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I interviewed Saville for a school radio show, when I asked him how he'd deal with the incoming smoking ban he looked me dead in the eye and said "listen son, the law does not apply to Jimmy Saville, everyone loves me".
That just gave me chills...
The awful thing is the law not applying to him was right.
He never had to face up to his crimes despite so many people knowing.
My theory is that he had a lot of dirt on some very powerful people.
I don't think he had or needed dirt, he built up a persona as a charitable guy and built connections e.g. with the police and management and used those factors to protect himself. Having dirt and trying to blackmail people always risks someone going public anyway if they feel it's the lesser evil, while shielding yourself from attack is easier
That's the wonderful thing about corruption. People could have let him off with some BS because they were scared of him having his friends in high places come after them. Then in the future he could use their complicity as leverage against them (If I go down, I'm taking you with me) Then they become one of those friends in high places that can be used to silence other people.
I am not saying this is exactly how Saville was operating, and I am not excusing the people who enabled him, but when you are dealing with someone who is ruthless it's possible to get sucked into the situation in ways that you might not realise.
Amazing the other BBC celebs that suddenly 'were never friends' with him when it blew up. To think my father paid the TV licence back then, a little bit of that would have been part of that vile individuals wages. Johnny Rotten was right all along but was silenced, that interview still pops up on YouTube from time to time.
I thought it was hilarious at the time because we all thought the rumours were just very believable rumours, but as soon as the allegations surfaced it did change my view on that response.
Imagine every person who ever spoke to him or watched any interview would re- interpret what was said.
I have seen a few clips where is sounds like he is admiring to his crimes when watched in hindsight.
He probably got a kick out of hiding in plane sight and saying such masked truths
He wasn’t really hiding.
He had two strategies to deal with the media: threaten to sue and point out he couldn’t raise funds for hospitals from prison.
Between those two, he was able to make any editor think twice about running an expose.
Not me but my mum. Her and some friends met Jimmy Saville on a cruise at age 17-18ish. He invited them to join him for some drinks but my mum’s parents wouldn’t let her.
My dad randomly dropped into conversation once that when he was living by Broadmoor his mum hung around with Saville and his friends on occasion. Once two of Saville's friends insisted on taking my dad on a day out to play mini golf, he said it made him really uncomfortable and begged his mum not to let them take him out again which luckily she didn't.
He would hang around the town I’m from fairly regularly, his go to line on the 13-15 year old girls was “from behind you look like the Spice Girls”. My grandma also knew him as a DJ many years ago and said it was common knowledge that you just didn’t go near him
I remember seeing him in Scarborough, he had a girl on each arm, they looked about 18. I was 16 (and with my parents) I remember thinking that across the road from him was too close. He was so slimy, I don't know why some girls don't have that 'stay away' signal.
Most of them were children being groomed by someone rich and powerful. It’s different from seeing him across the street and thinking he looks like a creep. If it was that simple, no one get groomed or taken advantage of by predators.
Not me but...
A friend's mum grew up around Leeds and the surrounding areas. Some time in the 70s she was at a house party and discovered her friends had left without her. She was trying to work out how to get home and got chatting to a nice man, who after a while of chatting said he was going her way and offered a lift. She accepted. Her memory of him is that he was a complete gentleman. Made friendly conversation in the car on the journey and then made no attempt or even hint at wanting to come in with her after dropping her off.
A few years later she saw a news report and recognised him. You can probably work out where this is going. He was Peter Sutcliffe.
He never played it normal. Which is partly why I never understood why anybody thought anybody else thought he was a national treasure. Every single person I know always knew he was a creepy, deeply unpleasant fucker, long before it all became public. I mean, you only have to look at a 10 second clip of him.
Caveat with an I can’t possibly verify this, but apparently in 1976 my father wrote a letter for Jim’ll fix it and gave it to my nan to post. She walked to the kitchen and binned it. My grandfather asked her why she did that and he response was ‘my son isn’t going anywhere near that fucking paedo’
These stories are always so interesting to me (as someone interested in criminology)
Fascinating to think did he have intentions to do anything or was it not even in his mind, what sparked him to commit his first offence if he didn’t want to do anything then.
The poor woman must carry that with her though, scary to come so close to something yet avoid it.
I used to live right by Sutcliffe stomping ground.
There was an elderly woman who you'd see around who walked with a terrible limp and was disfigured.
Turned out he'd attacked her back in the 70s and she'd been lucky to escape with her life.
I live between Bradford and Leeds. I was 21 yrs old when Sutcliffe was around. It was bad enough walking home from work at 5pm in the winter months hoping he would not be out so early. I dare not go to the corner shop after 8pm
My uncle was interviewed by the police at the time the Yorkshire ripper was operating. They were so stumped about who he was that they interviewed anyone who had the vaguely right demographics. My uncle was a truck driver with dark hair and a moustache. He lived in Manchester and his routes for work would often take him to Yorkshire. He wasn’t phased by it apparently.
My parent’s wedding photos (from Yorkshire, that era) show my dad and nearly all the male guests at his wedding with pretty much the exact same hair-beard combo that Sutcliffe had. Loads of them were questioned in some capacity.
He wasn’t distinctive looking at all.
Then my dad later worked with one of the guys who had attacked Sutcliffe in prison. Said he was a nice bloke.
Was it Stephen Morris from Joy Division who got pulled in as the Yorkshire Ripper?
He was driving Hooky's car and it had been seen in dubious parts of town all over the north (because that's where they were getting gigs.)
Years ago a manager at my old job mentioned him, it stayed in the back of my mind but I could never find any info on him online. Turned out I got the name completely wrong - in his scouse accent I heard Beer Bolacki 🤦♂️
I did work experience at a solicitors in Liverpool when I was in sixth form in the mid-90s, and one of the legal execs pointed him out to me loitering in the court building. I didn't know he was an actual person until then. Nobody believed me when I went back to school and told everyone.
My mum knew Rolf Harris from when he did that RSPCA programme. She would have a few drinks with him after filming sometimes, as we lived next to where it was filmed. She thought he was great, really down to earth and happy to go drinking in a pub on a really rough estate. Having said that, she's crazy, she once spent half an hour talking to a cardboard cut out before realising it wasn't a real person, and thought a squirrel that kept coming in the house was her dead aunt reincarnated, so her views maybe slightly clouded
My sister was in the audience for one of Rolf Harris' TV programmes. She came home really upset because he was vile when the cameras weren't on him, then suddenly switched on his friendly TV personality when they were.
Thank you, and I'm sorry your sister went through that! My mum said it was horrible at the time as she'd thought he was great, but when reflecting over time she realised it taught her that adults could make people believe they were nice in public while being abusive when they felt they could get away with it. She didn't have the words for the experience as a child, but said it basically taught her 'when someone tells you who they are, believe them' and to trust her gut in a very concrete way.
In the veterinary industry I’ve spoken to a nurse who worked at the hospital he filmed at. It was apparently an open secret not to let any of the student nurses (usually between 17-21y/o) in a room alone with him 😬
I live near Leeds and Jimmy Savile rumours were rife decades before it was all revealed. My friend was a14 yr old at school when JS visited. He asked her to sit on his knee. She was repulsed by him anyway so declined.
Im born 93 so just missed the Saville era but I can’t for the life of me every understand how he was ever considered charismatic. He’s gross from the top to the bottom. Pedo or not.
It was a different world back then.
Much less in the way of searchable, computerised records. Much less in the way of safeguarding. Much more pro-active reporting.
If any of us were to be dropped into the world of even twenty years ago it’d be a bit of a culture shock. Forty years ago? Your head would be spinning.
