On a dark December night, a couple were heading home after an evening out. As they drove towards Alvechurch in Worcestershire, they were stopped on a deserted country lane and the driver was murdered in a brutal attack. But who was this mystery assailant and what connection did they have to the victim? 

Basil and Avril Laitner’s day was filled with happiness. They watched their eldest daughter get married, and they spent the early evening at the reception, in a marquee tent in their back garden. When they waved their daughter and new son-in-law off on their honeymoon, they had no idea a stranger was watching too. 

The Laitner's dream day was about to turn in to their worst nightmare.

During September 2012 Dale Cregan opened fire on two unarmed police officers. After killing them both, he handed himself in at a local police station. His arrest ended a nationwide manhunt to find him as he was also wanted in connection with the murders of a father and son in Greater Manchester.

Along with Dale Cregan, nine other men would be charged in connection with the murders of PC Nicola Hughes, PC Fiona Bone, and Mark and David Short.

On Tuesday, September 18th, 2012, PC Nicola Hughes and PC Fiona Bone arrived at a property in Abbey Gardens, ten miles east of Manchester City Centre.

They were answering a routine call. 

After his release from prison in 1970, Roy Fontaine had accepted a job at Whittingham hospital, and he was staying at a prison hostel nearby in Preston. Under the watchful eye of staff, Roy carried out his duties as the hospital porter. While waiting for his boyfriend, David Barnard, to get parole, Roy Fontaine started a fling with one of his co-workers Mary Coggle. Roy used his leisure time, before the prison hostel curfew, to visit an RAF drinking club. While there, he began talking to Hazel Patterson, a well-liked widow who owned a newsagents. 

To ensure his brother couldn’t lift his head above the water, Roy held it under for a moment as the last of the air left Donald’s lungs. As Roy and Michael stepped back from the bathtub, they patiently waited. After five minutes Donald’s body bobbed to the surface.

Between 1975 and 1980 The Yorkshire Ripper used the North of England as a hunting ground. He spread fear not just in Yorkshire, but across the entire country.

The Yorkshire Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe, killed thirteen women and attacked eight others. But before his capture, police were duped by a recording and three letters sent by a hoaxer. The voice on the tape claimed that he was the serial killer. This false evidence would derail the investigation, and divert attention away from the real culprit. 

Police would later discover the recordings were made by John Humble.

For over a quarter of a century, the answer to the question, who is “Wearside Jack”, would remain unanswered, and John would lead detectives on a wild goose chase that may have cost three women their lives.

David Smith, a former member of the SAS, was due to receive a large sum of money as a company he owned was being sold. David and his partner Elizabeth were excited as the windfall meant they could buy their dream home and permanently move in together after a committed long-distance relationship. Life appeared to be going well. That was until Elizabeth suddenly fell ill. 

She was assessed by doctors and consultants, who broke the news that Elizabeth was likely suffering from the early onset of motor neurone disease. But not everything was as it seemed. Sometimes the sweetest lie is easier to swallow than the bitter truth.

Richard Buckland had spent the last three months in a jail cell. The 17-year-old had confessed to the brutal rape and murder of teenager Dawn Ashworth. A similar death had occurred nearby, three years before.

Alan Turing had served his country during the second war, decoding Nazi communications at Bletchley Park. After the war, he moved north to work at Manchester’s Victoria University and purchased a property called “Hollymeade”

Near the end of 1951, Alan Turing met 19-year-old Arnold Murray.

Two police detectives arrived at Hollymeade, the home of a faculty member at Victoria University in Manchester. Alan, the occupant, had reported a burglary after a handful of trivial items had been stolen.

The detectives did not dispute what Alan was telling them, and they believed the items were almost certainly taken. But there were not there to discuss a petty theft.

Olivia was woken up around 3:30 am on December 30th, 1999, by the sound of something crashing to the ground. She prodded her husband awake. She was sure that somebody was in the house. She jumped out of bed and ran to lock the bedroom door.

John Cooper was an unassuming man. He claimed to suffer from a frozen shoulder and near debilitating arthritis. But John was living a double life.

A dangerous prisoner escapes from custody.  The events that unfolded are what worst nightmares are made of.

Monday, August 23rd, 2010, officers from the central London police force visited the home of Gareth Williams at his top-floor flat on Alderney Street in Pimlico, London.

Gareth had been working as a communications officer at the Government Communications Headquarters in Cheltenham. The cypher and codes expert was seconded to the secret intelligence service headquarters on the bank of the Thames around half a mile from his home.

When Gareth didn’t turn up for work, his colleagues made attempts to track him down, however, when that failed the authorities were notified. Police arrived at Gareth’s home, and after receiving no response, they broke down the front door of his flat. They spotted a mobile phone and sim cards laid out on a tabletop.

As they entered the bathroom, they noticed a large red North Face sports bag in the bath. They unzipped the padlocked bag, and Gareth’s decomposing body was found inside.

But how did it get there? Did Gareth lock himself inside or had he been murdered and his body placed there?

On the evening of Friday, February 3rd, 2017, 95-year-old Denver Beddows, and his 88-year-old wife Olive, received a visit from their son and daughter-in-law at their semi-detached home in Woolston. 

Denver, or Charles to those that knew him, had been struggling to care for his wife of 65 years, as she had been involved in a car accident which had left her increasingly anxious. Both her physical and mental health had been deteriorating and, in turn, this put an increasing strain on her husband.

Denver’s son and his daughter-in-law left the property once they helped their father with the household chores. Less twenty-four hours later, Denver would be in police custody, and his wife would be lying in a critical condition after being attacked with a hammer.

WARNING: THIS IS PART TWO OF A TWO-PART STORY. PLEASE LISTEN TO SEASON 2 - EPISODE 13 FOR MORE DETAILS ON THIS CASE. 

On June 30th, 2003, a 14-year-old girl was found stabbed to death behind a wall on Roan’s Dyke Path, a countryside short-cut in Dalkeith, Scotland. The investigation into her death continued for nine months with little result but all that would change in April 2004.

On the morning of Wednesday, December 8th, 2004, a jury stepped on to a bus to travel from Edinburgh High Court to Roan’s Dyke Path, a countryside short-cut between the residential areas of Newbattle and Easthouses in Midlothian, Scotland.

Wilted sunflowers, stuffed bears, candles and tributes marked the spot of a horrendous tragedy.

A year prior, this countryside trail was the location where a 14-year-old girl was brutally murdered.

Scotland in the 1960s saw two murders with each case centred around a complex love triangle. Even though the motives and methods of these crimes were strikingly similar, the outcome was very different.  

John Frederick Perry had been through a messy divorce and now found himself living alone with his cat, Katie, in the village of Higher Kinnerton in North Wales. John had saved up some money and decided to treat himself to a three week holiday to Manila in the Philippines. On his travels, he met a young woman who he went on to marry.

From the outside, it appeared that everything was going well, but John began to get jealous of the male attention his much younger wife received.