Latest news with #Wests
Daily Mirror
17 hours ago
- Daily Mirror
Teen's face cocooned in tape so she could breathe but not scream before sick murder
*WARNING: GRAPHIC DETAILS* 30 years after Fred & Rose West, even the 'most seasoned detectives' are still haunted by the bizarre and twisted way they killed 15-year-old Shirley The remains of nine women were found in the Fred and Rose West's House of Horrors - each naked, missing body parts, and cut to pieces with a kitchen knife in the family bathtub. Some were buried with their hands and feet still bound. Others had gags and other sex act paraphernalia in their shallow graves. But all shared one tragic fact: They had suffered. Terribly. The nine victims of 25 Cromwell Street hadn't just been killed - they had been tortured, slaughtered and butchered. And today, 30 years on from Rose's conviction for 10 counts of murder and Fred's suicide, one find, in particular, still haunts even the most experienced of crime investigators. For detectives found one of the victims - later discovered to be 15-year-old Shirley Hubbard - had been kept alive, stripped and likely suspended from the cellar beam with her arms and legs outstretched.... all while her face was entirely cocooned. Her whole head had been covered in parcel tape, save for one small breathing tube inserted in her nostril. It would have been just enough to keep her alive for their sick sexual acts yet she would have been unable to either see or scream. "You can't understand the West case and understand how truly wicked Fred and Rose were until you understand what was actually done to these girls," says the leading expert, Howard Sounes. "This isn't Agatha Christie where girls get bumped over the head and they die. It's torture - sexual torture to death. Imagine the anguish of this girl, she can breathe but can't scream." Shirley's remains were found during the excavation of the cellar at Gloucester's 25 Cromwell Street following the police tip off and raid in 1994. The first body found had been that of Fred and Rose's own 16-year-old daughter Heather, who was in several pieces under the patio. She had disappeared in 1987, with the Wests telling their other children she had run away and cut contact. After police unearthed Heather's remains, they soon realised her murder was just the latest of many. The deaths at Cromwell Street dated back two decades to 1973. All the victims were vulnerable young women, either "lodgers or runaways". It's thought Fred and Rose often hunted the local bus stops looking for prey - and would lure girls with a promise of a safe ride home. Instead they became their "sexual playthings" - until they got bored. Howard Sounes covered the original story for the Mirror in 1994 and 1995 and went on to become a leading expert in the case, interviewing dozens of people connected to the case, and becoming the senior producer of this year's Netflix hit Fred & Rose West: A British Horror Story. He recently gained access to more than 100 hours of police interview tapes from West's initial 1994 interrogations for his new book The Fred West Tapes, which is released this week and is being serialised in The Mirror. Of all the gruesome details of the Fred and Rose case he's heard and seen, it's the shocking crime scene photo of Shirley Hubbard's skull that remains one of the most horrifying. "I've seen the picture as the skull came out of the ground," he explains. "There was just a skull, hair and teeth left in a cocoon of parcel tape. Inserted into the parcel tape, up in to the nostril of this poor girl - or where the nose would have been - was a plastic tube. Like a home brewing tube." Fred actually admitted in the police interviews: "We had to keep them quiet so I wrapped them up in parcel tape", but he was less forthcoming about the details. According to Howard, however, the sight was enough to make "even the most seasoned detectives wince". "So he wrapped this poor girl's face in tape - which, by the way, he stole from work, because he was a habitual thief - and she was left naked, hands bound, feet bound, and probably hanging from the cellar beams," explains Howard. "Then this tube was inserted. So she can breathe and that prolongs the ordeal but she can't scream. And that's how she's found." No one can know how long the 15-year-old was kept alive. Once dead, she was decapitated and placed in a well in the floor under the fireplace, which was then covered in concrete. The Wests used the same technique for all five girls in the cellar. The youngest West children would later remember sleeping in that same cellar, which Fred also refers to as his "dungeon" on the interview tapes. They had to use a bucket for the toilet at night and empty it each morning. One child claimed they had been locked in the cupboard under the stairs one day when they heard screams before later seeing freshly-laid cement. It took weeks to identify Shirley using skull analysis. Experts painstakingly tried to recreate her likely facial features from the remaining bone structure and cross referenced them with missing girls from the time. Shirley had been born in Birmingham and was known as Shirley Lloyd, and Shirley Owen. Her parents split up when she was just two and she had ended up in care. But she had been trying to make the most of her life. She had changed her name to Hubbard was on school work experience placement at Debenhams in Worcester when she vanished on her way home on November 14, 1974. She was reported missing but police could