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Police drop murder probe into graveyard body

Police have dropped a murder investigation after a body first thought to be that of recently deceased child found in a Stockholm cemetery turned out to be a 39-year-old woman buried over 40 years ago.

Published: 9 August 2013 12:10 CEST

Police drop murder probe into graveyard body

Workers at a Solna graveyard were convinced on Wednesday they had discovered a child buried in an “unused” section of the Norra Kyrkogården cemetery.

Police confirmed on Friday, however, that the body was not that of a child but of a 39-year-old woman buried in 1969.

Forensic teams and medical experts made the revelation, something that took Lars Wetterlund, head of the cemetery, by surprise.

“This is unbelievable. I saw the hand and the arm. This must have been a unique case for the body to have been so well preserved. It could be that the ground was airtight, but this was just sand,” he told the TT news agency.

Wetterlund was stumped by the fact that the body was found just 130 centimetres underground, when the cemetery usually buries people a further 20 centimetres deeper.

“But we don’t think something like this will happen again,” he said, adding that it would be up to the Catholic congregation to decide whether the woman’s family should be contacted over the matter.

TT/The Local/og

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Over a thousand people join protest against Stockholm attack

The demonstration, which was organised by the Left Party and the Green Party together with Expo, an anti-extremist magazine, was held outside the Moment theatre, where masked assailants attacked a lecture organised by the two parties on Wednesday.

In the attack, the assailants – described as Nazis by Expo – let off smoke grenades and assaulted several people, three of whom were hospitalised.

“Let’s say it how it is: this was a terror attack and that is something we can never accept,” said Amanda Lind, who is expected to be voted in as the joint leader of the Green Party on Sunday.

She said that those who had attended the lecture had hoped to swap ideas about how to combat racism.

“Instead they had to experience smoke bombs, assault and were forced to think ‘have they got weapons’?. The goal of this attack was to use violence to generate fear and silence people,” she said.

EXPLAINED: What we know about the attack on a Swedish anti-fascist meeting

More than a thousand people gathered to protest the attack on a theatre in Gubbängen, Stockholm. Photo: Oscar Olsson/TT

Nooshi Dadgostar, leader of the Left Party, said that that society needed to stand up against this type of extreme-right violence.

“We’re here today to show that which should be obvious: we will not give up, we will stand up for ourselves, and we shall never be silenced by racist violence,” said said.

Sofia Zwahlen, one of the protesters at the demonstration, told the DN newspaper that it felt positive that so many had turned up to show their opposition to the attacks.

“It feels extremely good that there’s been this reaction, that we are coming together. I’m always a little worried about going to this sort of demonstration. But this feels safe.”

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