that victim.
00:16:59
So, it -- it makes things
more difficult when you're
investigating a murder. -On March 10th, two days
after killing Peter Walker,
00:17:07
Ireland was desperate
to announce to the world what he'd done. -Ireland's pursuit of his role
as a serial killer was sustained
00:17:17
when he phoned "The Sun"
and said, "I murdered a man." He didn't say which man,
but nevertheless, confessed.
00:17:24
He also went on to say,
"Well, actually, I'm very worried
about the dogs in the flat,
00:17:31
so perhaps someone should
go 'round and look after them." -"The Sun" newspaper contacted
the police
00:17:38
and forensic psychologist
Mike Berry. -So, they rang me up
and they said, "We've got this weird chap
on the phone who says
00:17:47
he wants to be a serial killer." And from what they were saying
about the very nature,
00:17:52
I -- I was quite concerned. Most people don't ring up
the police to say they're going to be
a serial killer and then to say,
00:18:00
"Oh, we want the police
to go 'round, because of the dog
in the house." -Earlier that day when Peter
did not show up for work,
00:18:08
a concerned colleague went
to his home to check on him. When there was no answer,
the colleague sought
00:18:14
the help of the caretaker
who managed to open his door and found Peter's body
and reported it to the police.
00:18:21
The grim discovery confirmed
that the call to "The Sun" newspaper
was no hoax and Mike Berry knew
00:18:28
that the man on the phone
had to be taken seriously. -One of the things
I did say was,
00:18:33
not to antagonize him, not to -- to cry or devalue
what he's done. When they found the body,
they then found the dogs
00:18:42
and they made the mistake
of calling him an animal lover,
which was a bad mistake.
00:18:47
-And this is something that --
that he doesn't like. He doesn't want to be known
as an animal lover,
00:18:52
he wants to be known
as a serial killer and a -- a sadistic
and a cold serial killer.
00:18:58
-Because of the ongoing
Operation Spanner, the police found it
very difficult to investigate
Peter Walker's murder.
00:19:07
-The gay community as a whole
were very, very reluctant to come forward and get involved
with the police,
00:19:13
because obviously, they clearly
would've been worried that if they in some way acknowledged
00:19:16
or admitted involvement
in sadomasochistic practices, they might themselves be --
be prosecuted,
00:19:21
even if it was nothing to do
with the case itself. -The police didn't know anything
about S&M bondage
00:19:28
and stuff like this. They didn't know how to work
with the gay community. They didn't understand
the elements of the crime
00:19:36
and didn't recognize
that they had a serial killer until it was far too late. -What was for certain,
00:19:42
Mike knew that this murder
was not a one-off. -It was clearly well-planned
and violent and therefore,
00:19:49
he was going to do it again. What I couldn't do is predict
how quickly he was going to --
00:19:55
to kill again. -It would be over two months
before Ireland would strike for a second time,
May 28, 1993.
00:20:05
-Christopher Dunn
was from London. Again, he was picked up
at the Coleherne Arms.
00:20:11
Again, they went back
to his flat. -This time, Ireland killed
37-year-old librarian
00:20:18
Christopher Dunn, not by suffocation,
but by strangulation. -Although it can render you
unconscious very, very quickly
00:20:26
in a small number of seconds,
you have to retain that pressure for a number of minutes
to kill someone.
00:20:32
So, it's something you can't
usually accidently do, you have to maintain
that pressure and maintain it
00:20:39
and maintain it to cause death. It has to be
a very deliberate action. -And he would toy
with the body, as well.
00:20:46
He would hold the strangulation
until the face went a -- a different color,
then release him.
