Sister Smile is Dead: The Singing Nun’s Double-Suicide

 

Jeanine Deckers aka ‘Soeur Sourire’: The Real ‘Singing Nun’

Jeanne-Paule “Jeanine” Marie Deckers, famously known as ‘The Singing Nun’, was born in Belgium on October 17, 1933. Her parents owned a bakery in Brussels and hoped Jeanine would one day take over the family business. Instead, she enrolled in art school in Paris which she attended only briefly; After a nervous breakdown prompted by a failed engagement, Jeanine dropped out of school and joined the Dominican Fichermont Convent near Waterloo in 1959 at the age of twenty-six. There, she made a vow of poverty and took the name ‘Sister Luc-Gabrielle’. For the first time Jeanine Deckers, who had had a self-described “loveless” childhood,  felt like she was part of a family. She had written songs from an early age and was allowed to keep her beloved guitar which she had named ‘Sister Adele’.

Sister Adele

At the convent, she wrote and sung folk songs about Catholic saints. The nuns were so impressed with Jeanine’s talents, they encouraged her to make a limited press album which could be sold at religious retreats and to visitors of the convent to raise money for the order’s mission in the Congo.
In October of 1961, with the support of convent leaders, Jeanine Deckers recorded her first album in the Phillips Recording Studio in Brussels. An executive at the studio heard Jeanine’s songs and convinced the order to allow commercial distribution of the record. Jeanine signed a contract with Philips Recording under, ‘Soeur Sourire’, a stage name chosen by the church; In English, the name translates to ‘Sister Smile’. In 1963 a song by Jeanine Deckers about the 13th century founder of the Dominican order was released in Belgium as a single. To Jeanine’s surprise, the song, ‘Dominique’ (which many of you may remember as the French song played repeatedly throughout American Horror Story: Asylum) quickly became a number one hit in Belgium.

 

Dominique‘s popularity spread; The song rose to #1 throughout Europe, even in areas where French was not a predominant language. By December of 1961 Dominique-mania hit America where the single by “The Singing Nun” held at number one on the charts for three weeks; To this day, Jeanine Deckers is the only Belgium to have released a #1 single in the United States. Between 1963-1964 the song was on the charts in eleven different countries and was ranked higher than songs released by The Beatles and Elvis Presley. The French song was re-recorded in Dutch, German, Japanese and Hebrew. Jeanine went on a world tour as ‘Soeur Sourire’ and even appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show despite disapproval from her Mother Superior. Jeanine Deckers’s album Her Joy, Her Songs sold over two million copies; Having taken a vow of poverty when she joined the Dominican order, all of Jeanie’s profits went directly to the convent. In 1966 The Singing Nun, a highly fictionalized American movie about Deckers’s life and career in the convent starring Debbie Reynolds was released.

By this time, Deckers had retreated from the public eye and began to question many of the Catholic church’s teachings. Jeanine, who thought The Singing Nun to be an “absolutely idiotic” movie, resented the attention Dominique‘s fame had brought to her.

‘The Singing Nun’, 1966

She began to receive countless letters and gifts from admirers which she found to be flagrantly inappropriate. After being given an award for Dominique’s success, she commented that she might as well have been handed a bomb. For Jeanine, who had always been painfully shy and suffered from crippling anxiety, the attention was too much for her. After Dominique‘s popularity had subsided and the album Her Joy, Her Song ceased to sell copies, the convent sent Deckers to receive secondary theology training. During her time at university, she began to question many of the Catholic church’s teachings and rebelled by regularly wearing lipstick and smoking cigarettes. There, she became reacquainted Annie Pecher,  a fellow theology student and nun.

 

Annie Pecher

Jeanine had first met Annie while working as a camp counselor in her youth. Annie, who was eleven years younger than Decker, was attending the camp and quickly became infatuated with Jeanine; Of course, Jeanine did not appreciate the attention. When Annie became an adult, she made a point to live near Jeanine and would often visit her at Fichermont Convent. Allegedly, at one time, when it seemed as though Jeanine was to be sent to another country on missionary work where Annie could not follow, Annie attempted to commit suicide. In 1968 Jeanine Deckers released a new album and planned a tour throughout Canada. This album, in contrast to Her Joy, Her Songs, expressed many of Jeanine’s anti-Catholic views and included a song entitled ‘Sister Smile is Dead’. The most inflammatory song on the album, ‘Glory Be to God For the Golden Pill’, expressed Jeanie’s pro-birth control views.

 

Jeanine’s feministic views which were contrary to those of the Catholic church, caused a mass amount of controversy. The Canada tour ended abruptly when an audience in Quebec was horribly offended by Deckers’s new, anti-Catholic lyrics.

