All language subtitles for Britains.Most.Evil.Killers.S01E07.WEBRip.en

-In the West Yorkshire city
of Bradford in 2010,

one man's desire to
stand out from the crowd

was about to take
a macabre turn.

Captured on CCTV,
student Stephen Griffiths

arrives home with a young woman,
but just seconds later,

she's seen running away
from his flat.

Griffiths, armed with
a crossbow,

chases after her
and shoots her from behind.

She's dragged back inside,
never to be seen alive again.

-It was absolutely astonishing,

very seldom is murder
captured on camera.

-A psychopath with
a history of violence,

Griffiths confessed to the
murder of two other local women,

and even claimed to have
eaten parts of his victims.

-He's dismembered the bodies.

He's taken pictures of them.

This is somebody who is
quite comfortable around death.

-The concept that
he gave himself a nickname,

he wanted the celebrity
of being a serial killer.

-Stephen Griffiths,

the self-proclaimed
Crossbow Cannibal,

had emerged as one of
the world's most evil killers.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

It was a case
that shocked the nation.

40-year-old
Stephen Griffiths,

a serial killer obsessed student
with a history of violence,

admitted to murdering
and mutilating three women

in Bradford, West Yorkshire.

The killings took place
across a 10-month period

between 2009 and 2010.

Shocking CCTV footage captured
the final moments

before he executed
his last victim.

-This is the flat where
Griffiths lived and killed.

He described it
as his slaughterhouse.

-But Stephen Griffiths' story
begins 40 years before.

Griffiths was born
on Christmas Eve 1969

in the town of Dewsbury
in West Yorkshire.

-There doesn't appear
to be anything

really out of the ordinary
in terms of the family

that Stephen Griffiths
comes from.

-He had two very caring,
loving parents,

a stable marriage, and they were
moving up in the world,

you know, good, solid
Yorkshire folk,

but then it all
went pear-shaped,

now, I think that happened
when Stephen's parents,

Moira and Stephen Sr.,
split up.

-Griffiths had always been
close to his father

and he didn't react well
to the breakup.

-We know from listening
to some of the reports of people

he went to school with,
his peers,

they reported
that he was a bit of an oddball.

He was slightly strange.

He would collect hunting knives,
and he would talk about violence

in a way that
other children wouldn't.

-He became very,
very withdrawn,

very, very difficult to get
on with, very disengaged,

but also he was observed
being sadistic towards animals,

in the back garden
of the house

they lived in in Wakefield,
neighbors saw him

shooting birds
and dismembering them.

-When we look at serial killers

who have been abusive towards
animals when they were children,

that is indicative,
to me, of somebody

who is trying to gain control,

so they turn their attentions
to creatures

that they can wield power over,
and often that's small animals.

I think those early indicators
were there, but he certainly

didn't come from the hugely
dysfunctional background

that we see
other serial killers come from.

-Despite his unruly behavior,
Griffiths had a high IQ,

and his dad worked hard
to send him

to a 9,000-pounds-a-year
grammar school in Wakefield.

-He went to private school,

and I think that gave him a kind
of veneer of respectability.

Had he been a young lad
at a badly performing school,

you know, in a deprived area,
I think, perhaps his behavior

would have been
problematized much earlier.

He would have been on the radar
of police and social services

and agencies like that
much earlier,

but I think social class
and middle class-ness

provides a bit of
a protective layer

for some people who go on to
commit murder and serial murder

because we don't want to think
of middle-class kids

to go on
and do things like that.

-In 1986, at the age of 16,
Griffiths dropped out of school,

and it wasn't long
before the troubled teenager

had his first brush
with the law.

-Stephen Griffiths started
getting into trouble

with the police
at the age of 17.

He was trying to steal
some goods

from a supermarket in Leeds.

When the supermarket manager
tried to stop him,

he produced a knife
and slashed him across the face.

The wounds were so severe that
the victim needed 19 stitches.

-Griffiths was arrested
and spent a year

in a juvenile custodial unit.

When he was released, age 19,
he wanted to make a fresh start

and enrolled
in a psychology course

at the University of Bradford,

but he was soon
in trouble again.

In 1989, Griffiths was arrested
for possessing

an offensive weapon,
an air pistol,

and sentenced to 100 hours
of community service.

