The Green Chain Killer

For several years up to the early 1990s, a man carried out a series of sexual attacks on women in south-east London, many near the Green Chain Walk, a network of paths and open spaces. Police would later link Robert Napper to them. On July 15, 1992, Rachel Nickell, 23, was walking on Wimbledon Common with her two-year-old son, Alex, when she was stabbed to death in front of him.

Detectives focused on a local man, Colin Stagg, and used an undercover officer to try to draw a confession from him. He never gave one. Stagg was charged anyway, but in September 1994 a judge at the Old Bailey threw out the evidence, criticizing the police for excessive zeal, and the case collapsed. Meanwhile, in November 1993, Napper had killed Samantha Bisset, 27, and her four-year-old daughter, Jazmine, in their home in Plumstead.

Napper was convicted over the Bisset killings at the Old Bailey in October 1995, when he also admitted two rapes and two attempted rapes, and he was sent to Broadmoor Hospital. Years later, improved DNA testing tied him to Rachel’s death. On December 18, 2008, he pleaded guilty to her manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility and was ordered to be detained indefinitely at Broadmoor. Reporting in June 2026 described him as still held there.