Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Virginia McCullough case

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep‎. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 23:15, 1 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Virginia McCullough case (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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Fails WP:NEVENT. All of the sources are primary news reports which follow the trial with little outside commentary. Does not pass notability for crime specifically. News reports can be secondary, but none of the ones on this trial are because they are just recapping the legal process. The event did not have any specific consequences, news was largely localized, and there isn’t any coverage after the trial ended. This is also a PSEUDO biography of the perpetrator instead of an actual event article, which this also has issues with (pseudo isn’t a guideline but it does raise the question of whether we should judge this by criminal notability guidelines instead which this also fails). PARAKANYAA (talk) 22:48, 25 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Crime and United Kingdom. PARAKANYAA (talk) 22:48, 25 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Events and England. WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 02:43, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. Passes WP:GNG with extensive, international coverage in WP:RS (including just what's already cited in the article) and even a documentary retelling the story 5 years after the event ([1]). Does need a rename to focus on the murders, but that's not for WP:AFD. Longhornsg (talk) 03:10, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Is it actually international? All coverage I could find was local or localized to England. And most of the coverage I did find was trial updates. PARAKANYAA (talk) 03:14, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  It’s worth noting that under English law very little may be reported about a criminal case before the trial, because it is generally considered inappropriate to comment publicly on cases where criminal proceedings are ongoing. There are exceptions, such as the 2024 Southport attack, which attracted a lot of media attention because of the shocking nature of what happened, but this tends to unusual. Therefore, it’s not surprising that most of the details about what happened in this case were reported while the trial was ongoing, and more importantly, after the verdict. This is Paul (talk) 17:19, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Yes, but that doesn't prove notability. PARAKANYAA (talk) 00:05, 27 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep: This definitely passes WP:GNG, and I would argue also passes WP:NEVENT, since it received widespread coverage from national UK media outlets. Several hundred murders are committed in the UK each year, and the nature of this one makes it stand out from the rest. Not only is parricide a rare crime, the length of time the perpetrator was able to conceal the crime while continuing to live in her parents’ home, keep up the pretence they were still alive, claim welfare for them, etc, is also unusual. Many people go missing, and are generally reported to the authorities as missing fairly soon after they disappear, but in this instance the McCulloughs' absence appears not to have raised sufficient concern to raise the matter with the authorities for several years. A note on the article; it isn’t meant to be a biography of the perpetrator, and in fact most of it concerns the crime and the subsequent ramifications, so I would support a move to Murders of John and Lois McCullough. This is Paul (talk) 17:54, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Also, since the page is the subject of an ongoing move discussion, shouldn't that have been concluded before it ended up here? This is Paul (talk) 18:19, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  It is certainly odd that the proposer of the move discussion decided to nominate it here in the middle of their own discussion. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 18:50, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't pass GNG because all sources are primary as simply recitations of legal proceedings. There is nothing to say on it beyond that it happened. While debating the move I was looking at the sources to judge if there was a common name and found them unsatisfactory to prove notability. PARAKANYAA (talk) 00:04, 27 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The documentary mentioned above is certainly a secondary source. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:40, 27 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This and this may also qualify as secondary sources, and demonstrate ongoing interest/coverage, although they don't appear in the article at present, and I'd hold off adding them for now. There's also this article] that I think discusses aspects of the case ahead of the documentary, but it's behind a paywall so I can't access it. This is Paul (talk) 19:19, 27 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - ongoing coverage. Bearian (talk) 02:25, 27 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. All of the sourcing is news coverage, which does not meet WP:SUSTAINED or WP:GNG's requirement of secondary sources. !Votes citing news coverage as meeting GNG can be safely WP:DISCARDed. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 03:43, 27 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - For WP:GNG we requiresignificant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject andSources should be secondary sources. The nom. and Thebiguglyalien are correct to call out immediate news reporting after the conviction as primary news reporting, and this is a fairly recent conviction (October of last year) which has given limited time to produce secondary sources, as reporting restrictions in the UK would prevent publishing prior to the conviction. But there is one very good example of a secondary source, given above. The documentary, Killed By Our Daughter: The McCullough Murders (2024), is a secondary source from a national broadcaster and widely disseminated. To clearly meet GNG we need multiple sources, and there are not yet any mentions in books that I can find. However, this is one of those occasions where it simply stands to reason that this one will be covered in books and other such sources in the future. The unusual nature of the crime, in that it was unnoticed so long, will certainly gain such notice, and it will also be recognised for other aspects, such as the debt spiral. This will find itself into additional sources. We shouldn't, however, keep articles just because we believe they will be notable one day. There should be no article if we do not have the sources to write the article (although this is too often ignored). Nevertheless, in this case we do have sufficient sources to write the article. The documentary is an excellent source, and it is likely that there is enough coverage in the extensive news reporting to pursue this. I note that even the Lucy Letby article only got its second secondary source at the end of last year, but no one would have deleted that article either. So this is a keep for me. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:04, 27 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Note Just a reminder in case anybody misses this - there is still an active move discussion over at Talk:Virginia McCullough case, the result of which hinges on this discussion (at least, that's my interpretation, although the move discussion predates this, both are related as a delete closure here might result in either deletion, or at least deciding whether the present topic is actually notable) ASUKITE 15:58, 28 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.