find no trace - until their grisly find 20 years later. It is thought they lured her into their car while she was waiting at the bus stop. Shirley was the youngest for the victims found in Cromwell Street. (Fred's eight-year-old stepdaughter Charmaine was discovered under the floor of their previous address). While others may have escaped the exact same fate, almost all show signs of possible torture. Each set of dismembered remains was missing several body parts. "It was fingers and toes, but also large bones like kneecaps, sections of vertebrae," explains Howard. "There were dozens of body parts missing and no one really knows why. "The pathologist said you don't lose these body parts. They are being cut off. Yet we don't know if that's before or after death. Is he cutting them off as mementos? Or for torture? And where are they? Because there's dozens of missing bones and they have never been found." In another shocking case, it's believed the Wests may have kept one victim - 21-year-old Exeter University student Lucy Partington - alive for up to six days. She had disappeared on December 27 and on January 3 Fred went to A&E with a fresh knife cut to his hand. A knife was later discovered in Lucy's grave, suggesting he had accidentally dropped it in there after he cut himself. Given the timing of his hospital trip, police believe the Medieval English student may have been held hostage over the New Year holidays. "It's an aspect of the case that is seldom discussed because it is so chilling," says Howard. Lucy was from a middle-class family and had been to see her friend in Cheltenham the night she went missing. Lucy was "renowned for being sensible" according to friends. But her family later realised that she would likely have been waiting for a bus at a stop where the streetlights were out because of a miners' strike. It was also sleeting that night. So when the Wests pulled up in their grey Ford Popular with 'Vote Conservative' stickers on the back, they may have seemed respectable. Howard says in his new book: "Their son Steve West was a baby at this time and it is unlikely that he would have been left at home. The offer of a lift from a young family with a babe in arms may have seemed safe." It's a tactic the husband and wife are believed to have used multiple times. It's thought they then attacked their victims and took them to their "dungeon". Shirley Hubbard's makeshift cellar grave even had an extra grim nod to what was likely her fatal mistake. The fireplace in which she was buried had been covered with Marilyn Monroe wallpaper. It had the names of her films next to pictures from the movies. The words "Bus Stop" were positioned just above where her skull was found encased in concrete. Some of the other West victims had been closer to home - in fact they had rented one of their cut-price rooms on the top floor of their three-storey home. Fred and Rose had only been married less that year when they made their first kill - Lynda Gough, 18, a local fire officer's daughter and lodger, in April 1973. Another lodger was Shirley Anne Robinson, 18. She was missing two vertebrae, two ribs, 28 ankle bones and 42 of the 76 finger and toe bones. Nearby however were the remains of something else - her unborn child, believed to be Fred's and just a few weeks from full term. West was asked during the police interview about whether he derived pleasure from hurting his victims. While he had already confessed to multiple women dying at his home, he tried to maintain many of them were accidents. At one point he asked: "Are these people still alive when you remove [the body parts]?" To which he icily replies: "No comment on that." At another point in the interviews, he was asked the same question by another officer. Even though he admitted dismembering the bodies - in the family bathroom with a kitchen knife so as not to scratch the bath enamel - West seemed to find the suggestion he would deliberately torture someone as simply outrageous. "No, no. I couldn't hurt anybody like that," Fred told police. "I don't believe in suffering anyway. I mean, I couldn't torture anybody." He added: "Well, I mean ... If they were cut up, it was just their heads and legs. Nothing else took off." "That was Fred. He said these things in such a matter of fact manner," said Howard. "The Wests were never a normal couple. But they lived in a house, in the street, next to Marks and Spencer and a Seven-Day Adventist Church. Fred was that funny bloke who said hello to everyone. Rose was the slightly odd wife people avoided. But no one would ever have imagined they were mass murderers."
Irish Daily Mirror
4 days ago
- Irish Daily Mirror
'Fred West was a monster, but Rose did something even worse to us kids'
