Magician accidently kills assistant with chainsaw

Magician accidently kills assistant with chainsaw
Something went wrong.

A magician was performing the sawing in half illusion. He was using his own wife as his assistant.

He placed her in a box to saw her in half, but instead of sawing with the traditional hand saw, he chose to use a more dangerous chainsaw.

I’m not sure what went wrong, but there was a terrible accident.

Do not watch this video if you’re squeamish.

Some have said the video’s a fake, but it’s not listed as a fake at snopes, the site that exposes hoaxes. And at a popular online magic site, magicians who know the secret to illusions like this also did not reach a consensus about whether it’s real or fake.

If you’re able to watch it… what happened?

Magician Chainsaw Accident

Snopes, the urban legend reference page>>

68 thoughts on “Magician accidently kills assistant with chainsaw”

  • Anonymous says:

    The wife’s head gets stuck in the box which makes her unable to pull out the fake head to replace hers before time. She tries to signal the husband by moving her hands and head but because of the music, the husband is unable to see or hear her panics therefore chops her head off and the blood pours out of her covered mouth which creates panic among the audiences and the husband watches his wife in horror as he opens the box.

  • Anonymous says:

    The husband is unable to see her hands because of the music?? LMAO They did a great job–a lot of people are buffaloed and making fools of themselves believing it.

  • Anonymous says:

    This was clearly recorded before youtube came out, also it was in front of a live audience I’m pretty sure they didn’t just set it all up just for youtube… And it was published on the internet before it hit youtube.

  • Anonymous says:


  • Anonymous says:

    It can’t be fake, the assistant would have walked away perfectly fine. They would not say that she was dead if she was alive. Plus,not even the most professional magicians would do a trick that purposely ends like that. You are just in denial and don’t believe in any magic. People like you disgust me.

  • Anonymous says:

    It’s fake.
    First – why gag her so she can’t call out? No point in this trick, unless it’s to highlight the blood expelled from the mouth in the last images – that’s why it’s white.
    Second – if he cuts her throat with a chainsaw the jugular is going to expell approximately 7.5 pints of blood at high pressure and the whole front row is going to be awash – there was hardly any, especially as in point 1 above, there would be more blood expelled from the mouth and that gag would have been drenched.
    Third – how can she replce her own head with a fake one if the box is open so you can see it?
    Fourth – There is no historical record of this online (This would have been big news) – the only case of such an accident happening was a magician at a performance cutting his non-related assistant through the middle and he promptly fainted when blood flooded the stage – he was later arrested and taken in for questioning over the incident. If this guy killed his wife in an ‘apparent’ accident – he would have been taken in as it would have been more suspicious as they would have to explore any possible motives for deliberately killing her – again, this would have been BIG news.
    Fifth – It is narrated as if a documentary – from which programme and by which network exactly? Certainly not the UK. Again – no records. A TV station would not allow this graphic video to be shown without some form of censorship, nor would YouTube if it were real.
    Lastly – a message appears at the end which, if you translate it, is something about "1000 Euros per head" – somekind of other currency, which appears to make it somekind of play on what has been shown and may be an insurance advert. In which case it’s a bad taste joke.
    Unless the questions above (Especialy point 5) can be given some concrete evidential proof then it goes down as a fake in very bad taste. The points in the video – that are pretty obvious – create more suspicion than evidence for it being real.

  • Anonymous says:

    Agreed. Also, the seperation of the spine, especially with something like a chainsaw causes spasms of the lower body, it wouldn’t just go still like this.
    How do I know this? I clicked the wrong pictures on a certain image board. Scarred4life

    Anyway, the shock effect is pretty effective, it even went a little bit viral. So great job on his side.

  • Anonymous says:

    I agreed its fake . .just simple observation . .I must say that the way magician drove the metal plate down the assistant’s throat which is exactly the same path the chainsaw followed makes it look fake. If the assistant unable to replace the said "dummy head" then the metal plate will not went thru..but I admit that trick got me:)

  • Anonymous says:

    Actually, I saw one of those Mexico Narco Blog videos before where a dude cut his head cut off with a friggin knife and his friend with a Chainsaw. None of them had any spasms. Their bodies just became lifeless. I’m not saying the magician video is real or not, but she stopped moving instantly.

