The event became known as the Hungerford massacre. When Michael Ryan went on a killing spree in Hungerford in 1987, the news - like last week's shootings in Cumbria - shocked the country. Marcus Barnard, a local taxi driver, had been a father for just five weeks when he was shot dead. As the brothers were cleaning up, a reporter burst in. I could see her hip bone.". Many were attended by people who had never known the deceased in life, but wished to show support for their families and the bereaved Hungerford community in general. She was hit in the legs and the hips. So he continued to Inkpen and Mrs Roland-Clarke's garden. Fifteen vehicles were taken away for forensic examination. Wouldn't hurt a fly.". He then went back into the house, used the five-litre can of petrol to soak everything he could, and set the house on fire.Into his car, Ryan had packed military clothing, a large amount of ammunition and a first aid kit. "I didnt know by doing that, by asking him to come home, I was just leading them both into danger.". Mrs Pascoe, safe with her neighbours in a community centre, was playing cards with the children to distract them from the horror outside. Ryan's mother consistently pandered to her husband and son so Michael saw her as someone who was there to do things for him and essentially serve him - so he felt a sense of entitlement to treat her however he wanted.". Their younger son Trevor, who had been 18 in 1987, is being treated for PTSD while his older brother Peter, who was in the same year as Ryan at school, refuses to talk about that day. He got me in my lower back. Then he shot at Mrs Dean and sped back to South View where he set fire to his home and shot dead his dog, Blackie. Large crowds attended the funerals of Ryan's victims, Trevor Jackson had first heard of the shootings when a colleague asked: "What's happened to your parents?". He uses it against the people he has grown up with and against the unarmed police that are called. A 27-year-old unemployed local labourer, Michael Robert Ryan, armed with several weapons including an AK-47 rifle and a Beretta pistol, shot and killed sixteen people including his mother, and wounded fifteen others, then fatally shot himself. "I think he fully intended to fake his own death at home and disappear at that point," says Prof Jackson. They were unable to refuse him as he had no record of mental instability and no criminal record. About half an hour later, Mrs Roland-Clarke called him to the telephone. Susan Godfrey was shot dead in Savernake Forest. There was no way he would miss. There was also a made-up girlfriend - a delusion which went far enough for Mrs Ryan to invite people to the wedding. In his right hand, tied to his wrist with a bootlace, was his Beretta pistol. Michael Ryan murdered 16 people before turning the gun on himself. Seeing two of his neighbours, Roland and Sheila Mason, in their back garden, he shot Roland six times and Sheila once, in the head. Some more minor details of that fateful day in 1987 vary in the different accounts but all agree that it will remain in memory as one of the worst gun crimes in British history.Sir Charles Pollard, Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police from 1991 2001, commented, The realisation that this could happen in fun-loving England, where we dont have guns and the police arent armed it changed policing and it changed society forever.. Next to him, in the passenger seat, Ivor Jackson was also shot in his arm, chest and head. Lisa Mildenhall, 14, was shot and wounded by Ryan, who had smiled at her whilst she crouched on the ground at her front door, and then shot her four times in the legs and stomach. They lived a few doors from each other and their families were friends. This Wednesday was no different, with the schools on holiday, many people were taking advantage of the good weather. The incident prompted the government to change gun laws, banning semi-automatic and pump-action rifles. Police surrounded the school building and Brightwell worked to establish communication with Ryan and ultimately to persuade him to surrender. "She tried to tell Michael to stop and he shot her at close range," Mr Jackson adds. As he went along Priory Road, Ryan stopped at the home of Myrtle and Victor Gibbs, whose door was, as usual, locked. She knew her husband was dead. The British Home Secretary, Douglas Hurd, travelled to Hungerford on Sunday, 23 August 1987. He was shooting at me. Having created a fort for himself in the Gibbs home, Ryan fired at neighbouring houses, injuring a man at number 62 and a woman at number 67 Priory Road.Ian Playle, a 34-year-old clerk to the Justices at Newbury Magistrates Court, had brought his wife, Elizabeth, and their two young children, Richard and Sarah, to Hungerford on a shopping trip. Her children, who were 85 yards away from where her body was found, were later reunited with their father. "She was dead on the ground, on her front just by the drive of our house. Read about our approach to external linking. The police officers at the scene did not apprehend him at this point, as they were unarmed. Hazel Haslett escaped with minor injuries. Instead she found Ryan, who shot her once. People were said to have run into the streets chanting, The bastards dead, the bastards dead, whilst children cycled around on their bikes, yelling Good riddance, and people in pubs toasted his death. The week before the shootings he had helped Ryan bring a heavy cabinet down the stairs. 7 - Dorothy Ryan 'It's a show that I'm passionate about': Will Mellor on 'Cops Who Kill'. After some time, young Hannah unbuckled their seatbelts, so they could go in search of their mother. The wheelchair-bound Myrtle was totally vulnerable and Victor threw himself across her to protect her from the crazed gunman. Whilst she waited for help to arrive, she watched Ryan jog up and down the road, shooting at anything that moved. He arrived back in South View in time to set fire to his home, shoot his dog, chase another dog, and take three guns from his car before killing Mr and Mrs Mason at 12:47. But it appears she never contradicted him in public. "I said he could, and he said: 'When that man shot that man, all of the birds flew out of the trees and shat themselves'. The smiling Ryan shot 11 rounds from his semi-automatic at another car that drove into the street. 