00:20:53
Uh, so, he was, uh,
getting satisfaction and enjoyment out
of what he was doing to these --
00:20:58
these poor men. -Christopher Dunn's body
was found two days after his murder
by a concerned friend
00:21:07
who had visited his home
in Wealdstone, North London. -The interesting feature
about Christopher Dunn
00:21:14
was that the pathologist said
he could've died from, uh, accidental death as a result
of a perverse sexual act and --
00:21:23
and it wasn't treated as a --
a murder. Suspicious death, yes,
but not a full murder inquiry,
00:21:29
at that specific time. -Ireland picked up the phone
once again to tell people about the murder,
00:21:36
but this time,
he cut out the middleman and went directly
to the investigators. -And he made this series of
phone calls at different points
00:22:11
to the police during the course
of the investigation and it was clear, it was sort of strong desire
of acknowledgement.
00:22:18
If he had been the ultimate
criminal genius that he was, that he thought he was,
of course,
00:22:22
he wouldn't have made
those calls, anyway. But killers, serial killers,
particularly,
00:22:27
wrestle with this
internal conflict about, "I want people to know
what I do, but I don't want to be caught."
00:22:33
-On June 4, 1993, Ireland
was back in the Coleherne Arms. This time, he went home
with a 35-year-old
00:22:41
American businessman
called Perry Bradley III. -Unlike the other victims, he was strangled
while he was asleep.
00:22:52
If you have somebody
who's conscious and able to fight back,
obviously, you will see injuries
from a struggle.
00:22:59
If you're asleep, you will lose
consciousness very, very quickly and that means
that those defensive-type marks,
00:23:07
the struggle-type marks
will not be readily apparent. -Ireland had used a rope
from his homemade murder kit
00:23:15
to strangle Perry. Three days after his murder, the police were called to
his apartment in West Kensington
00:23:22
by concerned neighbors. -The police do not link
the killing of, uh, an American businessman
in Kensington
00:23:29
with the killer of a librarian or the killing of a director
and choreographer. -Now, the clear links
between the cases here
00:23:36
are all of these victims
are gay men, all of these victims have
engaged in sadomasochistic sex,
00:23:42
and that should be sending alarm
bells ringing, but it doesn't. -With three different
investigations running
00:23:48
across three different
policing areas, no link was made
between the deaths. The killer himself became
frustrated with the police.
00:23:57
-He wanted the attention and the
police weren't doing their job, as far as he's concerned.
00:24:01
I mean, if you're going to be
a serial killer, the world's got to know
what you're doing.
00:24:07
-By early June,
39-year-old Colin Ireland had brutally murdered three men
in the space of three months.
00:24:15
-For people like Ireland, who is ubiquitously unspecial, he had to become special
in a bizarre way.
00:24:26
He had to become special doing
something that he was good at. And getting these men to be
with him and killing them
00:24:32
is what he was good at. -On June 7, 1993,
the same day that police have discovered
the body of his third victim,
00:24:41
Perry Bradley III, Ireland was
on the hunt for another. This time, his victim
was 33-year-old Andrew Collier,
00:24:49
a warden at a sheltered housing
complex in Dalston. -Furious at the lack
of connection with crimes,
00:24:56
furious at the lack
of publicity, Colin Ireland kills
for the fourth time. -In many respects,
Andrew Collier was
00:25:04
the most significant
of the victims. Um, Ireland had returned
to the Coleherne Arms Pub again.
00:25:09
Andrew Collier lived
in East London. They went back
to his flat again. And it was a similar pattern
of them engaging
00:25:16
in sadomasochistic behavior and Ireland
strangled his victim. -He was strangled
with a ligature, a noose,
00:25:26
and we're now looking
at two victims with similar causes of death
and that potentially means
00:25:32
you can start
linking things together. -Once again, concerned neighbors
alerted the authorities
00:25:39
and on the 9th of June, two days after
he'd been murdered, Andrew Collier's body was found.
