This episode may contain content of a graphic nature, including descriptions of physical and
sexual violence against adults, children, and animals. Listener discretion is advised.
Hi everyone, I'm Talia and I'm Tanya, and together we are Crimes and
Consequences, a true crime podcast. Welcome back, everyone to another episode of
Crimes and Consequences. I am Tanya and this is my lovely co host,
Talia, and we are attorneys in real life. Yesh love to dive into
these cases. I don't know if love is the right word, but are
fascinated, faded and you must be too since you're watching. So before I
get into today's story, just like to remind everyone to hit like or subscribe
if you're watching us on YouTube on the True Crime Daily YouTube channel. Thank
you, yes, thank you True Crime Daily. Please hit the like.
And today's story that I'm going to tell is about a red hot love affair
that ended in murder. Oh but not in the way you think, okay,
because you're probably thinking a certain stereotypical way of murder. But anyway,
passion, yeah, passion. So the woman in the story, her name
is Ruth Ellis. She met David Blakely in August of nineteen fifty three,
after she initially met him. I don't think she liked him very much,
because she said, like, I hope I just never see that little shit
again. Oh well, I don't know if he's obnoxious or what have you.
But however, this initial dislike turned into attraction. Oh because within a
few weeks they started their romantic affair. That's weird. David was described as
being a very self confident type of guy. He you know, he was
popular with the ladies. Let's say, he was handsome, and he was
kind of like the playboy type. Okay, a little arrogant, manipulative,
Yeah, maybe a little bit. And it just seemed like he was the
type of guy that would never love a woman more than he loved himself.
Ah okay, yeah, narcissist. Maybe I'm not a psycho. Yeah,
he exactly. And unfortunately Ruth the type of man she was attracted to,
they were usually were heavy drinkers, and David was also a heavy drinker,
and he wasn't a very fun drunk. In fact, he just really couldn't
hold his liquor at all. He became destructive and crude and just that's really
yeah, just yes, exactly, really unattractive and not a very likable person
when he was drunk. He you know, I told you this, This
love affair moved quick. So within a few weeks I told you, they
started their affair. And then not soon after, David moved in with Ruth,
even though he was already engaged to another woman. Damn right, they're
romance. You know. It wasn't all roses and sunshine. Okay, right,
you're thinking, oh, they're really into each other, but then it
turned violent. Well how can they be that much into each other if he's
engaged, right, and she never wanted to see the little shit? Yeah,
right, Like it's like a love hate kind of thing. I don't
know, right, right. They both were driven by severe jealousy. A
mutual friend said about them that they were just two people who should have never
booked up, booked up right. Ruth was working trying to make the ends
meet, and David was jobless. Okay, but his big hobby was he
building a race car that he had named the Emperor, and I we have
a picture of it. It was a really expensive hobby, and David did
come from money, so I think part of the reason why he really didn't
work is because you know, he received an inheritance and it wasn't huge,
but it was enough for him to be comfortable. But he still mooched a
lot off of Ruth, so you know, he's not really contributing to the
bills. And Ruth is working in a nightclub. That's your waitress. Yeah,
she's a hostess, waitress. And he would show up at the nightclub
trying to get free drinks, of course, and Ruth allowed it because he's
her boyfriend, and she let him run a tab. But it became out
of hand and she'd have to pay for it. Yeah, and she'd have
to pay for it. And like I said, David wasn't a great drunk,
so he'd be there, he'd get drunk, and he just would turn
obnoxious an asshole. Actually, she lost her job because of him, and
then you know, they eventually she lost the apartment eventually too. Okay,
before she lost her job, however, you know the club that she worked
at, it was called the Little Club, a little club, and at
the Little Club she met a really great guy whose name was Desmond Cussin.
He was pretty much like everything you would ever want and a boyfriend. He
was unmarried. That's yeah, sing number one single. Unlike David, he
was. He was someone that had been in World War Two. He had
flown a bomber plane during the war. He was wealthy, He had his
own apartment. You know, he had good standing socially. His family owned
a tobacco business which he directed, so they had some money. Yeah back
in the fifties, right, everybody was smoking. I mean tobacco companies today
that money too. After he and Ruth began getting to know each other,
he told her he wanted to marry her. Oh, and he wanted to
adopt her two children, because I haven't mentioned Ruth was married before, and
she had two children with her ex husband. She had a girl and a
boy, and I'll tell you a little bit about them later. And so,
you know, he's telling her that he loves her and he wants to
marry her, and he was really, like genuinely in love with her,
but she is his boyfriend, right, And she wasn't in love with Desmond.