-He got into further trouble
when he felt he'd been slighted

by some fellow students,
female students,

at the college he studied at.

He went up to them,
four girls, produced a knife,

held the knife to the throat
of one of the young girls,

and asked her very menacingly

what she thought
she was laughing at.

Understandably,
the girl was terrified.

He didn't actually attack her,

but it was clearly
a serious offense.

-This time, the authorities
had had enough.

Griffiths was sentenced
to 2 years in prison.

During this time,
he spent 8 weeks

at Rampton Secure Hospital
in Nottinghamshire,

where the psychology
student's behavior

was assessed by a professional.

-The psychiatrist described him

as a sadistic schizoid
psychopath.

He said, "He seemed to relish
the very idea of killing

and maiming people"

and really made it
absolutely clear

that he had
a personality disorder

which would make him a very,
very dangerous man indeed.

-Psychopaths are people who are
essentially emotionally empty.

They don't have the same range
of complex feelings

that the rest of us do.

They tend to lack remorse.

They have a shallow affect,

kind of a shallowness
of feeling.

They are prone to boredom.

There's a need for kind
of stimulation all the time.

They can't feel real empathy
for other people,

so there's an inability
to put themselves

in someone else's shoes,
so it's that kind of coldness,

that kind of detachment
from feelings

and from empathy, really.

-After his short time
in Rampton,

Griffiths was moved
to Leeds Prison,

where reportedly he openly
talked to his fellow inmates

about murder.

-Griffiths was a troubled
young man.

He certainly had a very active
fantasy life.

He confessed that he fantasized
about killing

and that he was sure

he was going to kill
numerous times before he was 40.

-Griffiths was released
and continued

with his psychology degree,

and despite his ongoing
criminal problems,

the 24 year old
graduated in 1993.

Now in the outside world,
he continued to display signs

that he wanted to stand out
from the crowd.

-He had this habit
of dressing up

rather like a cinema villain
with a large,

dark leather trench coat,

and he walked
a pet lizard on a lead.

He was not exactly a commonplace
figure in Bradford,

which I think
rather appealed to him.

He was a vain man as well
as being deeply troubled.

-Stephen Griffiths had a fair
number of girlfriends

and female acquaintances

who initially were taken in
by his charm,

quite liked the way he looked,
quite liked the fact

that he appeared quite clever,
quite well-educated,

but eventually
they would get tired of him

because, you know, he was very
much a controlling character.

-In 1998, age 29, Griffiths met
a new girlfriend, Zeta Pinder.

-Me and me friend was looking
through a lonely hearts column.

She said, "Ah, let's just see
if we can find you another one."

I'm like, "No, because
it's full of psychopaths."

There were an advert saying,
you know,

"20-odd-year-old male,
learning to be a counselor,"

and I thought, "Ah, fine.
I'll give him a ring."

-Unaware of his previous
convictions and violent history,

Zeta decided
to meet Griffiths in a pub.

-It looked like goth.
He had really long black hair,

all greased up, really long
black leather jacket,

and he gave me
a photograph of himself

which I thought,
"What a bit of a poser."

And he talked a lot
about himself.

The time that I went out
with him he was really kind

and caring, very loving,
wanted to hold me hand

when we went out, very tactile,
just, yeah, really loving.

-Zeta's opinion on Griffiths
changed when she found out

he'd been lying to her.

-Later, like 2 years
down the line,

we were in Bradford
having a drink,

and he said, "I'm just going to
nip to me flat for something,"

and I was like, "What do you
mean you're going to nip

to your flat for something?
You live with your mum and dad."

It was like he'd got himself
in a corner, and he went,

"Oh, yeah, I've got a flat,"

and I'm like,
"Oh, well, let's go see it,"

so he's like, "All right,"
so we finished his drinks,

and then it was just right
literally around the corner

in, like, this big complex.

I mean, why would you say,

"Oh, I live with me parents,"
when you've got a flat?

-Zeta Pinder was about to meet
the real Stephen Griffiths.

-I never felt threatened
until I went in his flat.

While he was opening the door,

his exact words were,
"Oh, next door,

we'll walk around next door,"
and I'm like, "Why?"

He said, "Oh, because a woman
got killed outside there."