Few could be worse parents than Fred and Rose West. Their 16 year old daughter Heather was strangled, dismembered in the family bath (using a kitchen knife to avoid scratching the enamel) and buried under the patio. Fred West's eight year old stepdaughter Charmaine was found kneecapped and dissected under their previous residence. Not one, but two of West's pregnant mistresses were discovered in unofficial graves, both just a few weeks away from full term. West's ex-wife Rena was found in a nearby field, a runaway was buried under what used to be a paddling pool. Another woman was found under the bathroom floor and five more were in the cellar - where the youngest West children slept. However, those who survived life at 25 Cromwell Street in Gloucester didn't consider themselves much luckier. Author Howard Sounes, who helped break the West story as a Mirror reporter in 1994 and is now the leading expert on the case, recently gained access to over 100 hours of Fred West's unheard police interviews. Now, in Day One of our serialisation of his new book The Fred West Tapes: Secrets of the Fred and Rose West Murder Investigation, he shares his chilling previously-unpublished interview with West's son Barry, revealing what it was truly like growing up in Britain's House of Horrors, reports the Mirror. Barry's sisters, Mae West and Heather West, daughters of Fred and Rose West. (Image: Collect) Fred and Rose West's 10 victims (Image: Rex Features) Anna-Marie West was a mere eight years old when her father and stepmother first violated her. From then on, violation became a regular occurrence. She was bound to metal torture devices that builder Fred West crafted at work - and was told it was perfectly normal. Some, but not all, of the West children were exploited for sexual gratification not only by Fred and Rose. On occasion, a few of them were permitted to attend their parents' party - only, according to one child, to be abused by inebriated men with their parents' endorsement. Incest was ingrained in Fred's DNA, and child abuse was as commonplace as meal times at 25 Cromwell Street. But, oddly enough, it wasn't always their father who instilled the most fear amongst the West children. It was Rose. The mother and stepmother has refuted all allegations against her for 30 years. However, in November 1995, she was convicted of 10 counts of murder between 1971 and 1987. During the trial, the court heard copious evidence of her committing severe sexual and physical assaults against children. She later became only the second woman - after Myra Hindley - to be given a Whole Life Order, meaning she'll never be released. Many of her children, like her son Barry, received a life sentence of their own - never recovering from the trauma the Wests inflicted. Fred and Rose West 25 Cromwell Street. (Image: He battled with his mental health and had been using drugs. He tragically passed away two years after meeting me to recount the full horror of life inside the House of Horrors. In a heart-wrenching interview, Barry revealed: "My dad was a solid monster," but he added, "But she [Rose] was a complete psycho. That's what people don't know: My mum was, child abuse-wise, the main person. My mum was completely sick in the head. She beat me way more than my dad did, and enjoyed it, absolutely enjoyed it." When they were children, the West siblings were forced to sleep in the cellar, often locked in there at night, sometimes strapped to their beds. Rose was the jailer of her own children, wearing the keys to the cellar around her neck. The slightest provocation would trigger Rose, resulting in violent outbursts: not just hitting and slapping but stabbing and strangling her children. She also used a novelty giant wooden spoon as a weapon. "My nose is on a slant because of the amount of times she broke it," Barry confessed. "She would use [the spoon] as a baseball bat to beat us. I've got massive scars on the back of my head from the amount of times she split my head open with it. She broke my arm, all sorta stuff. She had intense enjoyment in beating the s**t out of me... " Inside 25 Cromwell Street where bodies were hidden just below where the children slept (Image: mirrorpix) TV Producer Howard Sounes covered the case for the Mirror in 1994 and is Senior Producer of Netflix's Fred & Rose: A British Horror Story. His new book, serialised in the Mirror, features a never-before-seen photo of Fred West in prison on the cover Tragically, these are Barry's earliest memories. He said: "She was just as sick as him. Her moods didn't change. She used to hit us even on Christmas Day. She used to smack you straight in the mouth." One Christmas, Barry made the mistake of not liking his mum's Brussels sprouts. "I put them in a tissue and then hid them in the back of a chair," he said. Days later Rose discovered them, rotting away. "She put them on the table, and she made me eat them," he added. "[Then] she put her hand over my mouth and made me swallow my own sick. That's the sort of s**t I had growing up. I don't remember any present opening." Life at Cromwell Street was utterly without joy. Rose dispatched her daughters to school with cropped hair, like lads, wearing boys' footwear because it was more durable. She forced her girls to wash their hair with washing-up liquid instead of proper shampoo and refused to buy deodorant, leaving them open to mockery from classmates. The West lads attended school dressed in their sisters' cast-offs, their hair allowed to grow long like girls. Several developed squints and speech problems, which can be signs of child abuse. Police bring out the grim evidence during the search of 25 Cromwell Street in 1994. This November will be 30 years since Rose West's conviction (Image: mirrorpix) Fred and Rose West (Image: PA) "When we was young, we all had speech impediments," says Barry, "I got my face punched in every day I went to school....