She was basically using him to make David jealous. Right. But I
told you she lost her apartment, so David went wherever, but Ruth moved
in with Desmond. Oh, and that was in June of nineteen fifty four.
She like I told you, she lost her job, she lost her
apartment, and that's pretty much the driving force of why she moved in with
Desmond. But he was over the moon. Did she still have her kids?
Yes, she still had her kids. And Desmond and Ruth were together
for about two years, and you know, it was a rocky two years
because you really even no exactly, and she was really in love with David.
Okay, sorry, you're okay, she's still in love with David.
Yeah. And after two years, after two years, and he tried to
give Ruth everything he financially, sup, I'm sorry. Yes, Desmond tried
to give her everything. He supported her financially, He got her own apartment
for her when she asked. He told her he wanted to pay for her
children to go to private school, and he wanted to pay for like French
lessons for her and modeling because she did do a little bit of modeling.
But so when she left Desmond for her own apartment, she let David move
in with her of a bit. Yeah, and well, wild Desmond's paying
for the apartment. Wild Desmond's paying for the apartment exactly, so that kind
of pissed him off. As you can imagine, that's not a good idea.
No, So during the following three months, her and David spent so
much time together, and you know, she's trailing Desmond along and it's kind
of fizzling out because he knows he can't really compete with David. He's finally
getting the yeah, I'm paying for an apartment where a man's living there.
Yeah. And the sad part too. You know, Desmond is this great
guy, he's in love with her, and she's in love with a piece
of shit. Oh yeah, who who really didn't treat her well? He
sounds like he was just using her kind of what she was doing with Desmond,
and you know, it just started to spiral out of control. Ruth
just couldn't stay away from David. Toxic love. Yeah, even though you
know she's on this rocky path with Desmond, but he you know, she
just couldn't stay away from David. There was a pretty bad fight between Ruth
and David on February sixth, nineteen fifty five. They it became violent and
physical. Who was violent? They both were violent with each other. They
actually when they were done, when all of a sudden done. They both
had black eyes. What Yeah, Ruth was limping, she was bruised.
And two weeks later, another fight took place and Ruth ended up with another
black eye and bruising that would just went like across both of her shoulders.
So she she got beaten. Yeah, she got beaten really bad. A
little over a month later, another fight took place, and during this one,
David punched her so hard in the stomach that it caused her to have
a miscarriage. Pregnant. Yeah, she was pregnant, and she was just
heartbroken because was it's Yeah, it was David's and she was heartbroken. But
he always managed to worm his way back into her. That's a black No,
Nope, after that happened, he just he knew how to get back
into her good graces. He sent her some flowers, he apologized in the
same routine. Yeah, it's really it was really sad, and they went
they got back together. Their last night together was April eighth, nineteen fifty
five. So this has been a really rocky couple of months. That following
morning, David had decided, Okay, I'm fully going to commit to Ruth.
So he asked her to marry him. Oh okay, you know he
knew this is what she'd been waiting for this whole time, even though they
are incredibly abusive and toxic. Yeah. Right, And so along with the
proposal, he gave her a picture of himself. Oh that's I know,
that's so fucking I know, right, How nice of them, And on
the back of the photograph he had hand written her a message telling her,
you know, he was just I love you so much. It's this adoring
message, and you know, she just cherished it. Okay. Before he
left her that morning, he made a promise to her that that night they
were going to go out for drinks at a place called or excuse me,
their friends were named the find Ladders. They're going to go over to their
house, like we're going to after what the find Ladders. That's their last
name, that's their last name. That they were going to go out that
evening and go over to their friend's house and have some drinks and celebrate their
engagement. But he never came back, and when nine point thirty pm rolled
around, she called over to her friend's house because maybe you know, he
went there first and instead of picking me up, And when the phone was
answered a night, eighteen year old nanny answered the phone and she told Ruth
that nobody was home. Nobody, nobody. And a little while later Ruth
called again, and this time someone else packed picked it up. It was
the man of the house. His name was Aunt Finelander, and Ruth asked
if David was there. He said no, David wasn't here, and Ruth
kind of felt like Aunt's wife, whose name was Carol, was trying to
influence David in a way that would turn him against Ruth for some reason,
like maybe, you know, she thought that Ruth wasn't good enough for David.
