London
Britain’s worst mass murderer, a family doctor who killed hundreds of his patients, was found hanging dead in his cell this week. Harold Shipman was convicted in 2000 of murdering 15 patients by injecting them with heroin, but an inquiry later found that he had killed at least 200 more. Most of the victims were elderly people he had known for years. Shipman’s motive was never established, especially as he maintained his innocence throughout the trial, despite an abundance of physical evidence. Families of the victims said they felt cheated by his apparent suicide. “I always harbored the remote possibility that one day I could confront him and ask him why,” said Danny Mellor, whose mother was one of Shipman’s victims. “Now that’s been taken away from me.”
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