Stephen Griffiths - "The Crossbow Cannibal"
Stephen Griffiths, who is charged with the murder of three prostitutes in West Yorkshire appeared in Bradford court today and gave his name as “the crossbow cannibal.” Apparently he was caught on CCTV murdering his last victim by firing a crossbow bolt into her head. The 40-year-old psychology student who was supposedly doing a Ph.D. on serial killers was noted for being an oddball by neighbours and a bit of a loner. He was said to be fascinated by another Bradford killer, Peter Sutcliffe who rampaged on a murder spree in West Yorkshire killing 13 women between 1975 and 1980.
From what I understand, Griffiths’ victims were dismembered which makes me wonder whether his self-appointed title of crossbow cannibal is a reference to what he got up to once he had killed the women. Watch this space as they as we learn more details about these horrific crimes. I expect that Griffiths may have eaten parts of his victims so I am curious to know if he believed he could imbibe his victim’s vitality or essence as I describe in SuperSense.
UPDATE: It has just been announced that Griffiths has been jailed for life after admitting the murder of three women. Here you can watch his confession on a police video. True to his name. he also claims that cooked and ate one of his victims and eating parts of another raw. In the interview, he ends by saying that he has no time for the human race – the human race on the other hand has all the time for Stephen Griffiths… god that sounded like a cheezy one liner that one might hear on CSI!
brucemhood.wordpress.com 
http://peterreynolds.wordpress.com/2010/05/28/its-not-drugs-its-drug-laws-that-killed-the-bradford-girls/
It’s our drug laws and cowardly politicians that are responsible for these girls’ deaths
im studyin Criminology in Ireland and this case is Bizare in so many ways “Crossbow Cannibal” i think i can guess why he calls himself that in my opinion the reason why they cant find the other bodys have they taught of the idea of him eatin them hench why he came up with such nickname. Second i cant see to understand why he stop at 3 wen he quoted in court wen the judge asked him his address he stated “Here i guess” which shows his desire to be caught i am studyin mind of killers as part of my career studies i hope to get into profilen i think 3 isnt even the start of how many he has or mite have killed the police have to stop and think of his age! how long he has bein live at his apartment! ect and count up how many missen woman wel prositutes ther mite be more victims more than 3 killers like him dont stop at 3 its to little of a impact he feeds off the trill of killen do you belive its only 3? searchin his books is the start of gettin inside the mind of this so called “Crossbow Cannibal” see what he has underlined that will answer the how and why and maybe ther where questions.
this is a very good point and i agree even though i am a 14 year old boy i agree with this i am studdying Stephen Griffiths in my R.E lessons as an act of evil. but what i dont understand is why would someone do this yes he may of had a mental health disorder but there are plenty of people out there who can help and yes why stop at three it does not seem right.
RE lessons never used to be like this when I was at school. You may of erd of the bibbel, which is full of acts of evil to study. Lots and lots of slaying ! That never seemed right to me, but God seemed to love it.
to PP: you are studying criminology? but you seem unable to write or spell. what you’ve written is pigeon english.
The Pidgeon English you speak of is actually spelled pidgin. Look it up at http://www.m-w.com
There is a high standard of education in Ireland. This being so, I can’t believe that David Doyle is a bona fide university student of anything, though he might study criminology privately at home.
“…how many missen woman wel prositutes ther mite be more….”
“….the other bodys have they taught of the idea of him eatin them hench why….”
Irish yes, serious student no. He would never have got in.
David Doyle himself, I am afraid, might be worth investigating: he just doesn’t add up; poor spellings vs university student? Huh
This is one of the strangest comment strings I have ever seen on this site, and that is saying something.
We must not suggest that David Doyle “feeds off the trill of killen”.
Actually, looking more closely at what he has written, although he certainly shows signs of speaking in an Irish way (his taught and trill, for example), he might be an immigrant to Ireland from somewhere else, because some of it seems to suggest that English is not his native language at all:
“i cant see to understand why he stop”
“i am studyin mind of killers”
“how long he has bein live at his apartment!”
This is more like an African or an East European than an Irishman, though certainly one who has been living in Ireland for several years.
There you are : a little profiling for you !
@poietes
Agreed
I just came over here to see if Bruce was writing about eurovision since he’s been entertaining himself by tweeting about it, and I am sadly ignorant of that phenomenon.
We’ve visited cannibalism before. My favorite example is General Butt Naked – but I’m betting the Crossbow Cannibal had some sort of fetish. If we have Girls & Corpses, why not cannibal porn?
urm Peter Sutcliffe was convicted for the murder of 13 women not 6…..