For the rest of the night, though, you know, David never
came home, and they asked, Hey, how come you guys didn't show
up? I know, That's what I wondered. Also, no, like
I don't know if they really had a plan. Yeah, I'm wondering.
I will never know. So Ruth kept calling looking for answers because David never
comes home, and eventually they took the phone off the hook because she called
so much and she's just knowing them. Yeah, when midnight rolled around,
now Ruth was like, Okay, now she can't get a hold of anyone
at their house. So she ends up going over there. She was convinced
David was there for some reason and that they were lying to her about it.
When she got there, she walked up to the front door. She
rang the doorbell just repeatedly, and she's banging on the door. Now this
is midnight, right, Nobody answers the door. She they have kids too,
because they got a nanny. She ended up smashing a window. Yeah,
and a little out of hand. She actually it was the window wasn't
on the house. The window was on a car that was parked in their
driveway. And it was a green Vanguard and it was actually David's car.
Oh, and so she's like, why is his car here? Right?
Why is this car here? Why are they saying he's not here? Why
did she smash the window? I know, I don't in a fit of
rage. I'm sure because she found his car there, and and i'd be
a way to get someone's attention. Yeah, exactly, Now they'll come outside.
So she stayed there for hours. She's outside of their house. Now
at two am, the police are called. So Ruth, now, you
know, I was like, okay, I guess I have to should go
gain my composure. You know, I got a little out of control.
Yeah, I know, I kind of lost my shit there. But you
know, she told them, nope, I'm fine, I'm fine, and
they don't arrest her, which I'm surprised because she smashed a window. Vandalized.
Yeah it's vandalized, right, she vandalized it. So the cops leave
and Ruth just started up her shit again. She's knocking on the door,
pounding on the door, ringing the doorbell, she's demanding the same night.
Yeah, I mean, she just doesn't get it, like David had just
proposed to her. That's true, I get that right, like a girl.
You gotta go home now. Yeah, he's recalled. The police were
called again, and now finally Ruth had left before they even got there,
and she's like, okay, fine, I'm just going to go home.
The next day, which was Saturday, Ruth called the Fine Ladders again,
but they they did put the phone back on the hook, but they just
stopped answering it. She went to their house three times around ten am that
morning. David was there, by the way, he was the whole time.
Didn't come out, she knew, Yeah, he didn't come out even
when she smashed his windows. I know, that's what I don't understand it,
Like, can you imagine, like this is total gas lighting? T
this is not okay. I'm sure she's making she's feeling like, am I
crazy? Right? Yeah? I mean she was acting a little Yeah,
they were going to celebrate and he's in the house and not coming out.
Right, David and Aunt's about ten am. Like I said, David and
Aunt go outside going to finally like check out the damage that Ruth has done
to the car. But Ruth kind of she was in the neighborhood and she
saw them come out of the house and they notice her. She's in her
car. So she's like, oh shit, they saw me. So she
speeds away and she came back about two pm and she sat in her car
and she's just stewing confront them, right, I know, she's just stewing.
Now it's been a few you know, now this is I spent a
day like what the fuck is going on? And she just you know,
there she's driving herself crazy with all these thoughts that she's having. She just
really had a bad feeling that you know, David's still there, and she
just started thinking that he's having an affair with the nanny. This is why
he's over there. Like she just starts letting her mind run away with her.
Didn't she just go home? I know, I'm asleep, I know,
sleep girl. She did. She was like, okay, I like
you said, I just have to go home and take a break. But
she did show up four times that day, and the last time when she
showed up, she noticed that the Fine Ladders were having a party. A
party. Yeah, the windows were open. I'm surprised they'd have a party
knowing that they're being st I know, like maybe they couldn't cancel it.
I don't know. The windows were open. So Ruth is listening. There's
music playing, people talking and laughing, and oh yeah, she just was
living seething, like she just the jealousy, the rage is just coursing through
her body. You know. She was like, you know, after everything
I've done for David, I supported is broke ass. I mean, he
doesn't really broke, but she was paying all the bills. You know,
he he caused me to lose my job, I lost my apartment. You
know, my kids have gone through all this bullshit. And he said he
want to marry me. Yeah, Annie said he wanted to marry her andie
cause her to have a miscarriage with their child. Now yeah, yeah,
son, asshole. She one of the times when she stopped home, she
had drank a bit, so she's also drunk when she shows up, and
she had taken a triquilizer, also taking a pill to kind of deal with
everything. And here she is, she's feeling like she's on the edge of
a nervous breakdown and here's David just partying his ass off, probably having sex
with the nanny is what she's thinking. And she's just beside herself. So
she decides she's gonna go home again and you know, maybe like try to
calm down. But even though, you know, she gets home, but
this jealousy is just eating away at her. So the following day was April
tenth, nineteen fifty five. It was Easter Sunday. She took a little
drive to Hampstead. Now this story I didn't tell you take place in England.
