00:00:05
-In April 1991, doctors at
Grantham and Kesteven Hospital in Lincolnshire
were perplexed.
00:00:14
In just 2 months, the health
of 13 children on Ward 4 had mysteriously deteriorated.
00:00:23
Four of them had died. -Sadly, I had to share
with the parents and said, "Look, this is impossible,
but I can't do anything more."
00:00:33
I felt so sad. He died in my hands. -But this was
no unfortunate coincidence. -I began to realize that
there was a serial killer
00:00:42
that was working on that ward and was causing the collapses
of these children. -Unbelievably,
one of the nurses
00:00:50
was deliberately attempting
to kill her young patients by injecting them
with deadly poison.
00:00:57
-A sergeant walked in,
and then he said, "We have reason to believe
that Paul's illness,
00:01:04
hypoglycemic attacks, were a result of
a maladministration of drugs," and I remember my words exactly.
00:01:12
"That would explain a lot,
wouldn't it?" -Beverley Allitt, the woman
dubbed the Angel of Death,
00:01:17
had, without doubt, become one of the world's
most evil killers. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ It was a case
that shocked the world.
00:01:48
For 59 days in 1991, there was a serial killer
stalking the children's ward at Grantham and Kesteven
Hospital in Lincolnshire,
00:01:58
but nobody knew it. 22-year-old nurse
Beverley Allitt's job was to protect
the children in her care,
00:02:05
but she abused her role. She was purposely harming them. Her crimes were horrific
and ruined the lives of many,
00:02:13
including the families
of her innocent victims. -As a judge set
to take her down,
00:02:18
there were emotional scenes
in the public gallery with families
bursting into tears.
00:02:23
One woman jumped up, shouting,
"Bastard, bastard." Another shouted,
"Lock her in a cage."
00:02:29
-Beverley Allitt had tried
to get away with murder. Her story begins
over two decades earlier.
00:02:37
Beverley Allitt was born
on the 4th of October, 1968, in the small Lincolnshire
village of Corby Glen.
00:02:45
She was one of four children. -There don't seem to be
any real red flags in Beverley Allitt's background
that would suggest
00:02:54
that she'd go on
to do the things she did, so normally, when we have
a serial killer,
00:02:59
we have an abusive
or a violent childhood. There's something that's there
in the background,
00:03:04
but with Beverley Allitt, there doesn't seem to be any real powerful
explanatory factor.
00:03:10
-Fast-forward to April 1991. 22-year-old Beverley Allitt had been working on
the children's ward
00:03:18
at Grantham and Kesteven
Hospital for three months. One of the consultants on Ward 4
was Dr. Charith Nanayakkara.
00:03:27
-My first impressions
about Beverley Allitt was nothing outstanding. She was just another quiet,
00:03:35
pleasant, obliging nurse
who was available. -During Allitt's short time
on the ward,
00:03:42
three children
had died suddenly, and a further nine
had fallen seriously ill under suspicious circumstances.
00:03:51
On April the 22nd, 1991,
Beverley Allitt was on duty when 15-month-old Claire Peck
was admitted to Ward 4.
00:04:01
She was under the care of the
two consultants at the hospital, Dr. Frederick Porter
and Dr. Nanayakkara.
00:04:09
-Claire Peck, she had come
with a severe attack of asthma, breathing difficulties,
requiring oxygen,
00:04:16
so Dr. Porter was called,
and he had come. He had tried to resuscitate and
provide all the necessary care
00:04:23
as appropriate, and Beverley Allitt, on this
occasion, had been with him. In spite of all
the efforts taken,
00:04:31
Dr. Porter couldn't
resuscitate her, and she had died within hours. -Claire Peck was the fourth
child to die unexpectedly
00:04:43
at Grantham and Kesteven
Hospital in 3 months. It was an alarming number
in such a short space of time.
00:04:51
-I said I really don't know
what's going on and got together with Dr. Porter
and the senior nursing manager
00:04:59
and checked through
all the cases of worrying, suspicions,
and uncertainties we had.
00:05:06
I compiled a report and sent it
to unit general manager, saying, "We have series
of these unexplained
00:05:15
and sometimes
explained collapses. We are very worried
about these problems, and therefore, their want
to bring it to your notice.
