https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13330347/Max-Azzarello-dead-fire-Trump-trial-NYC.html

Max Azzarello DIES just hours after setting himself on fire while protesting outside Trump's hush money trial in NYC as friends reveal the heartbreaking moment that triggered his spiral into self-destruction

    Protester Max Azzarello has died after setting himself ablaze in Manhattan Friday
    The 37-year-old doused himself in accelerant before igniting himself with a light
    Flames engulfed the conspiracy theorist, who has now succumbed to his injuries

By Alex Hammer For Dailymail.Com

Published: 04:51, 20 April 2024 | Updated: 07:46, 20 April 2024

The man who set himself on fire outside Trump's hush money trial in New York has died from his injuries, as his friends and neighbors said it was the death of his mother two years ago that made him increasingly unstable.  Max Azzarello, a 37-year-old from St. Augustine, Florida, died Friday night hours after the shocking display, said to be 'an 'extreme act of protest [against] a totalitarian con, and our own government' on his own Substack.  The Florida native was a graduate from Rutgers University, where he received a master’s degree in city and regional planning in 2012, friends said.  He was rushed to a nearby hospital’s burn unit where died just before 11 pm, sources familiar with the matter added Friday night hours after was seen throwing a stack of pamphlets that included a link to his conspiracy-laden Substack seconds before igniting.  In interviews carried out within that span, several who knew Azzarello described a different sort of man from the one responsible for a slew of rambling, paranoid posts plastered throughout his social media.  'He was super curious about social justice and the way things "could" be,' fellow Rutgers alum Katie Brennan told the New York Times Friday of the self-professed 'investigative researcher.  He was creative and adventurous.'

An friend from high school, Steven Waldman, remembered Azzarello who had a job in marketing, sales, and tech before becoming unemployed at some point in 2021 or 2022 as one of the smartest people he knew.  'He was a good friend and person and cared about the world,' he told the publication.

Both talked up the confirmed conspiracy theorist has decidedly normal, as did his neighbors in historic St. Augustine, where he lived in a small apartment near the Matanzas River.  '[He was] an extremely nice person,' recalled the property manager of his apartment building, Larry Altman.  He went on to add: 'He had political views that I would not consider mainstream.  He called our government and the world government a Ponzi scheme,' Altman remembered, before disclaiming those views were hardly a cause for concern.

'If you met Max, he’d shake your hand, and you’d have a nice conversation,' he told The Times. 'He’d treat you with respect.'

His oldest friends were left even more surprised by his sudden act, with Carol Waldman, the mom of his childhood friend, recalling: 'He was kind and a gentle soul.  A real wonderful, terrific young guy. Who had his whole life ahead of him.'

But things quickly changed after the death of his mother, Elizabeth Azzarello, on April 6, 2022 almost two years to the day before his self-immolation.  After the loss spurred by a bout with pulmonary disease  his friends in St Augustine said they saw a change, one that culminated with Azzarello secretly traveling to New York City at some point this year, without his family's knowledge.  'That was around the time when he became more outspoken,' Waldman said of this period, referring to the last eight or so months of 2022.  They were close, and they had a good relationship. He was heartbroken.' he recalled.

By the next year, Azzarello and his writings after penning a beautifully worded memorial following his mother's death were almost unrecognizable.  'This extreme act of protest is to draw attention to an urgent and important discovery,' Azzarello wrote in part of his online manifesto, titled The Ponzi Papers.  We are victims of a totalitarian con, and our own government (along with many of their allies) is about to hit us with an apocalyptic fascist world coup.'

He added how this supposed regime 'is about to hit us with an apocalyptic facist world coup,' just months after a series of arrests in his home state for incidents that took place in August, including hurling a drink at a photo of Bill Clinton.

Oddly, the alleged research investigator is seen smiling in an undated photo with the Democrat seen on his still-up LinkedIn, where he wrote, 'we have a secret facist problem.'

In March 2023, he changed his profession on LinkedIn as 'Research Investigator,' self-employed, and in June reportedly tagged Brennan and others to make sure they had seen something he had written.  Speaking to The Times, she framed it as a 'manifesto', and remembered how she called him to intervene.  When that didn't work, she said she wrote to one of his relatives to make sure they were aware he was not in the right state of mind just over a year before he woudl set himself on fire as Trump's criminal trial entered its fourth day.  Eight months before this, though, Azzarello posted to Facebook to tell his online friends he had visited a mental health treatment facility, writing, 'Three days in the psych ward, and all I got were my new favorite socks.'

