Mignardise

Miriam Killdeer | Issue 2.8

The execution of Thomas Mitchell was scheduled to begin at 11:00 AM on December 7th and was formally called to commence at 11:01. Twenty-seven journalists, twelve photographers, and two relatives were in attendance, as well as several guards, the presiding district attorney, the Riverside Penitentiary physician, and a local sommelier. Bruce Anthony Russo, second maternal cousin to the victim by marriage, served as proxy and was allowed into the execution chambers at 11:02.

In honor of the seventh anniversary of the trial, the district attorney made a brief statement on behalf of the decedent’s immediate family who had, due to an inability to travel, declined to attend. The first course was announced at 11:09: a variation of tête de veau paired with a quarter glass of oaked chardonnay. “The first course is of indescribable importance,” writes Suzan Perez in her landmark defense of the consumption method, A Humane Approach to Retribution. “A killer lives and dies for recognition. All other crimes—arson, theft, fraud—can be sourced back to financial insecurity or a general need to survive, but a killer seeks only the attention and dominance his crimes earn him. The only remedy for this murderous need for attention is a complete and utter removal of identity, which is symbolized in this course through the consumption of the facial tissue. It is also, of course, vital that this course be first, to demonstrate that the meal is not in reaction to the killer, but in opposition to him. From this point forward, the killer is anonymous, and only the legacy of his victim remains.”

The dish reached the table at 11:10, and Russo allowed several minutes for photography and documentation before beginning intake at 11:14. When asked for a comment, Russo generously provided a description of the meat’s tenderness and praised the preparation team for their dedication to replicating traditional methods of preparation. To achieve the traditional presentation, he explained when prompted, the head must be boiled in its entirety before the skull is removed and the flesh divided into even cutlets. He also noted the tongue was purposefully left undercooked as to better balance the gelatinous consistency of the skin, but he lamented that the flavor left much to be desired.

Russo requested the second course at 11:25: a half-serving of cervelle de veau, prepared in a butter sauce, flavored with parsley and paired with a quarter-glass of red Mercurey. The dish reached the table at 11:27, and intake began immediately. “The destruction of the brain,” Dr. Alexander Boyce, a specialist in the field of victim-focused criminal deterrence and author of Pound for Pound: The Butcher’s Justice, claims in a public statement, “is especially vital. The brain is the vehicle by which all criminal evil is born and therefore must be eradicated completely before that evil is, in turn, eradicated.” When asked for his opinion on this proposed eradication, Russo expanded on the importance of his role as the victim’s proxy and explained that he, personally, held elimination in equal regard to retribution. “We all loved Allison,” he would go on to say in a follow-up interview several weeks later. “and it’s our responsibility—no, our privilege—to wipe that vile man clean off the face of the planet.”

After stopping twice to allow questions from those in attendance, Russo finished the course at 11:40 and called for a short recess at 11:41. The execution continued at 12:01 PM.

With the next course came the first of two alterations. On the decision to forgo the traditional integration of the limbs, Sidney Warren, Deputy Chef of the Riverside Penitentiary Remains Preparation Team, explains, “We talked about it, and all of us agreed it was important to incorporate some part of the crime into the meal. I mean, you heard about how they found the girl, right? No arms, no legs, completely decapitated, stuffed into that tiny suitcase . . . it just felt wrong not to work it in. I mean, we can’t just go serving hands and feet up on a silver platter when hers still haven’t been found. It’d be insensitive.”

The ethicality of the alteration has not gone uncontested. On the topic of Mitchell’s third course, journalist Jason Phillips comments, “I think it’s generous to call the team’s decision ‘inspired.’ There’s a reason each course is what it is. The limbs are supposed to symbolize taking power away from the killer and re-endowing that power to their victim via proxy. For a man like Thomas Mitchell, power was essential. You can see a clear absence of it in his childhood, and how that absence was compounded by a suffocating career and lack of any real personal life later on. Thomas’ third course alteration is the kind of thing that can only happen when too many chefs are given too much time to overthink their responsibilities to the point of meaningless artistry. Had they been given any more leniency, they may have forgone the dish entirely in favor of reinventing the wheel.”

It’s important to note that the ethicality of Phillips’ statement has also been called into question. In a review of Phillips’ think piece, Dr. Rosana Spencer argues, “What traditionalists like Phillips fail to realize is that consumption is not just a mechanical process of preparation, plating, ingestion, and review. It’s an act of emotional release for the grieving. The suggested courses aren’t a checklist to be met as efficiently as possible; they’re a framework, and it’s expected that the preparation team go above and beyond to tailor each course to the needs of the family. The decision to alter Mitchell’s third course was a decision made out of sympathy for the family, something Phillips is clearly lacking.” On the topic of the alteration itself, Spencer adds, “While through a particularly literal lens, the alteration may seem more morbid than what would be appropriate on such a somber occasion, you’ve got to consider it from the angle of catharsis. Ultimately, the intention of the alteration is not to fulfill a board-written list of qualifications, but to deliver justice. Mitchell’s alteration is, at least, an attempt at that.”

