Shipman 'responsible for 215 deaths'

Family GP Harold Shipman murdered 215 of his patients, the judge heading the official inquiry into his crimes said today.

Dame Janet Smith also said there was a "real suspicion" that the doctor, from Hyde, Greater Manchester, could have claimed another 45 victims during a killing spree which went unchecked for 23 years.

Her shocking conclusion confirms Shipman as one of the world's deadliest serial killers.

Dame Janet's first report into Shipman's killings said that he began murdering patients in 1975, just a year after entering practice in Todmorden, West Yorkshire.

The report said that systems which should have safeguarded patients against misconduct failed and that it was "deeply disturbing" his killings did not arouse suspicion for so many years.

Dame Janet, a High Court judge, who has been hearing evidence since June last year at Manchester Town Hall, delivered decisions in 494 cases.

She decided that the first of Shipman's victims was Mrs Eva Lyons, who he murdered in March 1975 while at the Abraham Ormerod Medical Practice in Todmorden.

Another 71 patients were killed during Shipman's time at the Donneybrook House group practice in Hyde, and the remaining 143 were murdered at the one–man practice he set up in Market Street, Hyde, in 1992.

Of his victims, 171 were women and 44 were men, with the oldest being 93–year–old Ann Cooper and the youngest 41–year–old Peter Lewis.

The judge said in her six–volume, 2,000 page report: "There are 45 deaths for which I have found that a real suspicion arises that Shipman may have been responsible, although the evidence is not sufficiently clear for me to reach a positive conclusion that he was.

"In addition, there are a further 38 deaths in respect of which there was so little evidence, or evidence of such poor quality, that I was unable to form any view at all."

The inquiry examined a total of 888 cases. Dame Janet said there was "compelling evidence" in 394 of them that Shipman was not responsible for the death.

Dame Janet said in the report: "No–one reading this report can fail to be shocked by the enormity of the crimes committed by Shipman and to feel, as I do, the deepest sympathy for his victims and their families.

"His activities have brought tragedy upon them and also upon the communities in which he practised and which gave him their trust."

She said the inquiry would now go on to direct its efforts to devising improved systems "so as to ensure such a terrible betrayal of trust by a family doctor can never happen again".

Shipman is to be sent a copy of the report in Frankland jail, County Durham, where he is serving life for the murders of 15 patients.

Dame Janet's analysis of Shipman's killings revealed that in his single–handed practice he claimed one victim in 1992, 16 in 1993 and 11 in 1994.

In 1995 and 1996 he killed 30 patients in each year, and 37 in 1997. During the first three months of 1998 he killed 15 patients, after which there was an interval of seven weeks, before he went on to murder three more patients before his arrest in September.

Dame Janet's list of 215 patients who were unlawfully killed include the 15 women he was convicted of murdering at Preston Crown Court in January, 2000, and a further 27 on whom inquests were later held.

Dame Janet said that the majority of deaths were followed by cremation. Procedures that required a second doctor to sign the certificate and a third doctor employed by the crematorium to check were intended to safeguard the public.

But even with those in place Shipman was able to kill 215 people without detection.

"In reality, the procedures provided no safeguard at all," said the report.

Shipman had also managed to avoid referring deaths to the coroner that should have been referred, in all but very few cases.

He had been convicted of drugs offences in 1975 and had declared his intention never to carry controlled drugs again. Yet he was able to obtain large quantities.

In 1996 he had obtained, in the name of a dying patient on a single occasion, enough diamorphine to kill 360 people.

How that could happen and how the system should be strengthened would be considered by Phase Two of the inquiry, which resumes in the autumn.

Shipman's wife Primrose refused to answer any questions from journalists after the report setting out the scale of her husband's crimes was published.

At her small semi–detached cottage in the village of Walshford near Wetherby in Yorkshire, Mrs Shipman answered the door to reporters but quickly slammed it closed without comment.

Mrs Shipman, 54, a mother–of–four, has stood by her GP husband.