Killing of Nguyễn Xuân Đạt
2025 Vietnamese killing and snuff film
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On January 25, 2025, Nguyễn Xuân Đạt was killed and dismembered, in what was later described as a consensual homicide, in Hữu Lũng commune, Lạng Sơn, Vietnam. The killing, which had been filmed, became known internationally after Vice published an article calling the recording, The Vietnamese Butcher, the "first real snuff movie" and its later circulation on shock sites and social media in late July 2025.
Former office of the Market Surveillance Unit No. 4, Hữu Lũng commune, Lạng Sơn province, Vietnam
| Killing of Nguyễn Xuân Đạt | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Location | 21°30′3.0132″N 106°20′50.0424″E Former office of the Market Surveillance Unit No. 4, Hữu Lũng commune, Lạng Sơn province, Vietnam |
| Date | January 25, 2025 |
Attack type | Mutilation, decapitation, dismemberment |
| Weapon | Cleaver |
| Victim | Nguyễn Xuân Đạt |
| Assailant | Đoàn Văn Sáng |
| Motive | Autassassinophilia |
| Charges | Murder |
The recording of the killing was distributed through Telegram groups and dark web marketplaces as early as February 2025, making it the first known commercially intended recording of a homicide, commonly called a snuff film.
The murder suspect, former Vietnamese government official Đoàn Văn Sáng, was revealed by internet users. The alleged evidence against Sáng was published online in an 88-page document, which the Vietnamese government had later discouraged the public from interacting with. In November 2025, after both international and local outrage, the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security and the Lạng Sơn provincial police arrested Sáng on murder charges.
The Vietnamese Butcher
On July 26, 2025, eleven videos and ninety-eight images of what became known as The Vietnamese Butcher began circulating on Telegram and other encrypted messaging apps. According to the earliest reports as early as February 2025, the videos and images were being sold as a pack on the dark web market and the Chinese platform Baidu Tieba.[1][2] It was also later released through shock sites and other platforms as an extended version.[1]
The videos, which are recorded from multiple angles, show a naked male lying on his back with his head lying on a cutting board while masturbating on a bathroom floor. At the moment of orgasm, the assailant decapitates the victim using a cleaver. The remainder of the footage depicts the dismemberment of the victim, with the assailant wearing a face mask while holding the person's decapitated head. It later showed his internal organs being cooked, which was interpreted as a sign of potential vorarephilia or cannibalism on social media,[3][4] although this has not been corroborated by police.[2]
Prior to the recorded killing, another longer video had shown a rehearsal between the two persons, where the assailant is shown wearing a Guy Fawkes mask, only grazing the person's neck with a cleaver, before embracing the person at the end of the video.[1]
Investigations
Online investigation
Before an official investigation, many Vietnamese investigators had gathered information about the case through open-source intelligence (OSINT).[5] It was deduced that both people were speaking regional Vietnamese accents and that the place of the killing was either near the China–Vietnam border or the Cambodia–Vietnam border from floor tiles and household items in the initial video. While initial suspicions were towards a Buddhist who allegedly interacted with the victim, they were dropped after he had denied involvement.[1]
A Facebook group, "OSINT & Cyber Investigation Vietnam", was created in August 2025 which became highly involved in these unofficial investigations, with many users sustaining efforts in collecting evidence related to the case.[6][2] A Telegram group was also created to serve crime solving.[7]
Victim
The group eventually revealed the victim as Nguyễn Xuân Đạt (born on March 10, 1989), a native of Đông Hưng, Thái Bình (now Tiên Hưng, Hưng Yên).[8] According to his neighbors, Đạt was raised in Hanoi by his relatives due to his mother's mental illness,[9] and worked as a laborer and fishmonger in Hà Đông, Hanoi.[2] He had reportedly often expressed a desire to be decapitated as Đạt had made a comment on a manga piracy site asking someone to translate the ero guro manga Applicant for Death (Japanese: 他殺志願) by Juan Gotoh into Vietnamese. This manga had also shared similarities with Đạt's death, such as guillotines, consensual homicide and speaking decapitated heads, indicating autassassinophilia as a motive.[1]
After the murder, Đạt's Facebook account was locked down, which was thought to have been done by Sáng.[1]
Assailant
Around mid-November, an anonymous user in the group released messages and photos related to the suspect, from which other users correlated to Đoàn Văn Sáng, aged 57 and residing in Tam Thanh ward, Lạng Sơn.[10] Sáng was the deputy team leader of Market Management Team No. 4, under Market Management Department of Lạng Sơn province.[2][11]