Annie Pecher and Jeanine Deckers

Due to this, as well as rumors that Jeanine and Annie were in a lesbian relationship, they were both ousted from the Catholic church. The two promptly moved into an apartment together; While the exact nature of their relationship at this time is unclear, allegedly,  Jeanine initially told Annie she did not want a sexual relationship with her.

 

Jeanine and Annie

According to Annie’s diaries, however, that changed over the years as the two eventually fell in love. A friend of the couple claimed that Ann was extremely possessive of Jeanine and that she had less freedom during their relationship than she did while living at the convent. In the 1970s, Jeanine Decker shared in an interview that she owed $63,000 in back taxes from her record sales. Having donated all the money directly to the church, she asked her former convent that had profited off her talents to pay the taxes she owed the Belgian government. The order refused to pay, claiming the small convent was financially troubled itself and did not have the funds. She engaged in a lengthy legal battle against Belgian tax authorities but unfortunately, there was not a proper paper trail to prove her earnings had been donated to the Dominican order. In an attempt to pay back the debt, Jeanine tried to restart her musical career.

 

 She released an album of religious and secular children’s songs called I Am Not a Star in Heaven under the name “Luc-Dominique”; Allegedly, this was because the church owned the rights to the name ‘Soeur Sourire’ however, Jeanine confessed she had come to hate that name. In 1982, Jeanine Deckers lost her final case against the Belgian tax authorities and was ordered to pay the $63,000 in back taxes. Later that year she recorded a synthesized, disco version of Dominique and released a music video in a second attempt to raise the $63,000 she owed; This only drove her further into debt.

Jeanine & Annie at the school in Wavre.

Over the years, Jeanine had become addicted to the medication prescribed for her anxiety. As Jeanine sunk into a severe depression due to her financial state, she became completely depended on tranquilizers and alcohol. According to Annie, Jeanine was having, “nervous breakdown after nervous breakdown.”.
In 1983, Jeanine and Annie opened a small boarding school for Autistic children in Wavre, Belgium which brought both of them great joy. Sadly, they were forced to close the school in 1985. After the school closed, Jeanine Deckers and Annie Pecher decided to enact a suicide pact. On March 29, 1985 Jeanine and Annie killed themselves in the apartment they shared in Wavre by taking a large dose of barbiturates with alcohol.

 

 Their bodies were discovered on April 1st in unit 47B of the Green Horizons Apartment Building at 144 Chaussee de Bruxelles. Anne left a suicide note explaining that the closing of the school and their massive debt were the primary reasons behind the double suicide. She stated in the note that she and Jeanine had not lost their faith and would like a church funeral. They also asked to be buried together and requested “privacy” [regarding the nature of their relationship] from the investigators who would discover their bodies. In the note, Annie wrote, “We have reached the end, spiritually and financially and now we go to God… We go to eternity in peace. We trust that God will forgive us. He saw us both suffer and he wont let us down. It would please Jeanine not to die from the world. She had a hard time on earth. She deserves to live in the minds of the people.”.

Jeanine Deckers and Annie Pecher were buried together in the Cheremont Cemetery in Wavre, Belgium. An inscription on their tomb reads, “J’ai vu voler son ame/A travers les nuages”. It is a line from Jeanine’s song Sister Smile is Dead and in English translates to, “I saw her soul fly across the clouds”.

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The Most Beautiful Suicide

‘The Most Beautiful Suicide’, originally released on May 12, 1947 in LIFE Magazine

Sixty-nine years ago today, May 1st 1947, Evelyn McHale committed suicide by jumping from the 86th floor observation deck at the Empire State Building around 10:40 AM. The 23-year-old woman landed on a United Nations Assembly Cadillac Limousine that was parked on 34th Street approximately 200 feet (61 meters) west of 5th Avenue. Despite having fallen 1,050 feet (320 meters), her body appeared to be intact, even serene, as though she were sleeping. Her ankles are folded in a lady-like pose appropriate for the time, a gloved hand clutching her pearls, the only sign of damage is a tear in her hose. In contrast, the limousine her body rests on is crushed and broken glass surrounds the young woman. A patrolman named John Morrissey spotted a scarf drifting down from the Empire State Building which was shortly followed by Evelyn’s body. Her body landing atop the car created a cacophonic crash which alerted bystanders to the spectacle. Photography student Robert C. Wiles was across the street when he heard the loud, crunching of metal marking Ms.McHale’s suicide. In awe of her body’s unscathed appearance and leisurely posture, he snapped a photo approximately four minutes after her death. The photo was entitled “The Most Beautiful Suicide” and originally appeared on a full-page spread in the May 12, 1947 edition of Life Magazine with the caption, “At the bottom of the Empire State Building the body of Evelyn McHale reposes calmly in grotesque bier, her falling body punched into the top of a car.”. Unfortunately, not much is known about the life of Evelyn McHale, nor is there much known as to why she felt the need to take her own life.

