All language subtitles for Britains.Most.Evil.Killers.S02E01.WEBRip.en

-On Friday,
the 11th of May, 2012,

a fire ripped through
a family home in Derby

in the East Midlands.

Trapped inside and fast asleep
were six young children.

-The fire brigade were
in the house

flashing lights everywhere.

I pushed to the front
of the house,

and I could see the firefighters
bringing the children out,

some in blankets,

and the ambulance were trying
to resuscitate some of them.

-Firefighters and paramedics
battled in vain

to save their lives.

All six children died.

The youngest was just
5 years old.

-The damage to the house
is drastic, and there is no way

that those poor six children
could possibly have escaped.

Smoke inhalation alone
would have been deadly.

-But this was no accident.

As Mick Philpott,
the children's father,

wept in front
of the British public,

he was hiding
a sinister secret.

He had deliberately
started the fire.

-I think that the most tragic
part of this case is the fact

that six children's lives
were lost in Mick Philpott's

attempts to basically
rescue his own ego.

-Mick Philpott had set out
to look like a hero,

but he'd ended up as one of
the world's most evil killers.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

As news broke across Britain
in May 2012

that six young children had died
inside a burning family home

on Victory Road
in Allenton, Derby,

the entire nation were in shock.

The parents, 56-year-old
Mick Philpott

and his wife, 31-year-old
Mairead, were unharmed

but completely heartbroken.

Their five sons
and one daughter,

aged between 5 and 13 years old,
were dead.

Former neighbor to
the Philpotts, Daniel Stevenson,

witnessed the horrific event.

-My brother woke me up,

and that's when I looked
out of the window,

seeing a thick black smoke
coming from the house.

I got out of bed, got dressed,
put pajamas on,

trainers, run out the door,
went straight to the property.

Just wanted to help, so...

There was no way of getting in
through the front,

so I went around the back,
climbed over the caravan,

dropped down the other side.

I got into the back garden,
and I seen Mick and Mairead

there, and he was crying,
screaming, shouting.

-Despite brave attempts
from the emergency services,

nobody could get inside.

The fire was just too ferocious.

-Fire coming out of that box,

fire coming from around
the sides of the doors.

-By the time it was safe
to enter the house,

it was too late.

Five of the children,
10-year-old Jade

and her brothers John,

Jack, Jesse, and Jayden
had all lost their lives.

13-year-old Duwayne
died later at hospital.

However, it wasn't
a tragic accident.

Unbelievably, the house fire
was part of a deliberate plan.

Mick Philpott had masterminded
everything for his own benefit.

-I think that Mick Philpott
did an incredibly evil

and incredibly selfish thing.

He was essentially looking
to get revenge

for a perceived wrong
against him

by a woman who he thought
was under his control.

-His story begins
over 60 years ago.

Mick Philpott was born in 1956.

He grew up in Derby as part of
a large Roman Catholic family.

-It would have been
an environment in which

his parents' attention was
diluted across many children,

so he wouldn't have been
the center of attention

by any means,

and we know that
his mother worked very hard.

She had a job at a factory
that she only retired from

when she was quite old.

So he didn't appear to come from
an unusual background

by any means.

-In 1975, aged 19,
Philpott joined the army.

He began to show signs
of a violent temper,

especially
towards his girlfriends.

It would repeatedly land him
in trouble.

Local journalist Martin Naylor
recalls the events

that led to Philpott
being arrested in 1978.

-When Mick was a youngster,
I think 19 or 20, maybe 21,

he ended up with a conviction
for attempted murder

for which he was sentenced
to seven years in prison.

The story with that is that he
had a girlfriend back in Derby.

He was stationed
wherever his regiment were.

She'd had the temerity to
send him a Dear John letter

ending their relationship,

so he decided to go AWOL
from the army,

rock up at her house in Derby,
and attack her with a knife.

And then when her mother tried
to intervene,

he attacked the mother, too.

-Despite his seven-year sentence
for attempted murder

and grievous bodily harm,

Philpott served
just over three years.

He was released in 1981.

-From that point onwards,
Philpott set about controlling

every woman
he had any contact with

and to do so
in the most outrageous way.

