Transcript of Harold Shipman (Part 1)

Hey, weirdos! I'm Ash!

And I'm Alayna!

And this is Mom Ed!

This is Mom Ed, everybody! If

you're listening to this, I think it's Monday.

So Halloween has happened.

That's the thing, I was gonna say, I hope you had a happy Halloween!

I hope it was spooky and ooky! But that means

it's November. I know. I know that it's even right now 1 to 2 days away, but it makes me so sad.

October went by too fast.

I wasn't spooky enough.

No, I don't think I spookied enough to my fullest potential. I

didn't spooky to my fullest potential.

It was a great month.

Yeah, awesome.

Like really cool month.

Sorry, I was really just burping through my life right there. Awesome month. Lots of fun shit that we did and like cool people that we met.

Yeah,

but,

but

damn,

not enough spooky.

No, we didn't go to one fucking haunted house this year.

No, it just ended up being—

can we even qualify as spooky people anymore? I

know, I feel like really— I feel, I feel remiss here. But I did watch it, like a lot of spooky stuff. Oh, I did too.

I watched my Halloween baking championship.

So there you go.

And the girl that I wanted to win won.

There you go.

Spoiler alert, if you haven't seen it, the girl wins.

The girls wish.

There's 2 girls at the end, so you're fine. To

go.

That's how your youngest would say it.

It's true. So Halloween was awesome. And now it's over. In the future, it was awesome.

Yeah.

But you know what? We'll look forward to the holidays and Thanksgiving and still, it's still fall.

I'm gonna get so fucked up at your Thanksgiving. And I mean on food alone.

Hell yeah. On food alone.

So I'm getting fucked up on the turkey.

On the turkey.

Oh my God, and the strus.

The strus.

And the stuff.

The sweet potato strus.

And the regular potatoes.

What are you guys doing for Thanksgiving? Tell me about it. Tell me about it.

Thanksgiving might be up there in my favorite holiday. I think it might be tied with Christmas and Halloween at this point.

Wow. I mean, I love Thanksgiving as well.

I love it. I don't know how you do it. I just love the food. It's a lot of work.

It is a lot.

I never want to do it.

And afterwards, I always say, glad that's done.

Yeah.

But I like to do it as well.

Yeah, no, I get that. There's, there's like a, there's a fun feeling of satisfaction when you've like fed your whole family and like also hosted a party, like when you've done it all.

And then afterwards you're just like, okay, I could wait a year to do that again.

You know what I'm saying? It's like a sense of like Ina Garten, Martha Stewart realness.

Exactly. Yeah, that's exactly it.

Yeah.

Um, but yeah, I'm trying to think if there's anything else to update.

You're just going to tell us a horrible story?

I am. I'm going to tell you a British story today.

British.

Taking us out of the US for a little while.

Thanks.

A little vacation for us.

Thank you. Oh, make sure you're registered to vote.

Oh yes.

Make sure you're registered to vote and go out and vote.

Yeah. Don't, don't be dumb.

Yeah.

And not vote.

Yep. You better go vote.

If you are eligible to vote.

If you are eligible, get out there and vote.

Go. Vote, please.

For the love of Jawed. Thank you.

Appreciate it. Period. Now, today we're going to talk about Harold Shipman.

I've heard of this name.

It's going to be a two-parter.

Oh, a two-parter?

Because he— the man, he did a lot. He's known as England's most prolific serial killer.

Oh, damn.

But it's not— it's a different kind of situation, I would say.

Different kind of prolificacy?

Exactly. Uh, so let's talk about who Harold was.

Period.

Harold Frederick Fred Shipman was born January 14th, 1946.

Capricorn.

Capricorn. Oh no. Um, he was born in Nottingham, England, the second of 2 boys. His parents were Vera and Harold Shipman Sr.

Vera's a pretty name.

Mom Vera was a homemaker and, uh, Dad Harold was a truck driver.

We love a truck driver.

Yeah. When, you know, young Shipman was born, England had just started its long recovery from the destruction that came on from the Second World War. So that was the situation.

Yeah.

Which, again, it was a time where even, like, people who were super wealthy were affected by what was going on. But the Shipmans were a solidly middle-class family who managed to avoid a lot of the harsh like, the really harsh, like, hardships faced by other British people at the time. And they had very high standards for their children.

Okay.

Now, Fred— I'm gonna call him Fred because that's what they used to call him.

Okay.

Fred— and it's his mom— his dad is Harold, too, so that's confusing. Yeah, it's confusing. Fred Shipman's early life was mostly unremarkable. And that's not just me saying it, that's, like, people around him also saying he was pretty unremarkable. Damn. Pretty ordinary. But there was one unexpected tragedy in his late teens that definitely, like, set him on a different path. In 1963, when he was just 17 years old, his mother, Vera, died from cancer at the age of 42.

Oh, that's awful.

While the death of a parent is traumatic at any age, it doesn't matter. Some— some have speculated that this period had a pretty profound influence on Fred, especially with regard to his later criminal activities.

Interesting.

Among other things, as Vera's cancer advanced, she became more reliant on injections of various pain management medications.

Yeah, that makes sense.

Which gave the impression that she was improving until she ultimately died in the summer of 1963, just weeks after Fred graduated from high school.

Oh, that's really awful.

Now what we're gonna find out, that is significant.

Okay.

Because later Fred is going to become a doctor.

