Detective who led one of the largest manhunts in Britain for serial rapist known as ‘The Fox’ – because he broke into homes and made secret dens before emerging to attack – reveals clue that finally helped police catch him

A detective who led the hunt for one of Britain‘s most notorious serial sex attackers has recalled what finally helped police catch the criminal.

Better known as The Fox for the way he built dens in his victims’ homes to hide in before attacking them, Malcolm Fairley was a calculating predator whose cold, methodical crimes left dozens of lives shattered and the country on edge in 1984.

Fairley was finally caught in September that year at his home in Kentish Town, north London, after sparking one of the largest manhunts in British criminal history.

In 1985, he was handed six life sentences and remained behind bars until he died at 71 years old from a heart attack in a Hull prison last year.

Now, in a rare interview, the senior detective who led the criminal investigation, has spoken out about the case that would come to define his career and the trauma that, for many of the victims, never truly ended. 

Speaking to the BBC, former Det Ch Supt Brian Prickett revealed how it took police six months to identify Fairley and track him down in a time when there was no CCTV and no DNA evidence technology to assist with the search. 

He recalled: ‘Every time he carried out an offence we were able to establish a bit more information about him, and eventually we worked out he had an accent from a very narrow area of the north-east of England.’

Fairley, who wore a mask made from a trouser leg, was eventually arrested after forensic evidence linked his car to an attack, but Prickett claimed the impact of the attacks lasted indefinitely. 

The serial rapist, also a father of three children from his two marriages, committed break-ins and sexual crimes in Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Milton Keynes, South Yorkshire, and his native North East.

For months, a quiet terror gripped an entire community; doors were double-locked, curtains drawn and women changed their routines out of fear they might be next.

Prickett said: ‘The amount of fear in the area was incredible. That summer was particularly hot and people were having to bolt their windows, in some cases screw them down, because of the fear.’

Fairley’s crimes were carried out in the hot summer of 1984, when national tensions were inflamed amidst the ongoing miners’ strike.

His victims included both men and women, ranging in age from teenagers to pensioners. He would break into victims’ homes, help himself to food and drink, and then build a lair out of furniture and blankets.

He would also remove all light bulbs and then wait in the dark, flicking through victims’ family photo albums by torchlight before they returned.

At the height of his crimes, there were three attacks in the space of a week, and at the time of his arrest, Fairley had committed 81 offences.

Prickett revealed he visited a pioneering professor at Leicester University to ask about DNA technology and was told it would be at least nine months to a year before the science could be used in criminal investigations.

The police were forced to focus on meticulously preserving every piece of forensic evidence from the scenes, knowing it could prove vital in the future. 

Prickett said he had always been concerned that too much focus was placed on the offender rather than the victim, which is why dedicated teams were assigned to support those affected, many of whom never fully recovered. 

He added that several male victims struggled with guilt over not being able to protect their partners, which took a toll on their relationships. 

‘People say “We’ve got justice”, but it doesn’t compensate for what happened to them,’ said Prickett. 

In a Channel 5 documentary that aired last April, The Intruder: He’s Watching You, Fairley is heard being asked by Prickett if he tried to stop.

He replied: ‘Well I tried to. Many times. Every time I went I tried.’ Fairley was then asked by another officer: ‘Do you still feel you want to do it?’

He said: ‘Not really, it’s… but I still… get a sexy drive type thing.’ 

Asked by Prickett about an attack he carried out on an elderly woman, he said: ‘Well, I felt disappointed in myself to do it. You know, like it’s… it just weren’t me.’ 

Bedfordshire Police ended up with more than 5,000 suspects, and terrified residents resorted to sleeping with weapons under their beds, fearing that they might be next during the four-month spree.

Fairley had a string of previous convictions to his name and was the father of three children from his two marriages.

In one break-in, he stole a shotgun and ammunition and later used the weapon in other attacks, including in one where he shot a businessman at point-blank range. The victim had to have his finger amputated.

DCS Prickett added: ‘Psychiatrists said that he was rational and that he was normal. Well, I never accepted that. 

‘As a police officer, you deal with him professionally, but as a human being to human being, you’ve got complete disgust, you’ve got almost hatred. I don’t think I’ll ever understand the motivation he had for the attacks he carried out.’

After sentencing Fairley to six life sentences, following his trial at St Albans Crown Court in February 1985, Mr Justice Caulfield said: ‘There are degrees of wickedness beyond condemnatory description.

‘Your crimes fall within this category. You desecrated and defiled men and women in their own homes.’

On February 27, 1985, the Daily Mail revealed Fairley’s mugshot and declared: ‘The Fox – evil beyond words.’

Fairley admitted 13 offences – three rapes, an indecent assault on a man and another on a 74-year-old woman, five burglaries and three aggravated burglaries with intent to rape while carrying a firearm.

He also asked for 68 other crimes, mostly burglaries, to be considered.

An 18-year-old girl who was among his victims said in the Daily Mail after he was convicted: ‘I felt as if there was no one I could turn to and began crying and screaming.

‘Memories of that night were always with me, yet no one seemed to realise what was happening inside my head. Eventually, I could take no more and completely cracked up.’

In a three-hour ordeal, Fairley tried to force the young woman, whom he had raped, to carry out sex acts with her 21-year-old boyfriend and 17-year-old brother.