-Those who knew Philpott
were surprised to hear

just how violent
his past had been.

-I know Mick
can handle himself,

so, like, if anyone
was intimidating towards him,

he wasn't afraid
to pump his chest out

and stand up to them
and so forth,

so I know he had quite
a strong, like, reaction

when people kind of pushed him.

The bit that shocked me was,

I didn't know that he had tried
to kill his ex-partner.

-After his release from prison,

Philpott had a series
of volatile relationships.

In 1986, at the age of 30,

he got married
for the first time

and fathered two sons
and a daughter.

He later had a two more children
with a teenage girlfriend

and began to have several
relationships simultaneously.

By the time he was 50,

Philpott had fathered
a total of 17 children.

-I think he would have gone
for any woman

that would go for him,
but in his case,

he went for younger girls,
usually girls

who were very upset and down
and depressed either because

they came out
of a bad relationship

or they were mistreated
by their parents,

girls that had no self-esteem.

You can pick them
out of a crowd.

You know,
they think they're ugly.

They think that
they're inadequate.

They think that they cannot
have a boyfriend,

that everybody hates them,
that the world hates them.

All they need is a little bit
of love, is somebody to be there

and show them
that they are beautiful,

that they matter,
that they are somebody,

and he knew how to do that.

He would approach the girls
that were, like,

at the lowest they could be,
and he would be that person.

-In 2000, he met Mairead Duffy,
a 19-year-old single mother.

But within a year,
he'd met a 16-year-old

who became another
of his conquests.

She, too,
was a single mother at 16.

In 2003, Philpott marries
Mairead Duffy

but keeps his full-time
live-in mistress.

In fact, she is the bridesmaid

at the marriage
to Mairead Duffy.

It becomes a ménage à trois,
both bearing his children,

living in a council house
in Allenton near Derby.

They are -- well, one could only
describe it as extraordinary.

-Mick Philpott was a man
who was incredibly manipulative,

incredibly controlling,

and had managed to basically
convince these two women

over a course of several years
that this was,

you know, a really good thing,

that actually they were lucky
to have some of his attention.

-In 2006, 50-year-old
Mick Philpott was unemployed

and living on benefits in
a council house with his wife,

Mairead, his mistress, Lisa,

and their ever-growing,
far-from-traditional family.

-He had approached
the Telegraphto say

that he was living in the house
with his wife

and his then-girlfriend.

They had children together.
There were lots of them there,

and he wanted
a bigger council house,

so he thought that by coming
to his local newspaper,

he would get
a bigger council house.

So we ran the story.

The following day, it was picked
up on by all the nationals,

especially some of the more
right-leaning ones,

as you can imagine.

One of them, I think one
the tabloids dubbed him

"Shameless Mick"
and the kind of,

the media-frenzy roller coaster
went on from there.

-In 2007, Philpott appeared
on "The Jeremy Kyle Show"

to talk about his large family
and his lifestyle.

He began to draw attention
from the general public.

-He becomes quite famous
as a benefits scrounger

because he significantly
never has a job

and is claiming at one point
£60,000 a year

in benefits as well as
being given a house.

He parks a caravan effectively
at the side

of the semi-detached
council house he's living in,

in which he alternates.

He sleeps there one night
with the wife, Mairead Duffy,

and the next night
with his mistress,

as though he's
some kind of emperor.

-I think that Mick Philpott

breathes the oxygen
of publicity.

-I think he absolutely regales

in being the center
of attention.

He loves being talked about,
and I don't think

the nature of attention matters
very much to him.

It doesn't matter if it's
positive attention

or negative attention as long
as people are talking about him.

-Philpott enjoyed
his newfound fame

and went on to appear
in other television programs.

-He then participated
in a program

about benefits culture
with the MP Ann Widdecombe,

and he would have been
absolutely loving the attention.

He was basically having
his malevolent ego fed

from every angle here,

but what he really didn't care
about was the impact

that this had on his family.

His kids were bullied at school
because of the attention

that they got through him
being in the press.

His partner and his wife
were basically labeled as stupid

and ignorant,
but that didn't matter.

As long as people
were talking about him,

that's all that he cared about.