Oh, okay.

And he is going to kill people by injecting them with things. So that's just— I'm not saying that's the reason he did it. I'm just saying—

It's just interesting.

It's an interesting thing that happened, and things that people have researched and speculated into as possibly having an impact on him.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Now, in the fall of that year, Fred enrolled at university in Nottingham, and he studied his general courses there for 2 years and then transferred to Leeds University in 1965. Much like his earlier life, again, very unremarkable. Decades later, when asked about any memories of Fred during this period, Peter Costin, a former classmate, told a reporter, and I quote, what I remember from— what I remember about Fred was that he was just so ordinary. The thing I remember as remarkable about Fred was that he was unremarkable.

Wow, that's rough. If that was my legacy, I'd be upset.

That would be a bummer.

Yeah, I'd be like, okay.

In fact, what most What most people remembered of Fred at this time was that just one year into his medical studies at Leeds, he married his then-girlfriend. Her name was Primrose.

Oh, Primrose!

I think that's the prettiest name.

Primrose Everdeen.

Yeah. And she gave birth to a baby not long after because she was pregnant at the time of the wedding. That's what most people remember. That's what I mean.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Fred being married made him an outlier among his peers. who were almost entirely focused on their studies and couldn't imagine being married at this point in their lives.

I feel like, damn, that's a lot.

Um, one of his friends said, most of us were single at that stage, so we didn't really mix. Although I don't know him very well, he certainly did not stand out in any way. He was just an average person.

Fuck, everybody is reading him to filth without even meaning to, it seems.

He's honestly remarkable for being so unremarkable. Like, he— it's remarkable how ordinary he was. Yeah. That people noticed how ordinary he was.

He's just like white bread.

So he graduated in 1970, and he took a position at Pontefract General Infirmary, where he spent 2 years doing his residency before finally receiving his degree in child health.

No, thank you.

Which later, finding out who he is, I'm like, I'm sorry, what?

Fuck that.

Despite his initial plan to focus on children, his residency had convinced him that he was actually interested in becoming a general practitioner, a GP. So he found work as a GP at the Abraham Ormerod Medical Center, And started building a pretty good reputation there, actually. Finally, not so unremarkable.

Not so unremarkable.

Uh, one of the receptionists later recalled, he was a smashing fella and a very good doctor.

Smashing. He

was smashing.

That makes me think of, um, fucking Nigel Thornberry.

Tim Curry. RIP Tim Curry.

Smashing.

Smashing. Now, after being super unremarkable his whole life, he was really coming into his own finally. Finally. And it wasn't just his personality that his coworkers and patients appreciated. He was also a very skilled and reliable doctor. Um, Dr. Michael Greaves said, he was very good technically and very good clinically. He was brilliant and put a lot of work into the practice. Mothers thought the world of him, but he was good with everyone. There were chaps who thought he was absolutely fantastic.

Okay. We love a chap.

So it's like, at this point, you're just like, why didn't you just continue doing that?

Stay on that path, dog.

Like, being great and good at your job and helping people.

Yeah.

That would have got you a very good life,

I would think,

if you stayed on that track, I feel.

Well, it's like— because again, so far everything has been so unremarkable and ordinary that I'm like, what breaks?

Yeah,

like, what breaks in his brain that he starts killing people?

Yeah, I don't get it. Now, the Shipmans also seem to be thriving in their personal life. Once he was— once he was established at the medical practice, they were able to afford to buy a home in the Pennines, which is a region of northern England, and they fit in there perfectly.

Okay.

Now settled for what they planned to be a long stretch there, Fred and Primrose joined the local Conservative Party and the local church, where Primrose became a member of the choir.

Gorge.

As further evidence of their intent to, like, really get themselves in this community, Fred even helped dig out the massive piles of silt to help restore the— I think it's pronounced Ronchdale Canals.

Ronchdale.

Ronchdale. It seems entirely likely that they genuinely intended to settle into their new community and build their lives there.

That's what it sounds like.

But things didn't turn out that way.

I guess not, because we're talking about them on Morbid.

Yeah, it's not great. So in 1975, just one year after moving there, Fred was arrested and charged with 3 counts of obtaining a controlled drug by deception, 3 counts of unlawful possession of a controlled drug, and 2 counts of forging prescriptions.

Oh, well, that happened pretty quickly.

It seems that despite his upstanding and highly professional demeanor, he had become addicted to Demerol.

Oh.

Which is a powerful synthetic opioid. And when he couldn't get it legally, he started writing prescriptions for his patients for large amounts and then keeping the extra for himself.

Oh, no.

When the case went to court in February 1976, Fred told the judge he'd begun taking the drug to stave off, quote, Depression caused by opposition to his ideas for improving the medical practice.

Okay.

So I started taking the drug because I got depressed because people wouldn't listen to my ideas.

Yeah.

Miraculously, Shipman managed to avoid serious consequences for his crimes and was ordered only to pay a pretty modest fine, and the General Medical Council declined to impose any punishment.

Hello?

Yeah. Although he'd gotten off with an incredibly light punishment for the drug charges, the arrest and court hearing were embarrassing, obviously, and reputation damaging.

I was just gonna say that.

Prior to the hearing, he resigned from his position with the medical practice, and that winter he began seeing a psychiatrist for treatment for his addiction.

Okay.