He was also spotted outside the courthouse both Thursday and Friday, where he reportedly told The New York Times, 'Trump's in on it.'

Trump is facing allegations he falsified business records related to payments made to ex-porn star Stormy Daniels.  Again framing himself as a 'research investigator', Azzarello told the paper his beliefs were influenced by research he had carried out into Peter Thiel, the venture capitalist whose seed money helped start firms like PayPal and Facebook.  Photographed holding a sign that read 'Trump is with Biden and they're about to facist coup us', he said: 'It's a secret kleptocracy, and it can only lead to an apocalyptic fascist coup.'

The day before, he reportedly held a sign critical of New York University before heading to the courthouse, while handing out literature on the subject.  On Friday, the self-employed 'investigative researcher' suddenly tossed a stack of pamphlets into the air that included links to his manifesto, seconds before suddenly setting himself ablaze.  After the self-immolation, cops descended on the area just before 2pm, after which he was brought to a nearby hospital’s burn unit. He died shortly before 11 pm, sources familiar with the matter confirmed.  In an article authored hours before he spewed unfounded theories about the 'elites', COVID, and Clinton, who appeared to have become a source of fascination for Azzarello over the years.  The post bore the startling succinct headline: 'I have set myself on fire outside of the Trump Trial', as other social media posts provided more insight into the college graduate's fragile state of mind.

DailyMail.com gained more insight after learning the activist just week ago completed a six month probation sentence - handed out following a string of incidents in Florida involving either disorderly conduct, destruction of property, and overall erratic, 'rambling' behavior.  DailyMail.com obtained criminal complaints for each, which all place within a matter of days in August.  In the first of three, cops wrote how Azzarello threw a glass of wine at a framed and autographed photograph of President Clinton displayed in the lobby of the Casa Monica Hotel in his hometown of Saint Augustine the evening of August 19, 2023,  The complaint, which lists him as unemployed, notes the incident took place as Azzarello had just finished dinner at the hotel restaurant.  He went on to launch the glass at the image, breaking the glass on the framed photograph and damaging it with wine in the process.  Then, two days later, Azzarello was arrested again at the Case Monica, after he was reported for 'standing outside, stripping his clothes off and yelling at customers.'  When cops arrived, they noted how the suspect was 'wearing nothing but his underwear, standing on the sidewalk [, and] holing [sic] a speaker blasting music and yelling', officers wrote eight months ago.  The hotel manager, meanwhile, was said to have told officers that customers were 'scared for their safety', and that many were unable to enter or exit for fear of being caught up in the then-suspect's episode.  On August 24, he was arrested once more for graffitiing property and rifling through a woman's belongings in the flatbed of her truck, after allegedly being seen yelling in someone's yards after 'misinterpreting' an exterminator's sign warning people to keep their children and pets off a lawn that had just been treated.  Cops, at the time, wrote how the conspiracy theorist was convinced the pest control company was 'there to exterminate children and dogs', as all the events occurred within walking distance of Azzarello's apartment.  In a discovery that provided more insight into the man behind the incident, DailyMail.com found Azzarello had posted to Facebook earlier that month, this time to tell his friends that he had just spent three days in a psych ward.  'I was handcuffed, shoved, and put into a psych ward,' he wrote in the update, in which he described how cops suddenly showed up at his St Augustine pad necause he had tipped a Starbucks barista $200 and wrote 'Go F*** Yourself' on the receipt.

'I was given no information about why I was there until after my discharge,' he said, as another post a few weeks later indicated her served jail time for the alleged stunt.

Less than three months later, a suit he filed against Clinton and 100 other influential figures was tossed when he failed to follow up with required court filings, after claiming Mark Cuban, Richard Branson, the country of Saudi Arabia, and more were carrying 'an elaborate network of Ponzi schemes' dating back to the 1990s and continuing through 2023.  Other defendants named in the 2023 suit included 1992 Independent presidential candidate Ross Perot, who died in 2019.  The case filed by Azzarello without a lawyer was tossed this past October.  Then, in an Instagram story posted a little over nine weeks ago, Azzarello shared a picture of Taylor Swift donned in Super Woman apparel.  He wrote in the caption: 'Super Bowl LVII Forecast: 100% chance of broflakes melting down and whining across the nation.' 