-I wish I found it comical.
I found it despicable.

There is nothing about it
that I find admirable.

Philpott saw himself
as some kind of grand figure,

effectively bragging
about his success with women,

his success in scrounging
on the benefits.

-Mick Philpott is somebody
who has to be in control.

He has always got to be the one
making the decisions,

and other people basically have
to pander to his every whim.

-Philpott's wife and mistress
both worked

as part-time cleaners.

-But far from being
a source of their own income

and a source
of independence for them,

he would basically take
all of their wages.

He would be the one who
drove them to work,

dropped them off,
and picked them up.

He wanted to be fully in control
of these women's lives.

They didn't have
their own house keys.

-In 2012, 56-year-old
Mick Philpott

was living with his wife,
his mistress

and their 11 children in
a council house in Derbyshire.

By now, Philpott
was known nationally

as a benefits scrounger,

but little was known about
his controlling behavior,

his volatile temper,
and his obsession with sex

that included regular threesomes
with his wife, Mairead;

and a friend, Paul Mosley.

-There were, like,
11 kids in the house.

It's a small house,
two sexual partners,

and he used to bring a friend
for sex parties and stuff.

It's a horrible environment with
the kids in the house and stuff,

and you're doing all this.

So it doesn't take an expert
to realize,

"Okay, this is not
a good situation."

-And these sexual exploits
of Mick and Mairead

didn't stop at home.

-There was an incident
where they went out

dogging in Allestree Park,

and there are people who live
in Derby and know Derby

and know that Allestree
is a relatively affluent area,

and to hear that, you know,
people have been going there

to watch other people having sex
in cars sort of comes across

as quite a shock, and so...

It was seedy.

-In February 2012,
Philpott's mistress, Lisa,

decided she'd had enough of life
in the dysfunctional household.

She moved out with her five
children and demanded custody.

-A lot of people
won't have that courage,

but she just decided,
"Look, enough is enough."

She did the right thing.

She didn't go up to him and say,
"I'm leaving you,"

because I think if she tried
doing that,

he would overpower her because
he was a violent person and say,

"No, you're not leaving,"
or maybe lock her in.

He would have done something,
but she did the right thing.

She walked away first
and then sent him a message

and said, "I'm gone,"

you know, and then
he couldn't find her anymore.

-This was a point at which Lisa
had decided to take control,

to take her children,
and to go to a women's refuge,

and the key thing here

is that Mick hadn't decided
that that was okay.

He was the one that decided
when relationships were over.

He was the one that decided
what happened on a daily basis.

So the fact that Lisa
had betrayed him

by taking that power
away from him,

it was only going to result

in something
really alarming in return.

-Lisa moving out left financial
implications for Philpott.

Not only did he lose her income
as a cleaner

but also the benefits
he received for their children.

The custody hearing was set
for May the 11th.

Philpott concocted a plan
to ensure the children

would be returned
to Victory Road.

-Out of the vanity
and arrogance of the man;

together with his wife,
Mairead; and Paul Mosley,

the kind of live-in
sometime lover;

they hatch a scheme to set fire
to the house in Victory Road

in an effort to provoke the
council to give a bigger house

but also to blame his mistress.

She will not get the custody
of the children.

It is an extraordinary,
bizarre plan.

-I think Mairead was very much

under Mick Philpott's control
at this point in time.

I think he would have quite
easily have talked her around

into actually being
a part of this.

-It was a badly devised plan.

For me, what convinced him
is his own stupidity.

He was self-absorbed.

He thought that he was the king.

You know, he got
all the girls he wanted,

and he could control them
and everything,

and maybe Philpott thought
that he was that intelligent,

that it was that easy
to devise a plan

that he could get back
on the girl.

So he probably sat down,

wrote down
the plan very quickly,

"This is what we're
going to do," right?

Very easy.

-In the early hours of Friday,
May the 11th, 2012,

the same day as
the scheduled custody hearing,

Philpott, aided by his wife,
Mairead, and their friend

Paul Mosley, poured petrol
through the letter box

and set the family home alight.

Six of Philpott's children
were sleeping upstairs.

