World's Most Evil Killers - Season 3, Episode 10 - Mark Hobson - Full Episode | Forensic Files

-North Yorkshire, England, July the 25th, 2004. After a nationwide manhunt, one of Britain's most wanted killers was arrested two weeks
after he committed the first of four murders. He was spotted shopping at a local garage,
and the owner immediately alerted the police. -When he's approached by the police,
he's arrogant, vain, his ego in full play. He says, "I'm a... murderer, aren't I?"
-Fueled by drugs and alcohol, 34-year-old Mark Hobson had murdered his girlfriend, Claire,
and, six days later, her twin sister, Diane. -She was tortured. She was cut with razors, with scissors.
Those sort of injuries are sometimes the most upsetting because you can imagine what they'd feel like.
-The following day, he killed an elderly couple, James and Joan Britton. -He apparently wasn't able to even recall
murdering the Brittons. -Despite his so-called memory loss, the police were able to prove Hobson was the killer.
-Not only had Hobson treated them, his two victims, like disposable rubbish, he'd also mutilated them.
-Every piece of evidence which linked him to the killing of the two girls and of the Brittons was in place.
-In May 2005, Mark Hobson was deemed so dangerous that his final sentence ensured he would never be free again.
-Nobody had ever been given a whole-life order before when they'd actually confessed and they pled guilty to murder.
-The way he meticulously planned, executed, and then disposed of his victims makes Mark Hobson
one of the world's most evil killers. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ Selby, Yorkshire, July 2004. The senseless murder of four innocent people
in just one week shocked the nation. The man responsible was Mark Richard Hobson.
The first two murders he committed within six days of each other were of his girlfriend, 27-year-old Claire,
and her twin sister, Diane. -What makes Hobson's crimes especially evil is that they come without explanation,
because that's a special form of terrorism all its own, that you cannot know in advance,
not even about your own relatives, whether it's safe to be with them. -After murdering his second victim, Diane,
Hobson went on the run. He made his way to the village of Strensall, some 20 miles north of Selby.
There, he broke into the home of an elderly couple, James -- also known as "Jim" -- and Joan Britton,
and attacked them, leaving them dead. -What makes Mark Hobson one of Britain's most evil killers
is the amount of trauma and misery and devastation that he created over the course of just a few days.
He appeared to be a runaway train, he appeared to be out of control, but he knew exactly what he was doing.
He could've decided at any point to stop, but he chose to continue harming people.
This was completely unnecessary. -The gruesome killing spree sends shock waves across the Yorkshire valley.
Local journalist Mike Laycock has extensively researched Hobson's story. -In Strensall, the biggest thing we had to deal with
was teenagers hanging around on street corners -- suddenly confronted with the fact
that two people in the village, two elderly, frail pensioners had been murdered,
so there's a real sense of shock in a village like Strensall, and the same thing in Selby.
Two young twin sisters have been murdered in a terrible way. -I think it must have been terrifying for those
who lived in the community -- terrifying. -Paul Worsley QC led the prosecution team.
-They didn't know if he would strike again, whether he was holding some grudge to them
and their loves ones. For the Brittons, they were random victims of this man, so there was no rhyme or reason for him to attack them.
-But what caused divorcé and father of three Mark Hobson to embark on such a frenzied killing spree remains unknown.
-When we look at Hobson, at first, his life looks completely normal. He appears to have a normal family.
There doesn't seem to be any indications of abuse nor any indications of trauma from sources
outside of the family. -This killer's story begins in 1969. Mark Richard Hobson was born in Wakefield
and grew up in what appeared to be a happy and stable home with his two sisters.
-He comes from this traditional nuclear family, very much working-class. His dad's a coal miner.
His mum's a machinist. There doesn't appear to be any of that significant trauma or abuse
or neglect that we often see in the backgrounds of killers. -On the surface, Mark Hobson had a perfectly ordinary --
in fact, rather respectable childhood and youth. To all the world and to all his schoolmates and friends,
he was simply Mark -- nice-enough lad, nice-enough young man. -But one incident in his teens was an early warning sign
that evil was brewing inside 16-year-old Hobson. -He left Selby High School, and got a job
in a butcher shop in Gowthorpe, and he was quite shy and quite quiet. But, after about three weeks, he lost his temper
with a colleague at the shop and threatened to stab him with a boning knife, and the colleague was terrified, so he was sacked.
