Raymond Hewlett: Raymond Hewlett Biographical Info

PERSONAL

Born: 24th January 1945 in Blackpool

Second youngest child in a family of seven

Left school without any qualifications

Lived in Manchester, Blackpool, Telford, Shropshire UK. Forres, Scotland. Italy. Portugal

Lived many years in Ireland. See details below

Known to have traveled widely through Europe, including: Milan, Italy (1995)

SCOTS GUARDS

1961 - Joined Scots Guards at insistence of his father

Served 9 months in Scots Guard

Dishonorably discharged for causing disorder, being absent without leave and stealing a regimental bicycle.

MARRIAGES / CHILDREN

Susan Ginley

1963 - Married Susan Ginley

They had four children over the following five years.

Daughter Gina, 41 [in 2009] , to whom he wrote self-pitying letters from prison.

Son Wayne, 40 [in 2009] , who described his father as a “monster” who beat him savagely when he was a boy. (In September 2010, Wayne claimed to have received a deathbed letter from Hewlett - see below)

1963- 1968 - During that period, Hewlett was arrested for a series of offences, ranging from burglary to firearms possession

1972 - Jailed for one year after raping a 12-year-old girl he had lured into his car and knocked out with paint stripper. Served served 12 months of an 18-month sentence. Upon release returned to Todmorden. Wayne Hewlett said the family moved while Raymond was in jail and that Wayne & his siblings never knew about the crime. According to Susan Ginley, after his release Raymond "blew it" again. Quote: Susan Ginley: "My first instinct was to protect the kids, they really copped it. "I had to move two of them out of school. When one of my daughters went to the toilet, other kids said they would rape her. "We made another new start and moved south but he soon had a fling with a married woman - it was at least the third during our marriage and that finished us. I know he's got cancer but I do not feel sorry for him."

1975 - Lived at Dineley Avenue, Todmorden
1978 - Attempted to rape a 14-year-old. Hewlett held a gun to her head. Sentenced to four years - served 16 months

Anita Cox

1980 - Left Susan Ginley for Anita Cox. They had two children.
1981 - Susan Ginley divorced Hewlett

1982 - Married Anita Cox.

Reportedly Hewlett frequently viciously attacked Anita

"Gabriella"

Hewlett worked as a candle maker in the Italian mountains

While in Italy married "Gabriella" and had a son "Marco".

Gabriella left him after learning the nature of inquiries made re: Hewlett by the Italian police

Mariana Schmucker

Met Mariana in Italy

Was a mechanic on a tourist boat and Mariana was cleaner for the boat's owners on island of Elba

Returned to Co. Donegal with pregnant German partner Marianna (date?)

1997 - Photograph of Hewlett in Forres, Scotland with his "German national" girlfriend (Schmucker)

Police were aware he was planning to *return* to Italy in 1997

After a period in Ireland (where he is suspected of attacking at least one other child) Hewlett traveled overland through France and Spain to southern Portugal

Said to have had a "Nomadic existence" - crisscrossing Europe with Mariana and (eventually) six children

David (died Dec 2008 at age 10)

Michael (born in Germany)

Anya (born in Germany)

Jobe (born in Germany)

Yanina (born in Portugal)

Paul (born in Portugal)

Daniel (born in Spain)

Oldest son David was killed December 2008, allegedly falling out of the van as family drove through Spain en route to Germany. Spanish police were investigating

CRIMINAL HISTORY

Convicted paedophile

Three jail terms in the UK for sex crimes involving adolescent children

1972 - Jailed for one year after raping a 12-year-old girl he had lured into his car and knocked out with paint stripper. Served served 12 months of an 18-month sentence. Upon release returned to Todmorden

1978 - Attempted to rape a 14-year-old. Hewlett held a gun to her head. Sentenced to four years - served 16 months

1988 - Jailed for six years after the abduction of a 14-year-old newspaper delivery girl at knifepoint in Northwich, Cheshire. Fled to Ireland. Identified as the attacker by forensic evidence and brought back to face trial in UK. Two years into sentence was granted home leave from Leicestershire's Stoken Prison and absconded. Rearrested when he arrived back in Britain from Ireland in 1991.

MOLSEED MURDER CASE

Lesley Molseed's body was found near Ripponden on October 5, 1975

She had been stabbed a dozen times with a knife

Lesley had been abducted three days earlier while running an errand for her mum near their home in Rochdale

Det Chief Supt Max McLean led the investigation

McLean said in 2001 that he was confident he would find prime suspect, Raymond Hewlett

Stefan Ivan Kiszko (1952-1993), a British tax clerk of Ukrainian parents, served 16 years in prison after he was wrongly convicted of the sexual assault and murder of Lesley Molseed. Considered one of the worst miscarriage of justice in UK history. Stefan Kiszko died soon after his release from prison.