I said to him, "Oh, my God.
How can you live there

when a woman has been
killed there?"

and he's just like,
"Oh, it's fine. It's fine."

I just remember he had
a little side table

with a little white kettle
on it,

and he's like, "Oh, sit down.
I'll make you a cup of tea,"

and I sat down, and I saw this
big, huge bookshelf,

and it was just rows and rows
of, like, horror books.

There was not one nice book,
not one,

and just all on, like,
mass murders, Yorkshire Ripper,

and above the bookshelf was,
like, two Samurai swords,

one going that way
and then one going that way,

and on the floor,
he had, like, crossbows,

and he's like, "Oh,
I'll make you a cup of tea,"

and I'm like,
"Actually I feel a bit sick.

I may just go home.

Can you just take me home?
I just feel really sick."

-Zeta was shocked
by the discovery

of Griffith's hidden life
and left the flat.

The following day,
she ended the relationship.

Zeta had had a lucky escape.

By 2010, the man
she'd been dating

had become a serial killer,

and Stephen Griffiths'
eerie flat had played host

to the most brutal of murders.

By 2004, Stephen Griffiths,
a diagnosed schizoid psychopath,

was well-know to the police.

He had three convictions for
causing grievous bodily harm,

a fray, and possessing
illegal weapons.

He was fascinated
with crime and murder.

-I think Stephen Griffiths,
you know,

picked the most
bizarre role models.

I mean, most young men will be
looking to actors

of footballers or musicians,

but Stephen Griffiths was
looking to Peter Sutcliffe,

the Yorkshire Ripper,

and I think it was the notoriety
attached to Peter Sutcliffe

that Griffiths found
quite appealing.

This was somebody who already
had a taste for violence,

a taste for cruelty.

-Despite his criminal
misdemeanors,

35-year-old Griffiths continued
on from his degree in psychology

by enrolling in a PhD course
at the University of Bradford.

-I think for Stephen Griffiths,
being a PhD student

offered him the ideal cover

to basically talk
about and research

and get obsessed with the things
that he was obsessed with.

I think it gave a kind of veneer
of legitimacy and respectability

to something that was
highly dysfunctional.

-His thesis title was "Homicide
in an Industrial City,"

and he specialized
on lethal violence

in the late Victorian period,
but at the same time in his home

he had this library
of books, magazines,

videos all about murder,
torture, mass killings,

anything really which fed
that obsession

he had with violence
and killing and maiming people.

-I think it was because
he didn't have very much

in the way of boundaries
around that type of behavior,

and he just wanted
to absorb himself in it.

For Griffiths, it was very much
about him.

It was very much about what
he could achieve by it

by doing this sort of thing,

so he was kind of
an apprentice serial killer.

-And the apprentice was ready
to make the step up.

On June the 22nd, 2009,
a local Bradford woman,

43-year-old Susan Rushworth,
had just been reported missing.

-She had three children.

She had grown up locally
with a very respectable,

very loving, family,

but like a lot of girls who end
up working the street,

she'd somehow become
involved in drugs.

The suggestion was that
she'd had a marriage split.

She'd suffered depression,

and she'd got in
with the wrong crowd.

Before long,
she was taking heroin.

Before long after that,

the only way of paying
for the heroin habit

was to sell her body
on the streets.

-Susan was trying to break free
from her drug addiction.

-She was still in touch
with her family.

They loved her.
They looked after her.

She was still in touch
with her children,

and, you know,
there were often signs

that she was turning a corner.

One Monday, June 2009,
she was due to meet a friend,

and she just did not turn up,

and the family waited however
long it was respectable,

you know, it was worthwhile
waiting

before reporting it
to the police.

The police made an appeal
for information.

They found out nothing.

They scoured everywhere.

They checked CCTV footage.

They tried to find
her mobile telephone.

They found not a trace.

-Records showed that Susan's
bank cards hadn't been used

since the day she disappeared.

Her family launched a public
appeal without success.

Police scoured the local area,

including Susan's last
known address,

Oak Villas in Manningham,
but it seemed like

she just vanished off
the face of the Earth.

Ten months passed.

Susan Rushworth was
still nowhere to be found.

-A missing prostitute is not
particularly unusual.