00:05:24
We need your help." -On the 30th of April,
the hospital decided to ask the police
to investigate the deaths
00:05:32
to see if there
could be something or someone casting
a shadow over Ward 4. The case found its way
00:05:40
to Chief Superintendent
Stuart Clifton. -One of my dividend sergeants
at Grantham contacted me to say
00:05:46
that he'd had a call
from Grantham Hospital, which suggested that
they'd had a high number
00:05:51
of collapses of children, which may or may not be down
to some criminal act. When I use the term "collapse,"
I'm talking in terms
00:06:00
of each of them
having stopped breathing, and the resuscitation team, known colloquially
as the "crash team,"
00:06:08
were called to resuscitate
the children. There were two pediatricians
employed at the hospital
00:06:14
and Dr. Porter
and Dr. Nanayakkara, who had differing opinions about whether
the collapses of children
00:06:22
at that hospital over a period
of about three months were actually medically related
00:06:28
or whether they were
at the hands of somebody who was causing those collapses. -After a meeting
between detectives and doctors
00:06:36
on the 3rd of May, it was decided they'd ask
Professional David Hull, an expert on pediatrics,
00:06:43
to give his insight
on each of the cases. -He set out, in some detail, his findings
but concluded by saying,
00:06:52
"Of the 13 children
that I've looked at, I think that there
are only three
00:06:57
that are worthy
of further investigation. In two of these cases, I feel that there will be
a medical explanation,
00:07:07
and in one case, a little boy
called Paul Crampton, I think it's worthy
of further investigation."
00:07:15
-Five-month-old Paul Crampton
had been admitted to Ward 4 on the 20th of March 1991,
with a chest infection.
00:07:23
His dad, David,
remembers it well. -Paul was actually born with
measles, and he was taken home,
00:07:32
and then after a relatively
short period, a few months, Kath took him
to the doctor, my wife,
00:07:37
and he had a wheeze. They were, I think,
overcautious, but that's the right thing
with a child of that age,
00:07:43
and they took him into hospital. -The first 3 days of his care
were completely unremarkable,
00:07:49
and he was expected
to go home on that third day. During the course of that day,
Beverley Allitt
00:07:59
brought to the attention
of other nurses the fact that this little boy
was having difficulty breathing.
00:08:07
-I walked into a scene
I did not expect, and that was Paul
in the arms of the nurse,
00:08:12
I think,
at that particular time. He was cold, clammy, gray,
and I recall that Nurse Beverley Allitt
was there,
00:08:20
and she said, at the time,
"This child is hyperglycemic." The doctor had been called.
00:08:25
The doctor came, and Paul was
taken into the treatment room, and he disappeared for what
seemed to be an eternity
00:08:30
before we were allowed
into the treatment room, and I remember Paul sat there,
playing with his toes.
00:08:37
He seemed to have made
a total recovery. -The following day,
which was a Sunday,
00:08:42
Beverley Allitt
went to take the drip down, and within the space
of a few minutes,
00:08:47
the boy was, once again,
hyperglycemic. -So, obviously, that was
quite frightening, so we went,
00:08:52
within a very
short space of time, from a child that's coming home to a child
that's now seriously ill
00:08:57
and without
too much explanation. -Three days later,
this little boy is expected to go home that day
00:09:07
because he's continued
to recover from his attacks. At about 10 minutes to 12:00,
00:09:13
the boy's father goes up
to the hospital canteen to get himself
a sandwich, and when he returns some
20 minutes or so later,
00:09:21
he finds a little boy
that is gray, arched back and clearly
in some form of distress.
00:09:28
-Word came from the ward
that Paul had collapsed again, and colleague crashed through,
00:09:34
and when he saw his collapse, he immediately called
the team from Nottingham and transferred him.
00:09:43
-He went in the ambulance both
with my wife and with a doctor, and Nurse Beverley Allitt
went in the ambulance with him.
00:09:52
I remember walking into the ward
at Queen's Medical Center, and it was just a totally
different atmosphere,
00:09:58
calm, relaxed. Paul was in intensive care,
but you got the feeling that he was just
going to get better,
00:10:05
and he did. -Transferring Paul Crampton to Queen's Medical
Center in Nottingham
00:10:10
had saved his life. Tests reveal the insulin
in his blood, which is usually between
4 and 6 milliunits per liter,
00:10:18
was alarmingly high. -Dr. Porter had taken blood,
which had been sent to the University Hospital
at Cardiff
00:10:27
for examination. The insulin in the blood
of Paul Crampton, at 47,000, is the second-highest
ever recorded in the world.
00:10:37
-He was fortunate enough
to survive, and it just felt that he had abnormal
external insulin administered.
00:10:49
-I think, when we got
the blood results, I began to realize that
there was a serial killer
00:10:53
that was working on that ward and was causing the collapses
of these children. -I had a call
from Grantham Police,
00:11:03
and it was, "We'd like to come to see you,
won't tell you what it is,
00:11:08
but we'll come
and see you tomorrow." And so I had an office
in Grantham at the time,
00:11:11
and the sergeant walked in,
and then he said, "We have reason to believe
that Paul's illness,
00:11:19
hyperglycemic attacks, were a result of
maladministration of drugs," and I remember my words exactly.
