Shipman's suicide the 'easy way out'
Killer doctor Harold Shipman took the secrets of 215 murders to the grave when he was found hanged in his prison cell today.
Britain’s most prolific serial killer was discovered before dawn with a ligature made from bedsheets, hiding behind a curtain in his cell.
The former GP’s apparent suicide – the day before his 58th birthday – was greeted with shock and disgust by relatives who said he had “taken the easy way out”.
His death will end their hopes of ever knowing why the bespectacled monster killed their relatives over a 23-year period in Hyde, Greater Manchester, and Todmorden, West Yorkshire.
To the very end, Shipman had shown no remorse and made no confessions.
He was found hanged from the window bars of his single cell at Wakefield Prison at 6.20am, the British Prison Service said.
Some commentators questioned whether Shipman should have been on suicide watch - although the Prison Service said he had given no clues of his state of mind.
Jayne Gaskill, from Hyde, whose 68-year-old mother Bertha Moss died at the deadly doctor’s hands, said: “He has won again. He has taken the easy way out.
“He has controlled us all the way through and he has controlled the last step and I hate him for it.”
Thea Morgan, 65, who lost her 90-year-old mother Dorothea Renwick, said: “I want to see the end of him but I think he should have stayed in his cell and rotted.”
At the former premises of Shipman’s surgery the word “Justice” had been scrawled 12 times across metal shutters.
Shipman’s solicitor Giovanni di Stefano expressed his surprise at the apparent suicide, especially as he was about to launch an appeal.
“It is extremely strange, to put it mildly, that a person who at last is given a chance, not much of one, in getting an appeal off the ground would then suddenly kill himself,” he said.
Britain's prisons minister Paul Goggins announced that a full investigation into the death would be carried out by Prisons and Probation Ombudsman Stephen Shaw.
A brief scuffle broke out between a photographer and one of Shipman’s sons as he arrived at his mother’s house in Walshford, near Wetherby, West Yorkshire, this morning.
The family’s solicitor later said they had nothing to say.
Shipman was jailed for life at Britain's Preston Crown Court in January 2000 for murdering 15 patients.
His killing spree was described by trial judge Mr Justice Forbes as “shocking beyond belief” and in 2002 British Home Secretary David Blunkett ruled he should spend the rest of his life behind bars.
Dame Janet Smith, who chairs the ongoing inquiry into his killings, reported in 2002 that she believed Shipman had killed 215 patients and there was a “real suspicion” over another 45.
He targeted unsuspecting middle-aged and elderly women patients, murdering many with deadly diamorphine injections.
Shipman was also able to keep secret from his health authority employers the fact he had a previous conviction dating back 24 years for forging prescriptions to fuel his own drug habit.
In later reports, Dame Janet criticised an initial police investigation in March 1998 which failed to spot the trail of death at Shipman’s one-man practice in Hyde.
She also called for a radical overhaul of Britain's coroner’s and death certification system.
Shipman was finally brought to justice after police were alerted to his “cack-handed” attempt to forge the £386,000 (€558,000) will of an 81-year-old victim, former mayoress Kathleen Grundy.
Dame Janet said she would never be able to pinpoint Shipman’s motives, adding that he was possibly “addicted to killing”.
The prosecution during Shipman’s trial said the only reason could be that he came to enjoy exercising the ultimate power of life and death.
Shipman was discovered hanging during a routine cell check this morning and despite resuscitation attempts he was pronounced dead by a doctor at 8.10am.
Shipman had been on suicide watch earlier in his sentence but not since moving to Wakefield last June.
The prisons spokeswoman said Shipman had been behaving “utterly normally” and shown no signs of suicidal tendencies – even down to a telephone conversation with wife Primrose just last night.
Mark Leech, founder of ex-offenders’ charity Unlock and editor of the Prisons Handbook, said:
"Shipman was a very skilled general practitioner and he would have known the signs and symptoms that prison staff are trained to look for in terms of suicidal prisoners and it seems he successfully hid those symptoms.
“I don’t think there is any criticism that can be laid against the prison system in this case.“
But Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of probation union Napo, said: “It’s extremely worrying that one of the most high profile prisoners in the country has committed suicide.”
Senior investigating officer in the Shipman case, former Detective Chief Superintendent Bernard Postles, who retired in June 2003, said there had been a “real possibility” the killer would eventually confess.
“There are killers in prison who take 10 to 15 years to admit their part in serial killings,” he said.
“Unfortunately, that never came to pass and he’s now dead and taken the secrets to his grave.”
Other relatives of Shipman’s victims were said to be “extremely distressed” at the news of his death.
Solicitor Ann Alexander, who represents 200 relatives, said: “Many of the relatives had hoped that one day Harold Shipman would have answered many of the questions that they have surrounding their relative’s death, in particular why he committed these terrible crimes.
“We hope that the investigation will reveal how this was allowed to happen and that lessons will be learnt.”
Bill Catlow, 90, from Hyde, whose friend Lizzie Adams, 77, was killed in 1997, said he had been waiting for Shipman’s death since the trial.
“I am glad that he has gone. Shipman was an arrogant man, a thief and a liar, and this is the best thing that could have happened,” he said.
A post mortem examination was due to take place at Sheffield University.
