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Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, set within and beyond the West End.
EPISODE ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTEEN
This is Part Two of a four-part series into The Camden Ripper. The truth about may never be known, as it’s hard to understand who he is, as he appeared to be a different person to different people at different times. By viewing this story from his perspective, it is clear that there were four distinct sides to the personality of Anthony Hardy; the alcoholic, the addict, the sadist and the maniac. These are the Four Faces of The Camden Ripper. Part Two – Tony the Addict.
THE LOCATION
As many photos of the case are copyright protected by greedy news organisations, to view them, take a peek at my entirely legal social media accounts - Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.
The location of 4 Hartland where Anthony Hardy lived is marked with a black triangle. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other murder maps, such as Soho, King's Cross, etc, access them by clicking here.
Here's two little videos of 4 Hartland, taken from different angles, where Anthony Hardy lived in Camden and where his three vcitims were murdered. This video is a link to youtube, so it won't eat up your data.
I've also posted some photos to aid your "enjoyment" of the episode. These photos were taken by myself (copyright Murder Mile) or granted under Government License 3.0, where applicable.
SOURCES: The main source was the Independent Review into the treatment and care of Anthony Hardy by Camden Council, which also includes detail about the murder investigation, as seen in this PDF. http://nomsintranet.org.uk/roh/official-documents/IndependentReview_AnthonyHardy.pdf
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE: (Tony) “I don’t remember much, I blacked out. We had sex, some bondage, some rough stuff, but with me on top of her, being big, she must have suffocated under my weight. I’ve got nothing else to say”. On Sunday 20th January 2002, the body of 38-year-old sex-worker Sally Rose White was discovered in the locked bedroom of Anthony Hardy’s flat. Found naked with her legs splayed, this petite lady had engaged in rough sex with this nineteen stone man, which some light bruising, a bite mark and a wound to her head had proven. Deemed “a natural death” and “an accident”, a qualified pathologist confirmed that Sally had died of heart failure and thus Tony not “not responsible for her death”. With no witnesses, no murder weapon and no motive, as the Police’s prime suspect had no memory of that night owing to an alcoholic blackout, as was his legal right he would state “no comment” to every question and with a second autopsy returning the same conclusion, the murder case collapsed. Charged only with the criminal damage to his neighbour’s door, being assessed by several doctors as “highly distressed” and “a suicide risk”, as a long-term alcoholic with severe psychological needs, once again Tony was sectioned under the Mental Health Act for fear that he was “a danger to himself”. Only alcohol wasn’t his main addiction and one year later, the press would brand him The Camden Ripper. The truth about The Camden Ripper may never be known, as memories were vague, details were absent and even the evidence by medical experts couldn’t secure a conviction. And besides, it’s hard to understand who he was, as he appeared to be a different person to different people at different times. But by viewing this story from his perspective, it is clear that there were four distinct sides to the personality of Anthony Hardy; the alcoholic, the addict, the sadist and the maniac. These are the Four Faces of The Camden Ripper. Part Two – Tony the Addict. (Tony) “That night, I’d been drinking a lot as I was low. My neighbour’s leaky tap had upset me, but I have no ill-feelings towards her now. It wasn’t her. It was the drink. It makes the world a better place, people are friendly, it’s worth being alive... only I drink too much and I black-out”. But when asked by the psychiatrist about Sally’s death, Tony would only reply “I don’t recall” and “no comment”. Had he been found guilty of murder; he could have faced twenty-years in prison. Had he been declared a ‘danger to the public’, he might have been locked-up in a psychiatric unit for life. But being found innocent by a noted pathologist - and sectioned four times before – Tony knew that his hospitalisation was dependant on his recovery, meaning that he could be held for either days, months or years. On 8th April 2002, Tony was returned to the Mornington Unit at the Huntley Centre: an intensive care psychiatric facility within St Pancras Hospital, behind King’s Cross station and a few doors from his flat. Set within an old Victorian hospital, from the outside this secure unit had all the essentials to keep the in-patients within; like cameras, alarms, key-cards, locks and every exit secured by a series of thick metal doors. But inside, with soft lighting, bright walls, soft sofas and a large telly, like a budget hotel, it was a far cry from the old asylums, with its aim to reflect a more positive and happier mental state. Held under Section 37 of the Mental Health Act, a court order made following his criminal conviction for the damage to his neighbour’s front door, this meant that (unlike a prison sentence) the length of his stay and the