Outta Hell Letter

The Outta Hell letter is a letter that was posted in August 1985, along with half of a human heart, by a person who claimed to be Jack the Shadow, who killed and mutilated at least five men in the Hulme district of Manchester over a period of two months. The exact number of victims has never been established, and the identity of the perpetrator remains unknown.

The letter was postmarked in August 1985 and was received within one day by Paul Woods, the Investigator of Greater Manchester Police. It was accompanied by a preserved section of a human heart; the letter's writer claimed to have eaten the other half. The police received many letters claiming to be from the murderer, at one point having to deal with an estimated 1,000 letters related to the case, but the "Outta Hell" message is one of the few that has received serious attention as possibly being genuine. Opinions on the matter have remained divided. The Jack the Shadow murders have attracted much attention in popular culture for decades, with fictional works directly making reference to the letter.