Mary Bell – Stacy Green

Thriller Thursday: The Deepest Circle of Hell

Stacy — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 13:51:43 +0000

Due to this post from Roni Loren (thank you for the warning, Roni) I’ve decided to remove most photos from Thriller Thursday. I hope you’re still able to enjoy them!

In Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Captain Jack Sparrow tells Barbosa the “deepest circle of hell is reserved for betrayers and mutineers.”

I’d like to think the very deepest and hottest pit is set aside for the most horrendous criminals of all: child molesters/killers.

Unlike Mary Bell, Arthur Gary Bishop had a normal childhood. Born in Hinkley, UT in 1951, Bishop grew up in a devout Mormon family and was an Eagle Scout and an honor student. When he turned eighteen, he served as a missionary in the Phillippenes.

He would go on to molest and kill five young boys.

Years later, a student who knew Bishop in high school would say he was a “geek, rarely if ever finding someone who would accept the rare offer of a date.”

After his arrest in 1983, Bishop would admit to being addicted to porn—specifically, kiddie porn. He cultivated sick fantasies for years until he finally had to act them out.

Bishop didn’t start out hunting kids. His first scrape with the law came in 1978 when he was convicted of embezzling $8,714 from a used-car dealership where he worked as a bookkeeper. Those who knew him couldn’t believe it, but Bishop pled guilty and promised full restitution. The courts believed him. Then he jumped bail and took off.

Bishop at trial.

Once the news had broke about Bishop’s horrifying crimes, several Utah parents complained about him molesting their kids, but none had come forward prior to the murders. Had they approached police, they might have save the lives of Bishop’s victims.

Bishop made his way to Salt Lake City, changing his name to “Roger Downs.” That’s the name he wrote down when he joined the Big Brothers program, giving himself access to boys desperately in need of a father figure. The organization would later admit to getting tips about Downs’s molesting at least two kids—neither of which were assigned as his little brother. Big Brothers/Big Sisters said the accusations were reported but the police did nothing.

In 1979, molesting the boys was no longer enough.

On October 14, 1979, little Alonzo Daniels vanished from the courtyard of his apartment complex in Salt Lake City. Police combed the area, encountering “Roger Downs” in his apartment just across the hall from Alonzo’s. Of course, he denied knowing anything about the boy’s disappearance.

Bishop (a.k.a Downs) had lured the little boy away with candy, then (according to his confession), tried to undress and touch Alonzo once he had him in the solitude of his apartment. When Alonzo cried and threatened to tell his mother, Bishop lost control. He clubbed the four-year-old with a hammer and then drowned him in the bathtub.

Even worse, Bishop marched past Alonzo’s mother as she searched the courtyard for her child, never knowing his body was in the cardboard box her neighbor had just carried out to his car.

If that’s not the act of a savage animal, I don’t know what is.

The search for Alonzo included the city’s search and rescue team as well as hundreds of citizens, but it was too late. Bishop buried the Alonzo 20 miles southwest of Salt Lake City in the desert near the town of Cedar Fort.

Bishop would later say he felt disgust as his crime but also a sick excitement. And he knew he’d kill again.

There was no doubt Bishop knew right from wrong. Whether out of guilt or fear of arrest, he spent the next year trying to find other ways to soothe his urges. He adopted about fifteen puppies from shelters and used them as substitutes for the kids.

“It was so stimulating,” Bishop told Detective Don Bell. “A puppy whines just like Alonzo did. I would get frustrated at the whining. I would hit them with hammers or strangle them.”

The puppies weren’t enough. Bishop kept molesting kids, threatening them from telling. As long as the child was docile, Bishop didn’t feel the need to kill them. But fighting back or threatening to tell made him lash out.

Eleven-year-old Kim Peterson would become Bishop’s next casualty. He met the boy at a skating rink on November 8, 1980. When Kim said he’d like to sell his skates so he could buy a new pair, Peterson offered the boy $35.

The next day, Peterson left his house with his rollar skates. He’d told parents he was going to sell them, but that he’d come straight home.

Soon, another search party was formed. Witnesses from the skating rink remembered seeing Kim talking to a man around 25-35. They said he had a full face and wore glasses as well as an Army jacket or some kind of parka. Other leads turned up, but they were no good.

