A retired detective who helped to lock up the notorious north-east wife killer Malcolm Webster has said it’s possible he may have committed other crimes which went undetected.
Webster is serving a minimum prison sentence of 30 years for the 1994 murder of his wife Claire Morris, who he was drugging with sleeping tablets.
He staged a car crash and set fire to the vehicle with his wife still inside it and later spent Claire’s £200,000 life insurance policy on a Land Rover Discovery and yacht.
Now, Charles Henry has shared the untold story of how he exposed the so-called Black Widower who’d started a new life in Oban where he became engaged to another woman.
Channel 4 documentary
In a new Channel 4 documentary Married to a Psychopath, broadcasting tonight, the former detective inspector revealed how he went back to Webster’s childhood to gather key evidence.
He told The Press and Journal: “There was a part of the story that was never told. How this individual ended up in Oban and came to our attention and the troubles and strife that we had with this individual.
“There were some stories in the press about places of employment that Malcolm Webster had in the Middle East.
“We did check various hospitals in London, but not too much came out of that.”
He explained: “For sure, there is a possibility of other crimes which will we’ll never really get to the bottom of.
“Grampian Police at the time did try looking in those directions but I do know for a fact that it was incredibly difficult for them to take it any further forward.”
In 2006, intelligence reports alerted the former Strathclyde Police officer that Malcolm Webster had previously fled New Zealand with his wife’s savings.
They believed Webster had tried to kill Felicity Drumm.
It worried Mr Henry when he found out that Webster, now in Oban, was in a relationship with a new well-off woman called Simone Banerjee.
The pair were both nurses who worked together at the local hospital and later became engaged.
Mr Henry said he had sleepless nights worrying about her as he gathered evidence against the man she was planning to marry.
A police informant had told him that the pair were planning to spend their honeymoon onboard Banerjee’s yacht during a transatlantic trip.
“It was worrying. A bit traumatic,” Mr Henry said.
“Them sailing out into international waters absolutely horrified us.”
The rise and fall of cold and calculating Black Widower Malcolm Webster
Growing concerns led authorities to warn Simone Banerjee that her life may be in danger.
She was put in touch with officials in New Zealand who confirmed that her fiancé was already married.
Webster fled the area when she confronted him.
Inquiry into Malcolm Webster murder victim Claire Morris
In 2008 Grampian Police launched a murder inquiry into the death of Claire Morris after a test of her liver sample – stored after post mortem – detected the traces of sleeping tablets.
Forensic investigator Andrew Wade was instructed to re-examine her fatal crash in 1994.
He told the makers of the documentary: “My first impressions were that it didn’t look right. Something was wrong”.
The expert found that “some kind of bonfire built in the engine compartment” was responsible for the blaze.
“I was able to eliminate accidental causes and bring my conclusion to the fact that this was not an accidental fire,” he said.
It took prosecutors 50 days to present the evidence against Webster but less than four hours for the jury to convict him of murder and attempted murder on May 19 2011.
In 2016, Webster’s request to have his conviction and sentence reviewed was rejected.