Evelyn McHale

Evelyn was born on September 20, 1923 in Berkley, California to Vincent and Helen McHale. She was the 6th child born to a family of 7 children. When she was still very young, Evelyn’s mother, Helen, left the family for “material reasons” and her parents got a divorce. Her father retained full custody of the children and moved them to Washington, D.C. where he worked as a bank examiner. The family later moved to Tuckahoe, New York where Evelyn attended high school. After graduation, she joined the Women’s Army Corps and was stationed in Jefferson, Missouri. Eventually, she made her way back to New York State, living with her brother and sister-in-law in Baldwin, Long Island and got a job as a bookkeeper. Evelyn met Barry Rhodes, who was attending Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania and had recently been discharged from the Air Force. They became engaged and were set to be married in June 1947 at Barry’s brother’s home in Troy, New Jersey. McHale had even been a bridesmaid in Barry Rhode’s younger brother’s wedding. On April 30, 1947 Evelyn took the train from New York to Easton, PA to visit Barry on his 24th birthday. On the morning of May 1, everything seemed normal, according to Barry Rhodes. He took his fiancé to the train station, kissed her good-bye, and at 7AM she boarded a train heading to Penn Station in New York City. Barry later told investigators, “When I kissed her goodbye, she was happy and as normal as any girl about to be married.”. Less than four hours later, Evelyn McHale was dead.

1947 article on the suicide of Evelyn McHale. Though her age is listed as ’20’ she was in fact, 23.

Detective Frank Murray discovered a few personal items belonging to Evelyn which were left behind on the observation deck: a tan (or gray, reports vary) cloth coat which was neatly folded and placed n the observation deck wall, a brown make-up kit filled with family photos, and a black pocketbook containing a suicide not. The note Evelyn McHale left, the only explanation of why she leapt to her death read, “I don’t want anyone in or out of my family to see any part of me. Could you destroy my body by cremation? I beg of you and my family- don’t have any service for me or remembrance for me. My fiancé asked me to marry him in June. I don’t think I would make a good wife for anybody. He is much better off without me. Tell my father, I have too many of my mother’s tendencies.”. Despite her near perfect appearance, according to reports, when her body was moved she “fell apart”, the impact having liquefied most of her organs. Ultimately, her body was identified by her sister, Helen Brenner. However, her final wishes were respected in that she was cremated, and there is no grave for Evelyn McHale. Whether she would be pleased by it or not, the entire world remembers Evelyn McHale, as she was immortalized for her serene suicide. Evelyn was the 12th person to ever jump from the Empire State Building since its completion in 1931. She was one of five people who jumped from the building in a three week period, an event which prompted the construction of a 10 foot tall (3 meters) wire mesh barrier, and the employment of guards trained to spot jumpers, in an effort to prevent any more suicides at the location.
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‘The Most Beautiful Suicide’, colorized

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Francys and Sergei Arsentiev

Francys Arsentiev

Francys Yarbro was born on January 18, 1958 in Honolulu, Hawaii. In 1992 she married Russian mountaineer Sergei Arsentiev and together, they summited many peaks in Russia including ‘Peak 5800m’.

Francys and Sergei Arsentiev

The Arsentievs became the first people to ascend this peak, naming it “Peak Goodwill”. Francys became the first American woman to ski down Mount Elbrus and had summited both its east and west peaks. Francys dreamt of becoming the first American woman to climb Mount Everest without the aid of an oxygen bottle and on May 17, 1998, Francys and her husband, Sergei, set out to make it happen. Francys’s son from a previous relationship, who was eleven at the time, had final say as to whether his mother would go on the expedition to Mount Everest and attempt to summit without the aid of an oxygen bottle. During the 1998 expedition, Francys and Sergei made several attempts to summit which were aborted due to dangerous weather conditions. Finally, on May 22, 1998, Francys became the first woman from the United States to ascend Mount Everest without the aid of an oxygen bottle. Unfortunately, the couple had summited very late in the day and were forced to spend the night in the Death Zone (above 8,000 meters/feet) without supplemental oxygen. At some point in the evening, Francys and Sergei became separated; It is believed Francys was experiencing snow blindness, possibly oxygen depletion, and wandered off without him. When Sergei awoke on the morning of the 23rd to find Francys was gone, he made his way down the mountain to base camp.