00:11:27
"That would explain a lot,
wouldn't it?" -It was unthinkable. With someone at Grantham
and Kesteven Hospital
00:11:34
murdering helpless children, the police had to investigate
each of the cases to try and find the killer.
00:11:41
They would begin
with 7-week-old Liam Taylor who was admitted
on the 21st of February, 1991,
00:11:49
just two days after
Nurse Beverley Allitt had begun working on Ward 4. They had to tread carefully.
00:12:01
-In a health-care setting,
it is very difficult to investigate a murder
or a<i> suspected</i> murder
00:12:09
because all of the individuals
on that ward have a legitimate
reason to be there.
00:12:15
They have the access
to the victim anyway, and often, it's very difficult
to prove that direct link
00:12:21
between one particular
member of staff and one particular victim,
so the police have got a really,
00:12:26
really difficult job
on their hands when they're investigating
this type of crime.
00:12:30
-And it wasn't going
to get any easier. -About a week or so
into the inquiry,
00:12:35
the whole investigation
was blown by the local paper, and of course, then, the world's
press descended on Grantham.
00:12:42
-Local radio reporter
Sean Dunderdale was one of the first journalists
to latch onto the story.
00:12:49
-No one has ever experienced
a story like this before. We kind of heard rumors. We know the police
were involved at the hospital,
00:12:56
that something was happening, but exactly what,
I mean, at that stage, I don't think even the police
knew what they were facing,
00:13:02
what they were coping with. Because nobody knew
what was happening, there wasn't that much
information to start with,
00:13:08
and slowly, it started
to develop as a story that, clearly, something big
was happening at Grantham,
00:13:16
that there was
a major investigation, and eventually, it did sort of
get out there into the media
00:13:21
that there had been certainly
a number of odd occurrences involving children
in the children's ward.
00:13:27
-Detectives began to approach
family members of the victims with the shocking news
that their children
00:13:34
may have been
deliberately attacked by an active serial killer. -In the early stages
of the investigation,
00:13:41
the parents were certainly
at an attitude that suggested that the police
should not be interfering
00:13:48
with an investigation
of this type. I think it's fair to say that, as the teams began to
investigate the circumstances,
00:13:57
and they became more and more
aware of the circumstances surrounding the collapse
of their child,
00:14:02
they became
more and more on-board. -Police had to try
and find a link between all 13 of the children
who'd been affected.
00:14:13
They began with the first
suspicious case, the death of 7-week-old
Liam Taylor who'd been left under the care
of a new staff nurse,
00:14:23
Beverley Allitt. -On the 21st of February
of 1991, he was taken
to Grantham Hospital
00:14:33
and was seen by one
of the pediatricians and diagnosed
with bronchiolitis. A couple of hours later,
00:14:40
they see their child
with just a nappy on. He's clearly terribly
distressed, and the nurse,
00:14:48
Beverley Allitt, explains that,
during the course of feeding, he'd vomited and choked.
00:14:54
The next evening,
the two parents decide to stay in the hospital. The mom is so tired
that she goes to bed early,
00:15:02
and the father stays up. He looks in on the child
just before midnight, after having had a shower
at the hospital,
00:15:09
sees that there's
a nurse with him. He goes off to bed, thinking
that the problems are over,
00:15:17
and he's awoken about
5:00 in the morning by the night sister
who asked him to come
00:15:22
because Liam has relapsed. The child is blue, back arched, and Dr. Nanayakkara tells them
that he stopped breathing,
00:15:31
and they'd had some difficulty
restarting the heart. Later that morning, Liam dies.
00:15:37
♪♪ -Sadly, I had to share
with the parents and said, "Look, this is impossible,
but I can't do anything more."
00:15:51
I felt so sad. He died in my hands. -The last nurse to tend to Liam
before his death
00:15:58
was Beverley Allitt, who joined the ward
just 4 days previously. It was her first-ever
nursing role.
00:16:08
-So Beverley Allitt had applied
to other hospitals, other departments for a job
as a nurse upon her
00:16:14
completing her qualifications, and she'd been turned
down by all of them. When Ward 4 employed
Beverley Allitt,
00:16:21
it was because they were
incredibly short-staffed. They were pretty desperate. They needed more nurses on duty,
and normally,
00:16:29
they wouldn't have taken
Beverley Allitt on because she didn't have the
correct level of qualifications,
00:16:35
the<i> usual</i> level
of qualifications that they would ask for, so it was desperation, really.
00:16:41
-Allitt had begun training
as a nurse at 16. Even at a young age, she seemed to have an unhealthy
fascination with hospitals.
