Inventor claims toxic fumes killed journalist on his submarine
DANISH inventor Peter Madsen yesterday denied murdering Swedish journalist Kim Wall aboard his self-built submarine, saying she died when the air pressure suddenly dropped and toxic fumes filled the vessel.
However, on the opening day of his trial at the Copenhagen district court, the prosecution painted a picture of him as a sexual sadist obsessed with beheadings who murdered Ms Wall as part of a sexual fantasy.
Madsen, who has previously admitted dismembering Ms Wall’s body and throwing her remains overboard, told the court that the air pressure suddenly dropped in the engine room, where the 30-year-old freelance reporter was located while he was up on deck.
He denied premeditated murder but admitted he lied to investigators and changed his account of what actually happened to Ms Wall several times. “I wanted to spare her family and the world the details...about what actually happened when she died, because it is gruesome,” he said.
He said a vacuum effect meant he was unable to open the hatch to get in to Ms Wall, who was screaming for help. “I try to explain to Kim through the hatch how to stop the necessary engines, for five to 15 minutes I try to get in to her,” Madsen said.
“When I finally manage to open the hatch, a warm cloud hits my face. I find her lifeless on the floor, and I squat next to her and try to wake her up, slapping her cheeks.”
He said he sailed around for a few hours, contemplating suicide, and then slept next to her body for two hours.
He said that cutting her up was not a big deal because he already knew how to amputate limbs “to save lives”.
“I don’t see how that mattered at that time, as she was dead,” Madsen said with a small grin. “I tried first with an arm, and that went very fast...it went very fast, and I got her out of the submarine.”
Ms Wall was reported missing by her boyfriend after she failed to return from her trip on Aug 10. Her chopped up body parts, weighed down in plastic bags with metal objects, were later recovered from waters off Copenhagen.
Madsen, an eccentric semi-celebrity in Denmark who dreamed of developing private space travel and whom Wall had been trying to interview, had invited her out to the 60ft craft.
On a large screen in the courtroom, the prosecutor showed a series of text messages Ms Wall sent her boyfriend from inside the vessel.
“I’m still alive btw [by the way],” she wrote, adding:
“But going down now!” Madsen first told police he dropped Ms Wall off on an island, then said the hatch door fell on her head, then suggested she may have died of carbon monoxide poisoning. Asked why he kept changing his account, he said his approach at the time was to “stick to my explanation (of an accident) until your evidence means that I have to tell how she died.” A post-mortem examination had failed to determine a cause of death.