WARNING: This story contains distressing details
Police have concluded that Ani, a four year old girl who was declared missing on April 24th had died two weeks earlier after having been abused by her father, and that he had destroyed the body in a gruesome attempt to conceal the crime.
Police arrested the 27-year-old Bulgarian national nicknamed ‘Savvas’ yesterday on charges of homicide after a friend of his told police that Savvas had confessed his crime to him. Savvas has since confessed to destroying Ani’s body although denies killing her, maintaining that he had woken up from a drug-induced sleep to find the girl dead for unknown reasons. He then sought to destroy the body so that her mother Dimitrina Borosiva would not leave him.
‘I don’t know what happened. She may have hurt herself or had a serious illness,’ he is reported to have told police. “I was afraid of [Dimitrina’s] reaction. She would blame me for the death of the child which she had left me to look after. She would leave me and I can’t live without her. I tried to make the body disappear so that I wouldn’t lose her,’ he is reported to have said.
However police believe that Ani’s father murdered her after routinely subjecting her to extensive abuse, beating her and torturing her with cold baths.
After finding Ani dead Savvas sought to conceal the body in what police call a ‘chilling and inconceivable’ act as there are indications of ‘dismemberment, boiling of the body and its disposal in places where the body will never be found.’
The same officers maintain that what is known, horrifying as it is, is 'only 10%’ of what happened to Ani’s body. ‘There are 10 different parameters to the horror. We have not experienced this at this level,’ they said.
How the case unraveled
Police began to suspect Savvas and Dimitrina in Ani’s disappearance when the couple gave odd and conflicting information about how their daughter had gone missing.
At one point during an extensive early interrogation by police when Savvas, who is a drug addict, was experiencing withdrawal symptoms, he shouted, “Leave me alone. What do you think, that I chopped my child up and flushed her down the toilet?” The outburst immediately raised flags with police. Tragically, it was later to be confirmed.
Savvas and Ani’s mother had travelled to Bulgaria on the 22-23rd of April on Savvas’s urging. Savvas appears to have told Dimitrina that Ani had disappeared from his apartment while he slept and that as the mother she would be accused of neglect. In Bulgaria it appears they met with Ani's grandparents who urged the couple to return to Greece to declare the child missing. They returned to Greece on the 24th where they declared Ani missing with police and the charity 'Smile of the Child.' It is unclear whether at this point Dimitrina knew or suspected Ani's true fate.
While in Bulgaria the couple stayed with a friend. At some point Savvas confessed to him the horrifying details of Ani’s death and his attempts to dispose of the body.
Shocked, the friend later approached Bulgarian police and told them of Savvas’s confession. The friend was subsequently flown to Greece to testify before magistrates. In the meantime, officers in Athens, acting on the information provided by their Bulgarian counterparts, conducted extensive forensic tests in Savvas’s Athens apartment which ultimately corroborated the friend’s testimony.
A chilling and grisly crime
The picture now painted by police of what happened to Ani involves grisly attempts by Savvas to dispose of Ani’s body and a chilling detachment from his own daughter’s death.
Police released an official statement today with their main conclusions. According to it Ani appears to have been killed as long ago as the 8-9th of April.
Furthermore:
- No trace of Ani’s body is likely to be found as her father effectively destroyed it, by cutting it up, cooking it, and disposing of it in the toilet and in other locations.
- Savvas had put towels on the windows to absorb the steam
- On the 12th of April Savvas disposed of the last trace of Ani’s body
- Trace’s of Ani’s blood was found on various objects and in the house
- Savvas’s blood was found on a knife and a sheet
- Following the murder, Savvas bought new furniture and new mops and brooms to conceal the crime
- Savvas then sold Ani’s stroller, toys and crib to a Romanian owner of a store in the area on the 16-17th of April for 55 euros.
- According to police, the motive for the crime was Savvas’s jealousy of the little girl
- Savvas cleaned the pipes of his house and had planned to have them replaced
- Savvas also transported portions of the body in food containers to conceal their true nature.
- The first indications are that Dimitria did not know of Ani’s death
- There was no indication that the child had any significant health problems that may have contributed to her death.
A ‘Monster’
The gruesome crime has shocked the public in Greece. As the 27-year-old was taken to be arraigned before magistrates today, he was heckled by a crowd calling him a ‘monster’.
‘Savvas’ appeared before magistrates without a lawyer after his defense attorney quit several days ago due to the conflicting accounts provided by his client. Following the hearing magistrates ruled that he be remanded in custody pending his trial on charges of first-degree murder.
Dimitrina will face trial on charges of exposing a minor to danger and for perjury. She will be arraigned on Thursday.
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