Peter Dinsdale was born in Manchester, England, on July 31, 1960. He never knew his father, who left his mother Doreen shortly before his birth, and when he was only 6 months old his mother, who was working as a prostitute, sent him to live with his grandmother until he was 3.

His mother had virtually disowned him by then, and referred to him as "the freak" because of his disability and his occasional epileptic fits.

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"He was left half the time running around outside," neighbor Hilda Lister told a TV documentary in 2002. "She was no good...You don't neglect your kids like she did."

He grew up with the kind of rock-bottom self-esteem that is common among arsonists. "Nobody loved him," admitted Hilda Lister. "Even the kids used to take the mickey out of him (tease him)."

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