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  1. Birmingham

    Birmingham Active Member

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    Disposing of a body

    Discussion in 'Plot Development' started by Birmingham, Feb 22, 2018.

    EDIT: What I fail to mention in this message, is the fact that I need my protagonist to use the identity of her mother to help an older accomplice with identity theft. This is why nobody can find the mother or know that the mother is dead. This is also why I would not make the mother and daughter famous people. Sorry I didn't make that clear.
    The rest of the content of the first post is the original post. So here goes:

    So..... my time travelling, dimension crossing, anti hero will need to kill, and dispose of, at least two people, in an era close to our own (probably 2034 or something). An easy way to dispose would obviously be to dump them back in 1776 and let someone else have to deal with them, but those two specific people die decades before she regains access to time travel. So she'll need to use modern methods.

    She doesn't kill them in the same time so she only has to deal with one at a time.

    One thing I figured I should research is cremation (I can gently alter her biography so she'll have the access and general knowledge).

    So if you have good ways of killing and disposing, that's great.
    My protagonist's victims are her boyfriend (in his 20s) and her own mother (in her 50s or 60s).
    My protagonist herself is in her 20s, very skinny. Not the strongest person in the world.
    I figured she could either poison or lull someone into a false sense of security before charging. She might also have an accomplice (another woman, not super strong).

    So if I choose cremation (which I already started researching) do you have thoughts? If I choose arson, do you have thoughts?
    Do you have a way better idea?

    One last thing: These people cannot be traced to her. None of the boyfriend's friends or family met her, and she was estranged with her mother. The mother in particular must either vanish forever or be completely unrecognisable. This will help her later on in the elaborate chess game she plays to get access to the 1860s.
     
    Last edited: Feb 23, 2018
  2. Emmmie Heart

    Emmmie Heart New Member

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    If you do happen to kill them off, you can feed them to pigs, Pigs can eat an uncooked Human Corpse in under 8 minuets, bones included. However if she did poison them, the pigs could also die therefore showing her guilt. The question is, how vengeful can she be? How personal is she going to get?
     
  3. ITBA01

    ITBA01 Active Member

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    My first question would be how she would have access to a cremation oven? Or is she simply going to burn the bodies? In both cases, the bones wouldn't be fully destroyed, as that's done by grinding them afterwards. It would destroy the DNA however, so that's an advantage. As for arson, I would assume making it look like an accident (maybe something with the stove, or wiring) could help. Though that may not dispose of the bodies fully, and if they find poison during the autopsy, then that pretty much rules out an accident. Anyways, that's just my thoughts. Hope it helps.
     
  4. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    Not sure about the boyfriend, but I'd Burke the mother. Wait until she's asleep, or slip her some Valium or other prescription painkiller, then while she's out, suffocate her with a pillow while sitting in her chest. Then wait a few hours and have her call 911 (or 0118 999 881 999 119 7253 depending on where your story's set) and have her say the mother was like that when she came in to check on her. Given the mum's age, possible drugs in the system, and minimal physical evidence left by the method of murder, they'd probably rule it as natural causes. No fuss, no muss and someone else carries out the body.
     
  5. matwoolf

    matwoolf Banned Contributor

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    That'd be a fun write.

    First - I thought of re-opening the mothballed undertakers, and 'firing it all up.' Spooky.

    But easier - would be to slip your corpse amidst the wagonful heading down from the hospital.

    Though writer forums say this a lot - so maybe there's already too many pig farm endings?

    Jake parked the car and dragged granny to the sty. 'Eat her, eat my granny, eat her before the sun comes up. Come on!'

    THE END


    I like the idea of the pigs dying from the poison, & then the detectives sucking down those juicy pork chops and creating another layer of bodies. Before she knows it she's killed everybody in agriculture & enforcement.
    ...
    Also, just remember we do get occasional murderers here enquiring as to methods of disposal. It's unsavoury and illegal I'll remind you in most jurisdictions. My advice would be to hand yourself in @OP and adopt a philosophical attitude to your crimes, study philosophy perhaps? You'll be a professor by end of sentence, take pride in that.
     
