'Ted Bundy obsessive' Cody Ackland jailed for murdering teenager Bobbi-Anne McLeod

A Ted Bundy obsessed killer who murdered an 18-year-old student after kidnapping her from a bus stop was driven by a “morbid desire” to "imitate" serial killers, a court has heard.

Bobbi-Anne McLeod was last seen in November waiting for a bus in Plymouth as she was on her way to meet her boyfriend but never arrived at the other end, prompting a widespread police investigation into her whereabouts.

Three days later, Cody Ackland, a guitarist in local band Rakuda, handed himself into a police station and admitted to officers: “It was me”. He was arrested and later pleaded guilty to her kidnap and murder.

Ackland and Miss McLeod were not known to each other.

At his sentencing hearing on Thursday, Plymouth Crown Court heard details of what happened to Miss McLeod for the first time, including how Ackland approached her from behind at the bus stop before inflicting a “sadistic” attack inspired by the modus operandi of infamous serial killer Ted Bundy.

When he later realised she was still breathing, Ackland told officers: "I thought f****** hell, wow, I mean hats off to her."

During a nine minute confession interview, Ackland said the initial attack was “meant to be it” but Miss McLeod sat up and tried to scream. He then carried her semi-conscious body into his car, parked behind the bus stop, and drove her 20 miles to the Bellever Forest car park on Dartmoor where he killed her with a hammer.

When they arrived, Miss McLeod told him "I am scared", to which he responded: “So am I, I’ve never done this,” before striking her 12 times on the head.

Miss McLeod, who was 5”2 and weighed just over six stone, had to be identified through her dental records.

There was no DNA evidence that she was sexually assaulted, but Ackland told police that he was “wound up” that night by a recent break up and that his victim resembled girls he dated.

After killing her, he burnt her handbag and loaded her blooded body into his boot and drove 30 miles back towards Plymouth to Bovisand where he stripped her naked and left her in undergrowth.

The court heard that police found a trove of more than 3,000 dark and disturbing images on Ackland's phone.

Many of them were of the mutilated bodies of murder victims, as well as murder weapons, soiled and bloodied clothing, and the sites victims were found out.

He had conducted extensive searches on well-known serial killers, and held a particular fascination with Bundy, who confessed to 30 murders of young women in the US in the 1970s.

Ackland's attack on Miss McLeod bore a striking resemblance to the US serial killer, as he approached her from behind and struck her with the hammer before bundling her into his car.

On the Sunday afternoon, a day after killing Miss McLeod, Ackland was out socialising with friends, going for a pizza, joining rehearsal with his band Rakuda, before drinking into the small hours at a pub lock-in.

He would later tell a psychiatrist the feelings of depression he had felt before murdering Miss McLeod had now gone and was not feeling the same resentment as before "as if this violent act as rid him of these feelings".

Richard Posner, prosecuting, told the court that Ackland “led a double life” and had a “morbid interest” in the crimes of serial killers, searching for Golden State Killer Joseph DeAngelo Jr, Andrei Chikatilo, Ivan Milat, Fred West and Tommy Sells.

A week before the killing, Ackland carried out further searches for Bundy, Fred West and "Fred West's house", the court heard.

'Prolonged, savage and merciless attack'

Ray Tully QC, for Ackland, said that psychiatrists had found his client was not suffering from mental illness, but said he had struggled during childhood.

Ackland was diagnosed with ADHD, dyslexia, depression and anxiety and by the age of 19 "had a seven-year depressive history", Mr Tully QC said.

Mr Tully QC said Ackland had not received "much comfort" from either his home or his school life and that his father and other male role models had not provided much "in the way of succour or support".

Mr Tully QC said the killer “grew up feeling angry” at his “own inability to get on in the world”.

He said Ackland had approached his GP, saying he did not feel "right, the same as other people", but that he struggled to get the help he needed.

"He grew up to hate himself, angry with the world, angry with everything, and he did at time seek assistance and help about that, but it wasn't particularly forthcoming," Mr Tully QC told the court.

Sentencing Ackland to life in prison with a minimum of 31 years for the “prolonged, savage and merciless attack”, Judge Robert Linford told Ackland that he would remain indefinitely a "highly dangerous person", adding: "There is a strong possibility you may never be released from prison."

In a statement, Miss McLeod’s family said: "We have been robbed of our beautiful girl in the worst possible way and our lives will never be the same without her.

"I want Cody Ackland to know that he has taken away our world. We will never see her beautiful face or hear her laugh, see her get married or have the children she so wanted. So many everyday things have been taken away. Her not being here is still unimaginable.”

As he left the dock, Miss McLeod's brother Lee shouted: "You're a dead man."