  • Anonymous says:


  • Dante V says:

    Anonymous #4 (horrible English) is an idiot, lol. No TV network would ever air an uncensored death without catching hell from a shit ton of sources.

    It’s clearly fucking fake, get over it!

  • Anonymous says:

    This is definitely fake .. They wouldn’t show it.. even on the faces of death videos you used to be able to rent, if you read the fine print it states that these are re-enactments.

    Real death is taboo and not something you just find.. especially narrated.

    And the metal plate mentioned above is the proverbial nail in the coffin for me.. that plate slid down seemlessly, if her head was stuck then that would not have happened… In fact those plates are there specifically to serve two purposes..

    1. To make sure the box end is closed if it gets pointed towards the audience..

    2. MOST importantly, to make sure the path of the blade(s) or in this case, chainsaw is clear.. if the plate doesn’t go down smoothly then her head is still there because the door flap will still be in the way.. when she slides out of the way of the door flap it is free and open and the metal plate goes smoothly.

    – Someone who’s performed this trick multiple times

  • Anonymous says:

    I agree it is a horrible video.

    Id agree with everything thats been written already. Id like to add the reaction to the "accident" seems too quick to me. The assistant in the bottom half of the box jumps out too quickly in my opinion. Id guess she wouldn’t know the severity of what had happened and would have carried on as if nothing has happened risk revealing the trick.

    The photos of his "wife and assistant" don’t look real to me either.

    My guess is its a fake.


  • Anonymous says:

    The best evidence for it being fake is that there is no news story in any media about it. This type of news is tailor-made for controversy and therefore ratings. The headlines would shout: "Magician saws assistant in half – for real!" or "Magician kills assistant with chainsaw" would be plastered everywhere. Plus, there’s video, which a mainstream station would edit to remove any gore but still have a great story. It’s not real.

  • Anonymous says:

    If, as the script goes, the trick depended on her withdrawing her head and substituting a fake one so as to allow the chain saw to pass through that space, the metal partition he inserted either wouldn’t have passed through or would have injured or killed her at that point. But she’s fine when that blade passes through the slot. So, I’m thinking her neck couldn’t have been spanning that space then and thus not when the chainsaw goes through the same space. Conclusion: fake.

  • Anonymous says:

    lol it’s simple. it’s magic trick. and u will see in several other tricks of this type that the person inside it is perfectly capable of moving her head.

  • Anonymous says:

    Fake. I am a surgeon. The blase would hit her carotid arteries and stated above, the jugular veins. A stated above the white gag is for effect but in reality a wound of this nature would not produce the amount of blood seen on the gag while she is lying on her back, in simple terms, gravity. Next there would be massive blood loss onto the stage unless the box was water tight in which case her head would have been floating in blood. The blood would come in high pressure spurts from the carotid arteries. In accidents where people have been decapitated these sports would reach more than one metre and as many as three metres depending on the size of the person and physical health. Her arm movement at the point of death was rather subdued. I would have expected a more violent reaction from her whole body. Videos like this are sensational rubbish.

  • Anonymous says:

    You just watched a metal plate get pushed through her neck with no problem, and THEN sawed through. Why does nobody ever think about that plate? Had this been real, the plate would have stopped at her neck, leaving the plate sticking out of the box.

  • Anonymous says:

    yes it is fake… look at the tall guy with black shirt, he opens the box and looks at the girl from head to feet, then he stands taller and looks at her again.
    first: looking at a decapitated person you can only stay looking at the opening between head and neck or quickly turning away after looking it, not checking her head to feet.
    second: you would never stand taller to have a better look. (think about it! how sick you must be to feel the need of looking correctly at her decapitated head?)

