some of you may have seen the classic coen brothers film [ __ ] and if you have a memorable scene will have probably popped into your mind when you saw the title of this case well that scene wasn't just the imagination of a writer it was actually inspired by true events and this is the event that is believed to have inspired that scene this case takes place in newtown connecticut on the 19th november 1986. helicraft was a 39 year old woman who worked as a flight attendant and lived in connecticut she was from denmark but
settled in the united states she was married to a man named richard craft richard was a commercial airline pilot and the couple met sometime back in 1969. hello was training to start her career as a flight attendant and richard was training to become a pilot they married and moved to newtown connecticut in 1979 and went on to have three children named andrew thomas and christina richard earned a rather large salary from being a pilot roughly around 120 000 per year which was more than enough to fully support the family on his entire paycheck but despite
earning a lot of money he also worked part-time as a police officer too and according to those that knew him he had a strange fascination with his role as an officer even when he was off duty he sometimes responded to police calls without the authorization to do so hella was incredibly good at her job she was good with people and could speak four languages fluently but the main reason why she still worked was because richard was known to be incredibly tight with his money he would contribute close to nothing when it came to necessities and
luxuries for the children and when it came to family holidays it would be hella who would pay for everything he would give the bare minimum in 1984 richard was diagnosed with colon cancer and given the chance of survival of just two percent hella cared for richard while he was undergoing surgery and chemotherapy and miraculously he managed to defy the odds and his cancer went into remission he survived despite having three children together a nice home and a wife who'd cared for him in his most vulnerable richard was unfaithful and he had been unfaithful way before
they had even married and it turned out he didn't treat hello well at all he would later tell people that the only reason why he married her was because she became pregnant and it was too late to get an abortion he would often disappear for long periods of the time sometimes even for weeks and while he was away he would meet up with various women and have affairs heller was of course suspicious of this behavior and she hired a private investigator to find out where he was going she then learned the truth the private investigator
had managed to snap some pictures of richard kissing other women and these other women also worked as a hostesses receipts were also found which showed richard had bought christmas presents for another woman heller and the pi began to build a case against richard in preparation for the divorce but despite richard being the one who was unfaithful she was scared of how he would react when confronted with the evidence of his affairs and how he would react to her being the one to put an end to their marriage close friends of hella would later disclose that
she had told them that richard could also lose his temper very easily and was known to be physically abusive towards her over the time of the marriage she became increasingly wary of richard to the point that she made an effort to tell her close friends that she had no plans to leave and if she was ever to disappear it wouldn't be an accident richard would be the culprit in september of 1986 heller had decided the time was right to call an end to her marriage the affairs physical abuse and the lack of care and monetary
help towards their children was enough especially since he was buying other women gifts she met with a divorce attorney to get the ball rolling the dream of a fresh start was on the horizon on the 18th of november 1986 heller was working on a long flight from germany to connecticut she had conversed with her colleagues about her life-changing decision she had two concerns keeping her job to raise her children as a single parent and that richard might be able to track her down and find her as at one point he had worked on secret missions
in the cia but after careful consideration her colleague said by the end of the flight she seemed confident that she had made the right decision a violent storm was brewing and snow began to build as the plane touched down in connecticut heller was heading home her friends were giving her a lift back in the car as they pulled up hella let out a sigh thanked her colleagues for the lift left the car and walked towards her home upon entering it's believed that she told richard of her plans to leave as the sun began to rise
in the early morning of the 19th of september richard had woken up the children and their living nani the power had gone out due to the storm so he took them to his sister's house and when he dropped them off the children looked up to him and asked where their mother was richard assured his children that she would be with them shortly but she never came hella didn't make it to work on her next shift and her colleagues became very suspicious as they knew she was desperate to keep her job to provide for her three
children and they also recalled those chilling words she had previously spoken if i go missing it's not an accident hello's colleagues asked richard where she was and he gave several accounts regarding the whereabouts of her to different people at first he said that he was unsure of where she was then he said that she was visiting denmark to see her mother who was ill but when they contacted hello's mother she explained that she hadn't made any plans to see her daughter and that she wasn't even ill richard then changed his story again stating that she
was in the canary islands visiting a friend of hers all of hell's friends were in contact with one another and they compared stories that richard had told them once realizing that he had told various stories to different people they contacted the private investigator that heller had previously hired in hopes to find out what had happened to her the pi spoke to the nanny of the craft household and he asked her if she had noticed anything strange in the house she told him that surely after heller had disappeared she said that there appeared to be a
