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Episode 215: The hunt for 'The Silver Killer' - the UK's mysterious serial murderer

The murder-suicide riddle that shocked an English town

Nicola TallantSunday World

CHESHIRE, England 1996, Howard Ainsworth violently bludgeoned his wife to death with a hammer before taking his own life. Three years later in the same town, Donald Ward beat his wife to death with a ceramic hot water bottle before using the shards of glass to take his own life.

At least that’s what the police report concluded. In 2020, Cheshire coroner Stephanie Davies re-examined the deaths, and other similar cases, and concluded that they were not murder-suicides, but rather the work of an enigmatic serial killer who would go on to be dubbed 'The Silver Killer'.

Crime Word Podcast can be found on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and Soundcloud.

Today, journalist and author David Collins tells Crime World’s Clodagh Meaney about the inconsistent crime scenes, the report that rocked Cheshire police and the hunt for the serial killer you’ve never heard of.

This episode is graphic in nature and discusses suicidal ideation, listener discretion is advised.

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