CONFESSION EVIDENCE

WEAPONS DISPLAYED AT PETER SUTCLIFFE'S TRIAL

Displayed on a long oak table were the following items:
SEVEN BALL-PEIN HAMMERS
ONE CLAW HAMMER
ONE HACKSAW
THREE CARVING KNIVES
ONE LONG THIN-POINTED KITCHEN KNIFE
ONE WOODEN-HANDLED COBBLER'S KNIFE
EIGHT SCREWDRIVERS
ONE LENGTH OF ROPE

WEAPONS FOUND WHEN ARRESTED IN SHEFFIELD

When Sergeant Robert Ring heard that Peter Sutcliffe was still in custody and being questioned by Ripper Squad officers twenty-four hours after his arrest in Sheffield, he returned to the scene of Sutcliffe's arrest on Melbourne Ave. He explored the area where he had remember Sutcliffe had gone when "bursting for a pee". There, behind a small oil storage tank and on some leaves, he found:
ONE HAMMER - During the trial, Attorney General Sir Michael Havers said that this hammer had been used to murder Jacqueline Hill.
ONE KNIFE - Unknown if used in previous attacks or murders. Identified by Sonia Sutcliffe as one she had bought before she was married.

On January 8 1981, after thinking about the events of Sutcliffe's time at the Sheffield police station, Sargeant Ring remembered Sutcliffe's visit to the toilet when he first arrived at the station. Sargeant Ring went there and found that Sutcliffe had placed in the lavatory cistern:
ONE WOODEN-HANDLED KNIFE - Said by Sutcliffe not to have been previously used in any attacks or murders.

Found by the police in the glove compartment of Sutcliffe car:
THREE SCREWDRIVERS - Unknown if previously used in any attacks or murders.

Found in Sutcliffe's jacket pocket at the police station:
ONE LENGTH OF ROPE - Sutcliffe admitted at the trial that he had used this piece of rope in the murder of Marguerite Walls and the attack on Upadhya Bandara.

WEAPONS AND EVIDENCE FOUND AT SUTCLIFFE'S HOME

PAIR OF WELLINGTON BOOTS - Matched the boot prints found at the Emily Jackson murder and at the Patricia Atkinson murder.

ONE YELLOW-HANDLED SCREWDRIVER - Used by Peter Sutcliffe to stab Jacqueline Hill, and demonstrated by Attorney General Sir Michael Havers on how he used it to stab her through the eye.

ONE HACKSAW - Said to have been used by Peter Sutcliffe to try and decapitate Jean Jordan.

SEVERAL KITCHEN KNIVES - The jury at the trial were told that recovered from a drawer in Sutcliffe's home in Garden Lane, Heaton, were several kitchen knives, including:
ONE KITCHEN KNIFE - Used in the murder of Helen Rytka. Sutcliffe used this knife when he stabbed Helen Rytka several times through the heart and lungs.

WEAPONS FOUND AFTER DIRECTION BY SUTCLIFFE TO THEIR LOCATION

ONE CLAW HAMMER - Used in the murder of Patricia Atkinson. After the murder of Patricia Atkinson, Sutcliffe threw the claw hammer used to kill her from his white Ford Corsair into the grounds of Harrison's Printers in Cottingley Bridge. It was later found by a groundsman there who went on to use it for three years after finding it until recovered by the police after Sutcliffe's confession.

ONE LARGE PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER - Used in the murder of Josephine Whitaker and the murder of Barbara Leach. The screwdriver was badly worn and Sutcliffe had converted it into a bradawl and he had sharpened it before his attack on Josephine Whitaker. Near the the Woolley Edge motorway service station on the M1, about 11 miles south of Leeds city centre, Sutcliffe had thrown away the screwdriver while in his lorry. After his confession to the murders and attacks, it was retrieved by the police from an embankment next to the M1 motorway. Later the weapon was described at the trial by Attorney General Sir Michael Havers as "one of the most fiendish weapons you have ever seen".

OTHER EVIDENCE

TWO TAXI DRIVERS - When Sutcliffe was confessing to the murder of Helen Rytka, he mentioned that he realised that his initial attack had taken place almost in full view of nearby taxi drivers, who hadn't noticed the attack. The police taking Sutcliffe's statement had never heard about the taxi drivers before. The Ripper squad eventually traced them and they did confirm Sutcliffe's account of the event.

TREVOR BIRDSALL - Peter Sutcliffe's friend who was with him at the time of, but not involved in, two of the attacks. In 1969, in Manningham, Bradford, they were parked in a vehicle when Sutcliffe left the vehicle and hit a woman over the head with a stone in a sock. When Sutcliffe returned he told Trevor to drive off quickly. In 1975, in Halifax, Sutcliffe left the vehicle they were in, using the excuse he wanted to talk to a woman they had seen, and proceeded to attack Olive Smelt.

(NOTE: Sources: Burn, Cross, Jones, Yallop, The Times, The Sunday Times, Daily Telegraph, Mail On Sunday. Photo source: Nigel Blundell, "Encyclopedia Of Serial Killers".)

THE TRIAL

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