A case that baffled police for years in Poland | Forensic Files

[Music] it was 9:30 a.m. November 13th the year 2000 a male caller phoned an advertising company in the city of rots
valve Poland wrought Slav is the 4th largest city in Poland and has a population of about six hundred and
thirty five thousand people at different times throughout history rut Slav has been part of Bohemia hungry the Austrian
Empire Prussia and Germany it became part of Poland in 1945 as a result of border changes after the Second World
War the male caller wanted to speak to the owner of the advertising company Dariush Janoski
he needed three advertising signs made up and he needed it done urgently but it was the mother of Dario shoe answered
the call when she asked further questions about the job the caller refused to speak to her he demanded to
speak to Dariush Dariush wasn't in the office and so his mother gave the caller his cell phone number she didn't
recognize the caller's voice and he didn't leave a name although she thought he sounded
professional Darius returned to the office later that day he mentioned that he had been contacted by the male caller
about the urgent job and he arranged to meet with him later that afternoon at 4:00 p.m.
Darius left the office to meet with the Corp he left his car in the parking lot which his family said was unusual as he
usually took his car when meeting with customers away from the office Dariush never returned to his car and he
never made it home to his wife he never contacted anyone to let them know where he was which was completely out of
character his wife reported him missing [Music] it was four weeks later on a cold
overcast morning in December fishermen were casting out into the river Aundre the spot they were fishing at is a
remote hard spot to get to it is 60 miles out of the city of rots love so you can only get there by car but then
you have to park and walk several hundred meters through a forest to get to the river it wasn't a popular spot
it wasn't frequented by anyone other than fishermen and even that wasn't very often the fishermen spotted what at
first they thought was a log but as it drifted closer they saw a head of hair a closer inspection revealed they had
discovered the body of a male the male had serious injuries there were signs he had been beaten and tortured his head
was in a noose and his arms and feet were tied with rope that connected to the noose so he was in a backward cradle
position it was designed so that the noose would get tighter the more he moved his arms and his legs
the fisherman immediately contacted police who arrived and established a crime scene police divers searched the
river for any further evidence but they found nothing other police searched the surrounding banks and forest area but
they also turned up nothing the body had been in the water for quite some time so
zero forensic evidence was located police searched through missing person reports and found a match - 35 year-old
Darius UNICEF's key in the postmortem the forensic pathologist discovered the nhf ski stomach was completely empty
this indicated had been starved for at least three days prior to his death and first the pathologist believed the cause
of death was strangulation however based on the amount of water found in the lungs he changed his position and
believed en a chef's key may have been still alive when he was thrown in the river
there was no doubt you know Chesky had been murdered investigators believe given the way he was killed and may have
been gang-related they also believe more than one person may have been responsible ENF cesky was over 6 feet
tall and weighed over 200 pounds but criminal psychologist David Holmes believed that given the circumstances it
indicated to him there was a great deal of anger involved this was extremely personal and whoever was responsible had
made it their mission to punish y'know chefs key if police could establish a motive that would give them a clearer
picture if it was gang-related or maybe more personal they interviewed ENS chef skis wife family friends and business
associates they learned he was a successful young businessman he was popular friendly a gentle guy liked by everyone
his hobby was playing his guitar and writing music for a rock band he played in with a few friends his business
records were examined and no signs of any trouble at all there were no problems in his marriage and he and his
wife were planning to adopt a child in the near future he had no criminal record and was not linked to any
criminal associates no debts no enemies police came up with the zero potential motives for murder the investigations
thought very early on no forensic evidence no witnesses no motive nothing the Polish media started referring to
the murder as the perfect crime police turned to a popular Polish TV show nine nine seven nine nine seven being the
emergency telephone number in Poland the show is the Polish version of America's
Most Wanted that had already helped solve several other cases police have been stuck on in the past and it would
help give pront on exposure to unicef skis case the broadcast though ended up being considered a disappointment there
were plenty of hits on the website in the months and years after the episode aired
police were surprised to learn that the website hits had come from a virus Japan
South Korea and the United States which was unusual for the Polish television show but they got no useful information
at all they were no closer to solving the case the police had no idea who had killed Janoski
the only other useful piece of information that they had was the call that was made two younger chefs Kees
office at 9:30 a.m. the day of his disappearance that was traced to a pay phone down the street from the office
the pay phone was also used to call Eunice Chesky cell phone less than one minute after the call to his office but
police weren't even sure the calls were related to his disappearance the police investigation was completely abandoned