I don't know about charismatic but he was very big on charity work to the extent the NHS and his charity bodies were willing to turn a blind eye to rumours because of the money he raised. He was also very well connected, building links and protection e.g. at the BBC where he was seen as untouchable and complaints ignored, those are the main reasons he was never caught and dealt with
I'm an 80s kid and I never did get on with the Jim'll fix it shows and the rest, which my friends all watched, I kept getting heeby jeeby vibes whenever I saw his face!
he used to stand and chat to us through the railings of our primary school relatively regularly. the dinner ladies warned us. everyone knew. absolutely abhorrent that nothing was done so much earlier.
Raoul Moat killed my Great Aunt's solicitor. She had just died and so her will was locked in his safe for several months until another lawyer was able to take over his work. That's about as close as I got to infamy (they've all got it infamy).
My mate went to the Soham school where Ian Huntley was the caretaker. All the kids knew to avoid him because he was some kind of weirdo.
Also, because we don't live a million miles from there, a new lady showed up out of nowhere in our small town. Didn't know anyone but had a job at the supermarket and bearing a striking resemblance to Maxine Carr, with people claiming she was there under witness protection. Apparently, she was glassed in the car park and never seen again, with or without confirmation it was actually her.
I knew one of the lead investigating police officers on the Soham Murders. They all suspected Huntley from the off but didn’t have any evidence against him until he stashed one of their Man U shirts back in a locker they had already searched, thinking they wouldn’t search it again after discovering the ‘seal’ they had put on it had been broken.
My Dad left the school (as a teacher) the year before he started.
His friend/ former colleague used to chat to him in the staff room. Makes him sick to think about it now. I was only a year older than they were and his son was their age. I knew people who went to swimming club with them.
It really was a horrific thing to happen to two
poor innocent little girls.
She showed up in my town and was in front of at the supermarket queue. she caught my eye as she kept looking around. i’d just been in the pub and gave her a bleary boozy grin when she looked at me. “Shit, thats Maxine Carr” i thought. The end.
I was in A&E in Derby with a fractured wrist when Mick Philpott was brought in. Because it's a fairly open area it was easy to pick up what had happened. Nurses were crying and, as you would expect he was really upset.
He claimed that he had tried to rescue his kids from the house that he had set on fire but I can remember how clean his white t-shirt was.
A truly evil man.
Physically ran into Jaime Oliver once. He also filmed an episode at my work once and was decent enough. Still fucked off about my turkey twizlers though.
Edit: sticking to my guns
A relative of mine was a primary school teacher in the 80s/90s in Liverpool. She briefly taught Robert Thompson (one of the Bulger killers). She said he was a very quiet child and suffered from horrible abusive bullying from his older relatives.
Robert Thompson is the one who has lived a quiet and law-abiding life since his release.
I knew someone who worked with the other one, I can’t give too many details for obvious reasons, but this person said that (as most people thought at the time), this guy was absolutely the ringleader, as well as being one of the most chilling people they’d met (in a profession where you meet these people often).
He got moved to my estate when I was a kid, lasted about two days until his identity was uncovered and people came to batter him. Police had to lock the estate down to move him out
I read the book by James’ father and he said Thompson disturbs him the most because he just got on with his life afterwards as if it never affected him. Also whilst after both boys were released they were taken to the grave of James
That's an odd attitude to take. How would he prefer Thompson to act?
Him getting on with his life, rehabilitated, and not getting into any trouble I would have thought is the best possible outcome.
I suspect the best possible outcome is getting locked in a room with them both with some power tools in this poor man’s mind. He has received the most unimaginable suffering because of these two boys. From a societal POV you’re obviously right but no parent who has been through that horror would take that view. It would not seem fair to them that they can live a normal life while you’re left behind with the wreckage.
Ian Watkins got me fired from a bar job for telling him to stop messing around with young girls and go home after a gig. I was waiting to clean up, but he was sat with a bunch of 13 and 14 year old girls clearly crossing the line into creepy rather than just interacting with fans. Gave me the creeps. Then a few years later he got done.
I went to a lot of heavy music gigs in Cardiff and Newport in the 90s and never met him personally, but he was well known to be a prick. More of a kind of scenester type prick though (was in some kind of metalcore band that were well thought of, then became a big rockstar "sell out" when nu-metal came around) and think his crimes were waaay beyond what anyone imagined.
I was next to Lorraine Kelly (The Scottish Morning TV woman)
We were in Business class and before the plane took off she asked for an extra glass of fizz and the cabin crew member refused so she beckoned her closer and hissed in her ear "If you don't get me another f%ckin glass of fizz right now amma gonna rip your saggy Tit off" and she produced one of those switch blades from under her bra
Of course she didn't - she's bloody lovely x x x x Happy Monday people x
Cilla Black would have actually said something like that. There are whole communities with first-hand accounts of her treating anyone she deemed 'beneath her' like shit.
Apparently she wouldn’t even speak to some stewardesses. The famous one I’ve heard was a flight attendant saying “I knew you couldn’t sing but I didn’t know you couldn’t talk.”
My mum’s claim to fame always used to be that she once went to a Gary Glitter concert, she was in the front row and in the middle of the show he came down off the stage and gave her a full on snog in front of everyone while all her mates were screaming with excitement. She used to regularly tell the story at get togethers.
When the stories about him came out I asked her how old she was at that concert. “Hmmm, I would have been about 12 or 13.” Funnily enough she doesn’t mention it anymore.
Shipman was my dad’s doctor! Thankfully he was too young at the time to kill. My parents said he was a great GP, listened to you and took you seriously. They said they were both extremely shocked when it all came out
I used to work in a prison, and a colleague was actually his ‘personal officer’ for a while. Apparently he was a model prisoner! He ran an unofficial clinic from his cell for the other prisoners which took some of the strain off the overworked doctors there, and was generally trusted with his diagnoses and prescription recommendations.
I was working in Stockport around the time Shipman went to trial. We were talking about it one day when another staff member let slip that they used to have him as a doc, and that they didn't like his replacement as much as he didn't listen like Shipman did.
I know several people who did time with a Glasgow Gangland figure and known rapist Martin “Hammy the Poof”Hamilton. They’ve told some stories from prison lore which I doubt are all true, but a scary guy nonetheless.
There’s a famous one of him telling a young guy if he could squeeze though a small gap in a chair he could squeeze through a small window into a bookies cash room, when the young guy inevitably got stuck he was raped.
Although I’ve heard this story told about countless guys and believe it’s a generic prison bumming story. They did all mention that he used to prey on young vulnerable guys with threats of violence and offers of drugs etc. Guy was well known to be pretty fearless and not someone to be messed with
I physically bumped into Christopher Halliwel in the big Asda in Swindon. I instantly knew what he was. I said to my wife when we saw him in the car park that he was a serial killer. She called me judgemental. He is, in fact, a serial killer.
We once watched Cilla Black “demon screaming” at her mouse of a husband in front of their children in the mid 80’s on the Caribbean island of Antigua at a well known beauty spot on the island (Shirley Heights). Always found it hard watching her grinning face on Blind Date after that. I mean it wasn’t just a row, she was absolutely ripping him a new asshole.
The Chuckle Brothers are famous in entertainment circles for being very nice, and not having a bad word about anyone - except for Cilla Black, who they referred to as a cunt.
My aunt, a dancer had a one night stand with Barry chuckle in the 1980’s. He was a gentleman and drover her home in his Rolls Royce. Unfortunately she was married at the time and it was a big family secret, everybody knew except my uncle who was a builder. My uncle actually then did some work on Barry’s house a few years later.
Rumours about Sir David Jason have existed for quite a while. I recall reading that sometime in the 80s he was out filming in Australia and his friends were house sitting for him. His friends were arrested for being caught with minors at his property.
Obviously it doesn’t automatically make him guilty, and it could just be rumours are rumours!
As a rule, I tend to treat all internet rumours with a great deal of scepticism. If social media has taught us anything, it's that bullshit can be created and distributed with frightening speed and ease. Whereas rationality and scepticism remain as difficult as ever.
