The Irish Scissor Sisters

by Mick McCaffrey

  Kathleen finally stopped crying and said: ‘Get him out! Get him out.’

  They had a discussion about how to get rid of Farah’s body. Linda would later tell gardaí that her mother asked, ‘How are we going to get him out?’ and that Charlotte said they should cut him up and dump his body in the nearby canal. Charlotte tells a different story and later said, ‘Me mammy said just cut him up.’

  The sisters went into the kitchen and poured themselves a large vodka and coke. They knocked it back, trying to get the courage to carry out an act so unimaginable that it would make anybody physically sick. They had a couple more drinks and then looked at each other before heading into the bedroom where Farah’s body lay.

  The pools of blood had started to congeal at this stage and the blood on the carpet where Farah’s chest rested had spread to a five-foot radius. Charlotte left a large shoe print with her runner as she climbed to the left-hand side of the body and pulled him out from under the bed. She took his left leg and Linda grabbed a hold of his right foot and they dragged him out into the hall and down to the bathroom, about six feet away. A trail of blood marked the route where Farah’s body was pulled from the murder scene in the bedroom to the bathroom where his limp body would be chopped up.

  The bathroom in Flat 1 was filthy with dirt and grime and the tiles on the floor were thick with months of dust and scum. It was too small for a bath. A toilet sat at the back of the bathroom and a small shower area was to the right of this, about a foot and a half away. The walls were tiled and they hadn’t seen a cleaning brush in years.

  It took all the women’s strength to drag Farah in and to dump him in the shower, which was barely covered by a curtain. The base of the shower was far too small for the whole body to fit and his legs stuck out the side, lying against the floor tiles.

  The girls went into the kitchen and searched the drawers for something sharp to cut the body up with. Kathleen wasn’t one for home cooking so they had to make do with a nine-inch bread knife. The brand of knife was Kitchen Devil and both the hammer and knife had been in the flat when Kathleen moved in, nearly four months before.

  Kathleen didn’t want to see her boyfriend being dismembered so she went and sat in the front room. She hadn’t moved during the murder and wasn’t going to get involved now.

  Linda and Charlotte walked slowly into the bathroom and just stared at the body for a few minutes. Charlotte sat on the toilet and put her head in her hands, before getting up and walking over to Farah. She took the dead man’s trousers off and left them on the floor. His two legs were fully exposed now and he was only wearing white underpants.

  She picked up the knife and took Farah’s right leg in her left hand. She then started to use the knife as a saw and cut through the dead man’s right leg above his knee. She didn’t think the knife would be sharp enough but was surprised by how quickly the flesh cut, but the bones were more of a problem.

  The sound of the knife grinding through bone and cartilage at the top of the knee was too much for Linda. She cried and cried and would not stop.

  Charlie was focused on the task at hand and managed to hack through most of the leg after a few of minutes of intense effort. She couldn’t completely separate Farah’s kneecap from his thigh so she got Linda’s hammer and started hitting the middle of the knee for extra force. Blood splattered all over the bathroom and specks dotted her face. She alternated between the Stanley blade and the bread knife until the top of the kneecap eventually separated from the body. She picked the limb up and tossed it into the shower area, not bothering to remove Farah’s white sock. She then started sawing the left leg below the thigh and easily cut through the fatty part but again had problems with the muscle.

  Linda had calmed down by then and used her hammer on Farah’s left leg. She beat at it furiously until she could hear the weight of the metal hammer crack through the victim’s shin bone, shattering it. She must have hit him around thirty times before her arm got tired and she sat back on the toilet seat for a rest.

  Charlotte continued to work on the leg as Linda went into the linen press and took out clean white towels. She put a towel over the limb to stop the flow of blood that was seeping out of an artery. The blood was still warm.

  As Linda breathed heavily, trying to regain her breath, her sister continued to saw at the left leg until it separated from the rest of the corpse. She was getting better at it now but there was blood everywhere. It was seeping out the side of the shower onto the floor tiles, leaving a horrible mess. Linda used the white towels to soak up the blood from the bathroom floor and they soon turned a cross between dark red and black, as the blood mixed with the filthy floor.