As someone deeply involved in mental health I noted that the suspect appears to have received psychiatric treatment over a period of years,as did Antony Hardy,the so-called ‘Camden Ripper’.After the ‘Ripper ‘ trial a 200 page ‘Root Cause Investigation ‘was produced,an astounding and outrageous whitewash that was never scrutinised,though riddled with flaws and inconsistencies.Presuming the suspect was a patient of the local community mental health team-as was Hardy,who escaped from a psychiatric hospital and the relevant authority failed to alert the police,what immediately springs to mind is the level of monitoring,the diagnosis and medication.Had he been sectioned the Mental Health Act?Was he subject to a ‘Community Treatment Order’?What -crucially-was his diagnosis?While the subject remains an intense focus of media and public interest attention needs to be given to these areas as a matter of urgency.Barry Tebb
This is indeed a strange thread of comments regarding DD..
Mark, yes indeed my mistake.,, I will correct it and then of course your comment will look wrong. But we will know!
I would respectfully suggest that the comments on DD are not particularly strange in view of what he has written. It is DD who seems strange, unless he comes forward to tell us a little more about himself.
I am wondering if anybody should be speculating too much about the motives, lifestyle or possible defence of Stephen Griffiths, as this is all sub judice. For example, the statement “From what I understand, Griffiths’ victims were dismembered” was made when only one body had been found, and it strongly implies that Stephen Griffiths is guilty.
Rox, indeed this may be a gross miscarriage of justice but when you have video footage of Griffiths killing a victim on CCTV and he calls himself in court, “the crossbow cannibal” then it does seem reasonable to think that maybe he is involved.
Nonetheless, I am wondering if anybody should be speculating too much about the motives, lifestyle or possible defence of Stephen Griffiths, as this is all sub judice. And you say “apparently” he was caught on CCTV , and you have no evidence even apparent to link him to the other two murders. His mental health may or may not play some part in this .It is not for us to judge. People have in the past confessed to crimes they did not commit.
Um, Bruce?
What is the correct terminology for hitting a brick wall but continuing to move forward only to repeatedly experience sharp pain?
Damn! This is so sick!…
spelling fight!…
typical british arrogance
Guy, we’re not all like that! I promise!
It’s not just a few little quibbles about spelling, it’s also grammar and syntax, and the whole question of whether the admittedly rather strange Mr Doyle is quite what he would have us believe. As for comments on spelling being “typical British arrogance”, I don’t know about the USA or Australia or wherever Gigh comes from, but universities in France or Germany or Italy would certainly not accept spelling, grammar and syntax like DD’s . If you wanted to study maths, you would need to be quite good at arithmetic, too. Why is this arrogance ? Why is it typically British ?
I think this guy is a real sicko and that he only called himself the “Crossbow Cannibal” to make his insanity defence more believable.
Also I think the spelling fight is pretty puerile. Get lives people!
This was Originally a debate about the ‘crossbow canniabal’, however certain members of the debate seem to have been side tracked by the ‘few little quibbles about spelling’. Surely regardless of DD’s ethnic back ground, education, or ‘grammar and syntax’, he should be entitled to his view on this subject. And we should all respect that. Certain people, not mentioning any names should just be pleased that DD has become a part of this debate wheras all they have done is morph the subject of the thread into something belittleing and unkind. I am a first time commenter and in writing this comment i have spent more time focussing on my ‘grammar and syntax’ than on what i have actualy written. shall we all now maybe discuss the topic in hand.
Hi Stephen… I am intrigued that you have chosen the same nom de plume and have set up a website dedicated to the Crossbow Cannibal. I am sure others would be very interested in what motivated you to do this.
Yes indeed, we are intrigued by both Stephen Griffiths and David Doyle. I was merely trying to shed what light I could on the latter, not engage in the “spelling fight” that I have been criticised for. As my job is teaching English to foreigners (many of whom are anxious to pay to improve their English), such considerations are part of my life, just as mental health is part of Barry Tebbs’ life. Why does “Stephen Griffiths” feel so sure that he has “a life” and we haven’t ? I was not the first to mention the spelling, but I think I was more constructive than others. What does our Stephen Griffiths do which is so fabulous and rewarding ? Listen to fabulous groups ? Get himself tattooed ? Or does he run a multi-million pound business, perhaps ?
Indeed David Doyle (not his real name) is part of this debate and is entitled to his view. We would welcome him back. I have already suggested he should come back.
Surely the Stephen Griffiths now under arrest called himself “The Crossbow Cannibal” ironically, and with the hope of a defence that he could not get a fair trial because of media coverage ? He did not coin this term, as some people seem to think. He took it from a newspaper headline. So he is saying: “Look, here I am, everyone will assume that I am the crossbow cannibal, and I am staying here because of that, unless that injustice is remedied”. He is hoping to get off. If he was insane, he would not get off, he would be locked up in a different place and possibly for longer (if he was found guilty, which has not yet happened).
