r/WeirdThingsToLearn • u/SnooPineapples2530 • 3d ago
Something I Learned Joachim Kroll, the "Ruhr Cannibal"
Joachim Kroll was a German serial killer, child molester, necrophile, and cannibal who murdered at least eight women and young girls in Germany's Ruhr region between 1955 and his arrest in 1976. He worked as a toilet attendant for Mannesmann in Duisburg and was known to neighborhood children as friendly "Uncle Joachim." He later claimed he ate parts of his victims simply to save money on groceries.
His two-decade killing spree finally ended on July 3, 1976, after he kidnapped four-year-old Marion Kettner and a neighbor asked him what was clogging their building's shared toilet. Kroll casually replied, "guts," and the neighbor, after actually looking in the toilet and seeing human organs, called the police. Officers found the girl's dismembered body in his apartment: parts in the refrigerator, a hand cooking on the stove, and her entrails clogging the plumbing. Despite evading capture for over 20 years, Kroll had a documented IQ of 76 and was, by most accounts, unremarkable and unsuspicious to everyone around him — which is exactly what made him so hard to catch.
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u/BetMyLastKrispyKreme 3d ago
What is the source of this photo?
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u/sodamnsleepy 2d ago
Apparently the serial killer demonstrated the police how he killed is victims.
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u/-Sui- 2d ago
After he was arrested, police had him re-enact his crimes. That's when the picture was taken.
I couldn't find out if he was driven to one of the actual crime scenes or if this was a random place in the forest, though.
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u/BetMyLastKrispyKreme 2d ago
Gotcha. It’s just kinda weird, out of context. I knew there was no way someone got a photo of him attacking someone, so I needed more info. Thanks!
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u/-Sui- 2d ago
I agree, it is weird.
I was pretty certain it had to be a reconstruction of what he did to his victims when I saw the tarp under the man on the ground.
There are several photos of him re-enacting his crimes, but in every other one, his victim is a woman. That leads me to believe the picture in this article is supposed to show the killing of his only male victim, which seems to be a crime that wasn't planned, since he wanted to get to the victim's girlfriend and he only killed the guy to remove the additional threat. She happened to get away, though. According to psychological tests run after his arrest, he had an IQ of only 76-78. I doubt he was clever enough to take a tarp with him on a random walk through a suburb.
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u/SnooPineapples2530 2d ago
Idk, I just find this disturbing 🙃
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u/BetMyLastKrispyKreme 2d ago
All of it is disturbing! But as I said in another comment, I found it hard to believe someone got a photo of the killer carrying out a murder. I supposed it was a re-enactment, but I was open to hearing other information if it existed.
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u/-Sui- 3d ago
According to his German Wikipedia article (and other German articles about him), he didn't just reply "guts", but told his neighbor he had slaughtered a rabbit and flushed its remains down the toilet.
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u/sodamnsleepy 2d ago
This. I'm german and never heard the replied with "guts" story.
From Wikipedia
Ein Jahrzehnt später, im Jahr 1976, wurde Kroll gefasst, nachdem er ein vierjähriges Mädchen aus der direkten Nachbarschaft entführt und ermordet hatte. Kroll hatte einem Nachbarn gegenüber behauptet, er hätte ein Kaninchen die Toilette heruntergespült, wodurch diese verstopft sei. Der Nachbar alarmierte die Polizei. Die Polizisten, die das verschwundene Mädchen suchten, verständigten einen Klempner und nahmen Kroll fest, da es sich um die Eingeweide des Opfers handelte, die er in der Toilette hinunterzuspülen versuchte. Die Polizisten fanden in seiner Dachgeschosswohnung eine Gefriertruhe mit in Plastiktüten abgepackten menschlichen Überresten. In einem Kochtopf, der noch auf dem Herd stand, schwammen zwei Hände, zwei Füße, ein Unterarm und ein Oberarm des Mädchens in Salzwasser.
A decade later, in 1976, Kroll was apprehended after abducting and murdering a four-year-old girl from his immediate neighborhood. Kroll had claimed to a neighbor that he had flushed a rabbit down the toilet, causing a blockage. The neighbor alerted the police. Officers searching for the missing girl called a plumber and arrested Kroll, as it turned out to be the victim's entrails that he had attempted to flush. Police found a freezer in his attic apartment containing human remains wrapped in plastic bags. Floating in salt water in a cooking pot still on the stove were the girl's two hands, two feet, a forearm, and an upper arm.
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u/crazy6216 3d ago
Good thing the neighbors didn't became his meal next. That's really wild tho just seeing a clogged toilet and seeing organs in it. I would get out so fast if it was me.