Who is Robert Napper? The true story of Rachel Nickell's killer, how he was caught and where he is now

Netflix's The Murder of Rachel Nickell details how a series of police failures allowed Rachel Nickell's real killer, Robert Napper, to evade justice for years – while they focussed on wrongfully prosecuting Colin Stagg.

In that time, Napper, a serial rapist, remained free, going on to commit further violent crimes before advances in DNA technology finally linked him to Rachel's murder almost a decade later.

Here's everything to know about Robert Napper, the crimes he committed and where he is now…

Robert Clive Napper is a convicted murderer and serial sex offender from south-east London.

At the time Rachel Nickell was murdered in July 1992, Napper was living in the area and had already been linked to a series of violent sexual attacks.

According to André Hanscombe, Rachel's partner, there were opportunities to stop him before Rachel was killed.

In the Netflix documentary, The Murder of Rachel Nickell, André reveals that three years before Rachel's murder, Napper had been investigated in connection with a string of rapes along the Green Chain Walk in south-east London.

Rachel Nickell with her son, Alex, and dog, Molly

After a member of the public suggested Napper resembled a police identikit image, officers visited him and requested a blood sample. Napper agreed but never attended the station to provide it – instead, fleeing the area.

Police ultimately dropped the inquiry after deciding he was taller than witness descriptions suggested.

In September and October 1989, Napper's own mother also reported to police that her son had confessed to raping a woman in Plumstead.

"The attack Alex [Rachel’s son] witnessed was preventable," André says in the documentary. "Rachel's death was preventable. Samantha and Jazmine's death were preventable. If the police had done their job properly, he'd have been taken off the street."

On 15 July 1992, 23-year-old Rachel Nickell was walking her dog Molly on Wimbledon Common with her two-year-old son Alex when she was attacked.

Police officers described the scene as one of the most brutal they had encountered. Rachel suffered almost 50 stab wounds in what investigators called a frenzied attack. Heartbreakingly, Alex was found beside his mother's body.

Detective Sergeant Keith Penrose later said the toddler was discovered "caked in mud and blood".

The killing triggered one of the largest murder investigations in Metropolitan Police history.

One of the central themes of the Netflix documentary is how investigators became fixated on another suspect, Colin Stagg.

Despite the lack of forensic evidence linking Stagg to the crime, detectives pursued him for years and even launched the infamous ‘Lizzie James’ honeytrap operation in an attempt to obtain a confession – something a judge later ruled against, throwing Stagg’s case out (after he had already spent a year in jail awaiting trial).

According to Detective Superintendent Micky Banks, officers investigating the Bisset murder quickly noticed similarities between their case and Rachel Nickell's killing, but those on Rachel’s case initially dismissed concerns.

"They were convinced they had the right chap [Stagg]," Banks says in the documentary.

The mistake would have devastating consequences.

Colin Stagg was initially falsely accused of the murder

In November 1993, single mother Samantha Bisset and her four-year-old daughter Jazmine were murdered in their Plumstead home.

Detective Superintendent Micky Banks told colleagues to "brace themselves" before entering the flat.

Samantha had been stabbed and mutilated, while Jazmine was sexually assaulted and suffocated.

"My first thought was we had to get whoever had done this," Banks recalls in the documentary, describing the killer as a "maniac".

Both Samantha and Rachel were young mothers, both attacks involved extreme violence and dozens of stab wounds. The crimes also occurred in the presence of young children.

A breakthrough eventually came when police re-examined fingerprints found at Samantha's flat and realised that several belonged to Robert Napper.

After Napper's fingerprints were identified at Samantha Bisset's home, police arrested and interviewed him. According to officers featured in the documentary, he gave bizarre answers and frequently referred to himself in the third person.

When detectives searched his home, they discovered a red toolbox containing knives, a book about strangulation and a map marked with notes about potential locations, including near to where Rachel was killed.

Napper denied murder but admitted manslaughter of Samantha and Jazmine.

He was eventually detained in Broadmoor Hospital, the high-security psychiatric institution, after being diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.

For years, Rachel's murder remained unsolved and by 2002, the investigation had officially become a cold case.

The case was handed to forensic scientist Dr Angela Gallop to reopen, whose team re-examined evidence collected from Rachel's body using more advanced DNA techniques.

"There were some tapings taken from Rachel's body, and we noticed the original scientists hadn't found any DNA," Gallop explains in the documentary.

New testing methods allowed scientists to isolate both Rachel's DNA and a male DNA profile.

Investigators first compared the sample with Colin Stagg's DNA: there was no match.

The profile was then run through the national DNA database and matched Robert Napper – by which point Napper was already being held in Broadmoor.

Yes. In 2008, Napper admitted manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility due to his severe mental illness.

The court heard that he had been suffering from paranoid schizophrenia at the time of the attack. He was given an indefinite hospital order and remains detained in secure psychiatric care.

Robert Napper remains indefinitely detained at Broadmoor Hospital, a maximum-security psychiatric facility in Crowthorne, Berkshire. Born in February 1966, Napper is currently in his late fifties and is held under Sections 37 and 41 of the Mental Health Act 1983.

This specific legal framework means he is subject to a restriction order without a time limit; consequently, he cannot be discharged, transferred to another hospital, or granted temporary community leave without the express joint approval of the Ministry of Justice and an independent Mental Health Tribunal. Given his history, such authorization is considered highly improbable.

Before his transfer to Broadmoor in 1995, Napper was diagnosed with severe paranoid schizophrenia and Asperger’s syndrome.

The Murder of Rachel Nickell is on Netflix now