-At the time, Hobson's violent outburst seemed like an isolated incident. Five years later, age 21,
he moved in with his childhood sweetheart. -Mark Hobson is in his early 20s, and they form a family together, so he has two stepchildren,
and he has a daughter of his own, and they appear to be a normal family unit. -In 1994, two years after the birth of their daughter,
the couple married. It should've been a happy and fulfilling time for him. -She was later to refer to Mark as almost a perfect husband --
did everything right, worked hard. He was, at that point, working the Drax power station,
as well as doing some landscape gardening. There was nothing to indicate at all that Mark Hobson
would turn into a killer -- in fact, rather the opposite. He seemed an upright family man --
one child of his own, two stepchildren. -Out of the blue, three and a half years
after they were married, Hobson ended the relationship. -Mark Hobson literally walks out, says,
"I can't do this anymore -- I'm leaving," and literally just ups and goes. Now, there is a brief reconciliation,
but this doesn't last very long because Hobson has changed quite a lot and he's started to drink quite heavily
and she doesn't want him around the children. So, literally, overnight, things have changed.
-Hobson's divorce sparked a swift downward spiral. -Hobson's life did start unraveling.
He hasn't got that structure anymore. I think that that structure and that routine
was something that was quite important to him. He really is off the rails. -He left the power station and went to work as a nightclub
bouncer, doorman, in Selby, in Yorkshire. And, in my mind, it was the move to becoming a nightclub bouncer
that was to send Hobson completely off the rails. For the first time in his life,
he came into contact with industrial quantities of drugs, be it ecstasy, cannabis, cocaine, and he also started,
for the first time in his life, to drink -- and not just to drink a little, but to drink.
-Hobson's drug and alcohol addictions changed him. -He was developing a rather "Jekyll and Hyde" personality.
He could be laughing and joking one moment, and, the next minute, he could be flying into
a terrible temper, a really bad rage. -Alcohol reduces inhibitions. What does that mean?
It's the most dangerous drug in the world to be taken by somebody who has a murderous impulse waiting to bubble up,
because alcohol reaches into the frontal cortex, removes the self-control, and so while alcoholism doesn't make somebody murderous,
it can enable the murderous part of a person's soul to emerge. -In 2002, age 32, Hobson was outside an off-license in Selby
when he lost all control. After a disagreement about a woman, he viciously attacked a former friend
with a knife in front of horrified shoppers. -He attacked somebody who was supposedly one of his friends.
He stabbed this man five times, and it's been said that he was something of a love rival,
but this is a wholly disproportionate reaction to somebody looking at your girlfriend
or muscling in on your territory. -Now, that's not small. That's not mild. It is a wild overreaction,
no matter how they may have fallen out or over what. Nevertheless, it was a very sustained and brutal attack.
-The father of two was left fighting for his life. He was rushed into hospital for emergency surgery.
Incredibly, he survived, and Hobson admitted to wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.
Leeds Crown Court, Yorkshire, February 2003. 33-year-old Mark Hobson pleaded guilty
to unlawfully wounding his old friend. -He'd stabbed a man in the street in Selby called Gowthorpe,
but this man had been left in intensive care. He got a punctured lung. It could easily have been a murder.
-At the time, Hobson was considered a low risk to the public. He avoided a custodial sentence for the violent crime
and was given a community-service order. -To this day, I will not understand how it happened.
He did not receive any kind of a custodial sentence. He was simply given 100 hours of community service.
-This was an opportunity to intervene, to put the brakes on his behavior, and it was one that was completely missed.
And one of the other consequences was that he hasn't been forced to address or tackle his behavior.
-The following year, Hobson seemed to be getting his life back together, and he got a job as a bin man.
In April 2004, he moved into a flat in the village of Camblesforth, approximately five miles from Selby city center,
with his girlfriend, 27-year-old Claire. -And she was somebody who was quite vulnerable.
She'd suffered from anorexia. She had some issues with drinking, with alcohol, and I think he sensed this vulnerability, to be honest.
And if you look back at people's recollections of their relationship, it was an abusive one.
It was a toxic one. -Hobson's addictions quickly resurfaced, inflaming his vicious temper.
-He was seen as quite a violent man in the community, as a bit of a hard man and somebody who would get into alcohol-fueled brawls,
and you'd suspect that there was some poor treatment of Claire. -There was an incident in 2003 where people recalled him
dragging her from one side of the pub to the other by her hair and punching her in the face.
