Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Großmann (13 December 1863 – 5 July 1922) was a German

serial killer A serial killer is typically a person who murders three or more persons,A * * * * with the murders taking place over more than a month and including a significant period of time between them. While most authorities set a threshold of three ...

sexual predator A sexual predator is a person seen as obtaining or trying to obtain sexual contact with another person in a metaphorically "predatory" or abusive manner. Analogous to how a predator hunts down its prey, so the sexual predator is thought to "hunt" ...

, and alleged

cannibal Cannibalism is the act of consuming another individual of the same species as food. Cannibalism is a common ecological interaction in the animal kingdom and has been recorded in more than 1,500 species. Human cannibalism is well documented, bo ...

, though it was never proven that he cannibalized his victims. He committed suicide while awaiting the end of the main trial without giving a full confession, leaving the extent of his crimes and motives largely unknown.

Early life

Little is known about Carl Großmann's early life, except that he had

sadistic Sadism may refer to: * Sadomasochism, the giving or receiving of pleasure from acts involving the receipt or infliction of pain or humiliation * Sadistic personality disorder, an obsolete term proposed for individuals who derive pleasure from the s ...

sexual tastes and had several convictions for child molestation. As a young man, he served a 15-year prison sentence for fondling a ten-year-old girl and for brutally raping a four-year-old girl (who died shortly after the judgement).. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, Großmann sold meat on the black market and even had a

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stand at a train station near his home. Some believed the meat contained the remains of his victims, as he threw some of their bones and other inedible parts into the river. Pieces of missing women were found in the canal near Andreas Square and off the

Luisenstadt Canal The Luisenstadt Canal, or Luisenstädtischer Kanal, is a former canal in Berlin, Germany. It is named after the Luisenstadt district and ran through today's districts of Kreuzberg and Mitte, linking the Landwehr Canal with the Spree River, and s ...

, sometimes on a daily basis, which led some investigators to suspect that Großmann murdered up to 100 women and girls.

Arrest

On 21 August 1921, Großmann was arrested at his apartment in Berlin after neighbours heard screams and banging noises, followed by silence. The police burst into the apartment, finding on the bed the body of a young woman who had recently been murdered. Großmann was taken into custody and charged with

first degree murder Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. ("The killing of another person without justification or excuse, especially the ...

. Neighbours reported that he seemed to have had a steady supply of female companions, mostly destitute-looking young women, over the previous few years. Many went into the apartment, but few emerged from it. How many lives Großmann took is not known. Only the body of his final victim was found, along with bloodstains in the apartment that indicated at least three other persons had been butchered in the few weeks leading up to his arrest. One 1921 report claims Großmann had confessed to about twenty murders over twenty years. A 1922 report claims that Großmann had admitted to killing four women. Some have suggested as many as 50 women entered Großmann's apartment and ended up being murdered and dismembered. Großmann was not convicted of murder, because he hanged himself in his prison cell before the end of the main trial.

Bibliography

* Matthias Blazek (2009), ''Carl Großmann und Friedrich Schumann – Zwei Serienmörder in den zwanziger Jahren'', Ibidem-Verlag, Stuttgart, . *

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(2004), ''Die Bestie vom Schlesischen Bahnhof'', Jaron-Verlag, Berlin, . * Peter Haining (2005), ''Cannibal Killers Murderers who kill and eat their victims'', chapter: "The Bread And Butter Brides", Magpie Books, UK, . * Maria Tatar (1995), ''Lustmord: Sexual Murder in Weimar Germany'', Princeton, NJ (English), . * Masters, R.E.L.; Lea, Eduard; Edwardes, Allen, (1963), ''Perverse Crimes in History: Evolving Concepts of Sadism, Lust-Murder, and Necrophilia from Ancient to Modern Times'', NY: Julian Press

Early life

Arrest

Bibliography

References

See also