McGee status report
(Note: previous VFR entries on this case are linked at the bottom of this entry.)
Remember Patrick McGee, the Manchester man who was decapitated in his front yard on the evening of December 15 by a neighbor, who put the head in a garbage bin and called the police? Remember how the suspect was initially identified as a Filipino, but then that information got dropped into the memory hole when the initial version of The Mail’s article was trashed? Remember how there was only ONE (1) actual news article on this sensational crime (i.e., the second version of The Mail’s report), with all the other media items merely being copies of that one story, and how there was no further information, not the name of the arrested man, not even a human interest story on the murdered man?
Think of the way modern society boasts of the immense, the unlimited regard it has for the individual. Yet here is a man who was slaughtered in a hideous, grotesque, probably unprecedented fashion, a 63 year old man who had lived on the same street for most of his life, and nobody cares, no one is even in the slightest degree interested in what happened to him; the fellow is shuffled off to oblivion with a single, inadequate news story as a fare thee well. That’s how much modern society cares for its citizens, if they are killed in such a way as to trigger negative thoughts about a protected minority group.
In any case, I just did a search for “” Patrick McGee decapitated “” for the first time since I telephoned the Mail on December 23. There’s nothing new. All the links on the first page of the Google results go back to mid December. And the second highest item on the page is a VFR entry. It’s as though I were the Barack Obama of bloggers: I am the one I am looking for.
I’m going to call the Greater Manchester Police again this week and see what’s what. I also need to call a good newspaper in Manchester. There must be someone in the Dead Island who cares about what happened to this man.
And by the way, The Guardian, which is published in Manchester, does not have a single reference to McGee.
Update: By going directly to the website of the Manchester Evening News, which is apparently the main paper of Manchester, I have found a couple of articles from the days immediately after the murder that I had missed earlier in general Google searches. There are a total of three MEN stories on McGee. The third is very brief, and simply states that the suspect has held under the Mental Health Act. The first two provide additional comments from neighbors and a few more personal and more vivid observations about McGee than I had found previously in the Mail article and its offshoots, though the three neighbors quoted by name in the MEN were also quoted by name in the Mail. He’s not being treated as just a faceless, gentle parishioner. He’s called a “community champion,” who was concerned about crime, and one neighbor says he had a “wicked sense of humour.” Everyone reports on how nice he was, how very, very nice he was.. Yet the overwhelming tone of the neighbors’ comments remains as I’ve noted previously: there’s no indignation at the crime, no righteous anger, just a kind of passive, resigned attitude of, “it’s shocking, he was such a nice man.” I think that if there were neighbors who did express normal reactions of outrage, of wanting to know who had beheaded their well-liked neighbor and why, the paper would not have reported it. Today’s newspapers will not allow non-liberal statements, such as expressions of genuine moral indignation, into their pages.
There’s also one tiny piece of hard news I hadn’t seen before: his headless body was found inside his house. But there’s still nothing on how he was beheaded, nothing on what kind of weapon was used, nothing on the nature of the other wounds that apparently caused his death before he was beheaded, and, of course, absolutely nothing on the suspect.
Below are the three stories from the Manchester Evening News:
Murder victim’s head in wheeliebin
16/12/2008
THE severed head of a murder victim has been found dumped in a wheelie bin after the suspected killer phoned police.
Detectives made the chilling discovery after a man dialled 999 and led them to a house in Crumpsall last night.
The victim has been named by police as 63-year-old Patrick McGee, who lived alone at a house on Parkhill Avenue.
A 31-year-old man was arrested at the scene on Parkhill Avenue on suspicion of murder. He was being questioned by detectives today.
Sources confirmed to the M.E.N. that the victim had been decapitated and his head was discovered in a wheelie bin outside the property.
Police said that investigations were at an early stage and forensic officers were combing the area for clues. A post mortem examination is also due to be held.
Detective Chief Inspector Howard Millington, who is leading this investigation, said: “This is the shocking murder of a man and our thoughts are with his family at this terrible time.
“We know people must be stunned by what has happened, and the very distressing details that have come out about Patrick’s death. We want to reassure people that we are working hard to find out exactly what happened to him.”
Police were called to the house on Parkhill Avenue at 9.20pm on Monday evening.
Mr McGee, known in the area as Paddy, was brought up in Crumpsall.