This was an abusive relationship. It was quite visibly violent. -Hobson and his girlfriend's violent public
exchanges continued to escalate, making it difficult for Camblesforth locals to ignore.
-They both drank heavily -- there's no question about that -- and got into a great many fights.
At one point, she was christened "8 Ball" because she was always black and blue and he hit her so regularly,
but, equally, when Hobson went to visit his ex-wife, at one point, he, too, was covered with bite marks.
So this was not exactly a... calm relationship. It was really quite brutal. And no one can say that Hobson wasn't,
by this point, a violent man. -Some believe his violent outbursts towards Claire
were fueled by his obsession with her twin sister, Diane. -He had boasted to a fellow refuse collector
that he'd picked the wrong sister, that he should really have chosen a relationship with Diane
and not with Claire. Perhaps he just got bored with Claire, but the dreadful truth was that Claire was to pay with her life
for Hobson's change of affection. -In 2004, his lust for Diane was uncontrollable.
In June, he left his job and took up casual work. -He'd made himself a to-do list --
"Things I must do to get rid of Claire and to have Diane." At one point, it said, "Buy bin bags and ties
and disinfectant and bleach," all sorts of things he knew he might need if he fulfilled his plan to kill Claire.
And it was, in many ways, a very elaborate plan. -On the 11th of July, 2004, Hobson and Claire
were seen leaving the Comus Inn in Camblesforth. It was the last time that Claire would be seen alive.
When they returned to their flat on Millfield Drive, Mark Hobson put his murderous plan into action.
-He had basically decided that he didn't want her around anymore. He'd developed a fixation with her sister.
She was simply an obstacle that he wanted to get out of the way. -With Claire, he struck her on the head with a hammer 17 times.
That would, at the very least, render her unconscious, probably would've proved to be fatal in any case,
but he also strangled her. -Dr. Stuart Hamilton was a trainee forensic pathologist
who saw the victims' bodies firsthand. -The Hobson case was probably one of the first
relatively high-profile multiple murders that I saw in my career. It does stick with you.
-It was an utterly ruthless killing, no doubt fueled by considerable quantities of alcohol.
-After the brutal killing, Hobson used supplies he'd previously bought to conceal her body.
He dragged Claire up the stairs and wrapped her body in bin bags. -So, it's very much a case of "out of sight, out of mind."
He used some bleach to clean up one of the areas in the flat because I think he might have been bothered by there
being some kind of stain, some kind of smell there, but he stays in the flat with her body.
Her body is decomposing. This is the summer months. This is gonna be most unpleasant,
but he simply doesn't care about that. -The following week, Claire's decomposing body
remained in the flat while Hobson moved on with the second phase of his plan -- Diane.
-Diane was Claire's twin sister, and Hobson had developed a bit of a fixation with her.
He'd actually said to a work colleague, "I'm going to have her." Now, that phrase is very revealing for me.
That shows, for me, that Hobson is somebody who looks at women as things to be owned, things to be possessed,
not human beings with rights and feelings. He's quite misogynistic, and he's got himself
set on this idea that he's gonna have Diane. -Hobson contacted Diane and concocted a story
to get her to his flat. -The attack on Claire almost pales into insignificance behind the attack on her twin sister, Diane.
A week after he has dispatched Claire and leaving her to decompose in the bedroom of their flat,
he telephones Diane at her home and says that her sister -- her twin, Claire -- would very much like to see her
and she's been ill with glandular fever. It was of course a pretense, no more than a bait
to get the object of his intentions into his hands. -Diane told her parents she was going to visit Claire
and then planned to meet her boyfriend in the pub. She was last seen leaving her home that evening
and made the journey to her sister's. -She couldn't have predicted, is that she fell into the hands
of the man who'd already murdered her twin sister. Now, there's no doubt whatever that the objective here
was an entirely sexual one. There'd been no sexual attack on Claire, but there was a very distinct sexual motive
in Diane's killing, and the details of it almost defy description. -Once she set foot in the flat, her fate was sealed.
Hobson forced his will on Diane in the most terrifying way. -She was tortured. She was cut with razors, with scissors.
Those sort of injuries are sometimes the most upsetting because you can imagine what they'd feel like.