[I was] scared to go to school, scared to go home." It wasn't just Rose awaiting him at home. His father was there too. The youngsters once pooled their money to buy him a £12 Zippo lighter for Father's Day. They even had it engraved. "He threw it across the room," Barry recalled. "That was the kind of man he was." That wasn't even the beginning of it. West spoke about sex constantly in front of the children, about wanting to take his daughters' virginity, about the family tradition of incest, even sex with animals. His declared ambition – the very notion is mad – was to see Rose mounted by a bull. "[Dad] was such a revolting man, he was vile," Barry told me. Fred wanted to deflower his daughters, and Barry claimed he was coerced into sexual situations with his mother at just "eight or nine". The children frequently had to take phone bookings for 'Mandy', their mum's pseudonym when she was working as a prostitute. Barry began being offered up to clients as an extra, as such. Barry West, believed to be aged eight. He was given a new identity when his parents were arrested and kept his adult appearance secret Rose West, aged six. (Image: According to him, one evening, Rose came downstairs in her nightdress and told Barry to follow her to her room. "She said, 'There's a man in here and I want you to do exactly what he tells you to do, no matter what'," recalled Barry. "[I] was just confused. I didn't know what she was talking about. I walk in and there was a giant man in front of me." The man raped Barry. This was just the beginning. His abuser continued to visit the house to molest him and have sex with Rose. The mum had a dedicated pair of underwear for each regular, kept in separate labelled jars. West also insisted she kept all used contraceptives in order to "artificially inseminate" their children. Barry claimed they were even made to watch homemade porn featuring their mother. It was occasionally suggested within the family that Barry might not have been West's biological child at all, but rather the result of the incestuous relationship between Rose and her father, Bill Letts. Bill had reportedly been sexually abusing Rose since childhood and, according to notes made in prison by West, was a frequent visitor to Cromwell Street. The Irish Mirror's Crime Writers Michael O'Toole and Paul Healy are writing a new weekly newsletter called Crime Ireland. Click here to sign up and get it delivered to your inbox every week West claimed one of his daughters once came downstairs complaining: "Grampy [is] going to sleep with me." According to West, Rose responded: "He is not going to eat you, he is only going to f**k you. You'll probably love it." (Rose consistently denies all wrongdoing despite her murder convictions). Alongside the violence and abuse, young women were being lured to the house where they were assaulted, killed, and often dismembered by West (in the family bathroom). All victims were discovered with fingers, toes and other body parts missing, prompting one psychologist to suggest there may have been a cannibalistic aspect to the murders. The eldest surviving child Anna-Marie was approaching nine when 19 year old Lynda Gough was murdered in 1973, marking the first of the nine Cromwell Street killings. Eight more women, some of them lodgers, vanished over the following six years. The remains of West's first wife Rena, pregnant mistress Anne McFall and stepdaughter Charmaine were interred elsewhere. Most of the children insisted they were oblivious to what was happening. However, years later, one child (who will remain unnamed) alleged that there were days when they were locked in a cupboard under the stairs amidst shouting and screaming. Upon emerging, they noticed fresh concrete had been poured in the cellar. Fred and Rose in the early days of the relationship. Rose was found guilty of 10 counts of murder, while Fred hanged himself before trial (Image: Netflix: Fred & Rose West: A British Horror Story) "Why didn't we all run away?" Barry, who later grappled with severe psychological issues, questioned me. "I suppose that's the hold he had, the power. My dad was like God. You couldn't beat him. You couldn't run away. He would find you." Barry considered ending their torment by killing his father. "I tried stabbing him when I was 11 with a screwdriver. He just laughed at me," he alleged. The younger siblings did manage some retaliation against Rose, however. Just before they were taken into care during the police investigation, Barry claimed Rose attacked them with a wooden spoon and they all united to confront her. "I remember all my sisters piling on top [of her], and we all sort of stood up [to her] and she was exhausted," he alleged. "She was knackered. She hit us until [she] couldn't hit us anymore. And that's when she broke down. And I saw the weakness of her, and she was crying her eyes out." However, the children were well aware not to cross any boundaries - or break the West's code of silence. Heather, Barry's older sister, served as their warning. She disappeared at the age of 16 in 1987 after expressing a desire to leave home. The children were informed that she had moved away and severed contact. But it became a family 'joke': if you crossed Fred and Rose, you'd end up like Heather - beneath the patio, three paving stones up and nine across. Barry later revealed: "That was what was going to happen to all of us when we got old enough. If we didn't turn out like him, we was against him. And if we was against him, we would have to go in the garden – under the patio. He made us understand that." When this 'joke' reached the police, the diggers were brought in. And the Wests' decades of degradation could no longer remain hidden. Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest news from the Irish Mirror direct to your inbox: Sign up here.
