Ian Brady's Letter from Ashworth: 5 News Report, 2015

A 5 News report from January 2015 on a 750-word letter Ian Brady wrote from Ashworth Hospital, with John Kilbride's brother Terry and a forensic psychologist. Brady's words are read aloud by others.

Subject

Ian Brady

Recorded

January 2015

Runtime

3:09

Content warning: Concerns the abduction and murder of children (the Moors murders); no graphic detail.

The Report

This is a 5 News report from January 2015 about a letter Ian Brady wrote to the program from Ashworth Hospital in Merseyside. It is not an interview: Brady's voice is not heard. The 5 News reporter had written to him to ask whether the 50th anniversary of some of his crimes had made him feel any guilt. Brady replied with a 750-word letter which, the reporter says, did not mention his victims at all. Two passages from the letter are read aloud in the report. The reporter then shows the letter to Terry Kilbride, whose 12-year-old brother John was one of Brady's victims, and asks a forensic psychologist who had met Brady what the letter suggests.

Historical Context

Between 1963 and 1965 Ian Brady and Myra Hindley murdered five young people in and around Manchester: Pauline Reade, 16; John Kilbride, 12; Keith Bennett, 12; Lesley Ann Downey, 10; and Edward Evans, 17. Several of the victims were buried on Saddleworth Moor. In May 1966, at Chester Assizes, Brady was convicted of the murders of John Kilbride, Lesley Ann Downey and Edward Evans and sentenced to life imprisonment. He later admitted the murders of Pauline Reade and Keith Bennett. Keith Bennett's body has never been found.

Circumstances of the Report

Brady had been held at Ashworth, a high-security psychiatric hospital, since 1985. After an injury in 1999 he went on hunger strike and was force-fed from then on. In 2013 he appeared before a mental health tribunal seeking a transfer to prison; his application was rejected. By January 2015, the report says, he had been largely bedridden since breaking his hip and arm in a fall, and he was claiming in his letters that his health was failing.

What the Report Covers

In the first passage read aloud, Brady complains about his ward and his treatment. Terry Kilbride dismisses the letter as "another ploy" to win sympathy. In the second passage, Brady writes that, had he foreseen spending half a century in prison and being force-fed by nasal tube, he "would have exited decades ago". The forensic psychologist suggests Brady, whom he calls "very egocentric", may fear being forgotten. The report closes on the question of whether Brady will die without revealing where Keith Bennett is buried.

What Makes the Recording Significant

The letter is one of the later letters Brady sent to the media. It shows him, two years before his death, writing about himself and his conditions and not about the children he killed, as the reporter notes. The report sets his words beside the response of a victim's brother who had lived with the case for more than fifty years.

Archival Importance

Brady died at Ashworth Hospital on May 15, 2017, without revealing where Keith Bennett was buried. This report records the question as it stood in 2015 and preserves the reaction of John Kilbride's brother.

Important Caveats

Brady does not speak in this video. The letter passages are his written words read aloud by someone else; it is not clear whether the reader is the reporter or another voice. The first passage is only partly intelligible in the machine transcripts. Brady's complaints about his care and his claims about his health are his own claims. The forensic psychologist is not named in the report, and the reporter's surname has not been verified.

Reporter: For half a century, Ian Brady's breathtaking lack of remorse has remained intact, and he's always stuck by his policy never to apologize to the families of the five victims he lured to their deaths. The only thing to have changed is his health, and now the man who is perhaps Britain's most reviled killer for what he did on Saddleworth Moor claims he's deteriorating quickly. After previous correspondence with Brady, I wrote to him at Ashworth Psychiatric Hospital in Merseyside to ask whether the 50th anniversary of some of his crimes had made him feel any guilt. In response, he sent 5 News this 750-word letter. In it, he doesn't mention his victims, just himself. And despite being frail, he finds the energy to condemn those caring for him.

Brady'S Letter: [unclear: "Still beded than and worsening" / perhaps "Still bedridden and worsening"]. [unclear: "The C is described as" / perhaps "This is described as"] a discharge ward. I've been sitting here 30 years, and there's no turnaround of inmates unless in a coffin, so it's more accurate [as] a blocked sewer pipe.

Reporter: Brady was last seen in public in 2013 at a mental health tribunal, but he has been largely bedridden since then after breaking his hip and arm in a fall. Today, I showed the new letter to Terry Kilbride, who has every reason to resent Brady. His 12-year-old brother John was snatched, then murdered by him in November 1963.

Terry Kilbride: It's just, it's crafty. Very crafty, how he works things and does things. I mean, it's now this letter coming, coming through to you like it has done, about him not being so well, and he's, "Oh, I'm dying, I'm on my deathbed," and all this, you know. It's just another ploy, get people to think, "Oh, do we feel sorry for him?" Like hell they do.

Reporter: Later in the letter, Brady is in a more reflective mood and suggests he wished he had taken his own life years ago.

Brady'S Letter: Had I divined the future of spending half a century in prison and the final 15 years being force-fed by nasal tube in an unmonitored zoological cesspit of regression, I would have exited decades ago.

Reporter: This forensic psychologist, who's met Brady numerous times, says the killer may be feeling ignored by the public.

Forensic Psychologist: Brady is a very egocentric person. He very likes being in the limelight. I think probably at this point in time, he's a little bit frightened that people aren't remembering him, and people have maybe forgotten about him to a certain extent.

Reporter: After five decades, the question as to where he buried the body of 12-year-old Keith Bennett remains. If his poor health is now as bad as he suggests, will Brady go to his grave without revealing that last sad secret? Julian [unclear: "Drucker" / "drer"], 5 News. ---