It happens a lot.

They disappear to other cities.

They give up.

There's no reason
why particularly

they should be traced.

-Then on the 26th
of April, 2010,

a very similar missing-persons
report was filed in Bradford.

-This time it's
Shelley Armitage.

She's 31.

She's a very
pretty-looking girl.

She had aspirations
to be a model.

She had lots of friends.

She had a boyfriend
who loved her.

She grew up locally
with a family, you know,

who very much loved her.

That said, she was also
a heroin addict.

She'd also ended up selling
her body on the streets

in order to pay for her habit.

She arranges to meet a friend
one night in Rebecca Street,

which is a street
in Bradford's red-light area.

They have a bite to eat,
a drink.

They go their separate ways,
and then Shelley just vanishes

off the face of the Earth
like Susan before her.

-Detectives conducted a detailed
search of Bell Dean Road

near Shelley's home,
but they found no clues.

They did, however, discover CCTV
footage of Shelley

walking along
Sunbridge Road

in the heart
of the red-light district

filmed on the night
she went missing,

but the police had no leads

on either the disappearance
of Shelley or Susan Rushworth.

As they continued
to investigate,

in May, a third woman
disappeared --

36-year-old Suzanne Blamires.

-Her father was
a local businessman.

She went to a good school.

Basically she had everything
going for her.

She took A levels.

She wanted to build a career
in nursing,

and everything was going
very, very well

until, like the two other women
who had vanished before her,

she became involved
in the drug scene.

She became hooked on heroin,
and eventually she resorted

to prostitution
to pay for her habit.

She was working the patch
in the early hours of Saturday,

May the 22nd, 2010.

A few of the women were aware
of the fact that she was there.

Friends knew that she was there.

Friends expected her
to return home,

you know, after work in the
early hours of Sunday morning,

but again, she vanished.

-But this time, the police

didn't have to wait
long for a lead.

Just two days after
Suzanne's disappearance,

they receive news of
some horrific footage

captured on a CCTV camera
in a nearby block of flats,

the home of Stephen Griffiths.

-So everything becomes clear

less than 48 hours
after Suzanne's disappearance

when the caretaker
of Holmfield Court,

the block of flats
where Griffiths lives,

is reviewing the CCTV
footage for the weekend.

He's looking at the footage

taken from the camera
outside Griffiths' flat.

It's a Monday morning.

Like any other Monday morning,
he's just sort of sleepily

winding his way
through this film,

and then all of a sudden
he sees this figure emerging

from Griffiths' flat, running,

pursued by this figure,
which he immediately recognizes

as Griffiths, carrying
what looks like a crossbow.

-The girl captured running
for her life

was missing woman
Suzanne Blamires.

-He took her to his flat.

She quite quickly,
I think, realized

that she was
in grave danger and ran out.

-You see Griffiths
chasing after her.

You see him shooting at her
with a crossbow.

You then see him dragging her
back into his apartment

by her legs,
and that wasn't where it ended

because afterwards
he comes up to the camera.

He sticks his middle finger
up to the camera,

and he brandishes the crossbow.

-In a kind of defiant,
angry gesture towards the camera

and anybody else
who might be looking at him.

-On May the 24th, 2010,
after viewing the footage,

police immediately race
to the scene of the attack,

hoping that Suzanne Blamires
may still be alive.

-Armed police officers
turn up at Holmfield Court.

They storm up the stairs,
storm into Stephen Griffiths'

flat expecting, really,
some resistance.

Stephen Griffiths just gives
himself up meekly

and tells police
somewhat inexplicably

that he's
Osama bin Laden.

-Griffiths was immediately
arrested

and taken
to Halifax Police Station.

Suzanne Blamires
was nowhere to be seen.

The following day,
a member of the public

made a grisly discovery
that would shock the nation.

On the 24th of May, 2010,
in Bradford,

40-year-old Stephen Griffiths
had been arrested.

CCTV footage showed him shooting
36-year-old Suzanne Blamires

with a crossbow
outside his flat

before making an obscene
gesture to the camera.

-Oh, it was absolutely
astonishing.

Very seldom is murder
captured on camera

in the way it was captured here,
and it was particularly shocking

because of the enormity
of the case

and just the sheer
gruesomeness of it.