A fatal stab wound to the heart, most people can't imagine how that would feel. To be cut on the arm with a razor,
you can empathize with what that would feel like. -She must've been absolutely terrified,
you know, really fearful of what was going on, and doing everything she possibly
could to try and save her own life. But he wanted to own her. He wanted to possess her.
He had her in that flat, and he was going to do whatever he wanted with her. -But Hobson wasn't satisfied
with just fulfilling his sadistic sexual desires. -So, while Claire was murdered,
Diane is tortured and assaulted and murdered. It seems almost like she's more the focus
of what he wanted to do. Claire just needed to be taken out of the picture. -I think that the attack on Diane
was so much more aggressive because this was Hobson's target. This was what he wanted.
He probably fantasized, he probably ruminated over this for quite a considerable period of time.
Claire was simply the obstacle to get out of the way, and I think he saw Diane as the prize.
-Eventually, Hobson beat Diane with the same hammer that he used to murder her sister, Claire.
He then strangled and suffocated her. -The thing about these sort of assaults is that they are physically difficult to do.
It is not a quick, sudden, spur-of-the-moment thing. It takes effort. Even if someone was simply angry,
there's time there to realize what you're doing and to stop, but Hobson carried on.
-They were treated appallingly, and that kind of brutality, that kind of callousness,
that kind of depravity leaves me speechless. -Hobson continued to stay in the flat
where Claire's body had been left. -The smell of decomposition is incredibly distinctive.
It is very strong. It's not the sort of thing that you could easily cover just with an air freshener or some simple method.
The smell would grow over time as the body decomposes, and it will often leak out of houses.
It can be smelled in the street. It is biologically designed for you to realize that something is not safe to be around.
-None of this seemed to faze Hobson. But he made a big mistake. The night he murdered Diane,
she was due to meet her boyfriend in a nearby pub. -Diane's boyfriend, by this time,
is concerned that she hasn't appeared, so he rings her mobile phone. Hobson answers.
"Where's Diane?" "Oh, oh, she and Claire have gone 'round to their father's because he's had a heart attack."
Absolute, complete invention, but clever. Hobson doesn't stop there. He says, "But I must come and talk to you."
So Hobson, leaving the bodies of the two sisters in the flat, goes to the pub and meets Diane's boyfriend,
and they proceed to get drunk together. -And Hobson then invites him back to the flat.
Now, this, for me, is a really, really significant moment in this case because I think
Hobson's actually quite enjoying this. He knows what's going on. He knows exactly where Claire and Diane are.
They are in that flat. -Now, I can only imagine the boyfriend, by this point, was pretty drunk. No matter.
He agrees, goes back to the flat with Hobson. -When Diane's boyfriend entered Hobson's flat,
he was met with an overwhelming stench of decomposing bodies. -He actually comments on the smell.
He says, "There's a really nasty smell in here." And Hobson said, "Oh, that's the drains.
They've been playing up for a while. -Hobson tries to persuade the boyfriend to spend the night on the sofa.
"Oh, don't bother to go home. No, it's late. It's nearly 1:00." Lies down on the sofa, only to discover blood.
He gets off the sofa and says to Hobson, "What's this?" "Oh," Hobson says -- nothing if not a quick liar --
"Oh, Claire had a few women's problems. It's nothing to worry about." -Diane's boyfriend made his excuses
and left the flat to head home. -I think the fact that Hobson invited the boyfriend
back to the flat is incredibly revealing. There was absolutely no purpose for doing that,
other than feeling very powerful, feeling very important, feeling incredibly in control and proud of what he'd done.
-Had he not gone home, I'm sure the boyfriend would have paid with his life that night.
But the fact he did go home saved his life. -In the early hours of the following morning,
fearing that Diane's boyfriend was onto him, Hobson decided to leave Camblesforth
with just the clothes he was wearing and a kitchen knife. -After the boyfriend's gone home and in the depths of night,
Hobson persuades his mother to drive him to York, to the hospital. He tells her that the twins have been in a car accident
and that they are in York Hospital -- another complete fabrication. -Now, during this car journey,
he looks quite agitated, he looks quite concerned, but his mom takes him and leaves him at the hospital.
-On July the 18th, CCTV cameras at the hospital in York captured Hobson at approximately 2:40 a.m.
Later that morning, Diane's boyfriend awoke, concerned that he still hadn't heard from his girlfriend
about her father's heart attack the night before. He decided to pay her a visit at her parents' house.