Sergei Arsentiev

After failing to find her there, he gathered oxygen bottles and medicine and set off on his own to find his wife. Meanwhile, Francys encountered a Uzbek team of climbers the same morning who were in the final stretch of their summit. According to the team, she was frostbitten and appeared to be half-conscious, deprived of oxygen and unable to move on her own. The Uzbek team administered oxygen to Francys and carried her down the mountain with them as far as possible. Eventually, they had depleted their supply of oxygen and were too fatigued to continue the rescue effort. The team left Francys with a few oxygen bottles and returned to base camp without her. On their way, they encountered Sergei, who was on his way back up the mountain (in the direction Francys lay alone), in search of Francys. It was the last time Sergei Arsentiev was ever seen alive. The following day, on the morning of the 24th, another team of Uzbek climbers, along with British climber Ian Woodall and Cathy O’Dowd of South Africa noticed Francys on their way to the summit.

Cathy O’Dowd and Ian Woodall at Mount Everest’s peak in 1996. Photo courtesy Cathy O’Dowd’s private collection.

She was discovered where she had been left the previous evening, clipped to a guide rope on the mountain, lying on her side. Russian-made oxygen bottles were lying next to her, Sergei’s rope and ice axe were found nearby, but no Sergei. It was Cathy O’Dowd who insisted she and her team abandon their own summit attempt to tend to Francys. Ian Woodall came to the aid of Cathy and Francys as the remainder of the team continued with the summit. Cathy O’Dowd, who first approached Francys, discovered her lying in an inverted ‘V’, which caused Francys to appear as though her spine were broken. She was jerking in an unnatural way and had no motor control, her skin appeared waxy and white. She had removed her gloves and although her purple dow jacket was stikl on her body, her arms were not inside the sleeves. No visual signs of trauma were present and her unnatural positioning was found to be caused by muscular limpness. As they attempted to re-dress her, she did not assist, nor did she fight she only repeated, “I am an American. I am an American.”. O’Dowd and Woodall quickly realized she was not talking to them. As Cathy O’Dowd put it, Francys’s though and speech patterns were like that of a “stuck record”. The same Uzbek team who had assisted Francys previously passed by . When Cathy noticed them, she asked they come help but they responded, “We tried to help yesterday. We left her with oxygen. She is too far gone to help.”, and advised they leave her before leaving themselves. Cathy O’Dowd and Ian Woodall remained with Francys for over an hour and the decision to leave her was a difficult one which was only made after much discussion.

Body of Francys Arsentiev. Photo courtesy of GoreGrish.com

Ultimately, they knew there was nothing the two of them could do to help and that Francys’s best chance was for them to return to base camp, find assistance, and return with a team. Francys begged, “Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me.”, after one again assuring her they would return, Francys’s last word to them were, “Why are you doing this to me?”. Although they did return a they had promised, it was too late. Francys died on May 24, 1998 at the age of 40. In 1999 Jake Norton, a member of the Mallory & Irvine expedition team discovered the body of Sergei Artsentiev nearby the location of his wife’s body. He had perished farther down the mountain’s face and believed to have been attempting to rescue Francys when he sustained a fatal fall. Ian Woodall lead an expedition in 2007 known as “The Tao of Everest” which aimed to discover and burry the bodies of Francys Arsentiev, “Green Boots”, and David Sharp. Cathy O’Dowd, who married Woodall in 2001 played an integral role in “The Tao of Everest”. It was she and Ian who eventually rediscovered the area in which they had left Francys Artsentiev, reached her body which rested on a steep slope and gave her a proper Death Zone burial. Her body was wrapped in an American flag along with a note from her son.

 They then lowered her body further down the mountain’s face and out of sight from the main path. In 1999 Cathy O’Dowd returned to Mount Everest and became the first woman to summit the mountain from both its north and south route.

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The Genesee Hotel Suicide

 On May 7, 1942 Russell Sorgi, a photographer for the Buffalo Courier Express in Buffalo, New York was on his way back to the office from an assignment. Having taken a different route than usual, Sorgi was passed by police cars when he decided to follow them. The cars pulled up to the Genesee Hotel at 530 Main Street where Russell Sorgi noticed a woman “sitting on a ledge outside an eighth-floor window” on the corner of Gennesee and Pearl Street. Sorgi’s recalled, “I snatched my camera from the car and took two quick shots as [the woman] seemed to hesitate… As quickly as possible I shoved the exposed film into the case and reached for a fresh holder. I no sooner had pulled the slide out and got set for another shot than she waved to the crowd below and pushed herself into space. Screams and shouts burst from the horrified onlookers as her body plummeted toward the street. I took a firm grip on myself, waited until the woman passed the second or third story, and then shot.”. The woman who committed suicide from jumping out the eighth-story window that day was thirty-five year old Mary Miller.

