TRULY TERRIFYING: DENNIS NILSEN, "THE KINDLY KILLER"
Hello dear reader, and welcome to another new series on the blog that I'm introducing for the Halloween period. Truly Terrifying focuses on true, documented, frightening crimes, including both solved and unsolved cases. The first instalment focuses on Dennis Nilsen, Britain's second most prolific serial killer. I'll note that this was first written in 2016, back in the days when I thought running a horror blog sounded like fun. I've done my best to edit, adapt and correct it so the information is all currently up to date and please accept my apologies if anything is incorrect.Nicknamed by the media as 'The Kindly Killer' and sometimes as 'the British Jeffrey Dahmer', Dennis Nilsen murdered at least twelve men, and attempted to murder at least two more, between the years 1978 and 1983.
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| Nilsen is now known as a cold, calculating and narcissistic killer |
Nilsen was born in 1945, the second of three children in the unhappy marriage of Scottish housewife Elizabeth Whyte and Norwegian soldier Olav Nilsen. Olav had difficulty taking marriage and family life seriously, neglecting to spend any significant amount of time with his wife and children. As a result, the couple divorced in 1948, shortly after the birth of their third child, when Elizabeth concluded she had "rushed into marriage without thinking." Her parents, who had never approved of Olav as a choice of husband, were vastly supportive of Elizabeth's choice, and doted on their grandchildren. This feeling was strongly reciprocated by Nilsen, who held great particular adoration for his grandfather, Andrew Whyte, and has reported some of his earliest memories to be of the long walks they would take together.
On Halloween 1951, Nilsen's grandfather passed away whilst working as a fisherman. His body was returned to the family before burial, and Nilsen stated that his most vivid recollection of childhood is of his mother weeping and asking if he would like to see his beloved grandfather one final time. When he said that he would, he was taken to the room where Whyte's body lay in an open casket. His mother informed him that his grandfather was sleeping. Nilsen has blamed this incident for his development of psychopathic tendencies in later life.
Nilsen's mother would go on to remarry a man who he at first regarded as cruel, but would grow to respect in adolescence. It was around this time that Nilsen's homosexual desires made themselves known. However, he first believed that the affections he felt towards his male peers was nothing more than a manifestation of the deep care he felt for his sister Sylvia, due to the fact that most of them bore very similar facial features to her. Because of this belief, Nilsen sexually caressed his sister on one occasion, and at the time used this at evidence that he was bisexual.
After leaving school in 1961 with results that were considered above average but not exemplary, Nilsen worked at a canning factory for three months, at which point he decided he would join the army where he intended to train as a chef. He achieved this goal in 1966 and in the meantime served as a private. During this period he was stationed at Onsabruck, West Germany and his alcohol consumption increased quite considerably. One notable incident saw Nilsen drink to excess with a German youth and wake up on said youth's floor the following morning. Although no sexual activity occurred on this occasion, it was this that made Nilsen realise his desire for a young, slender male who was unconscious or even dead as a sexual partner. Nilsen retired from his military career in October 1972, at the rank of corporal.
Following the cessation of his eleven-year army career, Nilsen briefly moved back home with his family, where his mother became increasingly concerned at his apparent lack of desire for female companionship. On one occasion whilst living at home, Nilsen watched a documentary on male homosexuality with his brother, sister-in-law and another couple, all of whom spoke of the topic as repulsive. Nilsen, however, spoke ardently in favour of gay rights - an act which would lead to a fight with his brother, who informed their mother of Dennis's homosexuality. Nilsen reports that, following this incident, he never spoke to his brother again.
In December of 1972, Nilsen moved to London to begin police training. In April of the following year, he began working at Willesden Green as a constable. During summer and autumn of this year, Nilsen began a lifestyle he would later describe as a "vain search for inner peace", which involved the frequenting of gay pubs and numerous casual liaisons with men he met there. A failed relationship during this time led Nilsen to realise that his personal and professional life could not co-exist any more, and he resigned from the police force in December. For several months after his resignation, Nilsen worked as a security guard, until he eventually became a civil servant and began working for the Jobcentre. He was promoted several times within this job, and worked as an Acting Executive Officer at the time of his arrest.