-The fire that he set,
that they have set between them,

takes hold at a pace far greater

than they could possibly
have conceived,

and the house is literally
filled with smoke

in a matter of instants.

In his typically
vainglorious way,

Philpott makes a particularly
appalling 999 call saying,

"My children are inside."

-They was on the phone
to the emergency services,

I believe, and they were saying,

"Me house is on fire
and, me baby, me baby,"

and the officer,
they told the emergency service,

"My neighbor is here."

It was very, like, misty

because everything was
just happening so fast.

I attempted to go
into the house.

I got as far as the kitchen
and couldn't go any further.

The smoke was just too thick.

It was choking, black.

I couldn't see anything,
so I had to come back out.

There was ladders on the side
going up to a window.

I tried climbing up to there,

and there was a ratchet
in the window

where Mick's been trying
to smash in, I think,

and now smoke
coming from that window.

I then came back
down the ladders,

and I climbed up
on to a wooden frame,

what he's been building on
to his conservatory.

-The damage to the house
is drastic,

and there is no way that
those poor six children

could possibly have escaped.

Smoke inhalation alone
would have been deadly.

-I climbed up
to the window to see

if any of the windows
were open.

None of them were open.

Then I put one of the windows

through with a wrench
from the other window.

I chucked it at the window.

It smashed straight through.

I then continued putting
the window through

with the pickaxe on the roof,
smashing all the window up.

I was about to climb
into the property

and, again,
couldn't see nothing,

couldn't hear nothing,
couldn't hear no screams.

-When the fire service arrived,

the desperate attempts to
save the children continued.

The local press soon got wind
of the unfolding drama

on Victory Road.

-I was on the early shift
on the morning of the fire,

and I could hear that the news
desk phone was ringing,

so I made a bit
of a dash for it.

I grabbed the phone,
and it was the on-duty

police press officer,
and she said to me,

"We're just letting
the local media know early

that there's been a really
big house fire in Allenton,

and five kids are dead."

Within about 5 or 10 minutes
of knowing

that it was in Victory Road,
I phoned the local news agent,

who I know because I'd done
previous stories with him.

He answered the phone,
and I said,

"Joker, it's Martin
from the Telegraph,"

and he said,
"It's Mick Philpott.

It's Mick Philpott's house,"

and I didn't even have to
ask him what it was about.

He knew, and he'd blurted
that out straight away.

-Shocked neighbors began
to spill out on to the street

as the full horror
of the tragedy became apparent.

-I think nearly the whole
street was out in the front.

The fire brigade
were in the house,

flashing lights everywhere.

I pushed to the front
of the house,

and I could see the firefighters

bringing the children out,
some in blankets.

I think they used the blankets
to try and protect them

a bit more,

and the ambulance were trying
to resuscitate some of them.

♪♪

I was just hoping the kids
would survive and recover.

I just didn't really know
what to think at the time,

didn't know what had happened,

didn't know what had
caused the fire.

I just didn't know anything.

-Tragically, five of Philpott's
children died at the scene --

10-year-old Jade, 9-year-old
John, 8-year-old Jack,

6-year-old Jesse, and Jayden,
who was just 5 years old.

Their older brother,
13-year-old Duwayne,

was rushed to hospital
in a critical condition

but would later succumb
to his injuries.

-It almost defies
self-deception.

It is disgraceful,
but at the outset,

the police believe that this is
something that is genuinely

a tragedy -- six children,
no adults in the house.

You might ask, "Why weren't
there any adults in the house?"

-Forensic experts arrived
at the scene

and began to look for clues

to determine
the source of the fire.

Daniel Matthews was
part of the team.

-Mostly, the house was
pretty much undamaged.

The roof was intact.
The walls are intact.

The front door was noticeably
more damaged

than anywhere else and also
the window on the landing.

There's a small window
on the landing upstairs

that had been damaged
by the fire

and had dropped out,
but apart from that,

the only way that you could
really tell there was a fire

at the house was by small signs
of some soot coming out from

the vents at the top of some of
the double-glazed windows.

The fire had started
in the entrance hallway

behind the front door,
and from there it had spread

a little bit into
the living room,

but mostly it had
spread up the stairs.

