Read through this investigation and decide what the important factors are and write a profile of the killer. This is a general exercise to see if you are able to identify key information needed for profiling. Write/ create a criminal Profile on the following;
Police investigation report.
The body of a young woman was discovered in the water of Belstead Brook at Thorpe’s Hill, near Hintlesham, by a member of the public on December 2, 2006.The body, later identified as 25-year-old Gemma Adams, had not been sexually assaulted. Six days later, on December 8, the body of 19-year-old Tania Nicol, a friend of Adams, who had been missing since October 30, was discovered in water at Copdock Mill just outside Ipswich. There was no evidence of sexual assault. On December 10, a third victim, found by a member of the public in an area of woodland by the A14 road near Nacton, was later identified as 24-year-old Anneli Alderton.
The body of a young woman was discovered in the water of Belstead Brook at Thorpe’s Hill, near Hintlesham, by a member of the public on December 2, 2006.The body, later identified as 25-year-old Gemma Adams, had not been sexually assaulted. Six days later, on December 8, the body of 19-year-old Tania Nicol, a friend of Adams, who had been missing since October 30, was discovered in water at Copdock Mill just outside Ipswich. There was no evidence of sexual assault. On December 10, a third victim, found by a member of the public in an area of woodland by the A14 road near Nacton, was later identified as 24-year-old Anneli Alderton.
Anneli Alderton, aged 24, a mother of one who was also in the early stages of pregnancy had been living in Colchester, Essex. Alderton disappeared on December 3 and was last seen on the 17.53 train from Harwich to Manningtree. Alderton got off the train at Manningtree at 18.15 before going on to Ipswich via another train, arriving at 18.43. Alderton’s body was found on 10 December near Nacton, in woodland in front of Amberfield School. Alderton had been asphyxiated and was found naked, and posed in the cruciform position. Alderton had been addicted to drugs since age 16, shortly after her father’s death from lung cancer in 1998.
In a press conference police warned all women to stay away from the red light district of Ipswich. On December 12, Suffolk police announced that the bodies of two more women had been found. On December 14, the police confirmed one of the bodies as 24-year-old Paula Clennell. Clennell had disappeared on December 10 and was last seen in Ipswich.
Paula Clennell, aged 24, born in Northumberland and living in Ipswich, disappeared on December 10 in Ipswich at approximately 00.20. Clennell’s body was found on December 12 near Levington. Clennell was found naked but not sexually assaulted and a post mortem reported that she had been killed by a compression of her throat. Prior to her death, Clennell commented on the then recent murders in an interview with Anglia News, stating that despite them making her “a bit wary about getting into cars” she continued to work as “I need the money.” Clennell moved to East Anglia ten years before her death, following the break-up of her parents’ marriage. Clennell had three children with Elton Norris; all were taken into care and adopted due to her drug addiction. Clennell herself had spent some of her childhood in a referral unit, and it was shortly after being placed there that she started taking drugs.
On 15 December, the police confirmed that the other body was that of 29-year-old Annette Nicholls, who disappeared on December 5. The bodies of Clennell and Nicholls were found in Nacton near the Levington turn-off of the A1156, close to where Alderton was found. A member of the public had seen Clennell’s body six metres from the main road and a police helicopter dispatched to the scene discovered the second body of Nicholls nearby.
Annette Nicholls, aged 29, a mother of one from Ipswich, was initially thought to have gone missing on December 4, but at the trial it was revealed she was last seen in Ipswich town centre on December 8. Her family reported her missing after they grew concerned at the news of the other murders. Nicholls’ body was found on December 12 near Levington, naked but not sexually assaulted, and posed in the cruciform position; a definite cause of death could not be established, but her breathing had been hampered. Nicholls, the oldest victim, had been a drug addict since the early 2000s, shortly after completing a beautician’s course at Suffolk College. Soon afterwards, she had started working as a prostitute to fund her addiction.
During press conferences on December 13 and 14, DCS Gull revealed that police believed the locations where the five bodies were found to have been ‘deposition sites’, not murder scenes, indicating that the victims were all killed elsewhere and transported to the locations where they were later found; no comment was made on where the women may have been murdered.