“Roger Downs” lived a few blocks away from the Peterson’s home. He was again questioned and no connection was made. Bishop had bludgeoned Peterson to death and buried him near Alonzo’s body.

Like most serial killers, the violence was easier the second time around, the fear waned, and the rush of murder grew.

Eleven months later, four-year-old Danny Davis became Bishop’s next victim.

“I saw the most beautiful little boy kneeling in the aisle.”
–Bishop to the Deseret News

After trying to get candy from the gumball machine, Danny refused Bishop’s offer. Bishop moved to leave, but in a terrible twist, Danny had decided to follow the man and get some candy. Bishop led him to the parking lot.

Danny’s grandmother couldn’t find him and summoned the manager. Shoppers remembered seeing a little boy at the candy machine with a nice young man, but no one could I.D. photos of Danny.

The search for Danny Davis became among the biggest in Salt Lake City history. A $20,000 reward was offered, and the FBI, Child Find and the National Crime Information Center became involved, but no answers were found.

Bishop molested the boy, quieting his crying by pinching his nose and covering his mouth. He dumped his body with the other two like trash and went on with his life.

“Roger Downs” lived less than a block from the grocery. Again, police knocked on his door and again, no one realized “Roger Downs” lived close to all three victims. Years later, neighbors would remember Downs had a special affection for kids.

I don’t know how this wasn’t put together soon. Perhaps it was indicative of the age, when horrific child molesters were still relatively unknown. Maybe Bishop was just that good of a con man. Whatever the reason, he wasn’t finished killing.

In the police’s defense, other than being in proximity to “Downs,” there were no similarities in the cases. The boys were taken on different days of the week, at different times. Bishop broke the rule of serial killers and preyed on a victim outside his race with Alonzo Daniels. Kim Peterson was much older than Daniels and Davis.

Two years passed without a disappearance. Then on June 23rd, 1983, Troy Ward vanished. Allowed to play by himself at a park near his house, Troy was supposed to meet a family friend at four o’clock so he could be driven home for his sixth birthday party. Troy didn’t show.

A witness reported seeing a little boy matching Troy’s description leaving the scene with a man just before four. They seemed happy and the witness thought they were father and son.

Can you imagine the torment that witness later went through?

Like the others, Bishop molested Troy. He would tell Detective Bell that he thought about letting Troy go, but the boy’s threat to tell changed his mind. Troy was killed in the same manner as the others, but for whatever reason, Bishop buried him near Big Cottonwood Creek.

Like most serials, Bishop finally escalated. He could no longer satiate himself for long periods between kills. A month later, he killed thirteen-year-old Graeme Cunningham.

On July 14, 1983, Graeme was ready to go on a long-planned weekend camping trip. His companions? A classmate and an adult, Roger Downs.

Graeme disappeared before the trip. Snakeline, Roger Downs visited the Cunningham’s home to offer help.

“I wanted to help her,” Bishop later told Detectives. “I just didn’t know how to tell her I killed her son.”

Bishop’s reign of killing was about to come to an end. A detective finally recognized “Roger Downs” had been interrogated after each disappearance and that he lived close to the first four victims and was familiar with the parents of the fifth.

They couldn’t believe it—the killer may have been under their noses the entire time. Could he have made such a mistake as to take a boy he was known to? Yes, in fact. Killers often let down their guard and are caught by dumb decisions.

“Downs” was brought in for questioning, and by morning Detective Bell had the whole story, including his real name, from Arthur Gary Bishop.

The next morning, Bishop led police to the boys remains.

“I’m glad they caught me. Because I’d do it again.”

Bishop’s trial began on February 27, 1984. Bishop said his addiction to child pornography caused his fantasies and drove him to act out. Six weeks later, he was found guilty of five counts of aggravated murder, five counts of aggravated kidnapping, and one count of sexually abusing a minor. He was sentenced to death. Bishop apologized to the victims families and requested to be executed by lethal injection.