The body of Mary Miller, surrounded by investigators. “She waved to the crowd below… her body plummeted toward the street.”. Photo courtesy of Cultural Ghosts.

Ms. Miller checked into the hotel under the name “M. Miller” and claimed she was from Chicago. She immediately went into the hotel’s communal women’s restroom, locked the door, and stepped out onto the ledge through the window. Mary Miller was a resident of Buffalo who lived with her sister and had checked into the Genesee Hotel after telling her sister she was traveling to Indiana to visit relatives. Although there is not much information on Mary Miller available, what is known is that her sister was absolutely shocked by Mary’s suicide. The photo, which was titled “The Despondent Divorcee”, has no basis in fact as Mary Miller was not, nor was she ever, married. What makes her case so disturbing is that there is no known motive behind the suicide, no note was ever discovered and she waved to the crowd immediately before ending her life.

Postcard of the Genesee Hotel showing the window from which Mary Miller jumped. Photo courtesy of Cultural Ghosts.

In addition to The Buffalo Courier Express, the photo was published the next day in the May 8, 1942 edition of the New York Times and later, LIFE magazine. In the photo, a police woman can be seen entering the hotel in what was most likely an attempt to reach Mary Miller before she could kill herself; Perhaps seeing the officer enter the building prompted Mary to jump when she did, before she could be deterred. The photo is not only intriguing due to the suicide in progress captured; In 1942 most men were fighting in World War II and women had only just begun to join the workforce. The police woman seen running inside the Genessee Hotel was most likely one of the first woman to work in law enforcement in Buffalo. Two men in the coffee shop, seemingly unaware of the panic occurring on the street outside are seen next to a World War II propaganda sign displayed in the window which reads, “Give till it hurts Hitler”.

 The sign hanging from the side of the building advertises room rates at the Genese Hotel as “$1.00 and up” per night (but you have to share a bathroom, of course) and sandwiches at the coffee shop downstairs only cost customers 10 cents in 1942. The Genesee Hotel was erected in 1882, but this historic building has since been demolished.

Genesee Hotel in 1978, abandoned and boarded up for demolition. Photo courtesy of Cultural Ghosts.

The famous photo, generally referred to as “The Despondent Divorcee” but more correctly referred to as “The Genesee Hotel Suicide” was used in a psychological study. It was found that 96% of participants in the study did not notice Mary Miller falling to her death upon first examination of the photo.

Former site of the Genesee Hotel as it appears today. Photos courtesy of Cultural Ghosts.

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Photos courtesy Cultural Ghosts
From the same demented mind that brought you The Post-Mortem Post: FREAK
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Mummified Corpses of Little Girls Transformed into Russian Dolls

 During his childhood, Anatoly Moskvin’s parents would often take him for walks through graveyards in his hometown of Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. Today he is a 48-year-old writer/historian and expert on historical cemeteries in his native country. Moskvin has published thirteen books, speaks thirteen languages and has been described by many as a “genius”. 

Anatoly Moskvin

Despite his success in life, he was still living in a flat with his parents, Elvira (78) and Yury (78), in 2011. Moskvin’s parents would stay at their country home each summer leaving their son alone at their flat in Nizhny Novgorod. When the elderly couple returned early in the summer of 2011 they made a grisly discovery;  The mummified corpses of 28 little girls aged 3-12 were dressed to look like Russian dolls and arranged throughout the residence in demure poses. Anatoly Moskvin had, for several years, spent his summers digging up corpses; He visited over 700 cemeteries in Russia and estimates he dug up 150 bodies during his active years. 

 The faces of many girls found in his apartment were wrapped in a light-beige fabric to hide the effects of decomposition. Most were wearing dresses, stockings and knee-length boots or snow suits. Some were dressed as brides and one was made to look like a teddy bear. All were wearing make-up and were found with music boxes inside their rib cages. Anatoly Moskvin took meticulous notes, even recording the girl’s birthdays on the wall in his bedroom where he kept his dolls out of sight from his parents. He hosted birthday parties and tea parties for the girls he mummified, and gave them all new names.  One girl whose body became one of Moskvin’s dolls was ten-year-old murder victim, Olga Chardymova. She was killed the first time her parents allowed her to walk by herself to her grandmother’s house after protesting, “I’m ten already. I can go myself.”. Olga took her favorite green bag and blue umbrella and set off for her grandmother’s house which was one block away from her own after her parents had left for work.