00:16:50
-She was a regular
in the A&E department. She would constantly
turn up there,
00:16:55
complaining of various
symptoms and illnesses, and she got a bit
of a reputation
00:16:59
amongst the staff there, so they were very
surprised to learn that she was a trainee nurse,
00:17:04
and the dots just simply
weren't joined up because, often,
when somebody is a nurse,
00:17:10
and they're training as a nurse,
you're only seeing them, you know, during that
part of their day.
00:17:14
You're not seeing
the bigger picture. -Detectives investigating these
suspicious incidents on Ward 4
00:17:20
had begun to look into each case
to find a common link. Beverley Allitt
had again been on duty
00:17:26
on the 5th of March, 1991, the day that Timothy Hardwick
was admitted. -Timothy Hardwick was
an 11-year-old boy.
00:17:35
He had a lot of problems
in his life. He suffered with Cerebral Palsy
and was epileptic.
00:17:41
He had an epileptic fit
in school in Newark. As a result, he was transferred
to Grantham Hospital
00:17:48
where doctors managed to get
his fitting under control. A very, very short time after
Beverley had been left with him,
00:17:55
this child suddenly
stops breathing. She raises the alarm,
and the crash team recalls.
00:18:03
-One of the staff nurses
came to my office and said, "Dr. Nanayakkara, can you please
come and see Timothy?
00:18:10
He is not well." Apparently, he had collapsed,
and then when I went there, I tried to resuscitate him,
00:18:20
but by that time, he virtually
had no signs of life. -Sadly, they can't resuscitate
him, and the child dies.
00:18:33
Just five days later
on March the 10th, 14-month-old Kayley Desmond
was on Ward 4,
00:18:40
suffering with
a chest infection. After being left alone
with Allitt for some one-to-one nursing,
00:18:47
Kayley had an unexpected
heart attack. -Beverley Allitt was seen
in the room and actually called
other nurses to go
00:18:55
and have a look, which was
one of her common things. She would call
other nurses to say,
00:18:59
"Come and have a look
at this child," and then the crash team
would be called.
00:19:03
-Kayley survived the collapse and was transferred
to another hospital. Due to the massive toll the
arrest put on her young body,
00:19:12
she was left brain damaged. Detectives investigating
the unusual pattern of patient
00:19:18
collapses on Ward 4
found a clue in Kayley's X-rays. -We were able to show
that there was needle-tracking
00:19:25
under the arm of this
little girl and an air bubble, which had obviously
caused the equivalent
00:19:32
of what we would call
a heart attack. -This mysterious needle mark
was further proof
00:19:37
to detectives they were
dealing with a killer. They'd already discovered
the high insulin count
00:19:44
in the blood of Paul Crampton,
who survived. They continued their
investigations with the cases
00:19:50
of two more suspiciously
ill children, Bradley Gibson and
2-year-old Yik Chan. -Bradley Gibson is admitted
under Dr. Porter.
00:20:01
He was about 5 or 6 years old
and had breathing difficulties. Dr. Porter had treated him
with possible chest infection,
00:20:11
and he then suddenly
had stopped breathing and stopped his heartbeat,
as well, what you call a cardiac arrest,
which is extremely rare.
00:20:22
Dr. Porter had tried repeatedly
to resuscitate him with the defibrillator. He managed to get him round,
extremely fortunate.
00:20:33
-Yik Chan was admitted with
a suspected fractured skull. He was in the hospital
for a couple of days,
00:20:38
and he's charging
around the place. There's clearly not
very much wrong with him.
00:20:44
One particular evening,
Beverley Allitt is going off-duty, and she
speaks to the oncoming nurse
00:20:51
at about 9 o'clock
in the evening and said,
"Can you have a look in at Chan?
00:20:57
He's crying,
and he's not very well." The oncoming nurse
goes into the room
00:21:02
and finds him with his back
arched and blue, and the crash team were called,
and he's resuscitated.
00:21:09
-Bradley Gibson and Yik Chan
both survived unscathed. Three-month-old identical twins
Katie and Becky Phillips
00:21:17
were not so lucky. The pair were born prematurely and were regular visitors
to Ward 4.
00:21:24
In early April 1991, they were back and being treated
by Dr. Nanayakkara. -They had repeated admissions,
not surprisingly, again,
00:21:35
with a variety of illnesses,
diarrhea, vomiting, breathing difficulties
and so on and so forth,
00:21:40
and the parents, quite rightly,
were very worried and brought them
straight to the hospital
00:21:45
rather than going to the GP. I had seen them and discharged
them, reassured the parents,
00:21:53
but the same night, Becky was
brought to the crash-team staff, taking lots of effort
to resuscitate her,
00:22:02
but she was virtually dead, so I had a long discussion
with the parents. They were completely shocked,
and they were very, very upset.
