True Crime With Caledonian Kitty

(Thomas Watt Hamilton. Picture credit: criminalminds) 

This just happens to be the 40th true crime case I have covered this year and I was thinking about what I wanted to cover for this post. I have felt strongly about all of the cases I have previously covered but there are two that I have wanted to write about for a while and that's the Dunblane Massacre and the Lockerbie Bombing. 

Both cases happened in Scotland and I grew up hearing about them and what a devastating impact both events had not only in the places where they happened but the whole of Scotland and beyond. In this post I will be focusing on Dunblane and covering Lockerbie after New Year as it is such a big case in terms of all of the legal stuff and it will probably cover about three or four posts.

Before I begin, just a reminder that you can find all of my personal blog posts as well as regular updates on my Kofi page. You can also buy me a coffee on there to help me celebrate my 40th post or just to help me maintain my blog if you like.

The details included are upsetting so please bare that in mind incase you want to skip this post.

Let's begin...


On the 13th of March 1996 in a beautiful and scenic small town in Scotland, called 'Dunblane', something so horrifying occurred, so horrifying that Scotland as well as many parts of the world have never fully recovered from it. It was something that we never thought we would see in this country and it remains the deadliest mass shooting in British history. We never could have imagined it and never saw it coming. It was a horrendous nightmare and it would bring about certain laws being changed.

I want to try and start at the beginning and tell you a bit about who Thomas Watt Hamilton was, this is a name that is uttered with anger and disgust and I have had a hard time writing his name and looking at his pictures.

This is the monster (I don't want to call him a man) who walked into a primary school on the morning of the 13th of March 1996 with four guns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition and shot at innocent children as well as the teachers and staff before turning the gun on himself. He shot dead 16 children (all under the age of 7) and their teacher. Another child later died on the way to the hospital. Thomas Watt Hamilton had murdered 17 children and their teacher, injuring many others before he took his own life.

When the breaking news reports flashed across the TV screens (in the days before social media) people were in shock and absolute horror at the sight of anxious parents running towards the school and police and ambulances everywhere. In England TV programmes were interrupted with a special news bulletin from a Scottish news network, the whole of the UK was in disbelief.

This was a sight that was unfamiliar to us in the UK but is sadly common for places like the USA as I have previously written about many times before. The argument in America about gun laws has continued through the years even after so many devastating incidences, there has been no change. When Dunblane happened, there was no argument to be had. The UK might be slow with certain things and I regularly question the ''justice'' system in this country but as soon as Dunblane happened,  the law was changed.

Someone was talking about gun laws and used Dunblane as an example, we haven't had a school shooting in this country since it happened and the new law banning guns was brought in.

We know he was a heartless monster but I always try to delve into the backgrounds of the killers that I write about to give an idea of where these people came from and what may or may not have put them onto the path that they ended up on.

Thomas Watt Hamilton was born on the 10th of May 1952 in Glasgow. Eighteen months after he was born, his father left him and his mother and started a new life with another woman. Struggling to cope on her own, his mother took him to live with her adoptive parents and in a bizarre turn of events they decided to bring up Thomas as their own son and decided that his biological mother would be his older sister.

(Thomas Watt Hamilton. Picture credit: dailymail.co.uk)

When he got older, Thomas went to live with his grandfather and was said to have abused the elderly man and urinated in his cups of tea (He moved out of his grandfather's house in 1992 after a fall out and the pair never spoke again.)

In the early 1970s, Thomas had been a scout leader and was in charge of a large number of young boys. The boys nicknamed him ''Mr Creepy'' behind his back and after a while complaints started to come in that Thomas was behaving inappropriately with the boys, taking pictures of them without consent and touching them. Word soon got around and he was dismissed from his role. He tried again to be a scout leader elsewhere but he was blacklisted and couldn't take it any further. This left Thomas with a huge chip on his shoulder.