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  6. Birmingham

    Birmingham Active Member

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    Thank you all. It's weird that I haven't thought about the pig stuff myself, since we've seen it on TV (and in real life, unfortunately) a couple of times. I do love though the idea of the pigs themselves dying. That would be creepy.
    Regarding the question of how vengeful my protagonist is, well... she is not. I want her to be sort of vindictive against her mother, but that's not why she does this. She has a plan, and the people around her are chess pieces as far as she's concerned. She will genuinely help them, or crush them, based on what fits her plan. She would be the best daughter in the world if it fit her plan. But it does not.
    And that ties in with the fact that she can't just say "oh, look, mommy had a heart attack." She doesn't want the world to know her mom is dead. She just doesn't need her walking around. It's important that nobody would see her, dead or alive.

    One of my thoughts today was maybe have my character with her own atomizer. Some machine that would be small enough to carry (she's a quantom physicist who used to have access to technology of the 2040s before she escaped her era). Maybe she found a way to have her own small ionizer or itomizer or whatever it is she would need to get rid of one person without... you know, sucking everything around her
    (man, am I ripping off 1995's Arrival movie? Charlie Sheen and Ron Silver. Good movie)

    Regarding the last comment: I need this for a plot line in a story. I would be very dumb running around the internet asking about this stuff if I needed it for something nefarious.
     
  7. Birmingham

    Birmingham Active Member

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    She can gain access if, say, her mother is in the funeral directing business. I can also make her mother a pig farmer. Or just a loner. Just whatever might help with the plot. The elements of her childhood are not yet set in stone for my story, so I can tweak her background and make it very convenient for plans she wouldn't even hatch until adulthood. I wouldn't make the mother, say, a public figure, because that just destroys the entire plot line.
     
  8. Iain Aschendale

    Iain Aschendale Lying, dog-faced pony Marine Supporter Contributor

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    Dexter. If she lives near a large and deep body of water, just wrap some chain (they sell it by length at hardware stores, buying a couple yards isn't going to raise any eyebrows) around the corpse and drop it in the drink. If you want to get all Rob Roy, you can slit the belly open (to prevent decomposition gases from inflating it) and stuff it with rocks, but chain and/or cinder blocks should work. If the guy at the shop asks what you need it for, just smile and say "Dumping my ex in Lake Michigan, duh!"
     
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  9. Justin Thyme

    Justin Thyme Active Member

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    I've thought about this problem a lot.
    **From a purely artistic perspective obviously.

    One problem I tease around quite a lot is 'Sods Law' (AKA Murhy's Law and doubtless others as well.)
    This law states that 'If anything can go wrong, it will' therefore for a very small and light person, manhandling the recently deceased provides a greater chance of disappointing outcomes. (twenty stone rugger player tucks granny under his arm, checks up and down street, strides briskly to car, drops granny is in the boot. Shouldn't take more than 5 seconds.)
    Stringy little protagonist struggles with granny, drops bits on route to the car, takes ages, neighbour comes out and offers to help. Embarrassment all round.

    The Act;
    As for the deed itself, if the protagonist is small and not so strong you might consider the idea of a dropping a large cable tie over the subjects head and pulling it tight around their neck, this would take but a second and then the protagonist could sit back with a cup of tea while the victim expires on the floor. Could even be done quite easily while the victim is sleeping, or for the more adventurous, just take them by surprise.​

    Plus points;
    1. Once 'in situ' and tightened the victim is toast, a decent size cable tie (like the UK police use on peaceful demonstrators) 'aint coming off.
    2. could be practiced in advance to develop a good technique.
    3. No strength or effort required on the part of the protagonist. (I don't like to use the word 'murderer' - it's so judgemental.)
    4. Should the weapon be discovered prior to the act, it is not necessarily a weapon and could easily be explained away, unlike - for example; Arsenic.
    5. Reasonably quiet, no screaming, just a bit of short term thrashing around perhaps.
    6. No special tools, strength or skills required.​

    and negatives,
    1. should one fail to get the thing in place first time, the victim might guess something was amiss.​


    Disposal;