The window at the very top
of the stairs was open

a little bit, and that had been
breached by the fire.

Now, obviously, fire tends
to go up and out,

so effectively, the stairwell
from the fire in there

would act almost like a chimney
in that the fire

and the hot gases and the fumes
would all mostly go upstairs.

-In cooperation with the fire
investigators, the forensic team

needed to find out
if the blaze was accidental

or if someone had started it
on purpose.

-We had an arson dog handler
with us that day,

and that dog is trained
to indicate

on various different
ignitable liquids

such as petrol,
diesel, white spirits,

and the things
that we commonly see in arsons,

and the dog clearly indicated

that he thought
something was present.

So we would take a sample
from that area,

and then it would be sent
for analysis,

and the analysis determined
that petrol was there.

When I completed
my scene examination,

I was able to say that the fire
had been started deliberately.

-As the sun rose on the morning
of Friday, May the 11th, 2012,

the true horror of the house
fire on Victory Road in Derby

became apparent.

Investigations had revealed
that the blaze

which had killed six children
had been started deliberately.

Bereaved father Mick Philpott
had seemingly made

desperate attempts to save them,

but in reality, he had
orchestrated the whole thing

to try and win custody

of five of his other children
from his former mistress.

-I think Philpott thought that
nobody would ever leave him

because he was so amazing.

So I think it was a combination
of everything.

When somebody leaves you,

there's another thing happens
with the human brain.

It's like jealousy
automatically happens, right?

For one reason.

We are all, and in Philpott's
case even more

because he was
so self-absorbed --

you think you are
the best thing on Earth.

-Mick Philpott's plan

was essentially
to exact revenge on Lisa.

He'd moved from trying
to control her

by keeping her
in a relationship with him

to trying to destroy her
for leaving it.

He was vile towards her.

He made threats towards her
through other people.

She was incredibly frightened,
and what he was trying to do

was, essentially,
create a story,

create a set of events
that he could blame her for.

-I think what convinced him
that this thing would work

was himself, you know,

his stupidity and his
self-absorption that he thought,

"I'm too good.
This plan is infallible."

-On Saturday, the 12th of May,
the day after the fire,

Philpott's ex-mistress, Lisa,
and her brother-in-law

were arrested on suspicion
of starting the blaze.

It seemed that Philpott's plan
to frame her was working out,

but they were soon released
without charge.

Police were treating
the deliberate fire

as a murder investigation
after it was confirmed

that petrol had been found
inside the letter box.

-The police start to talk
to the neighbors,

who point out that Philpott is
this conceited pig of a man,

and they begin to put together
what actually happened.

They find evidence
of a petrol can.

They find a glove.

-Detectives began to grow
suspicious of the Philpotts

and their possible motives.

On Wednesday,
the 16th of May, 2012,

Mick Philpott held
an emotional press conference,

unaware that he was
the police's number one suspect.

-Didn't Philpott know that
the police is experts

on reading people, you know?

They have people who are
trained for years

on reading body language,
facial expressions,

eye movements, voice intonation,
you know, everything.

-Philpott appeared
to be distraught

when he faced the cameras

with a visibly grief-stricken
Mairead.

He started to thank people
who tried to help

on the night of the fire.

-And, of course,
the four firemen,

the police, the ambulances,
the doctors, the nurses,

literally everybody
who tried to help

save our children that couldn't.

[ Sniffles ]

-One intrigued viewer was body
language expert Robert Phipps.

-Mick Philpott is
very controlled

throughout the whole interview,

making a point of thanking
everybody else

but not really mentioning the
children that have just died.

The signals that he gives off
are not in the normal range

of somebody expressing grief,
anxiety, sadness,

which he should do,
having just lost his children.

Somebody normally
expressing grief,

you would see contorting
of the face,

not just one consistent look,

and this is what
you have with Mick,

is one consistent look
throughout the whole thing.

His face is not going
through the turmoil

as compared to Mairead,

who you see her eyebrows
are moving.

Her forehead has got
different wrinkles in it.

Her face is just
contorted with pain.

We don't see any of that
from Mick.

