A killer who struck men, women and children...bearing similarities to the attack pattern of Jack the Ripper, the police desperately sought to apprehend the taunting madman...

Victims

Aniela Kozielska (14) Died circa 1964

Another one of Staniak's "statistics", she was murdered in Warsaw. It would take a second murder 2 years later to establish a possible link, connecting the murders together. Incredibly, it would be her older sister.

Janina Kozielska (17) Died 24th December 1966

The second in a pair of murders which enabled a renewed effort by the German authorities to move in on apprehending Staniak. She was found horrifically mutilated aboard a train in Krakow.

There exists a further 20 other possible cases confessed by Lucian Staniak upon his capture, but as with other serial attackers of this type, there remains little (or no) evidence to confirm it.

Modus Operandi

The murder's by Lucian Staniak bore an immediate resemblance to the atrocities committed by another serial killer who operated almost 80 years before him: The Whitechapel Murderer - AKA "Jack the Ripper". With primary differences being the greater number of attacks he committed, (and the fact that men were sometimes killed at the scene), the attacks carried out on the female victims seemed to suggest sado-sexual activity, with disembowelment being a typical result. Another key fact is that the murders took place on the designated public holidays in Poland (such as "All Saints" or "May" days). Whilst not an activity that would have taken place at the scene of the crime, Lucian Staniak would write taunting letters to the police and media, which would contain challenges to be caught before he struck again. Details of the location of where he had left the last body were also included. The physical appearance of the writing were long spindly characters formed in red ink. As such, it did not take long for the media-machine to dub him as "The Red Spider".

Motives

The obvious motives linking the murderer to a character being "morally absent" and a "sexually-frustrated pervert" were also linked with an individual who strove to achieve notoriety in his deeds. As it turned out, the self-confessed motive from Staniak himself proved to be quite different. He revealed that both of his parents, and his sister were killed in an automobile accident involving a "hit-and-run" female driver. As the woman responsible escaped justice, Lucian decided to administer some of his own to any woman he found bearing a resemblance to her.

Quotes

One of the letters that he wrote to the media contained the following, which represented a typical example of the doomsday-like poetry contained in his writings:

"There is no happiness without tears; no life without death. Beware, I will give you cause to weep."

Another, sourced from the Internet Crime Archives:

"I picked a juicy flower in Olsztyn and I shall do it again somewhere else, for there is no holiday without a funeral."

Comments

If any detail about this case strikes the reader first, it would have to be the incredible "motive" that Lucian Staniak confessed to be murdering to. For an individual to possess the kind of mentality which was able to generalise among a broad range of women, who shared certain characteristics, insomuch as to be a target for intricate murders, has to beg the question "why?". Perhaps an underlying motive, culminating elements of "Notoriety", "Thrill" and "Deviancy" also lent a hand...

Links

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