The third course was announced at 12:03: a full portion of honeycomb tripe in a broth of red pepper, onion, hominy, and select seasoning, and paired with a half-glass of Rosso di Montalcino. Although not given prior notice of the alteration, Russo received the meal well at 12:05 and began intake at 12:06. When asked if he thought the preparation team’s choice was appropriate at 12:10, Russo initially requested further context before answering at 12:12. “Well, of course, if it were up to me, Mitchell’s would’ve been gagged, bound, and thrown into the same lake as Allison. This, though . . .  Allison would like this. She always seemed like the artistic type.”

Russo went on to compliment the cut selection and comment on the difficulty of separating the intestinal lining from the larger organ. The freshness received particular praise from attending journalists, although it’s debatable whether this was based on the genuine merit of the dish or a reference to the execution of Luke Rogers, which had made headlines three weeks prior for a live maggot found in the second course—a maghaz masala paired with an aged Riesling. Only hours after the incident, the Federal Bureau of Proxy Health and Safety opened an investigation, which was ongoing at the time of Mitchell’s execution.

Russo requested the next course at 12:36, checked his watch at 12:38, and began the dish at 12:42. With the fourth course came the second alteration; rather than a single organ of those suggested by the General Counsel on Criminal Punishment and Consumption, Mitchell’s preparation team opted for a spread of smoked kidney, liver pâté on toasted sourdough, minced lung in beef stock, and blood boudin noir—paired with a pint of barley ale. “Mitchell’s fourth course is one of the most ingenious in recent memory,” comments journalist Synthia McDanial in her article “Blood and the Men Who Drink It”. “Mitchell’s crimes are all about waste. To see it, all you have to do is turn your attention to how he disposes of his victims. He’s not a cannibal, and if Allison Russo’s disposal was an impulsive act, he wouldn’t have taken the time to dismember her so thoroughly or bring her body back to his apartment after killing her more than a dozen miles away. It’s estimated that nearly thirty hours (let me reiterate that: a day and six hours) passed between Allison’s death and the dismemberment, during which we can justifiably assume that he was in a stable enough mindset to thoroughly consider the weight of his actions and decide—we have to put a lot of weight on that word, decide—what to do next. The industrial nature of the items found in the suitcase with Allison’s torso (a far cry from anything you’d expect a white-collar man like Mitchell to have on hand) also show a certain amount of deliberate foresight, as well as the method of Allison’s death: asphyxiation.”

When McDanial returns to the topic of Mitchell’s execution, she explains, “By using not the lung, liver, or kidneys for the fourth course but rather serving a platter of all three (as well as a generous portion of the remaining blood), Mitchell’s preparation team adamantly refuses to endure his wastefulness. It’s this refusal to engage with the basis of his inhumanity that gives meaning to the execution as a whole. What is an execution, if not a refusal to endure the cruelty that warrants it?”

It’s important to note that there are alternate opinions. In The Morality of Ingestion: A Response to ‘Blood and the Men Who Taste It’, Odette Gilliard argues, “It’s armchair psychiatrists like Synthia McDanial that make it so hard for women to be taken seriously in the field of amateur criminal psychology. Her flowery arguments and exhaustive prose make good fodder for online hot takes but have little to offer in the way of genuine commentary. Mitchell wasn’t deliberately wasteful; he was sociopathic, and the fourth course wasn’t a rebuttal of any perceived flaw of the irrational actions of a killer but an attempt to make the delivery of justice more palatable for a relative of a very unfortunate girl. To claim that Mitchell’s actions show any kind of extensive foresight would be to claim that every pilot who crashes a plane does so intending to end the lives of their passengers. To prescribe any amount of deliberation to Mitchell’s crimes is a drastic oversimplification of the mind of a very troubled man, if not a calculated effort to lend more agency to a murderer than his victim.”

 Russo checked his watch once again at 1:05 and requested the fifth course at 1:09. The course was announced at 1:10 and plated by 1:12.

“The heart is really the crux of it,” said Governor Ezekiel Carlin in a public endorsement of the consumption method. “Bane of all evil, origin of all sin: the heart is what makes these monsters what they are. If they were listening to their heads, they would’ve kept to the path, followed the trail God paved for them, but no, they allowed the devil to seep into their hearts, and now us righteous folk have to do what’s right by the fallen. Get their hearts on a spit while their souls burn in Hell—that’s all we’re trying to do. The Lord sent us a mission when he gave us those rotting hearts in living bodies, and we’re going to do right by him.”

The fifth course reached the table at 1:15: the heart of Thomas Mitchell served raw on a bed of garnish and paired with a young pinot noir. Russo declined to take questions from attending journalists and, at 1:18, asked to speak to the penitentiary physician, who was informed that Russo had not been told the fifth course would be served uncooked. After being assured that there was no reason to believe the fifth course would pose any threat to the well-being of a healthy adult—an assertion supported by a recent study from the Federal Bureau of Proxy Health and Safety—Russo began intake at 1:27.

Two additional recesses were called at 1:32 and 1:48 before Russo finished the fifth course at 1:59. After a brief statement made by Clayton Ford-Jefferson, head chef of Mitchell’s preparation team, the execution of Thomas Mitchell was formally closed at 2:04 PM.

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Miriam Killdeer is an avid writer and proud South Florida local. Their work centers on themes of life, death, and all the little complications in between.