Peter Manuel

Peter Manuel
Peter Manuel mug shot
Born	(1927-03-13)13 March 1927 New York City, U.S.
Died	11 July 1958(1958-07-11) (aged 31) HM Prison Barlinnie, Glasgow, Scotland
Cause of death	Hanging
Other names	The Beast of Birkenshaw
Criminal penalty	Death
Conviction(s)	Murder, rape, sexual assault
Killings
Victims	At least 8
Span of killings	2 January 1956–1 January 1958
Country	Scotland
Date apprehended	13 January 1958

Peter Thomas Anthony Manuel (13 March 1927 – 11 July 1958) was a Scottish serial killer who was convicted of murdering a total of eight people across Lanarkshire and southern Scotland between 1956 and his arrest in January 1958, and is believed to have murdered two more, ten in all. Prior to his arrest, the media nicknamed the unidentified killer "the Beast of Birkenshaw". Manuel was hanged at Glasgow's Barlinnie Prison; he was one of the last prisoners to die on the Barlinnie gallows.

Manuel was born to Scottish parents in New York City; the family moved to Detroit, Michigan before migrating back to Scotland in 1932, this time to Birkenshaw, North Lanarkshire. During his childhood, he was bullied. By the age of ten, he was known to the local police as a petty thief. At the age of 16, he committed a string of sexual attacks that resulted in his serving nine years in Peterhead Prison. In 1955, he successfully conducted his own defence on a rape charge at Airdrie Sheriff Court.

Manuel was convicted in 1958 for the murders of eight people. One case against him was thrown out of court; another, committed in England, was attributed to him.

Anne Kneilands (17): On 2 January 1956, Kneilands was stalked at the now demolished East Kilbride golf course in the Calderwood area, where she was raped and bludgeoned to death with a length of iron. Although the police questioned him about the murder and he would confess to it two years later, Manuel escaped arrest when his father gave him an alibi. He was charged with this murder in 1958, but the case was dropped because of insufficient evidence.

Marion Watt (45), Vivienne Watt (17) and Margaret Brown (41): Marion, her daughter Vivienne, and her sister Margaret were shot dead in their home in Burnside, Glasgow, on 17 September 1956. At the time of the murders, Manuel was out on bail for housebreaking at a nearby colliery and officers in charge of the manhunt for the Watts' killer suspected him. However, for a time the main suspect was Marion's husband, William, who had been on a fishing holiday in Ardrishaig, but was suspected of driving around 90 miles through the night, faking a break-in to his own house, murdering his family, and driving back. The ferryman on the Renfrew Ferry claimed to have seen him on the ferry during the night (although this was not the most direct route) and a motorist claimed to have passed him on Loch Lomondside. Both witnesses picked him out at an identity parade. William Watt was arrested and held on remand in Barlinnie Prison, then released two months later, after the police realised that they could not make the case against him stick, and the ferryman seemed confused about what type of car he had driven. The police did not find any serious motive which might have led Watt to murder his family, although it emerged that he had a number of affairs during his marriage. Police frogmen searched the Crinan Canal next to the hotel where Watt had stayed, looking for a murder weapon and bloodstained clothing, but the weapon was actually in another stretch of water further south. It was established that the level of petrol in Watt's car had not fallen during his alleged overnight drive, so the police questioned petrol stations along the route to see if he had refuelled, and even speculated that he might have had a secret cache of petrol, and searched the route for it. William Watt remained the main suspect until the Smart family murder just a few miles away, when the police realised that there was a serial killer on the loose. At Manuel's trial, the defence argued that Watt had committed these murders.