To ask if you’ve met an infamous criminal?

[Anon778833]

Did they seem ‘normal’? Or did you get a strange feeling about them?

EmeraldShamrock
If you accidentally kill someone then it is still black and white to me. A moment of madness?
It was a physical fight that should have never happened the victim hit his head on the pavement.
The poor guy who died will never move on, I'm not trying to justify cousins actions at all.
I know a mother who lost her son in similar circumstances. He intervened in a fight, was punched, hit his head on the pavement and died. Very sad.

I am sorry. But who has a physical fight on the street. It’s not the norm and indeed can kill someone. It’s not unlucky that they got killed. When you go to hit or punch someone you want to hurt them.

Not me but a close friend (and it could have been me as we only live 200m apart - just happened to be her) - daily she walks over the railway bridge to get to town, and a few times she met this bloke who looked a bit lost and not quite all there. She would chat to him while waiting for the lift to get up to the bridge that crosses the railway line (Australia), which she needed if she had her small DD in the pushchair with her.

Turns out he had raped and murdered a 5yo girl years ago, had been locked in the secure psych ward of the local mental hospital and was allowed out on day release to the local town.

When this became clear, there was absolute UPROAR in the town and he had to be moved away. My friend was very shaken.

When my mother worked for social services she shared a large office for a year with someone who it was later revealed abused many, many children over his career. She never liked him (no clue about the abuse) and told me to stay away from his desk. I was nine or ten and occasionally went into the office after school and would sit and read alone until she was ready to leave. I remember him being very friendly and wanting to joke.

@EmeraldShamrock

If you accidentally kill someone then it is still black and white to me. A moment of madness? It was a physical fight that should have never happened the victim hit his head on the pavement. The poor guy who died will never move on, I'm not trying to justify cousins actions at all.

This was the same situation that happened to someone I used to be friends with when I was about 18. It ruined so many lives, his families and the victims families from one spur of the moment, split second decision. I am sure that plenty of young men have punched someone in their lives, never expecting the person to die from it.

I saw someone regularly in my job. I didn’t see them for the longest time then saw them on the national news for committing an awful murder.
They were a little strange but nice enough, never really looked you in the eyes though.

Not sure why I’m reading this thread…It’s pitch black and I am about to go out walking the dog and will constantly be looking behind me now! 😱

My old neighbour is a double murderer , they dismembered two People and dumped them in the river. I also spent a night drinking with a famous gangland criminal when I was younger 😅 had no idea who he was, he chatted me up in a night club , took me into the vip section and we had a great night. Few months later watching the news there he was going into court being charged with all sorts 😨😨

Rolf Harris came to do a book signing at a shop where I worked, circa 2000. He seemed like an utterly lovely, friendly guy. He was only supposed to be there for three hours but ended up staying all day of his own volition because people were queuing around the block. Hung out with us in the staff room at lunchtime and couldn’t have been nicer or more respectful to the staff (unlike some authors who are utter gits, it has to be said). I actually refused to believe that he’d done what he did for a very long time because he was just so nice that day. It just goes to show.

Not exactly infamous but he was nationally recognised in the end. I was a very, very naive 21 year old doing volunteer work in India. I was sharing a room with a girl who was the daughter of some diplomat who had lived all over the world in luxurious settings - she was very spoiled and complained about everything, I think her parents sent her on the volunteering trip. Anyway one night she said she couldn't take the 'conditions' anymore and had an invite to see a 'friend of her parents' and did I want to come. I said yes. She told me to change clothes, then on second thoughts told me she'd lend me something. We ended up getting picked up by a chauffer in a car with blacked out windows, escorted to the hotel that had been the Raj's palace (this was in Rajasthan) and escorted up the stairs by armed guards. I was a bit in awe but figured this was just what rich people were like. There was a chandelier in the lobby, genuine Renaissance paintings on the wall, it was like nothing I'd ever seen in my life. The 'friend of her parents' was a guy of about 40, spoke perfect English, dressed Western style, and had a young daughter who spoke only French (she usually lived in France with her mother). He was very polite and asked me a lot of questions about myself, saying very little except that he was 'businessman'. Which I suppose he was, of a sort. He ordered us everything on the menu, and probably some things that weren't, and a special dish for his daughter, which she rejected. Bear in mind there were people literally starving outside. We ate outside on the balcony which was built so you had a view of the river and lights and you couldn't see the street below with the beggars. The whole thing was incredibly surreal but I didn't make much of it. Again, I assumed this was just what rich people were like.