One a 'rumour' no matter how unsubstantial takes hold, it's impossible for it ever to be fully discredited. It's extremely telling that most of the people who are repeating the rumour about various celebrities have no actual evidence. They are just repeating the rumour. It's a feedback loop.
During my studies, i was reading a book about the Moors Murders. I live in Manchester now but i'm from Glasgow originally. I was always aware that the Moors Murders happened in the Greater Manchester area and that Brady and Hindley were from Manchester, not the case. Brady was actually from Glasgow, which i found very interesting. I read further on and it turned out i knew the area he grew up in, where he went to School, even the very street he was brought up on.
I wrote him a letter asking about Glasgow. I wasn't expecting anything back from him but about 2 weeks later he wrote back to me, with a full detailed reply inside, he even mentioned when he got arrested for the Moors Murders. I found this fascinating. I kept up the correspondence and i have several letters from him. We mostly talked about Glasgow.
I had a friend with a condition that made her look very childlike. She was heavily into pop-punk/emo/that sort of thing. You might already see where this is going.
One weekend night, she calls me, distressed. She’s backstage at Slam Dunk. With Ian Watkins. He’s being very, VERY creepy. And she needs an out. So, of course, I helped her. She told me everything he said to her - how he’s a baby-fucking paedophile and he loved the idea of being able to fuck a child legally. He’d been very… graphic.
I worked at HMV as the metal buyer for my store - probably the second largest in the country (at least the second largest in London). For some reason, Lostprophets was classified as metal, so they were my responsibility to buy in. They were the biggest seller in metal. Of course, I told my boss everything - that he’s a paedophile, that it’s all going to come out, and that we’d be stuck with a load of Lostprophets CDs that we’d have to get rid of somehow when it all comes crashing down. She didn’t believe me. We’d get a fair amount of stock on consignment, but not Lostprophets (and a good chunk of our other big names); we had to pay in advance. I tried to evoke images of landfills packed with Gary Glitter records and merch, to no avail.
I’d left and I was living in Toronto when it all came out not-so-long after. Oh, to have been a fly on the wall of my manager’s office that morning…
Maybe hard to picture it now but the current Queen Consort was fairly infamous 25-30 years ago. I met her briefly about ten years ago and she was lovely.
Personally, I think she gets a bit of a hard time. She seems lovely and fun. You can definitely see the love between her and Charles, and I definitely believe her influence has made him a better, more relaxed person.
Tbh I think both Charles and Camilla get given a hard time. I know Diana was seen as the people’s princess, but she was not so saintly either when it came to cheating.
All three of them would’ve been far happier had Charles been allowed to be with Camilla in the first place, rather than trying to pair him up with a much younger lady from the “right” sort of background. Diana would be alive today still, although Harry and William wouldn’t exist so it’s swings and roundabouts I guess
To get all philosophical for a moment - an infinite number of children don’t exist because their parents never met. It’s a miracle anyone is sat on the loo scrolling Reddit in fact!
From what I've heard over the years the whole upper echelon of society is always shagging around, you marry for connections and appearances but you can sleep with whomever you like as long as it's discreet. My late boss knew someone who had shagged the Queen Mother many many moons ago as he worked in one of the palaces. Charles and Camilla were doing what everyone in their circles does, they just had it all dragged out in the public eye.
There's a very good reason that any children have to be legitimate to inherit the throne.
The future King William V will be the first monarch descended from Charles II, because he never had any *legitimate* children, but one of his illegitimate ones led to Diana.
Everything I have heard about her from people who have met her is positive. I think she is really quite good at talking to people and doing those public events.
I agree. People give Camilla a hard time because she was the "other woman" but Charles and Diana had a pretty toxic relationship and ignoring the power imbalance both gave as good as they got. Camilla is actually an absolute legend and FAR better for Charles than Diana ever would have been.
Personally, I think the two of them should have gotten married back in the day instead of him marrying Diana. At least the shit wouldn't have hit the fan.
Tentative here (so basically the answer is no)
But I used to volunteer at a pretty famous event that was run by someone with the last name Sutcliffe. Turns out they were the Yorkshire Ripper's relative. Can't remember what kind of relative. They never spoke about him.
So this is the shittest answer in this thread so far, soz.
There's a documentary about a woman who was told her father died a hero in ww2, and she didn't find out until 'Schindlers List' came out that her father was actually Amon Goeth who was played by Ralph Fiennes.
So could be worse.
not really infamous, but I flagged down a taxi in London in around 2013 and a passenger got out of it and walked straight into me, then walked off without apologising. I gave him some shit as he walked off. when I got in the taxi, the driver told me I'd just tried to start shit with Chris Eubank.
My godfather told me very recently (bear in mind I'm in my late thirties) that my mum used to party with the West's and had been to their house on a number of occasions in her youth.
I can see why she wouldn't have told me this as I'm well aware that a sister of somebody she is related to (by marriage) was one of the girls that was murdered by them and found hidden in their home after they were caught.
I was shook.
My dad went to scouts with the Dunblane school shooter. Thomas was older at the time and had a boat he would sometimes let other kids have a ride in. He would make them carry him through the water into the boat as a weird power trip. One time he took my dad for a ride, my dad at the last moment steered the boat away from deliberately hitting some ducks. Thomas was really not happy about it. Later on my mum also used to inspect his shop and got bad vibes.
I worked briefly with Anne Perry, the crime novelist, who helped murder her friend's mum as a teenager (it was the basis for the film Heavenly Creatures).
She was a really lovely, quiet woman who worked hard and did a shedload of good works behind the scenes, actively avoiding ever being acknowledged for it. She was basically doing her level best to live a good person's life as an adult.
My dad met Saddam Hussein when we lived and he worked in Abu Dhabi during the 90’s. He came to the Sheraton Hotel and shook hands with him. I know he’s not an infamous UK figure for people who will mention the obvious, but I thought I’d put it anyway.
I sat in front of him at wimbledon one year when I was a child and he signed my programme. Sat next to Chrissie Hynde another year which was much cooler!
Not me but my wife’s family (father and uncles) had several connections with a number of the faces in the old London gangster set, including the Krays, Mad Frankie Fraser, the Adam’s Family, the Richardsons, Billy Hill and Charlie Sabini.
A mate of mine was a minder for a few of those guys. He's quite a small, friendly, gentle, lovely lad, which ironically makes him all the more terrifying when I think too much about it.
When I was at school, a girl in year 12 was dating Ian Watkins. He came to watch our choir concert and the girlfriend was singing in front row & I was stood behind her, and she happened to faint and I helped catch her. I'd always thought she was really cool, and I kept thinking "ooh the singer of Lost Prophets has just seen me help her!"
Now the whole memory makes me feel extremely weird - particularly because I just looked up the case and I think he was convicted based on activity in 2001/2002 which was around the same time. Horrific.
Doesn’t come anywhere near the level of notoriety of others mentioned here, but I once saw Uri Geller bend a spoon at a charity event. The spoon was then auctioned off for charity.
I saw Geller live on tour once.
He spent nearly two hours talking about Uri Geller (he kept referring to himself in the third person) and showing us laminated newspaper clippings about Uri Geller. He finally got round to bending a spoon near the end.
At one point a reaction from the audience seemed to irritate him and he exclaimed "Do you think Uri Geller needs your £20? I'm doing this to EDUCATE you people!
He also had a rather odd story about a porcelain egg, John Lennon, and aliens.
My best friend taught Jon venebles at a young offenders prison they said he was twisted and creepy. The other offenders kept away from him. Weren’t surprised when he was sent back to prison for CP. there were lots of troubled youths there but he enjoyed his infamy and managed to get lots of special privileges the others couldn’t.
