'I don't like humans' admits Crossbow Cannibal who murdered and dismembered three prostitutes... but did he kill more women?

• Killer used knives and a power tool to cut up bodies in bath.
  Police believe murder spree may have been prompted by his PhD on killers.
• • 'I've killed loads' claim leads detectives to open old files.
  • Judge hands 'evil' Griffiths a whole life term for his crimes.
  • Mother pleads with killer to reveal where her daughter's body is.
  • Killer told police: 'I don't have much time for the human race.'
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  Guilty: Stephen Griffiths, the 'Crossbow Cannibal', today pleaded guilty to killing three prostitutesA criminology student who dubbed himself the 'Crossbow Cannibal' and bragged to police about eating human flesh was today jailed for life for his 'wicked and monstrous' crimes.
  
  
  Stephen Griffiths, 40, who was obsessed with serial killers, murdered Suzanne Blamires, Shelley Armitage and Susan Rushworth, who all worked in the red light district near his home in Bradford, West Yorkshire.
  
  
  Griffiths, who pleaded guilty to the murders at Leeds Crown Court today, was caught when a caretaker at the flats where he lived saw horrific CCTV footage of Ms Blamires's final moments.
  
  
  When he was arrested Griffiths told police 'I've killed loads' and claimed he had eaten some of Ms Blamires's flesh, adding: 'That's part of the magic.'
  He added: 'I'm misanthropic, I don't have much time for the human race.'
  
  
  Griffiths stood in the dock to enter his pleas surrounded by five security guards. Dressed in a grey tracksuit, he said 'yes' when asked to confirm his name.
  
  
  He said 'guilty' in a quiet voice when the clerk put each of the three murder charges to him.
  
  
  Judge Mr Justice Openshaw, told the court the defendant's mental health had been carefully examined and there was 'no question that he was fit to plead'.
  The court heard gruesome details of the killings including the shocking revelation that 81 different pieces of Ms Blamires were found in or by the River Aire in Shipley.
  
  
  A broken knife and a crossbow bolt were embedded in her severed head. The prosecutor said the head had had its skin removed.
  The furniture and the walls in Griffiths' flat were splattered with the victims' blood and he claimed to have eaten raw parts of flesh of Ms Blamires.
  
  
  The magnitude of Stephen Griffiths's confessed crimes will inevitably open a floodgate of analysis into what drove him to such barbarity and whether he killed anyone else.
  
  
  

  Murdered: Susan Rushworth, Suzanne Blamires and Shelley Armitage worked in Bradford's red light district
  

  Horrific weapons: Two crossbows belonging to cannibal killer Stephen Griffiths were recovered by police

  
  
  Miss Blamires mother Nicky condemned the triple killer's actions, saying: 'Stephen Griffiths is a coward and we are shocked he pleaded guilty as it is not something I thought he would have the courage to do.'
  
  
  Christine Thompson, Susan Rushworth's mother, issued an emotional appeal to Griffiths to tell them what he has done with her daughter's body so she can finally be laid to rest.
  
  
  She said: 'As a family, we have not been able to put our daughter to rest because she has not been found, so we want to appeal to this man to tell us what he has done with Susan.'
  
  
  Gill Armitage, Shelley Armitage's mother, said: 'She took the wrong path at the young age of 16 years old when she became a victim of heroin. Her death will haunt us for the rest of our lives."
  
  
  Griffiths has a violent past and has a history of poor mental health. He spent time in Rampton high security hospital in Nottinghamshire in the early 1990s.
  

  

  Caught: The moment Griffiths arrived at the police station following his arrest and under interview by detectives
  

  In the dock: Griffiths, drawn by an artist while appearing in court in May, admitted the killings

  
  
  As a 17-year-old he was arrested for shoplifting in a supermarket but as he was detained he slashed a security guard's throat with a knife.
  He was jailed for three years.
  
  
  In 1989 he was prosecuted for possession of an air pistol but was not jailed. He was ordered to do 100 hours' community service as he had fallen foul of the previous conviction.
  
  

  JUDGE ALLOWS COURT TWEETS

  The judge in the case of triple-killer Stephen Griffiths today allowed reporters to use Twitter from the courtroom.

  It is thought to be the first time a judge has allowed this in practice since the Lord Chief Justice issued a direction on the subject yesterday.

  As the case in Leeds Crown Court began Mr Justice Openshaw made an order after he was asked by the press about 'tweeting' from court.

  In a written direction he said that, subject to normal rules banning photos and sound recording: 'The use of live, text-based communications by way of unobtrusive, hand held and virtually noiseless equipment to enable the press to produce fair and accurate reports of the proceedings is permitted, provided that their use does not disturb, disrupt or interfere with the orderly conduct of the proceedings.'