00:25:46
The case was handed
to Detective Albert Patrick, who had no idea
what he was about to discover
00:25:52
in Andrew Collier's house. -I put one foot in the door,
looked at this naked body
00:25:57
on the bed, uh, a cat dead with a condom on its tail
in the victim's mouth and the cat's mouth in the
victim's with his penis and --
00:26:06
and with a condom
on the end of it. So, most unusual, something
that, uh, for me, was --
00:26:12
was a key, uh, piece of evidence
that, uh -- that I wanted
to keep as tight as possible.
00:26:18
Because if somebody
10 days later, a month later, year later said, "Oh, I killed,
uh, Andrew Collier,"
00:26:25
"Well, tell me
about the crime scene." And clearly, uh, the cat was --
I don't think there's ever,
00:26:29
ever been a case, uh,
in the whole world where a cat has been killed
and draped, uh, across the body,
00:26:37
uh, with condoms,
as I described. -An extraordinary, bizarre act. The body will eventually
be discovered
00:26:44
in this extraordinary position. If there is any explanation
at all, apart from the sheer bestiality
of it,
00:26:52
is that Ireland was seeking to
capture the public imagination. I think he wanted the details
to become public knowledge,
00:27:00
so that people would say, "Oh, that's the man
who killed the cat." -After killing Peter Walker
three months earlier,
00:27:08
Ireland had apparently shown
concern for his victim's dogs, but now he'd gone to extremes
to show the media that he wasn't
00:27:16
the sensitive person
they had portrayed him as. -That really does get rid
of any notion
00:27:22
that he's an animal lover, so he's quite pleased
that he's managed to dispel this kind of cuddly element
to the storytelling around him.
00:27:30
-Ireland's bizarre display
help the police in their investigation. -And this was obviously
very similar
00:27:37
to the arrangement of condoms
and teddy bears, uh, on his first victim,
Peter Walker,
00:27:42
that it allowed the police
to link the two cases together. -I was aware of a previous
murder about three
00:27:48
or four months before, being dealt with
in South London, uh, and when I started
talking to, uh,
00:27:54
the scene investigating officer,
Roe Hemming, for the Walker case and looking
at my crime scene,
00:28:00
uh, there was concerns
that we could have the same killer responsible
at -- at both scenes.
00:28:09
-There wasn't a system
for connecting the dots, that we've now become
so used to.
00:28:14
It was still card indexes
and files and connections. It wasn't a matter of technology
that now we take for granted
00:28:22
and so it took a long time
for those dots to be connected. -And for the first time,
Ireland had slipped up.
00:28:29
The man who'd been so meticulous
in the past had left a clue behind
at Andrew Collier's home.
00:28:37
-I was fortunate that I was
the only detective to find a -- a crucial piece of evidence
at the crime scene
00:28:43
at the East End of London. It was his fingerprint. -At some point in the evening,
00:28:48
Ireland handled
the window frame, touched the window frame
of the flat when he looked out of the window
and he left a fingerprint.
00:28:56
-With the fingerprint sent off
for analysis, the police now knew they were
looking for a serial killer.
00:29:02
Ireland continued to call
the local stations to goad detectives. -It was the 15th of June,
1993, 2:15 p.m.,
00:29:14
call into my incident room and, uh,
my DC James Killian answered it and started talking
to Colin Ireland.
00:29:22
He was -- he was saying,
"Oh, by the way, I've killed somebody else in
Hither Green in South London,"
00:29:28
and put the phone down. So, clearly, my hair's up. Here we are, our fifth victim,
potentially.
00:29:35
And then about three hours
later, got a call to say that a body had been found
in a flat in Hither Green.
00:29:41
-Ireland had killed his
fifth victim on June 12th, three days before his call
to the police,
00:29:47
a 41-year-old Maltese
chef named Emanuel Spiteri, whom he strangled
in Emanuel's flat in Catford,
00:29:55
southeast London. -Emanuel Spiteri, again,
he'd been to the Coleherne. I don't think they spoke
but did sort of eye contact.
00:30:02
Emanuel Spiteri went home. Colin Ireland followed him,
picked him up at the -- the tube station, and decided
to go home to the flat.
