The Trail Went Cold - Episode 431 - The Bolney Torso

The Trail Went Cold

Robin Warder

True Crime, Tv & Film

4.5 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 14 May 2025

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

October 11, 1991. Bolney, England. The dismembered torso of a male homicide victim which has been rolled up in some carpet is discovered in a wooded area next to a bridle path. His head and both of his hands have been removed and since the victim cannot be identified, he is buried under the name “Unknown Male”. Investigators explore a number of different leads, including a wanted German fraudster who was living in the area at the time the torso was discovered, as well as the possibility that the victim’s death was a gangland killing, but the crime is never solved. On this week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we travel back to the United Kingdom to explore the bizarre story of an unidentified decedent known only as “The Bolney Torso”. Additional Reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bolney_Torso https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/4735827.Sussex_Police_still_trying_to_solve_riddle_of_headless_body/ https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-sussex-15256742 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/sussex/8403522.stm https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/9298428.New_clues_in_Bolney_Torso_mystery/ https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/6712688._Bolney_torso__riddle_still_baffles_police/ https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/8151356.Three_men_ruled_out_of_Bolney_torso_case/ https://www.sussexexpress.co.uk/news/crime/why-the-bolney-torso-killing-is-still-unsolved-27-years-later-122359 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-sussex-58862567 https://news.sky.com/story/west-sussex-unidentified-headless-torso-murder-remains-unsolved-30-years-on-12431156 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14220947/Unsolved-execution-couple-1989-linked-headless-man-mystery.html https://www.newspapers.com/image/751468511/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/1048097033/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/1048444168/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/1048446233/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/826135299/ "The Trail Went Cold" will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel Boston North Shore in Boston, Massachusetts on July 18-20, 2025. To get a 20 % discount on tickets, please use our specialized promo code, “ROBIN20”, by visiting https://www.truecrimepodcastfestival.com/. “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

Transcript

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0:00.0	October 11th, 1991.
0:03.0	Bolney, England
0:05.0	The torso of a male homicide victim which has been rolled up in some carpet is discovered in a wooded area.
0:11.0	Since his head and both of his hands have been removed, the victim cannot be identified, so he is buried under the name unknown male.
0:18.0	Investigators explore a number of different leads, including a wanted German fraudster who was living in the area, unknown male. Investigators explore a number of different leads,
0:21.7	including a wanted German fraudster who was living in the area at the time,
0:25.5	and the possibility that the crime was a gangland killing,
0:28.6	but the bologn torso is never identified.
0:31.7	After that, the trail went cold.
1:13.7	Music went cold. The Hello everyone and welcome to our latest episode of The Trail Went Cold.
1:18.7	I'm your host Robin Werner, and this week we're traveling back to the United Kingdom to explore a very unusual story about an unidentified decedent, the 2001 murder of an individual
1:25.1	known only as the Bollney Torso.
1:30.1	This case was suggested to me a few years ago by a listener named Alice, and while I've covered many other stories on this podcast involving
1:34.6	John and Jane Doe's, this one stands out from the rest because the victim's head and both of his
1:40.1	hands were removed in a deliberate attempt to prevent identification. The John Doe was
1:45.6	discovered in a wooded area near the village of Bolney, and while his exact cause of death could not be
1:50.2	determined, he was clearly the victim of a homicide, and you got the sense that this was not the
1:55.4	first time his killer had done something like this before. During the early stages of the investigation, one of the most
2:01.8	promising leads involved a German businessman named Gunter Niper, who was wanted for having
2:07.4	orchestrated an elaborate fraud operation in Ireland. Nieper and his girlfriend had rented out a house
2:13.2	in Boldie during this time period and were planning to use it to continue their operation,
2:18.2	but they abruptly left the area right before the torso was discovered.
	...

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