Azzarello wrote: 'Why are we all so divided? Because the people who stole the American Dream are shouting 'You're divided! You're divided!' in all directions.'

In another post from this time period, Azzarello appeared to show support for the Eras performer, commenting on a photo of her flashing the peace sign while delivering a commencement speech at New York University.  'Still her best picture,' Azzarello wrote over the May 2022 image, held in front of the same school would go on to slam two months later days before setting himself ablaze.

'NYU is a mob front', the headline of literature being passed around by the activist in Lower Manhattan not far from the courthouse Wednesday read.  An accompanying tagline added that the pamphlet was 'a brief guide to[the school's] most criminal secrets.'  Reporters with the Times, meanwhile, confirmed the suspect was holding a sign on Wednesday critical of the school at Washington Square Park Wednesday, before moving on Thursday to the park where the incident occurred.  A link to his Ponzi Papers Substack was provided.  On Wednesday, he also posted an Instagram highlight saying he would be 'spending the week at Washington Square Park airing out all of NYU's dirty laundry', a day before a final Instagram story just minutes before the blaze.  'I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you,' it read.

At 1:37 pm, law enforcement responded to calls reporting the fire, before rushing Azzarello to a city hospital where he is said to be in critical condition.  The New York Police Department said an investigation is ongoing, as other recent social media posts show how Azzarello recently praised 'martyrs' like the former U.S. military member who also lit himself on fire, but died during protest.  'Heroes and martyrs, folks,' Azzarello posted on his Instagram after the February death of US Air Force Active Duty Member Aaron Bushnell, adding 'God f****** bless you, Aaron Bushnell.'

Bushnell, 25, died after self immolating outside the Israeli Embassy this past February in Washington, D.C., in protest of Israel's war in Gaza.  'My name is Aaron Bushnell, I am an active-duty member of the United States Air Force and I will no longer be complicit in genocide,' Bushnell is heard saying in video of the incident.  '

'I am about to engage in an extreme act of protest, but compared to what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonizers, it's not extreme at all.  This is what our ruling class has decided will be normal.'

Like Bushnell, Azzarello released his own manifesto before his act on Friday.  However, unlike the late servicemen, his motives appear a bit more muddied with most of his pages attacking facism and the supposed complacency of the general public.  In his Substack, he again states he is an 'investigative researcher'.  The rest of the profile amounts to a rambling diatribe ageist the establishment, which Azzarello appears to be the authors of 'totalitarian con'.  He also warns of a 'an apocalyptic fascist world coup', and in fliers posted to his social media, he flaunts other self made pamphlets centered around the 'dipshit secrets of our rotten world'.  'When the economy collapses and it feels like World War III overnight, you'll know exactly why,' Azzarello warns in the flier.  His profile claims he has been self-employed since March of 2023. In one post, he claimed to have served 40 days in jail for one of the incidents back in August.  The NYPD investigation into the incident, as of writing, remains ongoing.

SIGNS YOU OVERDID IT FOR THANKSGIVING

> Paramedics bring in the Jaws of Life to pry you out of the EZ-Boy.

> The Gravy Boat you used was a real 12 foot boat.

> You get grass stains on your behind after a walk, but never sat down.

> You set off three earthquake seismographs on your morning jog Friday.

> Pricking your finger for cholesterol screening yields only gravy.

> You had five TV sets side-by-side to catch all the football games.

> That rash on your stomach turns out to be steering wheel burn.

> Representatives from the Butterball Hall of Fame called twice.

> It looks like the leftovers are gonna last until Christmas.

> Your arms are too short to reach the keyboard & delete this.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13306641/Schoolboy-eight-killed-hit-car-horror-accident-quiet-Wiltshire-cul-sac.html

Schoolboy, eight, killed after being hit by a car in horror accident on quiet Wiltshire cul-de-sac

By Eirian Jane Prosser

Published: 10:41, 14 April 2024 | Updated: 11:39, 14 April 2024

An eight-year-old schoolboy has died after being struck by a car on a quiet Wiltshire cul-de-sac.  Emergency services were called out to the crash in Woodland View, Dilton Marsh at 4.30pm on Saturday.  The incident, which saw the quiet road in the rural village closed last night, involved a vehicle and the young boy who had been walking in the area.   The tragic scene saw Wiltshire Air Ambulance scramble to the road alongside other 999 responders but despite their best efforts, he was pronounced dead at the scene.   The little boy's family have been informed and is being supported by a specialist officers.  A man in his 30s is being interviewed, the police said, as 'is usual in these circumstances'.  Tributes have flooded social media this morning, with many paying their respects tot the boys family.  One wrote: 'What an sad news fly high little sending hug and love to his family and friends at this sad occasion.'

