Man-eater : the saga of Alfred G. Packer, American cannibal

Schechter, Harold2015

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Summary

In February 1874 Alfred Packer staggered out of the Colorado mountains and into the Los Pinos Indian agency. Snowbound and lost, he claimed to have been abandoned by his five companions. But behind the wilderness grime he looked rather well fed. When questioned, he confessed that four of the group had survived by eating two who had died of exhaustion; later he killed another in self-defence, eating him also. Packer was arrested on suspicion of murder but escaped. That same month, the bodies of five men were discovered near Los Pinos. Packer's guilt was assumed, but the law did not catch up with him until 1883. Initially sentenced to death, he received a 40-year jail term and was paroled in 1901. Was Packer the flesh-eating monster of myth, or a wretch who acted out of self-preservation? This book tells Packer's story and reveals how recent forensic developments may shed light on his long-assumed cannibalism.