Another Crazy California Man Boils Wife

A few months back there was a story out of California about a man who killed is wife, boiled her body at his restaurant, jumped off a cliff when running from the police, and then was eventually convicted of her murder. I blogged about this gruesome crime and the subsequent murder conviction back in September.

I don't know what it is with Californians and cooking spouses, but it seems to have happened again. And this case is even more bizarre and gruesome in many respects. Last month, a frail looking man was arrested by police after they went to his home and found his wife's remains boiling in three pots on the stove. Oh, and her head was wrapped up in the freezer.

Here's how TruTV reported on the crime and the arrest.

Oceanside couple Frederick Joseph Hengl, 68, and his wife Anna-Marie Faris, 73, weren’t the perfect neighbors. She seemed mentally disturbed and rarely bathed. He was known around North Ditmar Street as a cross-dresser and general odd bird. When police were finally called in to investigate the overpowering stench emanating from their home, no one expected a scene so macabre.

Police performing a welfare check on Faris arrived to find a locked door and no answer to their knocks, so they searched the perimeter before entering through a window. They found three separate pans of meat cooking on the stove. A neighbor told officers that he had seen Hengl scoot out the front door when the police were checking around back. Officers ultimately found Hengl at a local bar.

After questioning Hengl, police soon concluded that the meat in the kitchen was his wife’s dismembered body. A search of the home turned up Faris’ head stuffed in the freezer. They found a meat-grinder “currently in use,” according to prosecutor Katherine Flaherty, “They also found a work area set up in the bathroom, with saws, a boning knife and other cutting instruments.”

At his arraignment last week, Hengl pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder, willful cruelty to an elder, and committing an unlawful act with human remains. If convicted, Hengl is facing 25 years to life in prison. Vista Superior Court Judge J. Marshall Hockett set Hengl’s bail at $5 million. He remains in custody.

Good grief. I know there are a lot of strange people all over the country, but why does California have so many?

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