Two years later I was scanning the news from Rajasthan (I love India and was thinking about my next visit) and saw a familiar face. For a second I couldn't place him, then I remembered. It was the guy. He'd been arrested for being a major part of an organized crime syndicate. It didn't accuse him of any violence directly, his part was to do with money laundering. So that was an experience.

A friend of my mothers was a dog walking friend of Dennis Nielsen. She was most surprised to see him on the news as a mass murderer. He was a quiet pleasant chap apparently they chatted most mornings. She was a forthright middle aged lady at the time so not his target victim type.

[quote MrsCardone]@Astrak Denis Nielson killed my friend. I wonder if he was the person you were also referring to?

I shared accommodation with a Senior Staff Nurse on a Children's Ward who burnt her boyfriend's house down with his wife and their two DC inside. All three of them died . The strange thing is, I can find no record of this crime happening. It was in 1983. Does anybody remember it? Oh, and she seemed so normal. And I got to know her well.[/quote]
It’s quite common. There are so many crimes that are never even mentioned in the media … I wonder if their killers get lighter sentences as a result.

@QuestionOf

Not sure why I’m reading this thread…It’s pitch black and I am about to go out walking the dog and will constantly be looking behind me now! 😱

Are you back yet?

Dh knew the pilot guy who murdered his wife and dumped her body in a roll of carpet in WastWater in the Lake District. Said he seemed nice and normal.

Worked in a&e near cat a prison so saw lots when they came in after various drug related incidents, self harm, fights etc as well as illnesses of course. Peter Sutcliffe a few years ago. I thought he was extremely creepy.

I lived with a girl whose brother had killed their mother. I met him once after he got out of jail. It was a huge story in the small city I lived in at the time. He was very quiet and didn't say much. Avoided eye contact. His sister (my housemate) was nice enough but quite a selfish thoughtless and messy person to house share with.

I was in hospital with someone who would go on to be convicted of murdering her boyfriend a couple of years later. The press made her out to be evil and calculated. Yet she was first hospitalised for her mental health before she was 10 and had been in and out ever since. The relationship was abusive as well. She didn't seem evil, just extremely vulnerable and someone who'd never really managed to live a normal life.

Also met a paedophile priest. He used to give me the creeps and I hated going to confession with him. Once I entered the room and he had his eyes closed, snapped them open and I jumped backwards.

OJ...Prick...

My Nan lived in Hyde in the 60s and knew Myra Hindley from the hairdresser's. Said she was beautiful but he was definitely the strangest. They were nick named Pinky and Perky before the crimes were found out.

@fancyfrogs, I read yours as, 'I worked near a cat prison...' I must need the weekend because it sounded completely normal until I got to the drug convicts part.

I met quite a lot of notorious bank robbers on the ‘Costa Del Crime’ back in the 80s. Some of them were charismatic older men with money, others horrible scary thugs hanging out in bars. The most infamous was Ronnie Knight who was always very pleasant.

A next door neighbour murdered his wife and chopped her body into pieces and scattered these around the local area. He was always a nice man as I recall. The wife was more challenging.

Someone I know spent a few days on holiday as a guest of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. He did nothing untoward with her but it sounds like quite a surreal experience with plenty of money at 5 star hotels.

Jimmy Savile, nasty slimy self-satisfied piece of work, though at 20, I was too old for him.

@PomBearWithoutHerOFRS

My sister has chatted briefly to Rose West (in prison, sister's job necessitates visits to inmates sometimes) She didn't realise who she was until a few minutes later. They just exchanged a couple of remarks about the weather outside. Obviously sis knew she was an inmate, but she was "just a woman making conversation" not some crazy eyed ravening devil woman.

My dad also met Rose in a prison setting and said the same.

She didn't say much to him and there was absolutely nothing interesting or remarkable about their meeting.

Not infamous, but I briefly met a man who later killed his wife. He was clearly an awful man…we talked about what a horrible encounter it was for years afterwards before putting two and two together and realising the news reports were him.

@Toooldforthis321 whoops my lack of punctuation this morning! I imagine a cat prison would be just as bad, scratchy little buggers on drugs

@damnthisvirusandmarriage

No but locally there was a girl murdered by this fella she was seeing. He raped her in her home, and cut up her body and spread it round our local area. They didn’t recover all the body only parts of it. He knew wildlife and put the pieces by badger sets as he knew they’d eat it.

I then took on her replacement at work as a client and had to go into the house where this happened. I always wondered if the new person there knew what had happened there. Have me the creeps. house was always freezing cold.

Was this in the northwest town beginning with B?