The Mask of Terror

9/3/2024

By M.P. Pellicer | Stranger Than Fiction Stories
For fourteen years, this mask of terror was what children saw as they were stolen from their homes by a depraved predator known as "The Beast of Jersey".

Gilles de Rais a French aristocrat became a serial killer and devout devil worshipper

The island of Jersey in the British Channel off the coast of Normandy is a British Crown dependency.

It all started in 1957, when a nurse waiting at a bus stop at Monte a l'Abbe, was approached by a man wearing a long coat with a scarf over his face. He beat her over the head, tied a rope around her neck and raped her in a nearby field. She was severely injured during the attack, and was eventually found and taken to a hospital.

In December, 1957 what was dubbed as Jersey's "Man in Black" struck a third time by knifing a nurse, Adele Cudlipp, three times while she was returning to her home at St. Helier.

There was another attack in October 1959.

The victims all described the same man: he was about 5'6" in height, in his mid-40s and had a strange Irish accent which they believed was fake. He also had a strange musty smell. Police agreed the perpetrator was the same man.

Three women were attacked and the press dubbed him Jersey's Man in Black c.1957

On this small island it appeared that a nightmare had come to life, when children were terrorized and kidnapped by a man wearing a rubber mask and a black wig. He would creep into their homes during the full moon, then he would tie a noose around their necks and molest them sexually. In some instances he would truss his victims like farm animals by tying their hands to their ankles.

On February 14, 1960 a man went into a bedroom where a 12-year-old boy slept. When the child woke up he saw a man in a mask standing at the foot of his bed who shone a flashlight into his eyes, and blinded him. The man placed a noose around his neck, and dragged him outside to a field where he raped him. After it was over he took him back into the house and disappeared.

Edward John Louis Paisnel (1925-1995) was caught in 1971. During the sensational trial that followed, it was revealed he followed in the footstep of the notorious Gilles de Rais (1404-1440)—a soldier, sadist and pedophile who once fought with Joan of Arc. De Rais brought children to his castle where he tortured them, and offered them as a sacrifice to the devil.

In a barn on his property Paisnel had erected an altar to satan that he hid behind red curtains. It was decorated with occult symbols and other arcane items. He would sacrifice small animals in a blood ritual, before going out for the night to claim another victim.

A secret room was also found at Paisnel's house concealed behind a hinged cupboard, which was hidden behind a curtain. There police found a large, wooden-bladed knife hanging over a glass chalice. There was also a china toad.

Edward John Louis Paisnel mugshot c.1971

Paisnel was captured when he stole a car, and came to a police roadblock investigating another murder. Convinced they were looking for him, he ran through the roadblock and a red light, leading the police on a 75 m.p.h. chase until he crashed at a bend and was tackled by an officer as he fled.

He had no need to confess since he was wearing his "Beast" costume, which consisted of a long overcoat with inch-long nails studding the lapels and shoulders. He had nail-studded bracelets on his wrists, and on his head was a black wig. Inside a coat pocket was the rubber mask.

Police also found two lengths of sash cord, a pajama cord and other articles. Paisnel explained he was going to an orgy. When asked about the wig, he said he used it as a disguise at a secret society meeting he attended. The sex orgies occurred during the religious meeting.

After Paisnel's arrest a girl told the courts that five years before, a masked man raped her while she was on holiday at the island. After hearing two minutes of a tape with Paisnel's voice she said: "That is the voice of the man who attacked me. The voice is the one thing that will stick in my mind."

One of the attacks occurred on July 19, 1964. The victim was a 10-year-old girl, and Paisnel entered the home through the kitchen window. He took her from the house wrapped in a household rug, and carried her to a field 200 yards away, near a road called the Devil's Chair. There he sexually assaulted her.

Alphonse Le Gastelois

Paisnel was convicted on 13 counts of assault, rape and sodomy in December, 1971 and sentenced to 30 years in prison. The children attacked were between the ages of 9 and 16. One of those victims was even impregnated by Paisnel. Another witness confirmed he used chloroform on sleeping children.

Paisnel's attorney, Tom Dore in his closing speech said that more than one person was responsible for the attacks on the children.

During the trial Paisnel's mother, Alice Maud Paisnel gave evidence for the defense. She testified that on the night of August 6, 1966, the date of an alleged sexual attack on a 15-year-old girl, he was watching TV with her and his father Emile Paisnel. He stayed there until the early hours of the morning.

Paisnel's mistress Florence Hawkins, a nurse who testified for the defense wept at his trial and sobbed when he was convicted, "Please, please, I must be near him."

It's believed the Beast of Jersey was also responsible for a number of unsolved missing children cases.

Testimony from neighbors proved that Paisnel led a double life for years. He was known as a pillar of society and a skilled builder, who went by the name of "Ted". He lived with his wife Joan and three children at Maison du Soleil, Boulivot, Grouville, Jersey.

His wife Joan founded a community home, and the couple would take in orphan children at their home in Grouville. They had their own three children. Ironically he played Santa Claus during the Christmas season.

Like many psychopaths, he urged the local authorities to capture the criminal who was attacking children, knowing full well he was the author of these crimes.