Before his execution, Bishop wrote the following letter:

“I am a homosexual pedophile convicted of murder, and pornography was a determining factor in my downfall. Somehow I became sexually attracted to young boys, and I would fantasize about them naked. Certain bookstores offered sex education, photographic, or art books which occasionally contained pictures of nude boy. I purchased such books and used them to enhance my fantasies … All boys became sexual objects. My conscience was desensitized and my sexual appetite entirely controlled my actions.”

Arthur Gary Bishop was executed by lethal injection at Utah State Prison on June 10, 1988. He did express remorse for his crimes, but I find no compassion for him. I’m against the death penalty in many cases, but this is one where I feel justice was served.

What do you think? Should Bishop have been sentenced to death? Should there be a mandatory death sentence for child killers?

Thriller Thursday: The Sweet Face of Pure Evil

Stacy — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 09:00:00 +0000

Mary Bell in 1968, aged 10.

Look at that face. So sweet, almost cherubic. An innocent child, right? Wrong. Mary Bell murdered two toddlers when she was just ten years old, making her one of the youngest (if not the youngest) serial killers in history and a true psychopath.

Mary Bell lived about 275 miles north of London in the small town of Scotswood. Her mother was a prostitute and her father unnamed, although he was thought to be Billy Bell, a known criminal. Family members would later claim Mary attempted to murder her mother several times as a child. Mary would also say she was a victim of sexual abuse and that her mother forced to her to have sex with men as a young child.

On May 25, 1968, just a day before her eleventh birthday, Mary strangled four-year-old Martin Brown and left his body in a condemned house. He small hands couldn’t squeeze hard enough to leave marks, and the murder went unsolved.

Martin Brown

Then, in July, Mary decided she wanted to kill again. She chose three-year old Brian Howe as her victim and enlisted the help of her troubled friend, Norma. The little boy was found in an industrial area, covered with grass and weeds. A pair of scissors lay nearby. There were puncture marks on his thighs, his genitals partially skinned. Clumps of hair were missing. An “M” had been etched onto the boy’s tummy with a razor blade.

There was a terrible playfulness about it, a terrible gentleness if you like, and somehow the playfulness made it more, rather than less, terrifying. – Inspector James Dobson.

Brian Howe

Before Brian’s body was discovered by police, Mary and Norma had offered to help the toddler’s older sister Pat search for him, going so far as to take her into the industrial area where his body lay. Mary wanted the sister to find the boy’s body, “because she wanted Pat Howe to have a shock,” Norma later said. Pat insisted he wouldn’t go that far from home and left.

Although she was barely eleven, Mary Bell immediately stood out to investigators, along with her friend Norma. Mary acted aloof while Norma was animated and excited, one authority said, “smiling as if it were a huge joke.”

With investigators honing in on her, Mary’s memory conveniently returned. She told investigator she saw a boy with Brian on the day he died. She claimed he hit the toddler for no reason, and that she had also seen the same boy playing with broken scissors. Even a calculating psychopath makes mistakes: the boy in question had been at the airport the day Brian died, and the scissors had been kept confidential. Mary described the scissors in detail, right down to their silver coloring and broken leg.

The scissors Mary Bell used to mutilate Brian Howe.

On August 7th, Brian Howe was laid to rest.

“Mary Bell was standing in front of the Howe’s house when the coffin was brought out. I was, of course, watching her. And it was when I saw her there that I knew I dare not risk another day. She stood there, laughing. Laughing and rubbing her hands. I thought, My God, I’ve got to bring her in, she’ll do another one.” – Inspector Dobson.

Dobson questioned Norma before Brian’s funeral. The girl now said Mary told her she had killed Brian and showed her his body. Mary allegedly told Norma “I squeezed his neck and pushed up his lungs, that’s how you kill them.” Norma claimed that when Mary showed her the body, Mary stroked the dead boy’s lips and said she had enjoyed killing him.

Police picked Mary up, and Dobson said that while the child was weary, she kept her wits. Dobson tried a variety of tactics with Mary, hoping to entice the truth out of her.

“I have reason to believe that when you were near the blocks with Norma, a man shouted at some children and you both ran away from where Brian was laying in the grass. This man will probably know you,” Dobson said.

“He would have to have good eyesight.”

“Why would he need good eyesight?” Dobson asked.