  • Anonymous says:

    and about the plate, no, those plates never go straight down to the assistant, they get alligned parallel to the box with some internal pieces that hold it that way (that plate is very flexible so it bends back normally when taken out)

  • Anonymous says:

    if you cut off someones head, especially with a chainsaw, wouldnt there be blood splashed everywhere within the little box?

  • Anonymous says:

    -10 star…that only fake right,if really something go wrong but this time for real,i really dont know what will happen next…people scream,blood came out from the box…

  • Anonymous says:

    There’s really now way we can tell if the magic was fake or not
    1. each division of the box can fit 1 person, the head might just be a fake head originally placed in the box, she might have been controlling the head with a stick that’s why she could only show 1 hand, when the chainsaw cut the stick, the head would stop moving.
    2. the metal plate can easily slide through since as the comment above stated, it’s flexible and don’t really cut through the box.
    3. The reason why the head can be replaced with a fake one was that even the audience is part of the video, the video was shot with a low pixel to conceal the fake head

    1. There might be no news about it because it is within the legal jurisdiction of a person to prevent leakage of news regarding such matter specially if the news would damage the life of a minor (probably their child)
    2. Most magic house/shows protect their trick by preventing video cameras from getting in the vicinity. The primary reason why this video is of poor quality was that this was shot using a concealed camera such as "spy cams", which is also how pirated movies are made.
    3. There won’t be much blood seen through the head since the box itself is an absorbent. I have seen a box like this in real life and it is mostly made of wood which is a good absorbent. The fact that there were still blood dripping would already mean that there’s a huge amount of blood lost to even exceed the capacity of such absorbent. Try chopping a rat’s head off on the chopping board made of wood.

  • Anonymous says:

    There is no way any person could stop the reporting of such an incident. The press would be all over this, and any intelligent person knows it. Regarding "their child", the press wouldn’t have to report any names, though I imagine that, since ni minor was involved in the trick, they would use names. You’re the classic mark. Illusionists love folks like you.

  • magicdom says:

    As a magician and behaviour analyst fan, I wild tell the reaction of the head in front of danger could not be from side to side but rather the subject would have his/her chin trying to go back in the neck or with a certain extent very small movement and deep neck muscle contractions.

  • Magic Mitch says:

    When I saw this I assumed this was a reenactment.
    There are many murders and other deaths each year that don’t make national news.
    On the other hand, I never heard news of this through my magician grapevine, so it is more likely a fake story.

  • Math Nieuminen says:


    I have been witness of a chainsaw accident. I’m a chainsaw operator in the North of Canada and my friend cut his leg last year. I have now a blog about this story. I want to promote chainsaw safety. I dont like to watch video like this since this accident..

  • Beguiling Hobbies says:

    This is not fake. Unless you are truly an expert who have seen a person got decapitated in real life, I’ll believe you.

    The first plate that he inserted is a specialized plate. It bends when pushed against almost everything. =.=

  • Anonymous says:

    I’m surprised no one’s commented on the ORDER of things in the "trick" — "normally", the box is sawed through and THEN plates are inserted (two per "cut" so that the parts of the box can be separated and "proved" to be really separated without exposing the ‘trick’. It strikes me as absurd that he inserts steel plates through the box/body FIRST — if he could put the plate through the box & body, what the hell does he need the chainsaw for? (and don’t tell me the plates ‘fold’ or ‘bend’. That’s not the point. Look at any other sawed-in-half video and you’ll see them saw through and then insert steel plates to separate the halves (or thirds in this case). This is fake AND stupid.

  • Sablicious says:

    Is that the same uncle who touched your private parts because he said there were gremlins down there?

  • Bob Brown says:


    lol everyone knows its fake you worthless fracking moron, maybe you should stop being a pathetic backbirther and get a real blog loser

    (actual swearing has been Fireflied.)

  • Anonymous says:

    Wtf.. This is fake. Sorry but did anybody notice the metal plate go through her neck? Lol. Yeah that makes so much sense. The metal plate would have stopped at her neck, been sticking out of the box and it would be over.

    Unless it was a blade, then it would cut part of her throat and stop most likely. Depends on the sharpness. She was 110% ok when that happened so that’s enough for me.

