A look back at some of the North-East's most horrific murders

The region has, sadly, seen a lot of brutal and vile crimes over the years including hideous murders and cannibalism. 

The Northern Echo takes a look back at some of the region's most shocking murders.

Norman Bowen-Jones and Timothy Dunn, Darlington

On a cold October day in 1996, detectives discovered the naked and decomposing body of 29-year-old Lesley Fox, in her basement bedsit. She had been lying dead for five days.

The woman, who was four months pregnant, had been the victim of a prolonged and violent sexual assault before being strangled.

She had been strangled with a rope, her naked body had been carried from the living room into the bedroom where the sexual assault had continued, and a duvet and vacuum cleaner were carefully arranged around the body.

Twelve days after Ms Fox's body was found, Timothy Dunn, then 15, and Norman Bowen-Jones, who was 17, appeared before Darlington magistrates charged with her murder.

Both denied murder - and while they both admitted being at her flat at the time of the killing, they blamed each other for her death. They were convicted of murder on November 11, 1997.

David Harker, Darlington

Cannibal killer David Harker

David Harker, known as the cannibal killer, was cold, calculating and motivated by fame.

Targetting Julie Paterson, who had depression, was reliant on valium and alcohol and with none of her four children living with her, he butchered and ate the Darlington woman in 1998.

He told The Northern Echo how he strangled her with her tights in his bedroom after they had consensual sex.

Harker, who was convicted in February 1999, cut off Ms Paterson's limbs and head before disposing of her torso in a black sack, dumping it in a derelict garden.

Detectives believed he kept her decapitated head in the corner of his bedroom for several days before deciding to remove it, with her limbs and head never being found. 

Officers trawled through 20,000 tons of rubbish at Coxhoe tip, in County Durham, dragging rivers and ponds and searching sewers, but to no avail.

Harker claimed he had cooked pieces of Julie's leg with pasta, saying it was an enjoyable meal.

Shaun Armstrong, Hartlepool

Shaun Armstrong, then 33, was jailed for life at Leeds Crown Court in July 1995 after pleading guilty to murder three-year-old Rosie Palmer.

Armstrong, who was described as having a ''severely disordered personality'', abducted Rosie in June 1994 after she went to buy an ice lolly from a van outside her home in Hartlepool, Cleveland.

Police found her body hidden in a wardrobe at Easington-born Armstrong's nearby flat three days after she disappeared.

At a review of Armstrong's minimum term in2006, Mr Justice Crane, sitting in London, said Rosie had been subjected to ''gross violation'' and it was the trial judge's view that she ''had almost certainly died because Armstrong suffocated her when she cried out at the assault''.

Billy Dunlop, Billingham

Billy Dunlop, who has admitted the murder of Julie Hogg

Billy Dunlop pleaded guilty to murdering Julie Hogg, aged 22, in Billingham, Teesside, when he appeared at the Old Bailey in 2006.

It came after relentless campaigning by Ms Hogg's mother Ann Ming, who created legal history after spending 17 years working to overturn the 800-year-old double jeopardy law that prevented people being tried twice for the same offence.

Dunlop faced two trials in 1991 for her murder but each time a jury failed to reach a verdict and he was formally acquitted.

Ms Hogg's disappearance in November 1989 was initially treated as a missing person inquiry but her Mrs Ming discovered her daughter's body concealed behind a bath panel 80 days later. 

Steven Grieveson, Sunderland 

Steven Grieveson, thought of as one of the region's few serial killers, has been convicted of killing four boys.

In 2013, he was convicted of murdering 14-year-old Simon Martin in the Roker area in May, 1990.

At this time, the former fairground worker was already serving life sentences for the murders of three other boys - David Hanson and David Grieff, both 15, and Thomas Kelly, 18.

But he confessed in prison to strangling and bludgeoning Simon in a derelict former Masonic hall after they had performed a sex act.

He said he had killed Simon because he feared people would learn of his bisexuality. But he pleaded not guilty to his murder, blaming the crime on an abnormality of mind.