Killers_ The Most Barbaric Murderers of Our Time - Cawthorne, Nigel [97]
However, DC Savage now launched an inquiry into the whereabouts of Heather. The West children joked that she was under the patio. They said Fred had threatened them that if they did not keep their mouths shut about the goings-on in 25 Cromwell Street they would end up under the patio like Heather.
Digging up a 900-square-foot garden was a huge undertaking and was bound to attract media attention, especially since the extension to the house had been built over part of the garden. But Detective Superintendent John Bennett eventually got a warrant.
Fred West knew that it was only a matter of time before the evidence of his long murder spree would be unearthed. He told his son that he had done something really bad and would be going away for a while.
‘He looked at me so evil and so cold,’ said Stephen. ‘That look went right through me.’
After the discovery of the bones in the garden, Fred was charged with the murder of Heather, Shirley Robinson and Alison Chambers. To protect Rose, Fred took full responsibility for the murders.
The police now broadened the investigation to look into the disappearance of Rena and Charmaine. Fred was assigned an ‘appropriate adult’ named Janet Leach. She was usually assigned to befriend and assist juveniles or the mentally subnormal when they were taken into custody. Fred West was thought to fall into this second category. Leach asked Fred whether there were any more bodies. West admitted that there were and sketched a map of the cellar and bathroom, showing where six more bodies lay. He admitted to murdering the girls he had buried there, but not to raping them. The girls, he insisted, wanted to have sex with him. However, he did not even know the names of some of his victims. One he called simply ‘Scar Hand’ because of a burn on her hand. Therese Siegenthaler he referred to as ‘Tulip’ under the mistaken impression that she was Dutch, though she was, in fact, Swiss. This made it difficult for the police to identify the bodies. With large numbers of people being reported missing each year, it was a mammoth task to match a set of remains to a missing person’s report.
Of course, Fred West did know the names of some of his victims. He admitted to murdering his first wife Rena and his lover Anne McFall and burying their bodies in the fields near Much Marcle. He also admitted to the murder of Charmaine, Rena’s eldest daughter. With his help the bodies of Rena, Anne McFall and Charmaine were found. However, he refused to cooperate with the Mary Bastholm case and her body has never been located.
From the start the police were convinced that Rose West was involved in the murders, even though she feigned shock at her husband’s confessions and denied everything. She played the naive and innocent victim of a murderous and manipulative man. Along with Stephen and her eldest daughter Mae, she was moved to a police safe house in Cheltenham. The house was bugged by police but she never said anything which implicated herself. However, on 18 April 1994 she was charged with a sex offence and taken into custody. The murder charges would come later.
By this time the world’s media had turned up in Gloucester. TV crews from America and Japan filmed interviews in the street and journalists quickly dubbed 25 Cromwell Street the ‘House of Horrors’.
The fact that a serial killer had been operating in Gloucester for over 25 years came as a shock to its citizens. They had got away with it because, with the exception of Lucy Partington, the Wests had deliberately targeted people who drifted in and out of society and whose disappearance would not be noticed. Nevertheless the international attention the Wests had brought the city came as a terrible blow to Gloucester’s