It's a UK story. So she takes this drive to Hampstead and she's
going to wait outside for David who's in a bar. He was having a
few drinks with her friends. How she knew. I'm not sure, but
she this might have been a place he frequented a lot. So he came
outside of the bar about nine thirty and she saw him. She saw him,
and she called out his name. She's like, oh, hey David,
Yeah, oh hey David. He hears her because I don't think she's
very far away, but he ignores her. And the next few events,
you know, because she's like, Okay, I'm not going to be ignored
because I'm I demand, I demand to answer right before I tell you more.
We're going to take a break. So, to the shock of everyone,
Ruth pulls out a thirty eight caliber smith and lesson, Holy shit,
she is not going to be ignored, no, and she fires it at
David. He starts to run, and now she's chasing him with the stun.
She's lost it. She fires her second shot and this one lands and
hits David and he falls to the ground. Shot him in the back,
but she then walks over to him as he's on the ground, and she
shoots him again and again and again, three more shots, and one of
the shots left gunpowder burns on the skin of his back. So she was
very close when she fired that shot. She ended up emptying this cylinder of
all the bullets in the Smith and Wesson, but upon shooting the sixth and
final bullet, she continued like. Patrons reported at the police later that she
was still firing because they could hear the clicks. Oh, she just like,
I don't even care if there's a bullet. Nope, I'm getting you.
Nope, I'm out of right. She's just yeah, she's consumed with
anger and jealousy. The sixth bullet that came, actually it didn't hit David.
It bounced off the road and hit a bystander whose name was missus Yule.
It hit't a weird place. It hit her in the thumb, and
she was walking into the bar. I know, it's kind of but he
hit by a bullet. I guess, I guess, and I think it's
a thirty eight. It's a pretty big bullet. I don't know if Missus
Yule had a thumb after that, but I guess, like you said,
it's alive, right, and it wasn't, you know, in a delicate
place. Right as David is lying in the street now bleeding, Ruth calmly
walks over to a man that is staring in horror at this, and she
hands him the gun. Here you go. I'd be like, no,
thanks, yeah, and this and just so happened to be an off duty
police officer. His name was Alan Thompson. Okay. Upon receiving the gun,
Ruth asked him, will you call the police, and he's like,
well, guess what, girl, I am the police, right and I'm
assuming somebody else would have already called, but I would think. But upon
hearing that he is a police officer, she asked if he could please arrest
her. She's done, done, yeah, exactly, take me away.
So she was taken to the Hampstead Police station and David was still alive.
Believe it or not. He was taken to the closest hospital. He was
pronounced dead on arrival, so he was lost before he got to the hospital.
His body was taken to the Hampstead Public Mortuary so that an autopsy could
be performed, and two of the bullets that had caused the most damage it
pierced his body caused hemorrhaging. I'm thinking it grazed his heart. That was
one of the bullets that did the most damage, and he ended up just
bleeding to death. At the police station. Well internally, probably externally too,
may not know a lot about damage. But anyway, at the police
station, three detectives questioned Ruth without a lawyer present. She didn't ask for
one, and you know, the police don't have to furnish you one.
You didn't have Miranda rights because you're in the fifties and it's in England,
so I don't know what their equivalent of the Marinda rights are. But yeah,
you're probably right because that didn't happen till what the sixties or seventies,
Yeah, the Miranda case. As she's being interviewed by the police, she
says to the detective, I'm guilty. I shot him. And she said
she had the gun in her per when she first went to the fine Lander's
home. Oh the first day. Yeah, the first day. Police asked
her, well, what did you plan on doing with the gun at the
Fine Ladders and she said, well, I planned on finding David and shooting
him. Oh. So I imagine that if David had come out of the
house he would have died. He probably would have died. So they did
a smart thing mm hmm by staying inside. So she made a full confession
and the police had tons of eyewitnesses. Anyway, I was clear. Yeah.
