and she had one full year left in high school before she had to make up her mind. One of her favourite subjects was English and
she spoke it very well, and had been very much looking forward to practising it when she headed off from Munich on her InterRailing adventure. Almut tells me that the original family home is just
up the street. Inga-Maria was the younger of two daughters.
In August 2006 Almut’s husband Josef died at the age of 67. In 1988 he and his wife had travelled to Northern Ireland to take their daughter’s body home and to meet police and make a
public appeal for help in catching Inga-Maria’s killer. “My husband was a very good man, very good father and very good husband,” says Almut, as she looks at his Memorial Card.
“Josef and I were both from Vorchdorf, a town in northern Austria. We met in school, I was the one who later pursued him. We moved to Germany for financial reasons and settled in Munich.
Josef is now laid to rest here in Munich with Inga-Maria, I visit them every day.”
Northern Ireland has thousands of unsolved murders, most of them linked to the Troubles. The Historical Inquiries Team was specifically set up to review more than 3,200 deaths attributed to the
conflict from the late 1960s to 1998. There is an understanding in Northern Ireland of the need to get answers for families who have been bereaved. That feeling is also reflected in the many other
cold-case murder investigations which the PSNI has undertaken in recent years. One of those cases is the murder of nine-year-old Jennifer Cardy, who was abducted while
cycling near her home at Ballinderry in south Co. Antrim in August 1981. Six days after her disappearance Jennifer’s body was found ten miles away at McKee’s Dam near Hillsborough. A
massive investigation was put in place at the time by the RUC , and in recent years detectives from the PSNI ’s Serious Crime Branch carried out
a full re-investigation. In October 2011 a Scottish serial-killer was convicted of Jennifer’s murder. After murdering Jennifer in 1981, this man had murdered three other girls in Britain
during the 1980s.
Another cold case which has seen renewed investigations is the disappearance of 15-year-old Arlene Arkinson, who vanished on a night out in August 1994. It is feared that Arlene was murdered and
her body secretly hidden either in Co. Tyrone or in Co. Donegal. In August 2011 it was confirmed that the PSNI planned to begin new searches for the missing teenager, using
specialist search equipment.
The potential for huge developments which forensic science can have in a cold-case review was clear in a remarkable case solved by the PSNI in 2008. For twenty years the
person who battered and strangled 66-year-old Lily Smyth in her apartment in Belfast had escaped justice. But the killer had left a small bloodstain on a towel in Lily’s apartment and tiny
amounts of his blood on her clothing. A full cold-case review had begun in 2005 and advances in forensics led scientists to finally identify the stain on the towel as being that of William
Stevenson, who had lived in the same flat complex as Lily. Stevenson’s blood was subsequently found on items of Lily’s clothing which had been kept safe for two decades, and the
probability of a match was given as one in a billion. In October 2008 Stevenson was given a life sentence and told he would serve a minimum of 25 years for a murder he had committed twenty years
before.
The person who left their DNA at Inga-Maria Hauser’s crime scene has never been detected in any other criminal investigation. This means he has not been convicted
of any crime in Northern Ireland, England, Scotland or Wales. Detectives have considered that perhaps the crime scene donor is dead. But even if he is, the developments in familial DNA mean he could still be identified through his relatives. The crime scene stain is a permanent fixture in the investigation, and establishing its owner is crucial in
she spoke it very well, and had been very much looking forward to practising it when she headed off from Munich on her InterRailing adventure. Almut tells me that the original family home is just
up the street. Inga-Maria was the younger of two daughters.
In August 2006 Almut’s husband Josef died at the age of 67. In 1988 he and his wife had travelled to Northern Ireland to take their daughter’s body home and to meet police and make a
public appeal for help in catching Inga-Maria’s killer. “My husband was a very good man, very good father and very good husband,” says Almut, as she looks at his Memorial Card.
“Josef and I were both from Vorchdorf, a town in northern Austria. We met in school, I was the one who later pursued him. We moved to Germany for financial reasons and settled in Munich.
Josef is now laid to rest here in Munich with Inga-Maria, I visit them every day.”
Northern Ireland has thousands of unsolved murders, most of them linked to the Troubles. The Historical Inquiries Team was specifically set up to review more than 3,200 deaths attributed to the
conflict from the late 1960s to 1998. There is an understanding in Northern Ireland of the need to get answers for families who have been bereaved. That feeling is also reflected in the many other
cold-case murder investigations which the PSNI has undertaken in recent years. One of those cases is the murder of nine-year-old Jennifer Cardy, who was abducted while
cycling near her home at Ballinderry in south Co. Antrim in August 1981. Six days after her disappearance Jennifer’s body was found ten miles away at McKee’s Dam near Hillsborough. A
massive investigation was put in place at the time by the RUC , and in recent years detectives from the PSNI ’s Serious Crime Branch carried out
a full re-investigation. In October 2011 a Scottish serial-killer was convicted of Jennifer’s murder. After murdering Jennifer in 1981, this man had murdered three other girls in Britain
during the 1980s.
Another cold case which has seen renewed investigations is the disappearance of 15-year-old Arlene Arkinson, who vanished on a night out in August 1994. It is feared that Arlene was murdered and
her body secretly hidden either in Co. Tyrone or in Co. Donegal. In August 2011 it was confirmed that the PSNI planned to begin new searches for the missing teenager, using
specialist search equipment.
The potential for huge developments which forensic science can have in a cold-case review was clear in a remarkable case solved by the PSNI in 2008. For twenty years the
person who battered and strangled 66-year-old Lily Smyth in her apartment in Belfast had escaped justice. But the killer had left a small bloodstain on a towel in Lily’s apartment and tiny
amounts of his blood on her clothing. A full cold-case review had begun in 2005 and advances in forensics led scientists to finally identify the stain on the towel as being that of William
Stevenson, who had lived in the same flat complex as Lily. Stevenson’s blood was subsequently found on items of Lily’s clothing which had been kept safe for two decades, and the
probability of a match was given as one in a billion. In October 2008 Stevenson was given a life sentence and told he would serve a minimum of 25 years for a murder he had committed twenty years
before.
The person who left their DNA at Inga-Maria Hauser’s crime scene has never been detected in any other criminal investigation. This means he has not been convicted
of any crime in Northern Ireland, England, Scotland or Wales. Detectives have considered that perhaps the crime scene donor is dead. But even if he is, the developments in familial DNA mean he could still be identified through his relatives. The crime scene stain is a permanent fixture in the investigation, and establishing its owner is crucial in
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