-If ever evidence were needed
of Philpott's capacity

for being disingenuous,
for convincing the world,

and I suspect himself,
into the bargain,

that he alone was right,

it was in the classic case
of his crocodile tears

during the televised
press conference.

Those tears were yet
further evidence

of his capacity
for self-delusion,

which is one of the hallmarks
of his life

along with the capacity
to believe that he alone

could dictate
what happens to the world.

-Right from the beginning,
Mick Philpott's body language

is inconsistent
with somebody showing grief.

His blinking rate
is far, far too high.

The normal range is around about
20, 25 blinks per minute.

We counted in this as much
as 80 to 90 blinks a minute.

This is showing his nervousness.

Mick is dabbing away with his
tissue here to imaginary tears.

They're not there, therefore the
tissue itself doesn't get wet.

It doesn't crumple.

If you look at that in
comparison to Mairead's tissue,

it's all crumpled because she is
actually expressing tears,

real, genuine tears.

If you look at the lines
on their forehead,

these are just straight lines.

There's no expression.

These are his normal,
everyday lines.

If you look at Mairead's face,
she's raised her eyebrows.

They've come in, so she's
got a furrowed brow,

and she's pulling
these eyebrows in,

which shows the pain
that she's going through.

You can also see the way her
mouth is contorted and changing

with each expression
of different emotions.

Mick is consistent
all the way through.

One thing that
they don't do throughout

the entire press conference
is appeal for help.

Who set this fire?

Who killed these children?

Why?
Because he knows he did it.

-It wasn't just the police
who were suspicious.

Philpott's performance
had baffled

the onlooking press, too.

-At the end of it,
I got in the car

to drive back to the office,
and I thought,

"That's not right. Something
is not right about that."

He's not once mentioned
the children.

He's not mentioned them by name.

He's not looked into
any cameras

and said, "Please, will
someone out there help me

find out who's done this?"

It's a suspicious fire
in his own home,

and not once has he made
an appeal to the public,

"To anyone who's watching,"
you know,

"Please, anyone with
information, come forward,"

not once.

So then I got back to the
office, and as I walked in,

I could see everyone was still
stood around the TV,

and we all looked
at each other,

and that was the moment
that we all knew,

you know,
something is wrong here.

This is a game changer.

-Disingenuous would be
a polite way of describing it.

It is typical of a man

who believes
he alone rules the world.

He is an emperor
of everything he surveys.

He is a man whose vanity
knows no bounds,

a man for whom he is
the center of the universe,

which, in the end,
convinced the police

that he wasn't
telling the truth,

that he seemed so capable
of this kind of sleight of hand.

He may have convinced himself,

but he didn't convince
many other people.

-I think he's such
a narcissist.

He's so arrogant, and he thinks
he's gotten away with it,

that he thinks he's invincible.

He thinks that his act,

as he's fooled many women
over the years,

is going to fool the rest of us,
and it certainly didn't.

-The residents of Victory Road
who'd rallied round the family

also started to wonder
what was going on.

-It appeared it was strange.

He did ask me if --
that he thought the police --

He said he thought
the police was blaming him.

He did say that to me.

They think he did it
and stuff like that.

-88 officers working on the case

had taken over 5,000 statements
from local residents,

some of which suggested
that the police themselves

had made more of an effort

to save the six children
than the Philpotts.

On May the 29th, 2012,
18 days after the fatal blaze,

Mick Philpott and his wife,
Mairead, were arrested

on suspicion of murder.

-And again, that was another
strange scenario

because I was sat at my desk,

and a press release pings
into my in-box that says,

"A 56-year-old man
and a 31-year-old woman

have been arrested on suspicion
of murder in connection

with the Victory Road fire,"

and immediately I stood up,
and I shouted over to news desk.

I said, "The Philpotts
have been arrested

on suspicion of murder,"

and that was the second time
in two weeks

that we ran a special edition
of the newspaper,

and that had never
happened before.

Although the police
wouldn't confirm on the record

that this is who it was, we got
confirmation via other sources

that it --
You know, if we said,

"It's the Philpotts that's been
arrested," would we be wrong?

No.