date of his discharge wasn’t decided by a judge, but by the hospital itself. Being so close to his home, his frustration was evident as he sat on his hospital bed seeing his old life below; the off-licence on Plender Street, the College Arms pub opposite, the café on Crowndale Road where he’d meet Maureen for a brew and a chat about crime, and the train station where sex-workers were within his grasp, as well as his flat, his bed, his bath, his tellies and his stack of porn videos. He was in, but wanted out, and the only way was to be calm, co-operative and to combat his addiction. Previously deemed a suicide risk by a panel of experts, upon his release from Pentonville Prison to the Mornington Unit, Tony said he was “feeling fine and had no thoughts of self-harm or harm to others”. The staff were right to be wary of this six-foot-one nineteen-stone hulk with a history of assault, abuse, sexual deviance and drunkenness, having been arrested twice prior on that very ward. Only he seemed like a different man now, with the psychiatrist later noting “Mr Hardy remained stable throughout his admission with no evidence of mental illness. He was granted escorted leave and spent a lot of time in bed and watching television”. He was a model patient. On his discharge summary, it even recorded that “Mr Hardy’s suicidal thoughts had stopped when he knew he was moving to hospital”. Listed as “not an immediate risk to himself”, on 29th April 2002, he was transferred to the Cardigan Ward, an acute mental-illness ward at St Luke’s Hospital in Muswell Hill, with a diagnosis of bipolar disorder exacerbated by alcohol. On his first day, given that his illness and addiction were treatable, he appealed his Section Order, asking that he be discharged from hospital, but his request was denied. Fully accepting their decision, once again Tony became a model patient. His mood was lucid and calm, he had no delusions or mania, his mood swings were treated with Lithium, his daily dosage of chlorpromazine (an antipsychotic medication) was reduced, and had a good understanding of bipolar disorder. He was quiet, polite and attended his therapy sessions and alcohol recovery programme. As a long-term alcoholic who abused booze when his mood was low, he had at least thirteen relapses during his stay at St Luke’s. Granted unescorted leave owing to good behaviour, this gave him a few hours to attend his appointments with the Alcohol Advisory Service, to shop for essentials and to visit his flat at 4 Hartland, as the Police had returned the items removed pending the ill-fated murder trial. Like many alcoholics, given a bit of freedom from this strict regime; he lied about his movements, he hid alcohol in his room and sometimes he returned to the ward still drunk. When he was bad, his leave was stopped and when he was good, it was reinstated. Apart from that, he showed no signs of mania or psychosis. He had a treatable mental illness, his problem was alcohol, but he wasn’t an addict. Even Tony admitted “Over the last decade or so, I’ve been prone to binge-drinking, although I wouldn’t really call myself an addict. It’s a crutch I use for when I’m low”. And the hospital agreed. Except for a few slips, Tony was focussed on controlling his usage and he had only one incident when he was abusive to another patient, but overall, he came across as pleasant, settled and compliant. Only Tony’s little show had left many people with an uneasy feeling. A social worker stated “I had the impression that Mr Hardy would tell me what he thought I wanted to hear, that he would give me the information about his drinking that would improve his chances of being released from his section”. Doctors at the Mornington Unit had also expressed their concerns prior to his transfer saying “When talking to him about the events surrounding his arrest, there was a severe lack of empathy and a strong sense that he was not telling the truth, but more than that, he knew we knew he was not telling the truth. I don’t say necessarily he was enjoying it, or that he was manipulating us, but that is unusual”. Some staff even reported that they found him to be “a creep, with a vague sense of evil”. Also, his failure to recall a single detail of Sally’s death was itself questionable. Throughout his life he had blamed his violent outbursts on alcoholic blackouts - “I’d drunk till I could drink no more. I blacked out. All I remember is being in a police cell” – only the officers confirmed that when Tony was arrested “he smelled of drink but wasn’t drunk” and the psychiatrists were equally sceptical. The acid and paint used to deface his neighbour’s door showed pre-meditation, as did the bucket of warm soapy water, the key he had hidden and the posing of Sally’s body. A psychiatrist stated “When I think of it, every time he did something bad, he had an alcoholic blackout and could never remember doing anything”. On 20th June 2002, six months after his arrest, a meeting was held to discuss his section discharge. It was denied, as the doctors felt his mental illness still required treatment and the community services were not fully in place to help him cope with his alcohol problem. In short “the risk of relapse, leading to failure to take the medication is too great in terms of risk to himself and others, given his history”. After three months of hospitalisation, Anthony Hardy could legally be held for another three months. Only the more he relapsed, the