When he arrived, Diane's father answered the door. The two quickly realized the twins were missing
and headed straight to Hobson's flat. -At about 8:00 in the morning of Sunday, the 18th of July,
one week after Claire has been killed, Diane's boyfriend and the twins' father arrive at the flat.
To have seen that not only had Hobson treated them, his two victims, like disposable rubbish,
he'd also mutilated them... -Hobson had left their bodies there in the flat, so not only had he murdered them --
then he just fled the scene afterwards with absolutely no regard to the impact of that event
on the people who were closest to his victims. -As the police were called to Hobson's flat,
he struck again in the village of Strensall, approximately 20 miles away. -Perhaps he was on some kind of spree at this point --
you know, "Now I've done it, I can get away with it, and, what's more, I'm gonna do it again --"
a kind of version of a spree killer but not with a sniper rifle or a gun, but a man who likes to kill
close up and personal with a knife. -On the run and in desperate need of food and shelter,
Hobson had broken into a home in the village. -He chooses a particularly frail, elderly couple called James and Joan Britton.
James is a former Spitfire pilot from the Second World War. James has got some form of Parkinson's and is very deaf.
Joan, unfortunately, can't really walk very well and is pretty blind. -Hobson brutally attacked the Brittons
and viciously stabbed them both to death. -Knives are designed to cut through objects,
and so they are quite effective tools if you wish to injure another person. But in Joan Britton's case, she was stabbed with such force
that the tip of the knife stuck in bone and broke off. That is way in excess of the force
that you'd need to use simply to stab somebody. It is at the severe end of what we see.
-The police were called by neighbors who discovered the bodies of the Brittons shortly after the murders had been committed.
When officers arrived, they were met with a shocking sight. They found the body of Jim Britton
laying in the sitting room and that of Joan Britton in the hallway. -There is definitely a sense in which Hobson
was preying on the vulnerable when he killed the Brittons, so Mr. Britton was elderly, was infirm,
and he beat him with his own walking stick several times -- many more times than he needed to do
to get somebody out of the way so he could escape from the house. He didn't need to kill this man.
He stabbed him. This was something that was really, really unnecessary. -In Selby, Yorkshire, the police had launched
a manhunt to find the killer of the twins, Claire and Diane, unaware he'd already killed again.
-The police obviously were looking for Hobson after the boyfriend of Diane alerted them to the fact that he
and, indeed, Diane and Claire's father had gone 'round and found the bodies. So then there was a manhunt for Hobson.
He was the obvious suspect. The list there, the items that the bought, the fact that it was in his flat,
and that he disappeared all inevitably pointed to him. -That evening, police release the story to the local paper,
the Evening Press. -Quite early on, from the moment of the day after the murders,
the police were already revealing that they had a suspect in mind, and they said it was Mark Hobson.
They named him initially as the suspect and the person they wanted to speak to in connection
with the murders of Diane and Claire. -In seven days, Hobson had savagely murdered four people --
Claire Sanderson, Diane Sanderson, Jim Britton, and Joan Britton, but, at this point, the police forces had not connected the murders.
-At that stage, they weren't sure the murders of Joan and James Britton was committed by the same person,
although there were strong reasons to believe that it was. It would be extraordinary if it wasn't,
but they couldn't be sure at first. -With Hobson still on the run, North Yorkshire
police released an image of him to the press. -So, quite early on, descriptions are issued,
photographs are issued. The police are really keen to get the message out there --
this is the person they wanted to find. They wanted the picture out there, the image of Mark Hobson out there
so that anybody, a member of the public, who saw him would be able to come forward
and tell the police where he was. -News of the killings quickly grip the country,
and alleged sightings of Hobson started to appear in Strensall, where the murders of the Brittons had taken place.
-As the week went on, evidence emerged that did tie in the two sets of murders, and it became clear
there was one person they were looking for, and that was Mark Hobson. -The fact he was in his flat and that he disappeared
all inevitably pointed to him. And then, when there was an unexplained killing for what appeared to be no reason at all 25 miles away,
then the police put two and two together and said, "We've got one man who is a out on a rampage --
and a very dangerous man indeed." -But four days after killing the Brittons, Hobson was still on the loose.
Police attempted to get Hobson to come forward by broadcasting a recording of his mother,
asking him to give himself up. But with still no sign of the murderer, fear continued to spread amongst the Yorkshire locals.
