Ipswich serial murders

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Location of Suffolk within England
Location of Ipswich within Suffolk

In December 2006, the bodies of five murdered women were discovered at different locations near Ipswich in Suffolk, United Kingdom. All five murder victims were prostitutes working in Ipswich. Suffolk Police have linked the killings in their murder investigation. There are currently fewer than 50 suspects in the case.[1] A £300,000 reward has been offered to anyone who provides police with information leading to a conviction.[2]

Confirmed victims

The bodies of victims were found at various locations around Ipswich.

On 2 December 2006, the body of Gemma Adams, a 25-year-old prostitute working in Ipswich, was discovered in Belstead Brook near Hintlesham.[3] She had been missing since leaving home on 15 November, just over a fortnight before.[4] A member of the public spotted the body in the water at Thorpe's Hill, and it was identified as Adams. The police treated the death as suspicious.[5] After growing up in Kesgrave, she studied for a GNVQ in health and social care at Suffolk College, before gaining a job at a local insurance company. She had a heroin addiction, and after losing her job, Adams started working in prostitution to pay for her habit.[6] There is no evidence that Adams was sexually assaulted.[7]

Six days later, on 8 December 2006, the body of 19-year-old Tania Nicol, a friend of Adams, who had been missing since 30 October, was discovered in water at Copdock Mill just outside Ipswich.[8] She was also a prostitute. There was no evidence she had been sexually assaulted.[7]

On the following Sunday, 10 December 2006, a third victim was found dead in an area of woodland by the A14 road by a member of the public near Nacton village which is a short distance outside the town. She was later identified as 24-year-old Anneli Alderton, and according to a police statement, was asphyxiated.[9] She was around three months pregnant when she died[10].

On 12 December 2006, Suffolk police announced that the bodies of two additional women had been found.[11] On December 14, 2006 police confirmed one of the bodies to be that of Paula Clennell, 24.[12] She went missing on 10 December and was last seen in Ipswich.[13] In Suffolk Police's words she died from compression of the throat.[14] On 15 December, the police confirmed that the other body is that of Annette Nicholls, 29, who went missing on 5 December.[15] These bodies were also found in Nacton near the Levington turn-off of the A1156, in the vicinity of where Anneli Alderton was found. A member of the public had seen one of the bodies just 20 feet (6 m) from the main road, and the police discovered the second body by helicopter whilst conducting their initial investigation.

Details Of Victims

  • Gemma Adams aged 25, 5ft 2, Petite, Blonde Hair and Blue Eyes From Ipswich, went missing on wednesday 15th november 2006 at 01.15am she was wearing red top, blue jeans, black jacket with hood and white trainers her body was found on saturday 2nd december 2006 in a river at hintlesham suffolk she was the first to be found she was naked but not sexually assaulted there was a 17 days gap until she was located.


  • Tania Nicol aged 19, 5ft 2, Slim, Brown Eyes From Ipswich, went missing on monday 30th ocotber 2006 at 10.30pm her mother reported her missing on the wednesday 1st november 2006 she was the first to go missing and was found on friday 8th december 2006 near copdock mill in a river she was not sexually assaulted she was wearing blue jeans, pink high heels shoe and was found naked there was a 39 days gap until she was located.


  • Annette Nicholls aged 29, 5ft 3, Slim, Brown Hair from Ipswich she was a single mother of a 1 year old and was wearing grey leggings, black top, bomber jacket and boots she went missing on tuesday 5th december 2006 at 9.50pm her body was found on tuesday 12th december 2006 near levington she was found naked and was not sexually assaulted there was a 7 days gap until she was located.


  • Anneli Alderton aged 24, Blonde Hair which was scraped back she was wearing blue jeans, grey top, black jacket she was a mother of a 5 year old boy and was 3 months pregnant at the time she vanished she was living at a temporary address in colchester, essex. she went missing on sunday 3rd december 2006 and was first seen on the 5.53pm train from Harwich to Colchester she got off the train at Manningtree at 6.15pm before going on to Ipswich via a train and arriving at 6.43pm her body was found on sunday 10th december 2006 near nacton in woodland behind amberfield school she had been strangled and naked but not sexually assaulted there was a 7 days gap until she was located. but police think she was at the location of her body sometime on the tuesday 7th december 2006 by a man who mistaken her body for a manequin.


  • Paula Clennell aged 24, born in newcastle but was living in Ipswich she was a mother of 3 children and was wearing a blue anorak when she vanished she went missing on sunday 10th december 2006 in ipswich around 12.20am her body was found on tuesday 12th december 2006 near levington on the same day as annette nicholls she wss found naked and was not sexually assaulted but was killed by a compression of the throat there was a 2 days gap until she was located.