In 1975, Nilsen purchased his now infamous flat on Melrose Avenue with then-partner David Gallachian, using the £1,000 his now-deceased father had bequeathed to him. The couple lived contently for almost two years, though there was little sexual connection, and Gallachian eventually left. It was here that Nilsen would begin his string of murders.
His first victim - fourteen year old Stephen Holmes - was murdered on 30th December 1978. The pair met in the Cricklewood Arms pub, where Holmes had been refused service of alcohol. Nilsen, believing the boy to be at least three years older than he actually was, invited Holmes back to his flat to drink alcohol there. Holmes spent the night, and when Nilsen awoke to the sleeping boy beside him, he became nervous that Holmes would wake up and leave - a deep fear of Nilsen's, who had at this point convinced himself he was impossible to live with. In order to have the boy "stay for the New Year, whether he wanted to or not", Nilsen strangled Holmes with a necktie until he was unconscious, then drowned him in a bucket of water. Holmes' body was stowed under the floorboards in Nilsen's bedroom for eight months before being burnt on a bonfire that Nilsen built in the garden of the flats - which he negotiated exclusive use of from the landlord. Holmes was the only one of Nilsen's known victims who was not dismembered before his corpse was disposed of, and he was not identified as a victim until 2006.
It wasn't until October of 1979 that Nilsen attempted to murder again. He picked up Hong Kong student Andrew Ho in a pub on Saint Martin's lane. Having lured Ho back to his flat with the promise of sex, Nilsen proceeded to strangle the student, who managed to fight off his attacker and flee the scene. Although Nilsen was questioned by police about the event, Ho decided not to press charges.
Only two months after the attempted murder of Ho, Nilsen carried out his second successful murder. This time, his victim was 23-year-old Canadian tourist Kenneth Ockenden. Upon discovering that Ockenden was not a local, Nilsen offered to show him notable London landmarks when they met in a West End pub. He also offered the youth a meal and alcohol back at his flat, an offer which Ockenden accepted. Nilsen went on to strangle Ockenden with the cable of a set of headphones, with which he recalled using to listen to music shortly after the strangling took place. The following day, Nilsen purchased a polaroid camera which he used to photograph Ockenden's body in several suggestive positions, before wrapping the body in a curtain and stowing it beneath the floorboards. Over the following fortnight, Nilsen would remove Ockenden's body from its resting place on four occasions, when he placed the body alongside himself in his armchair while he watched television.
The third victim was sixteen-year-old catering student Martyn Duffey, who had been sleeping rough for four days when he met Nilsen outside Euston Station on 17 May 1980. The boy, exhausted and hungry, readily accepted Nilsen's offer of a meal and a bed for the night. It was while he slept in Nilsen's bed that Duffey was strangled with a homemade ligature to the point of unconsciousness. Following this, Nilsen drowned the boy in his bathroom sink then proceeded to bathe with the corpse. After bathing, Nilsen placed the boy's body in his bed where he kissed and carressed it multiple times, before putting it into a cupboard for two days. The body was stowed alongside Ockenden, beneath the floorboards, when Nilsen realised that it had become bloated.
Following Duffey, Nilsen's rate of murder increased substantially. By the conclusion of 1980, Nilsen had committed five more murders of mostly unidentified homeless youths, and attempted to murder one more. Although Nilsen claimed only vague memories as to the identity and appearance of all but one of these victims (one being identified as 26 year old William Sutherland), he has given detailed accounts of the logistics of each murder, including one incident where he made an unsuccessful attempt to resuscitate the victim, and another where he lay alongside the body in his bed, listening to classical music before bursting into tears.
By Autumn of 1980, Nilsen's flat reeked of decay and was infested with flies and maggots. Although he sprayed insecticides and deodorants regularly, the problems did not cease and so Nilsen realised it was time to dispose of the bodies. Each was dissected and burned on a bonfire, on which Nilsen recalled adding car tyres so as to disguise the smell of burning flesh. He also recalled that three children stood by and watched the fire.
In early January 1981, Nilsen met an unidentified 18-year-old Scottish man, who he remembered having blond hair and blue eyes. On the twelfth of the month, he called in sick to work in order to dispose of this body and that of another unidentified victim. In the same year he met "an English skinhead" and "a Belfast boy." Though Nilsen recalled few details about these young men, he remembered quite vividly that they met much the same fate as their unfortunate predecessors.
