The stove murder in Kokemäki
Hilkka Hillevi Saarinen (b. 1st of November 1927, d. 23rd of December 1960) and her husband Pentti Frans Olavi Saarinen (b. 24th of March 1920, d. 1st of August 1986) lived in a large wooden house in Krootila village, Kokemäki. They had five children who had been taken away from them, because Pentti was very jealous under the influence of alcohol and acted violently towards his wife Hilkka and possibly also their children. The children had told that Pentti had in many occasions threatened to kill Hilkka and heard Pentti say that “they (police) would never be able to solve the murder”. In 1960 around Christmas time their eldest son (around the time being 13 years old) came to visit his parents with his friend. Hilkka was nowhere to be seen and when the son asked his father where mom is, Pentti just coldly answered that Hilkka had left while he was sleeping. When the son had asked if mother is in her old working place, Pentti answered “she is never there.”
When the boys arrived (a day earlier than they had promised) and went inside the house, they noticed how weird everything was. Pentti was surprised that they had came a day early and prohibited them going anywhere than the smaller part of the kitchen. When they fetched more bedsheets and other stuff from Hilkka’s room, the son wondered out loud why they won’t turn on the lights. Pentti just simply said the lights don’t work. Even though the room was dark in the bigger part of the kitchen, the son could see that the big stove looked different. Belongings on top of it that had been sitting there for years were scattered around the room. Pentti told him that he had been cleaning, which was very strange since Pentti never took care of any chores around the house, it was always Hilkka’s job. The son also noticed that Pentti’s knuckles in his hand were bruised so badly that his skin had gotten broken.
While the boys were visiting Pentti, he watched them very closely, following their every movement. This resulted to the friend leaving earlier than they had agreed.
Years went by and there was no sign of Hilkka. The eldest son visited the house once in a while and always tried to keep an eye on the things that changed around the house. He checked the cellar, outhouse and grounds around the house. In front of the cowshed there had been a big pile of sand that had suddenly disappeared. As time went by the son started to have strong feelings that Hilkka wasn’t alive anymore. After he had searched the grounds and everything outside, he continued his searching inside the house. He looked around the attic and below the floor boards. The big stove in the house seemed a bit off to him. He started to feel like Pentti had had something to do with Hilkka’s disappearance.
In 1966 the son sent a letter to the local police. He wrote: “I have suspicions that my father knows something about my mothers disappearance, more than he has told. He has clearly dissembled the stove and then laid the bricks back on again. Before this the stove hasn’t even been used in 7 to 8 years. Father was cleaning the house in the dark, even though there was light in the next room when I arrived there. I think the stove should be dissembled. My father can do anything.” However it wasn’t noted. One year later the son wrote another letter to a local paper with a secret name. The title of the writing was “Where do they disappear / I suspect my father to be a murderer”. He wrote about how he thinks his father has murdered his mother, but he changed the details and dates of the happening. Later when the son met Pentti, he had said “we both should just take care of our own things.” Pentti had read the writing and recognized it to be written by his son.
The investigation
It was the year of 1972 when new investigators had been commissioned to dig up some old unsolved cases. They finally took a deeper look in Hilkka’s disappearance. They contacted the eldest son because of the letter he sent to the police and he got the chance to read some interrogation material where was a lot of rumors from around the village. The things the son had been telling in his letter, could’ve easily been true, when taking in consideration all the things that went around the village about Pentti. Pentti had also told couple things that were contradictory.
On 27th of November 1972 on Hilkka’s nameday, 12 years after the disappearance, inspector Gunnar Kivelä, other police men and a mason went to Pentti and Hilkka’s house, with an order to dissemble the stove. Pentti was taken to the police station while they worked in the house. After they had dug about one meter they exposed a mummified head. When they continued digging a whole body was found. The corpse was moved to Pori and on the next day the son went and identified the corpse to be his mother, Hilkka Saarinen. Pentti stated the same he had told his son, he knows nothing about it.
The trial
The case was at first processed in district court. Pentti did not want a defender, but he was anyway assigned one because the court saw that he wasn’t capable to enforce his own welfare. During the trial Pentti denied all the accusations. At some point he told about how Roma people had came inside the house during Christmas in 1960 and apparently they had killed Hilkka. The theory was discarded immediately. Multiple witnesses told the investigators how Hilkka had told about the injuries she had gotten and how Pentti had abused her. Hilkka had visited a doctor on many occasions because of the injuries. Many people around Kokemäki knew how violent and horrible Pentti was towards Hilkka. Alongside the beating Pentti once had shoved Hilkka’s head to a bucket full of feces, and once when they were eating, suddenly Pentti had hit Hilkka with a fork. According to Pentti this happened because Hilkka had “eaten like a pig”.
The district court of Kokemäki saw that Pentti hadn’t killed Hilkka on purpose and that it had been an accident. Pentti was sentenced for 8 years in penitentiary for aggravated assault. However Pentti was released after serving for only one year, because the court of appeals in Turku and the supreme court saw that Hilkka’s cause of death couldn’t be determined with examination. They also saw that a person can’t be sentenced for negligent homicide when 12 years had passed.
Pentti went back to his house which was already deteriorating. He lived there alone until he died on 1st of August 1986. People around Finland gave Pentti a nickname “vapaa muurari (free (or independent) mason)”. The house was demolished in March of 2015 and this case is still officially unsolved. However, pretty much every Finn is certain Pentti killed his wife, probably on purpose.