00:22:12
I left some blood samples
in the laboratory for any future
investigations, if needed.
00:22:19
-And we subsequently found
that blood and had it analyzed, and that contained
9,660 milliunits
00:22:28
per liter of insulin
in the blood, and you always have to remember,
with these huge figures,
00:22:34
that a child should have
15 to 20 milliunits, so it's horrendous. -Later on that same day,
April the 5th,
00:22:42
Dr. Nanayakkara
asked Becky's parents to bring her twin sister,
Katie, in as a precaution.
00:22:49
-Katie's taken into hospital,
and that afternoon, she's allocated to the care
of Beverley Allitt.
00:22:57
One of the senior nurses
goes to that particular room to see what's going on.
00:23:03
As she enters, she sees
Beverley Allitt nursing the child in her arms. The child is crying.
00:23:10
She sees the child collapse
within Beverley Allitt's arms, and the crash team are called.
00:23:18
They manage to resuscitate
Katie, who is later transferred, but over the next three days,
00:23:27
the child, Katie,
suffers convulsions, and this child
is severely brain damaged as a result of what occurred.
00:23:36
Now, during my investigation,
Detective Inspector Jones managed to find X-rays that were taken at the time.
00:23:44
This child had squeeze injuries, which had broken
a number of ribs. -This was further evidence
that proved to detectives
00:23:55
that something very sinister
was happening on Ward 4 in Grantham and Kesteven
Hospital.
00:24:01
Between the deaths of Becky
Phillips on the 5th of April and Claire Peck
on April the 22nd,
00:24:07
four more boys had been
admitted with minor symptoms and unexpectedly
came close to death.
00:24:14
That made a total of 13
suspicious incidents -- four deaths and nine
close calls --
00:24:21
but now, investigators
have the arduous task of making a list of suspects. One of the names on that list
00:24:29
was a woman who always
seemed to be on duty whenever something went wrong -- 22-year-old staff
nurse Beverley Allitt.
00:24:40
In May 1991,
police were investigating a spate of mysterious
deaths and illnesses
00:24:47
on the children's ward at Grantham and Kesteven
Hospital in Lincolnshire. After digging deeper
into the individual cases,
00:24:56
they were certain they
were chasing a serial killer. -There's clear evidence
of air injected
00:25:02
under the arm of one child. There's evidence
of squeeze injuries. There's evidence of insulin.
00:25:10
What was a common factor with the vast majority
of these children was that each of them
had a cannula fitted, a site,
00:25:18
usually in the back
of their hand, where drugs or drips
can be administered through,
00:25:23
so injecting cardiotoxic drugs
would not be very difficult because it could go in
through the IV port.
00:25:34
-This is quite a common method
for, firstly, a female serial killer and a health care serial killer.
00:25:39
Poison is a very common
method used by these people. It's accessible. It's something that is not going
to immediately cause concern
00:25:48
because this is something
that's already in that hospital
environment anyway,
00:25:52
and also, poisoning
is quite a remote method of killing somebody. You're not up close
and personal with them.
00:25:58
It's not messy. You can administer the poison
and then leave the scene. You don't have to see them
suffer the effects of it.
00:26:08
Chief Superintendent
Stuart Clifton and his team interviewed all the staff
members on Ward 4,
00:26:14
and a new piece
of evidence emerged that suddenly became crucial. -I began to look at
the circumstances of insulin
00:26:22
in Grantham Hospital, and I found that it was kept
in locked fridges on the wards,
00:26:29
and on the children's ward, the key to the fridge
had gone missing three days before
the first child had collapsed.
00:26:43
Beverley Allitt was
the last-known person to have that key, but no hospital investigation
had actually taken place.
00:26:50
-Beverley Allitt's name
kept cropping up. She always seemed to be
at the hospital
00:26:55
when the incidents occurred, and the staff duty
rota confirmed this. -What we discovered was that,
for every collapse,
00:27:04
Beverley Allitt
was the only nurse that was on duty
on every occasion, and on many of these occasions,
00:27:10
we could actually put her
right at the bedside, either at the time
of the collapse or just before.
00:27:17
-On the 21st of May, 1991, Stuart Clifton
made the brave decision of having
Beverley Allitt arrested.
00:27:26
-I basically couldn't
take the chance that, if she was still
working on there,
00:27:29
she would harm more children, albeit that I hadn't completed
the investigation by any means.
00:27:37
We were merely scraping
the surface at that time. So she was arrested,
and the house was searched.
