Six men jailed for role in 'gruesome' castration and 'human butchery' ring can appeal their sentences, court rules

22 October 2024, 15:39

Six men jailed for their part in a “human butchery” enterprise can appeal the length of their sentences, the Court of Appeal has ruled.

Marius Gustavson and his cronies carried out “gruesome” acts of castration, penis removal and other procedures on victims as young as 16, the Old Bailey heard earlier this year.

Gustavson, who led the group, once cooked human testicles to eat in a salad and also froze his own leg so it needed to be amputated, netting more than £300,000 between 2017 and 2021 after posting videos of various procedures on his Eunuch Maker website, the Old Bailey previously heard.

Barristers for the men, who were jailed for between four years and life with a minimum of 22 years, requested the Court of Appeal allow them to challenge the length of their sentences.

And in a hearing on Tuesday, three judges gave the green light for an appeal to take place.

Mr Justice Murray, sitting with Lord Justice Edis and Judge Shaun Smith KC, said that while it was "thankfully, a highly unusual case", the appeal was "arguable".

The group is linked to a bizarre subculture where men become “nullos”, a slang term for genital nullification, by removing their penis and testicles.

Prosecutor Caroline Carberry KC said Gustavson, 46, was linked to at least 29 procedures and that there was "clear evidence of cannibalism".

The men used a variety of tools, such as clamps used for animal castration, as they netted thousands of pounds in the procedures.

Gustavson also offered to sell the severed penis of one of his victims for hundreds of pounds, with some 22,000 subscribers paying to access videos on the Eunuch Maker website with varying levels of membership from "free" to "VIP" which cost £100.

He was arrested after branding a man’s calf with the letters EM - Eunuch Maker. Following his arrest, police found his penis hidden away in his north London home.

Passing sentence earlier this year, Judge Mark Lucraft KC told Gustavson: “On the evidence you are very much the mastermind behind this grisly and gruesome enterprise. Like-minded individuals were recruited by you, Gustavson, to assist in what became a large-scale, dangerous, and extremely disturbing enterprise.

“The procedures were conducted in amateur and dangerous ways: in some instances, it is little more than human butchery. Some procedures were overtly sexual or had clear sexual overtones. Many procedures clearly caused great distress and some resulted in the need for immediate emergency medical treatment.”

The full appeal will take place at a later date.