ITV has commissioned a new six-part drama about the Yorkshire Ripper from the makers of the successful Des and White House Farm series.
The serial killer - real name Peter Sutcliffe - exacted a reign of terror in Yorkshire between 1975 and 1980, murdering 13 women and attempting to murder seven more.
The new show, which has the working title The Yorkshire Ripper, will dramatise the five-year search for Sutcliffe which involved more than a thousand police officers, in addition to exploring the effects of his actions on the lives of the victims' relatives and those who managed to survive.
"In a story full with eye-watering statistics, one for me has always stood out: Peter Sutcliffe rendered 23 children motherless," said screenwriter George Kay.
"That one fact in itself demands that any definitive drama about this case should encompass far more than just the story of a police investigation.
"We will focus not just on the police, therefore, but the victims, their families, those who were attacked but not believed, those who whose lives were permanently changed.
"This is not the story of a Ripper who hailed from Yorkshire, but the story of how Yorkshire was ripped apart."
Sutcliffe is now 74 and serving 20 concurrent life sentences at HMP Frankland in Durham, which has previously housed the likes of Harold Shipman and Charles Bronson.
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