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Moors murderer's inquest opens

Hindley was Britain's longest serving female prisoner
Hindley was Britain's longest serving female prisoner

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start quoteI have no sympathy for her even in death...I just hope she goes to Hellend quote
-- Winnie Johnson, mother of victim Keith Bennett
FACT BOX

1942: Myra Hindley born in a Manchester suburb, four years after Ian Brady.

1963: Pauline Reade, 16, disappears (July), followed by John Kilbride, 12 (Nov).

1964: Keith Bennett, 12, disappears (June) and then Lesley Ann Downey, 10, (Dec).

1965: Edward Evans, 17, murdered (Oct). Kilbride and Downey?s bodies found in shallow graves.

May 6 1966: Brady gets life for murders of Kilbride, Downey and Evans. Hindley gets life for killing Downey and Evans and shielding Brady after Kilbride's murder.

1974: Hindley given a year's sentence over a plot to escape from prison.

1978: She is attacked in prison and  needs plastic surgery to rebuild her face.

1987: Hindley and Brady confess to murdering Reade and Bennett. Reade's body is uncovered. Bennett's body has never been found.

1990 -- 1998: Successive British home secretaries confirm 'life means life' for Hindley.

1994: Hindley says: "After 30 years in prison, I think I have paid my debt to society and atoned for my crimes. I ask people to judge me as I am now, and not as I was then."

2002: In November she is admitted to hospital after suspected heart attack. She dies on 15th.

BURY ST. EDMUNDS, England -- Moors murderer Myra Hindley died of bronchial pneumonia caused by heart problems, an inquest has heard.

The child killer's inquest was opened and adjourned on Monday with a full hearing to be heard at a date to be arranged and before a jury.

Hindley died on Friday after spending 36 years in prison for her part in the torture, sexual abuse and murder of three children -- crimes that shocked Britain.

Home Office pathologist Dr Michael Heath told the inquest the 60-year-old suffered from high blood pressure and poor blood supply to the heart, resulting in blocked coronary arteries.

Her body is being guarded by police officers as arrangements are made for the funeral. No date has been fixed for the service but her solicitor, Andrew McCooey, said the service could take place later this week.

The inquest was held on Monday as police revealed they had been considering bringing new charges against Hindley.

The new charges would have been in connection with the deaths of two other children -- Keith Bennett and Pauline Reade.

Hindley and her lover Ian Brady admitted the killings in 1987, and their confessions helped investigators find Reade's body, but Bennett's has never been recovered.

Police began working on the new charges after lawyers for Bennett's mother, Winnie Johnson, contacted them, the UK's Press Association reported.

In June, the European Court ruled that politicians had no right to determine how long killers be kept behind bars.

The ruling had given Hindley hope that one day she might have been freed despite rulings by successive governments that life should mean life for Hindley.

A spokesman for Greater Manchester police told PA: "We and the Crown Prosecution Service were contacted by Winnie Johnson following the European Court ruling.

"Since then, we have reviewed the situation with regard to the possibility of further criminal charges, including examining the evidence from the 1960s and 1980s alongside specialists from the CPS.

"That work is still ongoing and a report will be produced. At the time of Hindley's death, the matter was being considered by us and the CPS and the report is likely to be completed in the next few weeks."



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