It's three days until Christmas Eve 2002 and it's bitterly cold outside. A couple is out walking their dog in Brunna, in Upplands-Bro, when the dog suddenly takes an interest in something.
On the frozen ground in a tunnel lies a bundle of cloth.
I poke around a little and then I see the tiny, tiny hand. Then I say, "I'm calling the police," the man in the couple previously told P4 Stockholm.
When the police arrive at the scene, they find a baby lying in the cloth, naked and lifeless. It's a girl.
The baby was wrapped in a pillowcase and the umbilical cord was still there, says Susanne Pilenbåge Fahlström at the Stockholm Police Department for Cold Cases.
The police know some things: the girl is about 50 centimeters tall and weighs around 3.5 kilograms. The body carries DNA traces from another person, a woman.
And the girl has been murdered.
“She has breathed”
"She was breathing before she died. You can have a stillborn child, but that wasn't the case here," says Susanne Pilenbåge Fahlström.
We know how she died, findings on the body prove it. But we can't go into more detail.
Many questions remain unanswered: Who left the girl in the underpass? And why?
The police and the municipality's social services wait until the last moment to bury the girl. But when eleven months have passed and no relatives have been found, she is laid to rest in Kungsängen cemetery. The coffin is white and crushingly small.
The gravestone reads "Unknown girl, 2002".
It's heartbreaking, says Susanne Pilenbåge Fahlström.
For 24 years, the police have been searching for answers. The girl's fate has touched many people and the cold case group still receives tips from time to time.
Prisoners have been released
The DNA profile developed based on the traces secured has been sent out via Prüm, a cooperation for the exchange of information in which all EU countries are members, and entered into the Interpol database.
Should the perpetrator be arrested in another case, the person could be linked to the murder of the infant via the DNA profile.
We haven't had any such match yet.
Using DNA traces, the police have also produced a kind of phantom image that shows the mother or a close relative. But Susanne Pilenbåge Fahlström emphasizes that it is not as accurate as a real phantom image.
"It becomes an average image of someone who has dark hair, who comes from the Middle East and who has brown eyes. It becomes a kind of made-up image based on the conditions that can be seen on the DNA strand," she says.
There have been suspects and detainees in the case, but they have since been released and removed from the investigation. The police do not want to say how many.
Bible in the snow
And then there's another piece of the puzzle.
18 days after the girl was found dead, a Bible is found in the same place, clearly visible in the snow.
There was a Bible school nearby. Most of the students there were interviewed, but nothing remarkable emerged, says Susanne Pilenbåge Fahlström and continues:
We have also checked social services, hospitals, midwives and psychiatric clinics. A party venue was nearby and the guests were heard. We have checked hotels and campsites.
On July 1st of last year, the law was changed and police were allowed to use DNA-based genealogy to solve murders and serious rapes. However, the method can only be used to find perpetrators - not to identify the deceased.
It is therefore not possible to use the method to find out who the girl was, and so far the police have not used it on the second DNA trace that was found. But it may become relevant, according to Susanne Pilenbåge Fahlström.
After 24 years, that's where the hope lies. If the case is to be solved, a match on the DNA profile is required.
It's difficult to get a prosecutor to prosecute someone if you don't have real evidence when it's this old, says Susanne Pilenbåge Fahlström.
That's what matters: important, "hardcore" evidence.
