Lake Bodom murders
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The Lake Bodom murders were an infamous multiple homicide that took place in Finland in 1960. Lake Bodom is a small lake by the city of Espoo, about 22 kilometres west of the country's capital, Helsinki. On the night of June 4, 1960, four teenagers were camping on the shores of Lake Bodom. Between 4am and 6am, an unknown person or persons murdered three of them with a knife and blunt instrument wounding the fourth. The sole survivor, Nils Wilhelm Gustafsson, had led a normal life until 2004 when he became a suspect. In October 2005, a district court found Gustafsson innocent.
The murders have proven to be a popular subject in the Finnish media and commonly have made it back to the headlines whenever new information or theories have surfaced.
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[edit] Victims
- Maila Irmeli Björklund, 15 years old at time of death. Stabbed and bludgeoned
- Anja Tuulikki Mäki, 15 years old at time of death. Stabbed and bludgeoned
- Seppo Antero Boisman, 18 years old at time of death. Stabbed and bludgeoned
- Nils Wilhelm Gustafsson, 18 years old at the time - the only survivor - Concussion, fractures in the jaw and facial bones and bruises on the face.
[edit] Theories
Some years later – between June 3 and 6 of 1972 (approximately the 12th anniversary of the murders) – a man announced in his suicide note that he was the Lake Bodom murderer. On the day of the murders he was working in a kiosk near the lake and had sold lemonade to the victims. He was generally known to have hard feelings about campers. However, police investigation disproved his claims and found an alibi for the man (he was allegedly sleeping at his home with his wife, who verified it).
After Nils Gustafsson went into a mental rehabilitation centre he pleaded in defence to the high courts that on the night of the Lake Bodom murders he saw the Grim Reaper(death)kill his friends.[citation needed]
In 2003, Professor Jorma Palo published a book on his theory about the murder. In 1960, Palo had worked as a doctor at a nearby hospital. Shortly after the murders, he had treated a highly suspicious man for his injuries at the hospital. The man was the German-born Hans Assmann who allegedly worked as an agent for East Germany. According to Palo, the lack of thorough investigation into Assmann's involvement was a diplomatic cover-up. The police denied this and claimed that Assmann had a valid alibi. In 1997, shortly before his death, Assmann confessed the murders to a Finnish journalist.[citation needed]
[edit] Arrest of Nils Gustafsson
In late March 2004, almost 44 years after the event, Nils Gustafsson was arrested by the police on the suspicion that he was the murderer. In early 2005, the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation (Finnish: Keskusrikospoliisi, KRP, Swedish: Centralkriminalpolisen, CKP) declared the case was solved based on some new analysis on the blood stains. According to the official statement, Nils Gustafsson, the survivor, had had an outburst of jealousy involving feelings for one of the other teenagers, Irmeli Björklund, who was his newfound girlfriend. Irmeli was stabbed multiple times after the fatal blow, while the two other teenagers were killed less savagely. Gustafsson's own injuries, while notable, were less severe.
The trial started on August 4, 2005. The prosecution called for life sentence against Nils Gustafsson on three counts of murder. They argued that the re-examination of the old evidence using modern techniques such as DNA profiling raises suspicion towards Gustafsson. The defense argued that the killings were the work of one or more outsiders and that Gustafsson suffered similar injuries to those sustained by the other three, and because of the injuries, he would have been incapable of killing three people. On October 7, 2005 Gustafsson was acquitted of all charges. [1]
On his acquittal, the State of Finland paid him €44,900 for mental suffering caused by the long remand time.
[edit] Cultural impact
The Finnish metal band Children of Bodom took its name from the Lake Bodom murders and has several songs referencing the incident. They have sold over a million copies of their albums. On an episode of the Adult Swim TV series Metalocalypse, the band Dethklok accidentally summons a troll from a lake in Espoo, Finland, possibly as a reference to the Lake Bodom murders.
