Chapter 87
Hanna hurries up the stairs to the police station on the second floor. Ylva might have completed the autopsy quickly, but it has still felt as if they’ve been waiting for the results for an eternity.
Hanna knows what her intuition is telling her.
Filippa was murdered.
On the way to the conference room, she stops in at her office and grabs a pen and her notepad.
“The moment of truth,” Raffe says, arriving at the same time as Hanna.
“Where’s Anton?”
“I don’t know. I tried calling him, but the line was busy, so I sent him a text.”
Daniel joins them and sits down on the opposite side of the table.
Within a very short time Grip appears in one box on the screen, Ylva in another.
Carina Grankvist isn’t there—maybe she’s still in Sadeln, examining the scene of the fire.
As soon as the fire service have completed their work, the forensic team takes over—those are the rules.
Hanna is itching to find out the result of that examination too.
“It’s good that we could all get together at such short notice, and that the autopsy has been completed,” Grip begins. “Ylva, over to you.”
Ylva’s face fills the screen. Today she is wearing a white lab coat over her dark turtleneck sweater, and her tight ponytail accentuates her high cheekbones.
“I just finished. It might take a little while before you receive a copy of my report, but I thought I’d give you a verbal summary because I know it’s urgent.”
Hanna listens intently as Ylva starts with the usual basic observations. Then she becomes more specific.
“The deceased had a significant blood alcohol ratio at the time of death. Over 2.0 mil—2.35 to be exact. Not high enough to be fatal, but certainly enough to significantly reduce her cognitive ability. There were also traces of cocaine in the body.”
Hanna makes a quick note. Ylva’s comments fit with the information given by Filippa’s friends, apart from the presence of cocaine. Then again it’s probably not surprising that they didn’t want to mention the use of illegal substances.
“There were no obvious signs of external violence or other injuries that could explain her death,” Ylva continues.
They already know this. Get to the point, Hanna wants to say, but she knows that wouldn’t go down well. There is no point in annoying the forensic pathologist.
Ylva doesn’t respond to being hurried along.
The screen freezes for a few seconds, then Ylva is back.
“As I’ve already said, the victim had had vaginal intercourse not very long before her death.
However, once again there was no sign of violence or anything else to indicate that this was a sexual assault.
There is no evidence of rough treatment or physical coercion.
Nor did I find any sperm, so presumably a condom was used, which again indicates consensual sex. ”
Hanna makes another note. That still leaves the question of which of the boys Filippa was with. Not Emil, given his sexual orientation. Hanna had wondered whether Pontus might have forced himself on Filippa, based on Olivia’s contention that Filippa would never have chosen to go to bed with him.
But if it was consensual, then that leaves only Amir and William.
Hanna pictures the two boys. Both have been questioned several times, and both have denied that they had sex with Filippa shortly before she died.
One of them is lying; there is no other explanation.
She focuses on the screen again, keen not to miss anything Ylva has to say.
“In other words, at first sight it looked as if the victim had died due to hypothermia. That she simply fell asleep in the snow without realizing that she was putting herself in mortal danger.”
Ylva pauses to consult her notes.
“The high level of intoxication means that she was not accountable for her actions. She might not even have been aware of the low temperature outside. In that case my conclusion would have been that she froze to death as a result of excessive drug and alcohol consumption, to put it in layman’s terms.”
Hanna can tell that there is a but coming.
“However, there is something that doesn’t fit. I found very faint traces of petechiae—tiny spots of bleeding on the mucous membrane inside the eyelids.”
Hanna purses her lips. She knows exactly what that means. Tiny spots of bleeding indicate that a person was suffocated to death.
She knew it.
Filippa was murdered.
“I have to stress that this result is not unambiguous,” Ylva adds, as if she is keen not to tie herself to a conclusion. Maybe she is just being professionally cautious, as most forensic pathologists are.
But Hanna can’t contain herself.
“It sounds as if you think Filippa was suffocated to death. Are we looking at murder?”
“Victims of suffocation present a particular challenge to forensic pathologists,” Ylva replies.
“If the deceased didn’t fight back, it is almost impossible to determine the cause of death.
Sometimes we can find the impression of fingernails if the perpetrator covered the person’s mouth, or fibers on the palate if he or she used a pillow or cushion, for example, but if the victim was unconscious, or highly intoxicated as in this case, then it’s very difficult to determine if a murder has taken place. ”
That wasn’t a proper answer either.
Hanna is growing increasingly impatient.
“It does seem as if you’re leaning toward the conclusion that a crime lies behind Filippa’s death,” Daniel says. “If I’ve understood you correctly?”
Ylva seems indecisive; she clicks her ballpoint pen several times as if she is torn between her gut instinct and the scientific data.
“It’s not within my remit to speculate,” she says eventually. “I can only report back on the results of my investigation.”
“Oh, come on, Ylva,” Grip says. She too seems to be losing patience. “We’re not going to report our informal discussions to the National Board of Forensic Medicine. You’ve worked on cases like this for a long time. Just tell us what you think, and I promise we’ll leave you in peace.”
Ylva considers for a few seconds, then gives in and leans forward.
“Okay. I have a feeling that something might have been pressed against the victim’s face.
There are tiny, almost microscopic scratches on the cheeks that I can’t explain either.
We are talking about minimal impressions, but I can’t find a reasonable explanation for how they could have occurred.
And combined with the traces of petechiae . . .”
Hanna glances over at the notice board, where photographs of Filippa’s body have been put up. She was lying on her side, with her face half-buried in the snow.
A thought comes to her out of nowhere, and she has to speak up.
“Is it possible . . . that Filippa was suffocated with the help of the snow?”
Now she’s said it out loud, it sounds slightly ridiculous, but she wanted to ask the question.
“How do you mean?” Ylva asks.
Hanna hasn’t worked it out yet, she tries to clarify her ideas as she is speaking.
“If the murderer pushed Filippa’s face down into the snow on the ground so that she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t that constitute the cause of death?
If she was too drunk to fight back . . .
then there would be no imprints of fingers or nails, no fibers, but she would still have been suffocated to death.
And the snow against her skin could explain the microscopic scratches. ”
No one says a word when she has finished, which immediately makes Hanna wonder if her theory is completely unrealistic. Maybe she should have kept quiet.
This isn’t the first time she has opened her mouth without thinking.
But Ylva gives her an appreciative nod.
“I can’t exclude the possibility that it could have happened that way,” she says slowly. “Such a scenario definitely provides a plausible explanation for my own observations.”
Hanna is grateful for Ylva’s support.
Daniel also seems impressed; he too gives her a nod.
“Murder, in other words,” Grip says firmly. “So now we know what we’re working with.”