The police investigation

Suffolk police have linked the killings and have launched a murder investigation.[16] At a press conference on 10 December, detectives from the Suffolk Constabulary issued a warning to all women in Ipswich not to work the streets, and revealed they had received offers of assistance from neighbouring police forces, particularly Norfolk, in their hunt for the killer or killers.

Chief Constable Alastair McWhirter has also acknowledged that the Suffolk force will be reliant on external assistance due to the magnitude of the investigation. A senior investigator with the Metropolitan Police, Commander Dave Johnston was reported to have been drafted into the murder inquiry team from Scotland Yard in London, to advise the Suffolk force.[17] The day-to-day investigation is being conducted by Detective Chief Superintendent Stewart Gull. Police have not ruled out a possible link between the current investigation and the 1992 killings in Suffolk. Furthermore, links are being sought with a number of other disappearances.[18]

At subsequent press conferences on 13 December and 14 December, DCS Gull revealed that police believe the locations where the five corpses were found to have been 'deposition sites' not murder scenes - that the victims were all killed elsewhere and transported to the locations where they were later found - although he was unable to indicate where the women had been murdered, nor whether the crimes took place at a single location or at multiple sites. He also revealed that some items of women's clothing and accessories including a handbag and jacket had been recovered and were being subjected to forensic tests to establish whether they belonged to any of the murdered women.[19][20]

During the course of the press briefings, DCS Gull stated that over 200 police officers were involved in the investigation, and some 400-450 calls were being received daily by detectives.

On 15 December Suffolk Constabulary website revealed that a total of 7,300 telephone calls had been made to police regarding the investigation, and that over 250 police staff were working on the cases, with support from 26 other police forces. [21]

Police have contacted 300 registered sex offenders in Suffolk regarding the attacks[22]

A friend of Gemma Adams, who also works as a vice girl in Ipswich has revealed that she was interviewed by the police on Sunday 17th Dec, after volunteering information about 'strange' conversations that Gemma mentioned having with an unknown regular client in the weeks before she went missing. This man is said to have repeatedly told Gemma things like, "I will make you famous," and, "How would you like to be on TV?" Police are apparently not ruling out the possible undertones of these words in the light of Gemma's murder.[citation needed]

Possible links to other crimes

Location of Norfolk, immediately north of Suffolk

Officers are also trying to establish whether the deaths of the five women in Suffolk are linked to the murders or disappearances of six other women and teenage girls in East Anglia, over the past 13 years [7] and four more in Atlantic City, New Jersey, USA, in the past month. These include:

  • Natalie Pearman, aged 16, from Norwich, Norfolk. Disappeared in November 1992, her body was found at Ringland Hills near Norwich. She had been strangled and was found partially clothed. [23]
  • Johanna Young, aged 14, from Watton, Breckland District, Norfolk. Reported missing on 23 December 1992, she was found in a nearby freezing pond half naked on Boxing Day (26 December). [23]
  • Mandy Duncan, aged 26, from Woodbridge, Suffolk. Disappeared in 1993 in Ipswich; her body has never been found.
  • Vicky Hall, aged 17, was from Trimley St. Mary in Mid Suffolk. Vanished on 19 September 1999, her body was found 5 days later 25 miles away in a river at Creeting St. Peter near Stowmarket. A local businessman was later tried and acquitted of her murder.[24]
  • Kellie Pratt, aged 29, from Norwich. Disappeared in 2000 in Norwich; her body has never been found.
  • Michelle Bettles, aged 22, from Norwich. Reported missing on 28 March 2002, she was found dead 3 days later near Dereham in woodland at Scarning, Breckland District, Norfolk. Her body was found clothed.[25]
  • Molly Jean Dilts, 20; Kim Raffo, 35; Tracy Ann Roberts, 23; and Barbara V. Breidor, 42. All were known prostitutes and were found murdered in Atlantic City in the month prior to the first recent Ipswich murder.[26]

Media coverage

Before the bodies started to be recovered, there was minimal attention form the media except local media. The national BBC news began giving coverage to the investigation following the discovery of the remains of Tania Nicol; and after the discovery of the body of Anneli Alderton, the story started getting major exposure on a national and international level, with the British 24-hour-news channels Sky News and BBC News 24 devoting little time to any other events.

