David Fuller: The Man Who Preyed on the Dead

14 July 2024

In 2021, the British police went to arrest an unassuming 65-year-old man who they suspected of being the Bedsit Killer. However, the police were in for a shock because Fuller’s ordinary appearance was concealing the sinister reality of the terrifying monster he really was. Not only was David Fuller a murderer, but he was a paedophile and a necrophile. He was a Morgue Monster.

This is the case of David Fuller and one of the most shocking cases Britain has ever seen.

This article contains descriptions of violent or distressing events – reader discretion advised

Table of Contents

David Fuller’s Past Crimes

David Fuller was born in 1954 and worked as an electrician and maintenance worker in the Navy shipyards of Portsmouth.

From a young age, Fuller was known to engage in criminal activities, such as stealing bicycles and committing arson-related property damage. Pyromania is one of the behaviours commonly associated with serial killers.

In the 1970s, his crimes escalated, and he was convicted of a series of ‘creeper’ burglaries, which entailed breaking into people’s homes through a rear window while the victims were present. Already we get the sense of Fuller’s desire for power and control over others.

Fuller was caught and pleaded guilty to these burglaries. However, he faced minimal consequences. In 1973, he was charged with three domestic burglaries at Portsmouth Crown Court, and an additional 23 offences were taken into consideration but ultimately dismissed. He also pleaded guilty to another offence in 1977, with three more offences being considered and written off.

Ultimately, Fuller was never jailed, which potentially emboldened him and allowed his predatory behaviour to escalate. We can see how the experience Fuller gained from these creeper burglaries allowed him to hone his skills, ultimately leading to the perfection of his criminal activities. So by the time 1987 rolled around and he went on to commit murder, he had truly mastered his craft.

Tragically, if he had faced proper consequences for his earlier actions, it might have prevented the tragic murders he goes on to commit.

The Bedsit Murders

Wendy Knell

In 1987, Wendy Knell, a 25-year-old manager of a Super Snaps store in Camden, was a happy, independent, and successful 25-year-old. Her family described her as funny, hardworking, and trustworthy.

Wendy lived in a ground-floor bedsit on the Guildford Road in Tunbridge. Despite the failure of her first marriage, Wendy remained determined to move forward, planning to marry her long-term boyfriend, Ian Plass. She had her whole life ahead of her.

However, unbeknownst to Wendy, she was being stalked. Living alone in a ground-floor flat made her an easy target, and on June 22nd, 1987, an intruder broke into her home, likely through an unlocked window. Her room backed onto a poorly lit alleyway that ran behind the house and provided easy access for anyone with bad intentions.

The next day, Wendy’s boyfriend, Ian, discovered her lifeless body in bed. She had been brutally beaten with a blunt object and strangled. There was blood on the floor by the side of the bed, and blood spatter on the wall. The absence of defensive injuries and the fact that her neighbours did not hear any screams would suggest that Wendy did not resist the attack but was assaulted while she was sleeping.

Forensic evidence revealed the presence of semen in her mouth, vagina, and on a duvet, and there were signs of anal penetration. However, the authorities believed she had been sexually assaulted post-mortem. Wendy had been bleeding profusely from the wound to her head, and blood analysis suggested the killer moved her body into different sexual positions, posing her for further sexual abuse.

There was also blood-stained clothing, a blood-stained Milletts carrier bag, and a distinctive shoe print in the blood on Wendy’s blouse. At the time, the police looked at all the shoe shops in Tunbridge Wells and the print was identified as belonging to a particular Clarks shoe. The killer also took Wendy’s keys and her diary from inside her bedsit.

Wendy’s attacker was familiar with her routine and confident that he had ample time to carry out the crime and fulfil his own sexual gratification without the fear of being caught. The premeditation and control exhibited by the perpetrator reflect his arrogance and belief in his own invincibility.

Caroline Pierce

Caroline Pierce, a lively, happy, 20-year-old woman worked as a manager at an American restaurant called Buster Brown’s on Camden Road, less than a quarter of a mile away from Wendy’s workplace.

