Black Panther Donald Neilson is dead

Black Panther serial killer Donald Neilson, who kidnapped and killed Kidderminster heiress Lesley Whittle has died, it was announced today.

Neilson, one of Britain's longest serving prisoners, was taken to hospital from Norwich Prison's lifers unit suffering breathing difficulties yesterday.

In 2008, Neilson, who was 75, was told he must die in prison where he had been serving four life sentences.

He murdered Lesley Whittle, daughter of George Whittle, who ran Whittle coach company in Kidderminster, and three sub-post masters, Donald Skepper, Derek Astin and Sidney Grayland.

He kidnapped and murdered 17-year-old Lesley on January 14, 1975 when he left a ransom note at her family home in Highley demanding £50,000 and left instructions to wait for a telephone call at the Swan shopping centre.

Neilson had learned that the teenage schoolgirl had inherited a fortune and later took her to a disused drainage shaft in a beauty spot, in Kidsgrove, Staffordshire.

He left her there with a wire around her neck, basic food requirements and some bedding.

She later died, either from being throttled, or from the shock and terror of her ordeal. Almost two months after her kidnap, her naked body was found in the shaft.

The former jobbing builder became Britain's most wanted man before he was finally brought to justice in 1976 at Oxford Crown Court. He carried out a series of robberies over a decade which led to the postmasters being killed.