The sister of Rose West victim Lucy Partington, 21, reveals she wrote a letter to her sibling's killer in prison to “somehow alleviate her suffering” and told the killer: 'May you be free from fear'

The sister of Lucy Partington, who was murdered by Fred and Rose West, reveals that she wrote a letter to her sibling's killer to alleviate Rose's “suffering in some way.”

Marian Partington, now 75, who lives in Oxford, was 26 when Lucy disappeared, and it was only 20 years later that she finally discovered what had happened to her younger sister.

In a BBC podcast Forgiveness: Stories from the Front Line, presenter Marina Cantacuzino, founder of The Forgiveness Project, discovers how Marian came to terms with the horrific death of her beloved sister and how she managed to find a path to forgiveness.

Lucy, 21, was in the final year of her English Literature degree at the University of Exeter when she disappeared on December 27, 1973.

Lucy had been kidnapped, gagged, raped, tortured and murdered by Fred and Rose West before being dismembered and buried under concrete in their home in Cromwell Street, Gloucester.

Marina said: 'I found myself writing a letter to Rosemary West, I wanted to let her know what journey I had to go on because of what happened to Lucy, and I wanted her to know that I wished her no harm.

“I think I ended the letter with, 'May you be free from fear.' So I wrote this letter, but I chose not to send it for another four years because I wanted to make sure that when I sent it, I wasn't expecting a response.

'And indeed the response came from the prison authorities that she did not wish to have any further contact.'

Marian said she was “deeply shocked” when she heard about Rose's crimes during the trial and that forgiveness did not come easily.

She said: 'I was deeply shocked during the trial by Rosemary's ability to lie, we were sitting through it and she was sitting there staring, there was a sense of anger.

“We heard what was found in Lucy's grave, there was tape, a gag to silence her, there was a knife.”

But when she heard Rosemary's testimony, she committed to trying to forgive her.

She said, “Forgiveness for me started with murderous rage, and I felt like a lot of raw, deep emotions had to be experienced before that word could really come into play.

“But I felt like this was the only way out, it's about developing a forgiving heart, until I came to a place where I could truly experience authentic compassion for Rosemary West.

'I actually saw the cage of her suffering, and I saw the greed, the hatred and the ignorance, what the Buddha calls the three poisons.

“She is demonized, she is hated by society and I just wish that the thought I had could somehow alleviate her suffering.”

Marian wanted to keep Lucy's memory alive through writing, but this also helped her process of forgiveness.

She said: 'I had to put something beautiful out there and the beauty was a description of my sister Lucy's life, and I had to give it a name and it was called Salvaging the Sacred. Lucy must have the last word.'

Lucy had gotten a ride from Fred and Rosemary on her way home from a friend's house.

Marian, who became a Quaker after Lucy's death, revealed how her family found out about Lucy's murder.

She said: 'She actually chose to become Catholic five weeks before she was kidnapped, raped, tortured and murdered.

'I was at work and I saw in the paper there was a story about a couple called the Wests and they had found three bodies in the garden and we all had a feeling it might have something to do with Lucy.

'Rosemary West lived on the bus route she would have taken to get home the night she didn't come home.

'I told my mother to contact the police and she did, and the next day they said they had news for us. Then it all went into slow motion.

“They said Fred West spoke to them and admitted there were more bodies in the basement and that one of them was named Lucy.”

A year after the discovery, Lucy's remains were needed as evidence for the defense.

However, Marian felt an instinctive need to go to the mortuary in Cardiff to hold and wrap her sister's bones.

She said: 'It was about reclaiming what was left of her from the miserable hole she had been buried in for years.

'I was amazed by the beauty of her skull, I lifted it out and kissed her forehead. We had two stuffed animals and a blanket that had been on Lucy's bed all these years.

'We placed them on either side of her skull and wrapped her in a soft brown blanket before putting him back in the box.

'I wanted to describe this because in the depths of horror there can be beauty.'

The couple tortured and murdered at least ten women over a twenty-year period between 1967 and 1987.

The serial killer couple were arrested in 1994, after previous failed attempts to prosecute them.

Fred was accused of twelve murders, but took his own life before the trial in 1995.

Rosemary was found guilty of ten counts of murder that same year and is currently serving a life sentence.

Marian previously said she had delved into the details of Rosemary's childhood in an attempt to gain some insight into how she could inflict such terrible atrocities on others.

In the BBC Inside Out West documentary, she said: 'I have details of Rosemary West's childhood – the family violence, the neglect and abuse, and [I have tried] to imagine what it would be like to grow up with very little love,” she said.

'I don't understand how cruel acts can happen that have no root in something else, something that happened in someone's life.

“But then people will always say that's no excuse.”