Robert Maudsely

The third murder (and fourth) and the third post...

Now we get to the third and fourth murders. For those of you just joining us, this is the third part of a three part series involving Robert Maudsley, and his commitment to murdering pedophiles. He has, thus far, murdered two, and now we have two more to get into, and you might think, he’s like, in prison though, right? How is he still killing people? I wondered the same thing, and we will get there, but first we have to go into Maudsley’s sentence from the second one.

Quick refresher. He murdered a guy in Broadmoor. This was his second murder, the first being what sent him to Broadmoor in the first place, and despite not being considered competent to stand trial in that one, for some reason, he’s good to go for this one. He netted himself a life sentence, and was shipped off to big boy prison. In this case, that big boy prison is, HMP Wakefield, a maximum-security prison in West Yorkshire, England. This prison is also affectionately knows as, Monster Mansion. Nice, right? It’s called this because, “the large number of high profile and high risk sex offenders, and murderers held there.” Seems like not the place to send a guy that takes clear issue with sex offenders, but again, what the hell do I know?

So, do you think that he took some time, settled in, got to know the lay of the land? No. He straight up murders two people like… immediately. When I say immediately, I mean, he got there, got put in a cell, chilled for about a year, and then was like, time to kill some dudes. That’s how immediate we are talking here. Maudsley has no chill.

All right, here we are at Monster Mansion, and Maudsley has just arrived. I am sure that this will go just swimmingly. Let’s see, shall we? Keep in mind, Robert has been abundantly clear that he wants to kill sex offenders. This has not changed, like at all. Not a smidgen. Also keep in mind, at this point, Maudsley is twenty-five years old. Pretty young, right? We are now in July of 1978, and Robert has good up until now. No murdering people in the lunch line, or anything of that sort. He is, however, still hearing voices. That, to me, seems like a reason to not have him at a place full of the very people that those voices want him to murder, but again, what the hell do I know.

Well, it seems I know more than the people in charge of the prison system in the UK, because Robert has decided that he is going to go on a killing spree. Who could have seen that coming? Oh, all of us? Yeah, you would think this would be a pretty obvious outcome, but apparently, we’re psychic or something.

Oh, and guess what else he has? Plastic utensils. Hooooowwww have not learned this lesson yet? Good lord, he just killed someone with a plastic spoon, but apparently either they didn’t get the message, or they thought, surely the dude that killed someone with a plastic spoon because they were a sex offender wouldn’t possibly use a plastic utensil to murder one of the numerous sex offenders in this new facility, right? That would never happen… Also, it was, AGAIN, that he made a knife out of the spoon. He is consistent, it seems. His plan is to attempt to lure sex offenders back to his cell and murder them there. Now, I have to point out there is a flaw in this thinking. Where did he think he was going to be hiding the bodies of these people?

There are not a lot of hiding places in that cell, and well, bodies aren’t small. I am confused by this thinking, but I try not to be too critical of someone that is hearing voices. That can’t make logical thinking easy. It seems like a strange plan to me, but apparently he was determined to kill the sex offenders in his cell specifically, so here we go.

So, here we are again, with Maudsley having access to murder weapons that he most definitely shouldn’t, and, go figure, he finds his next target. Now, he didn’t hang back in the corner and try to figure out who his next murder would be. No, he went along to various sex offenders and tried to convince them to go with him. How well do you think that is going to work, knowing his reputation? Not well, and he gets turned down, over and over again. That is, until he found someone that either didn’t know what he was there for, or thought that somehow he was all better now, and wouldn’t possibly do anything at all.

Victim number three, is named, Salney Darwood. Darwood’s crimes are not exactly easy to define. He was known as a sex offender who also murdered his wife. I don’t know who he offended against, and I do not know the circumstances of his wife’s murder, but he fit the bill enough to be on Robert’s radar. Also, it should be mentioned that he wasn’t a child predator. Keep in mind, Salney knew Robert. He was teaching Robert how to speak French. This was not a stranger killing, so again, I don’t know if he had no idea what Robert had done, or if this is a circumstance that he was convinced that they were friends, but either way, I can’t imagine his shock when Robert turned on him.