-For a whole week, there was a strange, surreal sense -- particularly in Strensall and Camblesforth,
but also in the whole of the York area -- that this man was on the run, possibly still in the area, living rough,
and people were concerned that they could be next. -Yorkshire, July the 25th, 2004.
A manhunt was underway to catch serial killer Mark Hobson, who savagely murdered four people in one week.
-He knows that it's all gonna unravel, and he's really, really trying to pull something together
and make sure that he gets away with it. -Hobson had been on the run for a whole week,
and the police mounted an extraordinarily large operation to try and find him. There were daily press conferences
on television screens around the country and, I think, around the world. Police said, "Do not, under any circumstances,
approach this man. He is dangerous. Call us if you see him." -Hobson had successfully evaded capture for a week
and was believed to be in the North Yorkshire area. Locals were alarmed as further details
were revealed about the brutal killings. -This is North Yorkshire. This is not the mean city streets.
This is not the kind of place where this happens. Hobson wasn't even an outsider.
He was actually from this community. He came from the Yorkshire area, so this was one of their own,
and I think that that makes it even more traumatic. -The community in York and surrounding areas
was obviously terrified. Here was a man who had already killed two people twice and clearly was capable of killing at will
and for no particular reason. The desperation of the community for there to be an arrest
and for this man to be stopped was extreme. -And their fears were justified, as it became clear that Hobson planned to kill again.
-He actually had a list of people that he was intending to kill. He had a list of items that he would need
to actually carry out those murders. -The police found, at his home address, a list with the name of other people
who appeared to be potential victims -- the parents of Diane and Claire and indeed the parents of his ex-wife.
-This was somebody who was not snapping, who was not out of control. This was very well thought through.
-After seven days on the run, Hobson eventually came out of hiding in the village of Shipton-by-Beningbrough,
approximately 6 miles from York. -One week after the bodies of Claire and Diane are discovered, the bodies of Jim and Joan Britton
are discovered -- one week later that he is finally spotted in a garage not far away from York.
-34-year-old Hobson didn't realize, but he'd been recognized. -Hobson was finally tracked down
when he went into a petrol station to buy a few items, and the attendant in there recognized him from a photo
that had been made public in a police appeal. -So, within 20 minutes, huge number of police officers
descended on the scene -- armed police officers -- knowing that he was somewhere in the vicinity,
and the manhunt really intensified, and he was found not long afterwards. -On the 25th of July, 2004, in Shipton-by-Beningbrough,
Mark Hobson, Britain's most wanted man, was arrested. His hideout was discovered just 8 feet from the main road
in the area, the A19. Hobson was found burrowed in a gap between a thornbush and a septic tank, behind an upholstery shop.
-And he was clearly in a disheveled state. He looked very tired, and he was quite recognizably the person
that had been on the "wanted" posters that had been around for the previous week.
-Once caught, Hobson showed no remorse for what he'd done. -When Hobson was arrested, he tells the officers,
"Well, I'm a [bleep] murderer, aren't I?" And I think this is really, really interesting
because he knows exactly what he's done. This isn't somebody who is denying responsibility.
He's fessing up straightaway. -Finally in custody, Hobson's reign of terror was over.
When questioned about the four murders, he denied any knowledge of killing the Brittons.
-Well, Hobson claimed that he lost a day and a half when he murdered the Brittons, the elderly couple.
Hobson claims that he was drunk when he committed these murders. He essentially blamed them on alcohol.
-There's no doubt in my mind whatever that, if Hobson had not been caught on that Sunday,
he'd have killed again and probably several more times -- one of those killers who, once the psychotic break had come,
would only be stopped when someone stopped him. And that someone, of course, was the police.
-On April the 18th, 2005, Mark Hobson stood trial at Leeds Crown Court, charged with four counts of murder for killing
Claire and Diane and Jim and Joan Britton. -Nine months or so after the four murders,
he pleads guilty to all four murders. Mercifully, for the families of the victims --
the twins' parents and the Brittons' daughter -- Hobson didn't submit them to the full detail
of exactly what had happened to their loved ones. -Paul Worsley was the prosecutor leading the case against Hobson.
-The case was very carefully prepared, as you would expect and hope, by North Yorkshire police.
There was, when the trial came to take place, nowhere for Hobson to turn. Every avenue of defense had been blocked.
Every piece of evidence which linked him to the killing of the two girls and of the Brittons was in place there.