11 - Eric Vardy S02:E05 - Thomas Watt Hamilton: Dunblane Massacre. "He was trapped and didn't have a viable way out of his situation.". hungerford massacre photos. Ryan then abandoned his M1 carbine in the Memorial Gardens. He would insist on lying down on the back seat of the car if we ever went out, so he couldn't be seen. Michael Ryan was just so, so insignificant. As they drove up Tarrants Hill, their windscreen was shattered by a spray of bullets and Vardy was hit twice, under the chin and in the torso. What happened in the woods is the clue to why the shootings happened, Prof Jackson believes. At age 11, he moved from the local primary school opposite his home, to the John OGaunt Secondary School, where he underachieved academically and would often play truant. Ryans school friend remembers his mother would buy the boy whatever he wanted, but his father "couldnt be played" and "wore the trousers" in the house. The damage to Michael Ryan's house after he set fire to it. Without replying, Ryan shot his mother twice in the stomach and once in the leg. I had been the one to carry out the checks for Ryans firearms licence.". A former school friend remembers a teenage Ryan boasting of spying on and stalking people there. The Hungerford Massacre on August 19, 1987, saw 16 people killed in a rampage by gunman Michael Ryan. "Theres no two ways about it. "It's difficult to ascertain exactly how much he planned it, but I think it was well in advance and right down to minor details," says Dr Yardley. Following the massacre, the British press was inundated with stories about Michael Ryan and speculation as to why he had committed so many acts of unprovoked violence. The bullet had passed through his skull and shattered his brain. Paying no attention to the police or the press, Ryan seemed oblivious to anything other than his hell-bent mission to kill everyone in his path. The investigation into Mrs Godfrey's death found she had not been raped. The town had long been a tourist destination. "It hasn't got any easier. She had started the day wearing yellow trousers, borrowed from her sister. Press intrusion is something the Jacksons continue to feel very strongly about. "It was a massacre," she says. Ryan approached, looked at him and shot him three times. "He was as good as gold. Four houses, including Ryan's home at the far right, were later demolished. It was the same school he had attended more than a decade before. Their friend George White, who worked with Ivor, said he'd drive him home. I couldn't walk. Scenes in Hungerford, Berkshire, following a gun siege in the town the day before, the event became known as the Hungerford massacre, pictured is the. "I think she either refused to [have sex] or resisted," he said. After all, he was in the area and knew Mrs Dean. This documentary examines Ryan's childhood, his acquisition of guns, and the killings. He cannot even pass the end of the road. He claimed he had been taken under the wing of a retired colonel who was going to buy him a house and a Ferrari. And she said I'm really sorry. One of the boys she was with went to fetch his mother, Sylvia Pascoe, a qualified first-aider who lived at No 14. "[Mr Ryan] was quite the bully. Lepetit had heard about shooting in his neighbourhood and was hurrying home to check on his family. "And I kept thinking, if it was true that I'd signed my dad's death warrant, it meant I'd also signed all those other people's too. Michael Ryan: The Hungerford Massacre: Directed by Adam Luria. ", Kathleen Wainwright later moved to Hungerford to be near her son. From the eerie quiet of Hungerford High Street after the murder of 16 people to the trail of blood leading up to the bedroom of an anonymous terraced house, Shepherd conjures up the uncanny. The couple and their two grown-up sons now live in a two-bedroom council house a few streets away. "If he did have a sexual crime in mind, then that would have been about control too.". In a further twist of fate, the local police helicopter was in for repair but police mechanics eventually made it ready for flight and it was deployed at around the time Ryan shot his mother. When, in March 1996 Thomas Hamilton shot dead 16 schoolchildren and their teacher in the Stirling town of Dunblane, Trevor Wainwright decided to write to the Scottish police. Mrs Gibbs died several days later, in hospital. An only child, Michael Robert Ryan was born on 18 May 1960 in the Savernake hospital, Hungerford. This seemed to fit the profile of Michael Ryan. When PC Wainwright heard it was Michael Ryan from South View, he couldn't put a face to the name. Luckily she hadn't been injured. Peter Sutcliffe was convicted of murdering thirteen women and attacking seven other women. George White was driving Ivor Jackson back from work. Armed with an automatic rifle, a pistol and at least one. Short for his age, Ryan was often teased and bullied but never retaliated and consequently avoided other children. I believe Ryan had probably been fantasising about it on a low level, but the events that day - and his personality type - led to it. Changing his mind, he retrieved it and carried on walking, away from town. Ryan was holding one of his most prized possessions - a Chinese copy of a Kalashnikov semi-automatic rifle. The police had already received a report, from George, of an armed robbery in progress at the petrol station and were en route to her. It was being chased up the road by Michael Ryan. Hungerford. 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