Uh, Dr. Grieve recalled, he said in court that he did not get on well with the partners at the practice, but I think he felt like we had let him down by not standing by him after his addiction came to light.

Okay.

Now, out of work and no longer possessing the same reputation he had when they first arrived in the area, Fred and Primrose decided to move the family 2 hours south to Durham to start over. Despite his documented charges of drug abuse and writing fraudulent prescriptions, he eventually was able to find another position in Greater Manchester as a GP.

That's surprising.

Uh, with the Donnybrook Medical Center, where he would remain for the next 15 years. Wow. Dr. Jeff Bills told a reporter, he was a very hard worker. Medicine was his whole life.

All of it.

Now, it literally— all of it. Now, in the years that followed, Fred and Primrose settled into family life in Greater Manchester. By the mid-1980s, Primrose had given birth to 2 more boys, and Fred went on to join the PTA at their school. When he wasn't home— at work or at home, he filled his time as a volunteer with the St. John's Ambulance Brigade. Serving as a divisional surgeon. Like, he's—

He's, like, in the community, like, enmeshed.

And the thing is, it's like, you made a mistake.

Yeah.

It was a big mistake.

Yeah, of course.

I'm not discounting that or, like, you know, lessening it. You were dealing with your addiction.

Yup.

You were trying to move on.

Yeah.

Why didn't you— why did you keep damaging your own shit? Like, it's just crazy to me. Because I'm like, yeah, that was a big deal what you did. And it's like, yeah, you should have consequences for it. But you were going to a psychiatrist to try to deal with the addiction.

Right.

You were admitting that, like, there was a problem here.

You were taking all the right steps.

Taking the steps, doing the things that we ask people to do in these situations.

And meshing yourself in the community, like, during recovery.

And getting yourselves involved with things that, like, would better the community. I'm like, I just— he— it's a conundrum.

It is a conundrum because, again, I'm like, What broke?

Yeah.

And you said— sorry, you said he was in the PTA or she was?

Um, I think he was, actually.

Yeah, that's what you said. Yeah. That's why I was clarifying. That's crazy.

Yeah, he went on to join the PTA.

Um, I'm like, where do you find the time to do all that shit?

That's the thing. He was like very involved. It's like in Hamilton during the Reynolds pamphlet where they say, you ever seen somebody ruin their own life?

This is the 3rd time you've brought up Hamilton today.

Hamilton has been like a big deal in my life today.

It has.

I don't know. It's just like, it's rem— it's, it's working.

I like the Reynolds pamphlet.

But they literally say, you ever seen somebody ruin their own life?

Many people. Thank you for asking.

Like, and also—

And hello, right here.

This is literally him.

Prime example.

Like, you're literally just ruining your own life.

The Reynolds pamphlet.

Exactly.

I love when they say it like that. Yeah. Have you read this shit?

Now, during this period, Fred Shipman built a large practice full of devoted patients who adored him. But behind the scenes, things at Donnybrook Medical Center were becoming increasingly tense between him and his coworkers. Sounds like he had trouble getting along well with others.

Yeah.

Senior partner Ian Napier said, on the one hand, he was charming, urbane, and pleasant with patients, but he had another side to him, and if crossed, he was capable of making people's lives miserable.

Capricorns don't fuck with being crossed.

I literally said that today.

Yes.

When I— when I— and I, in that same sentence, I was referencing Hamilton. No,

I— yeah, this is— this is a weird topic.

Full circle moment.

This is a weird topic.

Literally saying, I'm slow to anger, but I toe the line.

Yeah, that's— that's such Capricorn vibes.

When you cross that line, I'll ruin your entire fucking life.

Yeah.

But I won't do that initially. You get— it takes a lot.

I've seen it.

But cross that line.

But you're not that bad at a group project. I was just saying Capricorns don't love group projects.

Oh, I fucking hate a group project.

But you're not bad at it. This entire show is a group project between me and you.

But it's more just— I see, it is in a way.

Yeah.

But I think it's just because I can work with you. If I find somebody I can work with, that's okay. I don't like a group project.

I honestly don't want to work with people. I personally hate a group project as well. Yeah, I'd much rather

isolate and just work by myself. Yeah. Like, I— as soon as they're like, okay, you're all gonna figure this out, I'm like, no, I'm gonna figure this out. Like, that's good. Everybody go home.

Yeah.

I'll figure it out.

Everybody go home.

Like, I don't want to do that.

I just don't really— yeah. Yeah. That's not my vibe.

It's no. Now, according to the same source, Fred had a volatile personality and was capable of holding grudges long after whatever slight, real or perceived, had passed.

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but that's also a Capricorn. I know. I know.

You guys, I'm realizing this right now. You know that woman who's like,

I will literally open a professional grudgery and take on your grudges. Not a doubt in my mind, she's either a Capricorn or a Virgo.

Yeah, absolutely.

That's funny though.

I will hold a grudge against anybody.

Yeah. I'm sorry to all my non-astrology people. I'm really on an astrology kick.

It's okay. But it makes sense.

Yeah, I'll move on then.

No, because it's actually— as I'm reading this, I'm like, oh shit.

You're like, ugh.

I'm like, well, we do deviate at some point, so there's that. It says when he became angry with the practice manager, he stopped talking to her entirely and would only communicate with her in writing. And she was expected to do the same.

I hate that. That's iconic.

Even though they worked in the same building and he would see her every day.

