Hindley, Myra

▪ 2003

      British serial killer (b. July 23, 1942, Manchester, Eng.—d. Nov. 15, 2002, Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk, Eng.), was convicted in 1966 of the torture and murder of two children and of having been the accessory in the murder of a third. The “Moors Murderers,” as Hindley and Ian Brady came to be called because the victims' bodies were found buried on the Pennine Moors, were both sentenced to life in prison. The pair later acknowledged having killed at least two other children. As England's first convicted female serial killer, Hindley became a cause célèbre—considered a sadistic murderer by some but seen by others as a weak young woman brutalized into helping her homicidal lover. A haunting photograph of Hindley gained almost iconic significance during the trial and throughout her long years of incarceration.

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