Some of the most mesmerizing mysterious unsolved crimes revolve around people who seem to have appeared out of nowhere and died under very strange circumstances.
Without a doubt, they once and somewhere lived, breathed, loved, had friends and family, but at some point something changed and they fell into the hands of Death, which left them nameless, useless and not recognized by anyone like disembodied ghosts.
One such incident shocked a small rural community for years near the equally quiet and sleepy town of Tofield in Alberta, Canada.
April 13, 1977 began as a normal warm local spring day for the community, including the MacLeod farmers. After breakfast, the head of the family went outside and accidentally drew attention to an old concrete septic tank (a tank for purifying domestic waste water).
The septic tank had not been cleaned by anyone for many years, and McLeod thought it would be nice to take the pump out of it and use it for his needs, if it was still working.
But when McLeod and his wife began to pull the pump out of the septic tank, they stumbled upon an eerie sight, or rather the remains of a murdered man, which had obviously lain here for more than one month.
Later this crime will be called one of the most frightening and mysterious in the modern history of Canada, and the remains of the unknown will be called "Sam from the septic tank" ("Septic Tank Sam").
At first, the MacLeods saw only the bones of the legs and brown boots with socks sticking out of the dirty brown ooze. They immediately called the police and later they removed the entire body of the victim from the septic tank.
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The corpse was so badly decomposed and soaked in mud that it was seemingly even impossible to establish whether it was a man or a woman. According to investigators, he was in the septic tank for at least 4 months.
Reconstruction of Sam's face and his boots.
Later it was found out that this is the body of a man, and most likely not a white, but an Indian. Judging by his teeth, he was no more than 28 years old and in general he was quite healthy in appearance.
However, before his death, he was tortured extremely cruelly. Firstly, his arms and legs were tightly bound, and his skin was covered with burns from a burner and cigarettes. He was also severely beaten and the places that were not covered with burns were black with bruises. And in the end, his genitals were literally shredded.
But this man died not from pain shock and not from beatings, but from shots to the chest and head. Then the body was sprinkled with quicklime, wrapped in thick yellow paper, tied up again and dragged to a septic tank.
Curiously, the killer obviously knew that quicklime interacts violently with water, but did not know that when there is a lot of water, the reaction goes badly. Thus, in 4 months the body in the septic tank only partially decomposed, but was not completely destroyed, as desired.
What is even more remarkable, the septic tank was located in an open area, not in thickets and it was perfectly visible both from the side of the houses and from the side of the road. So the killer came here on purpose and then dragged the body across the field to hide it in a septic tank. And nobody noticed him.
And he did it as hard as he tortured his victim. Many investigators who studied the remains later said that it was the most vengeful and extremely cruel case of all that they had seen.
The lime did destroy enough of the victim's flesh, including the fingerprints. Therefore, the victim had to be identified in some other way. Investigators managed to remove dental prints, including those made of fillings.
By the nature of the fillings, you can often tell where they were made and even by which doctor. However, in this case, the dental prints were suddenly useless, although they were sent to the 800 nearest dental clinics. No one recognized such fillings and a person with such teeth did not receive treatment from any of them.
The prints were later published in dental journals and newsletters and again wasted. A lot of people who were missing were also checked, hundreds of local and city residents were interviewed. Nobody knew anything about the victim. He was nobody and appeared as if out of nowhere, like a ghost.
The remains of "Septic Tank Sam" were eventually buried in a beggar's grave in Edmonton. However, in 1979 they were exhumed when it was suspected that he might be a hired worker. At the same time, samples of his DNA were taken and measurements of his skeleton and skull were made in order to make a reconstruction of the appearance.
One of the reconstructions of Sam's appearance.
Unfortunately, things are deadlocked again. None of the reconstructions was identified by anyone, and DNA samples also yielded nothing.
At the same time, versions and hypotheses of who "Sam" could be and for what he was so cruelly tortured and killed were created. There were versions that the mafia took revenge on him, but one of the most popular was that "Sam" could be a pedophile and that he was dealt with in such a way by the relatives of his young victim.
It was also rumored that the killer was one of the locals. Only in this way could he, without problems and without risk, draw unnecessary attention to himself, make his way across the field to the septic tank and calmly bury the remains of his victim in it.
But all these were only versions without confirmation. Sam's killer was never found, and he was never identified. No one could give a clear answer to any of the many questions that arose during the investigation.
