In December 1992, 16-year-old Suzanne Capper was kidnapped, tortured, and
ultimately murdered over the course of an entire week by six perpetrators.
Surprisingly, the 1988 film "Child's Play" became entangled in the case as a
possible source of inspiration for the heinous crime.
Background.
Born in 1976 in Manchester, England, Suzanne Jane Jones (her birth name) was
described as a kind and easily influenced young woman who came into contact
with those who would become her killers while caring for a woman named Jean
Powell.
Capper began spending more and more time at Powell’s house after his mother
and stepfather separated. It wasn’t long before Powell, along with her close
friend Bernadette McNeilly, a mother of three who also lived with Powell,
began pressuring Capper to do as they said.
By that time, Powell had separated from her husband, Glyn, although the two
remained friends and he visited her regularly from his nearby home. McNeilly’s
boyfriend was 16-year-old Anthony Dudson, who was also having sex with Powell.
Meanwhile, Powell was sexually involved with Jeffrey Leigh, a regular visitor
to the house who bought amphetamines there. Another frequent visitor to the
house was Powell’s younger brother, Clifford Pook.
Kidnapping.
On December 7, 1992, Suzanne Capper was lured to Jean Powell’s house, where
Powell, Bernadette McNeil, Powell’s ex-husband Glyn, and McNeil’s boyfriend
Anthony Dudson were waiting for her. The motives behind the kidnapping,
torture, and subsequent murder were inexplicable and trivial, with
explanations ranging from Jean Powell’s claim that Capper had tried to
persuade her to sleep with a man for money, to Capper having taken a pink
coat from McNeily, to McNeily and Dudson contracting head lice after
sleeping in a bed they believed Capper had also used.
Torture.
As soon as Capper arrived at the house, her captors held her down while Glyn
Powell shaved her head and eyebrows and then forced her to wipe her hair off
and put it in a container. He then placed a plastic bag over her head and
walked around her while hitting her on the head. Jean Powell and McNeilly then
kicked her while she lay curled up on the floor, and the two women took turns
beating her with a three-foot-long (1 m) wooden stick and a belt. They then
took her to the bathroom and forced her to shave her own pubic hair as a
"ritual humiliation in retaliation for having, as they claimed, caused Dudson
and McNeilly to shave." Later, Jean Powell locked her in a closet for the
night.
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| The house where Suzanne Capper was held captive. |
The next morning, Capper was taken upstairs and locked in another closet. On
December 8, she was moved to McNeilly’s house out of concern that Powell and
McNeilly’s six children would be disturbed by Capper’s crying. There, she was
tied with her legs spread apart to an overturned bed with an electrical cord
in a back room on the ground floor.
Over the next five days, Capper was subjected to a series of violent acts,
which grew in severity and brutality as time went on. They regularly beat
her, injected her with amphetamines, burned her with cigarettes, and made
her listen to rave music, specifically "Hi, I'm Chucky (Wanna Play?)" by 150
Volts, featuring samples from the movie "Child's Play", played at full
volume through headphones. McNeilly called herself Chucky and began each
torture session with the phrase "Chucky's coming to play."
At some point during the week, Pook and Leigh called the house and saw Capper,
blindfolded and gagged, tied to the bed. By that point, Capper had been lying
in her own urine and feces for several days; they placed her in a tub filled
with concentrated disinfectant and scrubbed her with a stiff brush hard enough
to strip away her skin. Pook then used pliers to pull out two of his teeth,
which the police later found in his home "as a kind of macabre trophy." Dudson
said:
"I was standing in the doorway with Jeanie [Powell] and Bernie [McNeilly].
Cliff [Pook] took the gag out of his mouth. He told him to open his mouth.
He said, 'All right, I'm going to knock your teeth out.' He started hitting
his teeth with the pliers. He put the pliers on and started pulling. But
they broke and splintered. Then he hit them a few more times. He put the
pliers back on and really, really pulled. He pulled Suzanne's head forward
until there was a snap, and the tooth was caught in the pliers. He did it
again, and he was laughing."
Murder.
The six attackers learned that Capper's family was going to report her as
missing, and they agreed that Capper had to be taken out of the house.
In the early hours of December 14, 1992, Capper was forced into the trunk of a
stolen white Fiat Panda and driven 15 miles (25 km) to a narrow lane in
Werneth Low, near Romiley, on the outskirts of Stockport. McNeilly, the
Powells, and Dudson were in the car. McNeilly "laughed" as they made the trip.
Powell later said that Capper was pushed down an embankment into a patch of
brambles, where McNeilly poured gasoline over her. When McNeilly had trouble
lighting the gasoline, Glyn Powell and Dudson made several attempts before
setting the young woman's body on fire. McNeilly started singing "Burn, baby,
burn! Burn, baby, burn!" from The Trammps' song "Disco Inferno."
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| A Fiat Panda similar to the one used by Capper's murderers to convey her from Moston to Werneth Low. |
After committing the brutal crime, the four returned to Jean Powell’s house,
stopping to buy canned drinks along the way. Both Leigh and Pook were at the
house when they arrived.
Despite being engulfed in flames and suffering third-degree burns over
nearly 80% of her body, Suzanne didn't give up. She managed to put out the
fire by rolling on the wet ground and in the mud. In a state of severe shock
and enduring indescribable pain, she stood up and began to walk. She managed
to crawl and stagger along a dark, muddy path for about 200 meters, away
from the woods toward a road to seek help.
Suzanne ended up on a paved road near a golf club, where she was spotted by
some local residents who were passing by. At first, in the dark, they
thought she was an injured animal, but as they got closer, they discovered
the horrific scene. The passersby immediately came to her aid, covered her
with a jacket, and ran to call the police and an ambulance.
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| Werneth Low, where Capper suffered burns that led to her death. |
Resolution of the case.
Although he sadly died on December 18 after succumbing to his injuries, Capper
was able to identify his attackers and give the police details of what had
happened to him. When the case came to light, there was a public outcry as
people learned that the murder had been committed by a gang led by two women,
and that the crimes had been influenced by so-called “video nasties.”
Peter Wall of Greater Manchester Police reported that
"during interviews with the defendant, there was no suggestion that the
reason for Suzanne's murder had anything to do with 'Child's Play',"
but this was overlooked by the more sensationalist media headlines ('The
demonic Chucky doll linked to the horror crimes'; "The Curse of Chucky").
In the end, Jean Powell, Bernadette McNeilly, and Glyn Powell were sentenced
to life in prison, and Anthony Dudson received an indefinite sentence under
state custody because he was a minor; all were found guilty of murder.
Meanwhile, Jeffrey Leigh was sentenced to 12 years in prison and Clifford Pook
to 15 years for the crimes of kidnapping and unlawful detention.
Despite these convictions, the prison system eventually released all of them
after they had served their minimum sentences: Leigh was the first to be
released in 1998, followed by Pook in 2001. Dudson was released in 2013,
McNeilly in 2015, and Jean Powell in 2017. The cycle came to a definitive
close when Glyn Powell, the last to remain incarcerated, was released on
parole in May 2023.
Crime inspired by "Child's Play"?
The film's director, Tom Holland, has always defended "Child's Play" against
these accusations, arguing that horror movie viewers can only be influenced by
the content if they are already mentally unstable to begin with, and most fans
of the genre agree.
While many crimes have drawn inspiration from books, movies, and music, none
of them have been committed solely because of the medium itself. At the heart
of true crime lies human will, the most terrifying monster of all.
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