Another said: 'This is so very very sad. Sending my thoughts to his family at this most unimaginably awful time.'

'Rest in paradise beautiful boy, thoughts are with the family,' a third added, while a fourth wrote: 'My condolences to the family, this is so tragic to read.'

The devastating collision happened in Dilton Marsh on the warmest day of the year so far.  The quiet village has a local pub, called The Prince of Wales, a pre-school and a primary school as well as a parent and toddler group.  Woodland View is a small cul-de-sac with a few new build houses backing onto a large field. It is a close walk from both the primary and prep school.  'Our thoughts are with them at this extremely difficult time', a Wiltshire Police spokesperson said.

'A man in his 30s is being interviewed, as is usual in these circumstances,' they added.

Witnesses to the collision or anyone with dash cam footage are being urged to contact the serious collision investigation team on 01225 694597 quoting log number 218 of yesterday's date (13/04).

Witnesses can also contact the team directly by emailing SCIT@wiltshire.police.uk.

A clergyman was walking down the street when he came upon a group of about a dozen boys, all of them between 10 and 12 years of age.  The group surrounded a dog. Concerned that the boys were hurting the dog, he went over and asked "What are you doing with that dog?"

One of the boys replied, "This dog is just an old neighborhood stray. We all want him, but only one of us can take him home. So we've decided that whichever one of us can tell the biggest lie will get to keep the dog."

Of course, the reverend was taken aback. "You boys shouldn't be having a contest telling lies!" he exclaimed. He then launched into a ten minute sermon against lying, beginning, "Don't you boys know it's a sin to lie," and ending with, "Why, when I was your age, I never told a lie."

There was dead silence for about a minute.  Just as the reverend was beginning to think he'd gotten through to them, the smallest boy gave a deep sigh and said, "All right, give him the dog."

The owner of a drug store walks in to find a guy leaning heavily against a wall. The owner asks the clerk "What's with that guy over there by the wall?" 

The clerk replies, "Well, he came in here this morning to get something for his cough. I couldn't find the cough syrup, so I gave him an entire bottle of laxative."

The owner screams, "You idiot!  You can't treat a cough with a bottle of laxatives!"

The clerk calmly replies, "Of course you can! Look at him; he's afraid to cough."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13191273/Iron-lung-man-Paul-Alexander-dead-78-Man-paralysed-suffering-Polio-six-year-old-lived-iron-lung-70-years-dies.html

Iron lung man Paul Alexander dead at 78: Lawyer who was paralysed after suffering Polio as a six year old and lived in an iron lung for 70 years dies

    Paul Alexander contracted polio in 1952 and spent a lifetime in an iron lung
    His team confirmed via his fundraiser that he had died aged 78 on Monday

By James Reynolds

Published: 08:51, 13 March 2024 | Updated: 11:41, 13 March 2024

Paul Alexander, the man who lived in an iron lung for more than 70 years, has died at the age of 78.  A fundraiser for his healthcare confirmed Alexander, of Dallas, Texas, passed away on Monday without providing further details.  Alexander spent an extraordinary lifetime in the iron lung machine after contracting polio in 1952, aged six, which left him paralysed from the neck down.  Unable to breathe by himself, he relied on the machine to breathe for more than seven decades even as new technologies became available.  But in spite of his physical constraints, Alexander achieved much as a published author, lawyer and avid traveller, remembered worldwide for his enduring positive attitude and smile.  Writing on Alexander's GoFundMe page, Christopher Ulmer, organiser and disability-rights activist, said on Tuesday: 'Paul Alexander, “The Man in the Iron Lung”, passed away yesterday.  'After surviving polio as a child, he lived over 70 years inside of an iron lung. In this time Paul went to college, became a lawyer, and a published author.  His story traveled wide and far, positively influencing people around the world.  Paul was an incredible role model that will continue to be remembered.'

