Disturbing Unearthing: Bodies of Vanished Mother and Child Found in Freezing Units in the Alpine Nation
The remains of a 34-year-old woman and her 10-year-old daughter have been discovered inside freezers in an apartment in western Austria.
The deceased, a Syrian woman and her daughter, who had been unaccounted for for a number of months, were uncovered on the end of last week. The cooling units were placed behind a false wall in the flat, located in the city of Innsbruck.
Two men, a 55-year-old Austrian and his 53-year-old brother, were detained in the month of June. The older man, a colleague of the Syrian woman, informed police last week that there had been an incident—but denied murder.
Informing reporters recently, a official for the public prosecutor's office stated the pair were being held on "high likelihood of murder".
The names of those involved have been withheld by law enforcement, in following Austrian law.
The vanishing of the mother and child was initially flagged by the female victim's relative, who resides in Germany, on the 25th of July last year.
Investigators said the male associate informed them at the time she had taken an long journey with her child to travel to her relatives in the nation of Turkey.
The mother's debit card was then found to have been used abroad on multiple occasions.
Yet when investigators entered the mother's apartment, her cellphone was discovered.
An individual also stated overhearing a commotion in the dwelling, and cries of "mother" on the occasion the two were believed to have vanished.
A broader police investigation was initiated, with investigators uncovering various messages originating from the mother's device—among them a notice of quitting to her employer and communications to the 55-year-old suspect.
Officials confirmed a four-figure sum was also moved to the suspect.
Katja Tersch informed the press on recently that a storage facility had been secured before the vanishing and a freezer had been positioned inside.
The brothers removed the appliance from the facility on the day the victims went missing, the official revealed. And a week later, they acquired an additional appliance.
Authorities believe they consider this suggests the demise were planned in advance.
"The reason for their demise could not be determined due to the advanced decay of the victims," Tersch commented.
The prosecutor's spokesman—representing the state—said the specific order of occurrences is yet to be determined, but the bodies were professionally hidden and went unnoticed during a previous house search.
While the men were arrested in June, it was only on the 12th of November that the suspect confessed to an occurrence and to concealing the remains. He disputes any intent to kill, authorities confirmed.
At the same time, his younger brother acknowledged a attempt to hide evidence but rejected knowledge of a murder.
The brothers are at this time in pre-trial detention in detention centers in separate locations, around 117 miles (189km) apart.
Through a combined announcement, Austria's Minister for Women and Justice Minister stated the "suspected killing of two... constitutes the sudden and brutal end of two human lives and exposes a heartless setup".
"Female individuals are being murdered due to the mere fact that they are of the female gender," they added.
"Femicides are a profoundly embedded and society-wide problem that we must combat firmly."