Inseparable Bond

by David Poulter

  With his vanity, he had affairs with many women but his friends never told his wife and his conquests were not prepared to confide that Booth was a rough lover who enjoyed beating and half-choking them, always preferring painful anal sex.

  Soon his attacks on his mistresses became more and more violent; soon he was attacking innocent strangers with scissors and knives, aroused by the sight of their blood. As he constantly escaped detection, he stepped up the rate of attacks, varying his style to cover his tracks.

  A few months later, the City of York was in the grip of terror. Police had pinned twenty perverted crimes, including four killings, down to someone who seemed to have vampire tendencies, but they had no clues to the monster loose in their city.

  With the police frantically searching the city and surrounding area as far away as Harrogate, two girls, one 14 and her 5-year-old sister, walked from the playground and down the lane through the woods towards a row of shops. Booth approached the girls and said, ‘I’ve forgotten my cigarettes, would you run to those shops and buy me some and spend the rest of the money on sweets for you, I’ll look after your little sister while you go.’ Off she ran skipping down the lane holding the £5 note as she ran.

  Booth picked up her 5-year-old sister, carried her into the dark woods and efficiently slaughtered her, strangling her and cutting her throat with his pocket-knife. When her sister arrived with the cigarettes, he took the cigarettes and did the same to her.

  Twelve hours later, he drove to the other side of the city where he noticed a teenager heading towards a wooded area. He stopped the car and followed her, He grabbed her and threw her to the ground and he attempted to rape her, but she fought him off. He produced his pocket-knife and began stabbing her in a frenzy, piercing her neck, shoulder and back. As she rolled over, the knife snapped leaving the blade wedged in her back. She was lucky, her screams alerted a passer-by and she was rushed to hospital, but Booth had escaped yet again. The newspapers and local radio continued to report his exploits with mounting hysteria.

  The police now had their first clue of the broken knife blade, which doctors retrieved from the girl’s back, but Booth’s appetite, for blood, was increasing.

  She was not his last victim and the attempted murders and vicious attacks continued around the city through the winter and early spring, attracting continuous newspaper coverage and radio and television broadcasts.

  All women were now on their guard and warned to stay off the city streets after dark, but Sally Newsome, a 21-year-old waitress had read the warnings about the vampire while working in Knaresborough twenty miles away, but when she was sacked from her job, she boarded a train to York, her desperation for employment outweighed any fears of the vampire, as he had become known.

  As she left the train, she was approached by a man who offered to show her the way to a girl’s hostel, after establishing she had no accommodation for the night.

  She accompanied him happily but as they approached a group of trees, she drew back. The man assured her she had nothing to fear, but she refused to walk any further. As they argued, a man appeared from the shadows of the trees and asked, ‘Is everything alright,’ Sally’s escort ran off and she was left alone with her rescuer – Richard Booth.

  She was convinced that he had saved her from a fate worse than death, or death itself.

  Being shaken by her ordeal, she felt safe with her rescuer and agreed to walk with him to the hostel, unaware that she was being misled for the second time in less than an hour.

  Booth led her along the dark path then lunged at her, gripping her throat and attempting to rape her against a tree. Sally struggled but Booth was too strong for her, then as she was about to pass out, he raped her. She screamed hysterically, which frightened Booth as he ran off in to the dark woods.

  A woman walking her dog found Sally Newsome half naked. She was taken to hospital and was able to give a detailed description of Booth.

  Booth realised he had now blown his cover, as the net was closing in. He approached his small house and went inside to his waiting wife. He looked bedraggled, his clothes torn, with blood on his shirt. His wife took one look at him and left the house.

  She reported this to the police immediately, although she had suspected for some time that he could have been implicated in the crimes.

  The police visited the house to question him. Realising his murderous spree was at an end, he confessed to all the attacks and murders.

  The trial held in Leeds Crown Court was almost a forgone conclusion; thousands surrounded the court house to try and catch a glimpse of the vampire, yet now John Bell was within arms reach of this monster as he kicked his ball again the high perimeter fence of the prison exercise yard.

  Bell and the other inmates were called back into the building where they all returned to their working departments, Bell being in the prison laundry.

  He went into the toilet before entering the laundry, when he heard a scuffling sound behind one of the latrines. He slowly peered his head around the partition to see a young inmate, no older than 25, being forced to give oral sex to a prison officer where he was choking on the penis being thrust down the lad’s throat.

  Bell immediately backed away and continued his walk to the laundry room.

  He had disturbed the couple and was now being followed by the screw who pinned Bell against the wall saying, ‘If you say anything about what you saw, it will be down your throat next,’ and released his hold and pushed him down the corridor.

  Bell had soon realised that all he saw and all he heard was not to be mentioned and the sex offenders prison wing he was living on was a dangerous and inhospitable place and to keep yourself to yourself at all times.

  He disliked the laundry job, but all new inmates had to do their stint in that hot and dirty atmosphere.

