Cambridge rapist gets life

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33966, 6 October 1975, Page 15

Cambridge rapist gets life

(N.Z. Press Assn —Copyright) LONDON, October 5.

By day, a 47-year-old van driver, Peter Cook got his kicks by spending long stops on his delivery route around Cambridge boasting about his latest collection of hard-core pornographic books.

He loved every stop because it gave him a chance to flash his magazines and pictures and occasionally issue invitations to blue movie shows on his own expensive projector. By night, an English court heard last week, the sft 4in

short-haired former thief played out in real life the fantasies that those books and movies had built up. Cook admitted to the Court that he was the leatherhooded Cambridge rapist—the man who terrorised the women in the university town for eight months last year and early this year. He pleaded guilty to raping six girls and committing an act of buggery against a seventh. Mr Justice Stevenson gaoled him for life—“in this case life ought to mean life,” the Judge said. Lady’s wig Police finally caught up with Cook after he was stopped riding a bicycle

through the town at night wearing a lady’s wig. From there unfolded the bizarre tale of a man who one British newspaper described as the “most feared criminal to prowl the streets since Jack the Ripper.”

Cook led detectives to his secret compartment in a hut near his caravan where he lived with his 38-year-old wife, Margaret, on the outskirts of Cambridge.

First there was his red book.

For three painstaking years he had made up a list of names and addresses of likely victims after watching and following women all around the town. The lists in the book police say, were intricate.

The little red book was found under his leather hood. Cook had audaciously painted the word “rapist” across the forehead of the mask which had zipper-slits for the mouth and eyes. Even case-hardened detectives were taken aback by his collection of black corsets and built-up “falsie” bras. Newspaper cuttings And in the bottom of this compartment was probably the best example of his boldness. A newspaper cutting book with every grim detail of each attack. Cook’s defence counsel put the blame for his action on the library of pornography which he had built up over three years. Mr Brian Higgs, Q.C., told the Norwich Court: “After six months of reading the books and watching the blue films he was driven to commit the rapes.” Cook allegedly told police: “It was like being in another world. I think the films and books control me. I had to do something.” Amid shouts of abuse from angry women outside Norwich Crown court in northeast England Mrs Margaret Cook declared: “I will wait for my Peter.” During the 75-minute hearing the public gallpry was packed—mostly with women —and when Cook with a blanket over his head was taken to a waiting prison van women surrounded the van booting and cat-calling. Cook married Margaret in August, 1968. but her family, from a village close to Cook’s home, refused to attend.

Some say that the family did not approve because of his criminal record. He had been in trouble with the law since the age of 10, but had not been convicted of

any sexual offences. His specialities were burglary and housebreaking. The son of a former small builder, he made 10 Court appearances up to 1952 for offences ranging from stealing bicycles to house-break-ing and burglary. In 1952, convicted of 28 house-breaking charges, he was sentenced to five years gaol. Cook also spent time in the notorious Dartmoor prison and Broadmoor criminal prison for the mentally insane.

After marriage life appeared to go smoothly for Cook and his wife, who worked as a bookbinder for Cambridge University Press. They prospered financially even on their modest wages and Cook was able to buy a £4OOO cabin-cruiser which he named the Margaret Rose—after his wife.

After her husband was arrested Mrs Cook said that she had not dreamt that he was the rapist. “We used to laugh and joke about it when we saw reports about the rapes on television,” she said.