S5 Ep9: John Reginald Christie and the Murders at Rillington Place

Crimes of the Centuries

Amber Hunt and Audioboom

True Crime, Documentary, Society & Culture, History

4.6 • 3.8K Ratings

🗓️ 28 April 2025

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 1953, a horrific discovery was made behind some hastily hung wallpaper in a flat at 10 Rillington Place in London's Notting Hill neighborhood: The decomposing bodies of three women. Another body was found beneath floor boards, and two more skeletons were recovered from the backyard garden. Soon, a nationwide manhunt was under way for John Reginald Christie, a man author Kate Summerscale describes as "terrifyingly ordinary." His case not only gripped the UK but it sparked debate about another horrifying crime that had occurred in the same building just three years prior.

"Crimes of the Centuries" is a podcast from Grab Bag Collab exploring forgotten crimes from times past that made a mark and helped change history. You can get early and ad-free episodes on the Grab Bag Patreon page.

DON'T FORGET ABOUT THE CRIMES OF THE CENTURIES BOOK! Order today at www.centuriespod.com/book (https://www.centuriespod.com/book)!

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The weather. Tomorrow, expect a biting cold front. Hmm, how naughty. I wonder what I'll be
0:06.8	wearing or taking off. The night will be wild and untamed. Expect heavy, lashing rain
0:13.0	that'll soak you to the skin. By Monday, temperatures will rise slowly but surely reaching
0:18.7	their peak in the afternoon.
0:23.0	Not in the mood for miserable weather.
0:25.6	Fly cheaply to Turkey with Sun Express.
0:28.7	Sun Express, non-stop sunshine.
0:38.4	Some crimes are so heartbreaking or shocking.
0:44.6	They change laws, change society, or even earn the label Crime of the Century.
0:50.8	But the stories that made headlines and decades past aren't necessarily remembered today.
0:56.4	I'm Amber Hunt, a journalist and author, and in each episode of this show,
1:02.0	I'll examine a case that's maybe lesser known today, but was huge when it happened.
1:22.9	This is Crimes of the Centuries. The bottom floor apartment at 10 Rillington Place and Notting Hill had been empty for a few days.
1:27.6	No one knew what had happened to the occupants, but the couple who had lived there for years had made it quite clear they were not happy that most of the tenants were black, so their
1:33.0	neighbors figured that maybe they had finally just moved away.
1:36.8	They had said such awful things over the years and even went so far as to lace the hallways
1:42.5	with disinfectant.
1:46.3	Their way, they said, of keeping the smell at bay. So when the landlord noticed that the couple was gone, he figured the pair had
1:52.0	finally moved out, and that was a-okay by him. The landlord, too, was black, a former heavyweight
1:58.8	boxing champion named Charles Brown.
2:01.8	The couple hadn't been particularly nice to him, what with them being blatantly racist and all.
2:07.5	In short, Brown figured, good riddance.
	...

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