in June 2001 it was sent to the cold-case shelf Yana chefs Kees family and his friends remained haunted by his
death but the media attention had died off the case disappeared from the minds of the public around 18 months later in
2003 Rostov police conducted a routine review of all unsolved murder cases the fall of Darius Janiszewski
made its way to the desk of Detective yachak Rudovsky Rublev ski was 38 years old and had been
a police officer for nine years he had strong Catholic values and two liked the idea of being a cop and being able to
represent the good fighting evil when he wasn't working as a detective he studied
psychology at university to try and better understand the criminal mind Rublev ski was vaguely familiar with the
nhf skis murder he remembered hearing about it at the time but he didn't know any of the details he studied the fall
for several hours when he first got it trying to find any sign of a clue that had been missed by the original
investigators he found nothing and was initially as stumped as they were he wasn't sure about the organized crime
angle didn't seem to make sense to him given UNICEF's keys background unless it was a case of mistaken identity what was
perfectly clear to him though was the offender or offenders had a severe hatred and wanted him to suffer the case
stay with wróblewski he studied the file again the next day and the day after trying to find something anything his
persistence paid off Yin a chef's key had his cell phone with him when he left his office and it had
never been found wróblewski focused on trying to track down the inner chef's keys phone that
was his starting point he wasn't jumping for joy at the lead he was fully aware the chances of finding it were very slim
it could easily have been missed by the police divers and still be at the bottom
of the river or just about anywhere else for that matter he enlisted the help of
a newly hired telecommunications specialist the specialists explained that if the phone wasn't lost or
destroyed and it was still being used they could easily track it but they would need the IMEI number they were in
luck after all this time Janusz Jessica's wife still had the receipt from when the phone was purchased and on
that receipt was the IMEI number rube Leske couldn't believe his luck when they discovered the phone was still
actively being used rube Leske tracked down the current owner of the phone this owner had only recently purchased it
they were quickly eliminated from the investigation but Wroblewski track down the person they had brought it from and
on and on at when the phone had been bought and sold several times since she and chef ski disappeared by working
backwards through the phone owners Wroblewski eventually found the men who had possession of it only days after
UNICEF's key disappeared this man had purchased the phone from an Internet auction site Allegro just three
days after yanovskiy went missing Rublev ski was able to find the listing the seller's user name on the option side
was Chris b7 wróblewski traced the registration details of Chris b7 and found out that user name belonged or men
by the name of Christian Bala Krystian Bala was the eldest of two children born into a middle-class family his father
was a construction worker and a taxi driver he was a bright in intellectual child and a good student although
through junior school and high school he often had conflict with other students he was very egocentric and considered
himself to be superior to other students he was the first member of his family to
go to university where he studied philosophy his big ego and supreme confidence remained but at university he
was immensely popular both with fellow students and with lecturers some considered him to be a student Casanova
as he attracted a lot of female attention one professor described him as having a very inquisitive and rebellious
mind through University he started to turn into a bit of a fabricator of stories about himself he liked to play
games with people he made up so many stories that had got to the point where even his friends didn't know what
stories were and weren't true about him Barlow is one of the brightest philosophy students at the University of
rot Slav he graduated in 1997 with the highest possible grades and then enlisted in the ph.d program he always
dreamed of an academic career however things changed he had married his sweetheart stache' and she had given
birth to a son he now had a family to support so he dropped out of the ph.d program and bought a cleaning business
he was incredibly smart but he wasn't a good businessman he blew all of the money that came in and by 1990
9 he had filed for bankruptcy he's marriage crumbled as well stache' said the main problem with their marriage is
the barley' couldn't stop cheating on her there were always other women they divorced in 1999 and two years later
Bala was living abroad he had lived in Asia in the United States making a living by writing for travel magazines
teaching scuba diving and teaching English in 2003 Bala published his first novel titled a mock nothing stood out in
the initial background check of Bala hardly any criminal record - Samara - stuff Ruby Lipsky was keeping a very
open mind he thought it was quite possible Bala had a totally innocent explanation for selling UNICEF skis
phone maybe you'd found it maybe it had been given to him by somebody else well maybe it even bought it at a secondhand
store as Wroblewski couldn't go overseas to speak to Bala and there was nothing really jumping out at him on his
background check he decided to focus in on the novel he had written a mock a mock is a sadistic novel it contains
graphic sex and violent scenes the story revolves around the main character Chris
he is a board Polish intellectual who is into philosophy his wife catches him having sex with her best friend and so
she leaves him Chris then starts abusing alcohol and goes on a sexual rampage sleeping with many other women
