Back in the 1950’s and 1960’s three very famous killings, which are unsolved to this day, happened in different parts of Finland. I’ve already visited the murder scenes of the Lake Bodom murders and the Tulilahti murders, so here’s number three and probably the most famous one.
In May 1953 Kyllikki Saari, the 17-year-old daughter of a local farmer family went missing after attending a religious event. After that she wasn’t seen.
A search was intiated three days later, but nothing was found. Even the following search attempts yielded nothing. As the villagers realized that something quite out of ordinary had happened, they started filing reports. Other stated marks of a struggle and a bike dragged sideways on the dirt road nearby, others started talking about a cream-colored car, which wasn’t local.
It wasn’t until late July, when some local people, who’d gone berry picking, found Kyllikki’s bike in a swamp. The condition of the bike and the fact that it hadn’t been found earlier raised suspicions that it had been brought to the swamp much later than the disappearance. It started becoming evident, that this was no accident.
Nothing happened, all leads vanished. In October they decided to do another search and found Kyllikki’s shoe with a man’s sock stuffed in it. A day later one of the seekers found a dry pine, which was sticking from the swamp. He grabbed it and it came off revealing a horrible, rotten smell.
That’s where she was half naked, killed by a blow in the head. She was buried right next to the municipal church with 25000 people attending from all around the region. It was the size of a presidential funeral.
A memorial was erected in 1987 on the site where she was found.
Here it is.
During the years there have been several suspects ranging from the local vicar to a ditch digger. Several researchers claim to know the culprit, but officially the crime remains unsolved.
Here’s more about the subject.