On April eleventh, nineteen fifty five, which was the day after the
shooting, Ruth was charged with David's murder. In her final statement, she
said that on the day that she murdered David, she had been drinking at
Desmond's apartment and he was the one that had given her the gun. Okay.
After he gave her the gun, he took her out to a nearby
forest called Epping Forest so that he could teach her how to shoot it right,
how to use it. Okay. When she made her first appearance in
court, she still didn't have an attorney. And you know, they didn't
have a court appointed attorney. No, I don't know why. I don't
know why. I don't I don't know what was going on in the fifties
in another country. She they reigned her, They placed a trial date,
They make a trial date, and she goes to jail. She was questioned
by health mental health care professionals and she was determined that she had no signs
of any mental illness. No, she just snapped, oh yeah, and
you know, she told I think she ends up getting a court appointed attorney.
Because she does end up rejecting, like they want to go for the
insanity plea, I mean temporary yeah, or like a yeah, definitely had
a passion. That's like third degree, right, that's like a manslaughter.
So but she refused any insanity plea in order to reduce her sentence. You
know, she was like something right, diminished capacity, You're right, she
was that. She didn't even tell the police to that Desmond was the one
that drove her to the the pub that David was at that he shot her
at. He you know, she just didn't want to get Desmond in any
trouble. At one point, there's an adjournment because she does get legal representation.
They try to convince her to plead guilty to manslaughter, to take a
plea to get a lesser sentence to death. Yeah exactly. I mean,
like we've just discussed, I mean, heat, a passion is a yeah,
it is a circumstance and exactly, but she refuses, but granted a
forty day adjournment. Ruth was sent back to prison, and however, her
defense team never was able to convince her to take a guilty plea on a
lesser charge. I don't know why like what about for her kids, I
know, right, and their dad. They ended up obviously being sent to
their dad when she gets arrested. But she just I don't know if she's
trying to like punish herself. Yeah, that's what it sounds like. Yeah,
I'm guilty, I'll deal with the consequences. And her trial only lasted
a day and a half and it and I don't know why she's having a
trial if she's accepting like that she did it. Sentencing Yeah maybe, Yeah,
you're right, it could have been her sentencing because if she's saying I
did it and there's no not guilty plea, I mean, there's no point.
Trends. Yeah, it was a media circus, as you can imagine,
because, as a kind of indicated at the start of our show,
I mean usually when you hear like, oh, this red hot love affair
and somebody died, you usually think that a man is the killer. I'm
sorry to be stereotypical, but I mean, I mean, yeah, I
mean a lot of times it is right. I mean, of course there's
tons of women who murder, but like, to me, it's just what
I think of when I hear the circumstance initially, Yeah, so, and
Ruth was only about twenty eight years old. She was considered to be beautiful.
Like I said, she went to modeling school and she was getting modeling
jobs and she kind of had like a Marilyn Monroe look like she had the
platinum blonde and she kind of had that hairdo. When I saw a picture
of her, initially, I couldn't believe she was only twenty eight. I
mean it's yeah, she looked older just and I think it's probably the hairstyle,
makeup or something. I mean that looked like she was eighty, right,
and she's forty exactly like seventies. I mean yeah, like I think,
like sometimes I think we've all learned to look a little bit like I
don't know, younger might not be the right word. Maybe maybe we're looking
at real age and back then they just looked older. But yeah, so
she I think this and she's a woman. It's just sensationalize woman with gone
just out yeah and you know then yeah exactly like you know he's with someone
else and he's you know, gonna die kind of thing. So this trial
lasted a day and a half, and I tell you, it's a media
circus and there's just tons of people who want to come and watch, right,
so they end up you had to get a ticket. A ticket,
yeah, a ticket. They were a stub Hub or something ticket master and
exactly, and people who are scalping them you fucked no. And the highest
price at the time was like thirty pounds, which is a little less than
sixty bucks. So I mean, back nineteen fifty five, that was a
lot of money. Right, it's even kind of a little bit of money
now like sixty ticket. It's crazy. It's crazy, Okay. So eventually
some of them went as high as like four hundred dollars. Wow. Yeah,
so people were just inside the courtroom, you know. During this trial,
Ruth was dressed in a black two piece suit with a white blouse,
and some people say she looked very chic. Her hair had been freshly bleached,
Like I said, she was a platinum blonde, kind of like Marilyn
asked, why does it even matter what she looks like? At this point,
I don't know. I'm what's it. Yeah, it's gonna get sentenced
to death, I know. But people are like, oh, she looks
like she's a Hollywood you star. The thing for her defense team. Their
whole argument was that, you know, she's just beaten down, and she's
down on her And as she walked into the courtroom, someone in the gallery
yelled out blonde tart. Oh. And it was also said that when someone
accused her of the murder, she said, thanks, I don't know,
it's kind of unhinged to me. Thanks. Yeah, we kind of mentioned
earlier that she was I kind mentioned earlier, you know, she has this
trial. At the trial, she was able to tell her side of the
story and she just said, you know, I was treated badly by David
and I just had had enough and I just kind of snapped. So the
prosecution, Uh, the name of the attorney was Christmas Humphreyes, and that
a great name, Christmas Humphrey. Christmas Humphreyes. He had already been involved
in some high profile cases. He was an experienced litigator. He made the
case. You know, he kind of rebutted what she had to say by
just bringing witnesses and the defense only cross examined two of them. Yeah,
and so the defense team was made up of attorneys who the public had paid
for public public defenders, so you know, sometimes they don't have a ton
of experience. When it was time for her to finally take the stand.