In my research there is no mention of him having been married or previous relationships. I know that he had no children and was consider a ''loner'' and a ''creepy loner'' at that. No matter his attempts at creating a ''boys club'', he wasn't allowed to carry it through as people campaigned. He was angry and felt rejected at this and accused people of trying to spread false rumours about him , he tried to open his own shop but that came to nothing which he also blamed on the rumours about his behaviour with young boys.

In 1994, Thomas was cautioned by the police for behaving indecently with a young man in Edinburgh, he was also banned from a gun club just a few months before the massacre. To those that knew him they claimed that he never got over being dismissed from his position as a scout leader back in the 70s and he had an axe to grind. A man who knew him for 10 years said that every week that he saw him in those 10 years, he was constantly complaining about how he was done wrong with these (what he claimed to be) false allegations.

Neighbours who lived in the same street as him in Dunblane said that he was a very quiet man they would see him walking about with his anorak on and his head down. People mentioned seeing pictures of boys in swimming trunks on the walls of his house.

Before carrying out the massacre at Dunblane school, Thomas posted rant letters to the BBC and some Scottish newspapers. 14 A4 paged letters were also addressed to the Queen and the parents of the Dunblane children, Thomas had planned the whole thing out, these letters were his manifesto. He owned six guns and picked out four of them before setting off for Dunblane primary school.

On the morning of the 13th of March 1996, Thomas's neighbours reported seeing him trying to clear some ice from his van. This was around 8:15 am.

Thomas then drove his van to Dunblane primary school which was located about five miles from where he lived. He parked his van at the back of the school near a telegraph pole and cut some of the wires leading into the school. He then entered the school through a door near the gym and toilets.

At around 9:33 am, Thomas entered the gym hall which contained 28 pupils from primary one together with their teacher, Gwen Taylor who was with Eileen Harrild (a P.E teacher) and Mary Blake who was a supervisory assistant. Eileen said that she heard a glass door swing open and saw Thomas walk in, she threw her hands up to defend herself as she saw that he had guns. He was wearing firearm goggles with ear defenders on and combat fatigues.

Eileen was shot and endured injuries to her arms, Mary had been shot in the head and both legs but she and Eileen together with four children managed to crawl to a cupboard nearby and tried to hide. Gwen had died instantly having been shot 6 times at close range by Thomas.

At the start of the shooting, Thomas shot dead a young boy and injured several others. He started firing shots at random towards the children. Thomas left the gym for a few moments and left via the exit where he tried to fire some shots towards the library cloakroom where a teacher was injured by a bullet. He then tried to fire some shots at a mobile classroom, the teacher and the students were inside on the floor and trying to keep their heads down and away from the flying shards of glass.

(Anxious parents rushing to Dunblane primary school on the morning of the 13th March 1996. Picture credit: scotsman.com) 

Thomas then returned to the Gym and put one of the guns in his mouth and pulled the trigger. The whole ordeal lasted for about 4 minutes and when he took his own life, Eileen said there was an eerie stillness, the adults and the children began to react to their injuries and shortly afterwards the emergency services arrived. One of the children sadly died on the way to the hospital. The injured eventually made a full recovery although the mental scars of that day still remain.

The next day, a package arrived at Scottish Television HQ as well as Newspapers and other TV and radio stations. The package contained all of the letters of his grievances. Thomas had posted these letters on his way to Dunblane the morning before.


A memorial and prayer session took place at Dunblane Cathedral on the 15th of March 1996 and the next day which was Mother's Day in the UK, members of the Royal family visited some of the survivors who were still in the hospital.

On the 19th of March 1996, Thomas Watt Hamilton's body was cremated outside of Dunblane in an unknown location and the following day the first of the funerals for the children and their teacher took place.

On the 22nd of March 1996, Dunblane primary school re-opens. Over the next few months various memorials and tributes are held. Over 705,000 people signed a petition for a change of gun laws and the gym hall of the school where the murders took place was demolished.

In December of that year a charity single which was a cover of Bob Dylan's 'Knocking On Heaven's Door' which was sung by some of the children of Dunblane primary school (Here's a clip of the song here).

