The "Cannibal Cop" case: when fantasy becomes criminal conspiracy

¶ … Cannibal Cop" -- When does evil thought become a crime?

Gilbert Valle III was a 28-year-old former New York City police officer who was arrested after his wife reveled to authorities that he was obsessed with the idea of kidnapping women, torturing them, raping them then eating their flesh.

His wife had come upon his computer record of his visits to chat rooms (including "Dark Fetish Net") that deal in unspeakably evil activities. She saw that he had fantasized kidnapping women -- perhaps as many as 100 -- tying them up, raping them, torturing them, then butchering them and cooking them in the oven, after which he saw himself eating them.

He had what is called a "bondage fetish," among other fetishes, but all his planning, which consisted of Google searches for how to make chloroform, how to kidnap women and more, never actually materialized into real life actions. In other words, yes, he was originally convicted of conspiracy to commit kidnapping and he was convicted of illegally accessing the federal National Crime Information Center database. In that database he was apparently searching for potential female targets that he could kidnap and eventually eat.

This was clearly among the more bizarre crimes in New York City. Or was it really a crime? Valle was found guilty with conspiracy to commit kidnapping in 2013 in Manhattan Federal Court (the Thurgood Marshall Court House). A jury of six women and six men found him guilty. He served 21 months in prison. But a Federal District Court judge overturned his conviction; there was insufficient evidence that he really planned to commit a kidnapping crime.

Exclusive Interview with Valle

Me: What brought you to the point where you were actually planning to kill your own wife, slice her throat, tie her up, torture her and then cook her and eat her?

Valle: There are a lot of myths about what was actually going on.

Me: Well, what was actually going on?

Valle: Once you have that initial picture in your head, the initial concept of what you might like to do, you start to seek out pieces of information that go with those pictures in your head . . .

Me: An FBI forensics specialist testified in the trial that among the twisted searches you launched on your computer, you tried to locate "recipes for human flesh." You were seriously planning these ugly, unthinkable crimes, right? By the way, did you find any recipes?

Valle: Honestly I can't recall if I did or not.

Me: But here you are in a Federal Court having to listen to evidence that surely the jurors are shocked by. You were seriously planning to kidnap and barbecue the women who testified in court, right? Even if you, in your heart of hearts, didn't really plan to do that, it looks awful.

Valle: I want everyone to have all the facts before they make up their minds. I was born in Queens, New York. My parents separated when I was young. I graduated from the University of Maryland in 2006 with a degree in psychology. I never harmed anyone. Never.

Me: Did you receive any public support for your defense of Gatto?

Gatto: Yes, the nuns at Maryknoll Monastery were praying for us, and they sent us two Mass cards. One read, "Blessed be the Lord day by day. God, our salvation who carries us." I understand one of the jurors requested the nuns to pray for Valle. It showed that there is support for us from places that may surprise people.

Comparison of Courts -- State, Federal, and the U.S. Supreme Court

State and local courts are always established by the states, and local courts are established by cities, counties, and other municipalities. State courts have "broad jurisdiction" over the kinds of cases that they are involved in (Findlaw.com). Those cases tried in local and county courts include family disputes, robberies, traffic violations, broken contracts, among other issues.

State courts are always established by the highest court in the state, the Supreme Court. There are states with intermediate courts (Court of Appeals), and these are sometimes called Circuit or District Courts (uscourts.gov). If a party is not happy with a decision that a trial court has laid down, they often take those cases to the Court of Appeals. Some states have courts that specifically handle things like wills, estates, juvenile and family issues -- they are called probate courts in most cases. Judges for state courts are: elected, appointed for a certain number of years, appointed for life, or a combination of these time frames (uscourts.gov).

As to the federal court system, Article III in the U.S. Constitution authorizes the federal court system, and gives the authority to create lower federal courts to Congress. When a litigant is not satisfied with decisions rendered by a U.S. District Court he or she may appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals (uscourts.gov). Judges in federal courts are nominated by the president but must pass muster with the U.S. Senate.

A person not pleased with the decision rendered by the U.S. Court of Appeals may take his or her case to the U.S. Supreme Court. For example, a temporary restraining order (TRO) was recently issued by a U.S. District Judge in Seattle, effectively freezing President Trump's executive order (EO) to ban people from seven mostly-Muslim nations. Trump then appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, but a three-judge panel from that Court unanimously ruled that the TRO was justified. "There is no precedent to support" Trump's claim that his EO has authority and may not be reviewable, the Court explained (CNBC.com). So now, Trump can ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review the decision, but the High Court has no obligation to review it. The U.S. Supreme Court is the "final arbiter of federal constitutional questions" (uscourts.gov).