The prison life of twisted serial killer the 'Man in Black': How Peter Moore, 78, befriended Dr Death Harold Shipman, is 'extremely fit' and blames his murder of four men 30 years ago on fictional gay lover 'Jason'
For the monstrous 'Man in Black', life at one of Britain's most notorious prisons is a doddle compared to what he put his victims through.
Horror film-obsessed Peter Moore, who was convicted in 1996 of the savage, sexually-motivated murders of four men, is currently an inmate at HMP Wakefield.
According to a former prison mate who receives 'regular' letters from Moore, the killer is 'extremely fit' and leaves his cell 'daily' for exercise.
A little over 20 years ago, it was during those trips out of his cell that the former cinema chain owner got to know fellow serial killer Harold Shipman - 'Dr Death' himself.
Shipman - who in his role as a GP murdered an estimated 250 people, took his own life in 2004 - a day before his 58th birthday.
Moore admitted in a letter that he was 'going to miss' Shipman, who he described as an 'educating and interesting person to talk to'.
Shipman, who Moore said had been 'normal' when he saw him the day before his death, had allegedly been writing a book about famed French leader Napoleon Bonaparte.
Police later interviewed Moore over the death of the monstrous doctor, who hanged himself in his cell just four years into his whole-life sentence.
Moore had been at HMP Wakefield for more than two decades, having previously served time at Walton Prison.
HMP Wakefield, in West Yorkshire, houses up to 750 of the most dangerous prisoners in the country.
Each inmate has their own cell and most get a TV set in the rooms. Prisoners also get access to the gym and can do distance learning courses with the Open University.
Wakefield also houses a braille shop, where prisoners work to convert books so they can be read by blind people. Moore is among the inmates who have helped out there.
As well as Shipman, HMP Wakefield has also held double child murderer Ian Huntley and notoriously violent inmate Charles Bronson.
And it was, until this year, home to 'Hannibal the Cannibal' Robert Maudsley, who was moved just weeks ago to HMP Whitemoor in Cambridgeshire after going on hunger strike over the removal of his PlayStation.
Maudsley, 71, has killed a total of four people.
He got his nickname after murdering a fellow prisoner and leaving the body with a spoon sticking out of the skull and part of their brain missing.
It gave rise to the false belief that he ate the organ, prompting the moniker.
Other killers currently held alongside Moore include Jeremy Bamber - who was jailed for the killing of his adoptive parents, sister and nephews in 1985 - and paedophile former Lost Prophets frontman Ian Watkins.
Between September and December 1995, Moore stabbed to death and then mutilated Henry Roberts, 56, Edward Carthy, 28, Keith Randles, 49 and Anthony Davies, 40.
Moore, who owned a chain of cinemas and picked up his nickname because his choice of black shirt and matching trousers, carried out all the murders in north Wales, where he lived.
Although he initially admitted to the killings to his lawyer and the police, Moore later retracted his confession.
Instead, he blamed the murders on a fictional lover called 'Jason', who he is said to have named after the terrifying antagonist in the Friday the 13th horror franchise.
Unsurprisingly, police and jurors did not buy Moore's claims. He was convicted on all counts and told he would never leave prison.
Prosecutor Alex Carlile described him as having had 'black thoughts' and having carried out the 'blackest of deeds'.
Moore admitted to his lawyer Dylan Rhys Jones that he had carried out one of his murders - the stabbing of Keith Randles - 'for fun'.
Mr Rhys Jones recounted in his book, The Man in Black: Wales' Worst Serial Killer, that Moore told him of the killing: 'I just thought it was a job well done, and left and returned to my van.'
In 2019, more than 20 years after acting for Moore, Mr Rhys Jones wrote to his former client in the hope of getting more material for his book.
To his surprise, Moore sent him a 'jovial, friendly' reply and even agreed to see him in person.
He later sent the lawyer turned author a 'resumé' containing details about his early life and background.
The four-page letter began with Moore insisting that Mr Rhys Jones include an acknowledgement in the preface of his book stating that he 'apologises to the people of north Wales for his actions, but that "I don't admit being responsible for the four murders".
The demand for an inclusion of a bizarre apology for crimes he claimed to not be responsible for left Mr Rhys Jones stunned.
He wrote: 'Clearly I couldn't make any such promises – and didn't do so – but the main question I was left asking myself was, what was Moore apologising for?
'It seemed he was apologising for his conduct and saying sorry for the murders but also absolving himself of any responsibility at the same time.