In February 1997 the conservative government led by Prime Minister John Major, introduced the Firearms (Amendment) Act 1997 following the enquiry held in the aftermath of the tragedy.

On the 14th of March 1998 a memorial garden for the children and their teacher was opened. It is a flame sculpture with the inscription ''A Flame For Dunblane''. Various other memorials were unveiled in the coming years.


(Gwen Mayor's class. Picture credit: metro.co.uk) 


RIP to the following angels:

Victoria Elizabeth Clydesdale (age 5)
Emma Elizabeth Crozier (age 5)
Melissa Helen Currie (age 5)
Charlotte Louise Dunn (age 5)
Keven Alan Hasell (age 5)
Ross William Irvine (age 5)
David Charles Kerr (age 5)
Mhairi Isabel Macbeath (age 5)
Brett Mckinnon (age 6)
Abigail Joanne McLennan (age 5)
Emily Morton (age 5)
Sophie Jane Lockwood North (age 5)
John Petrie (age 5)
Joanna Caroline Ross (age 5)
Hannah Louise Scott (age 5)
Megan Turner (age 5)
Gwen Mayor (age 45, teacher)

This was quite an emotional case to cover as you can imagine but I'm honoured to have written about it for my 40th case. My heart goes out to the victims and their families, so many bright and beautiful children who's lives were cruelly taken away in a cold and evil way and their teacher too. It's heartbreaking and I feel nothing but hate for Thomas Watt Hamilton and that will never change. There's a lot more to this case with Thomas's possible connection to paedophile rings as well as private documents to do with the case which the public will not be able to see until decades from now. It's all a bit shady but I wanted to focus on what happened in this post briefly.

If you would like to look into the case further, there are quite a few articles online as well as various news clips on youtube. I will leave some links below.

If you are a regular reader and supporter of my blog I would like to thank you for all of your support, I can't believe we are at 40 true crime posts! All those late nights of research and hours of writing and typing have made it all worth it.

I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and please say a prayer for the children, their teacher and their families who have another Christmas without their loved ones. We will never forget them.

''Let The Little Children Come To Me And Do Not Hinder Them. For To Such Belongs The Kingdom Of Heaven.'' Matthew 19:14


See you in the next post (in 2020) x x x x


Further reading & sources:

Dunblane Article | Independent Newspaper
Dunblane Article | This Week UK
Dunblane Massacre | Wikipedia
Dunblane Massacre | Britannica
Thomas Hamilton Article | Independent
Thomas Hamilton | Murderpedia
Andy Murray's Article on Thomas Hamilton

(David Parker Ray. Picture credit: David Parker Ray - Wikipedia)

This is one of those cases which has been requested for quite a while. I had shared a post about it a few months ago on my Instagram page just briefly going over the case. I wasn't sure about covering the case as it is really graphic and sick but as it's approaching Christmas and I promised my readers some extra content, I thought I would give you what a lot of you requested.

Please keep in mind that the details included here are disturbing and as always I have tried to be as sensitive as possible with the details. You must be 18+ to view this post.

Before I begin, if you enjoy my weekly true crime cases or would like to subscribe and receive my weekly personal blog posts as well as regular updates, check out my Kofi page you can also buy me a Christmas coffee on there if you like.

Let's begin...

The name David Parker Ray may ring a bell with you or perhaps 'The Toybox Killer'?. This was one of the most disturbing cases that I've covered and it really is the stuff of nightmares. Well, David Parker Ray was born on the 6th of November 1939 in Belen, New Mexico. He didn't have the greatest start in life and was brought up by his grandfather. Little is known of his relationship with his mother but he did see his father regularly which was a source of trauma and anxiety for David. His father regularly abused him. David was a quiet and timid child who was too shy to speak to girls and often endured bullying at school. As he grew into a teenager he began trying to escape from his troubles by indulging in drugs and alcohol. The addiction to drugs and alcohol continued up into adulthood but he also had another addiction...he had some extremely violent tastes for sex. It wasn't your usual kinky fetishes or a bit of rough sex. David became aroused at the thoughts of torturing and electrocuting women as well as bestiality. He was one messed up individual but what was even more sickening and frightening is that these fantasies would someday in his future be carried out. He made his sick fantasies become a reality.

