A Mundane Letter from Serial Killer - Peter Sutcliffe (The Yorkshire Ripper)

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Sutcliffe & Jimmy Savill (which was worst?)

How'd do you fancy reading a rather mundane letter written by Peter Sutcliffe, also known as The Yorkshire Ripper? Well, you;re in luck.

Peter Sutcliffe was convicted of brutally murdering thirteen women and attempting to murder seven others in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s in Leeds and Bradford in the North of England, and so horrific were their injuries that he was dubbed the “Yorkshire Ripper”.

Being declared insane, Sutcliffe was (and currently still is) housed at Broadmoor Psychiatric Prison on an indeterminate sentence, and this letter was written by Sutcliffe to Sandra Lester, a friend, model, escort girl, part-time stripper and a supposed confidante, who later sold his story to the papers. They started writing in 1993, but the love letters stopped when he asked her to marry him and she said no.

The letter is dated 9th June 1998, it is handwritten with very curly handwriting, and with a sticker of a palm tree on the top of letter. Sutcliffe loves using excessive grammar.
 
“Dear Sandy. Hi!! How are you today? I hope this letter finds you happy and in the best of health (small kiss). I received your nice wee letter okay “with the butterfly stickers”, it’s such a bright and cheery letter so thanks for that. I hope you’re right about what you said about something changing for the better (as there’s something in the air, etc). …. (pages missing)… pleased its happened at long last. As you say, dad will be in touch when he’s got himself sorted out! Did I mention that I’d had a nice visit from Maria last Saturday? She was telling me all about her holiday! She really enjoyed herself and brought me loads of postcards back etc!! (smiley face) She said the weather was very hot all the time and she’d obviously caught the sun so she was looking very well. She said she’d been staying in London for a few days before making her way back home! Anyway take care 4 now cos you’re in my thoughts. I send you all my love and GR8 big caring HUGS!!!. Love Pete. X x x x x x x x

Next up is an interesting letter written by Sutcliffe to his friend Chris on 2015, again pages missing, but it ends like this…

“Yes! I have heard of (Ian) Brady’s book - The Gates of Janus - and I’d been told ages ago that there’s a bit about me in it, but I’m not interested in reading it myself Chris? Ha! No I didn’t know they sent Keith Richards to The Scrubbs. Yeah, Charles Bronson also spent time here at Broadmoor, until he caused a lot of damage to the roof. His previous name was Mickey Peterson by the way! There’s a DVD out called Bronson and it’s been on telly over here a few times! He was known for taking hostages etc! He’s a pretty good artist thought, I’ve seen quite a few of his sketches!! (smiley face) Well it’s almost time for my usual 9:30pm phone-call Chris, so I’ll try to finish off this letter and get it into the post-box ready for the early morning collection tomorrow. Well my good and dear friend, take care of yourself for now you hear!! (smiley face) Best wishes and regards as always. Your pal Pete. X

Oddly, in a later letter, it’s clear that Chris recounted the entire contents of a phone conversation between himself and Peter Sutcliffe to tabloid newspaper the News of the World, including a crappy joke Sutcliffe had made, which he was most displeased about (sad face) five exclamation marks.

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If you found this interesting? Check out the Mini Mile episodes of the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast, or click on the link below to listen to an episode.

Michael J Buchanan-Dunne is a writer, crime historian, podcaster and tour-guide who runs Murder Mile Walks, a guided tour of Soho’s most notorious murder cases, hailed as “one of the top ten curious, quirky, unusual and different things to do in London”, nominated "one of the best true-crime  podcasts at the British Podcast Awards 2018", and featuring 12 murderers, including 3 serial killers, across 15 locations, totaling 50 deaths, over just a one mile walk