Over an extraordinary life, Alexander's determination saw him achieve a number of remarkable achievements.  At 21, he became the first person to graduate from a high school in Dallas without ever attending class in person.  He was accepted into Southern Methodist University in Dallas, after much difficulty with university administration and then got into law school at the University of Texas, Austin.  He pursued his dreams of becoming a trial lawyer, and represented clients in court in a three-piece suit and a modified wheelchair that held his paralysed body upright.  He also staged a sit-in for disability rights and published his own memoir, titled 'Three Minutes for a Dog: My Life in an Iron Lung'.  The 155-page memoir was carefully crafted and took five years to complete; Paul wrote each word with a pen attached to a stick in his mouth.  Paul outlived both of his parents, his brother and even his original iron lung, which began leaking air in 2015, but was repaired by a mechanic Brady Richards, which was prompted by a YouTube video of Paul pleading for help.  The ventilator, a large yellow metal box, requires patients to lie down inside, with the device fastened tightly around their neck.  It works by creating a vacuum to mechanically draw in oxygen to the lungs for patients whose central nervous system and respiratory function were affected by polio.  While in hospital, doctors tried to get Paul to breathe on his own, turning off the machine and forcing him out, but it wouldn't take long for him to turn blue and pass out.  Despite the availability of more modern ventilators, Paul decided to continue using the iron lung machine because he was used to it.  Other devices also require intensive surgery.  Over his lifetime, Alexander never let the device get in the way of what he wanted to achieve, travelling on planes, living independently, praying in church, visiting the ocean, and falling in love.  While at university, Alexander met Claire, who he later became engaged to. He spoke candidly to The Guardian about how her mother forbade him from speaking to her daughter.  'Took years to heal from that,' he told the outlet.

In later life Alexander built a close relationship with Kathy Gaines, who became his caregiver or 'arms and legs', in his words.  Gaines stepped in to help after Alexander graduated law school, supporting him for more than three decades.  Alexander said the pair 'grew together', Gaines herself legally blind from type-1 diabetes.  Polio is an infectious viral disease that affects the central nervous system respiratory function and can cause muscle weakness and paralysis. It is transmitted through contaminated water and food or contact with an infected person.  It has largely been eradicated around the world after widespread use of the vaccine which came into use in the 1950s.  The disease remains endemic in just four countries today: Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan.  Polio was recently eradicated in India following an extensive campaign over a period of some 20 years, successfully ending the epidemic with sustained oral and injected vaccines.

What is polio?

Poliomyelitis is an infectious disease that can cause paralysis or even death.  While efforts to produce vaccines effectively ended the epidemic in the western world by the latter half of the 20th century, polio remained one of the most deadly threats to children well into the 1950s.  Polio spreads from person to person through the ingestion of faecal matter from an infected person, or less commonly through coughs and sneezes.  Despite advances in sanitation and hygiene practices through the 19th century, the number of cases of polio in Europe and America soared through the early 1900s.  In the first stage of contracting the disease, the infection stays in the digestive system and throat. Most babies are able to fight off the disease at this point without it becoming debilitating, developing immunity.  Children who develop the disease later on are often less well prepared to fight it without having developed resistance, which can see polio enter a second, more aggressive stage, affecting the central nervous system.  Awareness of how diseases spread in unsanitary conditions saw great steps forward in overcoming epidemics in cholera and typhoid, but the reduced exposure to the polio virus in youth meant many children caught the disease later in development by the 20th century, with horrifying consequences.

Sources: Science Museum, NHS

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13103789/what-happened-Fred-Rosemary-Wests-children-stephen-wright.html

What happened to Fred and Rosemary West's children: Almost 30 years after 'house of horrors' was found, STEPHEN WRIGHT reveals how some live in fear, others have built happy lives while a few were cut down by fresh tragedy

