Crimes tend to implement change within society and Lancashire is no different.

Over its rich history several shocking and horrific crimes have gained mass infamy in the county, changing how we solve crimes, how we punish them and how we view our fellow man.

These are the crimes that have changed Lancashire forever.

Louisa May Merrifield

The Blackpool poisoner was the third to last woman to be executed in Britain and the last female in Lancashire to face the noose.

Louisa poisoned her elderly employer Mrs Ricketts using the rat killer Rodine and later tried to cover up her crime by having the lady's body cremated rapidly.

She was found out and it later transpired that the 47-year-old had been married several times in the space of 10 months, inheriting vast sums as she went.

She was executed by Albert Pierrepoint in 1953.

The Blackpool poisoner.

The Penworthan Villa Attack

This one is more significant due to its immense mystery.

In December 1936, in Penwortham, both Bertha Somers and Martha Cragg were attacked by an unknown assailant who entered their house in order to ransack it.

Cragg was found tied to the bed whilst Somer suffered a serious skull fracture.

Despite a mass man hunt across the county the perpetrator was never found.

The murder of June Anne Devaney

This gruesome murder of a three-year-old infant in Blackburn was not only shocking but lead to a serious milestone in forensic investigations across Britian.

June was abducted from the Queen's Park Hospital in Blackburn by 22-year-old Peter Griffith who then raped the child before beating her to death.

He was not found for three months and was only identified and arrested when every male aged 16 and over, who had been in the vicinity of Blackburn on the night of the murder, had their fingerprints obtained by police.

It would be the first time fingerprints would be used to solve a murder in the UK.

22-year-old Peter Griffith was hanged for the murder and rape of a three-year-old girl.

Margaret 'Bill' Allen

Margaret Allen was born a woman but later lived as a man called Bill.

Bill was a strange figure who lived away from normal society in Rawtenstall and fell into a deep depression following the death of his mother in 1946.

Soon after Bill slid headlong into debt and brutally murdered a woman called Nancy, leaving her crumpled body in the street.

It was the first recorded murder in the town and possibly put some transgender issues into the mainstream for the first time.

Margaret 'Bill' Allen, the transexual who committed Rawtenstall's first recorded murder.

Lancaster assizes of 1806

Assizes were regular trials held to try the latest batch of criminals who had been arrested during a certain period.

The summer assizes in 1806 uncovered a subculture of homosexual men in Lancaster. These nine men had been charged with 'crimes' like sodomy and homosexuality after they were found to be regularly meeting at a house in Warrington.

What shocked the public was that these men were not the stereotypical homosexual 'sinner' propaganda would have them believe, but ordinary working class men.

Four of the nine were hanged, simply for their sexuality. The 'crime' still stands today as an example of the shocking way LGBTQI+ people were previously treated.

The Buck Ruxton Case

The savage surgeon murdered his wife and maid before cutting them up into 70 different pieces back in 1935.

The gruesome murders were dubbed the Jigsaw Murders, providing police with a huge task of putting the bodies of the two women together and trying to identify them both.

It was first time X-rays were used to help identify a victim.

The killings also sent a shock wave through the city of Lancaster when the friendly and well liked Dr Ruxton was charged with the murders.

Buck Ruxton who killed his wife and maid before cutting them up into 70 pieces.

George Shellerd

George Shellerd was a 40-year-old horse dealer from Chorley who purchased a revolver and shot Nellie Norris Whittle before slitting her throat and turning the gun on himself.

Mrs Whittle was only 28 and the wife of Humphrey, a member of the Chorley town council who was due to become the town's new mayor.

It transpired that Shellerd and the 28-year-old had been engaged in some kind of affair. The death shocked the town, not just because it was the future mayor's wife but because suicide had also been involved.

The murder of Sophie Lancaster

This was an event which changed Britain, let alone Lancashire.

The death of Sophie Lancaster in Bacup lead to a mass campaign across Britain with the Sophie Lancaster Foundation which focuses on protecting the welfare of subcultures in society.

The violent crime in 2007 shocked Britain but also found purchase in the alternative and goth community with magazines like Kerrang! throwing their weight behind the campaign.

Sophie Lancaster

The Pendle Witches

Still the most famous crime to ever happen in Lancashire is that of the Pendle Witches.

This trial is still talked about to this day and captures the imagination of the inhabitants of the county.

The exploits of the Devices, a poor, Catholic family, who probably used 'witchcraft' as a means of extortion, led to the execution of ten people in Lancaster.

Lancaster Castle, where the Pendle witches were tried