Body Dump (Pinnacle True Crime) [Paperback]

Fred Rosen (Author)

Book Description

Series: Pinnacle True Crime | Publication Date: July 1, 2002

In October, 1996, women began vanishing off the streets of Poughkeepsie, New York. All were young, pretty, and petite. Most were hustlers and crackheads. By August, 1998, as the toll reached eight, a victim's mother said bitterly, 'When they find one, they'll find them all'. She didn't know how horrifyingly right she was. "Hulking And Homicidal" - At the height of the manhunt, prostitute Christine Sala, hysterical, told police she had barely escaped being strangled by Kendall Francois, 27, a 6'4 inches, 300-lb middle school hall monitor whose slovenly personal hygiene had earned him the nickname 'Stinky'. When caught, Francois said that he'd killed the women because they hadn't given him all the sex he claimed he'd paid for. In "House Of Horrors", investigators in white bio-hazard suits entered the house where Francois lived and found eight female corpses, almost all decomposed. Some were placed in plastic bags together in the attic. Others lay in shallow graves in the crawl space under the house. It was such a tangle of rotting flesh and bones, even the investigators couldn't tell how many bodies there were. Now, sentenced to life in prison without parole, the man whom others dismissed as a smelly oaf had finally been unmasked as one of the most bizarre serial sex-killers of modern times.

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Pinnacle; Reissue edition (July 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786021438
• ISBN-13: 978-0786021437
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,538,672 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Outdoing "Jack the Ripper" and not knowing it!, August 6, 2002

By 

Russell A. Rohde MD "Owl" (West Covina, California USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Body Dump (Paperback)

"Body Dump" by Fred Rosen, ISBN 0-7860-1133-5 (ppb), Pinnacle Books 2001 - is a 303 page disquisition by determined writer (6 books) about the life and times of serial killer Kendall L. Francois of Poughkeepsie, N.Y. An additional 16 pages of photos show the victims, crime scene, killer, and forensic principals. A final 9 pages cover some confounding legalities of premature guilty pleading in capital crimes.

The book's presentation is interesting, appearing firstly to be jumping around but the reader discovers this is a likely ploy paralleling the confused thought processes or machinations of Kendall who forgot about one of the eight victims he'd killed and put in his attic. Kendall's M.O. was static, his signature (bathing) intriguing, but his motive elusive and not a factor in conviction, certainly a rarity in itself.

We have opportunity to witness the downside of sovereignty and non-cooperative jurisdiction of Town, City, State and Federal policing authorities until a serial killer is suspected. Rosen took some potshots as: "Law enforcement's continued reliance on the outmoded, ineffectual and unproved FBI serial killer organized and disorganized modality does nothing to help in catching these criminals." But, is this fair game when there are no bodies and no crime scenes?

All in all, I found the book interesting as a recital of an otherwise incongruous story of a killer stashing bodies (unbeknownst to family) in the attic and basement of his parent's home near the Vassar and Marist Colleges in Town and City of Poughkeepsie. Do take the time to read it.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Read the version at CrimeLibrary instead, July 13, 2007

By 

Randym - See all my reviews

This review is from: Body Dump (Paperback)

Driving home after work on September 3, 1998, I found my planned route unexpectedly blocked. I took a right onto Fulton Ave., to see that the usually sleepy street had become a madhouse. Dozens of police cars closed off the road. Huge TV trucks were parked as near as they could get. Throngs of journalists and bystanders were milling around, held back by a platoon of cops. A helicopter hovered overhead.

As I made a U-turn to find another way home, I turned on the radio, hoping to discover what the commotion was about. It wasn't difficult. Every station was blaring the news: the serial killer who had been stalking the women of Poughkeepsie for two years had finally been caught. He lived nearby; in fact, I frequently walked past his house.

Over the following weeks, gruesome details emerged about Kendall Francois. He killed eight women, mostly prostitutes, and kept their bodies in his house - even though he lived with his parents and younger sister. The smell was so bad that it could be detected on the street, and on the skins of the inhabitants of the house...but his family apparently knew nothing about the murders, or the bodies. The house was such a mess, filled with garbage, rotting food, dirty clothes, and excrement, that the police had trouble entering it without stepping on possible evidence.

Ever since this story broke, I've been waiting for someone to write a book about it. Elements of the case are so bizarre they beg an explanation. Unfortunately, this book doesn't provide one.

The main problem is that the author, Fred Rosen, seems to have been unable to get interviews with any of the principles, aside from the police. This makes his viewpoint extremely limited, not to mention one-sided. For example, Rosen writes at length about how unfairly the police were treated by the press. The local papers were rather scathing about the length of time it took the cops to catch Francois, so Rosen's complaint is perhaps warranted. However, it would have carried more weight if he'd given equal time to the reporters' side of the story. He also rails against the FBI and dismisses their profiling techniques as useless...again, sounding suspiciously like a disgruntled local cop.

But those are minor irritants. His inability to interview Francois or his family creates more serious weaknesses. The thin story must be puffed up with what amounts to a Poughkeepsie travelogue. We hear about the history of the area, get instructions on how to drive to the victims' houses, and are given detailed descriptions of local landmarks. It's mildly interesting for area residents, but dead boring for anyone else. (The information is mostly accurate, but there are a few howlers, such as his claiming the area is called the Lower Hudson Valley, when in fact it's the Mid-Hudson.)

Worst of all, the dearth of information means the most compelling questions of this case - why Francois did what he did, the way he did it - go unanswered. This is a fatal flaw. Motive is everything in a true crime book, and here, it's sadly lacking. Rosen can offer little insight on what made Francois tick.

Though the cover advertises "16 pages of disturbing photos," the photos are not all that disturbing. There are grainy pictures of the victims (mostly from the "missing" posters that were circulated before the killer was caught). There are photos of Francois' high school, and the school where he worked. There are a lot of pictures of the house, and some of the police officers involved in cracking the case. Far more disturbing images appeared in the local paper, The Poughkeepsie Journal, which ran photos of the bodies being carried out of the house on stretchers.

How could a comfortable, white-collar professional couple, living in a nice neighborhood, let their house get that filthy? Could they really have not noticed eight bodies, rotting away in their own home? Why did Francois keep the bodies in his house, despite the smell, and the danger of his family discovering them? These are the questions about this case that demand answers...but none are offered here. "Body Dump" is shallow, padded, and disappointing. [...].

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Fiction is stranger than truth, August 5, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Body Dump (Paperback)

If you are looking to read a hastily and poorly written piece of fiction, this is the book for you. "Body Dump" is fraught with error, from basic factual information regarding the case, to the functioning of the different agencies involved in the case, to the actual law of New York State regarding capital punishment. Particularly dangerous is Mr. Rosen's utter speculation regarding the motivations and thoughts of the subject of the book, Mr. Francois, whom he never interviewed. This is irresponsible and purient journalism at it's best.