John Childs

Case record: John Childs

Background

John Childs was a British murderer who killed six people between 1974 and 1978. He was described as a professional criminal and contract killer.

The offence

Childs killed six people between 1974 and 1978.

One victim was shot three times and then stabbed with a sword. Another victim was battered with an axe and a lead pipe before being strangled.

One victim was lured to a factory to be killed, and he turned up with his 10-year-old son. Childs shot both the father and the son to death.

Childs burnt the body of each victim in the fireplace of his London home. Childs had tried to mince the body and dispose of it down the toilet, which proved to be impossible. The bodies were dismembered with a saw and a wooden mallet before being incinerated.

Timeline

• August 1974 — Terry (Teddy) Eve was killed. He was beaten with a piece of pipe and an axe before Childs strangled him to death.
• January 1975 — Robert Brown was killed. He was shot 3 times and then axed and stabbed with a knife and a sword.
• November 1975 — George Brett and Terry Brett were murdered. They were father and son, and both victims were shot in the head.
• July 1978 — Freddie Sherwood was killed. He was shot in the head.
• October 1978 — Ronald Andrews was killed. He was shot in the head.
• 1980 — Childs was sentenced to life imprisonment.
• 2003 — Terry Pinfold and Harry McKenny were released after their convictions were quashed on appeal.

Investigation

Detectives reconstructed the burning in Childs’s fireplace using an 11-stone pig to prove it was possible.

The remains of Childs’s victims were never found because he dismembered the bodies and cremated them in the fireplace of his London home.

Trial

Childs claimed to have worked with Harry McKenney and Terry Pinfold.

Childs, Harry McKenney, and Terry Pinfold were sentenced to life imprisonment.

McKenney and Pinfold were recommended to serve 25 years before parole.

The judges described the evidence against Terry Pinfold and Harry Mackenney as unsafe and quashed their convictions.

Quotes

The judges said the evidence against Terry Pinfold, from Hornchurch, Essex, and Harry Mackenney, from Dagenham, Essex, was “so unreliable that it is worthless”.

Lord Woolf, the Lord Chief Justice, said fresh evidence showed Childs—regarded as an unsatisfactory witness even at the trial—was a “pathological liar”.

Sentencing

Childs was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1980.

Childs was issued with a whole life tariff, meaning he was unlikely ever to be released. Childs’s name was said to have never been publicised as such.

Appeals

In 2003, the Court of Appeal in London quashed the convictions of Terry Pinfold and Harry Mackenney as unsafe.

Outcome

Terry Pinfold and Harry Mackenney were released from prison in 2003 after their convictions were quashed on appeal.

Childs remained in prison.

Aftermath

Childs was said to be on a whole life tariff and would die in jail.

Other details

Childs was associated with three additional individuals in the trial: Harry McKenney and Terry Pinfold, who were sentenced to life imprisonment, and two other named victims in the case (George Brett and Terry Brett), who were father and son.

Victims listed in the case included Terry (Teddy) Eve, Robert Brown, George Brett, Terry Brett, Freddie Sherwood, and Ronald Andrews.

Terry Brett was the father of the 10-year-old son who was killed alongside his father.