He lived alone on Parkhill Avenue after the deaths of both his father and his mother, who he was caring for when she died.
It is understood that he has three brothers, one of whom is living in Manchester.
Mr McGee worked at North Manchester General Hospital as a building labourer until he retired around 10 years ago.
During his time there, he was an active member of the union UNISON and served as a union rep.
Tributes were paid to him by shocked neighbours. One man, a close friend who asked not to be named, said: “He would do you a favour before he would do you any harm. He was a quiet bloke but he would talk to people on the street.
“He did a bit of the stocks and shares and I believe that he owns some land in Ireland. He has lived on this street for nearly all his life. He was a really nice man. I do not think that he has ever married but I do not know whether he has any children or not.”
Another neighbour, a woman, said Mr McGee had a ‘wicked sense of humour’ and was liked by everyone on the street.
Neighbour Karen Rutter, 43, said: “He had lived alone for a few years now since his mother and father passed away.
“He was a really nice man who was well liked. I used to see him pottering about and him going to the shops. All I heard was that they found his body but it is very upsetting. Everyone liked him and it is a real shock for us all.”
Close friend Christine McDonough said: “I have lived here all my life and I have known Paddy as long as I have lived here.
“He was a really nice man and this is all just such a shock. It knocks you for six that someone could do this to another. It is just appalling.”
Shock at ‘head’ horror
Paul Britton
17/12/2008
A COMMUNITY champion was decapitated in a ‘shocking murder’ minutes after arriving home—from a meeting called to discuss crime in his neighbourhood.
Patrick McGee’s severed head was found by police dumped in a wheelie bin outside his terrace home on Parkhill Avenue, Crumpsall.
His body was found inside the house. A weapon was found inside the bin .
Detectives were today continuing to question a 31-year-old man, on suspicion of his murder.
A post mortem examination revealed Mr McGee’s head was severed AFTER several fatal stab wounds to his body.
Det Chief Insp Howard Millington called the death a ‘shocking murder’.
He said: “We know people must be stunned by what has happened, and the very distressing details that have come out about Patrick’s death.”
Mr McGee’s brothers, John and Dennis McGee, paid tribute to a ‘kind and gentle’ man.
They said: . He was a devout Catholic who enjoyed going to church. He had lived in that house for 50 years. He had retired early in his 50s to look after our elderly parents, who died in the 1990s, and had lived alone ever since.
“This has come as a terrible shock to us. It is the sort of thing that you read about happening to other people, you never expect it to happen to yourself.”
Retired hospital worker Mr McGee, 63, who was known to his friends as Paddy, had driven home from a Christmas meeting of the Parkhill and Cleveland Road Residents Association at Crumpsall Methodist Church just minutes earlier.
Vice-chairman Jack Higgins, 65, said: “We were talking about drugs and crime in the area. He was a really nice bloke and he cared about this area.”
Neighbour Karen Rutter, 43, said: “He was a really nice man who was well liked. I used to see him pottering about and going to the shops. . Everyone liked him .”
Close friend Christine McDonough said: “He was a really nice man and this is all just such a shock.” Mr McGee was brought up in Crumpsall, and worked as a building labourer at nearby North Manchester General Hospital until he retired around 10 years ago.
He was also an active member of the union UNISON there.
Teams of forensic officers spent yesterday examining the house for clues. The doorway was sealed off by police tape.
Man sectioned over decapitation
18/12/2008
A MAN arrested on suspicion of murder after a man was decapitated has been held under the Mental Health Act.
The 31-year-old was arrested on Monday after 63-year-old Patrick McGee was found stabbed to death.
His head was found in a wheelie bin outside his home in Parkhill Avenue, Crumpsall.
Police officers found his body at about 9.20pm after receiving reports he had been murdered.
Neighbours and relatives were left shocked by the brutal killing of the popular community man, known as Paddy.
Previous entries on this subject
Englishman beheaded in his front yard
An Englishman is beheaded in his front yard. The world is silent.
Oh little house in Manchester / How still we see thee lie
Nothing on McGee murder
Other news organs reported McGee murder, but repeated the same information
All (un)quiet on the Patrick McGee front
Discovered! The original December 16 Daily Mail article on the beheading of Patrick McGee
Trying to get information on the McGee beheading
Posted by Lawrence Auster at January 11, 2009 12:28 AM | Send