After leaving school in 1961 with results that were considered above average but not exemplary, Nilsen worked at a canning factory for three months, at which point he decided he would join the army where he intended to train as a chef. He achieved this goal in 1966 and in the meantime served as a private. During this period he was stationed at Onsabruck, West Germany and his alcohol consumption increased quite considerably. One notable incident saw Nilsen drink to excess with a German youth and wake up on said youth's floor the following morning. Although no sexual activity occurred on this occasion, it was this that made Nilsen realise his desire for a young, slender male who was unconscious or even dead as a sexual partner. Nilsen retired from his military career in October 1972, at the rank of corporal.
Following the cessation of his eleven-year army career, Nilsen briefly moved back home with his family, where his mother became increasingly concerned at his apparent lack of desire for female companionship. On one occasion whilst living at home, Nilsen watched a documentary on male homosexuality with his brother, sister-in-law and another couple, all of whom spoke of the topic as repulsive. Nilsen, however, spoke ardently in favour of gay rights - an act which would lead to a fight with his brother, who informed their mother of Dennis's homosexuality. Nilsen reports that, following this incident, he never spoke to his brother again.
In December of 1972, Nilsen moved to London to begin police training. In April of the following year, he began working at Willesden Green as a constable. During summer and autumn of this year, Nilsen began a lifestyle he would later describe as a "vain search for inner peace", which involved the frequenting of gay pubs and numerous casual liaisons with men he met there. A failed relationship during this time led Nilsen to realise that his personal and professional life could not co-exist any more, and he resigned from the police force in December. For several months after his resignation, Nilsen worked as a security guard, until he eventually became a civil servant and began working for the Jobcentre. He was promoted several times within this job, and worked as an Acting Executive Officer at the time of his arrest.
In 1975, Nilsen purchased his now infamous flat on Melrose Avenue with then-partner David Gallachian, using the £1,000 his now-deceased father had bequeathed to him. The couple lived contently for almost two years, though there was little sexual connection, and Gallachian eventually left. It was here that Nilsen would begin his string of murders.
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| Nilsen committed his first murders at 195 Melrose Avenue |
His first victim - fourteen year old Stephen Holmes - was murdered on 30th December 1978. The pair met in the Cricklewood Arms pub, where Holmes had been refused service of alcohol. Nilsen, believing the boy to be at least three years older than he actually was, invited Holmes back to his flat to drink alcohol there. Holmes spent the night, and when Nilsen awoke to the sleeping boy beside him, he became nervous that Holmes would wake up and leave - a deep fear of Nilsen's, who had at this point convinced himself he was impossible to live with. In order to have the boy "stay for the New Year, whether he wanted to or not", Nilsen strangled Holmes with a necktie until he was unconscious, then drowned him in a bucket of water. Holmes' body was stowed under the floorboards in Nilsen's bedroom for eight months before being burnt on a bonfire that Nilsen built in the garden of the flats - which he negotiated exclusive use of from the landlord. Holmes was the only one of Nilsen's known victims who was not dismembered before his corpse was disposed of, and he was not identified as a victim until 2006.
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| Holmes was just fourteen at the time of his death |
It wasn't until October of 1979 that Nilsen attempted to murder again. He picked up Hong Kong student Andrew Ho in a pub on Saint Martin's lane. Having lured Ho back to his flat with the promise of sex, Nilsen proceeded to strangle the student, who managed to fight off his attacker and flee the scene. Although Nilsen was questioned by police about the event, Ho decided not to press charges.
Only two months after the attempted murder of Ho, Nilsen carried out his second successful murder. This time, his victim was 23-year-old Canadian tourist Kenneth Ockenden. Upon discovering that Ockenden was not a local, Nilsen offered to show him notable London landmarks when they met in a West End pub. He also offered the youth a meal and alcohol back at his flat, an offer which Ockenden accepted. Nilsen went on to strangle Ockenden with the cable of a set of headphones, with which he recalled using to listen to music shortly after the strangling took place. The following day, Nilsen purchased a polaroid camera which he used to photograph Ockenden's body in several suggestive positions, before wrapping the body in a curtain and stowing it beneath the floorboards. Over the following fortnight, Nilsen would remove Ockenden's body from its resting place on four occasions, when he placed the body alongside himself in his armchair while he watched television.
