O
n September 7, 1998, George
McKeating switched on the
TV and a newsflash stopped him
in his tracks. A GP in the nearby
town of Hyde had been arrested on
suspicion of murder. The man was
called Harold Shipman. The true
horror of Shipman’s crimes — he is
believed to be Britain’s most prolific
serial killer — had not yet been
revealed, but the death of Kathleen
Grundy, and a dubious will that left
everything to her doctor, had
alerted the police that something
suspicious was going on. Her body
was exhumed and traces of
diamorphine (heroin) found.
McKeating was shocked, he
says, but not surprised. The
detective, who was now retired,
had led an investigation into
Shipman many years before and
the outcome had troubled him
ever since. “I had probably dealt
with 50-odd murders and many
more suspicious deaths by then,”
he says, “but that is the case that
comes back to haunt me.”
Born in Scotland, McKeating had
joined the West Yorkshire police
force in the 1960s. He was one of
the young constables combing the
moors for the young victims of
Myra Hindley and Ian Brady —
the only one of the search party
still alive today, he believes. He
rose steadily through the ranks of
the criminal investigations
department, and over the course
of his career dealt with more than
100 murders, suicides and
suspicious deaths, including five
double murders. His wife loathed
the smell of the mortuary
disinfectant that lingered on his
clothes. When he cameOne detective wanted Harold Shipman struck off as far back as 1976.
Instead the doctor went on to become Britain’s most prolific killer
Could Shipman’s 215
victims have been saved?
Rosie Kinchen
True Crime
home from work she’d say, “You’ve
been for post mortem. I can smell
it,” McKeating chuckles. It was
worth it, he says. “I was a dedicated
policeman.” Which is why the
Shipman case has hung over him
for so long. He came across the
doctor in November 1975. His
brief back then was to investigate
medical professionals who abused
controlled drugs. One day he got
a call from a local pharmacist. “He
said, ‘You want to look at some of
the pharmacies in Todmorden and
Hebdon Bridge because there is a
guy, a doctor, who is picking up
pethidine by the bucket-load’.”
The doctor in question was
Shipman, who had qualified as
a GP the year before and was
working at a medical centre
nearby. He was indeed collecting
large quantities of the pain-
relieving opiate.
McKeating began contacting
the patients named on the
prescriptions. As he spoke to more
and more of Shipman’s patients,
he noticed they had a peculiar
relationship with their young
doctor. Shipman lavished them
with attention. “He would drop inat nine or ten at night and say,
‘Pop the kettle on,’ ” McKeating
says. “Now that’s strange, isn’t it,
I don’t know any doctor then or
now who would do that.”
McKeating gathered testimonies
from 70 people who had all had
prescriptions for pethidine written
in their name and never been given
the drug. By the time he was ready
to make an arrest, Shipman had
got wind of it and checked himself
into a rehabilitation facility in
York. McKeating followed and
brought him into the station for
questioning. The impression
Shipman gave was one of extreme
arrogance, he recalls. “He had this
attitude of ‘I’m better than you,
I can outsmart you’, ” McKeating
says. But once he started talking,
“you couldn’t shut him up”.
There was no doubt in
McKeating’s mind that Shipman
was an addict. There were track
marks all the way up his arms.
The veins had been so badly
scarred that he had resorted to
trying to inject the drug into his
penis, McKeating says.
Shipman was charged with eight
offences of illegally obtaining
Below: the former
detective George
McKeating
investigated Shipman
for drug abuse in 1975.
He had hoped the
ensuing conviction
would see the GP
struck off. Right:
Shipman’s surgery
in Hyde, Greater
Manchester