throughout the book Chris mocks traditional philosophers and criticizes the Catholic Church in one scene Chris
and a buddy steal the statute of scene if any from a church in chapter 9 of the book Chris murders his girlfriend to
marry by tying a noose around her neck and stabbing her he conceals the murder so well he is never caught the main
character Chris also hints in the book that he had previously killed a man who had done him wrong the book was
published in 2003 and it didn't do too well few Polish bookstores carried it because of its graphic nature and those
that did carry it placed it on the high shelves out of the way so children couldn't pick it up despite only selling
a few thousand copies Bala said this I'm truly convinced that one day my book will be appreciated history teaches that
some works of art have to wait ages before they are recognized Rudovsky considered a few things Chris the name
of the main character is the English version of barlas first name Christian it is also the name he used on the
auction site to sell you know chefs Keys phone the book describes getting away with murder the victim in the book is a
woman however there are similarities with the noose around her neck but what made the hairs on the back of Rublev
skis neck stand up was the part of the book where Chris sells the knife he used in the murder on an Internet auction saw
the detail of young Chefs Keys phone being sold on an Internet auction site after his murder was never made known to
the public rube less he could see parallels between the book and the real-life murder investigation of yellow
chefs key his Philip was that there were too many parallels to be just the coincidence
wróblewski looked into the character of Chris more closely and found the following similarities dibala
both Kristen bala were consumed by philosophy both had been left by their wives both had a company go bankrupt
both travelled around the world both abused alcohol and the scene where Chris stole a statue of st. Anthony matched
one of the entries on Bhalla criminal record he had been arrested for stealing a statue of Saint Anthony from a church
[Music] wróblewski knew that these similarities were evidence of nothing it's quite
common for authors to draw from their own life experiences when writing books and creating characters wróblewski
wondered though if barla had gotten the inspiration for Chris's murder scene from a real-life event
Bhalla became his prime suspect for the murder of Darius Janiszewski although he
was quite aware he didn't really have any evidence other than the fact that Bala had sony ownerships keys phone
three days after his disappearance that was nowhere near enough to extradite Bala back to Poland ruble s he couldn't
even find a connection between Bala and Yana chef's key there was no evidence that they have known each other
Wroblewski didn't question Bhalla family or close friends he couldn't risk them tipping off Bala because the fear was he
would never return to Poland if he thought the police were after him Bala had made sporadic visits back home
to briefly visit family and friends so ruble s key would be patient and hope that Barla would return again ruble s he
continued studying barlas book he handed out chapters of the book to different officers and got them to analyze it
trying to find any other clues or hidden messages that could be connected to Yana
chef sees case Rublev she became obsessed with the last line of the book which reads this was the one killed by
blind jealousy wróblewski belaid bala maybe even them the motive tiene chef's Keys murder with this line jealousy he
also became fixated on the part of the book where Chris hints at murdering a man who had done him wrong in the past
was Bala telling them something Wroblewski was undertaking a very unorthodox investigation method and not
everybody supported it he was warned to proceed very very carefully a work of fiction didn't mean murder
but Wroblewski was convinced the MOC was a road map which led to the murder of Darius Janiszewski as your beliefs key
looked harder at Bala he found something else on the Internet site Allegro one month before UNICEF ski
disappeared Bala had clicked on a book titled accidental suicide or criminal hanging there was a police manual and in
it were descriptions of different ways to tie a noose again it was evidence of nothing but it was another little piece
of information that when added to everything else wróblewski knew didn't look good for
Bala Bala eventually returned to Poland in 2005 wróblewski had been working in a
chef's Keys case for two years Bhalla passport flagged when he entered the country he was arrested on the 5th
of September after leaving a drug store Varla gave away nothing at first he denied having anything to do with the
murder he was dismissive of police questions and said he didn't even know Jana chefs key had never met him had
never even heard of him had no idea who he was when Bala was asked about selling his
cellphone he said he couldn't remember where he got it from it was five years ago they then questioned by Allah about
a mock by Allah agreed he had used different parts of his life in the novel such as the stealing of the statue but
Bala said show me an author who doesn't do that then they asked the question they do have help killing inner chefs ki
Bala almost looked offended and chillingly replied he did not have any help he killed him on his own but almost
as soon as he said that he started urgently looking around the room and started making weird facial expressions
he asked for something to drink because he was feeling terrible then requested a
doctor the interview had to be suspended and an ambulance was called they examined him but couldn't find anything
wrong with him they said he was fine to continue the interview was restarted Bala retracted his confession then
refused to say anything further he wouldn't sign the interview documents so the police were unable to use what he
had said because it wasn't signed he was given a polygraph test the results were