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| Ockenden was set to return to Canada the day after his murder took place. |
The third victim was sixteen-year-old catering student Martyn Duffey, who had been sleeping rough for four days when he met Nilsen outside Euston Station on 17 May 1980. The boy, exhausted and hungry, readily accepted Nilsen's offer of a meal and a bed for the night. It was while he slept in Nilsen's bed that Duffey was strangled with a homemade ligature to the point of unconsciousness. Following this, Nilsen drowned the boy in his bathroom sink then proceeded to bathe with the corpse. After bathing, Nilsen placed the boy's body in his bed where he kissed and carressed it multiple times, before putting it into a cupboard for two days. The body was stowed alongside Ockenden, beneath the floorboards, when Nilsen realised that it had become bloated.
Following Duffey, Nilsen's rate of murder increased substantially. By the conclusion of 1980, Nilsen had committed five more murders of mostly unidentified homeless youths, and attempted to murder one more. Although Nilsen claimed only vague memories as to the identity and appearance of all but one of these victims (one being identified as 26 year old William Sutherland), he has given detailed accounts of the logistics of each murder, including one incident where he made an unsuccessful attempt to resuscitate the victim, and another where he lay alongside the body in his bed, listening to classical music before bursting into tears.
By Autumn of 1980, Nilsen's flat reeked of decay and was infested with flies and maggots. Although he sprayed insecticides and deodorants regularly, the problems did not cease and so Nilsen realised it was time to dispose of the bodies. Each was dissected and burned on a bonfire, on which Nilsen recalled adding car tyres so as to disguise the smell of burning flesh. He also recalled that three children stood by and watched the fire.
In early January 1981, Nilsen met an unidentified 18-year-old Scottish man, who he remembered having blond hair and blue eyes. On the twelfth of the month, he called in sick to work in order to dispose of this body and that of another unidentified victim. In the same year he met "an English skinhead" and "a Belfast boy." Though Nilsen recalled few details about these young men, he remembered quite vividly that they met much the same fate as their unfortunate predecessors.
23 year-old Malcolm Barlow was the final victim at Melrose Avenue. On 17th September 1981, upon discovering the young man slumped outside the property, Nilsen inquired about his wellbeing and discovered that his legs had been weakened by epilepsy medication. Showing apparently genuine concern, Nilsen supported Barlow to his flat and called an ambulance. Upon release from hospital the next day, the young man returned to Melrose Avenue in order to thank Nilsen for his kindness. After eating a meal and drinking with Nilsen, Barlow was manually strangled while he slept. His body was stowed in the cupboard beneath the kitchen sink.
Shortly after the murder of Barlow, Nilsen's landlord asked him to vacate the property so that renovations could be carried out. Initially resistant to the request, Nilsen finally accepted an offer of £1,000 to move away from Melrose Avenue. On 5th October 1981, he moved into the attic flat of 23D Cranley Gardens, where he would reside until his arrest. The day before leaving, he again burned the festering remains of his most recent victims, and again disguised the smell by crowning the bonfire with a car tyre.
Things were different at Cranley Gardens. Being in the attic flat, Nilsen had no access to a garden and little space to stow victims' remains. Nilsen did not kill again for several months, despite attempting to strangle 19-year-old Paul Nobbs on 23rd November 1981.
The killing streak began again in March of the following year, when Nilsen met 23-year-old John Howlett in a Leicester Square pub. The pair continued the night's drinking at Cranley Gardens, where Howlett eventually passed out. After watching the youth sleep whilst consuming more alcohol, and an unsuccessful attempt to rouse him, Nilsen decided to strangle Howlett with an upholstery strap. A vicious struggle ensued, and Howlett was eventually strangled into unconsciousness, despite being still alive at this point. Believing that he would be overpowered, Nilsen made three more unsuccessful attempts to kill Howlett within the next ten minutes. Eventually, he drowned the youth in his bathtub.
Just two months later, in May 1982, Nilsen met 21-year-old Carl Stottor at a pub in Camden. With the promise of more alcohol, Stottor went with Nilsen back to Cranley Gardens, where he eventually fell asleep on an open sleeping bag. He awoke to Nilsen strangling him and imploring him to 'stay still'. In his testimony, Stottor stated that he initially believed he had become entangled in the sleeping bag and that Nilsen was simply attempting to free him. He also recalled 'hearing running water' upon regaining consciousness, before realising his head was submerged in the bathtub and Nilsen was attempting to drown him.