'Was this an attempt, weak and ridiculous though it seemed, to relieve himself of the feeling of guilt?'
Mr Rhys Jones went on to receive a Christmas card from his former client in December 2019.
He had been due to meet Moore at Wakefield on February 10, 2020.
But just a few days before the meeting, the serial killer told him in a typed letter that his legal advisors had told him 'not to attend visits from you and not to provide case material to you, as they don't want any further publicity prior to my case going to appeal.'
Mr Rhys Jones, who admitted he was 'disappointed' to receive the letter, added in his book: 'I have no knowledge as to whether Moore really intends to lodge an appeal against either his conviction or his sentence.'
In 2024 book Inside Wakefield Prison: Life Behind Bars in the Monster Mansion, authors Jonathan Levi and Emma French shed more light on Moore's life behind bars.
A former fellow prisoner told them: 'Peter Moore I knew very well. He actually writes to me now on a regular basis. He has some minor health issues but is in good shape for his age.
'A very tall man with a full head of grey hair with a huge 1980s grey tash. Although he is from Wales, he speaks very well [posh] in a London accent. He is very articulate, clever man.'
'As sick as it sounds, but you want the truth, he actually jokes about his crimes. He claims they were committed by his alter ego Jason.
'His favourite sick joke about his crimes are he once dressed in a policeman's uniform, stopped a car and tied up a couple, male and his female partner.
'He said the man pleaded with him not to sexually assault the woman, he then said, "Sir, how dare you, I'm not here for her, it's you I want."
'Peter actually thinks this was funny. I have spent hours with him revealing all the details of his crimes.
'His voice is so polite and professional, very well spoken, and it is so odd to listen to a well-spoken man talk so much horror.
'Not the sort of thing you would expect from someone so well spoken.
'He is extremely fit. He goes out on exercise daily. He has no visits and when not working he cooks and keeps himself to himself.'
'He must have some personality issues because when he tells his stories he will give the impression it was him that committed the crimes all the way through the conversation, then he will blame Jason.'
In 2013, Moore unsuccessfully appealed his whole-life tariff at the European Court of Human Rights.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mail
42 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Art dealer's withering verdict on Petra Ecclestone's ex James Stunt
Cleared of all charges relating to a £266 million money-laundering scam – unlike his four fellow co-defendants, three of whom are on the run – James Stunt, who was declared bankrupt in 2019, argues that the value of his artworks, currently held by museums and galleries, is greater in value than his debts. But I can disclose that perhaps the most impeccably informed of Stunt's old acquaintances disagrees. New York art dealer Ezra Chowaiki, released from a US prison in 2020 after a 13-month stretch for fraud, first met the self-styled gold bullion dealer one weekend in 2015, when Stunt was still married to Formula 1 heiress Petra Ecclestone. What followed was so extraordinary that it helped spur Chowaiki into writing an eye-popping expose of the art world, the basis for a documentary now in development. 'Even within the absurd circus that is the high-end art world, Stunt stood out as a master clown,' Chowaiki tells me from New York, recalling their first encounter during which Stunt asserted that his Rolls was 'the only truly bulletproof car in England' and 'worth £1 million'. At his Mayfair office – which resembled 'something between Miami Vice and Succession' – Stunt reached into a safe, threw an object into Chowaiki's lap and asked: 'Do you know how much that's worth?' It was a gold ingot. Chowaiki then offered Stunt a painting. It was, aptly, a clown by Salvador Dali, priced £1.16million. Stunt responded by getting out his phone, showing Chowaiki two paintings by French artist Georges Braque and saying that he'd trade them for the Dali and $1million. Saying that he'd think about it, Chowaiki left London. In the following week, he alleges, he was 'hounded' by Stunt, who now offered the Braques for the Dali plus $500,000, and sent a series of 'increasingly deranged and voluminous texts'. Chowaiki insisted that Stunt send him photos of the Braques in their frames. 