Journalist Kim Wall's Severed Head Found In Bag With Metal Pieces

Danish police investigating the murder of the Swedish journalist Kim Wall have found her severed head and legs in a bag in Koge Bay, just south of Copenhagen, authorities said Saturday. The freelance journalist went missing on Aug. 10 when she went to interview the inventor Peter Madsen in his self-built submarine.

The bag was found not far from where Wall's torso was discovered 11 days after she went missing. Wall’s arms are still missing and the cause of death has yet to be established.

The police investigator Jens Moller Jensen said divers had found Wall’s head and legs, as well as her clothes and a knife, in plastic bags with “heavy metal pieces” to make them sink.

“Yesterday morning we found a bag in which we found Kim Wall’s clothes, underwear, stockings, and shoes. In the same bag laid a knife, and there were some car pipes to weigh the bag down,” he said Saturday, adding that a postmortem examination confirmed that the head was Wall’s and that it showed “no sign of fracture” or “any sign of other blunt violence to the skull.”

Last month, Madsen gave his account of Wall's death, saying she died in an accident when the submarine's 15-pound hatch fell on her. Madsen said after he realized Wall was dead, he continued out to the Baltic Sea, where he slept with Wall’s body on board the craft. When he decided to dump her body in the ocean, he said, her “shoe and tights fell off” while he carried her to the top of the submarine. He admitted in court to “indecent handling of a corpse.”

Madsen, 46, is being held on charges of manslaughter and abuse of a corpse in the death of the 30-year-old Swedish journalist.

Earlier this month, prosecutors said Madsen allegedly had videos of real women being tortured and murdered on his computer.

Investigators found a hard drive on Madsen’s computer aboard the submarine containing videos that depicted the torture of women, Special Prosecutor Jakob Buch-Jepsen said.

“We think it’s video recordings of the true killing of women,” he said, according to Swedish newspaper The Ekstra Bladet. He also noted that some of the videos appeared to depict “decapitation and burning.”

During a video call at the hearing, Madsen said that the computer was used by other people, not just him alone.

“I would like to clarify that the computer in the custody of the police and the items that have been removed from the space laboratory are not mine,” Madsen said.

The prosecutor alleged Madsen killed Wall sometime between Aug. 10 and 11, dismembered her body and attached a pipe to it in order to make it sink. Buch-Jepsen also said during the hearing that Wall’s body had “several” stab wounds as well as stitches sewn onto her body.

A judge ruled that Madsen would remain jailed until Oct. 31 as the investigation into Wall’s death continued.