'Fat for cosmetics' murder suspects arrested in Peru

[EpyonXero]

Maybe they saw Fight Club?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8369674.stm

Peru arrests 'human fat killers'
Four people have been arrested in Peru on suspicion of killing dozens of people in order to sell their fat and tissue for cosmetic uses in Europe.

The gang allegedly targeted people on remote roads, luring them with fake job offers before killing them and extracting their fat.

The liquidised product fetched $15,000 (£9,000) a litre and police suspect it was sold on to companies in Europe.

At least five other suspects, including two Italian nationals, remain at large.

Police said the gang could be behind the disappearances of up to 60 people in Peru's Huanuco and Pasco regions.

One of those arrested told police the ringleader had been killing people for their fat for more than three decades.

The gang has been referred to as the Pishtacos, after an ancient Peruvian legend of killers who attack people on lonely roads and murder them for their fat.

Human tissue

At a news conference in the capital, police showed reporters two bottles containing human body fat and images of one of the alleged victims.

One of the alleged killings is reported to have taken place in mid-September, with the person's body tissue removed for sale.

Cmdr Angel Toledo told Reuters news agency some of the suspects had "declared and stated how they murdered people with the aim being to extract their fat in rudimentary labs and sell it".

Police said they suspect the fat was sold to cosmetics and pharmaceutical companies in Europe, but have not confirmed any such connection.

Human fat is used in modern cosmetic procedures but in most cases it is the patient's own fat that is used and under strict legal guidelines.

Medical authorities have expressed scepticism about a black market for human fat, partly because of the wide availability of fat for use in surgical procedures.

'Detailed confession'

Gen Felix Burga, head of Peru's police criminal division, said there were indications that "an international network trafficking human fat" was operating from Peru.

The first person was arrested earlier this month in a bus station in Lima, carrying a shipment of the fat.

The Associated Press news agency quoted Col Jorge Mejia as saying one of the suspects had described to police in detail how the victims were killed and their fat removed.

The suspect said the fat was then sold to intermediaries in Lima and that the gang's leader, Hilario Cudena, had been carrying out such murders for decades, AP reported.

The alleged buyers of the fat are also being hunted by police.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/h...as/8369674.stm

Published: 2009/11/20 10:18:58 GMT

© BBC MMIX

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[Homeslice]

Damn...

[Dave]

yum yum

[azoomm]

If word got out of this high of a price for human fat, the overweight humans have ZERO excuses now...

[Trip]

I could get past this part

hahahahhahahahahhahahahhahahahaha

Pishtacos

[z06boy]

Gold mine

[101lifts2]

Thank God I have little fat.

[askmrjesus]

Originally Posted by 101lifts2

Thank God I have little fat.

Yeah, the Peruvians would have to crack your head open to get to it.

JC

[EpyonXero]

Originally Posted by askmrjesus

Yeah, the Peruvians would have to crack your head open to get to it.

JC

[EpyonXero]

Or maybe not. . .


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8389901.stm

Peru human fat killings 'a lie'
By Dan Collyns
BBC News, Lima

Peru's police chief has suspended a top investigator for saying he had caught a gang who were murdering people to sell their fat.

Last month, top organised crime investigator Felix Murga said police had arrested four suspects who confessed to murdering up to 60 people.

He said they were selling their fat for thousands of dollars a litre.

But the macabre tale now appears to be nothing more than a tall story - or a big fat lie.

'Sold-on'

In an extraordinary press conference, police showed two bottles of what they said was human fat and a photo of a decapitated head.

Mr Murga told journalists how four suspects had confessed to gruesome murders reviving an Andean legend about the Pishtacos - mythical killers who murdered people on lonely roads to collect their fat.

But two weeks later a complete lack of evidence showed the police account to be more fiction that fact.

As a result Peru's chief of police, Miguel Hidalgo, announced Mr Murga would be put on indefinite leave from his job for sullying the reputation of his unit.

Initial doubts were compounded when police from the region where the crimes were alleged to have taken place said they knew nothing about a gang of murderers killing people for their fat.

They were only able to corroborate one of the dozens of alleged disappearances in a region where drug-trafficking and violence is rife.

Mr Murga and the head of the anti-kidnapping unit had also claimed the fat was sold for thousands of dollars in the European black market supplying the cosmetics industry, but could not confirm any sales.

Medical experts dismissed this theory, saying human fat had no monetary value and injecting it from one person to another would be potentially life-threatening.

Some anthropologists say the police's story deliberately played on an old Peruvian myth to explain crimes which the police had failed to investigate fully.

Other observers say this story was just one of many embellished or invented news stories used as a smokescreen which are intended to distract the general public from the real issues facing Peru.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/h...as/8389901.stm

Published: 2009/12/02 03:53:52 GMT

© BBC MMIX