00:30:11
-After forcing Emanuel Spiteri
to give him his cash card and pin number, Ireland strangled him
to death with a rope.
00:30:18
This time the 39-year-old killer tried a new way
to hide the evidence. -There'd been attempt
to burn the flat.
00:30:27
The -- the furniture
had been piled up, he'd clearly set fire to it. Oxygen had run out
and that's why it went out
00:30:33
and very, very fortunately,
because it was a top-floor flat and it could easily
have killed people below and --
00:30:37
and to the side of it. -We know that he's done
a lot of reading around cases of serial murder.
00:30:43
He's probably got an awareness
that fire is one of the few things
that will destroy DNA.
00:30:48
So, I think what's going
on here is that he's trying to destroy
the evidence that --
00:30:53
that links him to the scene,
but at the same time, he wants recognition
for the crime, as well.
00:31:00
What he was doing was creating
another murder, creating another scene, and --
and trying to get recognition
00:31:06
but still maintain
that anonymity. -Luckily, the fire Ireland
had started had gone out
00:31:11
and the flat didn't burn down. Three days later,
on the 15th of June, Emanuel Spiteri's landlady
found her lodger dead
00:31:19
and called the police. They retraced
Emanuel Spiteri's last steps and for the first time,
got a look at the killer's face.
00:31:28
-Fortunately, he was captured
on CCTV at Charing Cross Station,
so we've got Emanuel, 5'2",
00:31:35
in front of, uh, Colin Ireland,
6'1" on a single shot, just coming out
of the tube station.
00:31:42
Not very clear at the head, but you can see the build
and the height, uh, and clearly, you've got Emanuel
is front of him.
00:31:48
-So, that was a crucial piece
of evidence. Although, obviously, it was not
the piece of evidence
00:31:53
which would necessarily confirm
that he was the killer, but it was -- it was that
kind of circumstantial evidence
00:31:58
on which a case can be built. -Armed with the image, the police
went on full-offensive
00:32:03
to try and catch the killer. -They managed to blow up
the image to get something that was, uh --
00:32:10
it was a reasonable
representation of Ireland. They didn't know what Ireland
looked like at the time,
00:32:14
but it was something
that they could use in publicity to attract attention
to the case,
00:32:19
to circulate crucially,
amongst the gay community. -Myself and Killian joined at a midnight
pressed conference,
00:32:26
because we were concerned that people
were being too relaxed about it. Uh, we -- we gave a description
of who we were looking for
00:32:33
and to warn them
that they had to be careful, 'cause the next one
could be you. -I think there was a general
call out
00:32:40
amongst the gay community
to be very careful who you go home
with tonight, kind of thing.
00:32:45
There was a great fear,
there was a great concern. -With the police closing in,
Colin Ireland
00:32:51
decided
there was no point in hiding and on the 19th of July,
he went to see a solicitor.
00:32:57
-He decided that, I'll -- I'll go in to the solicitor
and he gave an affidavit. He said, that, "Yes,
I am the man in the video.
00:33:05
Yes, I did go to
Emanuel Spiteri's address. But when I got
to the front door, there was another man
in the flat.
00:33:12
I didn't want a threesome,
so, uh, I went home. And it was too late
to get a train,
00:33:18
so I slept
in a nearby churchyard." -Unbeknownst to Ireland, someone from
the solicitor's office
00:33:25
passed on his details
to the police, who already had his fingerprints
on file from previous offenses.
00:33:32
-Eventually, we got
Ireland's name, cross-matched it
against the mark, and it was his.
00:33:37
So, that placed Colin Ireland
in the crime scene and although, you can't date
a fingerprint, it --
00:33:43
it most certainly helped in --
in the totality of the evidence. -On the 20th of July 1993,
Colin Ireland was arrested.