Believing the youth to be dead, Nilsen seated Stottor in his armchair. When his pet dog Bleep began to lick the boy's face, however, Nilsen realised his drowning attempt had been unsuccessful. Rather than try again, as he had with Howlett, Nilsen rubbed Stottor's arms, legs and chest in order to improve circulation. He then covered the youth in blankets and laid him on the bed. The youth drifted in and out of consciousness for the next two days. When Stottor regained enough sense to recall the experience and question it, Nilsen informed him that he had almost strangled himself after becoming entangled in the sleeping bag's zipper, and that Nilsen had placed him a bathtub full of cold water as he was in shock. Shortly after this, Nilsen accompanied Stottor to a nearby train station, where he expressed a desire to meet the youth again.
In September of the same year, Nilsen met 27-year-old Garaham Allen in Shaftsebury Avenue. Accepting Nilsen's offer of a meal, Allen accompanied him back to Cranley Gardens. After being strangled to death, Allen's body was retained in Nilsen's bathtub for three days before it was dissected on the kitchen floor. Nilsen again called in sick to work in order to complete the dissection.
Nilsen's final victim was killed in Jauary 1983. 20-year-old Stephen Sinclair was a deeply troubled young man, and was last seen by friends heading into a tube station with a man fitting Nilsen's description. After falling into a drug-and-alcohol fuelled sleep in Nilsen's flat, Sinclair was strangled with a ligature made from a neck tie and length of rope. Following the murder, Nilsen noticed crepe bandages on the boy's wrists, which he moved to reveal deep scars left behind by a recent suicide attempt. Nilsen proceeded to bathe and apply talcum powder to Sinclair's corpse and to arrange three mirrors around the bed, where he then lay naked next to the dead youth. Several hours later, he turned the corpse to face him, kissed the forehead, bade Stephen goodnight and fell asleep. Sinclair's body was also dissected.
As the lack of access to a garden ruled out burning the remains at this address, Nilsen instead boiled the extremities and heads of the victims' corpses to remove their flesh and attempted to flush the remains down his toilet. However, on 4th February 1983 - just nine days after murdering Sinclair - Nilsen, encouraged by the other tenants, wrote a letter of complaint to an estate agent, claiming that the drains were blocked and living conditions in Cranley Gardens were becoming intolerable.
The letter would prove to be a mistake on Nilsen's part. On 8th February 1983, drainage worker Michael Cattran discovered a flesh-like substance and several small bones inside a drainage cover on the side of the house. As the discovery occurred at dusk, Cattran and his supervisor, Gary Wheeler, decided to postpone further investigation until the following morning. Nilsen and neighbour Jim Allock conversed briefly with Cattran about the unsettling discovery, to which Nilsen nonchalantly responded that somebody must have flushed the remains of a fried chicken takeaway meal.
At half past seven the next morning, Cattran and Wheeler returned to find the same section of the drain cleared. Highly suspicious, the men investigated further and eventually discovered what appeared to be the remains of a human hand in a drainpipe leading from the top floor. Alarmed, they contacted the police, who found further scraps of a similar flesh-like substance to that which Cattran had discovered the night before. At the mortuary in Hornsey, pathologist Professor David Bowen confirmed that the flesh was indeed human and concluded that one piece, which he believed to have come from the neck, bore ligature marks.
After retrieving Nilsen's full name and place of work from neighbours, DCI Peter Jay and two colleagues decided to wait outside of 23 Cranley Gardens for Nilsen to return. When he did, Jay informed Nilsen that he and his colleagues had come to inquire about the blockage in his drains and requested entry to his flat, which Nilsen granted with little resistance. All three officers reported that, upon entering the flat, the stench of death was immediately overwhelming. When he was informed that the flesh found in the drains was human, Nilsen initially feigned shock and horror. However, when asked where the rest of the body was, he calmly told the officers that they could find the rest of the mains in two plastic carrier bags in the wardrobe in the bedroom. Horrified, the DCI Jay asked if any other body parts were to be found to which Nilsen responded;
"It's a long story. It goes back a long time. I'll tell you everything, I want to get it off my chest. Not here - at the police station."
