A former butcher accused of murdering an acquaintance and eating parts of his liver is seeking mental health care, a spokesman for Dorogomilovsky Moscow City court said on Thursday.
Nikolai Shadrin, 40, was arrested on May 17 after police found a stew made from a human liver in his fridge. The raid on his apartment came after various dismembered body parts were found around Moscow.
Shadrin is currently awaiting trial and denies the charges of murder. His lawyer says he needs treatment rather than isolation in a pre-trial custody centre.
According to the police, Shadrin often had drunken parties involving in his apartment. After one of them, he killed one acquaintance and warned another not to say anything to police.
Shadrin maintains however that the man he ate died of "other causes."
With regard to cannibal charges, he reportedly told police during questioning: "I did not like the corpse. I carved it like pork, and scattered across the district, in the river, manholes, and dumps. Why should I have buried him? I did not feel sympathy for him. He died and that is it."
MOSCOW, May 26
