NOW the police apologise at last... 45 years too late
THE families of Sutcliffe’s victims were given a ‘heartfelt apology’ yesterday by police over their attitude toward the sex workers he murdered.
It followed an appeal by Richard McCann, the son of the Yorkshire Ripper’s first murder victim, for officers to say sorry for implying some of the women he killed were not innocent.
The investigation became the focus of massive national attention after the fifth murder – that of 16-year-old shop assistant Jayne MacDonald in 1977. The four previous murder victims had been known as sex workers.
The attitude of police toward these women, including Wilma McCann, 28, was said by her son to have caused him shame and had a damaging impact on his childhood.
‘It really affected me,’ said Mr McCann, who has used his experience to become a motivational speaker. ‘I was ashamed of being associated with Sutcliffe and all his crimes and, possibly, to do with the way that lots of people in society looked down, and the police and some of the media – describing some of the women as innocent and some not so innocent.’
He told the BBC he wanted his mother, who was battered with a hammer and stabbed in October 1975, to be remembered as a mother of four children ‘going through adversity’.
John Robins, Chief Constable of West Yorkshire, said: ‘I apologise for the additional distress and anxiety caused to all relatives by the language, tone and terminology used by senior officers at the time in relation to Peter Sutcliffe’s victims.
‘Such language and attitudes may have reflected wider societal attitudes of the day, but it was as wrong then as it is now.
‘Thankfully those attitudes are consigned to history and our approach today is wholly victim focused, putting them at the centre of everything we do.’
Mistakes made in the investigation led by Assistant Chief Constable George Oldfield meant opportunities were missed to catch Sutcliffe.
The force was overwhelmed with paperwork, with everything written on index cards.