By Stephen Wright

Published: 13:49, 20 February 2024 | Updated: 14:31, 20 February 2024

For some three decades, Barry West had tried to escape the ghosts of his childhood.  As a schoolboy, he had been given a new identity and moved to a different part of the country a place of safety to help him bury the nightmare of his upbringing.  But the odds were stacked against him. And when his body was discovered slumped over a table by a mental health support worker, it seemed almost inevitable. He'd suffered for years from post-traumatic stress, anxiety, depression and long-term drug addiction.  Death at the age of 40 would have been a release from the horrors he witnessed as a child at 25 Cromwell Street, Gloucester, the notorious address where his parents Fred and Rose West slaughtered nine girls and young women including Barry's older sister Heather.  His passing from an overdose in supported living accommodation was not a violent end like those of the poor souls who suffered at the hands of his parents.  But it marked yet another tragedy in one of Britain's most shocking homicide cases.  It is 30 years ago this month that the West murders first came to light. On Thursday, February 24, 1994, police turned up at Cromwell Street with a warrant to search the garden for Heather's body. Two days later, they unearthed a human bone.  I reported on the case extensively for the Mail from those early days as more and more bodies were being discovered, through to the trial of mother-of-eight Rose at Winchester Crown Court in the Autumn of 1995. Her co-killer Fred had taken his life in a Birmingham jail on New Year's Day that year, mistakenly believing his death would spare her prison.  I sat through every day of Rose's seven-week trial. She was convicted of ten murders and told she would die in jail. It was a case which, for me, redefined the meaning of the word 'evil'.  What the victims went through how they were abused, tortured and raped before being killed and dismembered was utterly terrifying.  Over the years, many books have been written about the West case and countless TV documentaries made. All have focused largely on the killers and those they slaughtered.  But there is another category of victim whose stories have not been reported so widely. These are the West children, brought up in the most depraved and dysfunctional family imaginable.  Before the discovery of Heather's butchered remains under the patio at Cromwell Street in February 1994 the moment when the true horrors of the house started to unfold the Wests' offspring suffered abhorrent sexual abuse, repeated physical beatings and shocking mental torment.  It was not unusual for Fred to force them to watch video recordings of their prostitute mother (who worked under the name 'Mandy') having sex with customers upstairs. Three of her daughters were fathered by her customers.  Here was a home where, when Fred and Rose were not killing, life revolved around debauchery and sexual abuse. In evidence at Winchester that sent a chill down my spine, a witness recalled hearing a child scream 'stop it Daddy' from another room in the middle of the night.  How could anyone raised in such a warped environment not be affected by it?

How do you cope with being a child of arguably Britain's most evil couple ever?

Make no mistake, each of the West children were victims. As was Anne Marie West, Fred's daughter from his marriage to his first wife Rena. Nobody who heard her harrowing testimony when she gave evidence against her stepmother Rose will ever forget it.  Fred, who murdered Rena in 1971, repeatedly raped Anne Marie from the age of eight and made her pregnant when she was 15. And though she fled Cromwell Street, avoiding the fate of her dead half-sister Heather, her suffering did not stop.  Now 59, Anne Marie once gave a tearful, heartbreaking account of life with Fred and Rose in a TV documentary interview but she has not spoken publicly about her ordeal for many years.  Her stepbrother Barry also managed to escape the family home, albeit as a result of social services' intervention, but he was never able to shake off his appalling past. Now his harrowing story and those of some of his other siblings, who have tried desperately to rebuild their lives, can be told.  Barry John West, born at Gloucester Maternity Hospital on June 16, 1980, was named after Barry Island in South Wales where the family went on day trips. The Wests' second son was just 15 when his mother went on trial for serial murder.  He was one of five West children the others being Tara, Louise, Rosemary Junior and Lucyanna taken into care in August 1992 after police and social services became concerned about their welfare.  The authorities acted after one child, who was being repeatedly abused by Fred, showed a school friend the wounds to her body after one particularly brutal assault.  Fred was charged and Rose was subsequently accused in court of aiding and abetting rape and buggery of a daughter. But the trial collapsed the following year after their children, in a sign of the complicated relationship between the abused and their abusers, declined to give evidence against them.  Nevertheless, those five children would never return to Fred's and Rose's care, and police stepped up inquiries into the fate of Heather, who had disappeared aged 16 in 1987. In time, this led to that search of the Cromwell Street garden and the discovery of her body.  As Fred confessed to more and more murders, police switched attention to the cellar, where further butchered human remains were found.  Fred and Rose had targeted not only their own children, but live-in nannies, teenagers in care enticed to Cromwell Street with the promise of a bed and companionship, and young women lured into the couple's car wrongly feeling secure because of Rose's presence in the front passenger seat.  Some were kept alive for just hours, others for days during which, bound and gagged, they endured repeated sexual assaults before being murdered. Police found hooks drilled into rafters in the cellar, their use not hard to imagine. At least one victim had had plastic tubes stuffed into her nostrils through masking tape wrapped around her face.  By the time all this emerged, Barry had been given a new identity (which for legal reasons we are not disclosing) and moved to a new home well away from Gloucester.  As he moved into adulthood, he lived an itinerant life and was registered on the electoral roll at a series of addresses. He also spent time at Priory House, a mental health unit in the Home Counties.  His death he was found slumped over the table by his support worker on the morning of August 28, 2020 sparked internal investigations at the local county council.  Medical records revealed Barry had a complex medical and mental health history including an opioid addiction and a history of heroin misuse dating back 19 years. He had tried to take his own life in 2015 and there had been 'many overdoses'.  The coroner ruled that he had died as a result of misadventure following 'voluntary injections of pain relieving medication' including morphine, codeine and pregabalin, an anti-anxiety treatment.  A family friend said: 'Barry's was a difficult and tragic life. He was a very complicated, unhappy person and was badly damaged. He was 40 when he died but it was like talking to a much younger, immature person.' The friend added: 'He never found peace, he never escaped the ghosts of his past.'