“Because he was…clever to see me when I wasn’t there.” Mary then said she was being brainwashed and that she was going home. Dobson refused and forged on. Mary held fast.

“I am making no statements. I have made lots of statements. It’s always me you come for. Norma’s a liar, she always tries to get me into trouble.”

Note written by Mary Bell after the murders, found at a nursery she and Norma broke into.

Ignoring the nagging voice in the back of his head, Dobson allowed Mary to leave. He later brought her back to the station after getting more information from Norma.

Still cool under pressure, Mary finally admitted to being present when Brian died but implicated Norma as the actual murderer. Mary claimed she tried to pull Norma off the little boy, but that Norma screamed at her and kept strangling him. You can read Mary’s full statement here.

When Dobson told Mary she was being charged with the murder of Brian Howe, she reportedly said, “That’s all right with me.”

Once she was incarcerated, stories of Mary’s bizzarre behavior and abuse began to surface. Other children said she was a show off, and they didn’t believe her when she went around claiming she was a murderer.

According to friends and family, Mary had pushed her cousin several feet off a ledge behind some sheds, leaving him bleeding from the head. She also attacked three girls at a daycare, with Norma in tow. One of the girls claimed Mary had squeezed her throat, asking “what happens if you choke someone, do they die?”

Headline during Mary Bell’s trial.

Mary was soon connected to Martin Brown’s murder that had occurred months earlier. The three boys who had found the boys body remembered Mary and Norma squeezing through a broken section of boards to get into the house. Mary had brought Norma to show her the boy’s body.

Because police could find no signs of violence, the cause of death had been left open. But ice-cold Mary and Norma revelled in tormenting the boy’s aunt, asking her if she missed Martin and if she cried for him.

The girls didn’t stop there. June Richardson, Martin’s grieving mother, was also a target.

“Mary smiled and asked to see Martin. I said, ‘no pet, Martin is dead.’ She turned round and said, ‘Oh I know he’s dead. I wanted to see him in his coffin.’ She was still grinning. I was just speechless that such a young child should want to see a dead baby, and I just slammed the door on her.”

June Richardson with a picture of Martin.

At trial, the psychiatrist who had interviewed Mary said she exhibited the classic signs of psychopathy: she showed no remorse and was completely unemotional. Mary Bell was convicted of manslaughter while Norma was found not guilty and placed under psychiatric evaluation.

I have no idea how she only received manslaughter, but I can only assume it was because of her age.

The authorities had no idea what to do with an eleven-year-old murderer, so Mary spent the rest of her juvenile years floating from one institution to another. After the conviction, she continued to make headlines as her heartless and greedy mother sold stories about her to the press. In 1977, Mary escaped from Moore Open Court Prison, where she’d been since her transfer from a young offenders institution.

Mary Bell at 16.

Mary was released from prison in 1980 at the age of twenty-three, serving only twelve years for the murders of two helpless little boys. Even worse, she was granted anonymity, including a new name, to start a new life with her daughter (born in May, 1984). Their location was eventually discovered and the two had to escape the house under the cover of bed sheets. Yet another innocent child had been affected by Mary’s hideous actions, but this time it was her own flesh and blood.

Mary Bell in 1980 after her release.

Mary and her daughter were supposed to lose their anonymity when the child turned 18. But to the heartbreak of the victim’s families, Mary Bell succeeded in having her own anonymity and her daughter’s extended for life.

The Brown and Howe families were devastated. Mary had not only served very little time for the double homicides, but she also made money with an autobiography and would now be able to hide behind her daughter for the rest of her life, effectively negating any accountability.

Bell recently had a grandchild, and the order has been extended to include him.

“A child is a blessing. She took my blessing and left me with grief for the rest of my life. I hope when she looks at this child she remembers the two she murdered. I will never see a grandchild from my son. I hope when she looks at this baby she realized what my family are missing out on because of what she has done.”

— June Richardson, mother of Martin Brown.

You can find much more of Mary’s story here.

In all my research of violent crimes, this has to be the worst. The chilling way Mary spoke of her victims and her utter lack of remorse is astounding. What do you think? Should she have served more time, and should she be allowed anonymity?