'The images he had sent could have been scanned from books,' reflects Chowaiki, who says that he had severe doubts about the authenticity of one of the paintings in particular. He had one last exchange with Stunt, who lent several paintings to Dumfries House – saved for the nation by King Charles – only for it to emerge that a number of them were fakes. Called by Stunt, who was seeking guidance about how to have the Picassos in his collection authenticated, Chowaiki explained that they should be submitted to Picasso's son, Claude. He recalls that Stunt asked in a 'hushed' tone: 'Do you think Claude could The comment (presumably a joke) made Chowaiki laugh, he recalls, before he explained to Stunt that Claude 'would never compromise himself'. A source close to Stunt says that the visit to his office couldn't have happened as he did not have access to his office at weekend. Doubtless Stunt is speaking in good faith, besides which, as his former butler, John Gilmour, told the Mail On Sunday last month, he frequently enjoyed Sunday lunch with his godfather, convicted crime baron Terry Adams. But one wonders if he has failed, in this instance, to take into account his past cocaine addiction and the consequent damage that it might have done to his memory. Chowaiki's texts for the weekend in question unequivocally show that Stunt asked to meet him on September 27, 2015. The source additionally insists he did not toss a gold ingot as Chowaiki suggests and denies that Stunt ever asked whether Claude Picasso could be influenced. Chowaiki, aware that he blotted his own copybook, counters: 'As unreliable a narrator as I may be, I'm still better than most in this field. Plus, I keep my texts.' Double take as 'Kate' parties at Annabel's The Princess of Wales's absence from Royal Ascot was much remarked-upon, and some at Annabel's summer solstice party were convinced they had spotted her at the private members club in Mayfair. However, on closer inspection, they realised it was Meg Bellamy, who played the younger version of Catherine in drama The Crown. The actress, 22, wore a white mini dress, and one guest tells me: 'I had to do a double take.' Hancock's new ink Matt Hancock's reinvention continues. The former Tory MP, 46, resigned as health secretary after CCTV showed him kissing and embracing Gina Coladangelo, his aide, at Whitehall in breach of Covid distancing restrictions in 2021. The pair were both married to other people. This week, his daughter Hope, 18, announced online: 'My dad got a tattoo today. Mid-life crisis.' Hancock declines to say which design is now inked on his body – or on which part of his anatomy – telling me: 'I'm not commenting.' Not like him… Brian's boozy podcast appearance Recalling actor Brian Cox's recent appearance on her podcast, chef Angela Hartnett mischievously claims the Succession star, 79, got tipsy on margaritas before going on the West End stage that night. With Cox playing JS Bach in The Score at the time, Hartnett quips: 'We just got Brian Cox drunk, it was fine. He went on to do a show later, it was amazing.' Podcast co-host Nick Grimshaw says: 'He got right on it.' Surely not! Dominic West and Alexandra Tolstoy share trek's appeal Dominic West once trekked to the South Pole with Prince Harry, who later shunned him. But The Affair star's latest adventure found him saddling up with a far more appealing companion. Alexandra Tolstoy, 51, rode horseback across Kyrgyzstan with West, 55, for a new documentary. 'It's a bit embarrassing I haven't watched The Wire,' she says of one of the actor's most celebrated TV dramas. 'But it's been so much fun.' Author and broadcaster Tolstoy is a tourism ambassador for the former Soviet state. Royal fiction is foul play The Royal Family may feel they have enough to contend with from America, especially its West Coast. But things can deteriorate further, judging by a play now being performed off Broadway. It would be a challenge to summarise Prince Faggot – the play's title – as merely 'imaginative', given that it features a fetish mask and recreational drugs and other activities which would look more in place in Fifty Shades Of Grey. A programme note asserts that all the text is fictional and adds that 'any resemblance to real events is purely coincidental'. Yet playwright Jordan Tannahill opts for a central character called Prince George, son of the Prince and Princess of Wales, William and Kate. Shame on Tannahill. The smart set's talking about Henry's Royal Ascot role Carriage three in the Royal Procession caught the eye at Royal Ascot, thanks to the elegant figure of Harriet Sperling, the paediatric nurse accompanying the King's nephew, Peter Phillips, just over a year after the couple – both divorced – were first seen together in public. Their marital histories would once have made their attendance unthinkable, but this more forgiving era had another beneficiary – in carriage four. Not Lady Joanna Morton Jack, the Earl and Countess of Halifax's only daughter, but Joanna's husband, judge's son Henry Morton Jack. A barrister of brilliance, he's described as 'hugely talented' by Chambers legal directory. But he's not always been quite so upright... most memorably at a Madonna film premiere party in his youth when he and his chum, Prince and Princess Michael of Kent's son, Lord Freddie Windsor, took a little too much refreshment. Tuesday was certainly a day to build up a thirst but, happily, Henry, 46, remained splendidly vertical. How divorced Luke finally beat drugs Rupert Murdoch's former grandson-in-law, British rapper Luke 'Lukey' Storey, has spoken publicly for the first time about the addiction that destroyed his marriage to the media magnate's granddaughter – just 12 hours after they said 'I do'. Charlotte Freud, 24, daughter of media executive Elisabeth Murdoch and PR supremo Matthew Freud, married Luke in 2022 in a star-studded Cotswolds wedding with guests including Woody Harrelson and Claudia Winkleman. But behind the spectacle, the couple were already teetering on the brink. 