His elder sister Mae, who had not been taken into care, also found life after Cromwell Street very challenging. Her 2018 memoir, 'Love as Always, Mum xxx', laid bare her on-going anguish.  She described how Fred often put 'hard core porn' videos on TV for his children to watch some featuring 'mum and her clients'.  'Dad didn't make any secret of the fact he sometimes filmed her having sex,' she said. '...I used to find it completely repulsive.'

She added: 'We always knew about their interest in kinky sex: they never tried to hide it from us. They'd leave porn magazines lying around the house, along with bondage gear: masks, rubber suits, whips and the like. It wasn't unusual for us kids to come across dildos, vibrators and other sex toys just lying around the house. It amused Dad, more than anything, to see how we reacted.'

Rose used to ask Mae to answer the doorbell when clients arrived and would disappear upstairs with them, sometimes several clients over a period of hours.  Yet she still has happy childhood memories, and reminisces about family holidays in the countryside. 'My siblings and I all came to believe that, however strange and distressing things might be within the four walls of our house, we needed to stick together,' she said.

Today mother-of-two Mae, 51, lives at a secret location and remains in constant fear of being revealed as a West child. 'The shadows of the past remain,' she has said.

'Knowing your parents are regarded by most people as evil beyond belief is incredibly hard to live with I've found it very hard to deal with the assumption some people have had that my sisters, brothers and I grew up to think our parents' cruel and bizarre behaviour was normal. That couldn't be further from the truth.'

In her book, she added: 'I still see [sisters] Tara and Louise regularly. The three of us are in intermittent contact with our other brother and two sisters, even though they're scattered far and wide across the country, have new identities and are leading their own lives.  I know the abused can become abusers, and in my parents' case that was true. I strongly believe that this doesn't have to be the case. The cycle can be broken. My own children have grown up free of the terrible consequences of physical or sexual abuse.'

In a 2020 podcast her brother Stephen, who was born in 1973 and has not had an easy life himself, revealed he had not had any contact with his jailed mother for more than 20 years. He explained it was 'important' for him to cut his ties with her.  He said: 'In 1999, she called with hate and was blaming me for everything. She said I should have died when I was born and all that sort of stuff. It was a disgrace.'

Tara, born in 1977, was the first of three of Rose's illegitimate daughters conceived with black clients while she was working as a prostitute at Cromwell Street and at other locations.  One of Rose's favourite haunts, which she frequented with one particular regular called Rosco, was the Tara Hotel which gave rise to the name she chose for her daughter.  Tara moved out of the Gloucester area, changed her name and has struggled to form relationships.  Speaking in 1999, Tara said: 'I hate showing my tender side to men. I think it is a weakness. I pretend I am hard. I just can't say "I love you". I fear rejection because of my upbringing. I never said "I love you" to Mum and the love I gave Dad was just used by him.'

She had a string of broken romances behind her. 'A lot of men just can't handle the fact that my Mum and Dad are Fred and Rose West. I told one bloke and he literally ran out of the house. He was so scared.'