Robert immediately attacked Salney the moment he entered Robert’s cell. He stabbed him repeatedly all over his body, his back, neck, head, anywhere he could sink his makeshift knife, he did so. Then, after Salney collapsed on the ground from the ferocity of the attack, Robert pulled out a ligature and strangled him to death. While strangling him, he also repeatedly bashed his skull into the floor. How this attack was not heard by anyone, is a mystery to me. It seems like this would be a very noisy murder, but apparently, no one noticed. Salney Darwood has now lost his life and there are some people that suspect that this wasn’t unheard by the guards, but they allowed it to happen because they didn’t like the sex offenders either. I doubt we will ever know for certain, but it is suspicious that he was allowed so much access to his preferred victim pool.

Remember, Robert wants to go on a killing spree, so his solution for what to do with the body is what any kid thinks will get him out of trouble. When in doubt, shove it under the bed, and that is exactly what Maudsley does. He just rolled Salney’s body under the bed, cleaned up in his sink, and went out hunting for number four. This maximum security prison is starting to look like it is so in name only. Robert finds himself facing the same issue that he did when trying to lure victim number three, and that is, no one wants to go with him. They all have a healthy suspicion that he does not mean them good tidings, and refuse his offer. Perhaps they heard what happened, or maybe it was just his reputation that kept them well away. He continued searching for someone for at least an hour and wasn’t having any luck.

However, we do have another victim, so it obviously wasn’t everyone that wanted to avoid Robert like the plague. Actually, it was because Robert realized that his strategy wasn’t working. He wasn’t going to find what he wanted using it, so he changed tactics. He walks by the cell of a man named William Roberts. Now, Willy is a real piece of work. He strangled a four-year-old girl so he could rape her. Not exactly the sympathetic type. William and Maudsley do not know each other, but William’s reputation certainly preceded him. He was precisely the type that Maudsley looked for.

William is lying face down on his bed having a bit of a nap, and Robert seems to think to himself, “He’s a child molester. He’s perfect.” So, the decision is made, and Robert rushes William. He begins stabbing him all over his back. This, of course, wakes William who tried his best to defend himself, rolling over to face his attacker, but it was no use. Robert was in a frenzy and just kept stabbing William anywhere he could drive in that knife. He was so consumed with his mission to murder William, he didn’t realize for a few minutes that he was already dead. Even though he was already gone, Robert dragged him from the bed in order to smash his skull into the wall, as he had done similarly to previous victims. He did so with such force that it cracked and destroyed the plaster of the wall. He then threw his body to the floor and left as though nothing had happened.

Robert’s goal had been to kill seven people, but he was unable to find any more victims that he was able to target. Instead of going on a random stabbing spree through the common area of the prison, he went to the guards, put down his knife, and informed them of his latest crimes. The way he did this was by saying:

“It looks like you will be short two on roll call later.”

How the guards didn’t hear the second murder… Well, I think it might lend some credibility to the idea that the guards were just fine with what was happening. I have heard that guards, in the States, will tell other prisoners about the charges against sex offenders, especially if they offended against children. I also know that my former brother-in-law has had to be held in protective custody because, while he didn’t sexually assault any children, he did torture one to death over months, and the other prisoners were not too keen on his crimes. I can be pretty certain that he wasn’t telling anyone why he was there, but the other prisoners knew… somehow…

Robert now gets to go on trial for two more murders, and again, he doesn’t have a shred of remorse for his actions. In fact, he told them that he had done the world a favor by ridding it of those two offenders. He also said that when he murdered Salney and William, he was picturing his parents. He also said that all of his murderous rage was directed at his parents. His victims were just surrogates for the revenge he so desperately wanted for the abuse he had endured as a child. He stated, “When I kill, I have my parents in mind. If I had killed my parents in 1970, none of these people would have died. If I had killed them, then I would be walking around as a free man without a care in the world.”