  The Lord Chief Justice issued an Interim Practice Direction yesterday following the appearance of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange before magistrates in London last week.
  In 1991 he received a 24-month sentence at Leeds Crown Court for affray and possession of an offensive weapon.
  
  
  His girlfriends said he was violent and abused them but were too terrified to testify against him and no charges were brought.
  
  
  Police sources believe his killing spree could have been triggered by his studies. It is claimed Griffiths's PhD research into serial killers caused him to 'flip' and seek out prostitutes.
  
  
  His method of killing was so gruesome it could have come from a horror movie, using knives and a power tool to cut up the bodies in the bath of his flat.
  
  
  He made attempts to clean up but blood spots were left in his flat and detectives were able to make a match.
  
  
  Griffiths also claims to have eaten some of the flesh of his victims. He told police he cooked pieces of flesh and also ate some raw. Police said it is virtually impossible to verify his claims.
  
  
  Detectives have not ruled out that Griffiths may have killed more women and are looking for any evidence which links him to other unsolved murders or missing persons. So far they have found no evidence of this.
  
  
  Prosecuting, Robert Smith QC, said a caretaker lived at the flat building where Griffiths lived.
  
  
  It was his job to review footage taken from CCTV cameras at the flats each morning.
  
  
  On May 24, he reviewed the footage at 8.30am. The court was told he reviewed footage from camera 14.
  
  
  The footage showed Ms Blamires running out of Griffiths's flat, followed by the defendant, the court heard.
  
  
  She was later seen being dragged on the floor by her leg by Griffiths, Mr Smith said.
  

  Police carried out a huge search of the area surrounding Griffiths's flat after the discovery of body parts 

  
  
  Griffiths was seen to have something in his hand, the prosecutor added.
  The court was told the woman was shot with a crossbow before Griffiths 'gestured' by holding a finger up to the CCTV camera.
  
  
  Mr Smith told the court how Griffiths told arresting officers: 'I'm Osama bin Laden.'
  
  
  The prosecutor said once in a police station he told officers: 'I've killed a lot more than Suzanne Blamires - I've killed loads.
  
  
  'Peter Sutcliffe came a cropper in Sheffield. So did I but at least I got out of the city.'
  
  
  The court heard he told police he put a poisonous substance in a shop and said he called himself 'Ven Pariah'.
  
  
  Mr Smith said Griffiths told police Suzanne Blamires - who he knew as 'Amber' - was 'gone'.
  
  
  He said he told officers he had 'eaten some of her' adding: 'That's part of the magic.'
  
  
  Mr Smith said Griffiths told the interviewing officers he was 'only going to talk about five Bradford cases'.
  
  
  

  

  Face of evil: Griffiths pictured left at fee-paying Queen Elizabeth Grammar school, in Wakefield, and a snap from his MySpace web page thought to be taken when he was in his 20s

  
  
  Family members sobbed as the prosecutor revealed gruesome details of the murders.
  
  
  At one point a woman yelled out 'You f****** c***' as the details were revealed.
  
  
  Mr Smith said Griffiths had admitted to killing Ms Blamires in the flat and dismembering her by hand, while power tools had been used on the other victims.
  
  
  'It was just a slaughterhouse in the bathtub,' he told officers.
  
  
  He told police he was studying for a PhD in homicide and he had 'cut himself off from society' and a 'civil war' was going on in his head.
  
  
  
  

  VICTIMS WERE EASY TARGETS FOR 'EVIL' GRIFFITHS

  Stephen Griffiths's victims worked the streets of Bradford's red light district a short distance from his flat.
  

  Suzanne Blamires, Shelley Armitage and Susan Rushworth were familiar figures in the network of run-down streets off Sunbridge Road, a two-minute walk from the city centre.
  

  Working the streets and being addicted to drugs made the women easy targets for the crazed so-called Crossbow Cannibal. 

  Parts of Miss Blamires's body were discovered in May in the River Aire at Shipley, about five miles north of Griffiths's Thornton Road flat.

  

  Suzanne Blamires, 36

  

  Shelley Armitage, 31

  

  Susan Rushworth, 44

  In the days which followed, more of Miss Blamires was found in the water along with a small part of Miss Armitage's body.
  

  No trace of Miss Rushworth has yet been found.
  

  Miss Blamires was 36-years-old. Her mother Nicky Blamires, 55, said her daughter went to college and had been training to be a nurse.
  

  But Mrs Blamires said: "Unfortunately my daughter went down the wrong path and she did not have the life she was meant to have.
  