Some might think it “pretty puerile” to call yourself Stephen Griffiths and go to the trouble of setting up a website about him and his alleged crimes. Get a life! (We are all wasting some of our time on it here, but this is an extreme !).
However, if you are going to devote yourself to creating such a website, please make it accurate. He was not “reading criminology”. There is no such course at Bradford University.
http://www.brad.ac.uk/university/pgpros/lifelong.php
His research area was within “local and regional history/studies”.
To be more specific, according to the Yorkshire Post:
” Griffiths had been studying part-time at Bradford University since 2004, carrying out research for a local history PhD thesis with the working title Homicide in Bradford: 1847 to 1899.”
I’ve lost track of what and whom we were talking about. Is this Griffiths at Bradford the killer himself or the citizen who took the name Griffiths and made a website about the crossbow cannibal?
Or did the alleged killer make a website about himself?
I’m supposed to be writing end of the year school reports on three year olds, and this thread is much more diverting. That’s how it works when you’ve got a life, but you’re avoiding it.
“The Crossbow Cannibal”, if one were to take heed of Hollywood, said serial killer who was deeply immersed in the studies of Criminology would have prove fiendishly hard to catch, he would have danced with detectives, teased them, strung out more victims. Frightening us with his superior I.Q and baffling the Plod.
But alas, no, our rather hapless anti-hero, manages to get arrested and charged within seemingly the space of seconds, depriving us of serial (no pun intended) news coverage.
And “Crossbow Cannibal” and the media would do well to remember, this story is no Hollywood horror, it is rather most probably a damning indictment of the current UK mental health management system and it’s rather large shortcomings.
‘Care in the community’? Hollow words.
As for rather an unhealthy interest in serial killers, an individuals who exhibits an overt fascination with serial killers and their ilk, is seemily what ole’ “crossbow” was and the only things thats going to get him is a very long prison sentence.
Tricia, the Stephen Griffiths doing the PhD at Bradford University is the arrested one. He is said to have had his own website about this kind of crime. The one writing here and with a website if you click on his name is somebody else, unless (conceivably, I suppose) the arrested one has got access to a computer where he is now.
Have you located the housing Assoc’ tenements where he lived, on Google streets, may be Google blocking it, or they just gave up, but you can’t get all the way around the house now. All the same ‘spelling fight’ indeed. I think Americans can be just as petty, indeed they spell our language differently, as it would be too hard for them otherwise – poor things!!
Notice that it is the “spelling fight” which is sick, not the murders and the hint of cannibalism. And being aware of the way that one’s language is normally spoken by natives is “arrogant”. In fact typical British arrogance. I assume that Gigh has never tried out his hesitant schoolboy French on a typical Frenchman.
haha… great thread Bruce. The story you posted is horrifying, the comments provided much needed light relief. Go Rox!
This cannibal isn’t as interesting as the other ones Bruce has mentioned in the past because he’s just a typical serial killer. General Butt Naked was superstitious and ate livers to suck up his enemies’ life force. Did Preston Bush and his Scull and Bones cronies swiped Geronimo’s leg bone because they were superstitious or because they were assholes?
Given that the point over here at SuperSense is generally studying human behavior, we could look at the grammar fight as simply another example.
Oooops! Skull and Bones
Skeletons not rowing – poor darlings, indeed.
I blame Samuel Johnson.
For Christ’s sake, it’s not just or mainly spelling. It’s got nothing to do with Samuel Johnson. If you read David Doyle out loud, you will realise that this is not the usual speech patterns of an English or Irish person, although it has got some Irish features. Anybody who not only speaks like this but writes like this is not likely to get a grant to study criminology or any other subject (except English) at the public expense. This is not even unfair discrimination. If you can’t run or kick a ball, you will not get into a football team. That’s the way life is.
Another short but clear example is “why he came up with such nickname”. Would you say that? Many foreigners, especially East Europeans, would.
However well he did his research, I’m afraid David Doyle would not be able to produce an acceptable thesis at the end of it, so he would never have been taken on to do the research. It’s no good practising scoring goals if you can’t see the ball properly even with your glasses.
we must repent the sin of the sinners. Nobody is perfect, poor him don’t get any counselling before that taking back on his degree again, i’ve met quite a lot of strange mature students, Pray for them and their supervisor. Amen.
Repent, Repent & Repent. Amen.
I don’t quite understand all this.
Why she we repent, anyway ? Repent for what ?
Are you saying that this poor chap, if he has murdered several women, did so because he didn’t get enough counselling not to (from his supervisor at university ?) and that other people need to repent on his behalf ? No, I don’t follow.
“before that taking back on his degree again”. What does this refer to ? You seem to know more than the rest of us, perhaps.
Sorry, typing error, I meant “Why should we repent?”
But it’s true. I’m not perfect. I repent. I repent.