-For some observers,
the sheer audacity

of the notoriety-obsessed
Griffiths

to commit such a heinous act
on camera was no surprise.

-I would say the reason
Griffiths was perfectly prepared

for his actions
to be caught on camera

was that he actually
wanted to be caught.

He actually wanted the celebrity

that he'd been
seeking all along,

and after all, if he hadn't
been caught on camera,

he could perfectly well
have gone on killing

other prostitutes in Bradford
and concealing their bodies.

-With Griffiths in custody,
West Yorkshire police

began to search
the crime scene

and surrounding area
for any clues leading

to the location
of Suzanne's body.

While being interviewed,
Griffiths told detectives

that there were deep issues
inside of him.

He admitted killing
Suzanne Blamires.

However, he refused to tell
the police

what he'd done with her body.

But they soon found out.

On May the 25th,
the day after Griffiths' arrest,

a member of the public found
a rucksack in the River Aire

in nearby Shipley, just 5 miles
from Griffiths' home.

-He looks inside the rucksack,
and he finds a woman's head.

-Suzanne Blamires' head

still had the crossbow bolt
embedded in it.

-Obviously he's terrified,
calls police.

Police go along,
recover the bag,

conduct a further search
of the river,

find other body parts.

They turn out to be those
of Suzanne Blamires.

-Once remains are found,
if the case appears suspicious,

as a dismembered body
in a bag would be,

then the area is cordoned off.

The scene-of-crime team come in.

The detectives come in.

Quite often, at that point, the
pathologist is called to come

and give an initial assessment.

-Police divers also found
a makeshift tool kit

that could have been used
to dismember the body.

News of the gruesome discovery
soon broke across the nation.

-The suitcase containing
the tools was discovered

just over there
some 200 yards

from where Suzanne Blamires'
remains were found,

and all weekend police divers,
as you can see,

have been scouring this riverbed
searching for clues

that could help
this investigation.

-The police were able
to piece together

exactly what had happened
to Suzanne

from the evidence
found in Griffiths' flat.

After killing her,

Griffiths dismembered her body
in his bathroom.

He then placed the remains
in a rucksack and left his flat.

-There were also some clothes
belonging to Suzanne

which were found in a bin

a short walk away
from Holmfield Court,

and there was extensive CCTV
footage of Stephen Griffiths

making a journey
with holdalls,

which he admitted
were full of body parts,

to the nearest railway station,

and he then caught
the train up to Shipley,

and it was there that he dumped
the body parts in the river.

-As the search of
the River Aire continued,

back at Halifax Police Station,

detectives had
another breakthrough

during their interviews
with Griffiths.

Without prompting, he brought up
the names of missing prostitutes

Susan Rushworth
and Shelley Armitage.

-He says he's killed
all three missing women

plus a number of others,

but although he admits
the crimes,

he's, you know,

less than fulsome in the detail
that he gives them,

and they're left
feeling confused

as to whether they should
believe him or not.

-I think he was confessing
to the murders

that he admitted to

because that was also
part of his performance.

At this point in time,
he's playing the role

of this damaged perpetrator,

and he's really aware
of serial killers.

He's read about a lot of them.

He's read about the types
of things

that are going to get them what
they want when they are caught,

so I think he's giving
a little bit

in order to get
something back for himself.

-It's very difficult
to understand

precisely the horrific fantasy
that he was living out.

It was clearly to do
with control.

It was also clearly to do
with his own obsessions.

-Griffiths idolized
serial killers,

especially the Yorkshire Ripper,
Peter Sutcliffe,

who was convicted
of bludgeoning 13 women

to death with a hammer
in the 1970s.

Just like Sutcliffe,
Griffiths targeted prostitutes.

The local sex workers
were shocked to hear

that Griffiths
could be responsible

for killing all three
of the missing women.

-A lot of girls knew him,
you know, like,

I passed him every day, night
in the street, on Corridor.

"It's all right,"
lit up a smile,

seemed right warm, welcoming,
and just polite in general.

-He used to, like,
come up to us, talk to us,

say that he'd been out for
drinks at student nightclubs,

offer cigarettes.

He was nice to me, really,
never wanted business.

I asked him for business,
never wanted business

or anything like that.

