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The Bad Seed: The Shocking Crimes of Mary Bell
Mary Bell, whose name stands alone in the annals of crime, was born on May 26, 1957, to a teenage prostitute. Unplanned and unwanted, the baby developed into a youngster with a propensity for violence that would shake a nation to its core.
Emotionally detached from an early age, Mary was a terror both in the neighborhood and around the schoolyard. A bully who liked to pick on the younger children, it was common knowledge that if she fixed her eyes on a target, they could expect a throttling before the day was through. It was reported that, on one memorable occasion, she had pinned a younger girl to the ground and stuffed handfuls of sand down her throat.
Mary first appeared on police radar on May 11, 1968, when a three-year-old playmate was found wandering near his home in the Scotswood area of Newcastle, seemingly in a daze. Bleeding from the head, he told his mother that he and ten-year-old Mary had been climbing on an abandoned air raid shelter when she suddenly pushed him, sending him tumbling several feet to the ground below. The gash he received in the fall was serious enough to warrant a trip to the hospital.
The following day, three little girls who had been enjoying an afternoon on the playground told their parents that Mary had approached them, asking if they knew what happened when you die. Before they…
