“You have to mind the smell,” Marcus Peter Volke allegedly told the electrician. “I’m cooking up a pig’s broth at the moment.”
Volke had phoned Brad Coyne, an on-call electrician, Saturday evening to have his stove looked at. Unbeknownst to Coyne, the foul-smelling “pig’s broth” was actually the dismembered body parts of Mayang Prasetyo, Volke’s transgender wife, boiling in pots of water.
Coyne claims the apartment was very dark when he arrived and that the carpet “squelched under foot.” He took a look at the oven, found nothing wrong, and promptly left.
Later that night, police arrived at the apartment after neighbors called to complain about a “bad smell” coming from inside the residence. What they found were severed parts of Prasetyo’s body strewn about the kitchen and others cooking on the stove.
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Volke had no criminal record or known history of mental illness, and family members say the couple gave no any indication of trouble in their marriage. The two met while working on a cruise ship and married last year, honeymooning in Germany. They had just recently moved to Brisbane.
He was a professional chef. She was a “high-class” prostitute, charging up to $435 an hour for her services and marketed herself online as a “top high-class Asian shemale.” She used the money she earned to support her family back in Indonesia.
Prasetyo’s mother, Nining Sukarni, spoke to the Courier-Mail yesterday from her home in Lampung, Indonesia. She said she was heartbroken by the loss of her eldest child, whom she referred to as her son Febri. Each month, Febri sent money home.
“He put the sisters through school,” Sukarni said.
According to Sukarni, Prasetyo “seemed fine” the last time they spoke, though she said she was bored in Brisbane and was contemplating a move to Bali. She also told her mother she had started a business breeding small dogs.
When the police showed up at the apartment Saturday night, Volke immediately fled the scene. Police found him dead in a nearby dumpster, having slit his own throat.
Now, at least one media outlet is in hot water for its treatment of the story. The Courier Mail ran the headline “Monster Chef and the She-Male” on its front page and “Ladyboy and the Butcher” inside, sparking outrage from trans activists.
Melody Moore, coordinator of Trans Health Australia, called the headline “disgusting” and accused the paper of “dehumanizing a trans woman.”
Others took to social media to scold the newspaper. One person on Facebook wrote: “An innocent person just lost their life to a maniac and you nail her coffin to the front page of your publication with such a salacious and unnecessary headline.”
Some questioned the paper’s decision to run photos of the deceased in a bikini.
The paper has since changed the headline to “Killed and cooked trans woman was high-class sex worker,” but it has not responded to the controversy, though John McCarthy, a journalist at the paper, tweeted, “It’s a great story. Grow up and join the real world.”
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TinoTurner
Jesus…why are all “these kinda people” prostitutes?
Dave4445
@TinoTurner: A disproportionate number may be prostitutes because of employment discrimination. How many transgendered people have you interacted with in retail, restaurants, business? Probably the most misunderstood and marginalized people in society.
Zekester
I find the term disgusting but they were calling her what she called herself.
sweetbrandigirl2004
@TinoTurner: We’ll to answer your question the vast majority of them turn to sex work because stuck up bigots like you who own business won’t hire them leaving them no other choice !
Billy Budd
It is a mad, mad world.
hyhybt
I regret reading this after having stew for lunch.
siltor67
taste like chicken?
Cam
WEird story, Was he her pimp? Was it jealousy and he killed her because she was going to leave him? etc…
And the rest of it, I mean yeah, the guy had no history of mental illness, but I would say that dismembering her and cooking her might indicate that something was missed during his last check-up.
hyhybt
@Cam: It might, or it might have been just an attempt to dispose of the body.
Chris
Strip this away the sensationalism to the core and we see that, once again, a man decided that he had the right to kill a (trans) woman. Or, someone in a position of power killed someone with less. Horrid.
stadacona
Not sure why this is news on a gay website…
hyhybt
@stadacona: You expect this to be so common here that it’s not news?
NG22
You have to be really careful with the people you let into your life. Too many of these stories exist. I find it sickening that a lover could destroy his partner so horrifically.
Trust no one.
Sebizzar
@NG22: Exactly 🙁 I think this is maybe the 15th story I’ve read like this! Not helping my already messed up trust issues.
praenomenal
@TinoTurner: As, one of those people I would like to address you Tino. You are a bigot, but you know that. You bothered to even use scare quotes. Which, I mean, wow. So, in the effort to educate you I would first like to state for the record that I am a systems architect for shive company and make exceptionally good money. This was not always the case however. After 8 years in the industry and an expemplary work history I transitioned. I was very lucky because I was employed by a very open minded individual. However his company changed focus and I was laid off. It was early in my transition. I was not aware of my presentation. I did not know what I was doing and now I was unemployed. I was unemployed for a year. Passed over for multiple jobs that I was qualified for. It was not until I became much more able to “stealth” in the general sense that I was able to get a job. It is still not easy. I have to explain things to people. A lot. Imagine that you wore a giant button that declared your sexuality to everyone. It is like that.
I hope maybe that can explain why so many transpeople end up in sex work. Because it pays. Because we are already hyper sexualities in societies eyes. Because we need to eat.
Now, with any luck you will respond and try to defend your vile assertion.
lykeitiz
@praenomenal: I’m sorry, but I have to call out some of your BS.
First of all, unless you left out a part of your story, then it would seem that even in your most trying times, you yourself never turned to prostitution.
To say that a transperson could become a prostitute simply because of who/what they are is a generalization that I’m sure many transpeople would not agree with.
There are always options. Becoming a hooker is never a good career move no matter what your state in life is.
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
“Coyne claims the apartment was very dark when he arrived and that the carpet “squelched under foot.” He took a look at the oven, found nothing wrong, and promptly left.”
Looks like it may have been a very good idea to have “promptly left” for being that there was nothing wrong with the oven, Volke may have been looking for a side dish to prepare…………..
praenomenal
@lykeitiz: How is that in any BS? I never said or intended to imply that in any way. I was responding to a person who stated and I am paraphrasing, that all trans people are prostitutes. I was stating categorically that I am not. I was showing that as a transperson employment can be next to impossible. I was and am incredibly fortunate to have a lot more support than most people. During the hardest times I had hands to help me. I was showing the space that can create a high number of sex workers. I refuse to pass judgement or shame anyone who chooses that line of work, be they cis or trans. I never said that transpeople can become a sex worker because they are trans. I said they could choose that source of income because of marginalization and societal pressures due to their and my gender identity. Now. Where again is there any BS there?
I state categorically that because someone chooses or is forced into sex work does not mean they deserve this sort of murder and torture.
I honestly find your implication that sex work is in some way shameful.