I love cutting people off. It's literally one of my specialties. So when I see other people cut people off, I'm like, do it.

Yeah. And it's like— and right now you're like, dude, you just didn't have to go where you went.

Yeah. Right now I'm not mad at you yet.

Yeah. And the same source said, I remember on one occasion he reduced a drug company representative who had only been in the job for 2 weeks to tears.

Okay. Yeah, that's not nice. But I've seen you do the same thing.

I was at the— I too, I too have made somebody cry. They deserved it.

They did deserve it. Was it uncomfortable for everybody involved? Yes.

Yes. Not for me.

Did they— other than Elena? I was the only one that wasn't uncomfortable. But was it worth it? Absolutely.

Yeah. It was at a place we used to work. Yeah, they deserved it.

So they could figure it out.

Um, I'd do it again.

I'd sit through it. Honestly, as much as I hated it, I'd sit through it again. Did I want the earth to swallow me? Yeah, I sure fucking did. But I also was like, you deserved that.

You had that coming. One thing I'm gonna do is stand on business. So put me in that situation again, I will do the same exact thing.

Oh, I saw it coming too. I saw it. I saw it coming down the pike.

To be honest, they should have seen it coming as well. She very much should have. But, you know, they can't anymore.

Well, it was kind of a pussy— it was kind of a pussy move to cry.

Exactly. Now, despite the outstanding reputation that Shipman had with his patients and somewhat begrudging respect at least he'd earned from his peers— like, they didn't really like hanging out with him, but they were like, he's a good doctor. They said he was good at what he was doing. It seems that his achievements were never enough for him, which is also very Capricorn.

I'm trying not to, like, continue speaking.

I know you can't. It's honestly— you can't help it. He just— he didn't just want to be a well-respected general practitioner and reliable provider, which is a very great thing to be, and like, very successful.

He didn't want to be a doctor, he wanted to be the doctor.

He wanted to be at the top of the pile in the medical world. Yeah. A role that was not typically associated with general practitioners. Okay. Like, usually, like, top of the— if you're like, you know, and I'm saying like— General surgeons. The achievements that a lot of people in medical professions are looking to get, a lot of times those are going to be found in, like, different specialties instead of general. You know, of course there's, like, very high-ranking people that have achieved it. Yeah, you're a fucking doctor. But forensic psychologist Paul Britton later told the court, Shipman is hugely arrogant. He believes that he has struggled and is struggling against the odds. He believes the main obstacle is all of those foolish people out there and around him. The people who really ultimately only have one value, and that is to provide fuel for the fire that he is burning. I mean...

It's scary.

Yeah, it's really sexual, to be honest. It's scary.

It's scary.

It's really scary. Now, previously, when the pressure of life and his anxieties related to fears of, like, inadequacies would pop up, uh, he would turn to narcotics to dull the pain that he felt. But once that strategy had been discovered, He'd been reprimanded pretty lightly and allowed to carry on his practice. You know, he—

He wanted to move on from it.

Yeah. But if he turned to opioids for relief again and his use was discovered, it was pretty likely that he'd lose everything at that point. Like, you're not gonna get that twice.

Absolutely not.

What he needed in his mind was a new way to relieve the stress and frustration he was experiencing seemingly at all times. And by the early 1980s, he felt like he found it. Now, my suggestion would be hang a punching bag in your garage or outside.

Yeah.

Hit it a few times.

Take a boxing class.

Go for a run.

Eat a Moon Pie.

Eat a Moon Pie.

Quit murdering people.

Drink a 7-Up. Quit murdering people.

Because here's my question too. Like, obviously, he is not a rational thinker because he goes to murder for relief.

Yeah.

But also, how are you going to get to the top of your field when your patients are dying?

That's a great question.

That doesn't really make a lot of sense to me.

As it shouldn't.

I don't think you're going to get the accolades you're looking for when they're— when they're dying under your watch.

Yeah, I don't think they're like— the top-ranking medical officials are like, this one lost 700 patients last year. Like, I don't think that's the barometer that they're going with.

So, my brother, I think you lost the plot.

Now, years later, when Fred would, like, pass the 19— when he was arrested in the '90s, He'd be charged with a total of 15 murders committed between 1995 and 1998. But investigators very much believe that the number of victims is far greater than what they could prove and stretched back as far as the early '80s.

Okay.

When he was working as a GP at Donnybrook. According to author Carol Peters, who wrote a book about Shipman in 2005, Shipman's murders can be traced back to as early as 1981.

Okay.

when he was treating 2 elderly women diagnosed with terminal cancer. It would not have been uncommon for cancer patients to be treated with morphine for pain management. It also would, you know, it also wouldn't have been uncommon or entirely inappropriate for their physicians to reclaim a small amount of the unused drug when they died.

Okay.

But according to Peters, Shipman would often overprescribe, and when a patient died, he would— he would reclaim whatever morphine remained regardless of the amount, and he would, like, stockpile it.

So he had a morphine surplus.

Like, he himself had it, yeah. And because he was overprescribing, instead of just using the amount that wasn't used, which they could document—

Yep.

It was kind of untraceable. That's why it's so hard to document. Yeah. So that year, Shipman was called to Bradley Green— and this is the real name of the place— Bradley Green Old People's Center.

That's rude.

Which is

You put me in Bradley— listen, future children, you put me in an old people's center?

That is literally named Old People's Center. Yeah, no.

