Sadistic Killers: Profiles of Pathological Predators Read Online Free Page A
Author: Carol Anne Davis
Tags: General, True Crime
he’d meet her anguished parents at the police station to confirm this.
The newspapers at the time saw this as Heath surrendering to the authorities – but in likelihood the young sociopath thought 25
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SADISTIC KILLERS
that he could talk his way out of it and pretend to aid in the search.
But his fingerprints had already been found in the hotel room where Margery Gardner died and police were looking for him throughout Britain. And when he saw what he thought was Doreen’s ghost (it was her older sister who bore a remarkable resemblance to the murdered woman) he went white and began to shake.
Arrested, he eventually admitted to being Neville Heath. A ticket in his coat led them to a left luggage locker which contained the bloodstained scarf which had tied Margery Gardner’s hands and the other which had muffled her screams. The locker also contained the steel-cored whip which had so cruelly lacerated her flesh. Moreover, a pearl found in his pocket had been torn from a necklace around Doreen Marshall’s throat. His guilt a foregone conclusion, he was remanded in custody in Brixton prison.
Body discovered
On 8 July, a girl out walking her dog found Doreen Marshall’s body hidden under some cut branches and bushes on Branscombe Chine. She was naked apart from one shoe, though her clothes had been piled on top of her body. Her throat had been cut to a three quarter inch depth.
The police now began to investigate Neville Heath’s past, going through the six hundred names in his address books.
Understandably, given the ignorance about consensual sadomasochism which existed at the time, few of his lovers told the truth. For example, the married woman who had screamed when caned too hard told the authorities that she’d only gone to Heath’s room for a friendly drink and that he’d grabbed her arm and twisted it behind her back, telling her that he hated women. She further lied that when she refused 26
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Neville Heath
to strip for him, he threw her against the wall so violently that she passed out.
When she regained consciousness, she told police, she found that she was naked and that he had tied her hands behind her back with a handkerchief. Beating her with his fists, he knocked her out again. In reality, Heath’s biographer Francis Selwyn would later note that they’d had a consensual caning session but he’d probably caned her harder than they’d agreed upon.
Nevertheless, she’d voluntarily left the hotel with him rather than ask the manager to order her a taxi to take her home.
A crowd puller
Heath had cheerfully admitted both murders to the police but his counsel urged him to plead not guilty by reason of insanity for the sake of his family. Shrugging, he entered a not guilty plea.
Questioned by a psychiatrist, he would only say that whipping a girl gave him the kind of sexual release that sexual intercourse gave to most men. He subsequently suggested that he’d recovered from a blackout to find Margery Gardner lying dead next to him. He was so indifferent to the suffering which he’d caused, and so fearless regarding his own imminent fate, that it was evident to the psychiatrist that he was a psychopath.
Newspaper accounts of his flagellation fetish made the case the most talked about of its day, and women flocked to Neville Heath’s trial, coming to blows outside the courtroom in their desperation to reach the public gallery. Some had queued for 14
hours, his sadism clearly having strong appeal. That said, there was no suggestion in the newspapers at this stage that Margery Gardner and previous partners had consented to being tied up and chastened, so the public’s impression was of a man who had forced all of his partners to submit to the whip.
There had, of course, been British sadists before Neville Heath, but they lacked the clear sadistic symbolism of the whip 27
Sadistic
The newspapers at the time saw this as Heath surrendering to the authorities – but in likelihood the young sociopath thought 25
Sadistic Killers_INSIDES.indd 25
29/12/2006 09:58:48
SADISTIC KILLERS
that he could talk his way out of it and pretend to aid in the search.
But his fingerprints had already been found in the hotel room where Margery Gardner died and police were looking for him throughout Britain. And when he saw what he thought was Doreen’s ghost (it was her older sister who bore a remarkable resemblance to the murdered woman) he went white and began to shake.
Arrested, he eventually admitted to being Neville Heath. A ticket in his coat led them to a left luggage locker which contained the bloodstained scarf which had tied Margery Gardner’s hands and the other which had muffled her screams. The locker also contained the steel-cored whip which had so cruelly lacerated her flesh. Moreover, a pearl found in his pocket had been torn from a necklace around Doreen Marshall’s throat. His guilt a foregone conclusion, he was remanded in custody in Brixton prison.
Body discovered
On 8 July, a girl out walking her dog found Doreen Marshall’s body hidden under some cut branches and bushes on Branscombe Chine. She was naked apart from one shoe, though her clothes had been piled on top of her body. Her throat had been cut to a three quarter inch depth.
The police now began to investigate Neville Heath’s past, going through the six hundred names in his address books.
Understandably, given the ignorance about consensual sadomasochism which existed at the time, few of his lovers told the truth. For example, the married woman who had screamed when caned too hard told the authorities that she’d only gone to Heath’s room for a friendly drink and that he’d grabbed her arm and twisted it behind her back, telling her that he hated women. She further lied that when she refused 26
Sadistic Killers_INSIDES.indd 26
29/12/2006 09:58:48
Neville Heath
to strip for him, he threw her against the wall so violently that she passed out.
When she regained consciousness, she told police, she found that she was naked and that he had tied her hands behind her back with a handkerchief. Beating her with his fists, he knocked her out again. In reality, Heath’s biographer Francis Selwyn would later note that they’d had a consensual caning session but he’d probably caned her harder than they’d agreed upon.
Nevertheless, she’d voluntarily left the hotel with him rather than ask the manager to order her a taxi to take her home.
A crowd puller
Heath had cheerfully admitted both murders to the police but his counsel urged him to plead not guilty by reason of insanity for the sake of his family. Shrugging, he entered a not guilty plea.
Questioned by a psychiatrist, he would only say that whipping a girl gave him the kind of sexual release that sexual intercourse gave to most men. He subsequently suggested that he’d recovered from a blackout to find Margery Gardner lying dead next to him. He was so indifferent to the suffering which he’d caused, and so fearless regarding his own imminent fate, that it was evident to the psychiatrist that he was a psychopath.
Newspaper accounts of his flagellation fetish made the case the most talked about of its day, and women flocked to Neville Heath’s trial, coming to blows outside the courtroom in their desperation to reach the public gallery. Some had queued for 14
hours, his sadism clearly having strong appeal. That said, there was no suggestion in the newspapers at this stage that Margery Gardner and previous partners had consented to being tied up and chastened, so the public’s impression was of a man who had forced all of his partners to submit to the whip.
There had, of course, been British sadists before Neville Heath, but they lacked the clear sadistic symbolism of the whip 27
Sadistic
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