Shelter

Shelter is the main antagonist from the novel "Stone Cold" by Robert Swindells about homelessness. His character changed a bit in the TV show adaption of the story. He was played by unknown actor Peter Howitt in the episodes.

Character
Shelter was originally a soldier in the British Army because of his mental health condition. After spending several years being an orphan he decided to make use of his life believing most of the powerful people in Central London wished to put other homeless people on the street and decided to stop their aims by murdering all tramps. Shelter soon decided to pretend he ran a hostel in Camden in order to trick others into coming to his house. He mostly does this telling orphans that if they come to his house they can live normally there for free though really murders them. He is shown to be a creepy old man who is insane always vein about his captures. Shelter will often be cocky talking to his victim's corpses about how his day went.

Book
In the text Shelter is shown to have a log diary named "Daily Routine Orders" about how each day goes. Before moving to Central London to obtain his victims he headed to buy a cat named Sappho apparently in order to make his home less suspicious. Soon arriving in London he captured several orphans by tricking them into the hostel trap then murdering them. In a crosspatch between the hero of the story homeless child Link and his best friend Ginger who then made fun of the army he decided to capture them. First getting Ginger when he went on a trip with a gang of friends claiming that Link was hurt and bought to his house in order for revival needing his help Shelter murdered Ginger soon hunting for Link. While Link soon meets orphan girl Gail he stalks them until finnaly capturing Link. Link who began to start getting tortured was soon rescued by Gail along with the police. Shelter is seen to be arrested while Link falls out with Gail after finding out she wasn't homeless instead using him to give a good story to the press.

Trivia

 * Shelter is apparently a code name as well as Link's while neither of the two's real are ever told to the reader
 * It can be theorized Shelter also liked Gail as he wouldn't have revealed it in his journal but got angry at Link for having her to himself