Rent Martina Cole's Lady Killers: Bathory, Cotton and Dyer (2008)
4.0 of 5 from 45 ratings
2h 30min
- General info
- Available formats
- Synopsis:
British crime writer, Martina Cole, examines the life and times of the most notorious female serial killers across history and asks: Why do women kill and why are we surprised when they do? Each programme tells the story of an individual killer with expert analysis and dramatic reconstruction. The crime writer presents a profile of 16th-century Hungarian aristocrat Elizabeth Bathory. She and four collaborators were accused of torturing and killing hundreds of virgin girls and young women, with one witness alleging they were responsible for more than 600 deaths! Cole looks at the story of serial poisoner Mary Ann Cotton, who was hanged in Durham Prison in 1873 after the suspicious deaths of three, her mother, a lover and eight children. In an age of high infant mortality, the deaths of her children were not seen as unusual, but her bigamous marriage and frequent efforts to claim life insurance payouts eventually alerted authorities to the crimes, which all involved the use of arsenic. A re-examination of the evidence in the case of Victorian baby killer Amelia Dyer, who was hanged in 1896 for murder of children she adopted for a remuneration. In an unforgiving age, it was not unusual for babies born out of wedlock to be disposed off and Dyer made a good living by strangling her charges. Seven bodies were recovered from the River Thames, but the full extent of her crimes will never be know - Actors:
- Martina Cole, Allan Beveridge, Dennis Báthory-Kitsz
- Studio:
- Demand DVD
- Genres:
- British TV, TV Crimes, TV Documentaries