-I think there were multiple
reasons for Stephen Griffiths

targeting sex workers.

They will willingly go with you.
They will go to your house.

They will get into your car,

so they were easier prey
for Stephen Griffiths

because he was
essentially a predator.

-Stephen Griffiths was charged
for the murders

of Suzanne Blamires,
Shelley Armitage,

and Susan Rushworth
on the 27th of May, 2010.

Although Griffiths bragged
to detectives

that he'd killed loads more,
they didn't believe him.

Now investigators needed
to build a case against him.

As divers continued to search
the River Aire

for more evidence, they found
a further 81 body parts.

Locals were stunned.

-It's so close,
only 12 foot away,

just bringing things up,
and not seeing too much,

but knowing that there were bits
that shouldn't be in that river.

-DNA tests later reveal
that some of the remains

did not belong exclusively
to Suzanne Blamires.

Parts of human tissue
belonged to Shelley Armitage.

Griffiths had already
confessed to her murder,

but this was the first
physical evidence

that linked him to her death.

As the media broke the news

that Stephen Griffiths
would be charged

with three counts of murder,

one viewer was left
completely stunned.

-I was up watching television
with me husband,

and I just saw his face
on the telly,

and I was like,
"I know him,"

and Dave is like,
"No, you don't."

I'm like, "Yeah, I do.
I know him.

I used to go out with him."

I'm like, "Oh, God,
has he died?" you know?

And then when they had said
what he'd done,

I just got physically sick.

-Years earlier,
Zeta had found out

that Stephen Griffiths
had a dark side,

but now the world
was learning about him

and his online alter ego
Ven Pariah, who he described

as a misanthrope
who brought hate into heaven.

It was revealed that just hours

before murdering
Suzanne Blamires,

Griffiths had written
on his social media feed,

"Ven Pariah has emerged
into this world."

-Stephen Griffiths was
very much a narcissist,

and he wanted to perform

this very kind of exaggerated
persona online, Ven Pariah,

and it's something
that indicates to me

this is somebody
who is using this

as a performance
prop essentially.

We can be different people
online and offline,

but for me what I found
in my work

is there's much more continuity
than there is change

when we look at people's
behavior online and offline,

so I think this was
an indication

this was somebody
who wasn't quite normal.

-Real serial killers are often
mundane, commonplace men.

They do not like to draw
attention to themselves.

They don't care to be apart
from the crowd.

They want to merge in
with the crowd.

Griffiths is a single exception
to that rule.

-Despite having found remains
belonging

to Suzanne Blamires
and Shelley Armitage,

police had found no evidence
of Susan Rushworth.

In a cold-blooded act,
Stephen Griffiths,

although admitting
to her murder,

refused to tell police
what he'd done with her body.

-Griffiths took some pleasure
in leading the police

a little bit of a dance,

which was also designed,
of course,

to make him more famous.

-Forensic teams painstakingly
searching Griffiths' flat

did eventually
make a breakthrough.

Blood found in the bathroom
belonged to Susan Rushworth.

It's believed Griffiths killed
her using a hammer,

the preferred weapon
of his idol, Peter Sutcliffe.

-The fact that the final victim

was identified
through bloodstain

shows how meticulously these
crime scenes are dealt with.

It would be very easy
based on the fact that we knew

that somebody had been killed
with a crossbow to assume

that that blood related
to one of those two people,

but these cases are examined
in such detail

that this extra blood spot
was identified

that came from a third person.

-On May the 28th, 2010,

Griffiths appeared
before magistrates,

and just when it seemed
that he couldn't cause

any more suffering
to the victims' families,

he left the entire
courtroom in shock.

In Bradford, serial killer
Stephen Griffiths

had confessed
to murdering three women --

Susan Rushworth, Shelley
Armitage, and Suzanne Blamires.

The brutal murder of Suzanne
had been captured on CCTV.

On the 28th of May, 2010,

Griffiths was at Bradford
Magistrates' Court

for his arraignment.

Even from the dock,
the fame-hungry killer

continued to torment
the family of his victims

with his thirst for notoriety.

-And when Stephen Griffiths
was brought into the dock,

the court clerk says to him,
"What's your name?"

Everybody expected him
to say Stephen Shaun Griffiths.

