Hallelujah

There is no Woman of the Day post today but if there was, there would be two: funeral director Deborah Bambroffe and Dr Linda Reynolds, both of Manchester. In 1998, they were the first to raise the alarm about one of the most prolific serial killers in modern history. The police did a cursory investigation and stopped looking. More died. Most of his estimated 284 victims were widows aged between 49 and 81. Yes, you know who I’m talking about. Harold Shipman. Deborah Bambroffe, a member of staff at Massies' funeral directors in Hyde, was alarmed by the high death rate among his patients and noticed that the women always seemed to be dressed in their day clothes and he always seemed to be the one to find them dead. I mean, what are the odds? She was especially concerned about the death of Marie Quinn, an active volunteer for the WRVS and a churchgoer. Marie died in November 1997 — a stroke, or so said the death certificate completed by Shipman. “I was obviously worried because I had raised these concerns. I suppose I didn't want to believe those thoughts going through my mind - it seemed so ludicrous to the time.” Nonetheless, Deborah took her concerns to Dr Susan May at the GP practice right opposite Shipman’s in Hyde. Dr May relayed them to her colleague, Dr Linda Reynolds, who already had her own suspicions. New to the practice, she was worried that he was engaging in widespread fraud, not murder. Did you know that until 2024, GPs earned money for countersigning cremation certificates? It was a tidy little sum of £84 for each one, known as "ash cash". Oh, he had taken at least a little care to rotate his requests for countersignatures to GPs at the other practice (well, it only entailed crossing the road. No point in expending too much effort) but In 1997, those other GPs signed an average of 14 cremation certificates each. He’d signed 41. It should have stood out like a sore thumb. Linda alerted Greater Manchester Police and the coroner despite her fears that it could ruin her own career if she was wrong but she “didn't have any doubts about it because it was the only course of action." The coroner also informed the police. GMP didn’t assemble a team of officers to look for evidence. It didn’t open an incident room. No one checked Shipman’s criminal record, no one interviewed him, no one talked to the General Medical Council. No one even tried talking to the relatives of the dead patients. A detective inspector obtained copies of the medical records maintained by Shipman and deposited with the local health authority, and compared them with the death certificates; the ones also signed by him. Surprise, surprise. They tallied. I mean, really, what are the chances? And that’s where the cursory investigation stopped dead. It later emerged that Shipman had falsified medical histories, but come on now, look at the evidence at the time. All boxes ticked. Nothing to see here. Case closed. Shipman went on to murder three more women, including one aged just 57. He forged the will of his last victim by duping two other patients into witnessing it. Sadly, Linda died in March 2000, aged 50. Deborah is still around, still a funeral director, otherwise they’d both be Women of the Day for risking their reputations and their careers for speaking up. Both women deserve huge credit for doing what was right. Is there any particular reason why I’ve written about this today? Well, I’ve been mulling over the number of times that women, and often several women at the same time, somehow find the courage to speak up about the harm that just one man can cause in almost every sphere of life, and yet their voices are ignored or dismissed, and whole organisations or public bodies somehow find a way to sail past the overwhelming evidence rather than deal with the behaviour of the man. Or perhaps I am the only one who’s noticed this.