  The sisters had to repeatedly rinse out the towels using cold water from the shower. The plughole was blocked with blood and bone, so Linda had to put her hand down to clear a path for the water to escape. After she did this, she finished wringing out the towel and threw it across towards the sink on the other side of the bathroom. The wet towel hit the tiled wall and stuck to it, before slowly sliding to the floor. It left a two-foot long bloodstain.

  It was clear that they needed to get rid of the bits of flesh and bone fragments that were blocking the shower and causing a mini-flood on the floor. Charlotte lifted up the toilet lid and they each scooped up flesh and bone, throwing it down the toilet and flushing the chain. Later, tenants remarked that there was always a problem with the sewerage in the flat.

  With both Farah’s legs dismembered, he could now fit neatly into the shower. It was far too uncomfortable, however, trying to lean in and cut the corpse while trying to avoid the limbs that had already been severed. They would have been there all night if they had to do that. So they pulled the body out of the shower by the arms and laid it on the floor and cut it up there. Linda knelt on the floor for most of the grim butcher’s job while Charlotte sat on the toilet. They tossed each body part into the shower as they cut them off and this system seemed to work quite well.

  Over the next few hours, Charlotte became tired from cutting and said her right arm was sore. Every forty-five minutes or so she would sit on the toilet seat and rest for a few minutes while Linda took over the cutting. Both women alternated between using the knife to cut the victim’s flesh and the hammer to break his bones, by repeatedly chipping at them.

  During the rest periods, whichever sister was not disposing of Farah’s body would spend their time using the bath towels to clean the excess blood from the floor. There were two large holes in the floor, which had been caused by the hammer slipping when they were beating Farah’s leg earlier in the night.

  While her children were cutting up the body, Kathleen remained in the living room, leaving her daughters to get on with the grim deed. Charlotte and Linda next cut off both Farah’s arms, halfway between the elbow and shoulder blade. This took longer than you would imagine because the dead man was so lean and muscular; there was no fat on him at all. The Stanley knife was used for this and although it was small, its blade was very sharp and was perfect for getting past the difficult muscle. After the arms and legs were removed, they severed Noor’s two thighs from below the hipbone.

  Thirty-nine-year-old Farah Swaleh Noor had been alive and well only a few hours before but now all that remained of him was the upper part of his body, from his hips to his head. But the sisters were far from finished. They used the knife to cut off his midriff and opened up the stomach in the process. Farah’s stomach was already riddled with massive gaping wounds from where Charlotte had repeatedly plunged the knife into his chest. When the stomach was exposed it was almost too much for Linda to bear. She was especially disgusted by what they were doing and regularly used her top to cover her face to shield herself from the stink of the remains. The deep, foul smell of the gut and entrails in an open stomach would be enough to make even the most experienced medical technician retch. She nearly got physically sick. They left the Ireland jersey on the body in a vain attempt to contain some of the smell. In the days and weeks following
the murder, Linda could not sleep. She was kept awake at night with the memory of the lingering scent of human flesh being opened up. Somehow they kept to the task at hand and cut the midriff through the spine until it separated, leaving only the upper part of the body from the ribs to the head remaining.

  Linda studied the severed midriff and noticed that Farah Noor was still wearing his underpants. She remembered the stories that Kathleen had recently told her about being raped by Farah.

  She took her knife and pulled down Farah’s underpants. She grabbed the top of his penis and took it between the thumb and index finger of her left hand. Using her right hand, she sliced through the penis section, ignoring the testicles. It had shrunk with the cold mixture of water and congealed blood. She took the two-inch penis and tossed it into the shower with the other human remains.

  ‘There, you little fucking prick,’ she whispered. ‘Now you will never rape my ma again.’

