Joseph McCann's Shocking Crimes: Unraveling 33 Life Sentences
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00:00 the old Bailey has heard of course some terrible cases in its history
00:14 but this has to be one of the most disturbing that anybody really has
00:19 ever sat through. The absolute depravity of what Joseph McCann embarked
00:24 on in April and May of this year. The spree of abductions, sexual assaults and
00:32 rapes of 11 victims over the course of two weeks starting in Watford, moving to
00:39 London, then heading up to the northwest around Manchester and Cheshire
00:44 traumatizing his victims leaving them with a trauma that they will have to
00:49 live with for the rest of their lives.
00:53 [Music]
01:10 Born in London England on the 8th of February 1985, Joseph McCann's crime
01:15 spree started from a very young age. When he was a small boy his family moved on
01:20 to a council estate in Manchester and it was around this time that his interest
01:24 in criminal activity started. Aged just 11 he had his first run-in with the law
01:28 and by the age of 13 he'd already been convicted for theft. He and his two
01:34 brothers created such fear amongst the community that following multiple
01:37 complaints to the council the family were eventually evicted in 1998. As he
01:42 got older more arrests followed including carrying a knife, criminal
01:45 damage and the handling of stolen goods. He would set fire to cars and threaten
01:50 children and the elderly. Despite moving the brothers frequently returned to
01:54 their old council estates and continued what was described by the newspapers and
01:58 neighbours as a campaign of terror. It wasn't long before the brothers were all
02:02 issued with anti-social behaviour orders commonly known in the UK as ASBOs. They
02:07 were among the first people in the UK to ever receive this. The order banned them
02:12 from entering the Beswick area and exhibiting physically or verbally
02:15 abusive or anti-social behaviours in the city of Manchester. This didn't appear to
02:19 have much of an impact on the boys as they were photographed laughing and
02:22 swearing at the crowd while coming out of court. In the Beswick area crime fell
02:26 by a third and one supermarket claimed that their revenue had risen by £14,000
02:31 after the ASBO against the boys was given. Their lawyer claimed it was
02:35 against their human rights and they appealed the ASBOs three times. This
02:39 eventually resulted in them taking it to the Court of Appeal in 2001 but these
02:43 appeals were flatly denied by the court. In 1999 the McCann family moved again
02:48 this time out of the Manchester area. They moved to the south of England where
02:52 the brothers continued their criminal activities. Around 2007 Joseph was living
02:56 in Bedford. He'd recently become a father but was not present for the birth nor in
03:01 the baby's life due to spending time in prison. He was released later that year
03:04 but on the 27th of December he was arrested and jailed again for
03:08 burglarizing an 85 year old man's house and threatening to stab him.
03:11 Fortunately the elderly man had CCTV outside and he was swiftly caught and
03:15 sent back to prison in September of 2008. He was sentenced to imprisonment for
03:20 public protection or an IPP, an order to serve a minimum of two years and six
03:24 months inside. His IPP was a form of an indeterminate sentence meaning that when
03:29 his sentence was done the Parole Board for England and Wales would have to
03:32 determine whether or not he posed a risk and whether or not it was safe to allow
03:35 him back out. He would be on a 10 year long license meaning that if any
03:39 criminal activity happened in those 10 years he would be recalled to prison
03:43 immediately. While in prison various professionals and offending managers
03:46 expressed their deep concern that he still presented a huge risk to society.
03:50 One statement said that he posed serious harm to the public and known adults as
03:54 well as a medium risk to children, prison staff and prisoners. They believed that
03:59 he could also be a massive threat to teenage girls and showed signs of
04:02 wanting to sexually exploit them. Due to the analysis of the professionals his
04:06 many appeals for release were denied and he spent over eight years in prison.
04:09 While Joseph was doing time his brother Sean was also serving a two-year
04:13 sentence at HMP Peterborough for assault. Sean took his own life while in prison.
04:18 Joseph completed several rehabilitation courses and was eventually released on
04:22 license in March of 2017. After he was released he went back to
04:26 Buckinghamshire to live with family and then quickly moved out and off the radar.
