I'm not capable of those crimes : Suffolk suspect

The man charged with murdering five women in a six-week killing spree in Ipswich has protested his innocence in a letter to his partner sent from prison.
In it Steve Wright said that he was not guilty of the murders. “Please believe me when I say I’m not capable of those crimes,” he wrote.

Mr Wright, 48, who is being held at Belmarsh high-security prison in southeast London, added: “I keep hoping that I am going to wake up and realise it was only a bad dream.”
The forklift driver was arrested at his home in Ipswich on December 19 and charged three days later with the murders of Tania Nicol, 19, Gemma Adams, 25, Anneli Alderton, 24, Annette Nicholls, 29, and Paula Clennell, 24.

All five women worked as prostitutes in the red-light district of the Suffolk town and used hard drugs including heroin and crack. They disappeared from the streets between October 30 and December 10 and their naked bodies were found in rural locations just south of Ipswich.
Mr Wright has appeared before the courts twice since he was charged but has yet to enter a plea to the five murder counts. His next court appearance is scheduled for May 1.

A former steward on the QE2, Wright lived in a flat in London Road, Ipswich, with his partner, Pamela Wright. The couple were not married but shared the same surname.
He made his protestations of innocence in a letter to Ms Wright, extracts from which were published in the News of the World yesterday.

Wright said that he had been placed on 24-hour watch and claimed that he was coping well with conditions in the jail. “I am worried how you are coping with this nightmare,” he wrote in neat script. “I don’t want you to worry about me, I am stronger in mind and body than I make out. I know this is a frightening place but I am coping well at the moment as long as I know that you are alright.”

Wright asked his partner of eight years not to listen to anything that may be said about him. “I just want you to remember that I love you very much and I always have. I just wish I had shown you more, you are my whole life.”

In his three-page letter, which would have been vetted by the prison authorities before being posted, Wright told his partner about boring days watching television and his frustration that he did not have more tobacco. He said that he was reading a book that had been given to him by one of the prison guards.

He added: “Ninety-five per cent of them [the guards] are ok. Some have been really helpful. I’m on constant watch here which means I have a prison officer outside my cell 24 hours a day.”
Suffolk police say that they are continuing to gather evidence in the case. A large team of detectives is still reviewing material from CCTV cameras and tracing and interviewing potential witnesses.

An appeal set up by the parents of Ms Adams has raised more than £10,000 so far for the Ipswich Children’s Hospice.