-But Griffiths' answer
to the simple request

completely stunned
the courtroom.

-He describes himself
as the Crossbow Cannibal

with an utter contempt
for his victims,

their families,
the justice system,

the police, but with
a considerable amount

of adoration of himself.

-Of course, this causes

a stunned silence
in the courtroom.

That remained the case
for about 30 seconds,

and then I think one of
the families started weeping,

and all the journalists,
they're looking

at each other in disbelief,

asking each other whether
he really did just say that.

-Well, I think
Stephen Griffiths

felt the need
to give himself a brand

because I think his crimes
were performance crimes.

They were crimes that were
enacted for the camera,

and the fact that he imposed
this name on himself

rather than the media
labeling him

the Crossbow Cannibal
is really significant.

-We have a man who is deeply,
deeply narcissistic

and sees himself
as the center of the universe

and sees nothing else at all
except his own vanity,

and that vanity is the hallmark
of Stephen Griffiths' character,

that extraordinary,
overweening vanity.

-This is somebody who wanted
to be unique,

wanted to stand out
amongst other serial killers,

and that was
what that name was about.

-Griffiths had achieved
exactly what he'd set out to do.

With his self-proclamation,
the case had now picked up

immense media attention,
and the nation was in shock.

-Can you confirm your name
to the court, he was asked.

Barely audible,
a psychology graduate

believed to have been studying
criminology, replied,

"The Crossbow Cannibal."

-After he announced himself
as the Crossbow Cannibal,

of course there was
only one story

that the whole media were
talking about, and that was it.

It just took over.

I was just sitting there
speaking to a colleague.

We said, "Have you seen this?
Can you believe that?"

At that time, we'd never seen
anything like it before.

Most of the time, these
courtings are kind of

stare-down affairs,

but there this guy had,
you know,

stood up and announced himself
as this,

you know,
self-confessed serial killer,

and really we were
just flabbergasted.

-But could Griffiths really
have eaten his victims,

or was this just more bravado
from the macabre showman?

-I think, looking at
did Stephen Griffiths

cannibalize his victims,
I think it's a possibility

because this is a guy
who really didn't appear

to have any boundaries
around his killing behavior,

but at the same time, he's aware
of the power of that statement,

the impact that saying
he's done that

will have on his reputation,

and he'd come up with that
moniker, the Crossbow Cannibal,

so he had to claim that he'd
done that, even if he hadn't.

-Evidence found in Griffiths'
flat suggests

that he may actually
be telling the truth.

-There was a certain amount
of DNA evidence

on Griffiths' cooker

which, of course, you know,
sort of tends to back it up,

but also I think
it's a case of there

being no real reason
to disbelieve him,

and Griffiths, in his interviews
with the police,

was more or less truthful.

He was incomplete,
but he was truthful,

and I think as far
as they knew,

he didn't make up
any outright lies,

and if you think
about Stephen Griffiths

and what he tried to do,

achieve notoriety by somehow
concocting or contriving

this series
of very unpleasant,

very gruesome,
very shocking murders,

then the idea
of cannibalism

would fit into
that kind of jigsaw.

-I think when we look
at the amount of time

that Stephen Griffiths has spent
with the bodies of his victims

and what he's done
with those bodies,

he allegedly cannibalized
some of the victims.

He's dismembered the bodies.

He's taken pictures of them.

This is somebody who is
quite comfortable around death,

around dead bodies
and the various things

that come along with that.

Other serial killers
are more repulsed,

you know, by dead bodies,
so it's the crime itself.

It's the act that's important
for some,

whereas I think it's the process

that was important
for Stephen Griffiths.

-On the 16th of November, 2010,

a pre-trial hearing took place
at Leeds Crown Court.

Even more horrific details
of the murders emerged.

Griffiths had filmed and
photographed himself at work.

-I think Stephen Griffiths'
ongoing propensity

to document things
is what's going on

when we look at him
keeping pictures of the bodies.

He's keeping these mementos

because it's a way of proving
what he's done.

I think it's demonstrating,
"Look at me.

Look at how sadistic I am."

I think it's part
of the performance.

-There was a picture of Shelley
bound naked in the bath.

