One of Britain’s leading forensic psychologists, who has sat across from some of the world’s most disturbed criminal minds, has revealed he has never disliked a subject more than that of Moors killer Ian Brady.
Professor Jeremy Coid met Brady in 2003 while carrying out a mental health review for him at Ashworth High Security Psychiatric Hospital in Merseyside.
Brady, then 65, had been jailed for 37 years for the gruesome Moors murders with his evil accomplice Myra Hindley in the 1960s.
The twisted pair who have been remembered as ‘The Moors Murderers’ engaged in sadistic brutality and the murder of five children, before burying their bodies on Saddleworth Moor in north-west England.
Professor Coid made his comments in an interview with independent filmmaker Thomas Gardnerremembering that his first impression of the sadistic killer was remarkably discreet.
One of Britain’s leading forensic psychologists has revealed he has never disliked a subject more than the murder of Moors, Ian Brady (pictured)
Professor Jeremy Coid met Brady in 2003 while conducting a mental health review.
Professor Jeremy Coid interviewed the killer at Ashworth High Security Psychiatric Hospital in Merseyside
The atrocities committed by Myra Hindley and Brady in the 1960s have been seared into the public consciousness by their sadistic brutality and the murder of five children (Photo: PA)
“He was very pleasant and polite,” she recalls, “I thought he was a rather scruffy Oxford don. He was wearing a sports jacket and had grey hair.”
The child killer was born in 1938 in Glasgow, where he was raised by foster parents in the Gorbals, notorious for being one of Glasgow’s toughest and most impoverished slums.
As a teenager, Brady committed a series of minor offences and was eventually sent by the courts to Manchester to live with his mother and her new husband, Patrick Brady.
As time went on, with the intention of “getting better”, Brady He pursued new interests by creating a library of books on Nazism, sadism and sexual perversion.
Staring at psychopathy from across the table, Professor Coid commented that it exuded a desperate and sinister need to “control”.
He continued: ‘What happened during the interview was that it became very clear that it was very difficult to interrupt him.
‘He was such a self-centered man that he wanted to do nothing but talk about himself and his negative feelings towards others.’
Brady and Hindley eventually tortured and murdered five boys aged between 10 and 17 and buried their bodies on Saddleworth Moor; at least four of the victims were sexually assaulted.
His first victim was Pauline Reade, who was murdered by Brady and Hindley when she was just 16, in 1963. Hindley picked her up and took her to the moor where Brady sexually assaulted and strangled her.
Then, in 1963, Hindley and Brady lured John Kibride, a 12-year-old schoolboy, from a market in Ashton-Under-Lyne.
Following a familiar pattern, the three eventually made a detour onto windswept Saddleworth Moor. Brady told Hindley that he had sexually assaulted and strangled the boy.
The third victim was 12-year-old Keith Bennet in 1964, whom Hindley lured into a van and asked to help him with some boxes while her sadistic lover Brady watched his prey from the back seat.
After the three strayed back onto windy Saddleworth Moor, Brady later told Hindley that he had sexually assaulted and strangled the boy. She is the only one of the five victims whose body was never found.
The youngest victim, 10-year-old Lesley Ann Downey, had been lured from a fairground to Hindley and Brady’s home in 1964, where, once inside the house, she was stripped, gagged and strangled.
Brady and Hindley eventually tortured and murdered five boys aged between 10 and 17.
Pauline Reade, 16, was murdered by Ian Brady and Myra Hindley when she was just 16, and was buried on the moor after being sexually assaulted and slashed twice across the throat.
Hindley lured 12-year-old schoolboy John Kibride from a market in Ashton-Under-Lyne, where he was taken to the moors to be sexually assaulted and fatally strangled by Brady.
Keith Bennett, 12, who was lured onto the moors by the sick couple, is the only victim of Brady and Hindley who was never found as they took the secret to their graves.
Lesley Ann Downey, 10, had been lured from a fairground to Hindley and Brady’s home on Christmas Day, where, once inside the house, she was stripped, gagged and strangled.
Edward Evans, 17, was lured from a Manchester train station to the sick couple’s home on the Hattersley estate in Hyde, where he was attacked with an axe, suffocated and strangled.
She was later found naked with her clothes at her feet in a shallow grave on the moor after the couple captured a sickening 16-minute recording of her death.
The last victim was 17-year-old Edward Evans, who was attacked with an axe, suffocated with a cushion and strangled with an electrical cord in 1965.
Professor Coid said that while Brady’s crimes were shocking, he had experienced worse at times. However, the aura of the Moors Killer generated a personal antipathy he had never felt before.
He explained: ‘I think if you’re an experienced forensic psychiatrist it’s important to be aware of how your patients make you feel and how they make you feel about them.
‘It didn’t scare me at all, but it produced a deeply negative feeling in me.
‘A feeling of personal dislike towards him grew as the interview progressed.
“He was doing something to me, to my inner world. It was pretty clear throughout the interview that he was trying to control me.”
“I have seen criminals who have committed extremely unpleasant murders, and sometimes even worse, who have not succeeded in producing such a negative reaction in me.”
Brady never showed any remorse for his heinous crimes, while Hindley maintained that her partner had beaten and drugged her into a cold-blooded killer.
Referring to the pervert’s callous lack of remorse, Professor Coid said: “He never showed any remorse and made it clear he never would.
‘I asked him about remorse and he referred to it as the wind and said, “If you want wind, you’ll have to wait until Judgement Day to get it.”
