New Delhi: In a shocking incident that has rocked the entire nation to the core, a 28-year-old man Aaftab Ameen Poonawala, allegedly murdered his 27-year-old live-in partner Shraddha Walkar in a ruthless manner, in May. When the ghory details of the murder were revealed, it came to be known that Aaftab had not only strangled his partner to death, but also chopped her body into 35 pieces and stored it into a refiregrator until disposing it off in small polythene bags over a period of 18 days. It was not a difficult task for Aaftab to chop the body into several pieces, as he had earlier trained as a chef and knew very well how to use a meat-cutting knife.
While several other revelations in the Shraddha Walkar murder case have come to the fore during Aaftab's police interrogation, the accused revealed that he took inspiration from the popular crime web-series 'Dexter', for committing the ghastly crime.
About 'Dexter'
'Dexter' is a popular crime-drama television series that aired on Showtime for eight long years from 2006-2013, featuring its eight seasons. Starring Michael C. Hall as the protagonist Dexter Morgan, the tv series is based in Miami. The show is about the story of a man who leads a normal life during the day as a forensic technician specialising in blood pattern analysis but turns into a vigilante serial killer at night, hunting out criminals who evaded punishment by the judicial system due to corruption or other issues.
The show's first season is based on the 2004 novel 'Darkly Dreaming Dexter' by Jeff Lindsay. The show received universal acclaim for its storyline with the lead actors Michael C. Hall and John Lithgow, bagging the Golden Globe Awards. After a successful run for eight years, the popular show was reprised for a ten-episode series titled 'Dexter: New Blood', that premiered in November 2021 and concluded in January 2022. Each season of the crime-drama series has 12 episodes, making it a total of 96 episodes in its run-time of eight years. The series has a rating of 8.7 on IMDb.
'Dexter' Storyline
Orphaned at age of three years, Dexter (Michael C. Hall) witnessing the brutal murder of his mother with a chainsaw, had a very traumatic childhood. Guided by police officer Harry Morgan, who adopted him after the traumatic incident, Dexter turns into a vigilante serial killer. Recognizing the boy's trauma and the following improvement of his sociopathic inclinations, Harry manipulated Dexter to channel his ugly bloodlust into vigilantism, killing handiest heinous criminals who evade punishment by slipping through the crook justice system. To cowl his prolific path of homicides, Dexter seeks employment as a forensic analyst, specializing in blood spatter sample analysis, with the Miami Metro Police Department.
Dexter is extraordinarily careful and circumspect; he wears gloves and makes use of plastic-wrapped "kill rooms", carves up the corpses, and disposes of them in the Atlantic Ocean's Gulf Stream to lessen his possibilities of detection. Dexter juggles his personas, and recognises both aspects of his personality as an awesome part of himself. He relies upon their interaction, as a method of survival and normality. Although his homicidal inclinations are deeply unflinching, as he at first claims, for the duration of the collection he strives to feel ordinary feelings and continues his look as a socially accountable human being.
'Dexter' Cast
The crime-drama television series has a list of acclaimed actors to its credit. Apart from Michael C. Hall essaying the lead as Dexter Morgan, the other actors are Julie Benz, Jennifer Carpenter, Erik King, Lauren Velez, David Zayas, James Remar, C.S. Lee, Desmond Harrington, Aimee Garcia, Geoff Pearson, Jack Alcott, Julia Jones, Johnny Sequoyah, Alano Miller and Clancy Brown, as the main cast. The supporting cast includes Aster Bennett, Cody Bennett and Brian Moser, among others.
The show received several awards and accolades over the years, getting nominated in the 'Primetime' category of Emmy Awards, 24 times.
'Dexter' And Its Association With Real Crimes
With the ghory murder of Shraddha Walkar and Aaftab Poonawala revealing his inspiration behind the ghouslish act that he committed, it is noteworthy that the accused who sought inspiration from the crime-drama series 'Dexter' is not the first one. Over the yaers, there have been several cases across the globe where the accused took inspiration from the Michael C. Hall drama to commit some of the most gruesome killings.
The first incident that came to light was in 2009, when a 17-year-old boy named Andrew Conley admitted that the show inspired him to strangulate his 10-year-old brother. The incident took place in Ohio. The boy also admitted that he related to the character of 'Dexter Morgan'.
Other similar incidents have taken place in Spain, Sweden, Norway and other countries where the accused owed their allegiance to the crime-series, taking inspiration from Dexter Morgan to carry out brutal murders.
With Shraddha and Aaftab case, it is to be thought upon that how fictional characters can take a hold on the psyche of real-life characters and to what extent showrunners should show ghory details of crime scenes.