declared inconclusive in Poland police can hold a suspect for 48 hours then they have to either late charges or
release the case against Bala was still circumstantial at best there was no solid evidence against him at all no
motive no confession and police still hadn't been able to link Bala to UNICEF ski they decided to charge him with
selling stolen property being younger chefs his phone and for paying a bribe this is something that had nothing to do
with the murder investigation it was something police uncovered in their extensive background investigation
of Bala the charges meant Bala would have to relinquish his passport and remain in
Poland Rublev ski had worked hard on the case for two years but he just couldn't
connect the dots he felt the investigations slipping away from him as he was sitting back flicking through
barlas passport he noticed stents for South korea-japan in the United States it clicked almost immediately the hits
on the page dedicated to UNICEF's agent murder on the 9:97 website at the time they were baffled as the wire local
polish case was attracting attention from those countries Wroblewski compared the date of the website hit to the dates
Bala was in those countries and they were a perfect match it strengthened his belief he was on the
right track but again it still wasn't evidence of murder meanwhile Bala was a free man
while he was waiting for the two charges to be heard he was accusing police of harassing him trying to persecute him
for his art he also made a complaint he was kidnapped and tortured by police when he was first arrested
he got some support from friends and members of the public who are outraged police who are unfairly targeting in men
because of a novel hero one of barlas previous girlfriends set up a defense fund for him and an Internet campaign
was launched about the police persecution of Bala the campaign said Bala was being persecuted for writing a
book that went against the Catholic Church and Polish tradition Barla became a victim they contacted human rights
organizations and letters poured in from around the world defending Bala and his
right to freedom of expression in accordance with article 19 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights people were
demanding that Rudovsky and other officers involved in a case be held accountable and brought for justice a
psychiatric evaluation was ordered on Bala he was found to have narcissistic traits
he considered himself to be a superior human being smarter stronger and much more intelligent than anyone else Rublev
she was still trying desperately to find the evidence he needed to charge Barlow
with murder Jiri examined the phone calls that were made from the pay phone to you know
chefs DS office and cell phone this time with the help of the telecommunication specialists they discovered the calls
have been made with a phone card that had a unique identifying number although they weren't able to trace who had
bought the card they could find out what other calls were made with it they discovered the card had been used to
make 32 calls over a three-month period along with the calls to NSS keys office and cell phone calls were also made to
barlas parents his girlfriend at the time other friends of Marla and his business associates boobless key didn't
really doubt it before but now he was certain he had the right man but it still wasn't enough to charge Bala with
murder Sohrab Leske looked further into his breakup with his ex-wife Sasha wróblewski had tried to interview star
numerous times before but she flat-out refused so this time we Lipsky tracked down one of her friends
who was able to fill him in with what he needed to know Bala was extremely possessive and controlling of stache' he
was also physically violent towards her he would constantly check her phone to me and to know who she was talking to
and then he would beat her up accusing her of cheating on him even though he cheated on her countless times Bala
could do whatever he liked but he expected stache' to do as he told her after their divorce Bala remained
extremely possessive of stache' he would stalk her and did his best to continue to control her every move in the summer
of 99 after the divorce stache' went out with her friend that was now speaking to Wroblewski they went
to the Crazy Horse nightclub in Rostov Stash's started chatting to Darius Janiszewski in the club stashes friend
new Jana shitski from around town so she was certain it was him she was speaking
to ruble s key was sure he had just connected the dots between Bala and younger chefs key but he needed to hear
it from stache' armed with this information he was finally able to get stash at the talk to him what finally
convinced her was when Wroblewski showed those sections of a mock stache' was so
disturbed by similarities in the book to what she had experienced in real life that she agreed to talk stasher
confirmed that she had met yen s chef ski at Crazy Horse nightclub they spent the night just talking after which
Janice Chesky gave her his phone number they later went on a date and checked into a motel
however stasher says when she found out unit shifty was married she left before anything happened a few weeks after this
incident Bala showed up at her apartment in a drunken state he kicked down her door and beat her screaming he knew
everything about her Indiana chefs key he even screamed out what hotel and what room number they went to
as he was beating stache' he was screaming he had hired a private detective and he knew everything
when Stasha later heard ENS Chesky had gone missing she asked Bala if he had anything to do
with it he said he hadn't started didn't pursue it any further or go to the police with this information as she
didn't believe Bala was capable of murder upon hearing this wróblewski immediately
thought back to the last line in a mock this was the one killed by blinder jealousy that line made a whole lot more
sense now Bala was charged with the murder of Dariush younger chefs key the first day of the trial was the 22nd of