Olga Chardymova

Olga never even made it out of her building; A drug addict waiting in the lobby forced Olga back to the top floor where he robbed her of her earrings. The ten-year old girl was hit in the head with a metal bar and killed for trying to escape the thief. Her remains went undiscovered for five months; Olga’s body was eventually found wedged behind pipes in the attic of the building. Olga Chardymova was buried in a cemetery in Nizhiny Novgorod on October 2, 2002. Her parents, Natalia (44) and Igor (46) had built a metal fence around their daughter’s grave and began painting it on May 7, 2003. The following day when they returned to complete their painting, they noticed a wreath on Olga’s grave had been moved and sensed someone had been there. Shortly afterwards, they began finding notes on their daughter’s grave, addressing her as “Little Lady” and congratulating her on special events as though she were still alive. According the Olga’s parents, the anonymous person left notes on every holiday including the first day of school in September and the last day of school in May which would read similar to, “Happy last month of your 6th year at school.”. Each disturbing letter was signed “D.A.” meaning ‘Dorby Angel’ (‘Kind Angel’). Each was hand-delivered by Anatoly Moskvin who would regularly visit the graves of the girls whose remains sat in his bedroom. Each New Year, Olga’s parents would find their daughter’s grave had been decorated and would often discover stuffed animals and other soft toys on Olga’s grave which had been stolen off of other graves in the cemetery. Natalia Chardymova, Olga’s mother told reporters, “We shivered in fear each time we went to the grave, not knowing what to expect.” “Imagine what it was like for us, her grieving parents, reading these notes about our murdered daughter. It was not at all like some sick joke but a spear through our hearts.”. In June of 2003, Natalia and Igor were able to purchase a proper headstone for their daughter’s gravesite. Anatoly Moskvin penned threatening messages on it including, “If you don’t erect a great monument which she deserves, we will dig her body out.”.  Moskvin later destroyed the headstone with an axe. The Nizhny Novgorod police were appalled when informed by the grieving parents of what they had been subjected to by the anonymous psychopath. Unfortunately, there was nothing they could do at the time to track down the person but told them, “If you find him, do what you want to this barbarian, we wont object.” Natalia later stated, “If I’d met him at Olga’s grave, Id have killed him with my own hands.”. Notes and toys continued to be left on Olga’s grave and often, a metal cross on the site was found bent. After complaints of similar occurences at the graves of many other young girls in Ninzhny Novgorod, the police decided to open Olga’s grave on October 5, 2012, nearly ten years to the day since she had been buried. Olga’s parents and police found a hole in her coffin through which the girl’s remains had been removed. Investigators later discovered through Anatoly’s notes that Olga Chardymova’s body had in fact been removed in May 2003 when her parents originally suspected an unwanted visitor had been at their child’s gravesite. “You can’t imagine it”, Natalia explained,”That somebody would touch the grave of your child, the most holy place in this world for you. We had been visiting the grave of our child for nine years and we had no idea it was empty. Instead, she was in this beast’s apartment.”. During his hearing, Anatony accusingly told the parents of the young girls he had mummified and kept in his apartment, “You abandoned your girls in the cold- and I brought them home and warmed them up.”. After three years in a psychiatric hospital, Anatony Moskvin was determined to be not mentally well enough to stand trial. He was diagnosed with schizophrenia and while he is lucid most of the time, he becomes obsessive when talking about “his girls”. He had tried to adopt a girl of his own but was refused because he is unmarried.

 When asked why he exhumed and mummified the bodies of young girls he stated, “I am waiting for science to find a way for these girls to live again… I wanted to be an expert in making mummies… I wanted to communicate with these girls.” and explained how he chose which girls to take home, “I lay on the grave and tried to get in touch with her. I listened to what she said. Often they asked me to take them out for a walk.”.  Anatoly’s crimes were in no way sexually motivated and police claim, “He loathes sex and thought it was disgusting.”. Anatoly was raped as a child and claims his interest in necrology began when he was forced to kiss the face of an 11-year-old girl at her funeral. Psychiatrists believe there is little chance Anatoly will ever be rehabilitated and released from the psychiatric institute where he will remain for the foreseeable future. The stress of Olga’s death and the disturbance of her remains caused Natalia and Igor Chardymova to separate for fourteen months. Natalia explained the reason for their separation, “I just could not live in the block where my daughter was murdered. And Igor did not want to sell the flat, he would go into Olga’s room and stare at her things. Finally, I left and went to live with my mother.”.

Natalia and Igor Chardymova with son, Alexi.