There was some spray-paint
writing on her back,

and there was a voice-over
in which Griffiths is heard

describing himself as this alter
ego he has, Ven Pariah.

-On December the 21st, 2010,

the hearing began
at Leeds Crown Court.

Seven months after calling
himself the Crossbow Cannibal,

Griffiths had yet
to make a plea.

Cyril Dixon was
in the courtroom.

-He's brought in by prison van,
but at this stage nobody knows

whether he's going to
plead guilty or not guilty,

so that adds a kind of
an extra frisson of tension

about the proceedings.

It's also quite tense because
it's the last court day

before Christmas,
and it's one of those days

where people want
to get things out of the way.

-After his previous performance
in court,

no one quite knew
what to expect from Griffiths.

-The atmosphere
was highly charged,

and you had
a packed press bench.

You had a large room of family,
friends of victims.

You had a lot of general members
of the public.

All the senior police officers
were there.

It was one of those cases
which had really roused

a lot of passion
in the local community.

-But this time,
there were no theatrics.

Griffiths pleaded guilty to the
murders of Suzanne Blamires,

Shelley Armitage,
and Susan Rushworth.

He was sentenced
to a whole-life tariff

by Mr. Justice Openshaw
on the 21st of December, 2010.

-I'd like to say that
I'm extremely pleased

with the conviction
of Stephen Griffiths

for what can only be described
as horrifying crimes.

He's a heartless,
controlling individual

who takes advantage
of the vulnerable.

-Stephen Griffiths
was immediately sent

to Wakefield Prison.

He will never be released.

During his time there,

Griffiths has reportedly gone
on a hunger strike

and even attempted suicide
numerous times.

-When we look at
what serial killers do

once they are behind bars,
what most of them will do

is continue to try
and exert power and control.

Now, their options are much more
limited when they're in prison,

so we see them doing things
like hunger strikes, self-harm,

that type of thing

because that's something
they have control over.

They still have control
over their own bodies,

and that's something that
they'll use to their advantage.

-There's every indication
that his behavior

was just as outrageous
and extravagant

and attention-seeking
as it had been,

you know, in those distant years
when he used to dress up

in a long leather coat
and leather boots

and put baby oil on his hair,
you know,

just to make himself look more
interesting than everybody else.

-Despite many pleas
from her family,

Stephen Griffiths
has never revealed

where the body
of Susan Rushworth is.

For the families of all
his victims,

life will never be the same.

The lives of their loved ones
were taken too soon

by a deadly psychopath
with a hunger for popularity.

-I think Stephen Griffiths
was absolutely

after 15 minutes of fame,

and you could see that he'd been
his own marketing manager.

He'd got a brand identity.

He was the Crossbow Cannibal,
and I think he thought

that he was going to get
an awful lot more attention

that would last for much longer
than it actually has,

so if you look at who his idol
was, Peter Sutcliffe,

we still talk about
Peter Sutcliffe today.

-What struck me as particularly
unpleasant

about Griffiths was the fact

that he was able to choreograph
everything he did.

Many killers, you know,
even serial killers,

act upon urges
which they can't control.

With Griffiths, although
he had that urge,

he was controlling it,

and he was kind of embellishing
the kind of story

he was trying
to write about himself.

-Stephen Griffiths is one of
the rare British serial killers

who, I think,
could truly be called mad.

He's certainly
not criminally insane.

On the contrary, I don't think
he would pass

any judgment of that,

but his view of the world
is so bent,

so deranged, if you like,
that he fails to see

that he doesn't fit in within
any other civilized action.

-So if we're looking at

the psychopathic traits
and characteristics

as being inherently evil,
then, yes, he is.

He's somebody who lacks empathy.

He's somebody
who shows no remorse.

He's callous.
He doesn't take responsibility.

The murders that
Stephen Griffiths committed

were choices.

Yeah, he chose to lure
these women back to his flat.

He chose to kill them.

He could equally
have chosen not to.

-Stephen Griffiths killed
three women

for his own self-satisfaction.

He's never revealed why
he murdered Susan Rushworth,

Shelley Armitage,
or Suzanne Blamires,

but he has seized
numerous opportunities

to talk about himself.

His pure lust for infamy
and notoriety

without regard for others

is what makes him one of
the world's most evil killers.

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