  There were certain other jobs which were much sought after and that may well carry influences and power in the prisoner community, these are to be found wherever things that are desirable – in the kitchen, in the stores or to a lesser extent in the library. There is always a black market in prisons; food, clothes, and books. This is apart from the trafficking of tobacco and of course drugs, which find their way into penal institutions.

  The prevailing values are criminal, the economy is characterised by a shortage of money and of goods, satisfactions are few, a sense of grievance and of importance abounds where there is little laughter but much depression, boredom may often be punctured by spite and sometimes by violence, thus is the society of inmates.

  Bell wanted to do his sentence in peace, where there is a good deal of co-operation between prisoners and screws and the mutual interest in preventing the breakdown of the normal functioning of the institution, all the time each side has its own loyalty.

  Being a model prisoner does earn benefits and Bell wanted to keep well clear of fights between rival leaders even though they are accepted as normal behaviour.

  Keeping his nose clean could result in a job in the stores or the library, but it was early days for him to prove himself.

  After his day’s work, he went back to his cell to see the bookshelf cleared of magazines and no sign of his cellmate. The bed had been stripped, revealing only a heavily stained mattress and pillow.

  He was now in his own cell, which was large in comparison to other single cells, yet this was for three inmates and his privacy would soon be disturbed with the arrival of two new cellmates.

  He remained alone for the next six weeks, still working in the laundry and still without friends, as he began to feel the extent of separation from the outside world where any links between prison and the outside society consisted only of letters and visits which Bell did not often receive either, and was restricted to newspapers, television and radio to realise the developments as the outside world continued to expand.

  He spent his nights in the television room, watching football or a film. Sundays were often the worst days as some inmates go to a religious service in the chapel, not ne
cessarily out of religious conviction, and then were given longer exercise periods as most of the screws had their time off and the inmates spent most of the day being locked up in their cells.

  After yet another day in the sweatbox of the laundry, Bell returned to his cell to be confronted by a new inmate; he was a tall, thin white guy dressed in the usual blue overalls and emptying his bag onto the lower bed on the bunk.

  ‘Hi, I’m John Bell, who are you?’ the guy turned to Bell with a frozen smile. ‘Hi I’m Colin,’ as he quickly turned back to unpacking his bag.

  Colin Palmer had been sentenced to fifteen years for a string of crimes of various natures.

  He was from Staffordshire and had been born into a respectable hard working family, four of his brothers and sisters led perfectly normal lives, but his eldest sister had turned to promiscuity and drug taking and became an alcoholic in her early teens.

  He had gone to medical school at the request of his father, but failed many of the stringent courses as Palmer was more intent on profit and profligacy than medicine.

  He stole from his employer and took advantage of his trusted position to seduce his employer’s patients, where he assisted a top surgeon in the local hospital. Eventually the surgeon lost patience with his troublesome assistant and enrolled him as a ward orderly at the Stafford Infirmary.

  Palmer quickly found that this did not lesson his opportunities for sex and stealing and he also grabbed the opportunity to indulge in a new passion – poisons.

  Many poisons were reported missing from the dispensary and the authorities barred him from the dispensary, but Palmer was not easily rebuffed.

  A male nurse had been unwise enough to accept the offer of a drink at the local bar with him, unaware that Palmer was having a relationship with his wife. After only two glasses of whisky, the male nurse became violently sick and died four hours later in his sleep. Although the authorities were suspicious, nothing could be proved against Palmer who was the last person to see him alive. He was subsequently sacked from the hospital for theft.

  Palmer went about producing false medical papers and qualifications to the Hampshire medical authorities and was soon set up in practice in Bournemouth after purchasing a large house in the town centre from the proceeds of his lucky gambling addiction.

  With there being a shortage of doctors in the town, the locals were eager to put their lives in the new doctor’s hands. He married Marion Sykes, a local woman who was illegitimate, her father had committed suicide earlier that year and her mother had taken refuge in drink. Both Marion and her mother had been left well provided for on his death, with her mother living in a half a million pound house on Canford Cliffs.

  Marion had been awarded a large amount of money and a regular allowance. Marion’s mother was opposed to the marriage, but it went ahead against her disapproval.

  The couple were very much in love but their happiness was clouded when their children kept dying. Two were killed by mysterious convulsions when they were only a few days old, and the third son being the only one to survive.

  Several of Palmer’s friends and relations were not so lucky, he called to visit his uncle Jack in nearby Southampton, he was a drunken degenerate and Palmer invited him for a drink in his uncle’s local pub.

  His uncle died a few days later, leaving him a comfortable amount of money on his death.

  Palmer invited his mother-in-law to stay with his wife and the one son, yet although she was an alcoholic, she still had enough of her wits about her to detest her daughter’s husband. She was dead two days after arriving at their house.

  That nobody found anything suspicious into the deaths of those around Palmer was down to his fine performance as an actor. To the community he was a respected, church-going man, charming, kind and generous. His wife thought he was doing his best to save her mother when he gave her medication and personally prepared her food.