00:33:53
On the 22nd, he was charged
with the murder of 33-year-old Andrew Collier. The following day
on the 23rd of July,
00:34:01
he was charged with the murder
of 41-year-old Emanuel Spiteri. -If Colin Ireland had not been
caught when he was,
00:34:09
he would've continued
to kill relentlessly until he was eventually stopped. It is the classic element
of any serial killer.
00:34:18
They won't stop
until someone stops them. -And there was lots
of work done. We had I.D. prints,
we had voice I.D. prints,
00:34:25
forensication,
and lots of other things. He never opened his mouth
for three days.
00:34:30
But fortunately, because
of the similar fact evidence from the pathologist
and the crime scenes,
00:34:35
the fingerprint,
and the CCTV image, prosecutor agreed
that we could charge. -East Linton, North London.
00:34:45
Ireland had remained
tight-lipped throughout his incarceration,
but then on August 19th,
00:34:51
just a month from
when he was arrested, the killer stunned the police. -He said to the warden
in the prison, uh,
00:35:02
"I want to confess." He was remanded back
into police custody and taken
to Edmonton Police Station,
00:35:08
where there was a video sweep. And he --
he just put his hands up for -- he confessed
to all five killings.
00:35:17
-He did the classic "no comment"
for a while, then he was on remand
for nearly a month.
00:35:22
And then one day, he decides
to actually go off and tell the police
what he's done.
00:35:28
I suspect, 'cause he wanted
the attention. You know, he wasn't getting
the attention that he needed.
00:35:35
This guy clearly wanted to be
the film star, the center of serial
killing in England.
00:35:43
-This is a person
whose identity was -- and sense of self-worth,
was so frail, so damaged,
00:35:51
he was so completely
so self-esteemed that he would prefer
to be infamous as a killer
00:35:59
than be unknown and be a nobody. -Detective Inspector
Albert Patrick was in the interrogation room
00:36:07
and heard
the shocking admissions. -The first interview was,
"Okay, you tell us about
00:36:13
the five that you've killed." So, he talked about them
very matter-of-fact. -Ireland told the investigators
about each
00:36:32
carefully planned murder
in chilling detail. -He was just spelling it
out as it -- as it happened.
00:37:03
It was horrendous, really, uh, and the pain
he must've put through, uh, all his victims
was just, uh, unbelievable.
00:37:14
-In a couple of cases,
he stayed there overnight, so as not to attract attention
00:37:18
by leaving the property
late at night. He got it all organized
in a very disciplined
00:37:23
and rigorous fashion. And -- and he admitted
to the police that he could go on and do more.
00:37:29
He said, "I felt the process
accelerating. I was on this kind of --
of this treadmill of crimes,"
00:37:36
and that he was going to
keep killing and the gap between the crimes
would become shorter.
00:37:41
-On the 22nd of August, 1993, Ireland was charged with
the murders of Peter Walker,
00:37:47
Christopher Dunn,
and Perry Bradley III. After the confession, there was
no need for a public trial
00:37:54
and for Colin Ireland, bent on infamy,
that was a missed opportunity. -If you want to be
a serial killer,
00:38:01
you should have a nice,
long trial, get all that public recognition, and then they're
going to remember you.
00:38:08
If they don't know
about the case, and most people didn't know
about the case, again,
00:38:14
'cause it was in
a very short time period, didn't get into the
public attention in the way
00:38:18
it should've done,
from his point of view. -The police didn't have
a lot of evidence.
00:38:23
They had some evidence. It might've, if it had gone
to a jury, he might have
just scraped through.
00:38:31
The evidence was quite strong,
but -- but nevertheless,
a lot of criminals will say,
00:38:35
"Okay, I'll take my chance." But also, they know,
and he would know, that the whole case
would be examined in detail,
00:38:43
raked over by the prosecution,
the defense, and the media. So, he would have his kind of
moment in the sun.
00:38:50
-Ireland's hearing was
on the 20th of December 1993. Terry Kirby
was in the courtroom.