On November 23, an 88-page summary, often called the "88-page document" (Vietnamese: Tài liệu 88 trang), which had documented information about the case, was published on the group. The document contained theories about Đạt and the crime scene. It also held Sáng to be responsible because of the correlations between the assailant and Sáng.[6][2] A longer, updated version which had 110 pages appeared on the group on November 27 which strengthened the possibility that Sáng was the assailant.[12][13]
Official investigation
On October 3, 2025, an official notice from the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security informed that an official investigation of the case began after their "observations of the online space".[7][10] Sin Chew Daily later said that, although the video had spread from the dark web to mainstream domestic platforms, the police had only began an investigation after the release of the 88-page document.[14][4]
The Ministry of Public Security and Lạng Sơn provincial police arrested Sáng on charges of the murder of Đạt on November 28.[15][16][17] The same day, the provincial police issued a decision to convict a criminal case of murder.[18]
According to Sáng's confessions, he and Đạt had met through social media in 2020,[19] and according to initial reports, after getting to know each other, began often talking about "deviant and perverse topics" on extreme websites.[7] On January 25, 2025, after contact via mobile phone, Đạt had entered Sáng's workplace at the office of Market Surveillance Unit No. 4 (which had been vacant due to Tết celebrations) prior to the incident.[20] Sáng filmed the murder and put the video for sale on the dark web for US$100 in February 2025. Subsequently, someone purchased the full video for US$600, allowing this full version to circulate online. Sáng then disposed of the body to cover up the crime.[4] There was no explanation given by the police regarding Sáng's motive.[7]
The Ministry of Public Security recommended the Lạng Sơn provincial police to expand their investigation and obtain further evidence for prosecution, starting on December 10, 2025.[18] On that same day, Deputy Minister of Public Security Nguyễn Văn Long sent a letter to the Lạng Sơn provincial police saying that the investigation and prosecution was an "outstanding achievement" which "demonstrat[ed the] determination, high sense of responsibility and professional sharpness" of the police agency.[20]
Media coverage
On August 21, 2025, Ben Ditto of Vice wrote in an article on The Vietnamese Butcher that, though the case had not yet drawn as much international attention as some others, online sleuths were already "working overtime to put names to the victim and the killer".[1]
After the release of the 88-page document and Sáng's later arrest, the case had gained significant traction within Vietnamese and international media as the supposed "gruesome" nature of the images and videos caused social unrest.[21][22]
The media had also focused on the crime-solving efforts in the form of open-source intelligence with many news outlets emphasizing the role of "cyber investigators" in shedding light on the case and saying that the arrest of Sáng meant that the key details in the "cyber investigation" documents were accurate.[7][5][2][3] According to Sin Chew Daily, that as the police had not released any information about the case, netizens "took matters into their own hands" by participating in the investigation and eventually "compil[ing] an investigation report at the end of November" which had revealed the assailant to be Sáng and "speculat[ed] on [where] the possible crime scene" was.[14] Hong Kong's media outlet HK01 and Singapore's The Straits Times said that "online sleuths" played an important part in revealing Sáng as the assailant and the murder site,[3][2] with BBC News Vietnamese mentioning that "many people believe that the credit" for the investigation belongs to "cyber detectives".[7]
However, Hưng Yên provincial police had discouraged people from interacting with the original documents due to "malware concerns", with the Ministry of Public Security announcing on December 3, 2025, that documents such as the "88-page document" or "110-page document" had led to the spread of fake news and malware.[23]
After the documents began being shared online, Hưng Yên provincial police similarly issued a warning about sharing the documents or images and videos related to the killing and announced that distributing them can lead to prosecution,[24][25] with the police charging two individuals for spreading false information about the incident on December 25.[26][27]
See also
- List of incidents of cannibalism
- Murder of Bernd Brandes, a similar recorded case of consensual murder and cannibalism