Is serial there a serial killer dubbed “The Pusher” murdering men in Manchester by shoving them into canals?
This is from a story published in one of the national newspapers in the UK. There was a documentary on this subject last night on Channel 4. If you are able and have catch up service I would recommend watching it. For me it meant it left more questions than answers to what has been happening in the city of Manchester over the last six years.
More than 80 bodies – almost all of them men – have been pulled from canals and rivers in Manchester over the past six years, many in the city’s Gay Village.
Grieving families, academics and authors believe a serial killer could be stalking the city’s waterways, but police insist there is no evidence to back this up.
I am not convinced at all that that every case has been thoroughly investigated. The programme itself mentioned very briefly that some of the areas where bodies have been found are known cruising grounds for gay men. The programme didn’t elaborate too much on this aspect of the issue of twenty eight deaths that where deemed “open cases” to deaths where no firm conclusion has been made whether a death was accident or suicide.
I don’t know Manchester that well only briefly visiting in the late eighties with college but I do have extension knowledge of what gay men do and don’t do. I don’t understand why they hadn’t spoken to or found someone who was part of this “scene” apart from getting the views of a token drag queen while he was putting on his make up and wig. He commented that it seemed suspicious but the surface of the problems where only lightly scratched.
Why is it a majority of men who have died in the canals? If the police believe that the deaths are alcohol related and people accidentally falling into the water why isn’t there more women dying? If it is just men what are they doing there and how have they come to meet their deaths?
The CCTV images of some of the people who had died was extremely unreliable, poor quality to the point that you couldn’t be sure who you were looking at. I am interested in these cases because being a gay man I am very particularly in making sure that if I was to go anywhere where I wouldn’t normally go and with someone maybe I had recently met people would know about it. Three people have the ability to track my whereabouts on my iPhone 24 hours a day and I don’t leave the house without it.
There is a setting on my phone that if just before it is switched off or say the battery dies for whatever reason it will record the final GPS signal on the iCloud and this could be accessed later if necessary.
In part of my degree I did a module on serial killers and was very interested in the criminology side of this. I have been fascinated and curious about those who have been caught killing others for reasons usually only known to the person.
I don’t think we have heard the end of this story and soon something will emerge from the shadows. There too many unknowns and not enough firm evidence to prove that everyone of these deaths were due to accidents. A couple have been proved to be deliberate and the perpetrators caught and jailed. I will wait and see.
fredspoon 