The murders are said to have raised memories of Peter Sutcliffe, the "Yorkshire Ripper" who murdered 13 women, mainly those who worked in prostitution, over a period of five years in northern England;[27] and to "Jack the Ripper" the infamous Victorian serial murderer who also targeted prostitutes.[28]

As with many previous serial killers dating back to Jack the Ripper, many sections of the media have attempted to coin a name for the presumed murderer, using the terms "Ipswich Ripper"[29], "Suffolk Strangler",[30], "Suffolk Ripper"[31] and "East Anglia Ripper"[32] to refer to the case. Local Ipswich press have also referred to them as the "Brook Murders"[citation needed], after the locations where the first two victims were found. In Australia, the media has referred to the killer as the "Red Light Ripper"; in reference to Red-light districts, which prostitutes frequent.[33]

Television news broadcasts have been presented from outside Suffolk Police headquarters, exemplified by the December 13 news conference including questions from well-known presenters such as Fiona Bruce and Kay Burley rather than the usual reporters. Extensive coverage was provided by BBC's early evening regional programme Look East.

An ITV News Anglia Tonight reporter interviewed Paula Clennell about the initial murders just days before she went missing.[34] She spoke of being wary of getting into cars with clients but continuing to work on the streets as she needed the money to fund her drug habit.[34]

A reward was offered, first by local business Call Connection, who initially offered £25,000, but was subsequently raised to £50,000. Shortly after this offer had been made, The News Of The World offered a £250,000 reward for leads to a direct arrest and conviction of the murderer/murderers bringing the total reward on offer to £300,000.[35]

Coverage of related issues

The murders have refocussed press attention on a number of continuing issues and controversies that persist in British politics.

The first is that of prostitution in the United Kingdom. The laws concerning this have long been criticised.[36][37][38] The Blair government had proposed changes to legislation related to prostitution in January 2006[39] but has not proceeded with them.[40] The murders have highlighted the vulnerability of prostitutes and the lack of action taken by the government (whether this were to be more punitive in the hope of reducing the numbers of prostitutes on the streets, to move towards legalised brothels and other measures thought to improve the safety of the women) or to target the demand for prostitution through prosecution of the clients, as is done in Sweden[citation needed].

The second is that of drug abuse and whether it should be legalised/decriminalised, provided on prescription to registered addicts, or penalised more harshly.[citation needed] High numbers (95% according to the Home Office[41]) of prostitutes in the United Kingdom are known to have a history of substance abuse, and prostitution is one means of funding addiction.

A third area of debate relates to possible restructuring of police forces in Britain. During 2005, the government proposed merging smaller police forces in England and Wales (of which Suffolk Constabulary is one) with their neighbouring counterparts with the stated aims of improving the ability to pursue major inquiries (such as anti-terrorism, drug-trafficking and other similar complex investigations) and making efficiency savings. [42] Following further debate, including widespread opposition to the plans [43], it was decided in mid-2006 to drop these proposals. The pressure placed on police in the Suffolk Constabulary by the scale of the current murder investigations in and around Ipswich has prompted renewed discussion over the possible need for restructuring to regional and national policing in the United Kingdom.[citation needed]

Local response to events

In response to the killings a Reclaim the Night is being organised for Friday, 29 December.[44] This was accompanied by a minute's silence observed before Ipswich's local football team's home game against Leeds on 16 December, 2006.

Timeline of events

Alderton on a train in Essex
  • 30 October - Tania Nicol goes missing.
  • 7 November - Nicol's mother issues an appeal for information.
  • 15 November - Gemma Adams goes missing, police appeal for information.
  • 2 December - Gemma Adams's body is found near Hintlesham west of Ipswich.
  • 3 December - Anneli Alderton goes missing.
  • 5 December - Annette Nicholls goes missing.
  • 8 December - Tania Nicol's body is found near Copdock southwest of Ipswich.
  • 9 December - Police confirm "obvious similarities" between the deaths of Nicol and Adams.
  • 10 December - Anneli Alderton's body is found near Nacton. Paula Clenell goes missing.
  • 12 December - Two bodies of Nicholls and Clenell, are found in close proximity to one another near Levington to the southeast of Ipswich.
  • 13 December
    • Police in Suffolk reveal that there has been a large public response in aid of the investigation.
    • Clothes of two women were found. [45]
  • 14 December - Police confirm that one of the bodies found on December 12 near Levington is that of missing prostitute Paula Clennell.
  • 15 December
    • Police confirm that the second of the bodies found on December 12 is that of missing prostitute Annette Nicholls.[15]
    • Sky News reports that a girl has been reported missing but she is later found safe.[46]
    • Nicol's father makes public appeal to help solve her murder. [1]
  • 16 December

See also

Wikinews has related news:
Part of a series on
Homicide
Murder

Note: Varies by jurisdiction

Manslaughter
Non-criminal homicide

Note: Varies by jurisdiction

Family
Other

Media resources

Newspaper editorials

References

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  6. ^ Report from The Sun
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