British Killers

Frederick Walter Stephen West became one of the United Kingdom's most infamous serial killers after murdering numerous young women and girls between the late 1960s and 1980s. Working both alone and with his wife, Rose West, he targeted vulnerable victims, many of whom disappeared after visiting the couple's home at 25 Cromwell Street in Gloucester. The discovery of multiple bodies buried beneath the property exposed one of Britain's most shocking serial murder cases and permanently cemented Fred West's place among the country's most reviled offenders.

Harold Frederick Shipman became one of the most prolific serial killers in modern history after murdering patients under his care while working as a general practitioner in England. Convicted of 15 murders in 2000, a subsequent public inquiry concluded he had likely killed at least 215 patients, with some estimates suggesting the true total exceeded 250. Shipman's abuse of trust, combined with the enormous scale of his crimes, fundamentally changed patient safety, death certification, and medical oversight throughout the United Kingdom.

Ian Duncan Stewart Brady became one of the United Kingdom's most infamous serial killers after carrying out the Moors Murders with Myra Hindley between 1963 and 1965. The pair murdered five children and concealed several victims on Saddleworth Moor, creating one of the most notorious criminal cases in British history. Regarded as the dominant figure in the partnership, Brady spent the remainder of his life imprisoned and became a symbol of extreme criminality in the United Kingdom.

James Desborough is an English serial killer convicted of murdering Claudio Aquilino, Daniel Coleman and his prison cellmate, Steven Kempster, during 2025. Desborough met Aquilino and Coleman while they were living at a homeless shelter in Newquay before murdering, dismembering and attempting to conceal their remains in woodland near his cabin in Cornwall. While on remand awaiting trial, he strangled his prison cellmate at HMP Exeter. In July 2026, he was sentenced to a rare whole life order, ensuring he will never be released from prison. Police are also reviewing four unexplained deaths connected to the same homeless shelter, although Desborough has not been charged in relation to those deaths.

Jamie Reynolds murdered 17-year-old Georgia Williams in Wellington, Shropshire, on 26 May 2013 after luring his friend to his parents' home under the pretence of taking photographs. Reynolds had meticulously planned the killing around his fascination with hanging and violent pornography, using a ligature to strangle Georgia before sexually abusing her body and abandoning her in woodland near Wrexham. He fled the area but was arrested in Glasgow three days later. Reynolds pleaded guilty to murder in December 2013 and was sentenced to a whole-life prison term, meaning he will never be released.

Jason Marshall is a British serial killer who murdered Peter Fasoli in London before fleeing to Italy, where he murdered Vincenzo Iale and attempted to murder another man within weeks. Marshall used deception, impersonating a police officer or intelligence agent to gain his victims' trust before robbing and killing them. Convicted in both Italy and the United Kingdom, he is serving a life sentence with a minimum term of 39 years.

John Reginald Halliday Christie became one of the United Kingdom's most infamous serial killers after murdering multiple women, including his wife, at his home in Notting Hill, London, during the 1940s and early 1950s. His crimes, committed at 10 Rillington Place, led to one of Britain's greatest miscarriages of justice when Timothy Evans was wrongly convicted and executed before Christie's guilt was uncovered. The case remains one of the most significant in British criminal history.

John Cole became one of the United Kingdom's most reviled child killers after murdering five-year-old Logan Mwangi alongside his stepfather, Angharad Williamson, in Bridgend, South Wales, in 2021. Logan suffered prolonged abuse before being fatally assaulted and his body was abandoned in a nearby river. Following a high-profile trial, Cole was convicted of murder despite being only 14 years old at the time of the offence, making him one of the youngest people convicted of murder in modern Welsh criminal history.