Yorkshire Ripper’s penpal reveals her fears

Mar 7 2010 by Sophie Doughty, Sunday Sun

SHE has looked into the eyes of serial killer Peter Sutcliffe . . . and Olive Curry insists the Yorkshire Ripper should never be freed.

The 81-year-old, from North Shields, North Tyneside, who has visited the notorious murderer in Broadmoor high security hospital, and exchanged hundreds of letters with him, was horrified when she discovered Sutcliffe was appealing to the High Court to see if he can ever be released.

And the widow, who claims to have received sinister letters from the killer, said she would fear for her own safety if she knew he was walking the streets.

She said: “He can die in there for all I care and he should die in there.

Olive says she first met the Ripper in the 1970s, when she worked at the Fisherman’s Mission, on North Shields Fish Quay, and Sutcliffe, then a trucker would regularly come in for a cup of tea.

She was unperturbed by the then clean-shaven young man’s presence, and would often strike-up a conversation with him.

“He used to come in for a cup of tea like all the other drivers,” she explained. “He seemed perfectly normal. He first came in the summer of 1978 and after that he came in about once a week.

“When he was arrested I saw his photo in the paper and I just couldn’t believe it. I just thought it can’t be him, but it was.”

Sutcliffe, who was jailed in 1981 for the violent murder of 13 women in the Yorkshire area was always joined by another man when he came to the cafe.

After his arrest Olive became convinced he had carried out his hideous crimes with the help of an accomplice and could be responsible for even more murders.

He has always denied visiting Tyneside, but Olive is adamant she met him on a number of occasions, and that he was usually with a short fat man, with a Wearside accent.