Police photo of Issei Sagawa
Now and then on my blog I will do a post about the worst of the worst–serial killers. When trying to come up with a premise for this week’s post, I stumbled across the strange and macabre story of Issei Sagawa, a cannibal and minor celebrity. Yes, you read that right: a cannibal and a minor celebrity.
Sagawa was a troubled youth who was identified by psychiatric professionals as a potential threat to himself and others early on. While the story should have ended here with Sagawa safely medicated and locked away in a psych ward, Sagawa had one asset that many psychopaths lack–a rich father. Unwilling or unable to see his son for the burgeoning monster he was, Sagawa’s father shipped his son off to school in Paris, France to study Comparative Literature. It was while he was in school that he met Renee Hartevelt, ...