She used to visit her mother twice a year in prison and wrote to her frequently. She also met up with her brother Stephen and older sister Mae to talk about the past. 'We don't talk about the sad things. We try and remember the good times,' she said in 1999.  Sometimes she used to see Barry and her two other sisters, Rosemary Junior and Lucyanna, who have also started new lives away from Gloucester. Lucyanna went to university and is now working as a therapist in a different part of the country.  Now 46, Tara was last known to be living in a neat semi-detached house in a quiet town in the North of England.  Three decades have passed since the horrors of 25 Cromwell Street were first revealed to the world. The story of the West children is one of very mixed fortunes. But what of their monstrous mother?

In the months leading up to her trial, while researching the background of the case, I was introduced to a Roman Catholic nun who had comforted Rose at a remand prison near Bristol. Sister Paul gave me a letter Rose had sent to her.

It gives an extraordinary insight into the mind of Britain's most prolific female serial killer. Full of spelling mistakes, Mrs R.P West, as she called herself, wrote the letter at H Wing at Durham Prison where she was held in the run-up to her trial.  'We have a lovely chapel and I have meet (sic) the chaplins (sic) who are all very friendly,' she wrote. 'It was great to go to church on Sunday, and to praye (sic) together with other inmates and to share the closeness of God with them. I have made lots of friends here and I'm never short of a kiss or a hug when it is needed.'

Of course, her supposed conversion to Christianity was a lie. She has never come clean about what really happened at Cromwell Street, or said whether, as many suspect, there are more bodies to be found.  John Bennett, the highly respected ex-Detective Superintendent who led the police case, told my Mail+ True Crime podcast he believes Rose will take her secrets to the grave.  'I doubt very much that she will ever say anything more than she's already said, which is absolutely nothing at all,' he said. 'I think she is now  institutionalised. She's quite comfortable with being who she is, and where she is, and her personal circumstances. There is no gain for her whatsoever to make further admissions or to assist anybody.'

And as her former solicitor Leo Goatley wrote in his 2019 book Understanding Fred and Rose West, she likes prison: 'I know Rose accepted prison as the location of her being, as her domain and her domicile. The all-female environment also suited Rose's lesbian preferences, as her various relationships (including with Moors murderess Myra Hindley) verify. She can sew and knit, prepare meals, adorn her cell, watch television make her cell space pretty much as she want its.'

As another landmark anniversary approaches in this most macabre of cases, will she reflect on her evil deeds including the murder of her own flesh and blood?

Probably not. For her, life behind bars at high security HMP New Hall in West Yorkshire where a recent arrival is serial baby killer Lucy Letby is good. How sickening it is to consider that she is probably the happiest of the surviving West family.  About 200 miles from her jail, there is a 19th century church in Monmouthshire with an unusual grave. It is here 'in God's acre' at St Michael's Church in Tintern Parva that can be found the final resting place of Heather West.  Her grave is adorned with trinkets, mementoes, flowers and icons including a stone hand-painted with her name. It has recently been scrubbed to remove old lichen and moss.  She is watched over by a carved angel and the dedication reads: 'In our hearts, There lives a memory, Of a love, That once was ours.' A further inscription bears the dates of her short life which ended in 1986.  But one thing really stands out: only Heather's first name is on the headstone.  Minister Jan Pain said: 'It is unusual for a headstone to have just the person's first name and not their surname but in this case you can see why Heather's nearest and dearest might want to distance her from any association with West.'

Heather's sister Mae, who was in charge of her funeral, explained: 'I didn't want the name West used. To do that, would have defiled her memory.'

For Barry, that association with the word 'West' and the memories it stirred up was simply too much to bear.

Special Reporting: Simon Trump

The fates of the children

Barry: Died aged 40 in August 2020 after years of depression and long-term drug addiction

Tara: Aged 46, one of three of Rose's illegitimate daughters conceived with clients

Rosemary Junior: Started a new life away from Gloucester

Lucyanna: Went to university and now works as a therapist

Louise: Given a new identity but in intermittent contact with her siblings

Heather: Murdered by Fred and Rose and buried under the patio. Remains discovered in 1994

Mae: Aged 51, now a mother-of-two and lives in a secret location

Anne Marie: Fred's daughter from his first marriage with Rena. Now 59