Her attorney's whole argument was when she first fired the gun, she was emotionally
upset do to you know, just the severe treatment. I mean, like
I said, they were physical with each other and she would have bruises,
heat of passion. Yeah, kind of testimony from her. Yeah, And
she tried to make you know, he tried to make her like a good
impression on the jury, but he couldn't really undo right, right, you
can't undo the fact that she shot him six times or whatever and took up
the thumb of yeah, missus yule, or yeah, missus yule. And
he's really trying to turn her into a sympathetic person to the jury. But
she kind of when she answered, she was just there was really no sign,
like emotional sign, like she didn't play up any kind of stereotypical behavior
or anything. She's just very in control of her answers and seemed rational,
which is what her defention did not want her to act like. When she
was cross examined by the prosecution, Christmas Humphries only asked her one question and
he said, miss ellis when you fired the revolver at close range into the
body of David Blakely, What did you intend to do? Kill him?
And she said this was her answer, it was obvious that when I shot
him, I intended to kill him. Okay, like prosecution rests her on
it, like, okay, you're done. The next day, the jury
left the courtroom to deliberate, and it took them only twenty three minutes to
find her guilty of murder. It was never mentioned at any point during her
trial that you know, she suffered a miscarriage at the hands of David just
ten days prior to her shooting them. It was never mentioned that he abused
her physically on a regular basis. He had just proposed and then done all
the like yeah, and it's ghosted her, ghosted her, I mean,
yeah, viciously, Like who does that. The judge really felt like he
had no choice to sentence her to death, knew what she was. After
sentencing, the judge asked her if she had anything to say, and the
only thing she said was thank you. So I don't know, thank you.
Yeah. After sentencing was past some kids, I know that's what I'm
good. I don't know. I think I feel like maybe she just gave
up. I don't know. She remained really calm. Even after the sentencing,
she turned around to smile at her parents, her brother, and her
sister. They were in the gallery. She was then placed in a van
and sent to Holloway Prison to await her death sentence. From the moment she
killed David until the moment she was actually executed, she never sought percy.
She never tried to feel She thought that she deserved the death sentence, kind
of like what we talked about earlier, because she did kill someone. She
knew what she did. I mean, and maybe not at the moment,
because I'm thinking if she's so like enraged, you're not thinking right. But
I think like when you when you do something like that, you're kind of
like, Okay, I'm probably gonna be sentenced to death, even though I
really think she could have gotten a lesser sentence had she tried. Yeah,
had she tried. She told her attorneys do not seek any kind of appeal,
and before her sentence was to be carried out, she was allowed to
see her family one last time. Her brother noted that she was really calm.
She was didn't seem afraid that she was going to be dying imminently soon,
I mean the next day. She's much different than me. I know
I would be crying, I'd be carrying on. Can you call a governor?
Right? Yeah? Please please, somebody do something. And at the
time, England's method of execution was hanging still and Ruth was actually the last
woman to be hanged in England. But in preparation for her hanging, they
took her weight with clothes and she only weighed one hundred and three pounds.
Tiny, you know, she was tiny. An eight foot four inch drop
was set in the gallow. They tested it out before she was brought to
her spot with sandbags. They were going to ask Yeah, they had a
sand volunteer. They had no, not a volunteer. They had a sand
bag that weighed exactly one hundred and three pounds and they were left over overnight,
attached to the rope that was to hang her, And that was done
in order to prevent like stretching, like it was already being stretched, so
that I guess when she was dropped, you know, there wouldn't be any
mishaps. They want the net break, yes, they don't want them just
dangling, yeah, dangling. Yeah, I know, it's very very morbid.