-On the 22nd of June,
funeral services

for 13-year-old Duwayne,
10-year-old Jade,

9-year-old John,
8-year-old Jack,

6-year-old Jesse,
and 5-year-old Jayden

were held at Saint Mary's
Catholic Church in Derby.

In the days
after the deadly fire,

the local community had raised

more than £15,000
to pay for the funerals.

Mick and Mairead Philpott
were not allowed to attend.

-It's very close-knit, Allenton.

Derby, as a city,
is a small city,

but it's a very proud city,

and Allenton and some
of the neighboring areas to it

and some of the, I hasten to use
the word "poorer" areas,

but the less affluent areas,

it's very close-knit,
really close-knit.

I mean, the outpouring
of emotion

from the community was huge.

-On the 5th of November,
a further arrest was made.

Forensic evidence
had found petrol on the clothing

of not just Mick
and Mairead Philpott

but also their friend
Paul Mosley.

All three were originally
charged with murder,

but in December, these charges
were downgraded to manslaughter.

The police accepted that,
although they'd started

the blaze, they had not intended
to kill the children.

-It beggars belief to me

that this charge
is downgraded to manslaughter

because, according to
the statements at the time,

Philpott, his wife, and Mosley

didn't mean to
kill the children.

It's a tiny semi-detached house,

and you've got six
small children,

and you've set fire to it.

How can you not expect at least
one of those children to die?

It defies belief to me.

-At a hearing on
December the 17th,

all three pleaded
not guilty to manslaughter,

meaning a trial
would have to take place.

On the 12th of February, 2013,
at Nottingham Crown Court,

prosecutors set out to prove
that Mick Philpott

had made a plan
that went horribly wrong.

Local reporter Martin Naylor
was in the courtroom.

-I remember Mick,
when he gave evidence,

talking about hearing
a whooshing noise.

When you light petrol,
you're not lighting the fluid.

You're lighting the fumes
that's come off it,

and in the time it had taken
for someone

to put petrol
through the letter box

and then for someone,
probably him, to light it,

you know, this vapor
was all up in the air.

There was a huge whoosh.

What he was describing was
the whoosh of the fire

going flying up the stairs.

Now, those stairs had also been
recently painted with, I think,

a yacht varnish or yacht paint,
which is highly flammable.

So the children, although there
were working smoke alarms

in there, they had no chance.

They literally had no chance,
and obviously the cause of death

was the effects
of smoke inhalation.

-Forensic expert Daniel Matthews
was called to give evidence.

-I did some DNA work on the
petrol cans that were found,

and I did some DNA work
on some items of clothing

that were found in the house
to determine whether or not

they could have been worn
by occupants of the house,

and I did some microscopic
burn damage examination,

which would have
potentially indicated

whether a wearer
of some items of clothing

could have been close
to any amount of the liquid

when it was ignited.

-But because of the ferocity
of the fire,

no evidence remained
inside the house.

However, traces of petrol
had been found

on all three of
the defendants' clothes.

In one of the trial's
key moments,

Mick Philpott was asked to give
his version of the events

from the night
that led to the tragic death

of six of his own children.

-When Mick took the stand,

he was the showman
that he always was.

Again, he was crying,

or supposedly crying,
in the dock,

but the prosecution
saw through all that.

I don't think there was one
single thing that nailed him.

I think it was just the case
just built up

and built and built
and was so strong.

It was almost like piling bricks
on top of him,

just waiting
for him to collapse,

and I think his collapse
came in his cross-examination

because his denials was just
absolutely ripped apart.

-During the trial,
what we've got to remember

is that this
is essentially another stage

on which Mick Philpott performs.

He is playing to an audience.

There are several outbursts
of anger,

and when his relatives
shout at him in court,

he shouts back at them,

and he sticks
his middle finger up to them.

So he really is
incredibly defiant.

He's incredibly showman-like
in his personality.

He wants to be the center
of attention.

He knows that the media circus
is still going on,

and he wants
to be the ringleader.

-On April the 2nd, 2013,

after an emotionally exhausting
eight-week trial,

the jury found the trio guilty
of manslaughter.