'We had been married for 12 hours when our whole world fell apart,' Charlotte later admitted. Luke relapsed on the way to their honeymoon. What followed was a turbulent, 14-month marriage marked by mutual attempts at recovery – and frequent collapse. for Sarah's memoir, How Not To Be A Political Wife, at Hatchards in Piccadilly, London. 'It wasn't easy writing this book – and for some it will be an equally difficult read,' she admits. Luke, 39, now says: 'I ruined a lot of relationships while I was using – people I loved dearly, close friends, family. You can't heal relationships while you're still actively hurting yourself.' Sarah's bond with Kemi She may have fallen out with David 'man-baby' Cameron, but my colleague Sarah Vine enjoys warmer relations with the current Tory leader. Kemi Badenoch joined guests including Kirstie Allsopp and Piers Morgan at the launch party for Sarah's memoir, How Not To Be A Political Wife, at Hatchards in Piccadilly, London. 'It wasn't easy writing this book – and for some it will be an equally difficult read,' she admits. (Very) modern manners The love lives of Fern Britton's daughters are providing inspiration for her novels. 'Grace has a lovely partner, but Winnie is single, and whilst she's a very attractive girl, it all seems so difficult now,' says Fern, 67, who separated from their father, TV chef Phil Vickery, in 2020. 'In the 1970s, a man would come and say, 'Oh, do you want to go out?' and you'd reply, 'Yes, thank you'. Now, it seems they're all giving each other therapy about someone they've been seeing for ten days.' She tells Saga magazine: 'I was intrigued about how these relationships work and wanted to explore that a bit.'
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Palestine Action to be banned after vandalism of planes at RAF base
The Home Secretary is preparing to ban Palestine Action following the group's vandalism of two planes at an RAF base. Yvette Cooper has decided to proscribe the group, making it a criminal offence to belong to or support Palestine Action. The decision comes after the group posted footage online showing two people inside the base at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire. The clip shows one person riding an electric scooter up to an Airbus Voyager air-to-air refuelling tanker and appearing to spray paint into its jet engine. The incident is being also investigated by counter terror police. A spokesperson for Palestine Action accused the UK of failing to meet its obligation to prevent or punish genocide. The spokesperson said: 'When our government fails to uphold their moral and legal obligations, it is the responsibility of ordinary citizens to take direct action. The terrorists are the ones committing a genocide, not those who break the tools used to commit it.' The Home Secretary has the power to proscribe an organisation under the Terrorism Act of 2000 if she believes it is 'concerned in terrorism'. Proscription will require Ms Cooper to lay an order in Parliament, which must then be debated and approved by both MPs and peers. Some 81 organisations have been proscribed under the 2000 Act, including Islamist terrorist groups such as Hamas and al Qaida, far-right groups such as National Action, and Russian private military company Wagner Group. Another 14 organisations connected with Northern Ireland are also banned under previous legislation, including the IRA and UDA. Belonging to or expressing support for a proscribed organisation, along with a number of other actions, are criminal offences carrying a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison. Friday's incident at Brize Norton, described by the Prime Minister as 'disgraceful', prompted calls for Palestine Action to be banned. The group has staged a series of demonstrations in recent months, including spraying the London offices of Allianz Insurance with red paint over its alleged links to Israeli defence company Elbit, and vandalising Donald Trump's Turnberry golf course in South Ayrshire. The Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) welcomed the news that Ms Cooper intended to proscribe the group, saying: 'Nobody should be surprised that those who vandalised Jewish premises with impunity have now been emboldened to sabotage RAF jets.' CAA chief executive Gideon Falter urged the Home Secretary to proscribe the Houthi rebel group and Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, adding: 'This country needs to clamp down on the domestic and foreign terrorists running amok on our soil.' Former home secretary Suella Braverman said it was 'absolutely the correct decision'. But Tom Southerden, of Amnesty International UK, said the human rights organisation was 'deeply concerned at the use of counter terrorism powers to target protest groups'. Mr Southerden said: 'Terrorism powers should never have been used to aggravate criminal charges against Palestine Action activists and they certainly shouldn't be used to ban them. 'Instead of suppressing protest against the UK's military support for Israel, the UK should be taking urgent action to prevent Israel's genocide and end any risk of UK complicity in it.'