Paisnel's disguise

Prior to Paisnel's arrest, the first to be suspected in the crimes was a fisherman and farmer named Alphonse Le Gastelois (1914-2012). He was arrested but released for lack of evidence. This did not satisfy the townspeople, and his cottage was burned down in an obvious act of arson. Le Gastelois fearing for his life went to Les Ecrehous in a self-imposed exile that lasted 14 years.

Le Gastelois known as a loner who roamed the country lanes at night wearing a dirty raincoat tied at the waist with a piece of rope, came under suspicion due to his odd behavior. Of 30 suspects the authorities investigated, they only released his name to the public, which years later has never been understood.

Even after he was cleared by the arrest of Paisnel he continued to live at Ecrehous, where he survived from eating lobsters, rabbits, fish, seaweed and seagull eggs. He returned to Jersey in 1975. He never married or had children, and was looked after by his nephew when he became old.

Paisnel was released from prison in 1991, after serving 20 years of his 30 years sentence. He moved to the Isle of Wight, since sentiment against him was still high. He died in July, 1994.

Haut de la Garenne c.2008

Long after Paisnel was dead, and memories of his crimes had faded, his name would surface once more.

In February, 2008 police were searching the grounds of a former children's home in Jersey, after a child's remains were found in the building. They also discovered more bodies at what was once the Haut de la Garenne in St. Martin under a concrete floor.

Haut de la Garenne opened in 1867 as the Industrial School for "young people of the lower classes of society and neglected children." In 1900, it was renamed the Jersey Home for Boys. During the Nazi occupation it was used as a signaling station, and once the war was over it reverted to a children's home. It closed in 1987, and at that time it served about 60 people with special needs. It was refurbished and opened as a youth hostel in 2004.

The discovery was a result of a 3-month investigation into child abuse at several government institutions on the island.

The unearthed remains were believed to date back to the 1980s, however the police were unable to determine how old the child was, and whether it was male or female.

The police had been covertly investigating and gathering statements for one year regarding abuse that spanned more than 40 years.

Paisnel's beast suit

The first tip as to the scale of the rampant abuse of children on the island, was when the authorities were conducting a series of convictions for sexual offenses involving officers of Jersey Sea Cadets. They noticed links between the victims in those cases and other institutions on the island, including Haut de la Garenne.

More than 150 people called the helpline with allegations of abuse. Police received information on 140 victims and 40 suspects, that had all at one time worked at Haut de la Garenne. The allegations spanned from the end of World War II to the early 2000s. Some of the callers were as far away as Australia.

The allegations ranged from "pretty severe physical and mental abuse, right through to the most serious sexual crimes that you can imagine."

There were also questions as to why these allegations had not been presented to authorities before.

Using the information gathered, police brought dogs and ground penetrating radar to Haut de la Garenne. The radar and the dogs indicated where the archaeologist should dig.

In January, 2008 police charged a local resident name Gordon Claude Wateridge, 76, with the abuse of 3 girls under the age of 16 which occurred between 1969 and 1979.

What police found as they conducted the investigation was instances of pedophilia that involved several "persons of responsibility," and that some of them had worked at Haut de la Garenne.

Boys at Haut de la Garenne c.1946

As the investigation progressed, police realized there might be children buried on the grounds.

A former minister who had been fired in September, 2007 for asking questions, said that if the investigators had been "indigenous" none of the search would have happened. Senator Stuart Syvret handed out copies of a confidential report dating to 2000 on the activities of Andrew Jervis Dykes, a teacher at Victoria College who was jailed for abusing six pupils between 1979 to 1996. He claimed there was a "culture of concealment" within the Jersey legislature and judiciary that led to the abuse of children in different institutions, where the crimes were tolerated and possibly covered up.

Accusations also involved cover-ups after it emerged that several bones were found in 2003 by builders renovating the home, but the bones were deemed to belong to an animal, and the case was closed. A trapdoor, shackles and canes were also found at that time.

Police discovered that records kept at the school were sketchy, and possibly any children that were missing were reported as runaways.

The police concentrated their digging at a bricked up cellar at the back of the building, where witnesses said child abuse took place.

Bunkers from the time of the German occupation of Jersey

A Scottish resident who had lived on the island for 8 years said: "There have been rumors of child abuse abuse for years."

Inside the bricked up cellar, a concrete bath and a set of shackles were discovered. Another dungeon-like chamber was found beneath a trapdoor. Officers found 65 milk teeth in the basement, many belonging to older children who would have already shed them.

Authorities suspected that after Haut de la Garenne closed in 1986, abuse continued in other institutions. Jersey Island measures nine miles by five, and had a population of 90,000 at that time.

Gary Matthews, a former member of the island's parliament said that the political classes were terrified of scandals that would bring questions and interference from the outside. "The culture of secrecy started during the German occupation in the Second World War, when there was a certain amount of collaboration. Then, in the 1960s, when Jersey built up its all-important financial sector, secrecy became the rule."