David had been married and divorced a total of four times and lived in a place called 'Truth or Consequences' in New Mexico, USA. He had a daughter who he was extremely close too, so close that she would help him carry out his sickening crimes later on.

Like a lot of these psychopaths and sick individuals, they are often the pillar of their communities and David Parker Ray was no different. He was a swell guy, according to those that knew him. He would give you the shirt off his back if you needed it but what these people did not know, is that behind the ''nice, hardoworking'' David (who everybody felt they could trust) there was a sick, perverted and dangerous individual.

David Parker Ray seemed like just another guy who went to work everyday, paid his bills, had a drink at the bar and chatted with the locals, the only difference was, is that David would go home at night to his ''Toy Box'' where a woman (who he had kidnapped off of the street by posing as an undercover policeman) would be tied up in a trailer of hell which cost him $100,000 to make. His homemade ''Toy Box'' contained a gynaecologist table (which the women would be tied to with their legs up in stirrups), Leg spreader bars, straps, pulleys, handcuffs, rope, knives, syringes, drugs, saws, chains, ball gags, surgical blades as well as many other torture style items. He had electrical devices which would shock the women as well as a mirror on the ceiling as he wanted the women to see what he was doing to them, there was no escape from the pain and the horror, they could see and feel it. He would also videotape and record these gruesome sessions.

(Inside David Parker Ray's ''Toy Box''. Picture credit: thecrimemag.com)

This trailer aka ''The Toy Box'' was packed to the brim with stuff and he kept diagrams which he had drawn himself as a guide of what he wanted to do to each woman.

After being the swell guy at work and the bar, he would come home and go into the Toy Box and rape a woman, torture her and his partner Cindy Hendy would help him carry out these sickening acts, she allegedly forced some of the victims to give her oral sex as David watched.

The couple would often have sex parties at their house and a small number of David's close friends would be invited into the Toy Box to rape the victim. David would sometimes bring the victim out to his living room in his house and have his dogs have sex with her as his friends watched.

Even more horrendous that people were joining in on this was that his own daughter was involved too. His partner Cindy and his daughter Glenda would bring girls back from the bar for David to rape, humiliate and torture.

(The outside of the ''Toy Box''. Picture credit: thecrimemag.com)

David Parker Ray is not classed officially as a serial killer because no bodies have ever been found but previous acquaintances have said that some of the women were killed and their bodies thrown down land mines. Other women were drugged, washed and driven out to the middle of nowhere and thrown out of the car alive.

David and his acquaintances would pick up hitchhikers and prostitutes on the pretence that he was either a cop or had drugs. The victim would then be blindfolded and taken to the trailer where they were drugged. When the woman finally awoke, there would be a tape recorder placed next to them in which David Parker Ray described what he was going to do to them in graphic, chilling detail. Some of the transcript of the tape included as follows:

''Hello there b*tch! Are you comfortable right now? I doubt it, wrists and ankles chained, gagged, probably blind folded. You're disorientated and scared too I would imagine, perfectly normal under the circumstances. For a little while at least, you'll need to get your s*it together and listen to this tape. It is very relevant to your situation. I'm going to tell you in detail why you have been kidnapped, what's going to happen to you and how long you will be here. I don't know the details of your capture but this tape is being created July 23rd 1993 as a future advisory tape for future female captives was based on dealing with captives over a period of several years. If at a future date there are any major changes in our procedures, this tape will be upgraded. Now, you're obviously here against your will, totally helpless, don't know where you're at, don't know what's gonna happen to you. You're very scared or very pissed off. I'm sure you've already tried to get your wrists and ankles loose and no you can't. Now you're just waiting to see what's going to happen next. You probably think you're going to be raped and you're f*cking sure right about that. Our primary interest is what you have got in between your legs. You will be raped throroughly and repeatedly in every hole you've got because basically you've been snatched and brought here for us to train and use as a sex slave.'' (The original recording is not online but the transcript is. This video online has someone reading out the transcript in a light hearted way, not sure why but it's there should you wish to listen to it).