more those treating him were convinced that alcohol was the problem, when fact he was hiding the truth. His real addiction which was never diagnosed or treated... was sex. Since the 1970’s, as with alcohol, sex was vital to keep his mood in check, but in 1992, being diagnosed with diabetes, this disorder had left him with severe erectile dysfunction. A psychiatrist later stated “his distress, anger and frustration at his diminished sexual prowess was expressed in sadistic sexual activity, his intoxication with alcohol and his rage at his sexual dysfunction induced by diabetes”. Whilst held at the Cardigan Ward at St Luke’s, he fought to keep his sexual impulses under wraps, but sometimes they came out. In an arts therapy workshop, a female facilitator touched the glass jar he had painted with the words ‘Sally Rose White – R.I.P’, she apologised for leaving fingerprints on his artwork, at which he grinned and said “it’s okay, when I’m in the bath, it will remind me of you”. During his decade as a homeless man, Tony was evicted from countless hostels. Not only owing to his drunkenness, theft and assaults, but when he was manic, he became sexually aroused and uninhibited, often stripping naked, groping residents or staff, and suggesting they make a porno together. All of which he would deny had ever took place, blaming the incidents on high-jinx and alcoholic blackouts. On 24th April 1998, at King’s Cross station, he was arrested on suspicion of rape. Accompanying an 18-year-old sex-worker back to his flat at King’s Terrace, there they got drunk, stoned and whilst she was intoxicated, he inserted his fingers inside her. Unable to disprove her consent, he pled guilty to the lesser charge of indecent assault, but his police file shows that he was a suspect in three more rapes. Having coerced his care-workers into believing that independence was the key to his mental stability, given his own flat at 4 Hartland, in the privacy of his spare-room, Tony indulged his sick sexual cravings; whether domination, bondage, strangulation, or posing semi-conscious girls on the bed and shooting obscene images with his black Chinon camera, like a little treat to himself to masturbate over later. Only Tony wasn’t just a sex-addict, he was also a sexual sadist. In December 2002, having met a masseuse through a contact ad’, at her home, he raped her, taking a sadistic satisfaction in crushing her with his nineteen-stone bulk. She later stated “I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t breathe… it was like he was pushing me down into the bed… his face was pressed to mine, his chest was up to my neck and my head was forced back. He got a kick knowing I couldn’t breathe”. Pathologists call this Homicidal Asphyxiation, as it stops the blood circulating; causing dizziness, a lack of consciousness and finally death, which could easily be mistaken for a heart-attack during rough sex. (Tony) “I don’t remember much, I blacked out. We had sex, some bondage, some rough stuff, but with me on top of her, being big, she must have suffocated under my weight. I’ve got nothing else to say”. Unaware of his supressed sexual sadism, seeking to remedy his bipolar and alcoholism, as the sodium valproate was causing him impotence, the doctors prescribed Apomorphine - a precursor to Viagra. On 14th November 2002, a meeting was held by his psychiatrist, the ward doctor, a care-worker, a social-worker and Camden housing department, as well as Tony’s lawyers, to discuss his section order. Described as being calm and cooperative, they decided to treat Tony as an out-patient, as he “seemed to be dealing with his alcohol problem”. The next day, he packed-up and was discharged from hospital. A report by three psychiatrists with the North London Forensic Service was sent ahead of the meeting, but being misplaced in the mailroom, it arrived two days too late. In it, they expressed their concerns stating; “Mr Hardy poses a risk of violent behaviour even when his illness is controlled and when not intoxicated with alcohol” and “he should not return to his previous address owing to the extremely suspicious circumstances surrounding his arrest”. A doctor at St Luke’s also gave six warnings that Anthony Hardy should not be released, stating “he was vulnerable to relapse and he is a danger to women”. The report concluded “Mr Hardy has an untreatable personality disorder, there is strong risk of reoffending and he is likely to cause serious physical or psychological harm to others”. The report was right. Whilst on day-release for good behaviour, distracted by his alcoholic relapses, the hospital was unaware that he had taken a train out of London, raped a sex-worker and he was back in the Cardigan Ward before his curfew was up. He was breathalysed, but it showed he was sober. On 15th November 2002, Tony returned to his flat at 4 Hartland. Sat within sight of the Mornington Unit where just seven months earlier he had watched as his life slipped by... now he was free. As a stipulation of his discharge, he attended his therapy sessions, alcohol programme and collected his medication, he kept himself-to-himself and had no further incidents with his upstairs neighbour. With his life back to normal, he bought booze from the off-licence on Plender Street, had a few pints at the College Arms pub, picked-up sex-workers at King’s Cross station and chatted with Maureen about how skilfully the Whitechapel murderer had evaded justice. Only