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
This ticking timebomb of an assisted dying Bill will lead us to a moral abyss, writes professor DAVID S. ODERBERG
The passing of the euphemistically named Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill is a terrible milestone in the decline of medicine and medical ethics in the UK. MPs voted for it by a very narrow margin after some withdrew their support following the second reading, and the Bill will now head to the Lords, where it is unlikely to be significantly amended. Much of the impassioned debate revolved around crucial questions regarding safeguards against abuse, worries about possible coercion, and the need to focus more on palliative care, among many other legitimate and serious concerns. What seems largely to have escaped scrutiny is this simple fact: our MPs have approved a piece of legislation that is a euthanasia Bill in all but name. Let me explain why. The Bill makes it clear in multiple places that the person's death must be 'self-administered'. Clause 23 is explicit that the 'coordinating doctor' is not authorised by the Bill to administer the lethal substance. All they are allowed to do is 'prepare' the substance for self-administration, 'prepare a medical device' to enable the patient to self-administer, or 'assist' the patient to do so. The death-dealing act itself must be performed by the patient. Hence there is, technically, no euthanasia – no killing by the doctor of the patient. There is, however, the smallest of hints that all is not quite as it seems. According to clause 11, the 'assessing doctor' must 'discuss with the person their wishes in the event of complications arising in connection with the self-administration of an approved substance'. What could that mean? Well, the patient may, quite simply, find it difficult to self-administer. They might bungle it, as should be expected in such a fraught and stressful situation. Suppose they fail to self-administer despite making all the right requests at the right time. Or, even worse, suppose they partly self-administer but do not finish the job, and they are writhing in agony, not dead but in a terrible state. What then? I am no prophet, and I will not put a precise timeline on the following – save to say that it will all become clear in a handful of years. This Bill will be modified to allow active killing. Imagine a patient with motor neurone disease, or advanced multiple sclerosis, or late-stage Huntington's disease. Suppose, as is likely, they cannot self-administer, yet their request for 'assisted dying' is lucid, fixed, and follows the procedures in the Bill. By the letter of the law, their request must be denied. Yet surely this, from the viewpoint of the legislation's supporters, would be a perverse outcome. Here is a person in an awful state, who fits the Bill's definition of someone who is terminally ill (death reasonably expected within six months). Their circumstances are no different from anyone else entitled to request assisted dying except for the fact that they are physically unable to kill themselves. Should they be denied the right to a so-called 'peaceful death'? If so, the supposed injustice would be obvious: they would be, effectively, punished for their own misfortune. Through no fault of their own, they do not meet the Bill's criteria. Yet their medical condition could be, in terms of disability and subjective suffering, much worse than that of someone who does fit the bill and is allowed an assisted death. Could such an 'unjust' outcome be what Parliament intended? Clearly not. So what will happen is that euthanasia advocates will, as sure as night follows day, bring a test case involving someone with a dreadful affliction such as one of the ones I just mentioned. They will say to the court: 'Your Honour, it is simply unjust and perverse that my client can have no access to assisted dying, simply through no fault of their own, and even though their suffering is among the worst imaginable.' A judge will then do one of two things. They might appeal to clause 11 and 'read into' the legislation an implied legislative intent to allow active killing – euthanasia – in such a 'rare' case, and in similar ones. But I think this would be a stretch too far, judicially speaking. It is more likely that they will disallow euthanasia in the case before them but refer the matter back to Parliament for reconsideration, so as to remedy the unfair and unreasonable outcome of a badly drafted Bill. Badly drafted with intent? That is not for the judge to decide. So it will go back to Parliament, the boosters of euthanasia will storm the gates (metaphorically), and a sympathetic MP will table an amendment to remedy the injustice. And, hey presto, you will have euthanasia. The active killing of patients will be the law of the land. Our legislators, who once presided over a system that was the envy of the world for its palliative care, its hospices, its help for the most vulnerable to live out their days with dignity, should hang their heads in shame. The fact that yesterday's decision followed Tuesday's appalling vote to decriminalise abortion up to birth means we have descended yet further into the moral abyss.
