Péter Kovács (serial killer)

Péter Kovács (January 11, 1934 – December 1, 1968), known as the "Martfű Monster", was a Hungarian rapist and serial killer who attacked vulnerable women on the streets at night around the southern settlements of Szolnok. The case surrounding his murder series is considered to be one of the biggest professional mistakes of Hungarian law enforcement at the time, as an innocent man was initially condemned for them.

Péter Kovács
Born(1934-01-11)January 11, 1934
Szolnok, Regency of Hungary
DiedDecember 1, 1968(1968-12-01) (aged 34)
Szeged, Hungarian People's Republic
Cause of deathExecuted by hanging
Other names"The Martfű Monster"
Conviction(s)Murder
Criminal penaltyDeath
Details
Victims4–5+
Span of crimes
1957–1967
CountryHungary
State(s)Szolnok
Date apprehended
August 11, 1967

The first murder

Kovács worked as a truck driver in the area around Martfű, often travelling around the various settlements and had a good knowledge of the terrain in the outskirts of the inhabited area that he used in his first murder. Unlike most serial killers, Kovács was considered an average man with a normal background, who had built his own family and house and was well regarded to by his employer. On July 22, 1957, Kovács went to see an Argentine movie in the local cinema. In one scene from the film, a man behaved violently towards a woman. This scene excited Kovács so much that he decided that he wanted to be that violent towards a woman too. He exited the movie theater and headed to the Tisza Cipő shoe factory, at the gate of which the workers were just finishing their afternoon shift. There he caught a glimpse of a lone girl who was walking home towards Tiszaföldvár on a dirt road. Although he did not know the woman, he bicycled after her in an unlit street. While in the dark, Kovács struck a heavy blow to the victim's skull with a piece of iron. The victim, now unable to defend herself, was raped, choked to death just like in the movie, and finally disposed of in a drainage ditch. (The death was not caused by blow to the head or strangulation, but by suffocation). Kovács, after hiding the victim's body, then returned home.

The corpse was found the next day by workers. The police quickly explored the victim's personal relationships and became aware of one such relationship at work - she had a friendly, but emotionally insufficient, relationship with her colleague, János Kirják. The police brought him for questioning, but Kirják gave contradicting statements. His alibi, provided by his mother, could not be proven. Investigators believed that he had waited for the victim to go home and asked her to let him go with her, but the woman's rejection made Kirják so angry that he killed her. The investigators continued to pressure him into confessing, while the Martfű population become more and more outraged. In the end, Kirják finally broke down and signed a confession. Meanwhile, Péter Kovács appeared in a massive crowd on an on-site reconstruction of the murder. Based on evidence presented by the prosecution and his own written confession, János Kirják was sentenced to death by the Szolnok County Court. The Supreme Court of Hungary reconsidered the verdict after renegotiations, and so the innocent man was instead sentenced to life imprisonment in Szeged's Star Prison.

1960s attacks

The first murder was not followed up by Kovács for a long period of time. In the meantime, he married and built a house for his family, but the founding of a family was only a temporary deterrent. On the night of November 13, 1963, he attacked a woman in the village of Homok; he struck the woman with a hammer and tore her clothes off, but he was unable to finish the murder for unknown reasons. The unconscious victim was found soon after, and her life was saved through rapid medical intervention. Half a year later, on March 21, 1964, another unfinished murder occurred in the neighborhood when Kovács attacked a lone passer-by, but the victim was barely missed by the neck from the back of the hammer and managed to escape.

On May 4, 1964, a woman's corpse was found in the vicinity of Nagyrév. The body was in a bad state, and it was estimated that it had been in the water for about a month. No sign of a crime was found, and the cause of death was listed as drowning. In April 1965, the body of a teenage girl was found in the Tisza River. No signs of a crime could be found on the badly-wounded corpse, and so the conclusion was that the girl had committed suicide. But then the police came to realise that there could be a serial killer roaming the area, as there were several similar motifs found in both cases. Between April and May 1965, authorities conducted a thorough examination involving 40 men in the area, including Péter Kovács. However, since he was a man with a well-established family and work background, he was excluded from the list of potential perpetrators, and so the investigation ended up without any results.

Arrest, trial and execution

On June 20, 1967, another female corpse was found, this time near the Körös river near Öcsöd. The woman had been abused roughly before her death, with her skull bruised and her body mutilated. Blood and tissue residues were also found on the boundary of the nearby Körös Bridge, assuming that the body was thrown off from the bridge into the river. Investigators re-examined the possibility of a connection between young female corpses found in nearby rivers and the murder of a local woman. Due to the victim's skull injury, the identity of the perpetrator who murdered the woman and the perpetrator who disposed of corpses near river bridges was matched. Soon enough, the authorities found a valuable trace: a small piece of glass found under the victim's nail.

Péter Kovács, who was found to be missing for a day before the body was found, used the work truck for his own needs, along with his blacksmith brother-in-law, so he had the opportunity to commit the murders. By that time, however, Kovács's wife confirmed her husband's alibi, but the investigators did not believe the woman and continued their reconnaissance work. While examining the corporate truck driven by Kovács, they found glass shards on the driver's seat. It turned out that on June 19, Kovács accidentally caught his motorcycle to the closing chain of the shoe factory, breaking the truck's windshield. The same fragments were found on his clothing as well. Investigators' efforts to find witnesses were also successful as well, and more eyewitnesses were found who saw Kovács, his brother-in-law and the victim in a pub. The killer was finally arrested on August 11, 1967, after his brother-in-law had been summoned: the man confessed that they had fun with the victim, leaving the woman to Kovács, who would drive her home. He initially denied involvement, but two days later admitted to murdering the woman. By the end of August, Kovács admitted to several women around Tisza. By February 1968, the prosecutor knew that he had murdered the girl near the Tisza Cipő shoe factory, and not the convicted Kirják.[1] Kovács was also questioned about another murder, but he could be summoned for it.[2]

The innocent János Kirják was released after 11 years behind bars, while Péter Kovács, who admitted to four murders and two unsuccessful attacks, was sentenced to death by the Szolnok County Court, with the verdict upheld by the Supreme Court. His subsequent request for clemency was rejected by the Presidential Council, and he was hanged on December 1, 1968. It can be assumed that Péter Kovács could be responsible for more murders that the ones known, but no more bodies could be located.

In the media

In 2015, Árpád Sopsits began filming a movie about Kovács titled The Martfű Monster. On November 10, 2016, the film debuted, with Kovács (renamed to Pál Bognár) being played by Hadjuk Károly.[3] The film, of course, does not follow reality completely, as the Dr. Bálint Barna did not dive into the Körös part of the case and the death after the investigation.[4]

References
  1. Multiple Assassin ; South-Hungary , 15 October 1967; p11
  2. "Sixth-type killer" (in Hungarian). Népszabadság. 17 May 2009. Retrieved 28 August 2015.
  3. In Warsaw, the Martfű Monster was introduced
  4. "Martfűi rém: a filmbeli és a valódi ügyész is találkozott - SZOLJON".
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