The couple now have a son, Alexei, who they say has restored their faith in life. The couple moved to a new home, but still have a daily reminder of their daughter’s unfortunate end and the torment they suffered for nine years; From the kitchen window, the couple can see the psychiatric institute where Anatoly Moskvin still resides. Natalia and Igor fear he will one day convince his doctors he is cured and will be released. 

 The couple also question Moskvin’s parents’ knowledge of their son’s grave robbing tendencies, unsure how anyone could overlook the presence of 28 corpses in their home. Anatoly Moskvin’s mother, Elvira maintains, “We saw these dolls but we did not suspect there were dead bodies inside. We thought it was his hobby to make such big dolls and did not see anything wrong with it.”. Natalia and Igor chose to never see the “doll” Anatoly Moskvin created with their daughter’s remains. Police advised the couple against it, “The sight was too grotesque, they said. But I have seen the pictures of some of the other girls. I still find it hard to grasp the scale of his sickening work but for nine years he was living with my mummified daughter in his bedroom. I had her for ten years, he had her for nine.”. 
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Germanwings Crash: Andreas Lubitz Suicide was a Mere Side Effect to the Murder of 149 People

On the morning of March 24, 2015 Germanwings Flight 4U 9525 departed from Barcelona, Spain 20 minutes behind schedule. Pilot Patrick Sondenheimer apologized for the delay, telling passengers they would try to make up the time in the air. Unfortunately, the plane never made it to its destination of Düsseldorf. Instead, when suicidal co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz took his life that day, he took the lives of 149 innocent passengers and crew with him. In a pre-meditated aircraft-assisted suicide, Lubitz locked the pilot out of the cockpit and flew the Airbus 320 into the French Alps near Seyne-les-Alpes. Due to the discovery of a voice recorder from the plane, the one and a half hours leading to the fatal crash were caught on tape, revealing to the world the chaos and horror that ensued in the minutes leading to the deaths of everyone aboard. Before take-off, pilot Patrick Sondenheimer mentioned to Andreas Lubitz that he hadn’t had time to use the restroom in Barcelona to which Lubitz replies he can “go anytime”. For the first 20 minutes of the flight, the tone of the conversation between pilot Sondenheimer and co-pilot Lubitz is described as “jovial”. At 10:27am, local time, they reach their cruising altitude of 38,000 feet and Captain Sondenheimer asked Andreas Lubitz to prepare for landing. After this, Lubitz repeats to the pilot, “You can go now.”, a seat moving is then heard on the tape and the pilot responds to his co-pilot with, “You can take over.”. Shortly after this, at 10:29am the air traffic radar detects the plane is beginning to descend. Air traffic control contacted Flight 9525 at 10:32am but received no answer. At this point, an alarm goes off in the cockpit which can be heard in the background warning “sink rate”. Immediately after the alarm sounds, loud banging can he heard on the door of the cockpit. It is Captain Sondenheimer, who then screams, “For God’s sake, open the door!” as passengers also begin to scream for their lives in the background. By 10:35am a metallic banging is heard which is the pilot attempting to break down the door to the cockpit with an axe. At this time, the plane had descended to 23,000 feet, only 90 seconds later, the plane is at 16,400 feet and a second alarm sounds in the cock pit warning, “terrain–pull up!”. The captain screams at Lubitz again commanding him to, “Open the dammed door!”. By 10:38am the co-pilot in the cockpit can be heard breathing steadily, from this we know he was alive and conscious throughout the entire ordeal. The plane had descended to 13,100 feet at this point and at 10:40am, with passengers still screaming, the plane’s right wing is heard scrapping the top of the French Alps just before the tape cuts off and the plane crashes into the mountain, presumably killing all onboard at impact. Since the crash, it has been discovered tha 27 year old co-pilot Andreas Lubitz had suffered a history of severe depression and had sought help from at least three different doctors regarding his psychological illness between Feburary 2015 and the March 24th Germanwings crash. An iPad seized from Lubitz’s apartment revealed he had searched the Internet for information on how to commit suicide and security measures for cockpit doors in the days leading up to the crash. In his garbage, investigators found multiple physicians’ notes excusing him from work including one for the day of the fatal aircraft crash. His 26 year old girlfriend, Kathrin Goldbach, who was aware of his psychological illness and history or depression claims she, “did not know the extent of the problems” and was “optomistic” about their ability to work through them in their relationship. Goldbach, who met her late boyfriend as a teenager when they worked together at a fast food chain is now afraid to return to her and Lubitz’s hometown of Montabaur. Goldbach is afraid of the backlash she may face there due to Andreas Lubitz’s responsibility in the death of 149 innocent people on Germanwings Flight 9525. According to her pupils, Kathrun Goldbach had recently informed them she is pregnant (presumably with Andreas Lubitz’s child) though she has understandably not