Individuals with high status, who are charming figures, and who exhibit polite manners can fool anyone into thinking they are nice, educated, and innocent beings. One man used exactly those characteristics to hide his true self and avoid being suspected of being a serial killer. Władysław Mazurkiewicz, unknown perhaps outside Poland, was one such killer.
Mazurkiewicz was born on January 31, 1911 in Krakow, Poland. As a young child up to his adulthood he always gave off the impression of having style and brains. As a young man, he dined at the classiest restaurants, dressed in the finest attire, and stayed at the top star hotels. How did he afford such a lifestyle? Actually, his murders funded his tasteful lifestyle. At a young age his mother had succumbed to a disease. In his young adult years, he loved to study law and politics, but soon dropped out of school, claiming that higher education took too much time away from his social life. Gaining a spot in the elite social class of Poland was very important to Władysław. He was so influenced by the kind of lives they lived that he began to take larger and larger risks to join their ranks. He gamble money, and lost; desperate to get money, he turned to the higher risks of robbery, and in order to cover up his crimes, he resorted to murdering his robbery victims. That’s how it all started.1
In 1940, Mazurkiewicz said that he robbed and killed his first victim, a Jew. He was never caught for the crime. He traded the belongings of the Jew for money, as he would thereafter often trade stolen gold and leather for money. Following that year, he traveled throughout Europe and made dirty deals with members of the communist authorities in Poland. People said that Mazurkiewicz was rich after 1941, when the Jewish ghetto was founded in Warsaw. As a result, by 1943 the status of Mazurkiewicz’s possessions had increased. It is well known that during the deportation of Krakow’s Jews to Auschwitz, a group of Cracovians made a fortune. Cracovians, seeing Mazurkiewicz bet at the tables and the way he got away with robberies, had no illusions that he was just a rookie in these crimes. Interestingly, the label of “collaborator” did not cling to Mazurkiewicz. At the end of the 1940s, Mazurkiewicz changed into a Polish Red Cross employee for several years, while he spent time in Europe. There he searched for Polish citizens who wanted to return to the country, helped them to complete the necessary formalities, and then organized the trip back to their homeland. And Mazurkiewicz, as people who knew him, had a sensitive soul, loved nature, beautiful objects, and knew how to appreciate the beauty of architecture.2
Against this background of Mazurkiewicz’s biography, his family life is likewise puzzling. Mazurkiewicz had a wife—beautiful Helena—with whom he had lived at Biskupi Square since 1945. Mazurkiewicz met a man named Jerzy de Laveaux, known as the King of the Black Market, on May 29, 1946, when he was moving to the monastery in Cracow Bielany, and they ended up being neighbors. They later had a business there in the city involving the black market. In the spring of 1946, a Soviet officer visited him and offered to buy postage stamps. In the autumn of 1955, an indispensable garage failed to hide the bodies of two wealthy sisters. Before it happened, at the turn of August and September, the elegant murderer had a meeting in Warsaw with Stanisław Łopuszynski, who in those days had turned up his murky business in betting crimes and murders.3
In his murders, he would only use cyanide or a pistol, and he had gotten away with every single one of them, until a strange incident in 1955 when he made his first mistake. While driving from Zapokane to Warsaw in September with his friend Stanisław Łopuszyński, Stan had his attention distracted for a minute, and Mazurkiewicz seized the opportunity and shot him in the head. Shockingly, the bullet had missed his brain and he was only knocked unconscious. Stan woke up with a sharp pain in his head, and Mazurkiewicz apologized to him saying that he had played only a joke on him by throwing a fire cracker at him. Later, Stan attended a hospital, complaining of very harsh pains in his head. The doctors couldn’t find an explanation until they conducted an x-ray and found a foreign object lodged in his skull. When they pulled out the small object, they discovered it was a bullet. Stan put the clues together and figured out that his friend had tried to kill him. He reported it and the the police issued a warrant for Mazurkiewicz’s arrest.4
A month later, police caught up with Mazurkiewicz in a hotel near Zapokane, Poland. When they searched his home, they found that the concrete floor in his garage was uneven and looked disturbed. Once they broke open the concrete floor, they discovered the bodies of the Laveaux sisters, two daughters of a wealthy Polish family. He had stated that they both had asked him to watch over their jewels and currency while they went out of town. When they returned and asked for their jewels and currency, he had already spent it all on luxury items and gambling. So he invited them to his house for tea, and shot them both in the back of the head, and then opened a hole in his garage to bury them and fill the graves with concrete. 5
Police took Mazurkiewicz in for questioning and were baffled by his confession. In his many killings, he explained how he murdered some, starting with Tadeusz B, a polish army soldier, who had traded illegal currency with Mazurkiewicz, had lunch with him one day, and fed him a sandwich laced with cyanide. But luckily for the officer the small amount only knocked him unconscious for a few hours, and then he got medical attention, although they couldn’t trace any evidence of the sandwich to Władysław. Another victim, Wiktor Z, was poisoned with cyanide, shot, and then dumped into the Wisła river, Poland’s largest and main river. Władysław B, Jerzy de Laveaux, and Józef T all met the same fate. When the time for trial came, Mazurkiewicz was only charged for six murders and two attempted murders, even though he had told police he committed thirty.6 His lawyer at the time, Zygmunt Hofmokl-Ostrowski, argued that his client was a “natural” killer. He used the defense of mental illness, and that he had these instincts in his genes and couldn’t be a normal being even if he tried. The defense attorney also said that the people who he executed were “dysfunctional” in society so it was as if Mazurkiewicz was doing society a favor, and therefore shouldn’t be prosecuted. But the court thought otherwise and Władysław was sentenced to death. On January 31, 1957, his 46th birthday, Mazurkiewicz was hanged at Kraków’s Montelupich prison.