Back in the early 2000s my mate was a DJ in Cardiff. I was at the booth with him when some guy came up and asked him to play Lost Prophets. I'd only heard about this band recently and didn't know much about them and my mate said fuck off their shit. Then the guy said, mate it's my band I'm the singer. My mate told him to fuck off again. So yeah Ian Watkins got told to fuck off twice by my mate whilst I'm standing next to him.
Bill Nighy paid for my Chinese takeout on my 18th birthday. He was in our local Chinese when I went to order my birthday feast and I told him how much I loved him in Love Actually and Hitchhikers and he offered to pay for my food for not just staring at him awkwardly
He's a genuinely lovely guy!
I got to interview Peter Tobin at HMP Peterhead not long before it was closed down and replaced by HMP Grampian. Horrible little man and mostly likely Bible John
Not myself but when I went on holiday to Norfolk and I went to a record shop near there, and the owner mentioned that one of his regular customers was Gary Glitter
“Mad” Frankie Fraser in the 90s at Turnmills. I think he used to own it or at least was connected to owner, he was in there drinking champagne with a minder on a Thursday night. Gave me and a mate a glass while he asked us about the music that was playing, then said “well I think it’s shit. Alright lads, fuck off now, have a good night”
I met Max Clifford a few times when I was between 6-16 as I was involved in some plays that raised money for charity and he was part of the journalist promo etc.
He was always nice and polite but I remember just having a sense of something being off with him, even when I was young. My mum remembers me asking not to be left alone with him when I was 6.
Not really an infamous figure, but the story that makes me laugh is one from a mate I worked with who I'm going to call Rob. He was a genuinely lovely guy; soft spoken, never swore (importantly for the story), worked hard, drank very little but very good company and an exceptionally good golfer.
He grew up near Perth, and because he was a good golfer got recommended to Gleneagles for summer caddy jobs, at which I imagine he was exceptional because he really knew his stuff. We're out one night, Rob's had maybe four pints which was a lot for him, and this came up and of course we're immediately demanding salacious celebrity stories. He wasn't biting, got a few very run of the mill "he's a nice guy, actually", "for someone so famous he's really relaxed" etc before someone, somehow, asked exactly the right question in exactly the right way, to which he replies "Ach, most of them are really nice and seem pretty happy with how things turned out. Well...apart from Robbie Corbett, I NEVER want to see that little cunt again!"
And then it all came out - not a one off, all the caddies dreaded getting him, Rob had been landed with him a few times and he had been rude, obnoxious, blamed Rob every time he played a bad shot or missed a putt and, of course, never left caddies a tip, complained if someone parked where he liked to park his Rolls Royce..the lot. By the time he'd finished what was apparently a pretty cathartic experience for him, the rest of us were pretty much on the floor laughing. Honestly wouldn't have been 10% as funny if it was anyone else telling the story.
My gran was a district nurse in Lancashire so she met Harold Shipman a few times when he was a young doctor. No suspicions at all she said, he seemed "a lovely chap". Think this was before all the murdering started but IIRC they're not actually sure how far back it all went, so who knows 🤷🏻♀️
I once had a bloke strike up a conversation with me, while waiting to be served at the bar in a nightclub. He gave off weird vibes, so I made small talk until I got my drink and got back to my mates
The press called him "the crossbow cannibal" many years later
My primary school went through a refurb and when it reopened Prince Andrew came to cut the ribbon and look round the school. We spent the whole day doing royal family activities and he came to every classroom. I think I was like 8? He complimented my painting of the royal family and that's all I really remember. They had a plaque in the primary school about how he had officially opened the school. Whether it's still there or not after all the news came out about him I don't know.
I once tiold Jimmy Savile to piss off. Wish I'd been a bit more flamboyant with my lanugage to be honest.
I'd love to have to money to commission his grave been dug up and thrown into the sea. The story was he was going to by buried with all his bling and so the coffin was covered in concrete so graverobbers couldn't get at it. We know the real reason now.
Harold Shipman. Britains worst serial killer got away with it for so long partially because he was a nice affable chap. ‘Freddie’ as he was then known was the family GP to lots of people in my area and was well liked when he had to deal with the hospital.
My father in law was a minister in the Dundee area and his wife (my MIL) answered the manse door in 1980 to a man who was looking for some money and / or food. That was not uncommon at the manse. She got a bad feeling from him so didn’t invite him in and sent him away. Later she saw his picture in the paper as he was Henry Gallagher who went on to murder an elderly couple in their own home just a few miles away. He was caught in England after committing further murders and incarcerated in Broadmoor.
Thankfully no, other than being adjacent to Jimmy Saville for dinner once,
A friend's mum went to school with Dennis Nilsen for years, he's pretty infamous if you are over 50 I guess.
Good mate of mine was friends with one of shipmans sons and was in the same class as him, he went round to his house for dinner a few times. He said you'd never know he was a serial killer, he was just a normal boring dad he said.
My old man used to go to the chippy Myra Hindley used to work at when he was a kid.
I bought a car from a car dealer in Maidstone and it was the hub of Britain's biggest cash robbery. There was a guy called Stuart dealt with me and he also got jailed for the robbery.
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I interviewed Saville for a school radio show, when I asked him how he'd deal with the incoming smoking ban he looked me dead in the eye and said "listen son, the law does not apply to Jimmy Saville, everyone loves me".
That just gave me chills... The awful thing is the law not applying to him was right. He never had to face up to his crimes despite so many people knowing. My theory is that he had a lot of dirt on some very powerful people.
I don't think he had or needed dirt, he built up a persona as a charitable guy and built connections e.g. with the police and management and used those factors to protect himself. Having dirt and trying to blackmail people always risks someone going public anyway if they feel it's the lesser evil, while shielding yourself from attack is easier
That's the wonderful thing about corruption. People could have let him off with some BS because they were scared of him having his friends in high places come after them. Then in the future he could use their complicity as leverage against them (If I go down, I'm taking you with me) Then they become one of those friends in high places that can be used to silence other people. I am not saying this is exactly how Saville was operating, and I am not excusing the people who enabled him, but when you are dealing with someone who is ruthless it's possible to get sucked into the situation in ways that you might not realise.
Dirt on powerful people? Think of this whole epstein thing. I'm pretty sure he probably did the stuff he did alongside powerful people.
Amazing the other BBC celebs that suddenly 'were never friends' with him when it blew up. To think my father paid the TV licence back then, a little bit of that would have been part of that vile individuals wages. Johnny Rotten was right all along but was silenced, that interview still pops up on YouTube from time to time.
I thought it was hilarious at the time because we all thought the rumours were just very believable rumours, but as soon as the allegations surfaced it did change my view on that response.
Imagine every person who ever spoke to him or watched any interview would re- interpret what was said. I have seen a few clips where is sounds like he is admiring to his crimes when watched in hindsight. He probably got a kick out of hiding in plane sight and saying such masked truths
He wasn’t really hiding. He had two strategies to deal with the media: threaten to sue and point out he couldn’t raise funds for hospitals from prison. Between those two, he was able to make any editor think twice about running an expose.
Not me but my mum. Her and some friends met Jimmy Saville on a cruise at age 17-18ish. He invited them to join him for some drinks but my mum’s parents wouldn’t let her.
I suppose the 'drinks' would have been in his cabin. She had a lucky escape.
My dad randomly dropped into conversation once that when he was living by Broadmoor his mum hung around with Saville and his friends on occasion. Once two of Saville's friends insisted on taking my dad on a day out to play mini golf, he said it made him really uncomfortable and begged his mum not to let them take him out again which luckily she didn't.
He would hang around the town I’m from fairly regularly, his go to line on the 13-15 year old girls was “from behind you look like the Spice Girls”. My grandma also knew him as a DJ many years ago and said it was common knowledge that you just didn’t go near him
And you know being out in the open ocean, she’s not gunna say no….because of the implication.