to head back to his flat, his bed, his bath, his tellies, his stack of hard-core porn and his coffee table, on which he had placed a new piece of homemade art - a painted glass jar on which he had written ‘Sally Rose White – R.I.P’. Released back into the community and being supervised from a distance, several agencies oversaw his return, but no-one was wholly responsible for his day-to-day living, but Tony. With the stroke of a pen, he had gone from thick walls, locked doors, alarms, cameras, breathalysers and a round-the-clock suicide-watch (if needed), and now, he had become a bullet-point, a scribbled note and a checklist tick. As long as he turned up to therapy sessions and didn’t look drunk, he was left to his own devises. Going from a model in-patient to a model out-patient, Tony took his cocktail of seven different pills for his diabetes, his mobility, his bipolar and he was still self-medicating with large quantities of alcohol and cannabis, but he was on no-form of prescribed medication to control his rampant sexual urges. In fact, it was the exact opposite... Prescribed Apomorphine to combat his erectile dysfunction, having collected his carefully managed dose every Friday from St Luke’s, he secretly secured a second supply from University College Hospital. His libido was in overload having been bottled-up inside a prison and two psychiatric wards for almost a year, but now being free to roam at will and aided by a double-dose of pills to stiffen his stuttering prick, Tony’s sexual desires ran rampant as he trawled the back-streets of Camden looking for ladies. Easily blowing his disability allowance in brothels, for cheap thrills, he snapped covert photos of sexy girls walking alone and he was spotted licking the sofa in a local bar and cooing “I like the leather”. At home, luring back sex-workers with the promise of money and drugs, his perverted sexual needs got ever rougher, harder and riskier, as on his telly, he played sickening porn of simulated and real rapes. In mid-December, he travelled to the Midlands to see a masseuse called ‘Sara’. As before, he raped her. She later said “he was crushing me, stopping me breathing, his chest was pushing down on me, he was getting off on the fact that he was trying to kill me. And at the point of ejaculation, his eyes were like something I cannot describe. I knew that if I didn’t move that second I would be dead”. As if to relive this sick moment every time he bathed or showered, above his bathroom sink, in a childishly bright and cheerily orange daubing with blood red writing, he had immortalised her name – ‘Sara’. And, once again, he had returned to his original plan from one year ago, with his bed in the living room of his small sparse flat, he advertised in a local-newsagent - “spare room for rent, female lodger only”. On Thursday 19th December 2002, eleven months to the day after he had led Sally Rose White from King’s Cross back to his flat at Hartland, Tony would meet another sex-worker... and her name was Liz. Elizabeth Selina Valad, known as Liz, was born on 28th May 1973, to Hassan, an Iranian professor living in America and her English-born mother Jackie. Sadly, their marriage was not-to-be and after only two years, Jackie & Liz returned home to the market-town of Arnold in Nottinghamshire. With a working parent, a nice little home and her mum seeing a new partner called Peter, Liz had a good start in life. But she was as beautiful and talented as she was fiery and volatile. Whereas once she was a little girl who dreamed of living the high life in London’s glittering West End - marrying a rich man, staying in a penthouse and attending posh parties dressed in silks, gems and furs - as a teenager, her rebellious streak had led her to hang-out with a bad crowd, all of which ended in truancy, trouble and theft. Aged 16 and unqualified, Liz left school and headed to London, telling her mother that she was working as a secretary. In truth, she was a hostess in a massage parlour-cum-sauna selling sex for £30 a go. Two years later, Liz met her ‘meal ticket’; a multi-millionaire sugar-daddy in his seventies who plucked her out of this seedy hell-hole, and set her up in an exclusive Chelsea flat, with a Mercedes, a clothing allowance, a tab at designer stores, dinner at The Ritz and even a boob-job. Her dream had come true. Learning the truth and fearing the worst, Jackie pleaded with her daughter to come home, but Liz was living the life she wanted to live, and across the 1990’s, she believed she would always be happy. What happened to her sugar-daddy is unknown? Maybe he got bored, died or ended-up broke? But by the end of 2001 – with no skills, home, job or savings – as her glamourous life turned from disaster to disaster, being booted out of a steady job in a Peter Street brothel, by the bitter winter of 2002, 29-year-old Elizabeth Selina Valad was addicted to crack and feeding her addiction with sex-work. On the night of Thursday 19th December 2002, beside King’s Cross station, feeling thirsty, Liz told her boyfriend Neville that she was popping to the newsagents to buy herself a drink. She never got to the shop, she never bought a drink, she never returned to Neville and she was never seen alive again. At an unspecified hour - just as Sally had - like a sinister rerun to mark this macabre little anniversary, Liz entered the flat of her own accord at 4 Hartland, and as with both girls, neither were seen