mentioned this to the media. It was also revealed Lubitz may have been suffering from a condition which would have eventually led to blindness and that it may have played a key role in his decision to end his life. He had recently visited specialists regarding his failing eyesight which obviously would have caused him to be stripped of his pilot’s license. Due to German law, doctors are forbidden from revealing patient information to employers therefore, the decision to inform Germanwings of a history of depression was entirely Lubitz’s decision. According to the flight school Andreas Lubitz attended, he did make note of a period of severe depression he had experienced. He began flight school in 2008 and joined the Germanwings company in 2013 as a first officer. However, 6 years ago his training was interrupted for unspecified reasons, presumably psychological illness. Lubitz had received over 630 hours of flying time and Germanwings claims he had undergone an “extensive psychological review”. In other reports however, Germanwings has asserted their pilots psychological testing is NOT carried out by professionals in the field of psychology, but instead general practitioners during the pilot’s yearly medical assessment and aviation review. Following the crash, Germanwings spoke out on Twitter saying, “We are shocked by the statements from French authorities that the co-pilot deliberately crashed the aircraft.”. The CEO of Lufthanasa, the company that owns Germanwings later remarked, “We have to accept that the plane was crashed on purpose… It seems true that the co-pilot denied the pilot access to the cockpit.”. Lufthansa has set aside 203 million pounds to “deal with” the crash and victims’ families. Germanwings has instructed pilots to now greet each passenger during boarding and give a pre-flight speech assuring their safety in an effort to make up for their lack of concern regarding the mental state of their employees. Brice Robin, French prosecutor assigned to the criminal investigation of the Germanwings crash stated Lubitz’s intent was to “destroy the plane” and that, “If a human takes 149 people to death with him, I will not call that suicide.”. France’s B.E.A. or The French Land Transport Accident Investigation Bureau (Bureau d’Enquêtes sur les Accidents de Transport Terrestre) found from analyzing data on the flight recorder that Lubitz used autopilot to descend the plane and, “several times during the course of the descent, the pilot [Andreas Lubitz in this case] adjusted the automatic pilot so as to increase the speed of the plane as it descended.”. The French magazine Paris Match and german tabloid Bild claim a 15 second video shot from the back of the plane just before the crash was recently discovered. While investigators deny such a video exists, it is possible they are required to deny its existence at this time due to the investigation still being open. Co-editor and Chief of The Paris Match, Regis Lessommier claims he’s seen the video and says it’s one of the most disturbing things he’s ever seen. The publication reported, “The scene was so chaotic that it was hard to identify people, but the sounds of the screaming passengers made it perfectly clear that they were aware of what was about to happen to them.” The crash killed citizens of Germany, Spain, America, Australia, Argentina, Iran, Venezuela, Britain, the Netherlands, Colombia, Mexico, Japan, Denmark, Belgium, Israel and possibly more countries whose deceased have yet to be named. Included in those killed were 16 German high school students returning from a Spanish-language exchange program and Yvonne and Emily Selke, a mother and daughter from America. Emily Selke had recently graduated from Drexel University with honors. As of now, 470 personal items have been recovered from the crash site as well as 40 badly damaged cell phones. Extreme conditions in the crash site location has made recovery efforts difficult and more evidence is sure to be uncovered in the following months. As someone who has struggled with severe depression for years and lost many friends to suicide, I am sympathetic to the plight of people like Andreas Lubitz. It is painfully clear the entire world needs to make more of an effort to help those with psychological illnesses and finally realize that considering depression and suicide as “taboo” in today’s day and age is flagrantly archaic. That being said, in this particular case, I feel no sympathy for Andreas Lubitz’s suicide; Only those he drug to the grave with him against their will. Andreas Lubitz is a murderer who killed 149 innocent people, including minors in his method of ending his own life. This man, who ignored the screams and pleas of 149 people as he flew the plane directly into the French Alps is no better than any callous killer who eventually resorts to suicide. His ex, who wished to only be known as Maria W. says Andreas Lubitz once stated, “One day I’m going to do something that will change the whole system, and everyone will know my name and remember.”. Perhaps the best thing we can do to honor the memory of those who died that day against their will is to make changes to the whole system of mental health and airline safety on their behalf, not that of mass murderer Andreas Lubitz.
Germany has scheduled a national day of mourning for Germanwings crash victims on April 17, 2015. Some of the victims’ profiles are available on The New York Times website.
More details on the story as they become available.
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