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The Crimes

Crime Files

The Crimes

Between 1956 and 1958 Peter Manuel submitted his victims to an orgy of violence, making him Scotland's most notorious serial killer. The first of Manuel’s victims was 17-year-old Anne Kneilands. On 2nd January 1956, under the cover of darkness, Manuel stalked the teenager across a golf course in East Kilbride, near to where he was working for the gas board.

He raped Anne, and attacked her with an iron bar. Police reported that his victim was the subject of a ferocious sexual attack and had been horribly beaten about the head. Because he was a known sex offender, Lanarkshire police questioned Manuel about Anne’s murder. His father, Samuel, said Peter was with him at the time the crime was committed. Faced with this alibi and no other evidence, the case against Manuel was dropped and he was left free to kill again.

On 17th September 1956, he broke into the home of Marion Watt and her daughter Vivienne, in the middle-class Glasgow district of High Burnside. Margaret’s sister Marion was also staying for a visit. Manuel shot the three women in their beds and sexually assaulted the 16-year-old Vivienne. For a while suspicion fell on Marion’s husband, William, who was away on a fishing trip at the time of the killings. Police arrested William Watts, a successful local businessman, and charged him with the murder of his own family. He spent two months in jail before the case was dropped through lack of evidence.

Meanwhile, Manuel was locked up at Barlinnie Prison after being convicted of breaking into another house. Manuel resumed his killing spree when he was released from prison at the end of November 1957.

His fifth victim was believed to be Northumbrian taxi driver Sydney Dunn who was shot on 8th December 1957. Piecing together information concerning Manuel’s movements after his execution, police determined that he was on a job hunt in the North East at the time of Dunn’s murder. Although this evidence is not conclusive, it links him to the killing.

Isabelle Cooke was the next to die. The teenager was on her way to a dance and had arranged to meet up with her boyfriend, Douglas Brydon, at a bus stop near her Glasgow home. But she never arrived. Police mounted a hunt, but only found pieces of Isabelle’s clothing which suggested she may have been attacked. Isabelle’s body was not discovered until after Manuel was arrested for his other crimes. He confessed to her murder and led police to the remote spot where he had disposed of her body. She had been strangled with her own underwear.

Early on the morning of New Year’s Day 1958, Manuel broke into the home of the Smart family, in Uddingston, a suburb of Glasgow. Mr and Mrs Smart and their 11-year-old son Michael were all asleep in their beds when Manuel shot them in the head. Having committed the murders, Manuel spent some time in the Smart’s home, going back over several days, feeding their cat and eating the family’s food. The murders of the Smart family proved the beginning of the end for Manuel.