Some of the women who were captured would be held for days before either being allegedly murdered or drugged and abandoned.

Investigators believe that David Parker Ray started carrying out his sick crimes in the 1960s. The number of victims is said to be 60+, maybe more.

His final victim, Cynthia Vigil was abducted by David and Cindy as he did the usual routine of posing as an undercover cop who was arresting her for soliciting. Like many of the other victims, Cynthia had to endure having to sit through the horrifying details of the tape before being subjected to the most disgusting and horrendous ordeal which went on for 3 days.

On the 22nd of March 1999, David went to work as normal and left Cindy in charge of Cynthia. Cynthia was naked and chained up on a mattress in their living room. At some point, exhausted Cynthia, spotted a set of keys on a table whilst Cindy was in another room talking on the phone. Cynthia decided to take a shot at getting the keys and tried to escape. Cindy saw what she was doing and tried to grab hold of her and the pair struggled. Cindy broke a lamp over Cynthia's head but Cynthia would not give up and she was determined to stay alive and get out of there and she managed to unlock her chains and grabbed an icepick that she found on the floor and stabbed Cindy in the neck with it.

Cynthia ran as fast as she could, naked with only a slave collar around her neck and padlocked chains, she was exhausted, hungry and terrified but determined not to stop running. She finally found some help and the police arrived pretty swiftly. Not long afterwards David Parker Ray and Cindy Hendy were arrested.

At the trial the evidence against David was overwhelming and Cynthia together with another victim, Kelli Garret and the mother of a woman who had since passed away, testified against him. Kelli didn't want David to get the death penalty because she believed that, that would be the easy way out and she wanted him to suffer in prison for the rest of his life.

He never showed any remorse and was sentenced to 224 years in prison. It would seem that some justice had been done for these women but in a cruel twist of fate, David died of a heart attack at the age of 62 on the 28th of May 2002, having served just 8 months of his sentence. The women felt that they had been robbed of proper justice.

Cindy Hendy received 36 years for her role in the crimes and testified against David. In July of 2019 she was released.

Another of David's accomplices was Dennis Yancy. He received two 15 year terms.

David's daughter Glenda (also known as Jessie) was sentenced to two and a half years in prison with an additional 15 years to be served on probation.

If you've managed to make it this far you'll understand now why this wasn't a case that I was in a rush to cover. It's unbelievable that some of David's other accomplices have not been brought to justice or identified. It's unbelievable that people actually took part in the torture, rape and humiliation of these women and to think that David died so early into his sentence, I know he had already been in prison for two years but that is still not enough.

There's women out there who may have fallen victim to David and his accomplices but they have no recollection of what happened due to being drugged, there's some that I know have flashbacks to being tied up in that trailer, I cannot imagine what that must be like for them.

Do I think he's a serial killer? I would have to say yes. He was alleged to have killed women and dumped the bodies down abandoned mines and we know he'd been doing this for a very long time. One of his ex wives claimed that he told her that when he was a teenager, he abducted a woman, tied her to a tree, tortured and killed her.

My heart goes out to the victims.

Further reading & sources:

David Parker Ray - FBI Files

12 Facts About David Parker Ray - Ranker

David Parker Ray - Wikipedia

David Parker Ray - Documentary  

David Parker Ray - The Sex Chamber 

I hope you will join me in the next post, take care x 

(Left: John Evander Couey. Right: Jessica Marie Lunsford. Picture credit: thecriminaljournal.com)

This case breaks my heart and makes me sick, it's a wonder why I have decided to cover it on my blog but I feel that I owe it to beautiful little Jessica to share her story which sadly a lot of people don't know about. This case haunts me ever since I first stumbled across it years ago. I read about the horrific details about what happened to this child and the crime scene afterwards, it has left me with the most heartbreaking and horrendous visions of what this poor angel went through. I have been able to try and put it to the back of my mind but recently I saw a picture of a toy dolphin and it made me think of Jessica and I felt it was my duty to share her story, for her to be remembered.