February 2007 in Poland the jury is made up by the presiding judge one other judge and three citizens
barla complained his novel was being misinterpreted and that the police had taken random parts of his life and
presented them in a fictional story that suited their theory of the murder he again claimed he had never met Yana
chefs key and didn't know who he was police had the information from stache' but there was no corroborating evidence
it was staches word against bartlett's Bala was claiming stache' was just being a vindictive ex-wife making up stories
trying to get him in trouble maybe he could have convinced the jury of that maybe not but police now had
more evidence against him after charging Bala with murder they searched his parents home Bala had
left some belongings there before heading overseas in amongst those belongings they found a notebook with
details of Yana shift key and his company written down they also found a pen and a business card with Vienna chef
his name and company details on them Bala had always maintained that he never knew UNICEF's key had never met him
never heard his name didn't know a thing about him it was going to be hard to stick to that story Neela
prior to the trial commencing the judge had made a ruling macht could not be used as evidence at
the trial the judge didn't consider the description of a fictional murder as evidence but police had a lot more
information now a witness came forward and testified that Bala had questioned her extensively about youngish FCE prior
to his disappearance Bala wanted to know everything about him where he worked who
his friends and family were how we could be contacted a friend of barlas also came forward and testified that during a
New Year's Eve party in 2000 Bala was at the same club as stache' Bala thought a
male bartender was making advances towards Tasha and he started screaming at him that he would take care of him
and he had already dealt with such a guy it took five people to restrain Bala that night after all the evidence was
presented the jury retired to reach their verdict guilty Bala was sentenced to 25 years prison he immediately
appealed his conviction the appeal sided logical and factual inconsistencies in the trial one being the cause of death
medical examiners could not agree on what the cause of death was one testified Genachowski had been strangled
another testified he had drowned Bala also used a comment made by the judge in the trial as if grounds for his appeal
during the trial the judge commented she wasn't sure if Bala had acted alone or with an accomplice to the surprise of
many the appeals court annulled his conviction they ordered a neutral but they ruled that Bala would have to
remain in prison until the outcome of the new trial was reached the appeals court stated that there was an undoubted
connection between Bala and the murder but there were gaps in a logical chain of evidence
Bhalla rachel was heard in december 2008 he was convicted of murder for a second
time the sentence of 25 years was upheld Bala maintains his innocence and says he's being set up according to him all
of the evidence against him was planted and somebody is after the stream wróblewski claims that the crime scene
in the book M was the key for his investigation which is absurd he must be I don't know and indeed
complete injured illiterate ages about this kind of language came which has no relationship with anything in real life
some suspect amok was a confession written to clear barlas guilty conscience others don't see it that way
they believe Bhalla desire was to achieve literary immortality by writing what he believed was the perfect story
he's been quoted as saying there has never been a book quite like this they believe Bala was too smart for his own
good he thought he was so intellectually superior to everyone else that he never
considered being caught was a possibility that's why he freely wrote about the murder and left behind so much
evidence Bala had started writing a second novel at the time of his arrest police seized his computer with the
beginning stages of this second novel line they also found that Bala was collecting information on stashes new
boyfriend he had even posted on an internet forum asking if anyone knew him they believe stashes new boyfriend who
is going to be barlas second to murder victim who would then write about in his second novel Bala has vowed to finish
his second novel which he promises will even be more shocking [Music] you

Case 36: Amok

The Polish press called it “The perfect murder.”

“One of the most unconventional police investigations ever conducted.”

It was 9:30 am, November 13th, the year 2000. A male caller phoned an advertising company in the city of Wroclaw, Poland.

CREDITS

Narration – Anonymous Host Research and writing – Anonymous Host Production, scoring – Mike Migas Additional scoring – Andrew Joslyn

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Brief Summary

Darius Janiszewski's murder leads to author Krystian Bala's conviction, revealing disturbing parallels between fiction and reality.

Key points

Dariush's Disappearance. Dariush Janoski goes missing after an urgent phone call. His wife reports him missing.
Grim Discovery. Fishermen discover a body in the river, leading to a murder investigation.
The Perfect Crime. The media labels the murder as the perfect crime due to lack of evidence.
Bala's Novel Raises Eyebrows. Detective Wroblewski finds eerie parallels between Bala's novel and the murder case.
Bala's Defense Campaign. Bala's supporters claim he is being persecuted for his controversial novel.
Psychiatric Evaluation. Bala is found to have narcissistic traits, viewing himself as superior to others.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

The fishermen spotted what they thought was a log...

A shocking discovery in the river.

2:51WatchNov 19, 2018

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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