This, of course, does not bode well when it comes to sentencing. What other choice the court has other than to say, he is a danger to all those around him, and he cannot be allowed near other prisoners. He was convicted of two more murders, given two more life sentences, and was sentenced to prison, not a psychiatric hospital, and was sent to solitary for the protection of all those around him. He was considered an unmanageable threat.

He served his time in solitary confinement from 1978 to the early eighties, when there was an interview, and report by the UK press, where they came to report on Maudsley’s crimes. The called him, the most dangerous man in Britain, and he still has this title today. They detailed these crimes in their articles and the people of the UK were outraged. They didn’t believe that solitary was good enough of a punishment for what he did. They demanded more. Under the scrutiny of the public and their displeasure at him only being in solitary, they transferred him to a specially constructed cell, built just for him.

This is the cell that Hannibal Lecter’s cell is based on. It is the infamous “glass cell” that is constructed in the basement of the prison next to other solitary cells. His cell is 14 x 18 feet, and he spends twenty-three hours a day, confined here, with little human contact. The cell is not actually glass, as that wouldn’t be a safe cell to begin with. It’s often referred to that way because of the see-through nature of its construction. It is actually made of perspex plastic, which is really strong reinforced plastic that you can see through. Because of the nature of the material, Robert has no privacy at all. He is constantly on stage, as it were. No privacy for sleep, using the restroom, changing clothing, nothing. They felt this was necessary so that he could be monitored 24/7.

His bed is a concrete slab, adorned with the thinnest mattress available. He also has a table and a chair that were made of reinforced cardboard. There is a toilet and a sink, both of which are bolted to the floor. Apparently, to make his life there more difficult, the toilet often overflows, leaving his call smelling like a sewer. There aren’t any photos of the cell, and there isn’t a definitive description of it either. We don’t know if all four walls are made of the perspex plastic, or if it is just the front wall, like Lecter’s. It is one of the unknowns with Robert. We can assume, however, as the Lecter cell is definitively based on Maudsley’s cell, it may well look a fair amount like it:

But, that’s only speculation. This is also likely the reason that one of Maudsley’s nicknames is, “Hannibal the Cannibal”. Robert, as I mentioned, spends twenty-three hours a day, and is only allowed out for one hour a day. He is not allowed to interact with any other prisoners, and when he is out, he is always escorted by SIX guards. That is crazy to me. Also, his cell is behind seventeen locked doors. That is insane.

Robert has been in solitary for forty-six years. As you can imagine, not having access to sunlight for very long, and the extreme isolation has done a number on him. It is said that he isn’t allowed to have hair cuts, my guess is because they don’t think he is safe enough to have a barber around, so his hair is apparently very long and greasy, and his skin is extremely pale. Also, I have heard that he struggles with speaking due to no one talking to him. Apparently in the interview that he gave he spoke about losing his speech, and in the interview itself Robert’s speech is difficult to understand. This stands to reason with the isolation that he has been placed under.

Robert also spoke about not knowing the reason that he is still alive. He is lonely, he is isolated, and has no real desire to continue living in such a way. This interview is decades old, and he has continued to be subjected to this way of living for that entire time, and will continue to be subjected to it until the day he dies. He laments that none of the guards will speak to him. He thinks that it would be so easy to offer that little bit of kindness. This really lends to the notion of cognitive empathy. The guards are likely either afraid of him, or they hate who he is. That’s understandable I suppose, but from Robert’s perspective, he is going to be there forever. He’s serving his time, but he isn’t some sort of creature to be avoided. Even in the Hannibal Lecter stories, people still spoke to him, but not to Robert. The only images of Robert are from the eighties.