-I recall one of Mairead's
sisters standing up

in the public gallery
and shouting to her,

"I knew on day one
you'd done this.

I knew you'd done this,"
before storming out.

It was the first time
that we'd effectively

live blogged from court.

We'd been given permission
by the judge,

and my fingers were trembling
as I was, you know,

typing things out to send back
to the office for them

to just put on the website
straight away,

"Guilty verdict,
guilty verdict."

-On April the 4th, 2013,
during sentencing,

Judge Mrs. Justice Thirlwall
told the trio,

"All three of you
are responsible

for the deliberate
setting of that fire.

All three of you are responsible
for those deaths."

Mairead Philpott and Paul Mosley
were each sentenced to 17 years.

56-year-old Mick Philpott
was sentenced to life.

He was immediately sent

to Wakefield Prison
in West Yorkshire.

Mrs. Justice Thirlwall
described him

as a disturbingly dangerous man

and as the driving force
behind the wicked plan.

-In my opinion, Philpott should
be given a whole life term,

and I do not approve
of whole life terms,

but I cannot think of anyone
who more richly deserves

to spend the rest
of his life behind bars

than Mick Philpott, who killed
six of his own children.

He's a man who deserves nothing
but the greatest contempt,

and I cannot understand,
I will never understand

why he was not charged
and convicted of murder.

-One small mercy it is

that they would probably
have died very quickly,

but that didn't really help
the poor firefighters

who had to give evidence
and tell about bringing

the bodies out of the house
and putting them on the lawn

and trying to keep them
alive outside.

-For the neighbors who tried
to rescue the children,

it was an emotional moment.

-I was relieved
that it was over.

I was a bit shocked
that it was him

because if you did see him
with his kids, his family,

very heartbreaking
because he did love his kids.

He showed that very much.

I think it was some sort of ploy
to get something out of it.

I don't think it was meant
to spread that fast, the fire.

I don't think it was meant
to kill anyone.

I think it was a very stupid
thing to do,

and unfortunately,
he paid for it.

-The case has had a lasting
effect on the nation,

nowhere more so
than in Derby itself.

-I think the initial impact
was massive.

I think it was huge.

Certainly, at the time
of the fire

and in the next almost year

until the guilty verdict
came in,

it was the biggest story
that Derby has ever seen.

I once thought to myself,
and I once said

that I didn't think
Derby would get over this.

I thought it was too big
and too tragic a story

for a city the size
of Derby could forget,

but it has,
and it's got stronger.

The city has definitely
got stronger.

It's united people, and he is
the common enemy of the city

where he was born and raised.

-Philpott was the evil
ringleader in a despicable plan

that led to the death
of six innocent children.

-To me, it sounds like Philpott
was more upset

that the plan didn't work
than the loss of the kids.

I think it will hit him.

I think it hits any father,
you know,

unless you are about
100% psychopath,

which is, like,
you have zero emotions

toward other human beings,
and you pretend everything,

and I don't think
he was that detached.

-I think that Mick Philpott
did an incredibly evil

and incredibly selfish thing.

He was essentially looking
to get revenge

for a perceived wrong
against him

by a woman who he thought
was under his control.

The most tragic part
of this case is the fact

that six children's lives
were lost in Mick Philpott's

attempts to basically
rescue his own ego.

My view of him,
as a criminologist,

he was an incredibly
narcissistic

and a very dangerous man.

He was always going to result
in somebody else being harmed.

His actions would always lead
to someone else coming to harm

because it was all about him.

He never had any empathy,
any concern for anybody else.

-There is not one single word
you can find

to explain or apologize
for his actions.

Seldom have I ever thought
of someone as grotesque

and as thoughtless
and as vain as Philpott is.

There is something about him
that genuinely does send a chill

down your spine.

-Mick Philpott is a greedy
and selfish man.

His lust for revenge on a woman

who left him led to the death
of six of his own children.

He may not have meant
to have killed them,

but his devious plan in which
he involved his wife

and a friend meant that
Duwayne, Jade, John,

Jack, Jesse, and Jayden died
in the most horrific way.

The city of Derby now chooses
to remember them

and not the name
of Mick Philpott,

one of the world's
most evil killers.

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