Posted on 11/10/2007 8:51:14 AM PST by fweingart
A British man who claimed to have chopped up and eaten his girlfriend is facing 12 years in prison after pleading guilty to her manslaughter.
Paul Durant, 47, was arrested in February 2004 on suspicion of murdering Karen Durrell, 41, a divorced mother of two from Ilford, Essex.
She disappeared shortly after meeting Durant just days after she moved to the Costa Blanca on Spain's southeastern coast in January 2004. Police searched her flat in the resort of Calpe, 15 miles east of Benidorm, and found her blood in the bath, bloodstained knives and a saw with traces of flesh on it, but her body has never been found.
Durant wrote letters from his prison cell in which he claimed that he was driven to killing and eating Ms Durrell by voices emanating from his television.
"After I killed her, I cut her body into small parts, eating what parts of her I found eatable," he wrote in a letter sent to The Daily Mirror.
"I finally disposed of what was left in small rubbish bags," he said.
In the disturbing letters he admitted that he had discussed his desire to eat human flesh with Ms Durrell.
"Before I killed Karen, I told her I had come to Spain where I was going to kill and eat paedophiles," he wrote.
"My mental state was breaking down at this stage - I believed God had delivered her to me and I was getting messages from the telly. I believe she knew she had to die," he said.
But the court in Alicante heard that Durant, from East London, had battered Ms Durrell to death with a mallet on February 18 or 19 after a row over a video they were watching.
A prosecution statement based on a police interview with Durant after his arrest said: "They were both in the living room watching a film in which children were sexually abused when they started to argue about its contents.
"In the course of the argument, the accused left the room and returned with a mallet, which he used to hit her about the head from behind, provoking her death.
"Paul took the body to the bathroom and put it in the bath, where, using a knife and a saw, he cut it up and put the different parts of the body into plastic bags, which he put in a suitcase he found in the house, and put it in a container near to the house.
"The mutilated body was taken away unknowingly by rubbish collectors."
Durant will be sentenced by the panel of three judges at a later date and faces a prison term of 12 years.
Members of the victim's family attended the hearing and said they had been left devastated by not knowing what had happened.
"For us as a family the past four years have obviously been incredibly difficult," they said in a statement released through British police.
"Words cannot express how much we miss Karen, who was a much loved daughter, mother, sister and friend.
"Not knowing what happened to Karen adds to our pain still further.
"We draw little comfort from the conclusions of today's proceedings and as a family cannot find closure or move on with our lives at this time."
Durant's defence lawyer Juan Sanchez dismissed his client's cannibalism boast, and insisted his confession was "an attempt at gaining notoriety and fame".
I'm afraid to ask....and what parts might those be?
Ugh, English cooking taken to a new low.
Durant will be sentenced by the panel of three judges at a later date and faces a prison term of 12 years.12 years??? that's all? and that's likely the max. Seems like English justice is worse than their cooking.
"Words cannot express how much we miss Karen, who was a much loved daughter, mother, sister and friend."
The first quote, if true, does not indicate that she was a person of the highest moral stature.
Too bad he didn't stick with his plan.
Multiple Monty Python punchlines here, but....
Is the sentencing in Spain or England? I thought he killed her in Spain.
This is why I keep saying we should ban Katie Couric!
Internet dating gone wrong?
Apparently not.
They have CNN over there?
??????????
But, but that would amount to cruel and unusual punishment, wouldn't it? Oh, perhaps then we could inject him with drugs that would painlessly kill him...no, that amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.
Why don't we go back to hanging these SOBs!
A more cruel or inhumane death I cannot imagine.
Besides, drawing and quartering, historically, also involved a noose; typically the subject was hung to the point of near death until they were revived in order to be quartered.
OK.
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