04:30 This meant his offender manager was not able to contact him or keep track of
04:33 where he was. Despite his long stint in prison he wasn't deterred and the crimes
04:37 just didn't stop. A few months later he was arrested again and spent another two
04:41 years in prison. When sentencing him the judge told him that it would run
04:45 concurrently with his IPP sentence. However his offender manager team did
04:49 not recall him on that sentence. If they had done he would have had to appear
04:53 before a parole board again before being considered for release. Unfortunately
04:57 this meant he was able to be released just halfway through his sentence. Staff
05:01 at the prison contacted the probation services about their concerns
05:04 surrounding the fact his sentence was not running alongside his IPP. They felt
05:08 he was still evidently a very imminent threat to the public. Despite this in
05:13 2019 he was released without appearing in front of a parole board. He continued
05:18 to move around the country evading his offender manager team's attempts to
05:21 contact him. On the 21st of April 2019 his crime spree would take a much more
05:26 frightening and sinister turn. At 3.30 a.m. he abducted a 21 year old woman at
05:31 knife point as she was walking back from a nightclub. He drove her back to an
05:34 unknown house and raped her. Although he had told her his name was Joel McCann he
05:40 was identified the very next morning by Hertfordshire police. However they
05:43 couldn't locate him. Just four days later he abducted another woman in North East
05:47 London and subjected her to a horrific sexual assault over the space of 14
05:51 hours. He was spotted casually making a stop to a drive-thru with the frightened
05:55 woman in the back seat.
05:58 She was also still in his car when he held another woman at knife point and
06:12 forced her into the vehicle. While drinking bottles of vodka he drove to
06:15 Watford with the women and attempted to book into a hotel.
06:19 [Knocking]
06:29 "Hello?"
06:31 "Hello?"
06:36 [Knocking]
06:41 "Hello?"
06:47 "Hello?"
06:49 "Hello?"
06:52 [Knocking]
06:59 After he was unsuccessful one of the women smashed the vodka bottle over his head
07:03 allowing them both to escape. Investigators drew up a list of suspects
07:07 based on previous offending but as McCann had never committed a sex offence before
07:11 he wasn't on the list. These cases weren't linked with the 21st of April
07:16 attack until over a week later. Following this a nationwide manhunt was on to find
07:22 Joseph McCann and a reward of £20,000 was put up for anyone who could help.
07:27 On the 5th of May McCann was back in Manchester. He met a woman in a bar and
07:31 convinced her to let him go back to her house. Once at her house he tied her up
07:35 and raped both her 17 year old daughter and her 11 year old son. The daughter
07:40 managed to escape out the window and ran for help but Joseph was gone by the time
07:44 the police and neighbours arrived at 8am. Around 1pm that day a suspect had been
07:49 arrested and taken into custody but it wasn't Joseph McCann. While officers were
07:54 interviewing the wrong man McCann had moved on and driven to Bury. At 1.30pm he
07:59 abducted a 71 year old woman outside of a Morrison supermarket. He attacked her and
08:04 raped her. He stole her car and while the woman was still in it with him he attacked
08:08 and kidnapped a 13 year old girl. She too was sexually assaulted. The pair managed
08:13 to escape at a service station later that afternoon but Joseph carried on in the
08:17 victim's car. That same evening at around 6.30pm he was driving in Cheshire when he
08:22 forced two 14 year old girls into the car and threatened to kill them. He was seen
08:27 driving to a petrol station and buying a packet of condoms. The two girls although
08:31 not shown were in the back.
08:33 He was on a dangerous and disturbing rampage. Fuelled further by cocaine and vodka he
08:48 had no intent of stopping and there was no limit to how far he would take his appalling
08:52 crimes. Joseph McCann was now the most wanted man in the country. It was in this
09:17 moment however that the police finally caught up with him. They spotted him in his car
09:22 with the two girls in the back and began chasing him.
09:25 "Let me go"
09:27 "86 urgent"
09:39 "Oh crash crash crash"
09:50 "My car got..."