The details in this case are horrendous and involve child sexual abuse and child murder. I have tried to be sensitive where I can with the details. Please bare this in mind and feel free to skip this post if you feel it is too difficult to read on.

Before I begin, If you would like to keep up to date with my latest true crime posts, my personal posts or to buy me a coffee to help support my work, please check out my Kofi page.

Let's begin...

Jessica Marie Lunsford was born on the 6th of October 1995 in Gastonia, North Carolina. She was a beautiful young girl with long brown hair and the cutest brown eyes, she loved school and was a well manned student who was liked by staff and fellow pupils. She loved singing songs and spending quality time with her father who would often take her out for rides on his motorcycle which was one of her favourite things to do. Her family didn't have much money and Jessica lived with her father and his parents in a trailer home (in Homosassa, Florida) but they did their best with what they had and Jessica was a daddy's girl and one of her favourite possessions was a stuffed dolphin toy that her father gave her, she took it everywhere with her. Jessica didn't have much contact with her mother who had split up with Jessica's father Mark and moved away, married and had another child so her father and her grandparents meant the world to her.

(Jessica with her father, Mark. Picture credit: morbidology.com)

Being so young and just starting to learn about life, she wasn't quite sure what she wanted to be when she grew up, she told people she might want to become a singer or a fashion designer but she hadn't made up her mind. Jessica was a well behaved child and would attend church every Sunday without bother, she would be up early and dressed, ready for the day.

She was a bubbly child and family pictures show that she was always having fun, dressing up and smiling for the camera. Jessica seemed to have the world at her feel and a bright future lay ahead for this creative, bright and beautiful young girl but at 9 years old, every parents worst nightmare and one of the most evil things to have ever happened, happened to little Jessica Lunsford.

On the 24th of February 2005, Jessica's father was up early to get ready for work and noticed that Jessica wasn't in her bedroom. He noticed that her school uniform was still on the chair all folded up and she was nowhere to be seen, understandably he was in a panic wondering where his daughter was and the authorities were alerted. Straight away, the police, the neighbours as well as other volunteers were out searching for Jessica but could not find a trace of her anywhere.

The family had a habit of leaving the front door unlocked at night. There are a lot of people who do this even to this day because they feel that their neighbourhoods are safe or they don't know any different because that is how they were brought up. In the early hours of the 24th of February a disgusting predator by the name of John Evander Couey came into the trailer whilst everyone was asleep (he claimed he was trying to burgle the house and spotted Jessica who he originally thought was 6 years old as he'd seen her playing outside a few times) and woke up Jessica and told her to come with him. She was dressed in her Pyjamas and was holding her most treasured possession, her toy dolphin that her dad had given her.

The monster then took her to his half sister's mobile home which was located near to Jessica's home. In his horrendous confessions to the police he described how he raped Jessica over and over again during a weekend ordeal, he fed her scraps of food and gave her some water but kept her in a cupboard and threatened her to keep quiet, the poor child did as he asked. In a sickening and cruel manner, he described how after he had continually abused Jessica he was fed up and didn't know what else to do with her and there was reports on the news about her disappearance, he wanted to get rid of her but he didn't know how. He finally decided to tell her to climb into a black plastic bag, he told her that he had to hide her from the neighbours. Jessica, who was still holding her toy dolphin, did as he ordered and got into the black bag after John had tied her wrists together with speaker wire. He tied the bag at the end and then proceeded to put another black bag over the top of it. There was no way for Jessica to escape. She was trapped and struggled desperately for air. Jessica was afraid of the dark and would sleep with a bedside light on at night, it is hard to imagine the absolute fear and terror that this little girl must have been going through.

