Man kept dead parents in freezers for 30 years, prosecutor tells court
a month ago by QuentinCallaghan to c/nottheonion
Another article about the same case makes this smell even more like The Onion: https://www.mtvuutiset.fi/...
An elderly doctor says he froze his parents’ bodies at his father’s request. During police questioning, he spoke of pharaohs, catacombs, and Elon Musk.
“My father’s wish for me, as his eldest son, was that his body be mummified and preserved, and not disposed of by society through cremation or burial,” the man said during police questioning.
He says his father advocated for “ecological diversity, a pleasant lifestyle, and freedom of religion and funeral rites.”
“Even the ancient Egyptian pharaohs spent half their lives preparing for death. So did the richest man in the world, Elon Musk, who wants to be buried on Mars. I’ve heard this from my father before.”
According to the son, he was supposed to build a burial chamber for his parents. At first, his father had asked him to build the burial chamber in the United States. The family’s third child, the sons’ sister, has lived in the United States for several decades, and according to the son, his parents visited her there every summer.
“My father believed that his body would remain ‘forever’ and allow future archaeologists—if they were so inclined—to study what the human body was like back then. This isn’t some delusion of grandeur, but rather a product of the thinking of that era,” the man explained.
He said he must fulfill his father’s request to the end.
“This must be seen through to the end. I have promised, and I have a sacred duty to build the burial chamber and prepare the eternal coffins,” he said.
I hate it when that happens
Anyone could do it by just skipping on avocado toasts. People these days are too lazy.
Ante-chambers? In this economy?
and allow future archaeologists—if they were so inclined—to study what the human body was like back then.
Archeologist studying bones in a long-unpowered freezer:
"Serial killer. Definitely a serial killer."
I wonder if it's possible to affordably DIY a freeze dryer large enough to hold a human body. In principle such an innovation would allow low-cost, low-skill DIY mummification.
Sure. If you wait long enough, any freezer is a freeze dryer. Thats what freezer burn is.
Freeze drying machines just speed the process up with heat cycles, vacuum, and possibly some circulation at certain points in the cycle. But importantly, in order for freeze dryer machines to actually work decently, the material needs to be cut into very small, fairly even chunks.
Whole bodies are one case where sublimation alone is probably the best bet, maybe make the whole thing a vacuum chamber to drive moisture out faster, but skip the heat part. Importantly, this apparatus would never be cheap if you install anything other than freezing capabilities. Vacuum chambers are difficult to make, and they would need to run for a very long time to fully dry a body.
But the takeaway is if this guy was telling the truth about his absolutely unhinged plans, he at least stumbled upon a solution that would eventually preserve a body. Its a very fragile preservation, but it could work, sure.
I suppose especially if the freezer had a drain line and a defrost cycle, a regular freezer would dry out a body quite effectively over a long enough time. (Ideally you would remove the moisture from the freezer entirely, not just leave it in the freezer as ice. Maybe a DIY approach to mummification could go like this:
- Obtain chest freezer with a defrost and drain line feature.
- Place body in bottom of freezer.
- Pour a large quantity of salt on the body until completely covered.
- Turn on the freezer and let it sit for a very long time, like a year.
The problem with just freezing the body, without removing the moisture, is that to me this isn't true mummification. To me at least, a "mummy" is something that can be left in ordinary room-temperature conditions and not undergo further decay. While freezing a body will preserve it while cold, the minute you warm it back up it will start to rot. To be a proper mummy, it has to be able to survive outside of the freezer. Removing moisture would be critical for this.
I don't know why I'm writing about this. But sometimes it's fun to approach unhinged problems from a real engineering point of view. Sure, you can read a book on how the ancient Egyptians did mummification, but that's not exactly replicable today by ordinary people using commonly available materials. The Egyptian technique requires a lot of skill, many specialized tools, and a lot of rare ingredients. What I'm wondering is with modern technology, if there's a way to democratize mummification, to allow it to be approachable by the common man using readily available tools and materials with little requisite knowledge required.
I don't think freeze drying is ever going to be true mummification (based on your definition of storing it in room conditions) regardless of if there’s a mechanism to remove moisture from the freezer space.
The long-term freezing process itself dries out the body, so its just a matter of waiting before it fully dries out, that part isn’t a problem, and nothing extra really needs to be done to dry it, but what you are left with is basically a sponge of organic material that will want to soak moisture from the air. So so much surface area for moisture to settle into, and then your super dry person starts to get a sheen of mold..