Daily Mirror
5 days ago
- Daily Mirror
'My serial killer dad Fred West was monster, but Mum did the unthinkable to us kids'
On the anniversary of Cromwell Street trial, Fred and Rose West's son reveals what it was really like growing up in the House of Horrors - and how he once tried to kill his father, only to get an unexpected reaction Few could make worse parents than Fred and Rose West. Their daughter Heather, 16, was strangled, dismembered in the family bath (with a kitchen knife so as not to scratch the enamel) and buried under the patio. West's eight-year-old stepdaughter Charmaine was discovered kneecapped and dissected under their previous home. And not one but two of West's pregnant mistresses were found in unofficial graves, both just a few weeks shy of being full term. West's ex-wife Rena was in a nearby field, a runaway was buried under what had been a paddling pool. Another woman was under the bathroom floor and five more were in the cellar - where the youngest West children slept. But those who survived life at Gloucester's 25 Cromwell Street did not count themselves that much luckier. Author Howard Sounes helped break the West story as a Mirror reporter in 1994, and as the leading expert on the case recently gained access to more than 100 hours of Fred West's unheard police interviews. Now in Day One of our serialisation of his new book The Fred West Tapes: Secrets of the Fred & Rose West Murder Investigation, he shares his harrowing previously-unpublished interview with West's son Barry, revealing what it was really like growing up in Britain's House of Horrors….. Anna-Marie West was just eight when her father and stepmum first raped her. Thereafter, rape became routine. She was strapped to metal torture contraptions that builder Fred West made at work - and told it was perfectly normal. Some, but not all, of the West children were used for sexual pleasure not only by Fred and Rose. Once a few of them were allowed to go to their parents' party - only, according to one child, to be molested by drunken men with their parents' encouragement. Incest was part of Fred's DNA, and child abuse was as routine as mealtimes at 25 Cromwell Street. But, bizarrely, it wasn't always their father who inspired the most fear amongst the West children. It was Rose. The mum and stepmum has denied all allegations against her for 30 years. But in November 1995, she was found guilty of 10 counts of murder between 1971 and 1987. During the trial, the court heard abundant evidence of her committing serious sexual and physical assaults against children. She later became only the second woman - after Myra Hindley - to be handed a Whole Life Order, meaning she'll never be freed. Many of her children, like her son Barry, received a life sentence of their own - never recovering from the trauma the Wests inflicted. He struggled with his mental health and had been used drugs. He sadly died two years after meeting me to describe the full horror of life inside the House of Horrors. It is only now I can share that interview for the first time. 'My dad was a solid monster,' Barry told me. 'But she [Rose] was a complete psycho. That's what people don't know: My mum was, child abuse-wise, the main person. My mum was completely sick in the head. She beat me way more than my dad did, and enjoyed it, absolutely enjoyed it.' When the West children were young they were made to sleep in the cellar, often locked in there at night, sometimes strapped to their beds. Rose was her children's gaoler, wearing the keys to the cellar around her neck. The slightest thing would set Rose off, and she would lash out violently: not just hitting and slapping but stabbing and strangling her children. She also hit them with a novelty giant wooden spoon. 'My nose is on a slant because of the amount of times she broke it,' Barry told me. 'She would use [the spoon] as a baseball bat to beat us. I've got massive scars on the back of my head from the amount of times she split my head open with it. She broke my arm, all sorta stuff. She had intense enjoyment in beating the s**t out of me… ' Sadly, these were Barry's earliest memories. He said: 'She was just as sick as him. Her moods didn't change. She used to hit us even on Christmas Day. She used to smack you straight in the mouth.' One Christmas, Barry made the mistake of not liking Mum's brussel sprouts. 'I put them in a tissue and then hid them in the back of a chair,' he said. Days later Rose found them, rotting away. 'She put them on the table, and she made me eat them,' he added. '[Then] she put her hand over my mouth and made me swallow my own sick. That's the sort of s**t I had growing up. I don't remember any present opening.' Childhood at Cromwell Street was simply joyless. Rose sent her girls to school with short hair, like boys, wearing boys' shoes because they lasted longer. She made her daughters clean their hair with washing-up liquid rather than shampoo and she didn't allow the purchase of deodorant, which the girls were teased about. The West boys went to school in their sisters' hand-me-downs, allowing their hair to grow long like girls. Many developed squints and speech defects, which can be indications of child abuse. 'When we was young, we all had speech impediments,' says Barry, 'I got my face punched in every day I went to school….[I was] scared to go to school, scared to go home.' It wasn't just Rose waiting for him at home. It was also his father. The children once clubbed together to buy him a £12 Zippo lighter for Father's Day. They even got it inscribed. 'He threw it across the room,' Barry recalled. 'That was the kind of man he was.' That wasn't the half of it. West spoke about sex constantly in front of the kids, about wanting to take his daughters' virginity, about the family tradition of incest, even sex with animals. His stated ambition – the very idea is insane – was to see Rose mounted by a bull. '[Dad] was such a disgusting man, he was vile,' Barry told me. Fred wanted to deflower his daughters, and Barry claimed he was forced into sexual situations with his mother at just 'eight or nine'. The children often had to take phone bookings for 'Mandy', their mum's alias when she was working as a prostitute. Barry started being offered up to clients as an extra, as such. According to him, one evening, Rose came downstairs in her nightdress and told Barry to follow her to her room. 