Ex-detective recalls meeting 'devilish' Ian Brady

A retired detective constable who worked on the Moors Murders case has spoken about his time with “devilish” Ian Brady.

Evan John Hughes, from Pwllheli, was one of the first officers to sit with the child killer after he was arrested in October 1965.

Along with his lover Myra Hindley, Brady tortured and murdered five children over an 18-month period during the 1960s.

The pair were later jailed at Chester Assizes in 1966.

Brady was initially sentenced for the murders of Edward Evans, 17, John Kilbride, 12, and 10-year-old Lesley Ann Downey.

In 1985 he also admitted to the murders of Pauline Reade, 16, and Keith Bennett, who was 12.

Mr Hughes has now spoken out about the serial killer, who died at the age of 79 yesterday at Ashworth Hospital where he had been detained for the last three decades.

The former police officer told the BBC: “Honestly, you would think that he hadn’t committed anything, he hadn’t done anything wrong.

“He was quite cool, reading a newspaper and having a smoke.

“He was a hard man and devilish obviously in what he had committed but on the other hand he didn’t show this.

“He was a stern, angry-looking man who said nothing.”

Mr Hughes also recalled the “difficult” task of taking Edward Evans’ mother to the mortuary to indentify her son with a fellow officer.

He said: “I brought her back to Hyde [Greater Manchester] where she had to go into the mortuary and indentify her son.

“It wasn’t an easy task, it was very difficult.

“Being the senior of two of us, I had to knock on the door and it was answered by a neighbour.

“I had already lit a cigarette outside the door which showed how nervous I was despite the fact I was a policeman at the time.”

He also admits he and his wife were concerned for the safety of their eldest 12-year-old daughter as children kept disappearing “without trace” in the area.

“Everybody was worried stiff, children were afraid to go out,” he said, “it was an awful experience to go through what we did at that time, for everybody.

“I remember standing on the side of the grave of Lesley Ann Downey and by my side there was a chief inspector from Lancashire county and although it was dark at night, I could see the tears in his eyes.

“He turned to me and said ‘hanging has just been stopped and this would have been the only answer in this case’.”

Capital punishment was abolished in the UK in 1965, just a year before Brady and Hindley were charged.