dark stain on the carpet which then led to those stained parts of the carpet being pulled up she also said that richard had bought a freezer and then it had vanished when the nanny asked where heller was richard just told her that he was unsure the pi was positive that there was foul play involved in the two weeks that heller had disappeared richard never reported her missing the police were now involved and the forensics team began to investigate clues were found in the home that pointed to richard potentially being the one to blame for her
disappearance in addition to the carpet that had been cut and pulled up there was also blood marks on the side of the couple's bed and a few small blood stains in their room they then made some chilling discoveries just days after the disappearance richard had redecorated the room he had bought new bed sheets and a new duvet but not only that richard had also bought a chainsaw and a freezer which was now missing and even more disturbingly there was a 279 dollar receipt found for the rental of a diesel-powered wood chipper as well as a
u-haul truck even after heller had disappeared richard continued with the affairs he was having a snowplow driver then came forward with information that would help solve the case he told the police that he had seen someone that matched richard's description packed at the side of a road with a wood chipper at around three in the morning this was around the time that heller had disappeared once the police got this lead they quickly dispersed the team to investigate the scene once there they found clumps of freshly scattered wood chips and among those wood chips they found
a human thumb a fingertip with a nail still attached a toe bone fragments a piece of jawbone teeth and over 2 000 strands of blonde hair along with chunks of human tissue and women's underwear an expert determined that the bone fragments belong to a human and a forensics expert was able to identify a crowned tooth that belonged to heller divers then searched a nearby river and there they found pieces of a chainsaw that had the serial number filed off and intertwined in the teeth of the saw were hairs that matched those found under the wood
chips and inside the u-haul van that richard had rented they found a clump of material that tested positive for human blood their evidence was of course pointing to richard and it was pretty much concrete but it also became very clear that her body would not be found so the investigators had to theorize what exactly could have happened to heller they came to believe that richard killed hella in their bedroom after she told him she was leaving the theory is that after she told him he became enraged picked up a police flashlight that belonged to him
and repeatedly struck her on the head hence the blood in the bedroom and the carpet been ripped and pulled up he then placed her dead body into a freezer that he had bought once the body was completely frozen he drove out to where the bun fragments were found revved up the chainsaw and began to hack her body apart then he picked up the pieces of the woman that he had raised children with and threw them into the wood chipper dumping the remains into the lake along with the items he had used to commit the crime
the police were now confident that richard was the one who killed heller but connecticut law in the 80s was a little bit different they required a known cause of death for a murder case to go ahead and without a physical body intact this would be impossible the best the investigators had was a theory of what happened at night if there was nobody there would potentially be no case well that's what richard thought he firmly believed that he had committed the perfect crime by destroying the body but what richard didn't anticipate is that the police would
find the crown tooth and that the dental records would be enough to identify the tooth to be that of hellers he also didn't expect that the police would go through the effort of finding the chainsaw at the bottom of the lake and linking it back to him on the 13th of january 1987 heller was confirmed to be dead and on that very same day the police arrested richard when they went to his home they ordered richard to get out of his house but richard responded with a rather strange reply he said i'm tired i'll take
care of it in the morning the police then got into richard's house and dragged him out and he was held on a bale of seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars the murder trial began in may of 1988 the police got the help of an expert forensic investigator who created a test a pig's carcass was fed through the wood chipper and the remains were examined the pig's body was chewed up in an incredibly similar way to the remains found of heller leading the team to further believe that richard had attempted to get rid of her body
using the wood chipper that he had rented during the trial the evidence mounted up against richard and despite it all he still proclaimed his innocence and stuck to his defense his defense was that heller had run away and believe it or not one of the jurors actually believed his story and they voted to acquit him the trial was ruled as a mistrial and a second trial soon began which took the jury just eight hours to find richard guilty of murder he was sentenced to 50 years in prison on the 8th of january 1990. richard's sister
karen eventually took the children in and raised them she sided with a prosecution team during the trial and even encouraged the judge to give her brother the maximum sentence hella's friends and colleagues also pulled together and helped to raise money for the children's future the children also received money from richard's pension too in 1993 richard tried to appeal his sentence stating that the evidence that was presented wasn't enough to convict him and that the publicity the crime had received hindered his chances of a fair trial his appeal was denied richard was released in 2020 and
is now free he is 84 years old the most recent articles i could find states that he was part of a housing program for homeless veterans where he is now is unknown as far as i'm aware of the wood chipper case was the first case in connecticut history that someone was convicted of murder with no body richard has never admitted to taking his wife's life you
