A man who killed three women and mutilated two of them to satisfy his "depraved and perverted" sexual cravings was jailed for life on 25th November 2003.
Anthony Hardy had been released from a psychiatric hospital just weeks before he dismembered two of his victims, leaving their body parts in bin bags near his home in Camden, north London.
Nine months earlier officers had discovered the body of another woman in his flat, but her death had been put down to natural causes.
It emerged that Hardy had also previously been investigated about a series of rapes.
Earlier, he pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey to all three murders. Giving him three life sentences, Mr Justice Keith told him: "Only you know for sure how your victims met their deaths but the unspeakable indignities to which you subjected the bodies of your last two victims in order to satisfy your depraved and perverted needs are in no doubt."
The partial remains of Brigette MacClennan, 34, and Elizabeth Valad, 29, were found by a tramp rummaging in bins near Hardy's flat in the early hours of December 30, 2002. The body of , 31, had been discovered at the flat the previous January.
All of the women were drug addicts and had worked as prostitutes in north London.
Forty-four pictures of MacClennan and Valad were found by officers. They showed both women naked apart from a baseball cap - worn by Hardy when he was arrested - or a decorative "devil's mask". Both were dead when the pictures were taken.
Mr Horwell said: "Whether he intended to kill his first victim or else to do her serious bodily harm, it is the Crown's case that by the time he killed victims two and three, he must have intended to kill them."
He added: "We do not profess to have every piece of this disturbing jigsaw, but the defendant had an obsession with pornography and liked to dominate women. A motive for the murders we suggest is that he decided to kill these women in order to photograph them in various positions which he had arranged when they were dead."
Mr Horwell said Hardy had been preparing White to be photographed when he was disturbed in January by police investigating a dispute between him and a neighbour.
Officers discovered White's naked body on a bed in a locked room and Hardy was arrested for murder. However, a postmortem examination ruled she had died from a heart attack caused by a longstanding condition. "In the light of that [natural causes] conclusion police had no choice but to agree that no further action could be taken against the defendant," Mr Horwell said.
Hardy pleaded guilty to the criminal damage charge arising from the neighbour dispute and was sentenced under the Mental Health Act. He spent time at St Luke's hospital in Muswell Hill, north London, until he was discharged on November 4 last year - less than two months before the body parts were found.
Following that discovery a massive hunt was launched and officers recovered more body parts in bins around Hardy's home and found Valad's torso at his flat.
An examination revealed that both women received injuries consistent with strangulation and that their bodies had been mutilated after death with a sharp instrument.
The court heard that knives and saws were recovered from Hardy's home
.
Outside court, Detective Chief Inspector Ken Bell, who led the investigation, said it was the most disturbing case he had been involved in. "It has always been the belief of the investigating team that a man in possession of all his faculties committed these murders.
"Hardy is a dangerous, devious and manipulative man. He took his victims to his flat where he murdered all three vulnerable women.
"Hardy dismembered his last two victims with considerable skill, whether this was part of his gratification or simply an attempt to hide his crimes we will never know."
The police are now looking into unsolved murders going back 20 years to see if Hardy had a hand in other attacks. Scotland Yard said he had previously been investigated for a number of rapes and an indecent assault. Police would not disclose details but a Yard spokeswoman said that a file had been sent to the crown prosecution service which decided there was "insufficient evidence".
DCI Bell said there was an investigation ongoing now that was looking at possible links to other attacks and Hardy, although nothing concrete had yet been found.