That's fucked. Like an old folks home?

Yeah. Like, literally called that? So that year, he was called there to tend to 84-year-old Mary Slater— May Slater, excuse me. It was the practice of the center that whenever a physician came to see a patient, they would be accompanied to the patient's room by the warden, Doreen Lathwaite. On this occasion, Laithwaite did exactly that. But when she reached the room, she said Dr. Shipman specifically asked the— or this is what she told someone later that they told to this author. Dr. Shipman specifically asked the warden to go and meet May Slater's son, James, who had also been called to see his sick mother, and prevent him from coming to Mrs. Slater's bungalow.

So, he asked that this son be stopped from coming up? Yeah. Okay.

This left Shipman alone with the patient in her room for a significant amount of time.

And no one thought that was weird?

And when he emerged sometime later, he reported to the family and the warden that Mae had died.

That would be sus as fuck immediately.

Now, according to the death certificate, which was prepared by Shipman, Slater's death was the result of congestive heart failure. At the time, the records of the deceased were destroyed not long after their death. Like, that was a thing.

Oh, like standard practice.

So, there's no way to confirm whether May Slater had been suffering from heart problems prior to her death.

That's why that's a really stupid practice.

But a public inquiry performed years later found evidence that suggested she had been, so there wouldn't have been any reason for them to suspect foul play.

Okay.

Which may be the reason he chose that. Yeah. Because, like, if there's already that, then... they're not going to question it.

Yep.

Now, the scene repeated itself in August of that year when another of Shipman's cancer patients died, and he took whatever morphine remained after the death. The next day, Elizabeth Ashworth, another of his patients, became ill, and Shipman was called to the house. At the time— this is the next day.

I was just gonna say.

At the time, Ashworth was living independently in her own home and was generally believed to be in good health. She'd even been seen gardening on the day she was visited by Shipman. But just a few days after he visited the home and gave her an injection, she died.

What the fuck?

Between 1981 and 1984, there were a number of patients under Fred Shipman's care who died of what would, in retrospect, be deemed suspicious circumstances. They just can't prove them. Or those deaths were, at the very least, coincidental in the context of other deaths.

But probably not.

That Shipman was— so that Shipman was able to kill undetected is at least in part due to the victims he was choosing. In the vast majority of the murders, his victims were elderly. They were in poor health, if not terminal, at that point. So despite the relatively high number of deaths among his patients, their deaths seemed kind of ordinary or inevitable.

Yep.

And didn't really cause anyone to suspect anything other than just, unfortunately, nature taking its course. Also, in many of these cases, it would have been normal, if not expected, for the victim to have been administered pain medication. Right. So if anyone had conducted an autopsy, finding drugs like morphine in the person's body wouldn't set off any alarm bells.

And if you're terminal, that— those amounts can be pretty high.

Exactly. While Shipman managed to kill undetected during this period, there were limits to what he could accomplish. Given that his preferred method of murder was to give the victim an overdose of morphine, he could only achieve his ends so long as he had an untraceable supply of the drug, and he could only obtain that if he had cancer patients who left behind unused quantities of the drug. Although it's unknown how many people he killed between '81 and '84, it seems as though he'd run out of morphine by '85.

Oh.

Having had only one patient that year with terminal cancer.

Okay.

Nevertheless, according to The Guardian, there was one patient death in '85 that was reported to the local police as a suspected murder.

Oh.

It appears investigators interviewed Shipman and conducted a cursory investigation, But according to The Guardian, quote, no further action was taken.

Because again, like you said, it's hard to prove. It's hard to trace.

Yeah. But they—

but you can only get away with that for so long. That's the thing here.

That's— and they suspected him, obviously.

I mean, it is pretty crazy he wasn't caught until, what, the '90s?

But he's doing it in a way that is like—

He's not really doing it slowly though, either.

No, because he doesn't really have to.

Yeah. Yeah. It's a— it's a perfect set of—

Unfortunately, yeah.

Circumstances. Exactly.

Now, That Shipman managed to run out of morphine at various points throughout the '80s and, you know, had to stop killing for some time has become a subject of some debate as well. Okay. Those familiar with the case have suggested that if he needed more morphine, he would have simply stolen whatever necessary morphine his patients had on hand, leading them to suffer.

Okay.

Like, just why would he care?

Yeah.

This certainly seems like the kind of thing that a sociopathic killer would be capable of.

Yeah.

And it would have allowed for a larger body count than is already suspected. But Paul Brittain, who was that psychologist, he dismisses that argument as too simplistic.

Okay.

He said, this is a very complex human being.

Yeah.

We tend to think of Shipman, the serial killer, as ruthless, emotionless, and all the rest of it. This is true, to an extent, but this is also a man who believes that he is a great savior.

Yeah.

Bringing health and community benefit. He's also likely, at a very important fundamental level, to try to hold away the meaning of his killing. So, he's trying to— He's kind of— he's not looking at this as like, yes, I kill people because I want to. He thinks he's playing God. He is the person who gets to decide these things.

Yeah. And that wouldn't fulfill his God complex to let people suffer.

And to simply steal medication from his patients, he would have to confront the cruel and criminal nature of his behavior. Yeah. Like, upfront. Like, that would completely undermine what he believes about himself.

Right.

if he had to sit there and go, well, now I'm stealing and leaving them to suffer.

Right. That makes sense.

