Sidney Cooke became a person of interest but there was just not enough evidence. ibid. author
Six days after Jason’s body was found there was more shocking news. Only six miles away in a field the body of a six-year-old boy was found. The six-year-old boy was Barry Lewis. ibid.
Both boys had been drugged with the same tranquillizer. ibid.
Sidney Cooke, following on from the incident in the car, was arrested in company with 11 other people, for sexually abusing a group of youngsters, and because of the number they became known as the Dirty Dozen. ibid.
To the great surprise of the detectives, Bailey started to incriminate himself in the events that surrounded Jason’s death. ibid.
Staggeringly, Sidney Cooke was released. ibid.
He was very influential. If not the leader. Child Snatchers: A Day at the Fair II, author
Cooke as the ringleader got 19 years, Oliver and Bailey 15 year sentences, and Stephen Barrell got 13-and-a-half years. ibid.
Leslie Bailey was soon after charged with the murder of Barry Lewis, subsequently convicted, and sentenced to life in prison. ibid.
Bailey provided credible and horrific detail of Mark’s final moments. ibid.
Sidney Cooke’s alibi proved to be false. ibid.
He took great pleasure in recounting his despicable behaviour with children over many many years. ibid.
Leslie Bailey pleaded guilty to the manslaughter of Mark Tildesley and received two more life sentences. ibid.
Leslie Bailey was strangled to death in his prison cell in 1993. ibid.
Robert Oliver was released from prison in 1997. In 2013 Robert Oliver was jailed again for crimes involving children. After serving 9 years of his sentence for the killing of Jason Swift, Sidney Cooke was released from prison. ibid.
Staggeringly, Sidney Cooke was released in 1998. ibid.
He was charged with historic sex crimes and sent back to prison. ibid.
COOMBES, BARBARA: The Killer Within TV -
At a police station near Manchester a woman made a bizarre admission: ‘She just walked into the inquiry counter and told the inquiry counter clerk that she’d killed her father and buried his body in the garden.’ The Killer Within: Barbara Coombes: A Daughter’s Revenge, rozzer, Sky Crime 2021
‘She had been seriously sexually abused by her father over a period of time.’ ibid. brief
COOPER, BILL murder: viz Assassinations: COOPER, BILL
COOPER, JOHN: When Life Means Life TV - John Cooper - Real Crime with Mark Austin TV - Susanna Reid, Police Tapes: The Game Show Serial Killer TV - Britain’s Most Evil Killers TV - Faking It: Tears of a Crime TV - The Pembrokeshire Murders TV - The Pembrokeshire Murders: Catching the Game Show Killer TV -
A man who terrorised a Welsh community for more than a decade and who nearly got away with murder. He was a one-man crime wave. Responsible for armed robberies, a brutal rape and four shocking murders. He was a local celebrity who no-one suspected. When Life Means Life: John Cooper, 2013
A troublemaker from an early age. As Cooper matured he gave the impression of a family man. ibid.
Cooper even appeared on the popular television gameshow Bullseye. ibid.
Police seized hundreds of items. ibid.
In Pembrokeshire a serial burglar and armed robber has been sentenced to sixteen years in prison. ibid.
In 1985 ... a brother and sister had been shot dead and their farmhouse torched. ibid.
Forensic science had made a breakthrough. ibid.
Cooper was charged with four murders, an armed robbery, rape and indecent assault. ibid.
In September 2011 John William Cooper lodged an application to appeal against his convictions. ibid.
It’s all lies. John Cooper
In May 1989 John William Cooper went on Bullseye, a prime-time ITV programme watched by seventeen million. He had murdered two people. Within three weeks of this filming he had murdered two more on that same coastline. Real Crime with Mark Austin: The Game Show Killer, ITV 2011
The rural Pembrokeshire coast, West Wales ... In 1989 it became the scene of an horrific crime ... The killer had terrified Peter Dixon into giving him his pin number and he’d used it to withdraw £300 from cash-points in the area. ibid.
Cooper had a history of violence. ibid.
In March 1996 ... Five young teenagers walking through fields in Milford Haven were subjected to a terrifying attack. ibid.
The evidence found connected him to twenty-nine burglaries and an armed robbery. ibid.
The twenty-year-old spot of blood on John Cooper’s shorts was Peter Dixon’s. ibid.
This is the moment when detectives arrested one of Britain’s most cunning serial killers. But this story started 20 years earlier on a game show watched by millions across the country. Susanna Reid, Police Tapes: The Game Show Serial Killer, ITV 2018
In the 1980s two horrific double murders … ‘a Pembrokeshire brother and sister’ … Four years later the killer struck again … ‘51-year-old Peter Dixon and his 52-year-old wife Gwenda were found shot dead.’ ibid. news reports
‘We’ve just had a call from John Cooper. His wife’s dead. We think he murdered her.’ ibid. rozzer
In 2011 John Cooper was found guilty of four murders. Forensic fibres also linked him to an unsolved rape, and an unsolved sexual assault of two teenagers. He is one of the few prisoners in the UK serving a life term without parole. ibid.
June 1989, Wales: The man who murdered them [couple] was 44-year-old serial killer John Cooper. This prolific armed robber had mercilessly killed them just for their bank card. And the murderer loved the limelight. Britain’s Most Evil Killers s3e6: John Cooper, Pick TV 2019
He brutally slayed four people in a hit-man style execution then carefully covered up his tracks. ibid.
Pembrokeshire, south Wales: For more than a decade its people lived in fear terrorised by a violent armed robber and serial killer who lived among them. Faking It: Tears of a Crime s3e7: John Cooper
The best form of defence is attack. That in itself is an indicator of deception. ibid. Cliff
December 1985: A fire destroys a manor house near Milford Haven. Inside were Richard Thomas and his sister Helen. Both had been murdered. The police believed an armed intruder targeted the house thinking Helen was alone. When her brother came home, the gunman, fearing he’d be recognised, panicked and fired. ibid.
‘He is violent, he is sadistic, far far removed from the person that you see in public.’ ibid. Kerry
Weeks later in June 1989 Cooper continued to believe he would get away with his crime by striking again, and once again striking close to home. This time the victims were Oxfordshire couple Gwenda & Peter Dixon. ibid.
‘We recovered vast amounts of stolen property. Property from these previous burglaries, some dating back 15 years or more … We found in the cesspit five-hundred keys.’ ibid. rozzer
Then came the first damning forensic evidence. ibid.