The Darlington Cannibal

Julie Paterson was 32, a mother of four from Darlington in northeast England who had struggled with depression. In April 1998 she went back after a night of drinking to the Harewood Grove flat of David Harker, a 24-year-old man she had met that night.

Harker strangled her and then dismembered her body. He left the flat stained with her blood, and he told acquaintances that he had killed a woman named Julie. Nobody took him seriously until May 1998, when Julie’s torso was found wrapped in a bin bag in a garden. Police arrested Harker, and his flat supplied the evidence. After his arrest he claimed he had cooked and eaten part of her. Most of Julie’s remains have never been found.

Psychiatrists concluded that Harker had a severe psychopathic disorder. In February 1999 he admitted manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility and was given a life sentence with a minimum term of 14 years. He became eligible for parole in 2013 but has never said where the rest of Julie’s body is. The Parole Board has refused to release him or move him to open conditions at every review, most recently in May 2026, his ninth refusal.