[imagesource: Bax Lindhardt/REUTERS]

The murder of Kim Wall (below) made headlines in 2018, due in part to the bizarre nature of the crime alongside the brutality with which it was executed.

Wall, a 30-year-old freelance journalist who was researching a story on the entrepreneur and aerospace engineer, Peter Madsen (above), went missing after Madsen took her out to sea in his 17-metre homemade submarine in August 2017.

Her dismembered torso was found off the coast of Copenhagen 10 days after she was reported missing, and her head, legs, and clothes were later discovered in bags at sea in October.

Madsen was found guilty of premeditated murder, aggravated sexual assault, and desecrating a corpse in 2018, reports The Guardian, and sentenced to life in prison. He later appealed the decision, but his appeal was denied.

Life sentences in Denmark amount to 16 years, but the sentence can be extended.

Throughout the case, he insisted that Wall’s death, which happened on his submarine, was an accident.

Image: Tom Hall/ AP

He claimed that she had died of carbon monoxide poisoning while on board. He said that he dismembered her body because it was the only way to get it out of the submarine.

Horrifying. You can see why he was awarded life in prison.

Now, in a documentary released on Wednesday, titled The Secret Recordings with Peter Madsen, he has admitted to journalist Kristian Linnemann that he did indeed murder Wall.

“It’s my fault she died,” he says. “And it’s my fault because I committed the crime. It’s all my fault … There is only one who is guilty, and that is me,” Madsen said in the documentary, produced by Discovery Networks Denmark.

More than 20 hours of conversations were recorded with Madsen.

Prosecutors said 15 stab wounds were found on Wall’s body along with traces of Madsen’s DNA. A police examination of Madsen’s computer uncovered material featuring women being tortured and killed.

The judgement, following Madsen’s trial, described the murder as:

“A cynical and pre-planned sexual assault of a particularly brutal nature on a random woman who, in connection with her journalistic work, accepted an invitation for a sailing trip”.

Perhaps this confession will extend his life sentence.

This is a man who shouldn’t be free in the world.

[source:guardian]