A man has admitted causing grievous bodily harm with intent by removing another man’s testicle, after a police investigation into a sub-culture of extreme body modification.
Ashley Williams, 31, from Newport in South Wales, appeared in the dock at the Old Bailey on Friday to admit the charge, and now faces a possible prison sentence.
He is the latest defendant to admit involvement in body part removal following a criminal investigation into a sub-culture linked to the “eunuch maker” website.
According to prosecutors, defendants are alleged to have been part of a society in which people have willingly undergone extreme body modification.
The practice is linked to a subculture where men become “nullos” – short for genital nullification – by having their penis and testicles removed.
After Williams entered a guilty plea to causing grievous bodily harm, prosecutor Caroline Carberry KC told the court: “That offences relates to the removal of Janus Atkin’s testicle.”
Williams denied being part of a wider conspiracy to cause GBH – a charge which is set to now be dropped.
He appeared in the dock alongside his partner David Carruthers, 60, Atkin himself, and Ion Ciucur, 29, who all denied being part of the conspiracy.
They are set to stand trial next March alongside Marius Gustavson, 45, who is originally from Norway and is accused of being the ringleader of the extreme body modification ring.
The charges are said to cover the removal of body parts, the trade in body parts and the uploading of videos on Gustavson’s “eunuch maker” website.
Nurse Nathan Arnold, 48, from South Kensington, west London, has already admitted the partial removal of Gustavson’s nipple in the summer of 2019 and stealing medicine from the hospital where he worked in 2016.
Damien Byrnes, 35, from Tottenham, north London, admitted removing Gustavson’s penis on February 18 2017.
Both men pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to causing grievous bodily harm with intent.
Arnold also pleaded guilty to the theft of local anaesthetic lidocaine from the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and accepted a further offence of possessing extreme pornography.
Peter Wates, 66, from Croydon in south London, who is said to be Gustavson’s “right hand man”, has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to cause grievous bodily harm between January 1 2016 and January 1 2022.
Prosecutor say he was a “key player who had a role as a surgeon in a very large number of procedures”.
At a hearing in May, Jacob Crimi-Appleby, 22, from Epsom in Surrey, pleaded guilty to causing grievous bodily harm with intent to Marius Gustavson in February 2019.
Gustavson, from Tottenham, has pleaded not guilty to causing grievous bodily harm with intent to three men on dates in 2018 and 2019.
The charges relate to the alleged clamping and splitting of the genitals of the men, who cannot be identified for legal reasons.
Gustavson, appearing in court today via videolink from prison, admits separate charges of making and distributing indecent videos of a child.
He has not entered pleas on other charges including conspiracy to commit grievous bodily harm.
Judge Mark Lucraft KC adjourned the case for a further hearing on September 8.
A trial is currently set for March 4 next year.
