A SERIAL killer dubbed the Devil’s Disciple is back on the streets after 47 years — despite being deemed too dangerous to be freed permanently.
Patrick Mackay, 70, sauntered through a city centre bus station on day release from open prison.
Sporting a goatee beard, he wore a baseball cap, glasses and what appeared to be prison-issue tracksuit bottoms as he strolled among unsuspecting travellers.
He chatted to one stranger in Bristol and stood just feet from a baby in a pram.
Gareth Johnson, MP for Dartford in Kent, where Mackay is originally from, said: “There is a real danger from this man — he’s still young enough to kill again.”
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The fiend, now using the name David Groves, was refused parole last month then allowed to roam on licence from HMP Leyhill, Gloucs, just a week later.
Mackay admitted killing two widows in 1974 and 1975 as well as a priest.
He told cops he killed up to eight others, including a nanny and a boy of four, but retracted his confession.
Vic Davies, 67, the son of one of the eight, said of Mackay’s time out of jail: “It doesn’t make sense.
“There is clearly a desire to get him out of prison and it’s a massive gamble.
“It takes a split second for something to go horribly wrong.”
The Ministry of Justice declined to comment.
An Amazon documentary on Mackay, Confessions of a Psycho Killer, aired in February.
It features Sun man John Lucas whose book, Britain’s Forgotten Serial Killer, was used by researchers.