Fred and Rose West: A British Horror Story is the latest true crime documentary from Netflix, unpacking the depraved crimes of the UK’s most notorious serial killer couple. Warning: some may find this content distressing.
Across three episodes, the new docu-series explores Fred and Rose’s marriage, their Gloucester-based “house of horrors” where police uncovered the remains of multiple young women, and their eventual arrests.
It covers the impact their crimes had the victims’ families – including their own children – and features previously unseen footage of interviews with key figures such as Fred’s appropriate adult, Janet Leach.
However, the Netflix documentary is limited by its runtime, meaning there are some key details missing, including what life was like behind bars for Rose, as well as how many people the Wests may have really murdered.
How many people did Fred and Rose West kill?
Officially, Fred and Rose West were linked to 12 murders – but investigators and experts have long suspected that the couple’s true murder count is significantly higher, with some suggesting there could be 30 or more victims.
The 12 known young women the Wests murdered, either together or by Fred, took place between 1967 and 1987. They include:
- Anne McFall, 18 – A nanny Fred employed who he murdered alone
- Catherine “Rena” Costello, 27 – Fred’s first wife who he murdered alone
- Charmaine West, 8 – Fred and Catherine’s first daughter
- Carol Ann Cooper, 15 – A nearby children’s home resident
- Lynda Gough, 19 – A lodger at 25 Cromwell Street, the Wests’ “house of horrors”
- Juanita Mott, 18 – A young woman who vanished and was found dead at 25 Cromwell Street
- Lucy Partington, 21 – A university student who’s believed to have been abducted by the Wests while waiting for a bus
- Shirley Hubbard, 15 – A young woman who vanished and whose remains were found in the cellar of the Wests’ home
- Thérèse Siegenthaler, 21 – A Swiss-born college student who went missing while on a hike and was found in the Wests’ cellar
- Shirley Anne Robinson, 18 – A lodger who was eight months pregnant with Fred’s child
- Alison Chambers, 16 – A children’s home resident and visitor of 25 Cromwell Street
- Heather West, 16 – Fred and Rose West’s biological daughter
Fred confessed to many of the murders before dying by suicide in prison on January 1, 1995, while Rose was convicted of the 10 she was involved in. But it’s believed there are many more.
Several women known to have had contact with the Wests before vanishing without a trace have never been found, and key figures in the investigation believe there are more undiscovered graves.
Fred West’s confession to appropriate adult Janet Leach
Fred’s appropriate adult, Janet Leach, previously stated, “Fred said that there were two other bodies in shallow graves in the woods but there was no way they would ever be found. He said there were 20 other bodies… spread around and he would give police one a year.”
As is explored in the 2023 true crime docu-series, Fred West: The Glasgow Girls, the serial killer targeted women while living in Scotland, before he met Rose.
Alongside his known victims, around four women who were similar in age and looks to the Wests’ victims disappeared in Glasgow while Fred was living there.
Additionally, in the ‘90s, a former neighbor of Fred’s, John McLachlan, said he had rented an allotment nearby but that it wasn’t used for growing plants or vegetables.
“We used to come up here every day. West had a piece of ground which was always well dug but which he never put any plants in,” McLachlan told The Herald.
“I asked him several times why he did not use that bit for potatoes and he always said he was keeping it for ‘special purposes’. I told the police this and said to them they should check up on missing girls from that period.
“I was told there were four, one of whose names – Margaret McAvoy – I recognized. Fred West sometimes did not return from the allotment until the early hours of the morning and I just wonder now what he was doing down there in the dark.”
However, police were unable to excavate the site as it was reportedly built over to make up part of a motorway.
In 2018, Mae West – Fred and Rose’s biological daughter – appeared on Good Morning Britain, where she suggested that there may be many more victims.
“I don’t know (how many) – they do say they never stopped,” she said. “I was really young, it was the 70s, we had tenants, it was normal to see people coming in and out.
“With Heather we thought she ran away. I used to think everything they did was strange. That must have been when they were doing things.
“We didn’t see any evidence of that at all. People ask me do you think he stopped and I don’t think he did. I think he stopped using the house.” When asked if it was likely her parents had killed 30 more women, Mae replied, “Yeah.”
But with Fred dead and Rose West still in denial about the killings, it’s unlikely the true extent of their crimes – or the total number of victims – will ever be fully known.
OpenAI’s flagship GPT-4.1 model is now in ChatGPT