Like Wendy, Caroline lived alone in a ground-floor bedsit in Grosvenor Park. Following Wendy’s murder, the community in Tunbridge Wells had been on heightened alert and gripped by fear. The police had warned residents of prowlers in the area, so Caroline would have known about the attack on Wendy and recently had her window locks repaired as a precaution. In fact, her ex-boyfriend described an incident where Caroline had called him one evening, thinking she had seen someone outside her window.

On November 24th, 1987, Caroline spent the day with friends. She took a taxi home and was dropped off just before midnight. However, tragically, despite her efforts to reduce her vulnerability, she was never seen alive again. Her neighbours had reported hearing screams from the area around her flat, though it’s unclear whether Caroline even made it into her home. Caroline had vanished, and for 3 weeks, no one knew what had happened to her.

On December 15th, nearly a month later, Caroline’s body was discovered by a farm worker in a drainage ditch in a remote area on the Romney Marshes, 40 miles away from her flat.

**Police at the location where Caroline’s body was found**

Like Wendy, Caroline had been beaten with a blunt object and strangled. She was found naked except for her tights. Semen found on her tights confirmed she had been sexually assaulted.

Investigation

The unsolved murders of Wendy Knell and Caroline Pierce became infamously known as the ‘bedsit murders’. The police were convinced from the start that the crimes were linked and were desperate to find the perpetrator. However, with the national DNA Database still eight years away, all the authorities could do was wait for the technology to catch up.

Over a decade later in 1999, a re-examination was conducted on the duvet from Wendy’s bedsit. A semen stain on the duvet was submitted for DNA profiling, providing the investigators with the first complete DNA profile of the individual responsible for Wendy Knell’s murder. This DNA profile was then entered into the national DNA Database, but no match was found.

For the next two decades, the murders of Wendy and Caroline remained unresolved. For 30 years, the grieving families were forced to endure immense anguish as they were left without any answers. Furthermore, it was highly improbable that the killer’s sexual desires had been satisfied by just these two murders, and there were concerns that the perpetrator may have committed additional murders during this time.

Then, in 2019, forensic experts re-analysed the tights Caroline was wearing when her body was found. Advances in DNA technology allowed them to extract DNA from semen on the tights. This DNA sample matched the one obtained from Wendy’s duvet, providing the first conclusive evidence that the same person committed both murders. However, again, no matches were found in the DNA Database.

The police then used familial DNA analysis, a technique that matches crime scene DNA to family members already on the Database. This generated a list of around 1,000 potential relatives, which was then narrowed down to 90 individuals.

The investigation, a collaborative effort among multiple law enforcement agencies, involved interviewing all 90 flagged individuals and collecting voluntary DNA samples. Through this detailed process, a close DNA match led police to a man whose brother fit the suspect’s profile and lived near Tunbridge Wells at the time. The man who had been identified as the ‘bedsit killer’ was David Fuller.

Arrest of the Bedsit Killer

In the early hours of December 3rd, 2020, the authorities arrived at the home of the now 65-year-old David Fuller in Heathfield, where he lived with his wife and teenage son. Fuller had been married twice before and had two additional children.

Fuller was arrested and a DNA sample was taken. The results revealed that it was a billion times more likely that the DNA at the crime scenes belonged to Fuller than anyone else.

Yet despite the incriminating evidence, Fuller vehemently denied any involvement in the murders of Wendy and Caroline. He claimed having no knowledge of the crimes and was unfamiliar with Tunbridge Wells, even though it was the neighbouring town to his own.

However, the investigation revealed that Fuller had carried out electrical work throughout Tunbridge Wells, contradicting his statement. Also, the police discovered that Fuller had previously lived on Guildford Road just 100 yards away from where Wendy had resided, indicating his familiarity with the area. Furthermore, Fuller married in 1987, the same year the murders occurred, and his wife resided in staff housing at a school just miles away from the victims’ flats. Interestingly, several women in the area had reported a prowler around that time, including an incident at Caroline’s flat.

Additionally, the investigation revealed that Fuller frequently travelled to Romney Marsh in Kent, the location where Caroline’s body was discovered. His cycling club peers described him as friendly and helpful, a common trait among organised serial offenders who can seamlessly blend into the community despite their brutal acts.