Raymond Castree was convicted 12 November 2007 for Molseed murder. Continues to proclaim his innocence. Defence counsel Rodney Jameson QC told Bradford Crown Court that there was "an overwhelming possibility" that the man who sexually assaulted Lesley and stabbed her 12 times was Hewlett. There is controversy over the possibility that Castree's DNA was planted by police on the piece of tape used to convict Castree. Lesley's clothing had been destroyed by the Forensic Science Services. "Castree could not explain the evidence other than suggesting he may have been framed by two police officers he crossed swords with in 1979 or that the profile was the result of cross-contamination."

The book "Innocents" written by retired detective and local journalist concluded Hewlett was murderer of Lesley and provides details and witness statements. The book also established a previously unknown link between Mr Hewlett's family and friends of the Molseed family

HEWLETT AND MOLSEED MURDER

Prime suspect in the Lesley Molseed murder

Lived in Todmorden, West Yorkshire - 10 miles from Rochdale - when Lesley was killed

Left for Ireland the day after Lesley Molseed was murdered

On the day of Lesley's disappearance, Hewlett's turquoise Morris 1000 van was seen parked in the lay-by on the A672 Oldham-Halifax Road next to the isolated spot where Lesley's body was found. It had a tartan blanket, that Hewlett had stolen in Scotland, wrapped around its windscreen and side windows

Linked to the crime scene by his ownership of a blue Morris 1000 van which matched descriptions given by 14 witnesses who saw one parked in a lay-by at Ripponden on the day of Lesley's abduction

Witness Christopher Coverdale saw a man with a girl matching Lesley's description walking up the hillside next to the lay-by

Hewlett arrived back in Todmorden at 5pm and told his teenage girlfriend, Rosalee Dolan (sometimes misspelled "Rosalie") to provide him with a false alibi

Hewlett and Dolan first fled to Burnley - stayed with two friends, Michael and John Goodall

Later they went to Liverpool and then fled to Ireland

1992 - Rosalee Dolan made statement to police that she had believed at the time that she had been providing an alibi for Hewlett about the theft of a car and admitted she had lied.

Hewlett was re-investigated for the Molseed murder and interviewed again while serving a six-year prison sentence for a sexual offence committed in 1988.

1993 - Questioned by police re: Molseed murder. Most of his answers consisted of: "No reply". Freed due to "lack of evidence".

March 2001 - Hewlett was named by Det Chief Supt Max McLean as the prime suspect in the Molseed murder.

HEWLETT IN IRELAND

Part of a network of paedophiles that would hide out throughout Northern Ireland and the Republic

Took particular interest in Fermanagh because of its close proximity with the Irish border

Between 1991 and 1997 kept on the move from Cork, Donegal, Cavan, Sligo, Louth and Fermanagh

Visited at least nine counties

Spotted in Dublin, Kildare, Louth, Laois and Westmeath

Lived in Urris, Inishowen for an unknown time. "Inishowen councillor, Padraig MacLochlainn, confirmed the sex pest had lived in Inishowen. He said: "He had lived in the area, in Urris for a while. "This was in recent years, but I am not sure how long he lived in the area. "The person I was speaking to did confirm this. "People may not have been aware of his history he lived there for a while and then moved on."

1990's - Lived in Enniskillen - Hewlett caused alarm with local schools sending letters home to parents. The warning letter circulated by school principals described the man as “a high risk offender with every likelihood that he will re-offend”

During his time in the border county Hewlett investigated for the attempted rape of a nine-year-old girl in Co. Fermanagh

Chief suspect in two other attempted rapes in both Co. Down and Co. Cavan — where he was questioned over the rape of another nine-year-old girl after his then wife told the Gardai that she suspected her husband was the rapist.

1993 - Lived in commune in Co. Donegal. Commune members eventually asked him to leave after concerns re: remarks made by their children concerning Hewlett

Lived in Co. Louth (near the Cooley mountains - Dundalk area). While living in Co. Louth he was suspected of attempting to abduct and sexually assault a young girl across the border in Co. Down.

Lived in Co. Kerry (1 mile from Tralee)

1998 - Lived in Co. Donegal (Letterkenny area - gypsy camp)

2002 - Hewlett last spotted in Co. Fermanagh in Eniskillen. Resided in small apartment above a chip shop on Enniskillen’s Belmore Street.

2002 HEWLETTS IN PORTUGAL

First arrived in Portugal from Germany in the summer of 2002

Hewletts would stop in various places and "decide whether to hang around", depending on the weather nad how easy it was to make money. Hewlett would busk on the street, playing guitar.

