OPENING up a birthday card, Richard Everett chuckled as he spotted his dear brother cheekily referring to him as “old man”.
But upon later inspection, that small detail in the handwritten note didn’t seem like Stuart, 67, at all – and soon it was like “a dagger through the heart”.
Stuart Everett was beaten to death before his body was cut into at least 27 pieces with a hacksaw[/caption]
He even sent Stuart’s brother a warped birthday card in his victim’s name to pretend he was alive[/caption]
Marcin Majerkiewicz was a horror movie-obsessed monster[/caption]
For Richard’s sibling, of Salford, Greater Manchester, was dead by the time the card arrived through his letterbox. It had been penned by his flatmate murderer Marcin Majerkiewicz.
The vile ghoul, 42, who was believed to have been Stuart’s secret lover, beat him to death before dismembering the body into at least 27 pieces with a hacksaw.
From there, Majerkiewicz wrapped his remains in clingfilm, stuffed them into bags for life and took 11 public transport trips to at least seven locations to dispose of him.
Chillingly, after dumping one of the bags of body parts, he stopped off for a KFC – all paid for using his victim’s money.
The unemployed Polish fast food worker was £73,000 in debt when he killed Stuart last year and conducted an “unbelievably cold-blooded and macabre” cover-up.
Not only did he take his victim’s money but he took out phone contracts, bank loans and cash from ATMs – and even impersonated him on the phone, pretending Stuart had a stroke.
To aid the ruse, Majerkiewicz impersonated him in texts and birthday cards to family and friends while plotting to buy an Alicante apartment to flee prosecution with the money.
Forensic psychiatrist Dr Sohom Das said: “It was like a triple tragedy because while any murder is emotional, it’s trauma, but it’s all the callous way this was carried out.
“On top of that you’ve got the deception of him pretending to be the victim for several weeks. This is a dark and calculated killer.”
The tragic story is told in the new BBC Two documentary Cracking the Case: The Torso Wrapped in Plastic, which airs tonight.
CCTV footage of Majerkiewicz, who was jailed for a minimum of 34 years[/caption]
Blood stains were found on Majerkiewicz’s sofa[/caption]
Majerkiewicz plundered Stuart’s bank accounts after the murder[/caption]
The harrowing details are laid bare including the full investigation, considered “one of Greater Manchester Police’s finest… from start to finish”.
It saw them search 19 sites and analyse 2,000 hours of CCTV as they hunted for Stuart’s remnants – including at a pond where he disposed of parts while kids fed the ducks.
‘Spine-chilling’ case
Horror film obsessive Majerkiewicz, who had a tattoo of hockey-mask-clad serial killer Jason Voorhees from the Friday the 13th film series, had plotted the murder for a while.
In the weeks leading up to the killing, he had set-up email addresses and phone contracts in Stuart’s name and days before the killing looked up £50,000 loans.
It’s believed Majerkiewicz eyed up his “substantial savings”, with Stuart having worked hard as a civil servant for all of his life, and also his access to credit cards.
This was all unbeknown to Stuart, his housemate of seven years, who he had described to some friends as his “partner”. The relationship was not confirmed.
The investigation began when a suspicious ‘package’, which was black, bulky and covered in clingfilm, was found on a concrete slab inside an abandoned graffiti-lined bunker in a Salford nature reserve.
It was Stuart’s torso and highlighted the unknown perpetrator was “very dangerous” and needed to be caught immediately.
Police sought CCTV evidence for the last five days from the surrounding area – some 2,000 hours of footage – due to the knowledge the 18kg bag would have been hard to carry and easy to spot.
It took days to go through but eventually they spotted a man carrying “a very heavy looking bag for life”, who changed hands regularly and stopped for rest multiple times.
It’s barbaric. You can see how cold-hearted and callous this individual was
Dr Sohom Das
Minutes after disappearing into the woodlands, he emerged with the bag folded up into a square in his hand, which was described as “spine chilling” to see.
They tracked the mystery man down to the Winton area of Salford and by chance two police officers spotted long-haired Majerkiewicz getting on a bus.
Officers boarded too and cuffed the killer, who denied everything. He smiles, laughed, shook his head and said: “It’s definitely a mistake 100 per cent.”
‘Botched cover-up’
Police found a phone that didn’t belong to him and numerous bank cards not in his name. They searched his flat on Worsley Road, where they discovered bloodstains.
It was a “botched clean-up job” and DNA from blood samples on the sofa matched the torso, found weeks earlier, in the woods.
There was also a large piece of carpet that had been cut out entirely after it’s believed Majerkiewicz struggled to get the blood out after numerous scrubbing attempts.
Stuart’s brother Richard was informed and went back over messages, including a plan to move house, and birthday cards he believed were written by his sibling – whose nickname was ‘Benny’.
“The deception was cold, calculated,” Richard said. “When it dawned on me that he’d actually been murdered, I took a closer look at the card.
Police trawl woodlands in a hunt for Stuart’s remains[/caption]
Stuart Everett is in disbelief as to how anyone can be ‘so cruel, so horrible, so unfair’[/caption]
The vile killer sent bogus texts to cover-up the killing[/caption]
“He called me ‘old man’, he’s never called me ‘old man’. It was certainly not written by him and that was really like a dagger through the heart.
“All the messages allegedly from Benny (Stuart), all those weeks after he had been murdered were basically to pretend that he was still alive.”
It included a birthday card to Stuart’s sister-in-law with “£20 for scratchcards”, withdrawn from the victim’s bank account.
Parasitic predator
Police spent months trawling more CCTV footage and searching 19 sites – some required underwater search teams.
At Blackleach Reservoir, they found three pieces of skull – which confirmed Stuart died from blunt trauma to the head – deep underwater near fishing spots and where kids fed ducks.
At one large woodland they found his spinal column and another there was nine packages of body parts including internal organs.
Majerkiewicz, who refused to divulge other sites, changed Stuart’s bank accounts immediately after the death and even impersonated him on the phone.
The killer, a father of two, posed as his victim, pretending he had suffered a stroke and deliberately slurred his words to aid the ruse.
I’ve never seen anything quite as disgusting as this
Ex police detective Rebecca Mason
“It’s barbaric,” says Dr Das. “You can see how cold-hearted and callous this individual was.”
The actions displayed a “colossal lack of empathy”, the psychologist added, questioning whether he was a psychopath, deceitful, criminally versatile or simply parasitic.
In court, Majerkiewicz was said to have looked “quite relaxed”, not seeming to believe “the game was up”.
It was a common theme. The killer refused to even give up the locations of where body parts were after his arrest.
The evidence was so overwhelming that the jury convicted Majerkiewicz in just one hour and 36 minutes and he was sentenced to life imprisonment, with a minimum of 34 years.
Divers hunt for clues in the search for Stuart’s body[/caption]
Stuart and his grieving brother in happier times[/caption]
Majerkiewicz smirked and laughed after being handcuffed[/caption]
Judge Mr Justice Cavanagh told the remorseless killer: “You acted in an almost unbelievably cold blooded and macabre way, and showed complete disrespect and contempt for your friend’s remains.”
Recalling the verdict, brother Richard breaks down in tears and asks how anyone could be “so cruel, so horrible, so unfair” to “not only my brother but to any human being”.
The crime shocked many including seasoned detective Rebecca Mason, who labelled it a “horror story” before adding: “I’ve never seen anything quite as disgusting as this.”
Cracking the Case: The Torso Wrapped in Plastic airs at 10PM tonight on BBC Two. You can watch the whole series now on BBC iPlayer.