Granted, he has been allowed out of his cell several times for various reasons. He was sent to another psychiatric hospital in the nineties for treatment, but he was still held in solitary. He was in the hospital for three years and did very well there. His treating doctor thought that there was a chance that he could be rehabilitated if given the proper chance and treatment. Robert was improving. He spoke about the things that drove him to kill, and he was letting go of much of his rage. Any hope, however, was short-lived. The prison system decided that he wasn’t worthy of treatment or rehabilitation, and they brought him back to his plastic cell in the prison basement.

In the late nineties, he was transferred to a different prison in Milton Keynes, and was still in solitary. He was only here for a short time, but it was better for him. Despite being in solitary, he was granted more interaction with others here, both prisoners and guards. He was also treated better here by the guards, and not a pariah that shouldn’t even be looked at, let alone spoken to. They even sometimes played chess with him. However, again, this was short-lived, and he was, for some reason, sent back to his cage at HMP Wakefield.

After he had been in solitary for twenty years, in the late 2000s, he wrote an appeal to ask that his confinement conditions be lessened just a little bit. In his mind, he didn’t think that he was a danger any longer, that he had changed, and perhaps his time in the hospital facilitated that change. He asked to be allowed in the general population again, but his appeal was denied. He also asked for a pet Budgie bird, and he promised, I believe tongue in cheek, that he wouldn’t eat. He just wanted a companion to help combat the loneliness that he was dealing with. This was also denied. Feeling like he had no other options, Robert made a public appeal. His appeal wasn’t for better conditions. It wasn’t to ask that he be allowed out of solitary.

His public appeal was to beg for permission to die. He wanted to take a cyanide pill. He saw no reason to continue living. His request was denied. He stated, “The prison authorities see me as a problem and their solution has been to put me in solitary confinement and throw away the key. To bury me alive in a concrete coffin. I am left to stagnate, vegetate, and regress. My life in solitary is one long period of unbroken depression.”

To this very moment in time, and until that time that his life should end, Robert Maudsley is rotting away in that very same cell. I will say that the conditions in the cell have gotten a bit better. He has a television now, so there is a way to pass the time and also be exposed to speech. He also received a PlayStation 2. He has had some semblance of human interaction, finally.

Robert’s appearances in the media, and people speaking about the case, is how his siblings found out that Robert was actually still alive. They believed he was dead, as that is what their father had told them. Imagine finding out that the brother that you mourned was not only still alive, but he was serving time for four murders and the conditions that he was being held in. I wonder if any of them only knew the story of a man being held in confinement like that, and they agreed with it, only to find out it was their brother. I have no idea if that happened, but I wonder if it made anyone question their thoughts on the matter. Regardless of my musings, finding out that Robert was actually alive allowed his siblings to get back into contact with him, and also they were, after a fair amount of time, allowed to visit him, so at least there is that. He now has a very close relationship with his nephew, who has spoken about Robert’s case and conditions in documentaries, and in interviews.

His nephew also discusses Robert’s interests, which include classical music and art. Robert has a genius level IQ. It is unfortunate when you consider what his intellect could have been used for, but instead, he was abused to the point of creating such a break with normality that he is now in the situation he is in.

Robert Maudsley is an interesting case of using darkness for what could be argued, good. He turned his murderous rage on to other predators, not the ones that caused his abuse in the first place. However, the UK has a prison system that rarely keeps people in for their whole lives. Even Salney, the murder, that Maudsley ended, likely would have had a chance of getting out and back into the general public. He removed the sexual predators from ever having the opportunity to offend again. That can certainly be seen as a positive outcome.

He is also an interesting moral argument as well. Are his crimes so atrocious that the treatment that he was subjected to is just? Not in my mind, no. Also, he was getting better in the hospital, and instead of allowing that to continue, he was thrust back into solitary in the basement. That hardly seems like justice. I have never seen these sorts of methods applied to people that are genuine threats to the public at large, not just sex offenders, so I do not see a case to be made for Maudsley’s treatment. I think it is morally unjust to keep anyone in those conditions, but that’s my opinion.

That’s it, that’s the story of Robert Maudsley and how his darkness was enacted into the world. I imagine the comments section will be most interesting.