As DCI Jay and his colleagues escorted Nilsen to the station, he was asked if the remains came from one body or two. Staring out of the window, Nilsen casually responded that there were 'about fifteen or sixteen, since 1978'. With the aid of Nilsen's confession, several human remains - including two human heads which had been exposed to moist heat, and a torso with the arms still attached but the hands removed. Nilsen confessed to having masturbated beside or over the corpses, but stressed that he never sexually penetrated any of the victims, claiming that they were 'too perfect and too beautiful for the pathetic ritual of commonplace sex.' When questioned as to whether he felt remorse for his actions, Nilsen claimed that he "wanted to stop, but couldn't", claiming that he "had no other joy or thrill." He also stressed that he did not enjoy the act of killing but "worshipped the art and act of death".
Nilsen was formally charged with the murder of Stephen Sinclair on 11th February 1983, and was held in Brixton Prison on remand while he awaited trial. Nilsen was resitant to wearing a prison uniform, although he reluctantly agreed upon being told exceptions would not be made for him. In response to what he believed to be breaches of prison rules, Nilsen threatened to protest by refusing to wear any clothing at all. He also threw the contents of a chamber pot out of his cell, hitting several officers. This resulted in him being found guilty of assaulting an officer, and sentenced to 56 days in solitary confinement.
Nilsen was brought to trail at the Old Bailey on 24th October 1983, charged with six counts of murder and two counts of attempted murder. The defence pleaded not guilty to each charge; Nilsen's solicitor Ronald Moss plead diminished responsibility, and requested the charge be reduced to manslaughter. However, following a ten-day trial and several testimonies - including from survivors Paul Nobbs and Carl Stottor - the jury found Nilsen guilty of six counts of murder and the attempted murder of Paul Nobbs. Nilsen was sentenced to life imprisonment, with a recommended minimum sentence of 25 years.
Nilsen was transferred to Wormwood Scrubs immediately after his conviction. As a Category A prisoner, he was allocated his own cell, but was allowed to mingle with other inmates. In December 1983, Nilsen was attacked by fellow inmate Albert Moffat using a razor blade, which resulted in Nilsen requiring 89 stitches on his chest and face. Following the attack, Nilsen was transferred to Pankhurst Prison and later transferred again to Wakefield, where he remained until 1990. He was then transferred to a vulnerable-prisoner unit at HMP Full Sutton after concerns for his safety arose. Three years later, he was tranferred again to Whitemoor prison as a Category A prisoner, with increased segregation from other prisoners. In 1994, the 25-year-minimum sentence that Nilsen was issued eleven years previously was exchanged for a full-life tariff, ensuring that he will never leave prison. In 2003, he was transferred back to HMP Full Sutton, where he resided until his death in May 2018 He spent much of his free time painting, reading, composing music on a keyboard and writing to individuals who requested correspondence with him. Nilsen expressed no desire to obtain freedom, insisting that he fully accepted his punishment.
Special thanks to the following sources where I did my research:
Dennis Nilsen on Wikipedia
Dennis Nilsen on Biography.com
The Serial Killer Next Door: Dennis Nilsen on mudermap.co.uk
Interview with Dennis Nilsen (Murder in Mind, Carlton TV, 1993) by GuildfordGhost on Youtube
Shortly after the murder of Barlow, Nilsen's landlord asked him to vacate the property so that renovations could be carried out. Initially resistant to the request, Nilsen finally accepted an offer of £1,000 to move away from Melrose Avenue. On 5th October 1981, he moved into the attic flat of 23D Cranley Gardens, where he would reside until his arrest. The day before leaving, he again burned the festering remains of his most recent victims, and again disguised the smell by crowning the bonfire with a car tyre.
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| 23D Cranley Gardens, deemed 'the murder flat', was sold in 2015 for £300,000 |
Things were different at Cranley Gardens. Being in the attic flat, Nilsen had no access to a garden and little space to stow victims' remains. Nilsen did not kill again for several months, despite attempting to strangle 19-year-old Paul Nobbs on 23rd November 1981.
