Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
No music, no flowers and then dumped into Irish Sea in the dead of night
Details of Brady cremation revealed
THE remains of Moors Murderer Ian Brady have been dumped in the Irish Sea in the middle of the night.
Earlier the twisted child serial killer was cremated without any ceremony, speeches, music or flowers.
Terry West, the brother of victim Lesley Ann Downey, said: “My little sister didn’t get to choose how she was buried. If I had my way, I would just flush his ashes down the toilet.”
Brady died at Ashworth Secure Hospital, Merseyside, on May 15, aged 79.
The body was collected from the mortuary at Royal Liverpool Hospital by a Tameside council official at 9pm on October 25, court documents show.
Under police escort, the corpse was taken to Southport Crematorium.
It did not enter public areas and was incinerated in a standby cremator that was later sterilised by two workers.
The ashes were placed in a weighted biodegradable urn, made of Himalayan rock salt and designed to dissolve in the sea. His remains were then driven to Liverpool Marina before being loaded on to police boat Consortium. It sailed into the Irish Sea before the ashes were dumped by a police sergeant and council official at an undisclosed spot at 2.30am. Scotland-born Brady murdered and tortured five children in the 1960s with Myra Hindley, who died in prison in 2002. The victims were Lesley Ann, 10, Keith Bennett, 12, John Kilbride, 12, Pauline Reade, 16, and Edward Evans, 17. Brady had wanted to be cremated in Glasgow and his ashes tipped in the River Clyde. But council chiefs banned him. After his death there were fears Brady’s remains would instead be scattered on Saddleworth Moor, where four of the children were buried. Tameside and Oldham councils, which cover the area east of Manchester, went to court to block such a move. Brady’s solicitor Robin Makin gave assurances there was “no likelihood” of this happening. But the Chancellor of the High Court, Sir Geoffrey Vos, ruled last month the issue of disposal should be taken out of Mr Makin’s hands and given to Tameside council.
He also stated there should be “no music and no ceremony”.
In a statement, Tameside and Oldham councils said: “We are pleased that this matter is now concluded and we are grateful for the support and professionalism shown... to ensure Ian Stewart-brady’s body and remains were disposed of expediently at sea in a manner compatible with the public interest and those of the victim’s relatives.”
Terry Kilbride, 63, brother of murdered John, said he was told in advance of Brady’s cremation.
He added: “I was originally under the impression he was just going to be burnt and put in the grounds of a prison, but being put in the sea is the next best thing. I told my family, so they knew and I told the Bennetts and the Downeys.” Mr Kilbride praised Tameside council, which he said had fought a legal battle to frustrate Brady’s final wishes. He added: “I don’t think he had any rights at all to expect anything when he died.
“This was the only way to really put the families at ease and the public as well.”
Mr Kilbride described Brady as “clever and manipulative”, saying he “tormented” victims’ families from prison. He added: “He always seemed to come up on TV or in the papers around an anniversary or Christmas.
“He actually died on John’s birthday, May 15. You can imagine how that feels.”