  "She was a much-loved daughter, sister and niece and what has happened to her will haunt me to the day I die.
  

  "Suzanne was a bright, articulate girl who went to college and was training to be a nurse."
  

  She added: "Even though she ended up on the wrong path, she tried to protect her family and kept herself to herself so people knew very little about her.'

  Miss Blamires lived on Barkston Walk, in the Allerton area of Bradford.
  

  She had only gone missing four days before her body parts were found.
  

  Ms Armitage, 31, lived a short distance away and it is understood the two women knew each other.
  

  She was described as a "much-loved daughter and sister" and a "bubbly, lovely" person.
  

  Friends spoke of her "big smile" and her "big heart".
  

  The horror of her death and the cruel fact that only part of her body has been recovered was emphasised at her funeral in August when her brother Carl carried a 2ft 6in coffin into the church carrying her remains.
  

  Ms Armitage disappeared at some point between the late evening of Monday. April 26 and the early morning of the next day, in Rebecca Street, in Bradford city centre.

  Most people who worked in that area said they remembered her because of her engaging personality.
  

  Everyone who knew Ms Armitage said she only got involved in prostitution because of her drug addiction and was always talking about leaving, about becoming a model.
  

  Emile, a volunteer who worked with prostitutes in the area, said: "She was bubbly, lovely, a really nice person.'

  Miss Rushworth was the first of the three sex workers to disappear.
  

  She was a grandmother who had been battling heroin addiction.
  

  The 43-year-old was last seen on June 22 last year near to her flat in the Manningham area of Bradford.
  

  Ms Rushworth - known as Sue or Susie - suffered from epilepsy and had been getting help for her heroin addiction when she disappeared.
  

  Her mother Christine Thompson said: "She was my best friend and like a sister to me."
  

  Mrs Thompson said she had tried to help her daughter beat heroin and had paid £3,000 for rehab for her.
  

  Miss Rushworth also had two other children, Kirsty, 20, and nine-year-old Aaron.
  
  
  

  THE CROSSBOW CANNIBAL: A PhD STUDENT IN MURDER

  Stephen Griffiths was a loner who was obsessed with mass murderers.

  The 40-year-old perpetual student sealed his place in the macabre history of killers when he appeared in court for the first time and was asked to give his name.

  His chilling 'crossbow cannibal' reply referred to CCTV footage now in West Yorkshire Police's possession which showed his last victim, Suzanne Blamires, being shot in the head with a crossbow.

  In the footage, from a camera in the corridor at Griffiths's block of flats, Miss Blamires is dragged away and a man later emerges carrying bin bags.

  

  MySpace: The killer listed his mood on the website as 'evil' and quoted the Book of Ezekiel

  The name he gave himself is also thought to be a reference to reports he may have tried to eat the flesh of some of his victims after chopping them up.

  His behaviour when he made his first court appearance shocked onlookers.

  But it also supported descriptions of Griffiths by those who knew him.

  He had spent six years working on a postgraduate thesis about serial killers and murderers.

  On the web, Griffiths set up the pseudonym Ven Pariah and posted page upon page of pictures and words about notorious mass murderers, terrorists and even Nazi war criminals.

  Police closed down his MySpace site but the university researcher left a trail of pictures, messages and other information.

  Griffiths styled himself as the 'misanthrope who brought hate into heaven' and last accessed his pages on April 23 - a month before he was arrested.

  Listing his mood as 'evil', he quoted the Book of Ezekiel: 'The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides.'

  The same line was used in an execution scene in Quentin Tarantino's film Pulp Fiction.

  His Amazon wishlist included 25 books and DVDs, the majority about real-life crime and serial killers. They included box sets titled Notorious Killers, Serial Killers, Mass Murderers and Britain's Bloodiest Serial Killers.

  Griffiths posted this message on his profile: 'Humanity is not merely a biological condition. It is also a state of mind. On that basis I am a pseudo human at best. A demon at worst.'

  He also posted the message: 'Ven Pariah has finally emerged into the world. What will this pseudo human do. One wonders?'

  Griffiths was in born on Christmas Eve 1969 in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, to frozen food salesman Stephen Griffiths and his wife, Moira. He has a younger brother and sister.

  The family lived in the Thornhill area of Dewsbury but he moved to nearby Wakefield when his mother and father split up when he was young.

  He lived on a Wakefield council estate but secured a place at the respected Queen Elizabeth Grammar School - a private school in Wakefield which now demands day fees around the £9,000-a-year mark.

  John Haigh - who was known as the Acid Bath Murderer and who was hanged in 1949 - was also a pupil at the school.
  
  
  
  
  
  Fuente: dailymail.co.uk