He dragged Jessica in the black bags out to a shallow grave that he had dug under the trailer and buried her alive. He left her there to suffocate to death and then tried to carry on about his every day business like nothing had happened.

(The trailer where John Couey abducted and buried Jessica. Picture credit: murderpedia.org)

John Evander Couey was brought to the attention of police investigators as he had been on a list of registered sex offenders who were located in the area near Jessica's home. It is standard procedure that the police check out the homes of all of the registered sex offenders within that area and they searched the trailer that John had been living in with his half sister and two other people (who later claimed that they knew nothing of Jessica's abduction or murder). 

The evidence against John piled up and investigators found Jessica's DNA in his room, he told the police after taking a lie detector test that they didn't need to tell him the results and proceeded to give them a full confession (on the18th of March 2005) together with the details of where to find Jessica's body.

Investigators rushed to the scene and made the gruesome discovery, They found the black bags which contained Jessica's badly decomposed body. Another heartbreaking detail was that two of Jessica's fingers (which had become skeletonized) were discovered poking out of a hole in one of the bags as she had desperately tried to escape and get some air. When her body was removed from the bags, she was found clutching her toy dolphin.

(John Evander Couey. Picture credit: heraldtribune.com) 

As investigators looked into John Evander Couey's past they found that he was not only on the sex offender's register, but that he was also a career criminal who had previously been arrested a total of 24 times in a space of 30 years. He'd committed various crimes from theft to child abuse and was said to have been a heavy cocaine addict at one point.

During the trial, Mark Lunsford had this to say to John Evander Couey: ''I hope you hear her crying as you try to sleep at night. I hope you see the tears running down her face when she asked you to go home. I hope you spend the rest of your life in fear of death. You will never hurt another child again.''

(Jessica's treasured toy dolphin in an evidence bag during the trial. Picture credit: murderpedia.org) 

On the 27th of August 2007, John Evander Couey was sentenced to death, he showed no remorse at any point and just nodded his head when his death sentence was read out to him, not long after this, he was diagnosed with anal cancer and died on the 30th of September 2009. One can only hope that he had a slow and painful death and even then with some of the comforts of a hospital it would have been nowhere near the pain, suffering and sheer terror that poor little Jessica Lunsford had to go through.

After the horrendous death of his young daughter, Mark Lunsford established the Jessica Lunsford Act requiring tighter restrictions on sex offenders which includes wearing electronic tracking devices.

Mark also tried to take legal action against Citrus County's Sheriff Office and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Mark claimed that investigators had made various mistakes in the investigation which included the police looking at him as a possible suspect in his daughter's disappearance in the beginning.

It was also reported that when Jessica's disappearance was first brought to the attention of her estranged mother, she claimed that she had not seen her daughter for over 4 years.

Mark's girlfriend gave birth on what would have been Jessica's 12th birthday.

''We were more than a father and daughter, we were best friends. As a single father I learnt a lot about my children that only a single parent could understand. Me and Jessie used to argue about who loved each other the most and one day I told her, I said, you know...I love you this much and that means I love you all the way around and she looked up at me and she said 'Daddy, I love you this much that nothing will come between us''. - Mark Lunsford.

(Jessica's grave. Picture credit: findagrave.com)

''When a child dies, you bury the child in your heart,'' - Korean Proverb.

RIP Jessica Marie Lunsford.

Thank you for taking the time to read this heartbreaking post if you have made it this far you'll understand why it affected me so much. It's important that Jessica is never forgotten.

If you would like to leave a little memorial note or flowers for Jessica, you can do so here

See you in the next post x

Further reading & sources:

- Jessica Lunsford Case - Fox News

- John Couey Trial - CNN

- Jessica Lunsford - Wikipedia

- John Couey - Murderpedia

- The Story Of Jessica Marie Lunsford

- John Couey - Crime Museum

(John Worboys aka John Derek Radford. Picture credit: bbc.co.uk) 

You may remember me covering the shocking case of The Black Cab Rapist who was stalking the streets of London and targeting young women, sexually assaulting them after giving them drinks laced with drugs. 