But in total fairness, no mummies can actually be stored in room conditions without degradation for exactly the same reason. Museums put them into climate controlled cases and work very hard to make sure they don't deteriorate. The only reason Egyptian mummies survived as they did was that it’s pretty dry in the desert, and those tombs were pretty well sealed from weather fluctuations. Most (perhaps all, but im not confident enough to say that) other mummified bodies we’ve found have been frozen. I think (though I’m open to correction here) those basicallly have to stay frozen, or they start to deteriorate. (These didn't fully dry out because they were encased in ice)
And millinia later someone recovers some chronoradiography data proving it was a ritual suicide to achieve divine preservation through bulk paper roll storage in the tomb.
cryonics on a budget
Father died 30 years ago, but he heard his father talk about Elon Musk? Just a lil bit of psychosis there
Im confused how this man is claiming that his father "wanted a burial like Elon Musk" if his father died in 1996 when nobody knew who Musk was.
So, it could've been a simple mix up. People (old people, like Pharaohs but also modern people like Elon) talk about preserving bodies and his father talked about this too. This in this case being preserving bodies, not Elon.
I know language-wise the 'this' could have been Elon. Dude is clearly a few donuts short of a dozen, but the article is translated from Finnish. I'm sure it could be lost in translation or something.
Maybe he used AI to get out this situation, and the AI threw in Elon Musk into the mix.
Apparently they dug up another grave for some reason. The parents thing is a sidenote, not the actual crime I think
What brand freezer?
Sounds really reliable, and I'm in the market for one
I hope he left a good review online
Excellent, reliable freezer.
Kept my father safely frozen for 30 years. Would buy again for Mom.
Minimal freezer burn, still tasted fine.
Good luck finding a freezer nowadays with that kind of build quality.
I plan on being Crème brûlée'd.
Yeah imagine a bunch of random kids cutting yiu open playing with your testicles trying to impress a girl in the class.... This happens. I know because my medical student friends from the dorm used to take about the weird stuff they did. There's also the ever growing "bodies" exhibition... And again my testicles inside out for people to be impressed...
But maybe it will help something. It's not a bad cause.
I don't get a choice, it's organ donation or science donation in Australia.
I’ve also looked into it but your body basically need to be donated within 24 hours after death. Makes it basically impossible to have a funeral. Like I don’t give a fuck, but my loved ones probably do.
Your family gets the cremated remains after they're done with it. I guess it might be like a week or so?
We're not big on ceremonies anyway, so delaying for a couple of weeks or holding a wake without any physical remains wouldn't be a big deal.
Mixed with cocaine and snorted by family and friends as a sign of respect.
I mean, he didn't harm anyone. So I'd say this is just an odd request/action. I don't think there is a crime here. But fucking police just have to arrest because they don't know any different.
He dug up a grave in a public graveyard, that is not really a victimless crime..
He is also suspected of digging up a family grave last autumn. His 70-year-old brother has been charged with the same offence.
Decomposing bodies are really bad for the environment and especially people
I'm a moron, admittedly. I don't understand how that could be the case. I'd really love to be wrapped in a natural shroud and buried in my natural state with the worms and bugs in the dirt. I don't want any sort of chemical treatment. How is that bad for the environment and people?
This isn't me challenging you or being snarky, it's an honest question.
I thought my parents were cold.
And they thought it was bad when they froze me out of the will.
Honestly? Based. I'd do the same thing if my dad asked me.
They felt they needed to arrest him, but couldn't find a law more fitting than "violate the sanctity of a grave"?
Just leave him alone, and deal with it after he dies.
He dug up a grave unrelated to the quoted portion about keeping his parents in a freezer.
So did the richest man in the world, Elon Musk, who wants to be buried on Mars. I’ve heard this from my father before.
First of all, he knew about Musk 30 years ago?
But also, the lengths Musk will go to to keep us from pissing on his grave.
I guess that's a pun, not a typo.
hes different, he was taken from the siberian permafrost and was reanmiated with lindsey's SOul, after elaine chao went to a bhuddist temple to learn the secrets of reincarniation.
That freezer-burn is going to be nasty
The second.
Social media is warping our perceptions in all kinds of way.
That's really disturbing
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"yeah I was supposed to build a burial chamber for my mom and dad, but I procrastinated. just a little bit."
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