Electronic Kill Machine

Evolution of the Perfect Crime

It seemed almost adolescent to even break murder down to such a clichéd way of thinking, but how many murders were committed where the killers didn't follow a few simple, basic rules? Every crime show on television had made this point at one time or another.

And Lally, Weir and Anthony Calabro, stoned out of their mind, had figured this out while watching crime television.

On certain nights, perhaps when boredom overcame the value of good drugs, they'd even act out certain crimes. Jim Morel said he'd show up at the apartment Ant lived in with his great aunt, Marina Calabro, Lally and Weir, and they'd all be sitting around discussing how to get it right.

Measurements. Angles.

I'm telling you, one of them shouted, "Hit a person this way and it would work."

"It would! Yes."

They dissected murders to the point where they believed the best way to figure out the perfect murder was to look at it backwards. Take the end result—in other words—and track backwards to see how to do it properly without making one single, stupid mistake.

And then they came up with it.

"A frying pan," one of them had said.

A frying pan wrapped in a towel.

Even better.