00:27:46
During the course
of that search, we found a hospital pillowcase, a used syringe and
a little child's notebook,
00:27:58
and it was headed
"allocations book." -This allocations book had
gone missing from Ward 4.
00:28:05
It detailed the names
of children who needed extra attention and which nurse
was allocated to them.
00:28:12
It was not only further proof that Allitt had been
caring for the children who died but evidence
00:28:18
that she was hiding the
information from her colleagues. -Beverley Allitt was interviewed
at the police station
00:28:23
over the course of two days. She made no admissions. In fact, she went so far
as to distance herself
00:28:32
from all the events
at that hospital, saying things such as,
"I wasn't there on that day.
00:28:39
I didn't come on duty
until after that had happened," so she completely
distanced herself,
00:28:46
maintained her innocence. She was a very strange girl
in the interview in that she would talk
to you quite normally
00:28:54
or talk to the interviewing
officers quite normally about things
like football, pop music,
00:29:00
and the minute you got down to actually talking
about the events at Grantham Hospital,
00:29:06
she became a completely
different person. -When news of the arrest broke, the press knew
this was a huge story.
00:29:14
-Once the investigation
went that one step further, and obviously, a nurse
had been arrested,
00:29:19
a nurse was clearly
under investigation, they had to go public with that, and that's when
it all exploded, really.
00:29:24
That's when the world's media
were suddenly interested because it had never
been heard of before,
00:29:29
that a nurse would
do such a thing. You know, it's such a rarity
and, certainly in this country,
00:29:33
a first. The whole of Grantham was
just surrounded by journalists, TV crews from around
the world, newspapers.
00:29:41
-Allitt's arrest was also a huge
shock for the victims' families. -I felt mixed emotions.
00:29:48
One is, "Who would want
to harm a child?" But secondly, we now know
what was wrong with Paul,
00:29:54
and thank God it's not
anything to do with Paul. It's not a medical problem.
00:29:58
It is an outside influence. -Stewart Clifton and his team
were convinced that Allitt was
behind the deaths,
00:30:05
but they had no proof. She was released on bail
without charge. -I convinced the hospital
that they need to suspend
00:30:13
Beverly Allitt from duty because we couldn't
take the chance, and they couldn't
take the chance
00:30:18
that another child
would be attacked. -The police needed
to build a case. If they were right about Allitt,
00:30:24
then they just released
a serial killer into the public. Chief Superintendent
Stewart Clifton
00:30:30
turned back to the expert, who just a month previously, had concluded the majority
of the cases
00:30:36
could be explained medically. -I asked David Hall to go away and re-look at the case notes
of the children,
00:30:44
but to use the statements
that my team had taken, which detailed the circumstances
of the collapse
00:30:52
of each of these children. He agreed to do that. -Months passed as
Stewart Clifton and his team
00:31:01
built the case against
Beverly Allitt, and by November 1991, Professor Hall had reexamined
his original case notes.
00:31:10
Based on the new evidence
found by detectives, he agreed that all the incidents
could be viewed as suspicious.
00:31:17
On the 20th of November,
Allitt was arrested once more. -The former nurse is charged
with the murder
00:31:25
of four children. She also faces eight charges
of attempted murder of eight other children.
00:31:32
She faces a further eight
charges of causing grievous bodily harm with intent. -She was due to appear at
the Grantham Magistrate's Court
00:31:40
the next day. Bear in mind,
this is a young girl that's never been
in police custody before.
00:31:46
At 9:00 the next morning, one of the policewomen
had to go and wake her up. She didn't appear to have
a care in the world.
00:31:54
-There wasn't very much
in the way of remorse. She didn't cry. There was no kind of real
visible reaction in her.
00:32:02
So I think she does have
that kind of cold personality. She's orchestrated all
of these terrible events,
00:32:11
but she doesn't feel
any impact from them. She's somebody who doesn't have
the same feelings and emotions
00:32:17
as the rest of us. -During the 15-month wait
for her trial, the stunned press began to
uncover Beverly Allitt's history
00:32:26
of faking illnesses
and self-harming. -The more we dug into Allitt's
background, again,
00:32:32
the more unbelievable it became. And the one question
our listeners would ask is,
00:32:37
"How? How did nobody spot
all of this, and allow her to continue
being a nurse?
00:32:43
How did she get through
that recruitment process?" -We got her authorization
from her to have a look
00:32:49
at her medical records. They indicated,
going back to childhood, that Beverly liked to be
the center of attention.
00:32:57
There were incidents
while she was at school where she would sprain a finger and demand that her arm
be put in a sling.
00:33:04
-I think it's tempting
to let look back and say, "They should have
picked up on that.