Yeah, very antiquated, I mean okay. On the morning of her
execution, she wrote a letter to David's mother and in the letter, she
apologized for killing him and said, quote, I've always loved your son and
I shall die loving him. End quote. Around six thirty am, a
priest took her last and final confession and gave her last writes. She then
wrote a think you note to her lawyer. She did have a team of
lawyers, but there was one that she really trusted and liked, and that's
the one that she wrote the letter to. His name was Leanne Simmons.
About nine point thirty, Ruth was given a glass of brandy. Oh,
to stabilize her nerves. Right, giving her the glass by a doctor more
than one glass. Oh man, I'd need like the whole bottle, right
please. She drinks the brandy, and not a minute later, the execution
walked into her cell. When he walked in, she smiled at him.
Her hands were bound around her back with a leather strap, and then she
walked the fifteen feet to the gallows. Breathe, I know anxiety. She
didn't say anything as she walked over to the trap. Door and the cotton
hood was placed over her hud oh Lord. The executioner's assistant then wrapped a
leather strap around her legs and the trap door was open, and Ruth was
dead within less than fifteen seconds, so it was relative. Fifteen seconds is
a long time though, right, Well, yeah, her neck's gonna snap.
Yeah, so she's gonna I mean, you're still gonna have a pulse
for a little bit while your blood goes. Yeah, that's true. But
yeah, wow, yeah, wow, that's just crazy. I know.
You know, as you mentioned, she had two children. She left them
behind, her son Andy at the time of her execution, he was about
ten, and her daughter Georgina was three. Her ex husband's name was George,
so Georgina was named after him, and like I mentioned, Ruth was
only twenty eight years old at the time of her hanging. Sadly, though,
the story doesn't end there. There's even more tragedy for this family.
George ellis her ex husband. He died by suicide. He hung himself as
well. He hanged himself, hanged himself, hung himself, hanging, tanged
thank you on August second, nineteen fifty eight. So how wait, what
year did she fifty five, so it's only three years later later. And
her mother, Bertha Nielsen, was found in nineteen sixty nine unconscious in a
gas filled room in her apartment. So she committed suicide too. Well,
she survived, but she never really recovered in that she couldn't speak after that.
I think it may be damaged that part of her brain. Wow.
I mentioned that Ruth said that Desmond had given her the gun. Yeah,
he always denied that he gave her the gun. I know it wasn't me.
I didn't give it to her. And he emigrated to Australia and died
in nineteen ninety one. In two thousand and three, after a posthumous appeal
was brought by her sister Monica, the appeals Court concluded that it was right
to have convicted her a first degree murder, so the appeal was denied.
Yeah, her execution, like I told you, she was the last woman
to be executed in the UK by hanging. Her execution played a major part
in the movement to just completely abolish the death penalty in England, although it
really took like another decade after her death to for the lot to be changed.
You know, the one of the newspapers in defense of abolishing the death
penalty had said, quote, consider the task of explaining to the late Miss
Ruth Ellis's eleven year old son, now at boarding school, what had happened.
This boy, who is also fatherless, has had something done to him
that's so brutal. It's difficult to imagine. We should realize it. It's,
you know, something that should be realized. Perhaps the most haunting part
of what's included I'm sorry of the new law is that or the effect that
it had on her son Andy, was that he made audio tapes later in
life and he managed to interview Ruth's prosecutor because I think he just became obsessed
as I got older. I mean, it's hard to lose your mom,
right, and you don't know what's going on on your Yeah, and he
said that the that the prosecutor described his mother as cold blooded. Oh,
and Andy didn't feel that way. No, it didn't feel that way.
And he actually committed suicide in nineteen eighty two. But yeah, So that
is really my sad story of jealousy and rage and was losing it, losing
it and then the after effects of something that happens. I mean, that
was just something horrific. Yeah, and you can see the effects on other
people, right right, Like I'm not sure why George, you know,
her ex husband did it, but I mean I think her son was just
riddled with grief and I don't know he was in the kids went into the
foster care system too at one point, and I'm sure you know there was
Oh man, this is a pisser. Yeah, I know, I know.
Okay, So well, thanks for everyone for listening to today's story.
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