'She said, 'There's a man in here and I want you to do exactly what he tells you to do, no matter what',' recalled Barry. '[I] was just confused. I didn't know what she was talking about. I walk in and there was a giant man in front of me.' The regular raped Barry. This was just the start. His abuser continued to visit the house to molest him and have sex with Rose. The mum had a dedicated pair of underwear for each regular, kept in separate labelled jars. West also insisted she kept all used contraceptives in order to "artificially inseminate' their children. Barry claimed they were even made to watch homemade porn featuring their mother. It was sometimes said within the family that Barry may not have been West's child at all, but the product of the incestuous relationship between Rose and her father, Bill Letts. Bill had allegedly been abusing Rose since she was a girl and, according to notes made in prison by West, was a regular visitor to Cromwell Street. West alleged one of his daughters once came downstairs complaining: 'Grampy [is] going to sleep with me.' According to West, Rose said: 'He is not going to eat you, he is only going to f**k you. You'll probably love it.' (Rose routinely denies all wrongdoing even after her murder convictions). Alongside the beatings and the abuse, young women were being brought to the house where they were attacked, murdered, often dismembered by West (in the family bathroom). All were found with fingers, toes and other body parts missing, leading one psychologist to suggest there could have been a cannibalistic element to the killings. The eldest surviving child Anna-Marie was coming up for nine when 19-year-old Lynda Gough was killed in 1973, the first of the nine Cromwell Street murders. Eight more women, some of them lodgers, disappeared over the next six years. The bodies of West's first wife Rena, pregnant mistress Anne McFall and stepdaughter Charmaine were buried elsewhere. Most of the children maintained they had no idea what was going on. Years later, however, one child (whom I won't identify) claimed that there were days when they were locked in a cupboard under the stairs while they heard shouting and screaming. When they came out they saw fresh concrete had been poured in the cellar. 'Why didn't we all run away?' Barry, who went on to suffer a long battle of psychological issues, asked me. 'I suppose that's the hold he had, the power. My dad was like God. You couldn't beat him. You couldn't run away. He would find you.' Barry contemplated killing his father to end their misery. "I tried stabbing him when I was eleven with a screwdriver. He just laughed at me," he claimed. The younger siblings did get some revenge on Rose, however. Just before they were taken into care during the police investigation, Barry claimed Rose came at them with the wooden spoon and they all joined forces to turn on her. "I remember all my sisters jumping on top [of her], and we all sort of stood up [to her] and she was tired," he claimed. "She was knackered. She hit us until [she] couldn't hit us anymore. And that's when she broke down. And I saw the weakness of her, and she was crying her eyes out..." On the whole however, the children knew not to step out of line - or break the West code of silence. Barry's older sister Heather was their warning. She vanished aged 16 in 1987 after saying she wanted to leave home. The children were told she'd moved away and cut contact, But it became a family 'joke': if you crossed Fred and Rose, you'd end up like Heather - under the patio, three paving stones up and nine across. Barry later said: 'That was what was going to happen to all of us when we got old enough. If we didn't turn out like him, we was against him. And if we was against him, we would have to go in the garden – under the patio. He made us understand that.' When that 'joke' reached the ears of police, the diggers moved in. And the Wests' decades of debasement would stay buried no more….
The Spinoff
11-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Spinoff
Twenty years on, Outrageous Fortune remains as relevant as ever
Tara Ward reflects on an Outrageous week on The Spinoff. On 12 July, 2005, Outrageous Fortune burst onto our screens and transformed the landscape of New Zealand television. Created by Rachel Lang and James Griffin, the big, bold comedy-drama ran for six award-winning seasons and 108 episodes following the unpredictable exploits of the Wests, a family of career criminals living in West Auckland. It wasn't easy for the Wests to go straight, and Outrageous captured the attention and affection of New Zealanders in a way that no local scripted series had before. The Spinoff spent this week celebrating the 20th anniversary of Outrageous Fortune, and it's been a delightful trip down TV memory lane. We began on Monday with my cover story about how the Wests were born, and how the show was inspired by a news report that writer Rachel Lang heard in the shower one morning in 2003. I'd always thought Outrageous Fortune was an instant success, but it turns out New Zealand audiences were a tough crowd. It took three seasons before our love affair with Outrageous truly blossomed, and the show proved critics wrong over and over again. Across six dramatic seasons, Outrageous burrowed into our national consciousness in a variety of unexpected and colourful ways. I loved Alex Casey's deep dive into the show's spectacular use of swearing, while Liam Rātana took us on a thoughtful trip through Outrageous Fortune's most defining and memorable moments. Gareth Shute explored how the show championed a variety of iconic, sometimes forgotten New Zealand music, and Emma Gleason unpacked the unique style of our favourite Westies in all their leather and leopard-print glory. Tomorrow, actor Siobhan Marshall (who played Pascalle West) ends the week by taking us through her life in television. The legacy of Outrageous Fortune runs deep – even now, it's hard to see someone wearing leopard print without thinking of Cheryl West (and if you're wondering how obsessed New Zealand was with the show, check out this impressive 2010 entry for a Cheryl-lookalike competition in Ashburton). Outrageous Fortune inspired the award-winning prequel series Westside, and several of the show's cast and crew went on to achieve international success, including Antony Starr (The Boys, Banshee) and Robyn Malcolm, who most recently starred in the BAFTA-nominated After the Party and Netflix global hit drama The Survivors. Rewatching Outrageous Fortune reminded me that aspects of the show remain as relevant today as they were in 2005. 'In our real world, we are all encouraged to think that if we just try hard enough and show initiative, we can all be rich and famous,' Lang and Griffin wrote in their original Outrageous pitch. Twenty years later, everyone from politicians to influencers to the media remind us that we too can be wealthy and successful, if we only try hard enough. Lang was inspired to create Outrageous Fortune after she learned the median income for New Zealand women in 2003 was just over $14,000. The week before I spoke to Lang about that memory, the government rushed through changes to pay equity laws, which will predominantly impact the incomes of working-class women. Two decades may have passed, but some things haven't changed. Outrageous Fortune is a New Zealand television success story, a show filled with our voices, our issues and our humour. It's been a joy to spend a week remembering and celebrating the series. Once you've read all our Outrageous Week pieces, do yourself a favour – take a trip back to 2005 and enjoy a West family reunion this weekend.