As the investigation progressed, the authorities uncovered that Fuller meticulously documented his life, including his criminal activities. This evidence showed that Fuller had visited his victims’ workplaces while stalking them. The Buster Brown’s restaurant, where Caroline was employed, is mentioned in his diary. The authorities also uncovered photographs in the Supa Snaps sleeves where Wendy was employed. Approaching his victims beforehand was not just creepy, but it allowed Fuller to prolong his experience, establish closeness with his targets, and observe their habits, which were all meticulous elements of his fantasy and planning.

The authorities were also able to link forensic evidence to Fuller. The bloody fingerprint on the plastic Milletts bag behind Wendy’s bed matched Fuller’s left forefinger. The authorities also collaborated with a Clarks footwear archivist to analyse the bloodstained print found on Wendy’s blouse, confirming it matched a sports shoe Fuller was known to own during the time of the crimes. Investigators were also able to find photographic proof of Fuller wearing those exact same trainers in the 1970s and 1980s.

The overwhelming evidence left no doubt that David Fuller was guilty of the bedsit murders. However, the full extent of his depravity was yet to be uncovered during a search of his home, which not only explained why his murders ceased in 1987 but also revealed the horrifying activities he had been engaged in for the past 30 years.

The Morgue Monster

In November 1988, a year after the murders, Fuller had secured a job as a hospital electrician in the maintenance department of Kent and Sussex Hospital. He managed to dodge criminal record checks at the time, as the onus was on him to disclose any past criminal activities. Fuller concealed his history of burglaries and even received a promotion to maintenance supervisor, holding this position until May 2011.

Fuller was then employed as an estates supervisor at Pembury Hospital in Tunbridge Wells, an area which he had claimed he was unfamiliar with. As a trusted employee, he was given an employee swipe card giving him unrestricted access to various hospital areas, including the mortuary.

To maintain the dignity of patients, the mortuary lacked CCTV surveillance. This absence of monitoring and the lack of scrutiny over staff visits to the mortuary enabled Fuller to enter undetected.

Fuller meticulously arranged his schedule to coincide with the time when the mortuary staff had left for the day, giving him a three-hour window during which he was still on duty but could be alone in the mortuary. During this time, he used his maintenance equipment as a cover, entering thousands of times under the guise of carrying out routine maintenance.

However, during a thorough search of Fuller’s three-bedroom semi-detached family home, horrified officers uncovered the disturbing truth of just what Fuller had been doing during his visits to the mortuary. Hidden in a box screwed to the rear of a chest of drawers in his wardrobe, the authorities discovered evidence of Fuller sexually assaulting the bodies of numerous female victims over a 12-year period. He had meticulously recorded his crimes, capturing himself engaging in abusive acts upon the lifeless bodies.

**Hidden hard drives taped to the back of a cabinet in David Fuller’s office**

The staggering volume of evidence comprising over 800,000 images and 504 videos, documented his depraved acts, which included positioning the corpses in specific ways to satisfy his twisted desires. Images showed Fuller with his penis in the mouths, anuses, and vaginas of corpses. They showed him penetrating corpses with his fingers and tongue. It did not matter to Fuller if bodies were abused before or after a post-mortem had been carried out. Some of the victims bore marks after committing suicide, while others had medical paraphernalia still present when he penetrated them. Bodies were removed from fridges or body bags. Some were placed on the floor. He even attached a TENS machine to bodies to stimulate the genitals of the deceased.

The investigators were able to connect him to at least 102 female cadavers between 2008 and 2020, with the youngest victim being 9 years old and the oldest 100 years old.

Fuller’s record-keeping was so comprehensive that he would even use the details from the mortuary logbook to identify his victims, and then he would stalk them post-death by looking at their social media pages. One of his notebooks was called ‘Best Yet’, while other files had been labelled ‘Deadly’ and ‘Deadliest’. This indicates his relentless pursuit for more gratifying experiences to fulfil his twisted fantasies.

**David Fuller at a hospital where he worked**

Fuller’s malicious acts devastated multiple families. Two of his victims were sisters, Mary Akande, aged 16, and Helen, aged 22, who tragically lost their lives in a car accident along with their father. Their mother, Nike, survived the crash but had to cope with the agonising loss of her entire family and the distressing knowledge that her daughters’ final moments had been desecrated by Fuller.