09:52 "I can't wait to see if you can find the key or something"
09:54 "I'm on my way, I'm on my way"
09:56 "Where is he?"
09:58 "Where's he gone?"
10:00 McCann crashed the car into a Mercedes and started fleeing on foot. Fortunately the
10:13 two girls weren't injured, just extremely shaken. He somehow managed to escape on foot
10:18 before stealing a bike and riding away. He then abandoned the bike and booked a taxi
10:23 at around 8.15pm. It was at this point that roadblocks had been set up in the area and
10:28 the police were closing in on Joseph McCann. Cheshire Constabulary however did not issue
10:33 a warning to say he was in the area until 8.45pm. A police officer stopped the taxi
10:38 and unknowingly spoke to McCann, who was holding a pint glass and said he was returning home
10:42 after a visit to the pub. The officer had a description of McCann and knew he would
10:47 have a large tattoo on his stomach if it was him. He asked McCann to lift up his shirt
10:51 to which McCann shouted obscenities at him and ran out of the taxi.
10:55 [Music]
11:23 After almost nine hours of chasing Joseph McCann in cars, on foot and using helicopters,
11:29 on the 6th of May at 2.36am he was found hiding up a tree down a rural country lane.
11:34 [Music]
11:39 After a long battle with negotiators, he was finally detained and arrested. He taunted
11:43 the police by saying "if you had caught me for the first two, the rest of this wouldn't
11:48 have happened". He also claimed that the young girls in his car had just wanted a lift
11:52 and he was simply helping them out. He entered a not guilty plea to all the charges related
11:57 to the 11 women and children. On December 6th of that same year he appeared via video
12:02 link from Belmarsh Prison at the Old Bailey Courthouse in London. Mr Justice Edis was
12:07 presiding. McCann refused to come to court and complained that he was sleep deprived
12:12 and physically couldn't make it in. Not only did he show no respect for the justice
12:16 system, he showed no remorse to any of his victims. He was tried and unanimously convicted
12:22 of a shocking 37 offences. The jury praised the victims for their bravery and courage
12:28 in coming forward. Joseph McCann was given 33 life sentences in order to spend a minimum
12:34 of 40 years in prison for his heinous and appalling crimes. The judge branded him a
12:39 classic psychopath and his violent and horrific rampage was described as unprecedented.
12:45 Police believed that for those 15 days they were hunting for him, he was using a variety
12:50 of disguises, cars and false names. He was also being hidden and protected by various
12:55 associates and six people were arrested in connection with concealing him. The frightening
13:00 and depraved acts that Joseph McCann had inflicted on so many people and communities enraged
13:05 the public. People couldn't fathom how he had been released from prison with his IPP
13:09 sentence being ignored. BBC News said that the National Probation Service had "not
13:14 followed the correct procedures" and following his 2017 arrest he should have been made to
13:19 answer to the parole board before being released. This would likely have been denied by the
13:24 board meaning he would have remained in prison. The Ministry of Justice conducted an investigation
13:28 and review into what had gone wrong within the broader criminal justice system in dealing
13:32 with Joseph McCann. Although not normally done, these findings were released to the
13:36 public. They concluded that the National Probation Service did not manage McCann effectively
13:41 or in line with the policies and procedures which set out the expectations for managing
13:46 offenders who pose a high risk of harm.
13:48 "It was a very concerning case. This was a dreadful, dreadful set of offences and in
13:55 this case I think there was clearly an individual error. McCann should have been referred to
14:01 the parole board after he'd committed further offences."
14:05 They also found that the management of him as an individual was not consistent enough.
14:10 With a high turnover of staff and subsequent files and paperwork that needed to be handed
14:14 over being rushed. Other newspapers suggested that budget cuts and staff shortages within
14:19 the NPS had a part to play in things too. After an internal investigation, one member
14:24 of staff was demoted.
14:26 Harry Fletcher, the former Assistant General Secretary of the Probation Officers' Union
14:31 would say "a recent parliamentary answer shows that one person a week is let out wrongly."
14:37 There has never been a consequence as devastating as this.
14:41 [Music]