MCCANN CASE

Hewlett stated that he had been to Praia da Luz ONLY in 2002 when first arrived in Portugal

May 2007 Hewlett was living an hour from Praia da Luz, moving with his family between three towns - Vila Real de Santo Antonio, Fuzeta and Tavira - 60 miles away from Praia da Luz.

The Hewletts scraped money together by picking up unwanted jumble and old car parts, then selling them on.

Summer 2007: Local police helping in search for Maddie visited Hewlett and his family. Portuguese police visited him and his wife Mariana twice about the case. His van was inspected and Hewlett gave Portuguese police a DNA swab and fingerprints.

June 10, 2007 Hewlett left Portugal and took his family to Morocco. He said: "A friend gave me a broken old Mercedes and I stripped it down into parts. "I knew they were worth a fortune in Morocco because I'd been there for a couple of months in 2005. You can even get good money for Mercedes nuts and bolts there. "I knew people on the docks at Faro and I got the captain of a ferry to take us over for free. We stayed in Morocco for two months and came back in the August. I made 300 euros from the car parts."

News articles claimed that there was no public ferry service between Faro and Morocco.

Said he stayed at campsite in Morocco for at least two months and made 300 euros selling car parts.

First brought to the attention of investigators by Alan and Cindy Thompson

Hewlett was determined to be terminally ill with throat cancer

August 2008: Hewlett in Spain undergoing treatment for throat cancer and "Portuguese police, acting on unknown information" swooped on his truck.

December 2008: Hewlett's 10 year old son David fell out of the family van and died while the family was traveling in Spain.

April/May 2009: Hewlett's traveled through Spain to Aachen, Germany - Hewlett's health was deteriorating and Mariana was able to get state benefits

May 2009: McCann detectives tracked Hewletts to Aachen where he was receiving treatment for cancer at a hospital. The detectives had hoped to put a series of questions to him but he refused to see them and they were forced to return to the UK empty-handed.

June 2009: Hewlett was discharged by German doctors - told nothing could be done for him. Hewlett, Mariana and six young children were living in Aachen "in a squalid German flat" on a fourth floor tower block. Hewlett claimed he had only weeks to live. McCann detectives returned to Aachen for a second time but Hewlett was deemed too ill to undergo intensive questioning.

Newspaper reports claimed Hewlett resembled a pock-marked suspect seen near the McCann holiday apartment and had refused to give an alibi for the night of the disappearance, yet Portuguese police stated that photos of Hewlett had been shown to the 13 year old girl who claimed to have seen someone near the apartment - and she said it was not him. Portuguese police also said that Hewlett's wife had given him an alibi and that his bank card had been used in Lisbon (3 hours away from Praia da Luz) at the time of Madeleine McCann's disappearance.

June 2009: West Yorkshire Police were also investigating Hewlett's possible involvement with an indecent assault in 1975. He was interviewed in early June by two detectives who traveled to Aachen: Det. Max McLean and another officer from the West Yorkshire police.

Maintained his innocence regarding the McCann case

June 14, 2009: Hewlett said he had never seen Madeleine in real life and vowed to prove his innocence. Offered to take a lie detector test or any test offered. Said he had only seen Madeleine on missing posters and once on a TV at a bar. He said: "It's obvious why they're interested in me. But they can all think what they like. I didn't kill the McCann girl. It's the truth and it's never going to change. "There is a person who can say where I was that day, but why should I bring them into this? I've done nothing wrong." "I would say to the McCanns that I know what it's like to lose a child because it's happened to me recently," "I've been through hell and now I've got another hell which I don't deserve. I know for a fact that I didn't do anything wrong, but if people aren't listening, what can you do?" "I didn't kill the McCann girl."

June 14, 2009: Simon Wright, reporter for the Mirror claimed there was a "mountain of circumstantial evidence against Hewlett

~December 2009: Hewlett died of cancer and was cremated in Germany

~December 2009: Two weeks after Raymond Hewlett's death, a mystery man alleged to have appeared at home of Wayne Hewlett with letter from his father (see below). This contradicts news reports stating that in APRIL 2010 the Hewlett family was unaware of Raymond's death.

April 10, 2010: Article in the Sun announced Hewlett's death had occurred 4 months prior and reported that Hewlett's ex-wife Susan and his children were unaware of his death. Article stated that Hewlett had been cremated at a pauper's funeral in Germany.

September 2010: Wayne Hewlett, son of Raymond and Susan, claimed to have received a letter from Hewlett two weeks after he died. Wayne claimed the letter professed his father's innocence regarding Madeleine's abduction and that Raymond had been told by a gipsy that he had abducted Madeleine and sold her to a wealthy childless couple. Wayne claimed to have burned the letter which he said had been delivered to him by a "mystery man". Wayne did not offer to provide the PJ with any information but planned to be interviewed by the "McCann investigators."

Raymond Hewlett

Raymond Hewlett Biographical Info

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