00:38:56
-We all turned up at
the Old Bailey on the day and that's the first time
actually journalists
00:39:01
really had seen him,
uh, in the flesh. I remember these sort of
very broad shoulders.
00:39:06
And he -- he was just sort of
looking around like this, around the courtroom
and his, kind of,
00:39:11
head really didn't stop
moving all the while. But his face was a bit
sort of expressionless,
00:39:16
so you occasionally got
the feeling he was going to sort of break into a smirk. I mean, I rather got the feeling
that he was kind of
00:39:22
looking 'round, um, just sort of saying
to everybody, "Are you aware this is me?
00:39:27
I did this.
Are you aware of this?", looking, and looking
for people's reaction.
00:39:31
I mean, that's what he wanted.
He wanted that attention. He wanted people to say,
you know,
00:39:36
"You're the guy that did this." -At the end of the one-day
hearing, Colin Ireland
00:39:40
pleaded guilty
to all five murders and was given
five life sentences, one for each of the men
he killed.
00:39:47
He was immediately sent
to Wakefield Prison. -Passing sentence on Ireland,
the judge at the Old Bailey said
00:39:54
"To take one life is an outrage,
to take five lives is carnage." I could not agree more.
00:40:02
-Colin Ireland was narcissistic
and psychopathic, no sense of remorse
of what he'd done.
00:40:09
Even when he was explaining
to the police, he was victim-blaming or he was
justifying his behavior
00:40:15
by saying they came
and talked to him. A man talking to another man doesn't justify
you killing them.
00:40:22
Uh, but he wasn't mad. He was bad, but not mad. -On December 22, 2006,
the Home Office
00:40:31
changed Ireland's sentence
to a whole life term, meaning he would
never be released.
00:40:36
He died in Wakefield Prison
on February 21, 2012. He was 57 years old. -And I think all the victims
and families,
00:40:47
uh, would probably be pleased that that's happened,
to be quite honest. -Colin Ireland essentially
set himself a goal,
00:40:54
he set himself an aim in life
to become a serial killer and for me, this really does
mark him out as one of the --
00:41:00
the most evil serial killers
that -- that I've ever come across, because his intention was
to cause harm to other people.
00:41:07
This wasn't a means to an end, it wasn't a way
of getting something else. He actually enjoyed
hurting others
00:41:13
and he set out to do this. -We can have no sympathy
for that. There should be no admiration
for a man
00:41:23
who set out
to be a serial killer. Ireland is a wicked, evil man and treated his victims in the
most despicable, depraved way.
00:41:34
-In May 2007, a report by the
Independent LGBT Advisory Group found that "a lack of knowledge
of the gay scene in London
00:41:43
had affected the Metropolitan
Police's investigation into the murders." -It's tragic that five people
had to die before the police
00:41:53
and the community
changed its behavior. But we're much more aware
of equal rights,
00:42:00
we're much more open
in many ways, so therefore, gay men,
gay women, transgendered men,
00:42:09
women,
they can be themselves more, without fear of, um,
being criticized. They no longer have to be
in the closet.
00:42:17
-The case still affects
the detectives who had to sit across
the interrogation desk
00:42:22
and interview a callous killer. -A striking moment was actually seeing
Colin Ireland face-to-face.
00:42:29
He was so matter-of-fact,
you know, just different from, uh, any -- any other person
I've charged with murder.
00:42:37
Uh, he just didn't show
any remorse for what he -- what he did. He was just a --
just a horrible,
00:42:44
horrible, evil man,
being brutally honest. He was just a loner who --
who, for whatever reason, uh,
00:42:52
decided to become
a serial killer. -Colin Ireland was
a selfish killer who took the life
of five innocent men,
00:42:59
just because he decided
they deserved to die. His sick New Year's resolution
to become a serial murderer
00:43:06
makes him stand out
as a twisted individual and ensures he'll be remembered as one of the world's
most evil killers.
00:43:15
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