Another of Fuller’s victims was just 9 years old. Not only did Fuller have to remove her clothes before assaulting her, but he also had to remove the toys that her mother had loving placed with her daughter’s body. The mother described her daughter as the kindest and bravest person, and she later faced Fuller in court, stating that what he did to her child was unimaginable and akin to rape, as her daughter could not consent.

She was my baby and couldn’t say no to a dirty old man who abused her body, but she would have. (6)

Another victim was 24-year-old Azra Kemal, who died after falling from a bridge in 2020. Her grieving mother’s anguish was compounded by the revelation that the abuse had occurred just hours after she had visited her daughter to say her final goodbyes. Driven by intense grief, she carried a knife into the police station, intent on taking revenge against Fuller. The police had to physically restrain her and kept her in a cell for 34 hours for her own safety. However, the police were sympathetic and showed understanding towards the mother’s distressed state.

If I’d found him, I’m 99.99 per cent sure I’d have put that knife straight through his heart because he’d put a knife through mine. (9)

Fuller’s obsessive and meticulous documentation of his crimes demonstrated his complete lack of remorse for the suffering he caused. He had gone to great lengths to hide the hard drives, ensuring they would not be discovered, proving just how aware he was that what he was doing was wrong.

The investigation was massive, with 9 officers working for 5 months, sifting through 100 hard drives, 1,300 CDs, 2,200 floppy disks, 30 mobile phones, photoprints, negatives, slides, and camera film rolls. Their efforts led to the identification of around 80 of the 102 victims, whom Fuller had sexually abused. The police were able to match the swipe card data and CCTV footage of Fuller entering the mortuary with the dates and times of the abuse videos, allowing them to understand his movements and identify his victims.

Ultimately, the scale of his offences against the deceased made this case one of the most extensive and disturbing instances of necrophilia ever recorded in British legal history. However, the case took an even darker turn, as it was revealed that Fuller was not only a murderer and necrophile, but he was also a paedophile.

The police recovered thousands of explicit images of children. These included videos depicting the oral rape of a 3-year-old child and the vaginal rape of a 6-year-old child. Additionally, he also had category B material of a child being masturbated over.

The investigation also revealed that Fuller had hidden a pen camera in his home to secretly film his wife’s relative when she visited. He had hidden the pen in a bathroom and recorded the woman undressing, showering, and even using the toilet. He had even gone so far as to digitally superimpose the relative’s head onto the images of the deceased bodies he’d abused.

Fuller attempted to deny that sexual gratification was the motivation behind his actions. This was clearly an effort to minimise the gravity of his reprehensible crimes.

However, he could not deny his abuse of corpses due to the overwhelming photographic evidence against him, and on October 8th, 2021, Fuller pleaded guilty to sexually abusing the bodies of 78 women and girls.

However, when questioned about the murders of Wendy and Caroline, the evidence was not as conclusive, and he denied having any involvement in their murders.

Throughout the investigation, Fuller exhibited no compassion, empathy, or remorse, only self-pity.

Court Case

The case against David Fuller commenced on November 1st, 2021, at Maidstone Crown Court. He initially pleaded not guilty to two charges of murder for Wendy Knell and Caroline Pierce. However, realising he had no defence, Fuller changed his plea to guilty on the fourth day of the trial.

Fuller pleaded guilty to the mortuary offences. In describing Fuller’s crimes, the judge, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb, said:

Having killed two young women who were full of the promise of life you became a vulture, picking your victims from among the dead, within the hidden world of hospital mortuaries which you were left free to inhabit, simply because you had a swipe card. (11)

On December 15th, 2021, David Fuller was sentenced to two whole life terms without the possibility of parole for the murders of Wendy Knell and Caroline Pierce.

For abusing corpses, he was sentenced to a total of 16 years, which included a conviction for possessing indecent images of children.

David Fuller will die in prison.

Aftermath

The impact on the victims’ families has been devastating. Wendy’s boyfriend Ian Plass was plagued by long-term guilt, distraught that he wasn’t with Wendy the night she was murdered. Wendy’s mother, Pamela, was deeply affected, to the point of leaving her job and struggling in her marriage. Sadly, Wendy’s father Bill passed away in 2017 without seeing his daughter’s killer brought to justice.