The Spinoff
10-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Spinoff
How the West was worn: The fashion of Outrageous Fortune
For Outrageous Week, fashion writer Emma Gleason unpacks the unmatched style of New Zealand's favourite westies. The Wests burst into our consciousness in a flurry of leather and leopard print, canonising the style of West Auckland with an attention to detail not often seen on screens. Sharkies, black hoodies and leather jackets were rendered faithfully, and so too was the distinctive fashion of the Westie woman – a brash bricolage of animal prints, gleaming adornments and tight, tight denim. Seasoning all the flavours of this distinctive wardrobe were the fashions of the mid-aughts Aotearoa — skirts were short and cleavage out, T-shirts emblazoned with logos, and it was all very, very 2005. Costume designer Katrina Hodge was tasked with outfitting Outrageous Fortune's rogues' gallery. 'I can't recall the exact brief I was given at the time, but the tone was clear: real, broken-in, lived-in, and iconic,' she says. 'Each character had a backstory, and that's where the work really began. To build an authentic look for each one, we'd deep-dive into their world and ask: Where do they work? What music do they love? What are their hobbies? Do they walk, drive, or ride a motorcycle? Who do they aspire to be?' Understanding and reflecting a subculture faithfully requires research, and Hodge's took her to the West Auckland shopping mecca of Henderson Mall. 'It was gold. There were so many real-life Cheryls and Pascalle-types – women out on the town at the mall, sunglasses pushed up on their heads, hipster bootcut jeans just a bit too tight,' she recalls. 'There was a clear recipe these West Auckland women embraced: strong, overtly proud, bold, no matter your body type. It was a visual feast and an absolute gift in terms of sourcing and inspiration.' Malls were where she built out Robyn Malcolm's wardrobe, sourcing a lot of her signature tight, lacy and low-cut tops from places like Hartleys and Max. Wealth markers mattered, of course, so there were designer brands in the mix too – Muse, Yvonne Bennetti, Sass & Bide, Miss Crabb – and Hodge even went shopping across the ditch (the height of sophistication at the time) to tap into loud Aussie glamour. 'I actually hopped on a plane to Sydney a couple of times and shopped at David Jones specifically for Cheryl. We didn't have David Jones in New Zealand, and their offering was quite different – more variety, and just the right kind of pieces that Cheryl could own.' Cheryl's look was distinctive, regimented: shield sunnies, V-necks, tight bootcut jeans, high heels. In her interview for The Spinoff's Cover Story, Robyn Malcolm describes it as a form of armour. 'She was un apologetic, aggressive and very sexy about the way she dressed, and that immediately put me in a certain headspace,' she says. Though Cheryl's famously associated with leopard print, she didn't actually wear it until the end of season one. 'I'd sourced that leopard print dress specifically for the cast photoshoot, and from the moment I saw her in it, I was determined to get it into the season finale,' Hodge says. 'It wasn't intentional symbolism at the time, but in hindsight, it does feel fitting.' Placing the costumes within the Auckland of 2005 and reflecting the material aspirations of the family saw Hodge sourcing local fashion labels to 'ground the show in a recognisable New Zealand aesthetic'. It's a roll-call that includes Zambesi, Lucie Boshier, Deadly Ponies, Lonely Hearts, Kathryn Wilson and, for Van and Munter, Huffer. Designers saw their pieces on telly each week and got behind the show. 'We bought quite a few pieces from Karen Walker for the show; she was incredibly supportive, and her designs often struck the right tone between fashion-forward and character-specific,' Hodge remembers. Local designs most often appeared on aspiring model Pascalle (Siobhan Marshall), the most overtly trendy West. She was eclipsed only by the show's resident sophisticate Tracy Hong (Michelle Ang) who, thanks to her father's money, had the most obviously high-end, fashion-forward outfits of the series, all avant-garde (for Auckland) knitwear and edgy tailoring that communicated sexual power and business savvy. Brevity was the essence of Pascalle's wardrobe. 'I used to call my skirts my belts, because they were basically belts,' says Marshall. Jackets were abbreviated too, so were tight pastel tracksuits and tiny handbags. With her white-framed shield sunnies and salon hair, she looked like a Hilton sister from Henderson, one who wore brands like Miss Crabb and Mala Brajkovic, both of which were big news in Auckland at the time. So was Karen Walker, who had released her 'Liberal and Miserable' collection in 2004. Hodge had several pieces from that range, and would frequently dress Antonia Prebble in that iconic T-shirt. 'It just felt so apt for Loretta. The slogan captured her sharp wit, cynicism, and that early-era teenage defiance perfectly,' she explains. 