    But there’s more. If it cut through her neck blood would be squirting at high speeds and would be all over the stage. This is obviously fake so well done

  • defmos123 says:

    fake because she would have signaled him with her other hand, theres no way they did not have a safety cue in case something went wrong!!!!

  • Anonymous says:

    Its FAKE. As a few have already pointed out. Look at the sequence of performance especially at the head end which incidentally is part shrouded in a box anyway now why would that be I wonder ? hmmm ( trick) Did you notice a steel blade was already shoved through her neck, BEFORE the chainsaw, yet she is still animated and alive, so if it had gone wrong she would have died right then. The chainsaw is therefore not relevant but of course most of you missed the logic ( which is good misdirection I guess) and picked up on the chainsaw cause its menacing and noisy.

  • Anonymous says:

    Yeah, it’s real.

    1.) Watch the blood spray on the floor as the blade goes through her neck.

    2.) The reaction of the audience is timed with the woman’s scream.

    3.) The(legs-feet)woman brings her feet into the box when the woman screams hysterically.

    4.) The bound was put over the woman’s mouth to make the fake head seem more real. (to blend the two more)

    5.) I don’t understand the news blackout of the story unless it happened before the internet took off. It is hard to find old news stories pre-internet.

    6.) A clean cut would make the arteries suck in for a time. The video ends before most of the blood comes out. He didn’t saw through the whole box. He stops the blade’s downward motion when he realizes that he is single again.

  • Sablicious says:

    " It is hard to find old news stories pre-internet."

    Yeah. Coz I’m still trying to confirm / debunk that rumour about the fellow from Nazareth who was said to have walked on water…

  • Anonymous says:

    I’m voting "fake." Penn and Teller have done this trick-gone-horrifically-wrong several times with the same assistant. Also, while the plate he used as a divider can bend, he slides it in with almost no resistance, which shouldn’t be possible, given that one would have to use their hands to guide it away from their body. It won’t just bend on its own, especially when it’s hitting soft tissue like the neck — that moment alone should have gotten a significant reaction from the assistant. And finally, I can’t see the body just going limp like a dishcloth when being beheaded, nor people just standing around looking at a beheaded body like confused idiots with hardly a reaction from anyone. Especially the husband still fresh into his marriage with her. That we never get a name of these two, plus given how the trick is designed in such a way as to have something go horrifically wrong, I can’t buy this as being real.

  • Anonymous says:

    I just realized this. As they open the middle box, LOOK WHAT FALLS OUT !!!! The fake head that was suppose to be switched falls out of the box when they realized something went wrong. I wasn’t sure at first, but now I think it’s real ):

  • Anonymous says:

    The assistant/girl couldn’t give signal to the magician using her other arm. Her other arm is inside the box to bend/slide the blade so that it wont hit her neck.

  • Caoimhe Reid says:

    This isnt fake because the assistant/wife couldn’t of shook her head if it wasn’t a real head and how did the fake head fall out if it was in the place for the fake head. She was able to shake her head and nod it and wobble it, so therefore it was her own head not a fake one!

  • Anonymous says:

    How can any of you believe this is Real? It wouldn’t last 2 hours on YouTube if this was a real grisly death. The only deaths you will see on youtube are either news coverage or home video of a sociopolitical struggle (Syria?Egypt etc.) not some fucking magic trick gone deathly awry. Obsiously not real

  • Anonymous says:

    Why was there no blood on plate when security guy pulls plate. Why was husbands reaction normal and not panicked or dramatic. The white cord or dolls head would of had to have some blood on it as you can see it falls out of box. Yet the video shows none.