-Due to the horrific nature of the crimes, a psychiatric report was conducted. -Hobson was examined by a psychiatrist,
obviously to try and find some reason, some explanation for this appalling saga of killing
for which he was responsible, but, very surprisingly, none was found. And therefore he was someone who was fully responsible
for the killing of those four people. -All the evidence conclusively pointed to Hobson
knowingly committing the murders. -I believe that Hobson admitted to all of the murders
because he was advised, "If you confess at the first opportunity, you're perhaps likely to receive a lighter sentence for that."
So I think there's this self-interest going on here. He didn't suddenly develop a conscience overnight.
He was trying to secure the best outcome for himself. -But the judge, Mr. Justice Grigson,
could not see any reason to offer any leniency and stated to Hobson in open court,
"The enormity of what you've done is beyond words. The damage you've done is incalculable.
You not only destroyed the lives of your victims, but you devastated the lives of those who love them."
-The judge now asks for guidance on sentencing, to know what the parameters of sentencing could be,
and this experienced judge well knew what they were likely to be. In respect of each of the murders,
Hobson did receive a sentence of life imprisonment to run concurrently in respect of all four murders.
-On the 27th of May, 2005, at Leeds Crown Court, Mr. Justice Grigson sentenced Mark Hobson
to a whole-life order, ensuring that life meant life. -Now, this set a complete legal precedent,
because nobody had ever been given a whole-life order before when they'd actually confessed
and they pled guilty to the murder. -Mrs. Sanderson, the mother, was there, as was the father.
On hearing the sentence -- and I'm sure it was one with which they agreed, because that's the heaviest sentence any court
in this jurisdiction can impose -- became very upset and told him to rot in hell.
-But a few months after entering prison, Hobson's violent temper struck again, this time at Soham murderer Ian Huntley.
-When he was in prison, Hobson attacked Ian Huntley, the murderer of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in Soham.
He actually poured boiling water over Ian Huntley. Now, this wasn't done to avenge the harm
that Huntley had done to his victims or his families. This was very much done to protect
Hobson's own status within prison. -You have to look back at the big picture. Here's a guy who we know primarily about him
through his two bizarre homicides, the twin sisters, but we know that violence lurks.
The interesting thing is his violence is not limited to that context. We know, from the killing of the older couple,
that, when it's instrumentally necessary, he'll kill, but we know something else -- he can be very violent.
He stabbed somebody in a public place through the lung, and he viciously physically assaulted somebody in jail.
So this is a person who has intense aggressive impulses being held in check at all time.
-Despite pleading guilty and spending the rest of his life in Wakefield Prison, Hobson's motivation for committing the murders
remains a mystery. There was no reason known to the police for Hobson to do as he did.
He took not just one but four lives for no reason, no motive, no medical condition that had caused him
to behave in this bizarre and appalling way. -We all fancy ourselves being able to see the potential
for evil or for tragedy by looking at somebody's life and seeing some indications of that possibility.
What the Hobson case says, frighteningly, is that maybe anyone can be a killer. -In just seven days, he brutally killed four people.
The callous killing of his girlfriend, Claire, the savage sexual assault and murder of her sister, Diane,
and the violent deaths of elderly couple Jim and Joan Britton makes Mark Hobson one of the world's
most evil killers. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪

Mark Hobson killed four people in North Yorkshire, England in July 2004. Hobson committed his first two murders within six days of each other. He is currently serving a whole life sentence.

An in-depth look at the lives and crimes of some of the world's most evil killers, including Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, Richard Ramirez, Cary Stayner, Leonard Lake, Dorothea Puente and more.

Brief Summary

Mark Hobson murdered four people in a week, shocking North Yorkshire with his brutal killings and lack of remorse.

Key points

Mark Hobson's Arrest. One of Britain's most wanted killers was arrested after a nationwide manhunt.
The Brutality of Hobson's Crimes. Mark Hobson committed four murders in just one week, shocking the nation.
The Evil Within. Hobson's seemingly normal life hid a dark and violent side that led to murder.
The Downward Spiral. Hobson's life unraveled after his divorce, leading to violent outbursts and addiction.
The Attack on Diane. Hobson's fixation on Diane led to her brutal murder after he killed Claire.
The Brutality of the Murders. Hobson's violent attacks on the Brittons reveal his predatory nature.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

This was completely unnecessary.

Commentary on Hobson's choice to continue harming people.

3:45WatchJul 29, 2021

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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