Managers where a double murderer was able to abuse dead bodies were aware of “problems” in the running of mortuaries as early as 2008.
An independent inquiry set up to examine how David Fuller was allowed to defile corpses found that:
- Deceased people were left out of fridges overnight and during working hours
- Fuller entered one mortuary 444 times in the space of one year “unnoticed and unchecked”
- There was a “persistent lack of curiosity” around his actions
The report also found there were “serious failings” in management.
The electrician had filmed himself abusing corpses in hospital morgues over 15 years before his arrest in December 2020.
He abused corpses at Kent and Sussex Hospital and the Tunbridge Wells Hospital.
Fuller was given a whole-life prison term in December 2021 for the murders of Wendy Knell and Caroline Pierce in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, in 1987.
At the time of his sentencing in 2021, 78 of the mortuary victims had been identified.
But following Fuller’s conviction, the Kent and Essex Serious Crime Directorate was able to identify a total of 101 victims.
He was sentenced again in December last year for the further abuse of 23 bodies.
Last year, the daughter of one victim described how she felt when she found out about the abuse of her mother and said: “The pain and emotional upset seared through my body like a knife.
“He took advantage of her helplessness in death where we were unable to protect her.”