00:33:07
They should have known
that this was somebody who was not quite right." But I don't think they would
have automatically made the link
00:33:13
between somebody who was
perhaps harming themselves, and somebody who would then
go on to harm other people.
00:33:19
Nurses care for their patients. They want to preserve
their lives and enhance that quality of life.
00:33:24
So to think that a nurse
would do this, it's almost unthinkable. -On February the 15th 1993,
24-year-old Beverly Allitt
00:33:34
was in Nottingham Crown Court, charged with the murder
of four children and the attempted murder
of a further nine.
00:33:43
Her not-guilty plea meant a trial
would have to take place. -For much of the time,
Beverly was not there
00:33:51
because she was
suffering from anorexia and was supposedly
too ill to attend trial.
00:33:57
The judge, in his wisdom, ruled that it should go ahead
without her. -The court case was a very
harrowing experience.
00:34:03
I mean, it was a long,
drawn-out affair. Beverly Allitt wasn't in court
for a lot of it.
00:34:08
Again, I think some
of that manipulation that she was known for, some of the manipulation she had
clearly done in the hospital,
00:34:14
she was trying it
with the court case as well, and I know that was having
an impact on family members.
00:34:20
They knew of their own
individual case, but the actual scale of it, apart from what they'd read
in the media,
00:34:25
heard on the radio, it was the first time
they'd actually heard exactly what had been happening
at Grantham Hospital.
00:34:31
-I mean, that was quite dramatic
because obviously it was a significant media interest,
00:34:37
and we couldn't
walk down the street from the car park
to the court case without having microphones
stuffed under our nose
00:34:43
and cameras flashing. And yet, there was
a lot of emotion, and a lot of emotion
around that time, clearly.
00:34:50
-You couldn't just go home
and, you know, close the door and put the TV on
and forget about it.
00:34:56
It just was all-encompassing. It was the only thing that was
on my mind throughout the case
00:35:01
and for a long time
afterwards, as well. -In the times that Allitt
was in the courtroom,
00:35:06
she seemed completely distanced from what was going
on around her. -I firmly believe she felt
00:35:12
the families would
still be on her side because, you know,
they had been very close.
00:35:16
You know, they thought that,
certainly initially, in those initial stages,
that, you know,
00:35:19
she'd helped save, or tried to save,
their child's life. And so in court, you know,
she would smile at them.
00:35:27
-To the outside world,
a lot of the evidence may have seemed circumstantial, but as the trial went on,
00:35:33
it became clear the case
against Allitt was a strong one. -For a long time, people
believed it must be a mistake.
00:35:40
You know, a nurse surely wouldn't be
responsible for that. There must be some
other explanation for it.
00:35:45
But then, slowly,
as the evidence was revealed, you could see that tide turning,
00:35:50
that people suddenly realized,
complete revulsion, that a nurse, of all people,
would do that.
00:35:58
You know, suddenly, like,
"Well, if I can't trust a nurse, who can I trust?"
00:36:02
And I think that was a real
shock to the nation. It resonated right across the
country when those actual facts
00:36:08
came out about what
Beverly Allitt had done. -During the trial, the jury
heard from experts who believe
00:36:15
that Allitt had been suffering
with a mental illness throughout her life, which caused her
to commit the murders.
00:36:22
-The Munchausen syndrome
is a condition, which basically means that people will invent
symptoms in themselves
00:36:30
in order to gain the attention
of medical professionals. There's also Munchausen
syndrome by proxy.
00:36:38
This is when somebody invents
symptoms in somebody else in order to get attention
from medical professionals,
00:36:44
and that somebody else
is often a child or somebody who you're
in charge of the care of.
00:36:51
-I think she's certainly ill,
and there has to be an element of evil somewhere within that
because people can be ill
00:37:01
without wishing to cause
harm to other people. -On the 28th of May 1993,
after a draining 3-month trial,
00:37:11
the jury had reached a decision. -I think the moment we were
called back into the court
00:37:16
is something, you know, we'll always,
certainly, I'll always remember. It was very tense,
you know, very quiet.
00:37:23
A member of the jury stood up, and that first verdict
came in of guilty, and there was just a, again,
an intake of breath,
00:37:31
lasted just a couple of seconds. Then, someone, I remember,
shouted, "Yes."
00:37:38
And I think there was
a couple of people clapping, and then tears
from the families,
00:37:44
tears from members
of the public. It was a very difficult job
for the police to actually say,
00:37:49
"You know, without doubt,
Beverly Allitt was responsible." So there was always that
possibility the jury could have
00:37:58
just tipped the other way, and thankfully, you know,
that guilty verdict came in.