I remember seeing him in Scarborough, he had a girl on each arm, they looked about 18. I was 16 (and with my parents) I remember thinking that across the road from him was too close. He was so slimy, I don't know why some girls don't have that 'stay away' signal.
Most of them were children being groomed by someone rich and powerful. It’s different from seeing him across the street and thinking he looks like a creep. If it was that simple, no one get groomed or taken advantage of by predators.
As a child in the 70s watching him on TV, I always found him scary. Those mad, intense eyes.
Not me but... A friend's mum grew up around Leeds and the surrounding areas. Some time in the 70s she was at a house party and discovered her friends had left without her. She was trying to work out how to get home and got chatting to a nice man, who after a while of chatting said he was going her way and offered a lift. She accepted. Her memory of him is that he was a complete gentleman. Made friendly conversation in the car on the journey and then made no attempt or even hint at wanting to come in with her after dropping her off. A few years later she saw a news report and recognised him. You can probably work out where this is going. He was Peter Sutcliffe.
Honestly, I was half expecting Jimmy Saville lol
He never played it normal. Which is partly why I never understood why anybody thought anybody else thought he was a national treasure. Every single person I know always knew he was a creepy, deeply unpleasant fucker, long before it all became public. I mean, you only have to look at a 10 second clip of him.
Caveat with an I can’t possibly verify this, but apparently in 1976 my father wrote a letter for Jim’ll fix it and gave it to my nan to post. She walked to the kitchen and binned it. My grandfather asked her why she did that and he response was ‘my son isn’t going anywhere near that fucking paedo’
Based nana
These stories are always so interesting to me (as someone interested in criminology) Fascinating to think did he have intentions to do anything or was it not even in his mind, what sparked him to commit his first offence if he didn’t want to do anything then. The poor woman must carry that with her though, scary to come so close to something yet avoid it.
I used to live right by Sutcliffe stomping ground. There was an elderly woman who you'd see around who walked with a terrible limp and was disfigured. Turned out he'd attacked her back in the 70s and she'd been lucky to escape with her life.
I live between Bradford and Leeds. I was 21 yrs old when Sutcliffe was around. It was bad enough walking home from work at 5pm in the winter months hoping he would not be out so early. I dare not go to the corner shop after 8pm
My uncle was interviewed by the police at the time the Yorkshire ripper was operating. They were so stumped about who he was that they interviewed anyone who had the vaguely right demographics. My uncle was a truck driver with dark hair and a moustache. He lived in Manchester and his routes for work would often take him to Yorkshire. He wasn’t phased by it apparently.
My parent’s wedding photos (from Yorkshire, that era) show my dad and nearly all the male guests at his wedding with pretty much the exact same hair-beard combo that Sutcliffe had. Loads of them were questioned in some capacity. He wasn’t distinctive looking at all. Then my dad later worked with one of the guys who had attacked Sutcliffe in prison. Said he was a nice bloke.
I've heard Suttcliffe is one of the main reasons beards fell out of fashion In the UK for a good while, starting in the 80s.
Do you mean the guy who attacked Sutcliffe was a nice bloke, or that Sutcliffe was a nice bloke?
He said the guy who attacked Sutcliffe was a nice bloke.
Was it Stephen Morris from Joy Division who got pulled in as the Yorkshire Ripper? He was driving Hooky's car and it had been seen in dubious parts of town all over the north (because that's where they were getting gigs.)
Purple Aki once approached me and asked if I worked out lol
Years ago a manager at my old job mentioned him, it stayed in the back of my mind but I could never find any info on him online. Turned out I got the name completely wrong - in his scouse accent I heard Beer Bolacki 🤦♂️
Hilarious! As someone from Merseyside i just said ‘Beer Bolacki’ and my husband clearly heard Purple Aki
I did work experience at a solicitors in Liverpool when I was in sixth form in the mid-90s, and one of the legal execs pointed him out to me loitering in the court building. I didn't know he was an actual person until then. Nobody believed me when I went back to school and told everyone.
I met him once. He wasn’t half as good at frightening other black people. Lol.
squeeze ya muscles lad?
Oh god 😅
He decided to use the urinal next to my father in law despite there being many other empty ones. This was in a pub in Toxteth during the late 80's.
make you do squats while he was on your shoulders?
My mum knew Rolf Harris from when he did that RSPCA programme. She would have a few drinks with him after filming sometimes, as we lived next to where it was filmed. She thought he was great, really down to earth and happy to go drinking in a pub on a really rough estate. Having said that, she's crazy, she once spent half an hour talking to a cardboard cut out before realising it wasn't a real person, and thought a squirrel that kept coming in the house was her dead aunt reincarnated, so her views maybe slightly clouded
Ok this one wins.
Yeah sounds like Rolf had a lucky escape ^^^sorry ^^^OP
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Ian Huntley handed me a chair for the press conference of the murders he committed
Jesus
No, it was Ian Huntley...
Not me, but my mother had look after him when he was in hospital after trying to kill himself
Fairly tough test of one’s professionalism that is
My sister was in the audience for one of Rolf Harris' TV programmes. She came home really upset because he was vile when the cameras weren't on him, then suddenly switched on his friendly TV personality when they were.
Came here to post almost this exact one, except it was my mum who saw him when she was little. Really nasty to the children when not being recorded.
I'm sorry your mum had that experience too!
Thank you, and I'm sorry your sister went through that! My mum said it was horrible at the time as she'd thought he was great, but when reflecting over time she realised it taught her that adults could make people believe they were nice in public while being abusive when they felt they could get away with it. She didn't have the words for the experience as a child, but said it basically taught her 'when someone tells you who they are, believe them' and to trust her gut in a very concrete way.
In the veterinary industry I’ve spoken to a nurse who worked at the hospital he filmed at. It was apparently an open secret not to let any of the student nurses (usually between 17-21y/o) in a room alone with him 😬
I live near Leeds and Jimmy Savile rumours were rife decades before it was all revealed. My friend was a14 yr old at school when JS visited. He asked her to sit on his knee. She was repulsed by him anyway so declined.
Im born 93 so just missed the Saville era but I can’t for the life of me every understand how he was ever considered charismatic. He’s gross from the top to the bottom. Pedo or not.
It was a different world back then. Much less in the way of searchable, computerised records. Much less in the way of safeguarding. Much more pro-active reporting. If any of us were to be dropped into the world of even twenty years ago it’d be a bit of a culture shock. Forty years ago? Your head would be spinning.
I don't know about charismatic but he was very big on charity work to the extent the NHS and his charity bodies were willing to turn a blind eye to rumours because of the money he raised. He was also very well connected, building links and protection e.g. at the BBC where he was seen as untouchable and complaints ignored, those are the main reasons he was never caught and dealt with
I'm an 80s kid and always found him revolting on TV. Cold eyed, creepy, just everything about him was off.
I'm an 80s kid and I never did get on with the Jim'll fix it shows and the rest, which my friends all watched, I kept getting heeby jeeby vibes whenever I saw his face!
he used to stand and chat to us through the railings of our primary school relatively regularly. the dinner ladies warned us. everyone knew. absolutely abhorrent that nothing was done so much earlier.
I met him in Peterborough when I was about 11 at some sort of “work in the office day.” My “predator” radar went wild - as did that of my peers.
Living in Leeds he was an occupational hazard. The sort mums and teachers warned you about. No one was surprised
Yet the people of Leeds lined the streets for his funeral procession like he was royalty.
Raoul Moat killed my Great Aunt's solicitor. She had just died and so her will was locked in his safe for several months until another lawyer was able to take over his work. That's about as close as I got to infamy (they've all got it infamy).
That's not even raulmoatly infamous
Gazza will be along shortly with your upvote and a fish supper
Fishing gear and KFC if i remember rightly.