The killing streak began again in March of the following year, when Nilsen met 23-year-old John Howlett in a Leicester Square pub. The pair continued the night's drinking at Cranley Gardens, where Howlett eventually passed out. After watching the youth sleep whilst consuming more alcohol, and an unsuccessful attempt to rouse him, Nilsen decided to strangle Howlett with an upholstery strap. A vicious struggle ensued, and Howlett was eventually strangled into unconsciousness, despite being still alive at this point. Believing that he would be overpowered, Nilsen made three more unsuccessful attempts to kill Howlett within the next ten minutes. Eventually, he drowned the youth in his bathtub.
Just two months later, in May 1982, Nilsen met 21-year-old Carl Stottor at a pub in Camden. With the promise of more alcohol, Stottor went with Nilsen back to Cranley Gardens, where he eventually fell asleep on an open sleeping bag. He awoke to Nilsen strangling him and imploring him to 'stay still'. In his testimony, Stottor stated that he initially believed he had become entangled in the sleeping bag and that Nilsen was simply attempting to free him. He also recalled 'hearing running water' upon regaining consciousness, before realising his head was submerged in the bathtub and Nilsen was attempting to drown him.
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| Stotter was lucky and bafffled to have survived his encounter with the Kindly Killer. |
Believing the youth to be dead, Nilsen seated Stottor in his armchair. When his pet dog Bleep began to lick the boy's face, however, Nilsen realised his drowning attempt had been unsuccessful. Rather than try again, as he had with Howlett, Nilsen rubbed Stottor's arms, legs and chest in order to improve circulation. He then covered the youth in blankets and laid him on the bed. The youth drifted in and out of consciousness for the next two days. When Stottor regained enough sense to recall the experience and question it, Nilsen informed him that he had almost strangled himself after becoming entangled in the sleeping bag's zipper, and that Nilsen had placed him a bathtub full of cold water as he was in shock. Shortly after this, Nilsen accompanied Stottor to a nearby train station, where he expressed a desire to meet the youth again.
In September of the same year, Nilsen met 27-year-old Garaham Allen in Shaftsebury Avenue. Accepting Nilsen's offer of a meal, Allen accompanied him back to Cranley Gardens. After being strangled to death, Allen's body was retained in Nilsen's bathtub for three days before it was dissected on the kitchen floor. Nilsen again called in sick to work in order to complete the dissection.
Nilsen's final victim was killed in Jauary 1983. 20-year-old Stephen Sinclair was a deeply troubled young man, and was last seen by friends heading into a tube station with a man fitting Nilsen's description. After falling into a drug-and-alcohol fuelled sleep in Nilsen's flat, Sinclair was strangled with a ligature made from a neck tie and length of rope. Following the murder, Nilsen noticed crepe bandages on the boy's wrists, which he moved to reveal deep scars left behind by a recent suicide attempt. Nilsen proceeded to bathe and apply talcum powder to Sinclair's corpse and to arrange three mirrors around the bed, where he then lay naked next to the dead youth. Several hours later, he turned the corpse to face him, kissed the forehead, bade Stephen goodnight and fell asleep. Sinclair's body was also dissected.
As the lack of access to a garden ruled out burning the remains at this address, Nilsen instead boiled the extremities and heads of the victims' corpses to remove their flesh and attempted to flush the remains down his toilet. However, on 4th February 1983 - just nine days after murdering Sinclair - Nilsen, encouraged by the other tenants, wrote a letter of complaint to an estate agent, claiming that the drains were blocked and living conditions in Cranley Gardens were becoming intolerable.
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| Nilsen's neighbours complained of blocked pipes resulting in smelly and dirty water |
The letter would prove to be a mistake on Nilsen's part. On 8th February 1983, drainage worker Michael Cattran discovered a flesh-like substance and several small bones inside a drainage cover on the side of the house. As the discovery occurred at dusk, Cattran and his supervisor, Gary Wheeler, decided to postpone further investigation until the following morning. Nilsen and neighbour Jim Allock conversed briefly with Cattran about the unsettling discovery, to which Nilsen nonchalantly responded that somebody must have flushed the remains of a fried chicken takeaway meal.
At half past seven the next morning, Cattran and Wheeler returned to find the same section of the drain cleared. Highly suspicious, the men investigated further and eventually discovered what appeared to be the remains of a human hand in a drainpipe leading from the top floor. Alarmed, they contacted the police, who found further scraps of a similar flesh-like substance to that which Cattran had discovered the night before. At the mortuary in Hornsey, pathologist Professor David Bowen confirmed that the flesh was indeed human and concluded that one piece, which he believed to have come from the neck, bore ligature marks.
