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

Monday, August 23, 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 3, 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 30, 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 8, 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… 

WARNING: THIS IS PART TWO OF A TWO-PART STORY. PLEASE LISTEN TO SEASON 2 - EPISODE 10 FOR MORE DETAILS ON THIS CASE. 

Jennifer and June Gibbons were twins. They would shut themselves away in their bedroom, not coming down for meals, and even when they did they would barely acknowledge their family. All this changed in the summer of 1981, but their actions would lead them to the gates of Broadmoor psychiatric hospital and a cocktail of antipsychotic medication. 

From a very early age, identical twins, Jennifer and June Gibbons were insular. They created their own secret language and refused to talk to anyone else. Following a conviction for burglary and arson, during their late teens, they were both sent to Broadmoor psychiatric hospital. 

This selective muteness would leave them trapped in the secure facility, on a cocktail of antipsychotic medication, for 11 years. But when they heard that they were being released, they both reached an agreement that one twin should lead a normal life.  

Tragically their decision would have fatal consequences.

On Friday, May 6, 1927 a large black trunk was abandoned in the luggage office at Charing Cross station in London. The trunk sat amongst the other abandoned luggage in the stifling heat until Monday morning. Staff arrived to begin their working week and were hit by a pungent odour. The source appeared to be coming from the large black trunk. An officer arrived and pried it open. He saw five large parcels wrapped in brown paper and tied with string.

Stephen Farrow was born in 1964. He was the black sheep of the family.

We’ve all had them. Those awkward first dates. You struggle to find something to talk about. So you go for the sure bet, and you mention the weather. But what would you do if you ended up meeting someone for a romantic night in, and you end up being arrested, and held in police custody for a crime you didn't commit?

Bijan Ebrahimi lived on the ground floor in a four-story block of flats located on Capgrave Crescent in Bristol. Bijan, a shy man and an Iranian immigrant, suffered from health problems that left him disabled. He had a close bond with his family and took joy in tending to his garden in a communal area that overlooked the surrounding flats.

Despite being quiet, he didn't go unnoticed. He was verbally abused by some of his neighbours, as he was seen as being “different” and viewed as an easy target by his tormentors. His pleas to the local authorities for help were met with complacency, and Bijan was dismissed as being a pest and annoyance. Bijan recorded some of these incidents, however, this antagonised a gang of nearly two dozen residents who surrounded Bijan’s flat in July 2013.

Alan Hopkinson is a former member of Mensa with an IQ of 159. He was a computer programmer and had served in the royal air force. At the time of his arrest he was middle-aged with a salt and pepper hair, and a moustache. Nothing about him stands out. You could pass him on the street and not take notice. 

Alan Hopkinson is also highly dangerous due to his obsession with young girls.

In 2009, Christopher Monks persuaded a boyfriend, he met through an internet chat room, to kill his parents in return for a disturbing reward.

WARNING: THIS IS PART TWO OF A TWO-PART STORY. PLEASE LISTEN TO SEASON 2 - EPISODE 4 FOR MORE DETAILS ON THIS CASE.

During April 2016 Helen Bailey, a successful author, disappeared. She allegedly left a note, found by her husband to be, asking that no one contact her as she needed some time alone. Over the following weeks and months, appeals were made by Helen’s friends and family in the hope someone might have spotted her.

Ian Stewart lived on Baldock Road in Royston with his finance, successful author Helen Bailey. The couple shared their home with Ian's two sons, from a previous marriage, and Helen's beloved miniature dachshund called Boris. Ian and Helen had planned their wedding for September 2016, but in April of that year,  Helen disappeared. A note left, that looked to be written by Helen, requested that no one contact her as she needed some time alone. Over the next few months, appeals for her whereabouts were made by her family and friends along with most national newspapers, but no one could answer the question, Where is Helen Bailey?

Over ten days in 2013 Joanna Dennehy went on a sadistic killing spree. She murdered three men and left two others fighting for their lives. 

On Tuesday, November 24, 2015,  Michelle James and an acquaintance, were clearing out a communal garden in Beddau, Wales, after a neighbour, Leigh Sabine, had passed away. 

Before she had died, Leigh who was always talkative and very outgoing had told her friend Michelle there was a medical skeleton in the garden and laughed suggesting it would be funny to scare one of their friends with it.

This practical joke would lead to Michelle’s arrest, spur a murder investigation that would span the globe, and ultimately led back to a two pound stone frog that lived on Leigh’s bedside cabinet. 

On May 12, 1958, 31-year-old Peter Manuel went to trial at Glasgow High Court for the murder of eight people.

So desperate were people to get a seat on the public benches for the trial of the infamous Beast of Birkenshaw, they queued outside the court overnight.