I LOVED the movie Fargo! The Coen Brothers are geniuses. I seem to remember that there was some statement in the credits to the effect that the movie was based on a real-life crime. Does anyone have a clue as to which crime they mean? I’m interested in true crime stories, and I’d like to track down the case. Thanks a lot, yah?
The Coen brothers admitted to Roger Ebert that they made Fargo up.
Keith
No foolin’. It sounds bizarre enough to be real.
I am suprised that I haven’t heard of more people using a chipper shredder to dispose of the evidence. 
There actually was a murder case in the northern U.S. where the husband disposed of his wife’s body using the chipper shredder. IIRC, husband was a pilot, wife was a stewardess, he was having an affair, she confronted him, he killed her and drove around to various bridges in a snowstorm with the exhaust end pointed over the bridge. If it wasn’t for the fact that one of the streams was frozen over (so the shredded body parts landed on the ice instead of in the water) he might not have been found guilty. It was aired on the Discovery Channel.
I think I saw one on American Justice. I tuned in late, so I didn’t get all of the details, but it might be the same one you’re talking about, Mojo. One whole molar was recovered, and this was what was used to identify the deceased. It was believed that the murderer froze the woman in a freezer, sawed her up with a chainsaw, did the chipper/shredder stuff, and then tried to file off the serial number of the chainsaw so it couldn’t be traced. Then he chucked the chainsaw into a stream, too, but it was recovered. An evidence specialist was able, through a special process, to read the serial number and so trace the chainsaw to the murderer. Told you I’m interested in true crime!
Yep, they’re the same guy. I was just reading about him on Sunday in Mike Newton’s Killer Cops (Loompanics press). I’ll try and find his name when I get home tonight.
–sublight.
p.s. If you’re interested in true crime, Newton’s written several mini-encyclopedias of serial killers and other murderers.
1986, Newtown Connecticut (just up the road). Richard Crafts accused of killing his wife and using a wood chipper to dispose of the body. One tooth recovered. Suspicious because he returned the chipper/shredder to the rental place cleaner than it had gone out.
Now, of course, I cannot remember if he was acquitted or not. It really was quite the nine-day wonder at the time…
Hi Doc
I grew up in CT and remember the Craft case pretty well. If I am not mistaken, he was found guilty. It was in the press a lot at the time not only because of the brutal nature of the crime, but because there was a cadre of people out there who believed him (he said she took off overseas and that is why she was missing) and the sensation of a trial without (for the most part) a body. The lake is on rte. 34, no? Real pretty drive if you close your eyes as you go through Derby. Takes me back.
From the Danbury News-Times:
“Crafts was charged in January 1987 and convicted in Norwalk in 1989 after a second trial. The first trial, in New London in 1988, ended in a mistrial when one juror did not find him guilty.”
There was at least one appeal but I dunno the resolution(s). Far as I know he’s still in the clink.
Just the sort thing you’d expect in a town with a flag pole sticking up outa the middle of Main Street…surrounded by windrows of broken headlite glass. 
Ain’t that just down the street from Dr. Mikes Ice Cream? Mmmmmmm
It didn’t involve a woodchipper, but the “husband arranges wife’s kidnapping” thing was based on a case here in Minnesota. I’ll post a cite as soon as I can find it.
It’s amazing when real life is creepier than a creepy movie.
This happened right near where I live (Western CT), unless there were several woodchipper murders. I remember seeing an expose on one of those Unsolved Mysteries-type shows. Anyway, carry on.
I believe the lake involved was Lake Zoar, which is kind of eerie to begin with (great name, though). And yeah, it is route 34, which runs up to New Haven and beyond.
One thing about Fargo, the things that happen to Steve Buscemi’s character definitely define “a really bad day” (got the stuffing beat out of him, shot through the cheek, brained with an axe, and put through a wood chipper).
I vaguely remember that as well. I also clearly rememeber the the woodchipper murder because my sister had a true crime book in the late 80’s called The Woodchipper Murder.
My guess is that Fargo was based on more than one true crime.
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Sorry for the hijack but this is along the lines of being ground-up. Just not in a wood chipper.
For a weird true crime story try the one about Helen Brach (of Brach candies). True may be misleading as no one has ever found her body so this is the specualtion that went on.
Helen Brach left her house to go on a trip. Her driver supposedly dropped her off at O’Hare Airport and that’s the last he saw of her.
The driver either bought or had access to an industrial strength meat grinder. The speculation is that he ground-up Mrs. Brach and fed her to her dogs.
To my knowledge no one has ever been charged with the murder and the body certainly wasn’t ever recovered.
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Rhythmdvl, hey don’t dis Derby. The Wife worked at the phone company there when she was younger. And Books by the Falls is in that town. I know that they have all the old books I’ve ever wanted in there. Their organization leaves something to be desired, though. (Picture an explosion in a library…)
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