'It said everything Loretta would, without her having to open her mouth.' That top, and others like the D.A.R.E T-shirt, reappeared in the series constantly. Hodge says it helped to add authenticity, depth and continuity to each character. 'Clothes weren't just costumes – they were part of the world, part of the story. The scuffs, the stretch, the history in each piece made the characters feel more real,' she says. 'It was really important to me that their clothes felt lived-in.' Many garments were secondhand, sourced from op shops or vintage boutiques like Fast & Loose or Scotties Recycle. Slogan T-shirts were integral for characterisation. 'Graphic tees played a big part in character storytelling, and I used them with real intention throughout the series. The slogans and imagery often carried symbolism or subtle narrative cues,' explains Hodge. Their very appearance was rebellious. 'Outrageous Fortune was one of the few shows where the producers and directors really embraced that level of subliminal messaging. On most productions, you're encouraged to avoid obvious slogans or text — but here, it became part of the visual language of the show.' Van (Antony Starr) wore T-shirt that read 'Guilty' in gothic font, but his twin Jethro (also Antony Starr) used fashion to send a different message. A newly-minted lawyer, his blousy shirts sharpened up by season two, where he goes shopping for trendy striped shirts and leather jackets on Ponsonby Road with Hayden (Shane Cortese with blonde highlights). Many of the suits were from Fifth Ave, Smith & Caugheys and Crane Brothers, with Murray Crane himself custom-making the baby blue suit (kitsch!) worn by Ted West for his wedding in season four. That look was an outlier though, as most of the series saw Frank Whitten dressed in his signature tracksuits (usually Adidas or Carhartt) and a cheesecutter. 'Frank could look just as dapper in a tracksuit and worn grey trainers as he did when dressed in his Sunday best. He had this quiet charisma,' says Hodge, adding that the late actor was a pleasure to dress. 'Effortless, grounded, and full of character. Always quiet in his fittings, but I knew when he liked something, as he would get a sparkle in his eye.' She adds that Ted was her quiet nod to The Sopranos. There were other parallels between the television crime families. Singlets are beloved by bogans as much as made men, and Wolf (Grant Bowler) had a lot of them. He also wore swaggering jackets, matched only by his rival in love and leather, Wayne (Kirk Torrance), who got to wear what's possibly the best suede jacket ever seen on New Zealand screens. Another jacket, by Australian streetwear brand Tsubi – SO cool in the early 2000s – was such a uniform for Munter that Tammy Davis ended up keeping it after the show. While a tool for building consistency, costuming also reflected narrative shifts and personal growth. 'As each character's journey deepened or changed course, their wardrobe evolved to reflect that growth,' says Hodge. Loretta was introduced to us with a definitive look: men's jeans, baggy T-shirts (very Lorde 2025) and Converse sneakers or, like Ted, Adidas tracksuits. 'But as she discovered her wily power and began to embrace her sexuality, her style shifted with her. She started to dress with more intention and confidence, revealing a new identity through her clothing.' Speaking of revealing, even the underwear was critical to the world-building. 'Every costume started with the base layers and built out from there. Lingerie wasn't just functional but foundational to the look, the mood, and the character,' Hodge says. Particularly for Cheryl, it was a way of scaffolding her confidence and deportment. 'I often intentionally clashed the bra with the outfit, so it became part of the look – not something to be hidden. A red lace bra under a leopard print dress… a purple one under something equally loud. The girls, as we called them, were always front and proud.' Twenty years on, it's the subtext of the show's styling – and its real-world counterparts – that still speak the kind of volumes that would warrant a noise control call out. All those nuanced fashion conventions in Outrageous Fortune communicated the way women wielded the social capital they had (usually sexual) and how a 40-something matriarch uses accessories to assert dominance. The costuming explored the hierarchies of masculinity, the uniforms adopted for differing vocations of criminality (bank robbers, bikie gangs et al) and the class tensions that still plague Aotearoa to this day. The clashing, brazen style of Outrageous Fortune made an impact at the time, and formed part of a wider cultural shift in the mid-2000s towards bold, brash fashion and the reappraisal of class conventions. It's ripe for revival, with 2000s fashion tropes finding favour with Generation Z and older cohorts (like mine) returning to old favourites. Baggy jeans and graphic T-shirts are the uniform du jour of mall-dwelling adolescents, and low-cut tops and even lower jeans can be seen today on young women across the country. Flashy fashion is back, along with a rebellious attitude, proving that – even two decades on – the Wests are still holding the bag.