Caroline’s mother, Katrina Frost, described the 34-year-long nightmare she endured.

Life has never been the same again. Christmas time no get-togethers, no grandchildren, Mother’s Days are a bitter reminder of when Caroline’s funeral was held. Anniversaries, her birthday, the day her body was found goes on the same every year. (8)

It is crucial that Wendy and Caroline’s murders do not become overshadowed by the tragedy of mortuary crimes. For Wendy and Caroline’s families, the nightmare of their killer being caught may have ended, but the nightmare of losing their loved ones will haunt them forever.

The impact on David Fuller’s family has been equally devastating. Fuller’s ex-wife, Jill Palmer, and his children were shocked, unable to reconcile the man they knew with the “monster” who committed these horrific acts. Additionally, Fuller’s third wife, Mala Fuller, decided to divorce him and start a new life.

The ripples of David Fuller’s crimes do not only affect the victims, but extend to so many other people as well, and probably will continue to do so for generations to come.

Testament must be given to the painstaking work of the authorities who played a pivotal role in ensuring justice was served. The tireless efforts of the investigators and forensic scientists who meticulously preserved evidence over many years were instrumental in building a strong case against Fuller, ultimately leading to his conviction.

However, while Fuller’s involvement in necrophilia and his access to the dark web may have provided him with material to sexually gratify his deviant desires, his extensive history of sexual offences targeting individuals from young children to elderly women, as well as the nature of the content he downloaded involving the rape and murder of women, strongly suggests that he may be responsible for additional undiscovered murders.

The authorities will likely undertake extensive investigative efforts to ascertain if Fuller is linked to any further unsolved homicides, and the hope is that he will be held responsible for those crimes as well, should they be uncovered.

Regardless of whether more victims are uncovered, Fuller is an individual who should never be allowed back on the streets, as he has demonstrated the capacity to commit the most heinous of crimes while seemingly leading a normal, law-abiding life among us.

Overall, the public’s faith in the safety and reliability of hospitals was deeply shaken by not only Fuller’s crimes but how he was able to go undetected for so long. In response, the government launched an independent inquiry in December 2021 to investigate how Fuller managed to perpetrate these crimes, with the goal of preventing any similar incidents from occurring in the future.

When we entrust our loved ones to a medical facility, we expect it to be a sanctuary of protection and care, a place where people go to heal. The public could never have imagined that individuals like David Fuller, capable of such heinous acts, would be roaming the hospital halls.

Unfortunately, monsters like David Fuller exist everywhere, hiding behind ordinary lives. Fuller’s case shows that evil can lurk in unsuspecting places, carried out by seemingly unremarkable individuals. The story of David Fuller is a powerful reminder of the necessity of vigilance and the need to seek justice for those who cannot defend themselves.

Sources

TV / Movies / Videos:

Sky Documentaries. David Fuller: Monster in the Morgue. 2022.

Websites:

BBC News. David Fuller: The sisters killed in a car crash, abused after death. December 15, 2021.
BBC News. David Fuller trial: Wendy Knell’s former boyfriend felt daily guilt over death. November 2, 2021.
Crimeline. David Fuller Sentencing Remarks. 15 December 2021.
Kent Live. Family of murder victim Wendy Knell ‘deeply sad’ dad died before seeing justice. November 5, 2021.
Kent Live. The ‘dirty old man’ who abused my 9-year-old: Mum’s shattering message to David Fuller. December 15, 2021.
Sky News. David Fuller: How was one of Britain’s most prolific sex offenders caught and how did he get away with it for so long? November 5, 2021.
Sussex Live. The shattering messages from mums of two women murdered by East Sussex killer David Fuller. December 15, 2021.
The Standard. David Fuller: Mother of victim was arrested in attempt ‘to kill him.’ November 6, 2021.
The Standard. David Fuller: ‘Depraved’ Bedsit Killer sentenced for sexual abuse of dead women. December 7, 2022.
The Telegraph. Families of dead women sexually abused in mortuaries by bedsit killer David Fuller face him for first time. December 15, 2021.