You can check out the post here 

I have a quick update on the case. In May of this year (2019) he was suspected and charged with the sexual assault of four more women. 

He had already been serving time for the other sickening acts that he had committed in the early 2000's and now he has been found guilty of four more assaults (as I mentioned in my original post on the case, he is suspected of carrying out more attacks and is still being investigated) and jailed for a minimum of 6 years. He pleaded guilty for the attacks and the sentencing took place today (Tuesday 17th of December 2019).

John Worboys, who now goes by the name John Derek Radford is in prison at this moment, he was nearly released last year but due to public outcry and a campaign by his victims and their families, he has remained behind bars, partly for his own protection.

I will update you should any other details arise about this case, 

x Jo

Sources & further reading:

John Worboys Article

This week I'm not able to post a true crime case (with it being the run up to Christmas, work and not getting the time this week), however I am posting another true crime Q&A post. I have also posted a personal Q&A for my monthly subscribers over on my Kofi page. If you didn't already do so, please check out my three part series on the Kenny Richey case.

I will be back on the research on Monday and posting another case so stay tuned for that.

So here goes...

Q1) Which movie do you think was the best based on a serial killer or true crime book?

I've always said that 'To Catch A Killer' is my favourite, John Dennehy gives an amazing performance as John Wayne Gacy. I also think 'Monster' is an amazing film and Charlize Theron is amazing as Aileen Wuornos but I do think the movie tried to portray Aileen (in my option) in a sympathetic light.

Q2) Which case are you working on next?

I haven't decided which cases(s) I'm going to cover next. I have a list and I'm hoping to squeeze a few in before Christmas because I'm nearly at my 40th true crime case and I would like to have hit that goal by the end of the year.

Q3) What has been the longest case you have worked on and how long did it all take to put together?

That's a hard question to answer because there's been quite a few, the ones that come to mind are, Columbine, The Tracie Andrews case, The Sylvia Likens case and The Life & Death of Marvin Gaye. These cases took me all week to do and I would often be up all night working on them.

Q4) Last true crime podcast you listened to?

I always listen to 'Trace Evidence Podcast'

Q5) Do you have a favourite serial killer interview?

I'm wouldn't say 'favourite' but I find Ted Bundy's interview he did hours before his execution quite interesting as well as Aileen Wuornos interviews where she would appear to be nice but then someone would say something the wrong way and you could see her eyes change.

Q6) Favourite police interrogation 

That would have to be the Russell Williams one. That was a masterpiece!!

Q7) Which true crime docu would you recommend?

Talhotblond! That was amazing and kept me on the edge of my seat right up until the end. If you can find it anywhere, i recommend watching it.

Q8) Top 5 cases you've covered so far that you would recommend to a new reader?

I'm proud of all of the cases I've worked on because I've put a lot into each of them but I would have to say:

- Toxic Relationship: The Tracie Andrews Story

- Deadly Obsession: The Ricardo Lopez Story (Bjork's Stalker)

- The Camden Ripper: Anthony John Hardy

- What Happened To India Chipchase?

- The Black Cab Rapist: John Worboys

Q9) What do you think of sites that sell serial killer memorabilia? 

It's a bit strange. I personally wouldn't want to own anything that a serial killer once had. Saying that, some people might find me weird for writing about serial killers and true crime cases. I also read a lot of true crime, have true crime books and watch true crime documentaries which other people might think is strange. Each to their own.

Q10) Have you ever been to a prison? if you have, did you see anyone famous?

Yes, I've visited a prison and the only 'famous' person (if you could class them as famous) wasn't a murderer but a minor celebrity, Amy Winehouse's ex husband Blake. Whenever I saw him in the newspapers he looked terrible because of the drugs but when I saw him there he had been clean and actually looked handsome, I could kind of see what Amy liked about him. Some time later though he was out of prison, back in trouble and back on drugs.

Well, there we go, short but sweet but let me know if you have any more questions you would like me to answer.

Catch you in the next post x