  The job of cutting Farah Swaleh Noor up took the Mulhall sisters over four hours. The blade on the bread knife was serrated and was not much use for the grim task of dismembering human remains, while the Stanley knife was essentially too small. But after hours of frantic work and intense effort all that remained of Farah Swaleh Noor was his torso and head. Linda and Charlotte were shattered after the night of murder and butchery. This was in marked contrast to Kathleen who had not taken part in either the murder or dismemberment – instead she was watching television.

  Farah’s eyes were closed and he looked very pale. The mixture of blood and water had made his complexion lighter. His short black hair was covered in thick congealed blood.

  ‘What are we going to do with his head?’ she asked.

  Linda thought for a moment. She realised that if they didn’t cut it off and the body was found, the police would easily find out that it was Farah Noor and would find them all. They’d be sent to prison for life and she’d never see her four kids again. There was nothing else to do.

  ‘We’ll have to cut it off,’ she declared.

  Charlotte took a deep breath and began breathing heavily. Linda composed herself and got one of the white towels and placed it over Farah’s face so he wouldn’t be looking at her. She picked up the hammer and started raining blows against the battered neck, to try to detach it from the torso. Charlotte took over and pounded the head but it would not dislodge. Linda eventually picked up the bread knife and put her left hand around the dead man’s forehead. She put her knee on his torso to steady it and began sawing at the head. Charlotte helped and it took them about ten minutes with the blunt knife to sever his windpipe and get the blade through the back of his neck. The top of Farah’s spine stuck out of the back of his head. It was like a scene from a horror movie. His hair was so short and so sticky that Linda struggled to hold the head but she certainly didn’t want to put her hand inside the brain and skull, so she just let it drop and it made a thud on the floor.

  With the dismemberment of the corpse now completed the girls went into the sitting room and collapsed on the settee, where Kathleen was resting on another chair. They had a couple of drinks to steady their shattered nerves. It was only when they sat down and were away from the bathroom that the enormity of what they had done hit them. They didn’t know what to do next. The bathroom of the flat resembled an abattoir and would obviously have to be cleaned. It was hard to know where to even begin.

  Linda began to get emotional on the couch and sobbed. Charlotte put her arm around her but didn’t join in. Her attitude was what’s done is done. All they could do was make sure that the guards didn’t catch them. Farah was from Somalia and didn’t have any family in Ireland. His only real family was Kathleen and she and the girls would make up a story about Farah running away to be with an ex-girlfriend. He had been known as a ladies’ man when he was alive, so if the police checked they would think that the story wasn’t too far-fetched. They started thinking about who might notice that Farah wasn’t around. Kathleen couldn’t think of anybody off-hand. Most of his friends were in Cork and he wouldn’t be seeing them anyway now that he lived in Dublin. The Somalian community in Ireland was not that big and they tended to keep themselves to themselves. People wouldn’t necessarily think that Farah not being around was a big deal. Finally they agreed it could be done.

  The next problem was what to do with all the body parts. Farah wasn’t a small man and they couldn’t just walk down to the canal and throw him in. They would need to pack him in black bags and transport him to the water. Charlotte thought that walking in the middle of town with black bags early in the morning would arouse suspicion. She suggested that they put the body in the sports bags Kathleen used for her frequent moves. By now it was around 11 p.m. and they agreed that they should clean the place up and pack up the body. The plan was to dump it first thing in the morning, before rush-hour traffic and while it was still dark. Charlotte had been drinking down by the canal before and knew Clarke’s Bridge at Ballybough. She decided that it would be as good a place as any. The water was deep and the body would sink to the bottom. You didn’t get too many people fishing there so it wasn’t too likely that some poor unfortunate would hook an arm when he was fishing for pike.

