Murder of Helle Crafts

Helle Crafts
Born	Helle Lorck Nielsen (1947-07-04)July 4, 1947 Charlottenlund, Denmark
Died	November 19, 1986(1986-11-19) (aged 39) Newtown, Connecticut, U.S.
Nationality	Danish
Occupation	Flight attendant
Known for	Murder victim
Spouse(s)	Richard Crafts
Children	3

Helle Crafts  ⁽ⁱ⁾  Hell-Ah Craf-Ts (born Helle Lorck Nielsen, July 4, 1947 – November 19, 1986) was a Danish flight attendant murdered by her husband, airline pilot Richard Crafts. Her death led to the first murder conviction in Connecticut without the victim's body.

Helle Nielsen and Richard Crafts married in 1979 and settled in Newtown, Connecticut. Helle continued working while raising their three children. By 1985 Helle had learned about Richard's several affairs and began divorce proceedings. On the night of November 19, 1986 a friend dropped Helle off at the couple's home. This was the last time anyone but her husband saw her.

Over the next few weeks, Helle's husband gave her friends a variety of stories as to why they were unable to reach her – that she was visiting her mother in Denmark, that he did not know where she was, that she was with a friend in the Canary Islands. Friends grew concerned because they knew about Richard's aggression and temper; Helle had told some of them, "If something happens to me, don't think it was an accident."

In the Crafts home police found pieces of carpet taken from the master bedroom floor. The family's nanny recalled that a dark, grapefruit-sized stain had appeared in an area of the carpet now missing. There was also a blood smear on the side of the bed. Richard's credit card records showed several unusual purchases around the time Helle vanished, including a freezer that was not found in the house, bed sheets, a comforter, and rental of a woodchipper. In papers provided to a private investigator by Helle was found a receipt for a chainsaw, which was later found in Lake Zoar in Newtown, Connecticut, covered in hair and blood matched to Helle by DNA.

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