00:38:02
I think it was a huge sense
of relief for everyone. -On May the 28th 1993, Judge Mr. Justice Latham
sentenced Beverly Allitt
00:38:12
to 13 concurrent life sentences, one for each of the charges
against her. A relieved David Crampton made a
statement outside the courtroom.
00:38:25
-Well, I saw Beverly Allitt
as rather a pathetic figure, really, and when we listen
to her medical evidence,
00:38:30
we probably could conclude that
these tragedies were inevitable. -There was clearly some
massive media interest
00:38:36
associated with the Allitt case,
both pre and post the trial. That was pretty easy
for me and my family
00:38:44
because Paul was
at home and well. If Paul... If something worse
had happened to Paul,
00:38:52
such as had happened
to other families, how would I have
conducted myself? I don't know.
00:38:57
Thankfully,
I'll never have to know. Paul is 26 years old. He has a house, and he has a
long-time partner, lovely girl.
00:39:04
He's got a career. Paul is doing very well,
very, very well. -Beverly Allitt was immediately
sent to Holloway Prison,
00:39:12
but after just
a week behind bars, she was transferred
to Rampton Secure Hospital
00:39:17
in Nottinghamshire. -I think the fact that
Beverly Allitt has ended up in a secure hospital
00:39:22
is a really interesting
one for me because this is somebody who, before developing
Munchausen syndrome by proxy,
00:39:30
could have been argued to have
just Munchausen syndrome. So she was fabricating illnesses
and symptoms in herself
00:39:37
before she was harming
other people. She was going after
that role as the patient.
00:39:42
She wanted to be seen, you know,
by medical professionals and play that sick role.
00:39:48
She's essentially achieved
what she set out to achieve. She's got that status
of the patient,
00:39:53
which she always wanted. -What do I think about where
Allitt is serving her sentence?
00:40:00
I don't waste
any energy on that. I don't really think about it. She doesn't enjoy the same
freedoms that I do
00:40:06
and the rest of my family and the vast majority of
the population in this country.
00:40:11
She's in a prison, whether
that is more comfortable than perhaps some people would
like is a bit academic really.
00:40:18
-In December 1993, Central Television
interviewed Beverly Allitt inside Rampton Hospital as part
of a special news report.
00:40:27
-She enjoys relative
luxury and freedom within the maximum
security ward. The parents of her victims
who gave their approval
00:40:33
for these pictures
to be included in Central TV's
the "Tuesday Special"
00:40:37
tonight believe
she should be in prison. -It's not too bad.
-What's a good thing about it?
00:40:44
-Well, I've got
more freedom in here. -You like it better than
where you were before?
00:40:49
-Yes.
-Why? -Because I got more freedom. I'm not locked up all the time. -Stewart Clifton also visited
Allitt inside Rampton in 1994,
00:41:00
determined to get
the truth out of her. -She made admissions
at that time. She admitted nine
of the 13 cases
00:41:09
that she'd been convicted of. She wouldn't have anything to do
with the two Phillips' cases.
00:41:17
The minute that I began
to press her for details about precisely what she'd done,
what she'd used,
00:41:24
she just walked away from me, wouldn't answer
any more questions. -There are plenty of question
left unanswered,
00:41:31
especially for the loved ones of the victims
of Beverly Allitt. -Allitt's crimes are like
dropping a pebble
00:41:37
into a pool of water. Those ripples spread far more,
a dramatic effect, clearly on the families,
the families of the victims,
00:41:47
but their extended family, grandparents, parents,
et cetera, and, of course, a dramatic effect
on the hospital and its staff.
00:41:54
So her crimes went far more
into the community, not just the immediate
people affected.
00:42:01
-I think Beverly Allitt
was really most at home when she was
in the middle of drama,
00:42:06
so she was deliberately
creating the drama and then casting herself
in a leading role within it.
00:42:13
-There's a real impact there of,
you know, it could have been
a family member, you know.
00:42:17
It's the local hospital. One of my members
of my younger family could have gone
into the hospital
00:42:23
to be cared for by a nurse
and look what happened. And that the thing
with this story, you know,
00:42:28
it could have happened
to absolutely anyone. The parents who were affected
by that were purely unlucky
00:42:34
that their child went
into that hospital on that day, and that Beverly Allitt
was their nurse.
00:42:40
-We may never understand
why Beverly Allitt intentionally set out to poison the children
she was meant to care for.
00:42:47
Her lust for attention
turned from selfish to deadly, and for three months in 1991,
00:42:54
she acted upon it
in the most horrific manner. Nobody on Ward 4 was safe, but the determination
of doctors and police
00:43:02
brought justice for all
the victims' families and proved that Beverly Allitt,
the Angel of Death,
00:43:08
was a cold-blooded killer. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