  • Sablicious says:

    1. Not enough blood. The cut is made BETWEEN the boxes and thus no "absorbent box material" theory (lol!) holds even toilet water, and with so little blood upon cutting her neck, it’s nonsensical that he insta-killed her. The slightly bloodied rag in her mouth is clearly there to accentuate the imaginary horror.
    2. He hardly cuts through the box. In fact, she would not die instantly UNLESS (and even this is a stretch because humans have a thing call NERVES) the saw went right through, FAST. If you dare, go view a Islamist decapitation video (LiveLeaks) and see the struggle and writhing in agony the victim exhibits during the process of decapitation. The assistant here does nothing other than flail around BEFORE the chainsaw blade enters the box.
    3. The "grainy video makes it real, clandestine footage" theory is crap because the seemingly only woman to stand up in shock, ‘happens’ to do so right in front of this camera. It’s clearly set up and the woman grabbing her head is there for affect and distraction. Moreover, the footage is of nowhere near the poor quality that it would qualify it as some VHS handycam recording.
    4. The music playing in the background, WHERE THE SHOW IS TAKING PLACE, is called Spybreak by the Propellerheads (pun intended?). This is a 1997 tune that was popularised by the film The Matrix in late 1999. The Internet was around back then and if someone was going to use this tune, it would likely be AFTER said film made it well known. Thus the "there was no Internets, so no news was ever recorded of this accident" theory is tin foil stupid.
    5. A trick with this amount of risk, using THE MAGICIAN’S WIFE no less, would have fail safes aplenty. She would have had more than one way to signal him / someone were there really a problem.

    Finally, the entire act seems faked, forced and in a hurry to get to the coup de grace. There’s very little of the fanfare and showmanship that’s customary of magic shows and everything seems geared to rush the act to the finale. People pay money to see these shows and want to be entertained; not pushed out the door ASAP. Again, this stinks of fakery.


  • Unfortunately, it appears to be REAL for a number of reasons:

    1) It would be impossible to fake it or the actors would have faken it differently.
    If the aim was to entertain the cloud, it would be prepared much more intensely and dramatically. There is not enough blood simply because she was lying in a box that caught the majority of blood. If this was an intended performance, they would sprayed the blood everywhere and not bothered spilling just a little bit on the floor so that barely anyone could see it.

    2) Her movement coordination. It would be extremely hard or even impossible to coordinate the exact movement of the hand when there was an alive person because she wouldn’t see the exact position of the saw. As well as spill the right amount of blood out of the head’s mouth. As you can see, it follows exactly the moment when the saw hit the neck.

    3) Real blood. The blood seems chunky, dark and thick, exactly what it would look like in real life. When it was a prank, they would’ve probably use some sort of red liquid or ketchup, which has much less denser consistency and would make more mess, just for the effect.

    4) Media coverage. If they faked it, there would be a purpose (exposure, commercial, TV shows…) and it would be revealed, because that’s why they’ve done that. There was no revelation, which tells me somebody wanted that material to disappear and then some sort of a prank channel took it over, thinking it was fake. But if you look at all the pranks, there is at least some sort of evidence of the purpose they were made for. At least the NAMES of the actors. What would be the point of investing tens of hours into rehearsing it and then keeping the point to yourself? Doesn’t make sense at all. Seems to me that they wanted to forget that.

    5) Their reaction. What would you do when you planned a trick like this? Would you say “and at the end, everyone will just stand there staring at the scene”? No, you’ve probably prepared some dramatic reaction. This tells me that this is totally genuine, because this is how people react in a shock, not how people think they would react.

    6) The metal plate I think is no evidence, because in normal tricks they are using it too, exactly the way it was used here. So, probably made of some flexible material.

    7) He didn’t seem to have cut the head off completely since he probably realized what he did when blood started pouring out on the saw.

    8) Purpose. In the 60’s, the only reason of doing this kind of prank would be to entertain the audience, nothing less, nothing more. There weren’t any viral videos at that time, so I assume they would do anything to make it real on stage, not for the camera. They are actually doing the opposite, there is just not enough drama. There are examples like this when performers wanted to make it interesting for the audience and it’s full of blood, shouting, panic. This is the opposite.

    Overall, the movement, the reactions, the blood spill, everything seems too real and too well elaborated for just one night. If this was a prank, that would be an extremely hard to do and bad looking prank. When there is a shootout, the majority of people is thinking there is a firework. Real tragedies do not look like in the movies. They look like this.

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