An example was made of the case of Roger Holland, 43, a St. John ambulance volunteer, who was a convicted pedophile when he applied to become a part-time police officer in 1992. Only six years before he had sexually assault a mentally impaired, 14-year-old girl. He admitted to molesting a second child, whose parents felt she was too traumatized to press charges. Holland confessed that he had "a problem for younger girls."

Edward Paisnel with his wife Joan and his stepson

Despite his conviction the Jersey authorities decided this was in the past, and allowed him to stand for election as a constable's officer. He was elected unopposed. Re-elected in 1995, he was promoted in 1997 to the rank of vingtenier (constable's officer) the second most senior in the island's volunteer force. In 1999, a young girl alleged he had "committed a sexual act with her." in the back of a police van. He resigned in 1999 and in 2001 was jailed for 2 years for two counts of indecent assault.

Edward Paisnel the Beast of Jersey, would dress as Santa Claus and handed out sweets to the children, which he asked to call him "Uncle Ted". He was one of the guests at the horrific parties held in the home where both boys and girls were tortured and raped.

It has been claimed during public evidence that Paisnel regularly visited La Préférence, a home run by his mother-in-law, to abuse young residents. There were many reports of "someone" moving around in the crawl spaces at night during the 1960s, which is believed was Paisnel. The inquiry later heard from a witness, who was born in 1990 and stayed at La Préférence in the early 2000s. He claimed that he was physically assaulted by a man who worked for Social Services.

A witness referred to as Mr. D, claimed he would occasionally stay at the home of the Paisnels to help with building work during his time at La Préférence. He claimed that Joan Paisnel would beat him and appeared to take sexual pleasure from doing so, stating that 'she would go red in the face with enjoyment'.

Ironically Joan Paisnel authored a book titled The Beast of Jersey shortly after her husband's arrest and conviction, as if to separate herself from his deeds. But in truth was she ever questioned as to how much she knew of what he was doing?

Jersey Lighthouse

Another question asked was how on such a small island did so many hundreds of children end up in care homes? Poverty was listed as the most contributing factor.

In 2012, Wilfrid Brambell (1912-1985) an actor who played the "dirty old man" Albert Steptoe in the BBC comedy Steptoe and Son, was accused of abusing two boys in a theatre on the island of Jersey at height of his fame in the 1970s. Brambell was homosexual, and had a criminal record for "persistently importuning for an immoral purpose" in a public lavatory at Shepherd's Bush, west London, dating back to 1962.

The victims who were now adults said they did not report the abuse, because they did not trust the island's constabulary.

One of the tormentors at Haut de la Garenne was Jimmy Savile (1926-2011). After his death, police concluded he had been one of Britain's most prolific, predatory sex offenders. There were allegations during his lifetime, but like the cases at Haut de la Garenne accusations were dismissed, ignored or disbelieved. Savile also abused children at Sacre Coeur orphanage on the island, which was run by French Catholic nuns.

Books on black magic found in Paisnel's possession when he was arrested c.1971

At the end of the investigation at Haut de la Garenne, it was found that of 170 bone fragments recovered, only three could be human and probably dated back centuries. However the investigation code-named Operation Rectangle did unearth an extensive scandal of sexual and physical abuse at the school, and other Jersey orphanages.

Eight people were prosecuted for 145 offenses and seven were convicted. Some of the offenders had already died. At the end of the investigation the police had collected more than 500 claims of offenses.

Wilfred Krichefski a Jersey senator and TV executive who had already died, was named as an abuser posthumously.

The Channel Islands were the only part of the British Isles to be occupied during the war, remaining under German control for five years until they were liberated in May 1945.

"One man Giffard Aubin told the inquiry he was taken into care during the occupation, when his father complained about a local brothel frequented by the Germans. He told the inquiry the complaint was passed on to a Jersey Centenier — an honorary policeman — who declared that Aubin's father was an unfit parent."

Another man described where his father was deported to Germany, and he was caught stealing to feed his family. As a consequence he was sent into care. Children fathered by German troops were sent into care as well.

"At the Sacre Coeur orphanage, one woman said, if a child wet the bed they would be put on a chair with their pants on their head. The other children would then be told to form a circle around the child and the nuns would lead a rhyme in French, ridiculing them. Another woman said she was abused by Savile at the orphanage in 1969. She said she reported it to a nun, but had her mouth washed out with soap and was told never to speak to anyone about it."

The Sacre Coeur orphanage was open for 70 years before there was any state inspection. A home run by the Vegetarian Society who punished children caught eating meat, was only inspected once in 1981, after it had been open for 33 years.

In 2017, there were calls to demolish Haut de la Garenne, which had been dubbed the "house of horror". In 2018 it was decided not to raze it.

The school was used as a set for the BBC series Bergerac that aired from 1981 to 1991 on BBC One.

The questions beg to be asked: how a man could terrorize a community for 14 years on an island that measures only 9 miles by 4 miles in the 1950s, when it was inhabited by only 30,000 inhabitants? How could such a small, inconspicuous place become the hub of pedophiles throughout the years, without fear of discovery or so it seems? Was it really a coincidence that Paisnel used Gille de Rais as his muse? Perhaps there were many Beasts on Jersey.