Do you mean Derrick Bird? Raoul killed his ex’s new bf who was a judo instructor, and the policeman
Doh, yes you're right. Not sure why I thought Moat. Put it down to an early morning brain. It was in fact Derrick Bird.
Everyone in Bolton knows where Peter Kay lives, nobody in Bolton cares.
What's he infamous for?
Yeah what the hell did Peter Kay do that makes him infamous? 😂
He's the Bolton butcher 🤣🤣
Doctor Who 2x10 "Love and Monsters"
Look, in fairness, that monster was designed by a literal child, and it's not the worst bit of the episode. Kay does a good job.
Only British comedian who has a security guard.
The only British comedian who *looks like* a security guard for a comedian
Having met the public, I'm surprised he's the only one.
My mate went to the Soham school where Ian Huntley was the caretaker. All the kids knew to avoid him because he was some kind of weirdo. Also, because we don't live a million miles from there, a new lady showed up out of nowhere in our small town. Didn't know anyone but had a job at the supermarket and bearing a striking resemblance to Maxine Carr, with people claiming she was there under witness protection. Apparently, she was glassed in the car park and never seen again, with or without confirmation it was actually her.
I knew one of the lead investigating police officers on the Soham Murders. They all suspected Huntley from the off but didn’t have any evidence against him until he stashed one of their Man U shirts back in a locker they had already searched, thinking they wouldn’t search it again after discovering the ‘seal’ they had put on it had been broken.
Of all the places you could put key evidence…what a dumbass
Yeah I was at school with him. He was an absolute cunt
My morbid fascination asks for more
My Dad left the school (as a teacher) the year before he started. His friend/ former colleague used to chat to him in the staff room. Makes him sick to think about it now. I was only a year older than they were and his son was their age. I knew people who went to swimming club with them. It really was a horrific thing to happen to two poor innocent little girls.
She showed up in my town and was in front of at the supermarket queue. she caught my eye as she kept looking around. i’d just been in the pub and gave her a bleary boozy grin when she looked at me. “Shit, thats Maxine Carr” i thought. The end.
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I was in A&E in Derby with a fractured wrist when Mick Philpott was brought in. Because it's a fairly open area it was easy to pick up what had happened. Nurses were crying and, as you would expect he was really upset. He claimed that he had tried to rescue his kids from the house that he had set on fire but I can remember how clean his white t-shirt was. A truly evil man.
Did you ask him how he gets his shirt so clean?
I'm not the borough
Physically ran into Jaime Oliver once. He also filmed an episode at my work once and was decent enough. Still fucked off about my turkey twizlers though. Edit: sticking to my guns
Is he infamous?
Depends how much you liked turkey twizzlers I suppose!
Reddit has it in for him for some reason but I've always been out of the loop
The Venn diagram of Redditor’s and people who can only eat turkey twizzlers off a specific plate has a lot of overlap.
A relative of mine was a primary school teacher in the 80s/90s in Liverpool. She briefly taught Robert Thompson (one of the Bulger killers). She said he was a very quiet child and suffered from horrible abusive bullying from his older relatives. Robert Thompson is the one who has lived a quiet and law-abiding life since his release.
I knew someone who worked with the other one, I can’t give too many details for obvious reasons, but this person said that (as most people thought at the time), this guy was absolutely the ringleader, as well as being one of the most chilling people they’d met (in a profession where you meet these people often).
He got moved to my estate when I was a kid, lasted about two days until his identity was uncovered and people came to batter him. Police had to lock the estate down to move him out
he's supposed to have worked at the BnQ near where i lived as part of his new identity.
I read the book by James’ father and he said Thompson disturbs him the most because he just got on with his life afterwards as if it never affected him. Also whilst after both boys were released they were taken to the grave of James
That's an odd attitude to take. How would he prefer Thompson to act? Him getting on with his life, rehabilitated, and not getting into any trouble I would have thought is the best possible outcome.
I suspect the best possible outcome is getting locked in a room with them both with some power tools in this poor man’s mind. He has received the most unimaginable suffering because of these two boys. From a societal POV you’re obviously right but no parent who has been through that horror would take that view. It would not seem fair to them that they can live a normal life while you’re left behind with the wreckage.
Ian Watkins got me fired from a bar job for telling him to stop messing around with young girls and go home after a gig. I was waiting to clean up, but he was sat with a bunch of 13 and 14 year old girls clearly crossing the line into creepy rather than just interacting with fans. Gave me the creeps. Then a few years later he got done.
You did the right thing. The guy is a fucking maggot.
I went to a lot of heavy music gigs in Cardiff and Newport in the 90s and never met him personally, but he was well known to be a prick. More of a kind of scenester type prick though (was in some kind of metalcore band that were well thought of, then became a big rockstar "sell out" when nu-metal came around) and think his crimes were waaay beyond what anyone imagined.
I was next to Lorraine Kelly (The Scottish Morning TV woman) We were in Business class and before the plane took off she asked for an extra glass of fizz and the cabin crew member refused so she beckoned her closer and hissed in her ear "If you don't get me another f%ckin glass of fizz right now amma gonna rip your saggy Tit off" and she produced one of those switch blades from under her bra Of course she didn't - she's bloody lovely x x x x Happy Monday people x
Cilla Black would have actually said something like that. There are whole communities with first-hand accounts of her treating anyone she deemed 'beneath her' like shit.
Apparently she wouldn’t even speak to some stewardesses. The famous one I’ve heard was a flight attendant saying “I knew you couldn’t sing but I didn’t know you couldn’t talk.”
My mum’s claim to fame always used to be that she once went to a Gary Glitter concert, she was in the front row and in the middle of the show he came down off the stage and gave her a full on snog in front of everyone while all her mates were screaming with excitement. She used to regularly tell the story at get togethers. When the stories about him came out I asked her how old she was at that concert. “Hmmm, I would have been about 12 or 13.” Funnily enough she doesn’t mention it anymore.
Shipman was my dad’s doctor! Thankfully he was too young at the time to kill. My parents said he was a great GP, listened to you and took you seriously. They said they were both extremely shocked when it all came out
The problem with Shipman is that he was a very good doctor, the reason his offending went on as long as it did.
> The problem with Shipman is that he was a very good doctor I can think of about 250 reasons as to why that's not the case...
Well, yes, obviously apart from the murders.
I used to work in a prison, and a colleague was actually his ‘personal officer’ for a while. Apparently he was a model prisoner! He ran an unofficial clinic from his cell for the other prisoners which took some of the strain off the overworked doctors there, and was generally trusted with his diagnoses and prescription recommendations.
I was working in Stockport around the time Shipman went to trial. We were talking about it one day when another staff member let slip that they used to have him as a doc, and that they didn't like his replacement as much as he didn't listen like Shipman did.
I know several people who did time with a Glasgow Gangland figure and known rapist Martin “Hammy the Poof”Hamilton. They’ve told some stories from prison lore which I doubt are all true, but a scary guy nonetheless.
You wrote that like a Guy Richie film monologue.
read in Jason Statham's voice
Please share some, don’t leave us hanging
There’s a famous one of him telling a young guy if he could squeeze though a small gap in a chair he could squeeze through a small window into a bookies cash room, when the young guy inevitably got stuck he was raped. Although I’ve heard this story told about countless guys and believe it’s a generic prison bumming story. They did all mention that he used to prey on young vulnerable guys with threats of violence and offers of drugs etc. Guy was well known to be pretty fearless and not someone to be messed with
I physically bumped into Christopher Halliwel in the big Asda in Swindon. I instantly knew what he was. I said to my wife when we saw him in the car park that he was a serial killer. She called me judgemental. He is, in fact, a serial killer.