    One idea I've been toying with for a while is as follows; disassemble the corpse - at the crime scene if possible, otherwise in the privacy of one's own home or other safe place.
    Then wrap the meaty chunks in biodegradable plastic, (nice and tight so the juices stay in) and dispose of them onto the grassy embankment of a motorway (freeway?) by chucking them out of the car window late at night, ideally onto a stretch of motorway pretty far from anywhere - it is highly unlikely that anyone will find the bits before the biodegradable wrapper has gone and the wildlife have snacked their way through one's late granny.
    Portions awaiting disposal can be kept in the freezer, (no juice, no smell, very convenient.)​

    This method has plus points,
    1. The biodegradable wrapper will bio degrade and not cause a hazard to wildlife.
    2. The local wildlife get a bonus meal.
    3. Granny gets an environmentally friendly last resting place(s)
    4. Odds of the chunks being found once on the verge are pretty small.
    5. No special tools or skills required.​

    and negatives,
    1. mystery meat in the freezer.
    2. having it in the car with you en route to the disposal sight. (Sods law again).
    3. I gather disassembling a corpse can be messy, this sort of mess can be regarded as 'evidence' by law enforcement.​
     
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  10. matwoolf

    matwoolf Banned Contributor

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    According to @OP - it doesn't matter about being found out - she's flying forward t'21st century - so she can behave like any normal murderer, pop down B&Q, axe, gaffer tape, lime juice, or ask on chef thread, spade, bucket for head and a hole on moors aside bicycle and her Persian rug.
     
    Last edited: Feb 22, 2018
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  11. surrealscenes

    surrealscenes Senior Member

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    If they have pets, she could kill, chop, dig, bury the parts, fill some, bury the pet, fill the rest. Place it in a wooded area.
     
  12. Cave Troll

    Cave Troll It's Coffee O'clock everywhere. Contributor

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    "Hello, Jeffery want some bodies to play with?"
    "I suppose, beats the hell out of twiddling my thumbs." :p

    The pig thing could work, though with that one Granny getting eaten
    by them, comes off more like a bizarre fetish than way of disposing a
    body. Just saying without context to put it in perspective it does come
    off that way. :p

    For cremation it might help if they have access to a facility that could
    get the job done, and with the privacy/time to actually get it done.
    Fastest way would be to have access to a foundry, and just dump the
    body in a pool of slag. There won't be anything left of the remains for
    identification, and it will be way better than using acid to destroy the
    remains.
    Working at a mortuary with the capability would also be viable, but they
    would have to be able to do it after hours when they won't be likely to
    get caught in the act.

    You could try and find an alt way of getting rid of a body by say, weighing
    the body and dumping it in the ocean. Could make for an interesting case
    on a cruise liner, since the further from shore you are the less likely random
    parts will not make it all the way to land.

    Or you could go extra hardcore and shoot a plane carrying them over unfriendly
    airspace, and let them deal with the mess. Alt you could convince them to go to
    a hostile country, and then set them up with some crime. They will not die right
    away, but if no one knows where they are then they will not fair well in some
    horrific prison.
     
  13. Homer Potvin

    Homer Potvin A tombstone hand and a graveyard mind Staff Supporter Contributor

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    This reminds of Joe Pesci in Casino:

    "A lot of holes in the desert, and a lot of problems are buried in those holes. But you gotta do it right. I mean, you gotta have the hole already dug before you show up with a package in the trunk. Otherwise, you're talking about a half-hour to forty-five minutes worth of digging. And who knows who's gonna come along in that time? Pretty soon, you gotta dig a few more holes. You could be there all fuckin' night."
     
  14. matwoolf

    matwoolf Banned Contributor

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    ''But Joe, I think you misunderstand our desert burial. We ain't turning on the car lights, sitting round a camp fire and belting out moma's Puccini for the cacti, you fuckin' idiot. We is discreet, heh, heh, what an asshole. Gangsters talking shit again."
     
  15. NobodySpecial

    NobodySpecial Contributor Contributor

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    If you leave the body in the right spot, you may not have to dig a hole. Give it a week and pack of coyotes could have that body spread out over a five square mile area. Maybe a few pieces would be found, but likely not enough to determine a cause of death.
     
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  16. Iain Aschendale

    Iain Aschendale Lying, dog-faced pony Marine Supporter Contributor

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    Sky burial, Arizona style? I like it.
     