  A lot of clothes and household towels had got covered in blood during the murder and subsequent dismemberment. They had changed colour from the mixture of blood and guts and it wasn’t as if you could just put them in the washing machine and use them again. They would have to be destroyed. The duvet on the bottom bunk was splattered with blood from Farah being repeatedly stabbed – that would have to go too. There were also Linda’s and Charlotte’s clothes to think about. They were drenched in blood and would have to be thrown out as well. Farah also had clothes in the wardrobe. If the guards were to believe that he had run off with some woman, then they’d have to get rid of all his clothes as well. Otherwise it would just make the guards suspicious and lead to them asking questions. There was a major problem though. It was only Tuesday night now and the bin men didn’t come until Friday. It would be far too risky to leave bloody clothes in the flat or in the back yard for three days. If the guards did somehow find out what had happened, the first thing they would find would be the bags left for dumping and they’d all be caught. None of the three Mulhall women knew how to drive or had a car. They’d have to contact somebody they could rely on, someone who definitely wouldn’t go to the police telling tales of murder. Who can you trust to keep such a secret though? Linda and Charlotte didn’t have many friends. Kathleen had left her old life behind when she upped and moved with Farah Noor. The three of them knew that there was only one answer.

  There was only one person that would even contemplate covering up Farah’s murder. But it wouldn’t be fair to drag him into this. It was bad enough that they had got themselves in such a mess without inflicting it on him. But what other choice did they have? It was now 11.41 p.m. Kathleen took Linda’s mobile and dialled a number that she hadn’t rung in a long time.

  ‘Hiya, love,’ said the voice on the other end of the phone.

  ‘It’s not Linda, it’s me,’ said Kathleen.

  ‘What do you want?’ came the reply. He would recognize that deep voice anywhere and he didn’t want to hear it again for as long as he lived.

  ‘I’m with Linda and Charlotte in me flat. There’s a problem here. You need to come over.’

  John Mulhall hung up the phone and cursed his ex-wife. She had been out of his life for three and a half years but she was still causing him trouble.

  Little did he know that that one phone call would change his family’s life forever and that he would be dead nine months later because of it.

  furious when Kathleen phoned to tell him about the little problem his two eldest girls were having in Richmond Cottages. He hung up the first time but phoned back a few minutes later because he loved his daughters and would always do anything he could to help them.

  Kathleen wouldn’t tell him what was wrong at the flat or if Linda and Charlotte were OK, so he ev
entually agreed to drive over to Ballybough from Tallaght.

  While they were waiting the first thing that Linda and Charlotte did was wash themselves. Spending over four hours dismembering a corpse is a messy business and the sisters were covered from head to toe in blood. All their clothes were filthy and caked through with layer after layer of dried, gooey blood. Their hands were also red and thick fragments had got caught under their false nails, while their hair looked like it had been treated with red shampoo. The only part of them that wasn’t that bloody was their faces. They were dotted with the odd speck of red but were not as bad as you would imagine. The natural thing for anybody to do when their face gets splashed with dirt is to use their clothes to clean it. This is exactly what the Mulhalls did. When blood spurted up at them while they were hacking the body, they had used the sleeves of their tops to wipe it away – neither girl would ever consider going out without wearing heavy make-up and even during their darkest hours they were not prepared to see their faces spoilt. During the rest breaks they both regularly cleaned themselves in the bathroom sink and dried their faces with toilet roll. They now wanted a good wash and went into the kitchen and filled the sink with water. Charlotte and Linda cleaned away the blood and skin pieces from their hair and skin. They didn’t have the option of having a shower at the moment but the sisters made the best of a bad situation. They decided that there was no point changing their clothes yet because they still had to go and clean the flat before dumping the body. It would only ruin a new set of clothes.

  They then went to tackle the corpse in the bathroom, having taken a roll of plastic bags from the kitchen to deal with the body parts. There was blood everywhere. The walls had changed colour, with a mixture of dried blood and guts and the blood had gone as high as six feet up the wall from where Farah’s arteries were cut and had sprayed out of control. The floor was waterlogged with blood and you could see the impression the towels had left in the large pools as the sisters had made futile efforts to clean while cutting up the body. The toilet and sink hadn’t escaped the carnage and the inside of the toilet bowel was now dark red from the bits of bone and brain that had been flushed down it.