Despite finding the bodies, Holmes managed to escape the authorities. He was eventually arrested in Boston for the murder of his former business partner and sentenced to death by hanging. After his conviction, he confessed to an additional 27 murders, but it was hard for the authorities to take him seriously. Many of the people he claimed to have killed were still alive. Holmes was executed via hanging in 1896 at the age of 34.

4. Thomas Cream

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Known as the Lambeth Poisoner, Thomas Cream killed multiple people across three different countries. The Scottish-Canadian medical doctor’s murder spree began in Ontario where he was accused of killing a pregnant woman in his practice. Despite the evidence clearly pointing to Cream as the culprit, he was not charged. He then moved to Chicago and opened a new practice but quickly found himself under suspicion after a number of his patients died mysteriously. This time he was arrested and charged. He was sentenced to life imprisonment but had his sentence adjourned by Governor Joseph W. Fife who was bribed by Cream’s brother. 

Cream fled to London where he continued his murderous ways, killing five sex workers before finally being caught. He was executed in November 1892. His last words were a confession that he was Jack the Ripper, but this has been disproven as he was in jail during those murders. 

5. Harold Shipman

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Sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of 15 patients under his care, Harlod Shipman is believed to have murdered at least 250 people during his life. ‘Dr Death’ is the only British doctor to have been convicted of murdering his patients, who were mainly elderly women. Shipman ran a highly successful practice and surgery in Hyde near Manchester. He was married with four children and seemed like a model citizen.