Icepick

An icepick is a tool used to pick or chip at ice. It resembles a scratch awl, but is generally made for picking at ice rather than wood.

Icepicks have been used for more than their intended use, however. For example, psychiatrist Walter Freeman used icepicks in what have been termed "icepick lobotomies", effectively hammering an icepick into the patient's brain with a rubber mallet via the eye's tear duct.

Leon Trotsky is often reputed to have been killed with an ice pick; in fact he was killed with an ice axe.

Culture and media

Icepicks have also been used as weapons in fact and fiction. There are many "icepick" murders portrayed in fiction, including a notable scene from the movie Goodfellas. The nickname "Icepick" is prominent among certain criminal elements to indicate a person who is particularly brutal.

In the computer game Ragnarok Online, ice picks are used as weapons that counter the target's armor, turning its defense into more damage.

The killer in the 1992 film Basic Instinct uses an icepick on her victims.

An icepick was one of the weapons used in the 1970 "Green Beret" murders of Collette MacDonald and her two young daughters. Jeffrey R. MacDonald, the victim's husband, was later convicted of the crime, although he has continually maintained his innocence.

Mafia hitman Abe "Kid Twist" Reles used an icepick as his weapon of choice.

Icepick is also a metalcore band from West Haven, Connecticut.

Jason Voorhees uses an icepick to kill his mother's killer in Friday the 13th Part 2.

An icepick is also a BMX trick. It is a stall/grind performed on the back peg/axle only.

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