After retrieving Nilsen's full name and place of work from neighbours, DCI Peter Jay and two colleagues decided to wait outside of 23 Cranley Gardens for Nilsen to return. When he did, Jay informed Nilsen that he and his colleagues had come to inquire about the blockage in his drains and requested entry to his flat, which Nilsen granted with little resistance. All three officers reported that, upon entering the flat, the stench of death was immediately overwhelming. When he was informed that the flesh found in the drains was human, Nilsen initially feigned shock and horror. However, when asked where the rest of the body was, he calmly told the officers that they could find the rest of the mains in two plastic carrier bags in the wardrobe in the bedroom. Horrified, the DCI Jay asked if any other body parts were to be found to which Nilsen responded;
"It's a long story. It goes back a long time. I'll tell you everything, I want to get it off my chest. Not here - at the police station."
As DCI Jay and his colleagues escorted Nilsen to the station, he was asked if the remains came from one body or two. Staring out of the window, Nilsen casually responded that there were 'about fifteen or sixteen, since 1978'. With the aid of Nilsen's confession, several human remains - including two human heads which had been exposed to moist heat, and a torso with the arms still attached but the hands removed. Nilsen confessed to having masturbated beside or over the corpses, but stressed that he never sexually penetrated any of the victims, claiming that they were 'too perfect and too beautiful for the pathetic ritual of commonplace sex.' When questioned as to whether he felt remorse for his actions, Nilsen claimed that he "wanted to stop, but couldn't", claiming that he "had no other joy or thrill." He also stressed that he did not enjoy the act of killing but "worshipped the art and act of death".
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| Nilsen was eventually tried at The Old Bailey |
Nilsen was formally charged with the murder of Stephen Sinclair on 11th February 1983, and was held in Brixton Prison on remand while he awaited trial. Nilsen was resitant to wearing a prison uniform, although he reluctantly agreed upon being told exceptions would not be made for him. In response to what he believed to be breaches of prison rules, Nilsen threatened to protest by refusing to wear any clothing at all. He also threw the contents of a chamber pot out of his cell, hitting several officers. This resulted in him being found guilty of assaulting an officer, and sentenced to 56 days in solitary confinement.
Nilsen was brought to trail at the Old Bailey on 24th October 1983, charged with six counts of murder and two counts of attempted murder. The defence pleaded not guilty to each charge; Nilsen's solicitor Ronald Moss plead diminished responsibility, and requested the charge be reduced to manslaughter. However, following a ten-day trial and several testimonies - including from survivors Paul Nobbs and Carl Stottor - the jury found Nilsen guilty of six counts of murder and the attempted murder of Paul Nobbs. Nilsen was sentenced to life imprisonment, with a recommended minimum sentence of 25 years.
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| Nilsen was incarcerated at HMP Wormwood Scrubs |
Nilsen was transferred to Wormwood Scrubs immediately after his conviction. As a Category A prisoner, he was allocated his own cell, but was allowed to mingle with other inmates. In December 1983, Nilsen was attacked by fellow inmate Albert Moffat using a razor blade, which resulted in Nilsen requiring 89 stitches on his chest and face. Following the attack, Nilsen was transferred to Pankhurst Prison and later transferred again to Wakefield, where he remained until 1990. He was then transferred to a vulnerable-prisoner unit at HMP Full Sutton after concerns for his safety arose. Three years later, he was tranferred again to Whitemoor prison as a Category A prisoner, with increased segregation from other prisoners. In 1994, the 25-year-minimum sentence that Nilsen was issued eleven years previously was exchanged for a full-life tariff, ensuring that he will never leave prison. In 2003, he was transferred back to HMP Full Sutton, where he resided until his death in May 2018 He spent much of his free time painting, reading, composing music on a keyboard and writing to individuals who requested correspondence with him. Nilsen expressed no desire to obtain freedom, insisting that he fully accepted his punishment.
Special thanks to the following sources where I did my research:
Dennis Nilsen on Wikipedia
Dennis Nilsen on Biography.com
The Serial Killer Next Door: Dennis Nilsen on mudermap.co.uk
Interview with Dennis Nilsen (Murder in Mind, Carlton TV, 1993) by GuildfordGhost on Youtube
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