or heard. Coming in from the bitterly cold drizzle and biting wind, the warmth of the radiators must have felt soothing, and although his flat must have seemed a little odd, they had probably been to worse places. Besides, decorated with his childlike art, a Wombles poster and with a Christmas tree up, as this funny man with a bushy beard, a loud gaudy shirt and a set of amusing socks exuded a fatherly air, there was no reason for fear, as he offered Liz a drink, a smoke, some dope and some quick cash for a good fuck. As before, Tony & Liz were just two addicts fuelling their needs, so for both, it was a win-win situation. Only, with Sally being a simple girl who was naïve and easily-led, where-as she had willingly followed Tony into the spare-room for consensual sex, Liz did not. We will never know why. Maybe the money wasn’t enough? Maybe bondage wasn’t her thing? Maybe the rape porn made her nervous? Or maybe – having knocked Sally unconscious during rough-sex, rendering her perfectly submissive to his whims – this time, Tony didn’t plan to make the same mistakes with such a fierce and fiery woman as Liz? Owing to the blood spatter, it’s clear that Tony had smashed Liz hard across the head with a heavy blunt object. Slumping onto his sofa, he gripped her thin throat with his hands and strangled her until almost every ounce of life was lost. Almost... but not quite. Dragging her limp body into his spare-room, on that same double bed where Sally had died, Liz was his to do with as he pleased. Binding her wrists and ankles tight, he climbed on top of this small slim lady, as this nineteen stone hulk crushed her under his bulk, trapping her blood and slowing her heart as he brutally raped her, again and again. At some point during the assault, she died. But he didn’t care, as to him, she meant nothing. (End) (Tony) “I don’t remember much, I blacked out. We had sex, some bondage, some rough stuff, but with me on top of her, being big, she must have suffocated under my weight. I’ve got nothing else to say”. Eleven months earlier, owing to his own impulsive fury over his neighbour’s leaky tap, unwittingly the Police had disturbed his sick and twisted sex-act with Sally’s still-warm corpse, but having blacked-out he had claimed he couldn’t recall. Only now, being free - thanks to a bit of luck, a bungling pathologist and the manipulation of those there to protect him – Tony was free to finish what he had begun. Popping his black Chinon stills-camera on a sturdy tripod, Tony manoeuvred the lifeless limbs of Liz’s naked body in a series of lewd and disturbing poses. With her legs splayed wide and topped with a set of his ‘Mr Men’ socks on her feet - ironically the beaming yellow grin of ‘Mr Happy’ - inside her gaping vagina a six-inch Rampant Rabbit vibrator had been thrust. Angling her neck with a pillow, so her head was cocked coyly towards his snapping camera as if (from the grave) she was lovingly enticing her lover into bed, although she was a beautiful woman, he covered her face with his black NY baseball cap and (in some photos) a devil’s mask. To Tony, Liz was a nobody, a nothing, it didn’t matter who she was, as with her identity disguised, when he masturbated to the photos, this wantonly submissive woman who fulfilled his every fantasy could literally be anyone. Anyone... or even maybe you? Instead of being in prison, every day that Tony was free to roam, he passed the Mornington Unit, the Police Station and the Coroner’s Court where so many mistakes had been made. And yet, with only one body in his flat, unlike his infamously sadistic hero, this rapist and a murderer wasn’t a real serial-killer yet... but within days, Anthony John Hardy would earn his nickname as The Camden Ripper. OUTRO: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much for listening to Murder Mile. Part three of this four-part series into The Camden Ripper continues next week. But to know more about this case, stay tuned till after the break (which last week featured an advert for vaginal lube – lovely) for some extra details, as well as a little quiz, a big biscuit, no cake, but a nice cuppa. Before that, a big thank you to my new Patreon supporters who are Farideh Hartman and Andi Browning, I thank you very much, I hope you are enjoying all the extra crime-scene photos and videos to go with this series, as well as lots of secret goodies from more than one hundred previous episodes. Plus, a thank you to Mike Hughes for your kind donation via Supporter, cakes have been purchased and scoffed. And a well done to the winners of the very exclusive key ring competition via Patreon, who were; Gemma Archer, Selina Dean and Fiona McCulloch. Murder Mile was researched, written and performed by myself, with the main musical themes written and performed by Erik Stein and Jon Boux of Cult With No Name. Thank you for listening and sleep well. *** LEGAL DISCLAIMER The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of. *** LEGAL DISCLAIMER 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", one of The Telegraph's top five true-crime podcasts and featuring 12 murderers, including 3 serial killers, across 15 locations, totaling 50 deaths, over just a one mile walk.
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AuthorMichael J Buchanan-Dunne is a crime writer, podcaster of Murder Mile UK True Crime and creator of true-crime TV series. Archives
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