January 2, 1981: The Yorkshire Ripper Is Caught

January 2, 1981: Peter Sutcliffe, a 34-year-old truck driver, is arrested in Sheffield. The police have caught the man they had called the Yorkshire Ripper.

Four months later, he was found guilty of murdering 13 women and attempting to murder seven others between July 5, 1975 and November 17, 1980. He was sentenced to 20 concurrent sentences of life imprisonment.

Born on June 2, 1946 in Shipley, West Yorkshire, Sutcliffe initially attacked women and girls in residential areas, but appears to have shifted his focus to red-light districts, because he was attracted by the vulnerability of prostitutes, and the perceived ambivalent attitude of police to their safety.

If the number of 13 murders is correct, then it's more than twice the total of the original "Ripper" of prostitutes, Jack the Ripper, in London in 1888. The manhunt for him broke the record set by Jack for the biggest in the history of British law enforcement.

Like another serial killer, parking-ticket dope David "Son of Sam" Berkowitz, and a later mad bomber, Timothy McVeigh, it was a minor automotive infraction that led to his being caught: He was driving with phony license plates.

He was caught by Probationary Constable Robert Hydes, in the driveway of Light Trades House on Melbourne Avenue in Sheffield, South Yorkshire. In the car with him was Olivia Reivers, a 24-year-old prostitute, who, had they not been caught, could well have become his next victim. He was arrested, and transferred to Dewsbury police station in West Yorkshire. There, Sutcliffe was questioned in relation to the Ripper case as he matched many of the known physical characteristics.

He confessed on January 4. Just as the "Dear Boss" letter in the Jack the Ripper case said, 93 years earlier, Sutcliffe abhorred prostitutes. "The women I killed were filth," he told the police. "Bastard prostitutes who were littering the streets. I was just cleaning up the place a bit."

He went on trial on May 5, and was convicted on May 22. Despite being found sane at his trial, Sutcliffe was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. Attempts to send him to a secure psychiatric unit were blocked. Three times, fellow inmates tried to kill him, all unsuccessfully.

He only left prison briefly, to be treated at University Hospital of North Durham, where he died from complications of both diabetes and COVID-19 on November 13, 2020. He was 74, and it was no great loss.

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January 2, 1981 was a Friday. Baseball was out of season. The major college football bowl games had been played the day before, but 1 remained for this day: The University of Miami, ranked Number 20, beat Virginia Tech, 20-10 in the Peach Bowl, at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.

There were 10 games in the NBA -- with few distractions, unlike the day before with the major bowl games, and the next 2 days with the NFL Playoffs, it was a good day to scheduled them:

* The New York Knicks lost to the Detroit Pistons, 102-100 at the Silverdome in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan.

* The New Jersey Nets lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers, 111-105 at the Rutgers Athletic Center (now the Jersey Mike's Arena) in Piscataway, New Jersey. Mike Mitchell scored 34 for the Cavs.

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Washington Bullets, 92-82 at the Capital Centre in the Washington suburb of Landover, Maryland.

* The Indiana Pacers beat the Atlanta Hawks, 109-106 at The Omni in Atlanta.

* The Kansas City Kings beat the Utah Jazz, 101-95 at the Kemper Arena (now the Hy-Vee Arena) in Kansas City.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Dallas Mavericks, 124-120 at the Reunion Arena in Dallas. The Mavs were a 1st-season expansion team, so this was not yet a rivalry. Moses Malone led all scorers on the day with 40 points for the Rockets, also grabbing 15 rebounds.

* The San Antonio Spurs beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 118-112 at the HemisFair Arena in San Antonio. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar scored 36 in defeat.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Denver Nuggets, 133-132 at the McNichols Arena in Denver.

* The Golden State Warriors beat the Boston Celtics, 121-106 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena.

* And the Philadelphia 76ers beat the Seattle SuperSonics, 120-117 in overtime at the Seattle Center Coliseum. Julius "Dr. J" Erving scored 36 points.

And there were 6 games in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers beat the New York Islanders, 3-1 at Madison Square Garden. By winning the Stanley Cup the season before, something the Rangers hadn't done since 1940, the Islanders definitively supplanted the Boston Bruins as what they had pretended to be since a 1975 Playoff win: The Rangers' arch-rivals.

* The Montreal Canadiens beat the Hartford Whalers, 3-1 at the Hartford Civic Center (now the PeoplesBank Arena).

* The Detroit Red Wings and the Vancouver Canucks played to a tie, 2-2 at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.

* The Winnipeg Jets beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 4-3 at the Winnipeg Arena.

* The Calgary Flames beat the Los Angeles Kings, 7-6 at the Stampede Corral in Calgary.

* And the Edmonton Oilers beat the Boston Bruins, 7-5 at the Northlands Coliseum in Edmonton.