Twisted killer boiled body parts

Four decades ago drains blocked by rotting corpses exposed one of Britain’s most notorious mass murderers – Dennis Nilsen

- GAIL SHORTLAND

On 8 February 1983, a plumber arrived at a property in Muswell Hill, north London. Residents in the flats at 23 Cranley Gardens had complained of blocked drains. It was dusk when Michael Cattran took up the manhole cover outside and spotted what appeared to be a flesh-like substance and bone fragments.

One of the tenants, called Dennis Nilsen, commented that it looked as though someone had been “flushing their Kentucky Fried Chicken” down the toilet.

It was dark, so Michael arranged to return in the morning – unaware that he’d just spoken to a serial killer who’d been disposing of his victims’ body parts down the loo.

Dennis Andrew Nilsen, known as Des, was now just hours away from capture after a killing spree that began five years earlier, taking the lives of at least 12 young men and boys. The Muswell Hill Murderer was about to be exposed to the world.

Born in Fraserburgh, Scotland, Nilsen knew as a teen that he was gay, but felt ashamed and hid his sexuality. After joining the army he trained as a chef and served for 11 years.

One night, while based in Germany, he got drunk with a young German man and they passed out on the floor together. Although nothing sexual occurred, waking up next to the unconscious man triggered a chilling urge in Nilsen. He’d later cover his own body in talcum powder and look at himself in the mirror, imagining it was a dead body.

In 1972, Nilsen left the army and moved to London, where, incredibly, he spent a few months as a junior constable in the police force. He then became a supervisor at a job centre in Kentish Town.