Well to suggest that he has eaten every single part of the two still missing victims is absurd. My guess is that they are buried someplace deep under water, dismembered and packed into plastic bags or something. I also wonder if the reason he dubbed himself such a dramatic name is sheer hunger for publicity. Since he leaves neat and is studying criminology chances are small he’s psychotic. Therefore he’s probably narcissistic or anti social. His needs might be many, but it may be that what he got out of dominating and killing those women, he also gets from bathing in the public gaze. It’s a familiar phenomenon that some serial killers kill because they simply like to be the center of attention. Son of Sam is a good example of that. I know this theory doesn’t hold up since he hasn’t been much attention seeking before capture. Just my thoughts anyways…:)
uh and I meant to say “lives neat”. And also sorry for other typos, I’m a foreigner alright?
nicely put….and your the only 1 thats talked any sense i this thread so far…your also right about the publicity thing.
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So Sorensen says that this killer is not psychotic, and Oscar reckons that this is the only sense in the whole thread ? I think most people would agree that his behaviour is just a little more than “antisocial”.
What do you two suggest, then, an Asbo ?
not at all,he was antisocial in the extreme,i should know,i lived nxt door to him for 4 years.but i wud never have classed him as psychotic,he seemed in control of his mind etc a couple of days b4 his arrest when i was talking 2 him…it was pure publicity he was after,the infamy,,,,living on forever through the notoriety.ultimately,i dont think anyone will know why he did it.
Great to see there are so many psychiatric experts on here, and there was me thinking that the average bod on internet forums get all their expert knowledge from tv and hollywood.
Regarding the morbid curiosity that some seem to hold for serial killers like jack the ripper and his cronies is not that uncommon and the success of movies like “silence of the lambs” and “manhunter” adequately demonstrate this point in my view..
Serial killers are good news for all but the victims and their families, the media has a field day, many books are written by opportunist authors and no doubt pc plod has his fair share of kickbacks from the media for leaked “juicy bits”.
Yes, it’s extremely interesting that Oscar lived next door to him, and of course he would know him well, but that doesn’t make him a psychiatric expert who can declare that somebody can behave like this without being psychotic. However, I’m not an psychiatric expert either. Nonetheless, I don’t think the term “anti-social” is adequate for this: there may be another term more appropriate than either, I don’t know. Psychopathic, perhaps, but Joshua Greasley is right to caution us: we do not know.
never said i was a psychiatric expert rox,i merely pointed out that since he was caught,he started acting very differently.bit odd that dont you think? he was a real loner,never let ppl in his flat,except 4 the odd prostitute.[i thought that it was just something he “treated” himself to every week.he even had a girlfriend recently,saw her a few times…she was located safe an well,none the wiser btw.he was known as penfold by the others in the flats,bit of an oddball,but noone thought he was quite like that….as for joshuas remark about the police…perhaps they could have done more,they were raiding his flat nearly every week,for seperate issues.they never suspected him of bein a killer.and they were good to me when it all happened.one thing i will say tho,i have realised exactly how disgraceful the press act in these situations,theres a whole load of rubbish written about it,and i didnt like the fact that i had to go back to the flats 1 day,there was a load of floral tributes/cards on the wall outside,a reporter was reading and takin pictures of what folks had written! thats ppl’s private thoughts ffs!
Just gave this thread a read… Neato stuff, dudes (is that too American or Aussie?).
DD does appear to be texing his post but I do find possible that he may very well be who he says he is. We all make spelling mistakes and syntax errors (perhaps not as many as our DD). If he is “studyin Criminology in Ireland” we could probably assume he is steaming drunk at 12:34am and having a laugh. I certainly was having a chuckle when reading his work.
The Crossbow Cannibal is just another killer… boring! Not as cool as he thinks he is. Killing for fame? Detached from life and his victims? Will pretend there are many more victims left uncovered. The girlfriend had no idea? Street walkers say he was just a little odd but not a killer!
Does any of this sound familiar? I can name that tune in 3 notes, Brucie!
I say all this very loosly and with my tongue planted firmly in cheek .
Good god, I have just noticed I made a typo. I must be Irish.
Unlike DD, nothing Popsnack writes betrays an Irish way of speaking, so he needn’t worry about that.
The main thing to come out of this is that Bradford University seems to have been inadvertently running a criminology course as a practical career training course for an up and coming serial killer, and nobody noticed this!!! He had even spent time in a hospital for the criminally insane several years ago. The lesson is that responsible institutions should look very carefully at the motives and private lives of similar students (and I expect they already have).
There is no doubt that modern crossbow could be a deadly weapon, considering that its speed usually at 300+ feet per second, and any people who know how to use can shoot a elk or small bear without difficulty. I include this lethal aspect of this “recreational equipment” in my collective ultimate crossbow comparison guide. Hope that could be a help. Thanks.