Customer Reviews

Body Dump (Pinnacle True Crime)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

"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.

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. [...].

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.

This chronicle of the Kendall Francois murders was a good read but had to many detailed descriptions of state and local police procedures and agencies for my liking. While it keeps you engrossed in the weird, outlandish life of the killer (and his family) the details of the actual murders of the prostitues involved was to descriptive at times for readers of true crime who dislike alot of gore in their books. Of course storing bodies althrough your house, and having to describe it as the author did, would tend to get a little gory. A good read overall.

Mr. Rosen seems to be a competent writer, but there are daunting problems, I would think, for anyone attempting to write a book dealing with serial murder, especially if your focus is on the murderer himself. Most serial killers aren't loquacious in the manner of a Ted Bundy or a John Gacy; the majority seem less than willing to unburden their sordid psyches to courtroom psychiatrists, much less a writer looking to pen a best-seller. Rosen is up-front about this- Francois never responded to his inquiries. Thus, Rosen's focus is of necessity on the police investigation, the lives of the sad victims, and the trial and sentencing that wrapped things up. The life histories of the prostitutes Francois murdered, and the affect their horrible ends had on their families, does make for compelling reading. Unfortunately, the rest of it is less compelling. I'm not a particular fan of courtroom drama, or the intricacies of modern policing. We never get an inkling of what made Francois tick. Rosen talks to none of the people who really knew Francois, or his family members, or any psychiatrists with a theory as to what creates a monster like the Poughkeepsie Killer. Rosen sums everything up with the prosaic observation that Francois is "Evil, pure evil." While there may well be an element of truth in this, it makes for dull, superficial reading.

I read a lot of "True Crime" books. Maybe because it is encouraging when the forces of law & order "get their man" (or woman) and partly to ponder how a human psyche could go so wrong "Body Dump" is even more macabre than most books of its genre. It is about one sick man who murdered Poughkeepsie prostitutes and dumped the bodies in his attic and basement. Kind of a John Wayne Gacy thing. Kendall Francois "racked up a kill total greater than Jack the Ripper's." And he lived in this house with his parents and sister. His mother, a psychiatric nurse, never noticed anything amiss with her house - the stench of decomposing bodies? - or with her bouncing baby (6' 4", 300 lb) boy?

The book includes pictures of men in Tyvek Coveralls - looking like lunar landing crews - investigators in "sterile suits that keep biohazards from getting on them and to keep them from contaminating the crime scene" deconstructing the house and its eerie environs.

Author Fred Rosen takes time to explain the evolution and pitfalls of "profiling" -think Clarice Starling, Hannibal Lecter, and Samantha Waters- which was seriously useless in this case. Francois transgressed one of their basic tenets: serial killers kill their own race.

Rosen repeatedly refers to this serial killer as a "Black Pillsbury Doughboy." I wish he hadn't done that. Now, every time I see that cute little giggling guy on the TV commercials, I'll be reminded of murder? What's next? A nymphomaniacal Betty Crocker? I doubt that Pillsbury or General Mills would be amused.

"Body Dump" is the story of serial killer Kendall Francois, who murdered 8 prostitutes in Poughkeepsie, New York in the late 1990s, and hid their bodies in his house, right under the noses -- literally -- of his family, with whom he lived. The book, while well-written and researched, is ultimately unsatisfying, no doubt to the author himself as well. Since neither Francois nor his parents ever went public, we never learn why he felt compelled to brutally murder these poor women, or how his parents and siblings managed to reside in a filthy, putrid-smelling house without checking for themselves Kendall's poor excuse of dead raccoons in the attic. (Did his family guess the truth but live in denial, or were they just major slobs?)

Apparently there were some psychological issues in Kendall's background, but as he pled guilty and the case never went to trial, his psychological records were never made public. Letters Rosen wrote to him in prison went unanswered.

So, both Rosen and the reader are left without insight into what turned one man into a monster.

I didn't like this book at all. It was incredibly boring and didn't give much detail about the killer. I wanted to know about his family, his childhood and HIM.
This book was more about the prostitutes and their drug habits than it was about the actual crime itself. I don't reccomend at all.

I thought the book was okay. I live in the town where this all took place, and the details that were incorrect -- completely verifiable details like the name of our newspaper -- leaves me a bit credulous as to the rest of it. Overall, it is generally a good book in terms of covering what happened, but when the little details that can be tracked down are wrong (store names as another example), it makes me wonder how much else is conjecture and not verified.

I bought this book four years ago upon recommendation of a co-worker. Note to readers: Understand the reading habits of those who recommend books to you.
In any event, I have tried to read this book for four years, and have gotten as far as page 117. The writing is so poor as to be distracting. It is as if "Run, Spot, Run" was reworked as true crime. I have gotten through other poorly written books in the past, so I soldiered on. The breaking point for me was all of the factual inaccuracies in the book. It makes me wonder if Mr. Rosen did not expect any locals to read it? His research is poor and dare I say pathetic. I will not finish the book - more information was available in the local papers. I agree with the other comments about the quality of the photos. There is nothing disturbing about this book other than the fact that Mr. Rosen made money off the tragedies of the victims.