- “The Joys of Private Enterprise,” TIME vol. 68 no. 9 (1956): 34. ↵
- Cezarego Łazarewicza, Elegant Murderer (Poland: W.A.B., 18 November), 224. ↵
- Cezarego Łazarewicza, Elegant Murderer (Poland: W.A.B., 18 Novemeber), 224. ↵
- Artur Drożdżak, “Władysław Mazurkiewicz,” Serial Killer, (November 2013). ↵
- Inside Poland, “Władysław Mazurkiewicz,” Poland’s Gentleman Killer, (July 2014). ↵
- Mazurkiewicz Władysław – Elegancki morderca [feat. Straszne historie na faktach | NIEDIEGETYCZNE. YouTube. April 14, 2016. Accessed August 29, 2017. https://youtu.be/E4CgevTIspQ. ↵
62 comments
Timothy ODekirk
This is an extraordinary story about this person. How a person from a high class society can be a notorious serial killer,. just seems unlikely to me. I was unaware of this particular person in history, probably because this took place in Poland, and my knowledge of Poland is weak. But, that is why I love this site because it introduces me to interesting topics like this one, which intrigue me so. I found it somewhat sinister when Mazurkiewicsz tried to kill his close friend, and that his friend survived the shooting. But, what I find even more diabolical, is the fact that when his woke up from the shooting, Mazurkiewicsz told him he was just playing a joke by throwing a fire cracker at him. That is just messed up in so many ways. I also found it interesting how Mazurkiewicsz had a defense attorney and the whole nine yards for his trial. This shows Mazurkiewicsz’s wealth and how money can sometimes hide the crimes that others commit. But, in this case, it didn’t help Mazurkiewicsz, as he was executed for the crimes that he committed in Poland.
Christine Sackey
This was a fascinating story about basically a beautiful killer. All the murders that he did were so gruesome and creepy. I found the one about the two sisters in his concrete floor in his garage disturbing. It is sad that he felt like killing was his only options to get what he wanted. It is quite scary to think that he looked normal but was a killer.
Brianda Gomez
This was a very interesting article. It was both creepy and amusing learning about this notorious killer that haunted Poland. It is very true that someone like Mazurkiewicz would be able to charm anyone he wished due to his many appealing characteristics. Just like the police I too am baffled to read and learn about what he did to his many victims. He was a cruel man that put an end to many individuals life and brought sorrow to many families. Great article!
Dayna Valdez
I really enjoy reading articles such as these. I had never heard about him, while reading these different articles, I’ve learned so much. As innocent and civil he portrait himself to others, he was a very dangerous man. The different tactics that he used were very interesting to read and learn about. It’s crazy to think that the people you think you know may not be really who you think they are.
Manuel Aguilera
I am not surprised he was caught sooner as he did seem to have the perfect façade. I do on the other hand, feel that the killings were projected as he was already involved with gambling and did seem to have an ego (something present in many psychopaths) according to the article. I am surprised that he also had a wife that never seemed to have either noticed or even paid attention to what he was doing. Also, I find it crazy that he was caught because a man managed to get shot in the head and not die.
Amanda Cantu
Good read, I honestly never heard of him until I read your article. It’s crazy how money drives people to do crazy things, but then I guess it explains why greed is considered a deadly sin. It makes you wonder that if by chance he had money if he would have resorted into murdering people. But it shows that you can’t trust people, the most seemingly perfect and innocent people have dark secrets too. They may seem normal on the outside but on the inside is a whole different story that know one is really going to know.
Valeria Hernandez
Veronica Spryszynski, provides readers with a well-structured article. Her narrative displays a wonderful story arc. she builds up to the climax perfectly her details and sequel events fit the timeline. The story of Wladyslaw Mazurkiewicz is very interesting as I had never heard of him. He committed frightening crimes for simple ambition. The most astonishing fact about this story is that Wladyslaw Mazurkiewicz committed 30 murders and was only charged for six.
Gabriela Serrato
This story is unbelievable and almost like a horror movie. The arrogance and greed of one man turned him to killing, as he claimed, thirty people? That disgusts me. How can one put more value on money and jewels than actual human lives. He obviously lacked sympathy and cared for no one other than himself. It is scary that he got away with so much without a trace. It frightens me as to what people are actually capable of. I wonder if he truly did care for his wife, or if he married her to appear normal. Because I honestly do not see how he could love and care for anybody else if he was such a brutal killer.
Jasmine Martinez
This was a very interesting article! I was shocked as well as how he was making profit from his killings. I found it genius that he used his connection to the elite society as a front for his true intentions, and not only that but it seemed to be a heavy influence on why he committed these murders in the first place. It had very chilling murders, and was written really well.
Amanda Perez
Mazurkiewiez’s story is different from most murder stories that I have read in the past. His motives went past the need for money and possessions. It is apparent that he cared deeply about his image and status and that he would do anything to keep and even higher that social status even if it meant making it a habit of taking various lives, betraying friends and risking his own life in the process.