That's just not who he sees himself as. He is that person.

Yes.

But he doesn't see himself as that person.

I feel like that was like a Mindhunter moment.

It was.

I'm rewatching Mindhunter right now. Oh,

it's so good.

Oh my God. Give us a 3rd season.

Whoever didn't, like, redo that, fuck you.

Seriously.

Fuck you. Rather than risk any blow to his ego by recognizing the complete callous wickedness of what he was doing...

Yeah.

...he turned to a strategy that had worked for him in the past when he was in need of controlled drugs that couldn't be traced back to him. Uh-huh. According to Detective John Ashley, there was very little in the medical records that recorded diamorphine being actually administered to anyone who had a legitimate need. And the amounts on the prescriptions he submitted to the pharmacies did not match what he was administering. So it's believed that when he ran out of the stockpile of morphine he'd been collecting over the years, he just fell back on the tactic he'd used in the past to get drugs for himself. He would just overprescribe.

Okay.

Because before, he started doing the whole, I'll just take what they don't use. Yes. Like, not give them as much as they need, take what they use.

Well, because he was so much closer to that previous charge, he was probably nervous to order, but now he's farther away from it.

Exactly. So now he just falls right back into that, like, I'll just write prescriptions for it.

Yeah.

Um, which gave them a— he would give them a small amount, or in some cases he wouldn't give them the morphine because sometimes they didn't need it.

Okay.

But he would just— and that's how he kind of, like, you know, like, explained it away in his own mind.

Yeah, yeah.

And he would just keep the rest. Now, while no one at Donnybrook seemed to notice the large amounts of patients dying under his care, They did notice his increased irritability and stress as the years went on.

Well, they probably did notice the large amount, but again, these are terminally ill people that you're expecting to pass away.

So I guess notice isn't the— isn't the word. More like— Suspect anything. Suspect anything nefarious going on.

It's horrible, but it's—

Unfortunately, just—

It's kind of the perfect crime for him.

Yeah, exactly.

Like, it's awful.

Now, one former staff member said no one else was up to his standard. You could not tell him anything, and he was never wrong. Which is again very Capricorn. It's

also very— I feel like he's like INTJ.

Yeah.

Like personality type.

Yes, which is also my personality type. So there's that. Well, it appears he saved the worst of his anxieties and frustrations for his unfortunate patients. Those who worked around him weren't exactly spared his wrath either. Dr. Napier said he was not violent in any physical sense. It was almost like a childlike temper tantrum. He would go completely over the top, and it was as if he had no control over it. He didn't do it with any of the partners. He would only talk like that to his subordinates. Ah. Yeah. Now, by January 1992, his personality and poor, you know, interpersonal skills had become something of a problem at work.

I would think so.

At the time, new policies related to the hospital and healthcare system in the UK were changing how patients could receive care from their providers. directly impacting which services the government would cover.

Okay.

The changes prompted many of the partners at Donnybrook to leave the facility for private practices. Shipman later said in court, the other doctors were not as committed as I would have been to make the changes work. So, like, that's better than— they just weren't committed.

Yeah.

Instead of continuing on at the center, he started operating his own practice because there was, like, no one left. on the premises of Donnybrook. So he stayed, just operating his own practice. Okay. But within 4 months, he abandoned that plan and set up a completely new private practice, taking 300 of the center's patients with him. Wow. And refusing to pay his share of the annual taxes.

Fantastic.

Now,

it's so interesting. He had to have had interpersonal skills on some degree.

Oh, he did.

To have that many patients follow him.

Because, again, patients loved him.

Right.

Like, patients loved him because they had no idea what he was doing to them when they were— you know what I mean? Like, his— he could charm them. I just—

I do— I find it so fascinating when people, like, can't work with other people, but, like, on a, on a smaller scale. Like, I've worked with people in the past, like, in the hair world, where you're like, you have so many clients that love you, but, like, you're a fucking demon.

You're a nightmare to work with.

Yeah, exactly. Like, on a co-worker level, I always find that so fascinating.

It's like 2 sides.

Yeah.

how people work. Yeah. It's so strange. Mm-hmm. Now, his new one-man operation was located in an old insurance office on Market Street in Greater Manchester's shopping district. Okay. Eventually, he bought the shop next door and expanded the size of the practice, enthusiastically involving himself in the renovation process. He was excited about this.

Yeah. Well, and of course, he's got his hands in everything.

Yeah. He also inserted himself into the local community, chairing the local medical committee that oversaw GP practices in the region. And he joined the board of the Small Practices Association, which was responsible for reporting complaints about local providers. Which was smart to do, because now he's there. He can keep an eye on what's happening. Yeah. And he can potentially put up a roadblock if something needs to be blocked.

It's very like how serial killers will talk to the police about—

Exactly.

To get information.

You want to be in the know. You want to be able to, like, get in front of stuff. Due to the new regulations around healthcare, patient bills were not always paid by the government in a timely manner, and money was often tight in these early days of the practice. So unable to afford a proper full-time assistant or nurse to help with the workload, Primrose would regularly step in to help with the operation of the business. Um, that's his wife, in case you forgot. Uh-huh. Despite the hardship, Fred was determined to ingratiate himself with the new community and went out of his way to get to know his patients and their lives outside of the practice. He just really wanted to be a part of it. Um, local councilor John Bell said, He was revered for his attention to detail, the way he talked to people and remembered things.