  17. Birmingham

    Birmingham Active Member

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    Okay, again, I need the death to be unknown to anybody. If my protagonist, little Janie Doe, wants her mommy, Jane Doe, to disappear completely, she can't have an article in the paper that says: Jane Doe found dead. No evidence will ever be found on who the killer is.
    Or: A kazillion people killed in a plane crash, here are all of their names so now you know they're all dead, including Jane Doe

    I don't want to give away too much, but a bit of it is about identity theft. You can't help anyone steal the identity of your mother if your mother happens to be a famous living person or a famous dead person. Only if she's dead, and only if nobody knows, can you pass on your friend and accomplice as your mother.
     
  18. Birmingham

    Birmingham Active Member

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    I got some new ideas on how she can do things. Since she's a time traveller, who had time to research lots of stuff before jumping, she has tons of knowledge about the future. In the future she may have read about a serial killer who was executed, but now she lives in an era where nobody knows who he is but her. She can use the info to find some Dahmer type and tell him "look, I don't give a shit what you do. I will actually give you victims and keep my mouth shut." If she fears death by him she could also go to someone who she knows has no problem with having partners (there were killers like that). She could also marry someone who she knows is about to get rich if she wants money and space for her little people ionizer that she can build (I figured it takes less time for a quantom physicist from the future to build something like that than, say, another time machine instead of the one she used, abandoned, and vandalized in the future).
     
  19. WhiteKnight75

    WhiteKnight75 Member

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    If you plan to have her burn the bodies, keep in mind that it is going to stink. A lot.
    Also, it creates large amounts of dark smoke and the bones won't get fully destroyed.
    So having her do it in her back yard would probably not work out.

    If you want some other methods to think about here you have some:
    • cut them into 6 pieces and disolve them in lye, then mix with a lot of bleach and pour down the drain
    • put them in a plastic bag, tie a weight around them and chuck them in the ocean
    • put them 6 feet under (litterally). This will prevent dogs from sniffing them out. For extra safety put some small dead animal over them so if a dog does smell them it will only dig out the animal
    • if you want the untimate method, find an ironworks and dump them in the molten metall. When it's tested the quality of the metall will only have decresed slightly at which point the chinese will be blamed
     
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  20. Maggie May

    Maggie May Active Member

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    I have worked with LE in locating remains and seriously most are found (at least parts). In the case of Katie Poirier, Don Blum kidnapped her and killed her. He tried to dispose of her body in a fire pit, he tried to burn up the evidence. All they found was a shard of a tooth and part of the jaw bone, based upon the forensic dentist they were able to id her remains. There was no DNA used. Since she does not want the person walking around and no one to notice that they are gone, check into mummification. If she would need access to finger prints of the deceased person for ID as part of the stealing their ID. Don't dispose of the body, hide the body.
     
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  21. NobodySpecial

    NobodySpecial Contributor Contributor

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    There’s alway running the body parts through a wood chipper into a pond.
     
  22. Cave Troll

    Cave Troll It's Coffee O'clock everywhere. Contributor

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    Ooh a red Christmas, I like it. :p
     
  23. Partridge

    Partridge Senior Member

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    An old Cosa Nostra trick was to simply chuck the body into a metal barrel full of acid, and stir occasionally. When bones stop appearing after you stir it, you know your job is done. I read about a case (in an actual book, one made of paper) where they disposed of a jockey's body that way. They caught because they were impatient and left a bit of spine behind.
     
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  24. Iain Aschendale

    Iain Aschendale Lying, dog-faced pony Marine Supporter Contributor

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    Cremation as practiced in Japan leaves the bones so burnt that they can be crushed to powder between one's fingers. It takes about an hour and a half to two hours to reduce a 160cm-ish woman to this state.

    And that's all I have to say about that.
     
  25. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    I just cremated my grandmother this past week (or rather, had someone else do the job for me/us) and it was pretty much the same deal using the natural gas powered furnace the crematorium used and the total ash of her remains after the procedure was only about 2 liters. The funeral director was very quick to point out, however, that doing this yourself in a funeral pyre or home made furnace would be far less efficient, leaving more remains, and that I should, for the love of god, not try it.
     
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