  He was clever enough to allay suspicion by calling in a second opinion, a fellow local doctor who, although an ageing 70-year-old, was prepared to agree with the young doctor’s diagnosis. The death of his mother-in-law was not as profitable as he had expected. Her property was tied up and the little money left for her daughter was a mere drop in the ocean compared to the amount of his mounting gambling debts.

  He owed thousands of pounds to his best friend after a run of bad luck. He invited him back to his house and after a convivial evening, he took to his bed with a severe stomach pain.

  His wife was called and she remained by his side until he died two days later.

  Palmer’s wife was becoming upset about the death of her mother, her children and now his friend and all in the same house. Palmer’s finances were now in a more hopeless state than ever.

  With his debts now out of control, he took out two life policies on his wife, as he needed to gain money desperately, desperate enough to murder the woman he loved.

  Strangely the insurance companies did not bother to ask how a doctor with a small salary could afford to pay the large premiums required for the two policies.

  He managed to tide himself over with more borrowing from friends, when as luck would have it, his wife returned home from visiting friends with a heavy cold and feeling unwell. She took to her bed and received many phone calls from her relatives asking into her condition. Palmers devoted care soon turned a minor ailment into a chronic antimony poisoning.

  On her death, he took the precaution of getting further opinions from two other doctors who were prepared to concur with Palmers diagnosis.

  The insurance companies were at first reluctant to settle the policies he had taken out such a short time before and were suspicious at such a sudden death in a seemingly healthy 27-year-old woman, but faced with the verdict of two doctors of good repute, they decided not to call for an inquest.

  On the large pay out, Palmer was able to clear his debts, shrugging off the suspicions of the two insurance companies, but when he applied for life insurance for his young son, their suspicions were alerted and they investigated his application and the recent death of his wife.

  The police were drawn into the investigation when a warrant was issued to search Palmer’s house and exhume the bodies of his wife and his recent visitor where an autopsy was performed. The results were conclusive; they had all been poisoned with large doses of insecticide. He was sentenced to life and John Bell was sentenced to a shared cell with Raymond Palmer.

  ‘What’s it like in this place then?’ Palmer asked.

  ‘Ninety per cent boredom, ten per cent on a knife edge, the inmates run it, pretty much, and if anything kicks off, there’s nothing the screws can do apart from call for reinforcements, so they’re given a fair bit of leeway,’ Bell replied.

  ‘I’d like to get my hands on that bastard who shoved me in here,’ said Palmer, ‘he’s a cruel, hard-faced bastard who enjoys looking at guy’s arses. It’s not my first time in the slammer but it’s the first time a screw has touched my arse like that,’ Palmer said.

  ‘Which screw was that then?’ asked Bell.

  ‘That big bloke with the shaven head, Dickson, I think they called him.’ Bell realised it was the same screw who had threatened him after he had disturbed the young lad giving him a blowjob in the shower block.

  ‘I know him. He gets the young lads to go down on him when there’s nobody around,’ said Bell.

  ‘Well if I get chance, I’d like to see how he likes it,’ Palmer said, as his rubbed his hands before grabbing his crotch.

  Palmer threw his bedding on the lower bunk and climbed onto it mumbling, ‘I’ll get that bastard, you wait, the first time you’re on your own, you’re a dead man,’ he muttered.

  It was known throughout the sex offenders wing that many of the inmates have sexual problems, for people who have difficulties with social relationships are likely to have difficulties with sexual relationships and in this place there were many who will manifest themselves through, shyness, exhibitionism, untruthfulness, and the tendency to
exploit others, yet this was never subjected to a prison officer, or at least as far as Bell was aware, yet the thought of this did excite his sadistic sexual appetite.

  There were many homosexuals on the wing, Bell being one of them, but in the ‘nick’ they are still known as ‘queers’, by now being an historic term.

  Although they were still in the minority, they were looked upon as profoundly different from the others and the first to be raped, particularly if their crimes had been towards children.

  Through the unavailability of the opposite sex, there is a greater proportion of homosexuality in the prison than in the average population on the outside, plus the sex offenders and an unknown number of other offenders who are also deviant and inadequate.

  The other wings in the prison offered home visits at weekends, where two nights at home is long enough to re-establish a sexual relationship in a natural atmosphere, but for Bell and many others in his high security offender’s wing, nobody was ever given the privilege.

  Most prisoners would masturbate because there is little else to do but it still leaves the sexual pathology and complex problems untouched where there is a lack of affection and tenderness from a partner.

  Rape is commonplace and goes unreported due to the repercussions from other inmates, resulting in further rapes. This normally happens late at night in the cells or the shower block, like the incident Bell had witnessed a few months earlier.

  Palmer was hanging over the corridor railings watching the arrival of a new set of inmates, with his eyes firmly fixed on officer Dickson as he unfastened the handcuffs of an old guy and pushed him along the corridor. As he walked back into the cell he repeated his intentions, ‘I’ll shag that bastard good and proper one day,’ he said.

  Palmer lay on his bunk, staring out at the small barred window. Along the landing we could hear spyglasses clicking as a member of the staff did their hourly check.

  The screw arrived at our cell and slammed the door shut and locked it.