Well, he also has to remember certain things about, like, their family. Of course he does. Who's gonna miss them when they're gone?

He's gotta know everything that's going on. And it's like, he has all these qualities that you're like, you could have made a great career for yourself, and you really did fuck up your own life.

Yeah.

Like, congrats.

Yeah, good work.

Like, you idiot. Now, the problem was his generosity and respect that he had for his patients wasn't something he tended to extend to those outside of the practice. And before long, he had found himself on the wrong side of the West Pennine Health Authority.

Okay.

The organization whose job it was to monitor and regulate private practitioners in the region. So that wasn't good for him. Um, the— so apparently the thing that was the issue was the frequency with which Shipman prescribed drugs to his patients and how generous he was with the dosage and amount. Wow. You didn't think anybody was going to catch on to that?

It's interesting though. I mean, obviously it's a different country. Like, I feel like in America that's been happening like forever. Yeah. And it's only really just become a thing where they're like, hey, stop doing that.

They were on it way before.

But yeah, they were on it way before us.

Yeah. Within just the first year of his practice in 1993, Shipman was among the top 5 prescribers out of the region's 230 general practitioners. Wow. Causing many within the health authority to become a little suspicious. According to the agency's director of primary care, Jan Foster, Fred was, quote, always defensive with them, but he had rational arguments for his prescribing. So had he not been so well-liked by his patients and otherwise recognized as a good doctor, it's unlikely that he would have avoided trouble so easily. Yeah. It was on his side that he managed to maintain. that reputation. Yeah. But as it was, he had 3,100 patients.

How do you— is that typical?

Far more than the average prescriber.

I was like, that can't be typical.

And they all appeared to think very, like, highly of

him. 3,000?

Yeah.

Holy shit. How do you remember, like, details about that many people? I'm just Googling really quick how many patients a typical GP has. Conventional primary care, 2,000 to 2,500.

So he was way above that.

Yeah, still. He was still above it. Yeah.

Yeah, he had like, what, like almost 600 more than that?

Well, and that's in a standard insurance-based model, it seems. Wow, that's crazy.

At a time when healthcare was undergoing obviously major state changes, such as— such a thing of this like was almost unheard of. So the authorities saw no reason to really shake things up at this time. They were like, he's got way more, uh, patients than the average GP, and they all fucking love him.

And it's like, are we really

gonna

then when you have that many, like, that is gonna skew the numbers a little bit in your prescriptions.

Yeah. And again, especially when he was able to kind of justify his heavy prescribing method. Right. So they had no idea that the doctor wasn't just prescribing medication for his patients. He was overprescribing to replenish a stockpile to murder people with. Now, within the first 2 years of private practice, he wrote prescriptions for massive doses of morphine, relying on his tried-and-true method, you know, terminal patients, overprescribing, prescribing. For example, in 1994, he prescribed 10 100-milligram vials of morphine for one of his patients.

Jesus.

Just one day before she died.

Wow.

According to her medical records, the patient had never needed morphine in the past, and it's entirely likely that upon her death, he stole the remaining vials.

Yeah, of course.

In 1996, he prescribed 2,500 millimeter— milligram. I don't know why I keep saying millimeter. milligram vials for another patient on the day that he died. Wow. 20 500-milligram vials of morphine.

That's wild.

Over the years, this became such a common practice that in total, he, quote, procured 22,000 milligrams of morphine, the equivalent of 1,466 fatal doses.

Wow.

Yeah.

Wow. When you put it like that.

Incredibly terrifying.

Yeah.

Now, just a few weeks after his new practice opened, he paid a visit to the home of one of his patients, Monica Sparks. Monica was 72 years old and lived alone, and again, pretty good health. In recent weeks, though, Monica had started having dizzy spells and had fallen on one— more than one occasion. So she made an appointment with Shipman, who offered to see her at home.

This is so scary.

It's so scary. That afternoon, Monica's sister-in-law, Phyllis Hoyt, called Sparks and was surprised when Dr. Shipman answered the phone. The doctor informed her that during their appointment, Monica had suffered a stroke. He claimed that he tried to call for an ambulance, but none were available. So he told Monica to lie down on their bed and wait for him while he ran to his office to get what he needed to tend to her until an ambulance could arrive.

That's a whack story.

But when he returned, Sparks was dead. Uh... Yeah. Monica Sparks would be the only known murder that Shipman committed in 1992.

Okay.

But the following year, once the practice was fully operational, it's, uh, he's believed to have murdered 16 of his patients.

In 1992 alone?

Yeah. Wow. All elderly. In some cases, Shipman is believed to have killed a patient, then written them a prescription for morphine after he killed the patient.

Stop.

By the time the body was discovered the following day, the prescription had already been filled, and Shipman would simply adjust the death certificate so the timeline would make sense. And that's it. So nobody would ask questions.

This is crazy.

It seems that as the practice became more successful, his need to kill grew along with that success. Yeah. At the same time, losing so many patients, even the elderly and infirm, did tend to raise some questions eventually. Especially in cases where the patient wasn't terminal. Like, Monica Sparks was in good health and was believed, again, to be in good health. Like, there was a lot of those.

Yeah.

In some cases, Shipman used his position of authority to fend off any questions or suspicions from the family, with his confidence and arrogance tending to kind of, like, deter any further questioning. While this may have been successful as a means of dealing with the families, he knew it wasn't gonna suffice for any authorities who may come around with questions. So he began editing his own records to support whatever cause of death he listed.

