Peter Woodcock
Peter Woodcock | |
|---|---|
| File:Woodcockmugshot1.JPG Woodcock in 1957. | |
| Born | March 5, 1939 |
| Died | March 5, 2010 (aged 71) Penetanguishene, Ontario, Canada |
| Details | |
| Victims | 4 known |
Span of crimes | 1956–1991 |
| Country | Canada |
Date apprehended | 1957 |
David Michael Krueger (March 5, 1939 – March 5, 2010),[1] best known by his birth name, Peter Woodcock, was a Canadian serial killer and child rapist who gained notoriety for the brutal murders of three young children in Toronto, Canada in 1956 and 1957 when he himself was still a teenager. He was subsequently diagnosed as a psychopath and placed in a psychiatric facility.[2] Expensive treatment programs for Woodcock proved ineffective when he murdered a fellow psychiatric patient in 1991; after his death in 2010, he was described as "The serial killer they couldn't cure".[1]
Life and crimes
Woodcock was born to a 17-year-old Peterborough factory worker who gave him up for adoption. He spent the first three years of his life in various foster homes; he was physically abused in at least one of those homes. He was later adopted by a wealthy family living near Yonge Street and Lawrence Avenue, who paid for a private school education, therapy and bikes for Woodcock. When he reached puberty, he began to travel around Toronto on his bike, fantasizing about becoming a gang leader and, in reality, sexually assaulting children in Parkdale and Cabbagetown. Ultimately, Woodcock would brutally murder three young children in 1956 and 1957.[1]
Woodcock was apprehended for the murders in 1957, found not guilty by reason of insanity, and placed in Oak Ridge, an Ontario psychiatric facility located in Penetanguishene.[1][2] There, he legally changed his name.[1] Following the completion of a treatment program for Woodcock and other psychopathic individuals, he was deemed greatly improved, and sent to a medium-security hospital in Brockville, Ontario in 1991. There, Woodcock claims, he fell in love with fellow psychiatric patient Dennis Kerr, who rejected his sexual advances.[2] During the first hour of his very first weekend pass in thirty-five years, Woodcock stabbed Kerr to death. Woodcock was being supervised on the pass by Bruce Hamill, a former patient who killed an elderly Ottawa woman in 1977. Hamill was an accomplice in the Brockville murder, and both men were subsequently returned to Oak Ridge.[1] Woodcock has told how the treatment program served only to make him more adept at manipulating others.[2] Having spent the majority of his fifty-three years in custody at Oak Ridge, Woodcock passed away there on March 5, 2010, his 71st birthday.[1]
Woodcock, billed as David Krueger, was prominently featured in the 2002 BBC documentary, Mind of a Murderer: Mask of Sanity.[2]
Victims
- Wayne Mallette – seven-year-old boy lured into the deserted Toronto Exhibition grounds on September 15, 1956. Originally another teen, identified only as "Ronald Mowatt", was charged with the child's murder.
- Gary Morris – nine-year-old boy lured to Cherry Beach on October 6, 1956.
- Carole Voyce – four-year-old girl murdered by Woodcock on January 19, 1957 in a ravine under the Prince Edward Viaduct.
- Dennis Kerr – psychiatric inmate murdered on July 13, 1991 with a knife and hatchet by Peter Woodcock with the help of a former inmate, Bruce Hamill.
References
- ^ a b c d e f g "The serial killer they couldn't cure dies behind bars". Toronto Star. March 9, 2010. Retrieved July 22, 2010.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ a b c d e Mind of a Murderer: Mask of Sanity. BBC. 2002. 38 minutes in: "In 1957, he was found not guilty by reason of insanity, and was sent to a secure mental hospital. He has since been diagnosed as a psychopath." (Overview at bbcactive.com).
- Mark Bourrie. By Reason of Insanity: The David Michael Krueger Story. Toronto: Hounslow, 1997.
- Peter Vronsky. Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters New York: Berkley, 2004. ISBN 0-425-19640-2
External links
- Peter Woodcock at the Crime Library