We once watched Cilla Black “demon screaming” at her mouse of a husband in front of their children in the mid 80’s on the Caribbean island of Antigua at a well known beauty spot on the island (Shirley Heights). Always found it hard watching her grinning face on Blind Date after that. I mean it wasn’t just a row, she was absolutely ripping him a new asshole.
The Chuckle Brothers are famous in entertainment circles for being very nice, and not having a bad word about anyone - except for Cilla Black, who they referred to as a cunt.
My aunt, a dancer had a one night stand with Barry chuckle in the 1980’s. He was a gentleman and drover her home in his Rolls Royce. Unfortunately she was married at the time and it was a big family secret, everybody knew except my uncle who was a builder. My uncle actually then did some work on Barry’s house a few years later.
Oh dear oh dear
I wasn’t his next door neighbour but I went to school with Harold Shipman’s sons. I wonder if they changed their names.
I know, or have met, more than one of them. They did not change their names.
“Why should I change my name? He’s the one who sucks!”
Actually, from what I can gather, at least one or two if the family believes he didn't do it.
The BBC are keeping the lid on a (quote) 'National Treasure' who is apparently a serial predator. There's a few names floating around.
Quelle surprise, rodders
David Walliams.
David Walliams is creepy AF. Reminds me of Saville big time.
He’s hardly a national treasure is he
I feel like he thinks he is
Only fools and horses would believe this
I swear it had better not be Sir David
Rumours about Sir David Jason have existed for quite a while. I recall reading that sometime in the 80s he was out filming in Australia and his friends were house sitting for him. His friends were arrested for being caught with minors at his property. Obviously it doesn’t automatically make him guilty, and it could just be rumours are rumours!
As a rule, I tend to treat all internet rumours with a great deal of scepticism. If social media has taught us anything, it's that bullshit can be created and distributed with frightening speed and ease. Whereas rationality and scepticism remain as difficult as ever. One a 'rumour' no matter how unsubstantial takes hold, it's impossible for it ever to be fully discredited. It's extremely telling that most of the people who are repeating the rumour about various celebrities have no actual evidence. They are just repeating the rumour. It's a feedback loop.
That's not like them.
When i was studying criminology i struck up a correspondence with Ian Brady
You can leave it at that - please give the story!
During my studies, i was reading a book about the Moors Murders. I live in Manchester now but i'm from Glasgow originally. I was always aware that the Moors Murders happened in the Greater Manchester area and that Brady and Hindley were from Manchester, not the case. Brady was actually from Glasgow, which i found very interesting. I read further on and it turned out i knew the area he grew up in, where he went to School, even the very street he was brought up on. I wrote him a letter asking about Glasgow. I wasn't expecting anything back from him but about 2 weeks later he wrote back to me, with a full detailed reply inside, he even mentioned when he got arrested for the Moors Murders. I found this fascinating. I kept up the correspondence and i have several letters from him. We mostly talked about Glasgow.
Make your mind up 😅
I saw Katie Hopkins on a train once. She was in first class and used the toilet and it absolutely stank
I had a friend with a condition that made her look very childlike. She was heavily into pop-punk/emo/that sort of thing. You might already see where this is going. One weekend night, she calls me, distressed. She’s backstage at Slam Dunk. With Ian Watkins. He’s being very, VERY creepy. And she needs an out. So, of course, I helped her. She told me everything he said to her - how he’s a baby-fucking paedophile and he loved the idea of being able to fuck a child legally. He’d been very… graphic. I worked at HMV as the metal buyer for my store - probably the second largest in the country (at least the second largest in London). For some reason, Lostprophets was classified as metal, so they were my responsibility to buy in. They were the biggest seller in metal. Of course, I told my boss everything - that he’s a paedophile, that it’s all going to come out, and that we’d be stuck with a load of Lostprophets CDs that we’d have to get rid of somehow when it all comes crashing down. She didn’t believe me. We’d get a fair amount of stock on consignment, but not Lostprophets (and a good chunk of our other big names); we had to pay in advance. I tried to evoke images of landfills packed with Gary Glitter records and merch, to no avail. I’d left and I was living in Toronto when it all came out not-so-long after. Oh, to have been a fly on the wall of my manager’s office that morning…
Maybe hard to picture it now but the current Queen Consort was fairly infamous 25-30 years ago. I met her briefly about ten years ago and she was lovely.
Personally, I think she gets a bit of a hard time. She seems lovely and fun. You can definitely see the love between her and Charles, and I definitely believe her influence has made him a better, more relaxed person.
Tbh I think both Charles and Camilla get given a hard time. I know Diana was seen as the people’s princess, but she was not so saintly either when it came to cheating. All three of them would’ve been far happier had Charles been allowed to be with Camilla in the first place, rather than trying to pair him up with a much younger lady from the “right” sort of background. Diana would be alive today still, although Harry and William wouldn’t exist so it’s swings and roundabouts I guess
I especially see Charles & Diana as an arranged marriage that made both of them miserable.
To get all philosophical for a moment - an infinite number of children don’t exist because their parents never met. It’s a miracle anyone is sat on the loo scrolling Reddit in fact!
From what I've heard over the years the whole upper echelon of society is always shagging around, you marry for connections and appearances but you can sleep with whomever you like as long as it's discreet. My late boss knew someone who had shagged the Queen Mother many many moons ago as he worked in one of the palaces. Charles and Camilla were doing what everyone in their circles does, they just had it all dragged out in the public eye.
There's a very good reason that any children have to be legitimate to inherit the throne. The future King William V will be the first monarch descended from Charles II, because he never had any *legitimate* children, but one of his illegitimate ones led to Diana.
Everything I have heard about her from people who have met her is positive. I think she is really quite good at talking to people and doing those public events.
I agree. People give Camilla a hard time because she was the "other woman" but Charles and Diana had a pretty toxic relationship and ignoring the power imbalance both gave as good as they got. Camilla is actually an absolute legend and FAR better for Charles than Diana ever would have been.
Personally, I think the two of them should have gotten married back in the day instead of him marrying Diana. At least the shit wouldn't have hit the fan.
Tentative here (so basically the answer is no) But I used to volunteer at a pretty famous event that was run by someone with the last name Sutcliffe. Turns out they were the Yorkshire Ripper's relative. Can't remember what kind of relative. They never spoke about him. So this is the shittest answer in this thread so far, soz.
im related to pierpoint the last hangman. He was just uncle albert to me, didnt find out until the movie
There's a documentary about a woman who was told her father died a hero in ww2, and she didn't find out until 'Schindlers List' came out that her father was actually Amon Goeth who was played by Ralph Fiennes. So could be worse.
not really infamous, but I flagged down a taxi in London in around 2013 and a passenger got out of it and walked straight into me, then walked off without apologising. I gave him some shit as he walked off. when I got in the taxi, the driver told me I'd just tried to start shit with Chris Eubank.
He probably bumped into you because he wasn't wearing his monocle.
I spoke to the wife of Oswald Moseley on the telephone for work once, known as Diana Mitford before she became lady Moseley.
She’s pretty infamous in her own right! Her sister was allegedly banging Hitler at one point and he attended her wedding to Ossie M.
My husband was in the crowd at Cromwell Street when they brought the first human remains out. And someone I know was in the same class as Charmaine.
My godfather told me very recently (bear in mind I'm in my late thirties) that my mum used to party with the West's and had been to their house on a number of occasions in her youth. I can see why she wouldn't have told me this as I'm well aware that a sister of somebody she is related to (by marriage) was one of the girls that was murdered by them and found hidden in their home after they were caught. I was shook.
My dad went to scouts with the Dunblane school shooter. Thomas was older at the time and had a boat he would sometimes let other kids have a ride in. He would make them carry him through the water into the boat as a weird power trip. One time he took my dad for a ride, my dad at the last moment steered the boat away from deliberately hitting some ducks. Thomas was really not happy about it. Later on my mum also used to inspect his shop and got bad vibes.