Damn.

For instance, in the case of 82-year-old Amy Whitehead, a patient with no history of heart disease that, according to Shipman, died from a heart attack, he revised his records, adding an entry for a visit in which he treated her for, quote, coronary attack. By 1995, he had resorted to just burning or otherwise destroying the patient records immediately following their death. Making it difficult for anyone to argue with his assessments or claims.

And that would look so suspicious, but because of the time, it was, like, yeah, considered somewhat standard.

Yeah, he's like, what?

Holy shit, dude. This guy is evil as fuck. Yeah, diabolical.

It should be said that while Fred Shipman managed to get away with a staggering number of murders for a surprisingly long time, it was not like no one had concerns or suspicions that something nefarious was occurring in this practice.

Yeah, you've already said that.

Yeah.

But it's not like you can just blow up the practice on one suspicion, you know?

Exactly. Like, you can't just— on a hunch.

Unfortunately.

In fact, there were many family members and even members of his own staff eventually who were, if not suspicious of murder, at least concerned about the number of patients who were dying under his care. But during the inquiry conducted following his trial, one nurse after another explained that they were concerned that if they spoke out or questioned him, they might lose their job or even their ability to work in the field.

Yep.

Um, members of the inquiry were told the nurses had not raised the matter with their managers because NHS culture was at the time dictated that doctors should not be challenged.

I mean, it's true. It's still that way.

And the nurses also believed that those above them were aware of the patient's circumstances and were, quote, dealing with suspicions about the patient's death. So they were like, someone else is going to do this. Also, at the time the murders were occurring, there was no whistleblower protections in place.

Oh.

So an employee who spoke out against someone as obviously, um, like petty or vindictive as Fred Shipman clearly displayed that he was, was risking way more. Like, way more. They were gonna lose everything. Now, as for the grieving families of victims, they were much easier to dismiss in his mind, as the doctor supposedly trusted by their loved ones Shipman was in a position of power and would often bully and berate anyone who questioned his treatment and expertise by asking how it was that their family member died from something they'd not shown any signs of in the past. And there's also the obvious fact that no one, even the most suspicious, would expect a general practitioner capable of committing multiple murders. Because also they'd be like, why?

Right.

Why did you do this? Like, what is the reason? Uh, prosecutor Richard, um, Henrique said he took advantage of their grief and their lesser knowledge of medicine.

Yep.

As they grieved, this piece of shit employed every device to make sure no postmortem examination would take place.

Wow.

Yeah.

To be in such a position of power like that, like, he really is playing God.

Yeah, exactly. And he may have been able to put off grieving family members and conserve staff members, but his peers outside of the practice were something else too. Like, he's— again, subordinates to him in his own mind are easy to control. He can figure that out. His peers and people above him are where he gets a little shaky. For the most part, the practitioners in the area were familiar with Shipman and thought him arrogant and quirky, often giving him a pass on any Peculiar behavior. Yeah, they were just like, he's fucking weirdo. That's just who he is. In fact, it wasn't until a new provider in the area, Dr. Linda Reynolds, began asking questions that others began to look closer at the number of deaths occurring among Fred Shipman's patients.

I also love the correlation there. Reynolds, Reynolds pamphlet. It was like we foreshadowed.

I didn't even mean to do that.

I know you didn't, but—

But that's poetic.

Check that out.

And that's where we're gonna end for part 1.

Oh, I'm excited to get to part 2 because I love—

We're gonna get him caught.

When a woman takes a man down.

Yeah, we're gonna get this motherfucker caught.

Yeah, fuck this guy.

We're gonna get him caught. We're gonna see him pay.

Let's do it.

But it's a very interesting case just because of how strange it is. And like, you're literally like, why?

Yeah, why?

Why are you doing this? Like, again, why did you blow up your whole life and everyone else's?

Because he thought he was smarter than everybody. Yeah, like, he never thought he was gonna blow up his own life.

That god complex. Ego will get you every time. Ego will get you.

Yep.

And he is definitely one of those cases.

Well, let's do a fun fact because that is sad that people who were already suffering just died at his hands.

Yeah.

So I'm gonna tell you that, you know how you feel more creative in the shower?

Yeah.

There's something to that. So it says, um, this is from Google, warm water and a quiet distraction-free environment help lower your stress hormones and trigger relaxed alpha wave states in the brain, Which make it easier to think laterally. Huh. And then on the same coin, warmth and light routine physical activities can cause modest feel-good releases of dopamine, which support positive mood and cognitive flexibility.

Oh shit.

So that's why you're more creative in the shower.

That makes so much sense.

Yeah, I am more creative in the shower.

Me too. I always come up with ideas there.

Also, if I've gotten in an argument with anybody recently, I think of the sickest comebacks in the shower.

Yeah. Oh my God. That happens to me all the time.

I'm like, why didn't I say that to their ass? Yep.

I know it pisses me off.

I know, but that's fun that there's actually something to that.

Yeah, I love that.

It's fun.

That is a fun fact.

You're welcome.

You're welcome.

Happy post-Halloween, and we hope you keep listening.

And we hope you

keep it weird. But not so weird that you're a doctor with a god complex who kills his patients.

Yeah, truly get it together.

Yeah, just like quit murdering people.

Don't be dumb.