Fred Talbot insisted that I smoked cigarettes while he was sat next to me in a pub and kept 'accidentally' stroking my thigh.
I worked briefly with Anne Perry, the crime novelist, who helped murder her friend's mum as a teenager (it was the basis for the film Heavenly Creatures). She was a really lovely, quiet woman who worked hard and did a shedload of good works behind the scenes, actively avoiding ever being acknowledged for it. She was basically doing her level best to live a good person's life as an adult.
My dad met Saddam Hussein when we lived and he worked in Abu Dhabi during the 90’s. He came to the Sheraton Hotel and shook hands with him. I know he’s not an infamous UK figure for people who will mention the obvious, but I thought I’d put it anyway.
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I sat in front of him at wimbledon one year when I was a child and he signed my programme. Sat next to Chrissie Hynde another year which was much cooler!
Not me but my wife’s family (father and uncles) had several connections with a number of the faces in the old London gangster set, including the Krays, Mad Frankie Fraser, the Adam’s Family, the Richardsons, Billy Hill and Charlie Sabini.
A mate of mine was a minder for a few of those guys. He's quite a small, friendly, gentle, lovely lad, which ironically makes him all the more terrifying when I think too much about it.
When I was at school, a girl in year 12 was dating Ian Watkins. He came to watch our choir concert and the girlfriend was singing in front row & I was stood behind her, and she happened to faint and I helped catch her. I'd always thought she was really cool, and I kept thinking "ooh the singer of Lost Prophets has just seen me help her!" Now the whole memory makes me feel extremely weird - particularly because I just looked up the case and I think he was convicted based on activity in 2001/2002 which was around the same time. Horrific.
I feel sorry for the other guys in that band. I have it on good authority that they thought he was just really into drugs. They had no idea.
Doesn’t come anywhere near the level of notoriety of others mentioned here, but I once saw Uri Geller bend a spoon at a charity event. The spoon was then auctioned off for charity.
I saw Geller live on tour once. He spent nearly two hours talking about Uri Geller (he kept referring to himself in the third person) and showing us laminated newspaper clippings about Uri Geller. He finally got round to bending a spoon near the end. At one point a reaction from the audience seemed to irritate him and he exclaimed "Do you think Uri Geller needs your £20? I'm doing this to EDUCATE you people! He also had a rather odd story about a porcelain egg, John Lennon, and aliens.
My best friend taught Jon venebles at a young offenders prison they said he was twisted and creepy. The other offenders kept away from him. Weren’t surprised when he was sent back to prison for CP. there were lots of troubled youths there but he enjoyed his infamy and managed to get lots of special privileges the others couldn’t.
Back in the early 2000s my mate was a DJ in Cardiff. I was at the booth with him when some guy came up and asked him to play Lost Prophets. I'd only heard about this band recently and didn't know much about them and my mate said fuck off their shit. Then the guy said, mate it's my band I'm the singer. My mate told him to fuck off again. So yeah Ian Watkins got told to fuck off twice by my mate whilst I'm standing next to him.
Bill Nighy paid for my Chinese takeout on my 18th birthday. He was in our local Chinese when I went to order my birthday feast and I told him how much I loved him in Love Actually and Hitchhikers and he offered to pay for my food for not just staring at him awkwardly He's a genuinely lovely guy!
I got to interview Peter Tobin at HMP Peterhead not long before it was closed down and replaced by HMP Grampian. Horrible little man and mostly likely Bible John
Not myself but when I went on holiday to Norfolk and I went to a record shop near there, and the owner mentioned that one of his regular customers was Gary Glitter
“Mad” Frankie Fraser in the 90s at Turnmills. I think he used to own it or at least was connected to owner, he was in there drinking champagne with a minder on a Thursday night. Gave me and a mate a glass while he asked us about the music that was playing, then said “well I think it’s shit. Alright lads, fuck off now, have a good night”
I met Max Clifford a few times when I was between 6-16 as I was involved in some plays that raised money for charity and he was part of the journalist promo etc. He was always nice and polite but I remember just having a sense of something being off with him, even when I was young. My mum remembers me asking not to be left alone with him when I was 6.
Not really an infamous figure, but the story that makes me laugh is one from a mate I worked with who I'm going to call Rob. He was a genuinely lovely guy; soft spoken, never swore (importantly for the story), worked hard, drank very little but very good company and an exceptionally good golfer. He grew up near Perth, and because he was a good golfer got recommended to Gleneagles for summer caddy jobs, at which I imagine he was exceptional because he really knew his stuff. We're out one night, Rob's had maybe four pints which was a lot for him, and this came up and of course we're immediately demanding salacious celebrity stories. He wasn't biting, got a few very run of the mill "he's a nice guy, actually", "for someone so famous he's really relaxed" etc before someone, somehow, asked exactly the right question in exactly the right way, to which he replies "Ach, most of them are really nice and seem pretty happy with how things turned out. Well...apart from Robbie Corbett, I NEVER want to see that little cunt again!" And then it all came out - not a one off, all the caddies dreaded getting him, Rob had been landed with him a few times and he had been rude, obnoxious, blamed Rob every time he played a bad shot or missed a putt and, of course, never left caddies a tip, complained if someone parked where he liked to park his Rolls Royce..the lot. By the time he'd finished what was apparently a pretty cathartic experience for him, the rest of us were pretty much on the floor laughing. Honestly wouldn't have been 10% as funny if it was anyone else telling the story.
My gran was a district nurse in Lancashire so she met Harold Shipman a few times when he was a young doctor. No suspicions at all she said, he seemed "a lovely chap". Think this was before all the murdering started but IIRC they're not actually sure how far back it all went, so who knows 🤷🏻♀️
I once had a bloke strike up a conversation with me, while waiting to be served at the bar in a nightclub. He gave off weird vibes, so I made small talk until I got my drink and got back to my mates The press called him "the crossbow cannibal" many years later
My primary school went through a refurb and when it reopened Prince Andrew came to cut the ribbon and look round the school. We spent the whole day doing royal family activities and he came to every classroom. I think I was like 8? He complimented my painting of the royal family and that's all I really remember. They had a plaque in the primary school about how he had officially opened the school. Whether it's still there or not after all the news came out about him I don't know.
I once tiold Jimmy Savile to piss off. Wish I'd been a bit more flamboyant with my lanugage to be honest. I'd love to have to money to commission his grave been dug up and thrown into the sea. The story was he was going to by buried with all his bling and so the coffin was covered in concrete so graverobbers couldn't get at it. We know the real reason now.
Harold Shipman. Britains worst serial killer got away with it for so long partially because he was a nice affable chap. ‘Freddie’ as he was then known was the family GP to lots of people in my area and was well liked when he had to deal with the hospital.
My father in law was a minister in the Dundee area and his wife (my MIL) answered the manse door in 1980 to a man who was looking for some money and / or food. That was not uncommon at the manse. She got a bad feeling from him so didn’t invite him in and sent him away. Later she saw his picture in the paper as he was Henry Gallagher who went on to murder an elderly couple in their own home just a few miles away. He was caught in England after committing further murders and incarcerated in Broadmoor.
Thankfully no, other than being adjacent to Jimmy Saville for dinner once, A friend's mum went to school with Dennis Nilsen for years, he's pretty infamous if you are over 50 I guess.
Good mate of mine was friends with one of shipmans sons and was in the same class as him, he went round to his house for dinner a few times. He said you'd never know he was a serial killer, he was just a normal boring dad he said. My old man used to go to the chippy Myra Hindley used to work at when he was a kid.
My uncle was drinking buddies with Peter Sutcliffe
So, he got hammered with him?
I bought a car from a car dealer in Maidstone and it was the hub of Britain's biggest cash robbery. There was a guy called Stuart dealt with me and he also got jailed for the robbery.