June tenth: Veikko Saukko emailed the kidnappers and informed them that he had raised the cash and was prepared to make the exchange. He was given the following instructions. He was to park a car at one p.m. in a specific space in a parking garage in Helsinki. The bags of cash were to be in the trunk, the key taped under the rear bumper. An orange traffic cone should be placed in the adjacent space to the right to reserve it.
The kidnappers chose their parking spot well. Only one security camera picked up on them, and they were obviously disguised in wigs, sunglasses and false facial hair. In front sat a driver. In the rear, Kaarina Saukko and a man holding a surgical saw in one hand and a scalpel in the other. Kaarina’s eyes and mouth were covered by tape. The driver moved the cone, parked, and transferred the sports bags of money to the front seat of his own car. They left the garage and were monitored by UAV aircraft until they entered a forested area near Turku under tree cover, out of view.
Twenty minutes later, the car exploded. Kaarina Saukko had been moved a safe distance from the vehicle, bound hand and foot but uninjured. The man in the rear of the vehicle beside her was discovered to be a mannequin fastened upright in the car. The lone kidnapper appeared to have left the scene of the explosion on a small motorcycle, probably a dirt bike. Kaarina reported that during the time she had spent abducted, she received good treatment in the basement of a home. During transport, her eyes were covered, but it had been a long journey. She also stated that she and Antti had been separated, and that she never saw him during the time of her abduction.
That evening, on the bank of the Aurajoki River, which runs through Turku and into the sea, the body of Jussi Kosonen was found. He had been murdered by a single gunshot to the back of the head. His body was near a speedboat that he had purchased in Turku, with cash, three days previously. The money and paintings were nowhere to be found. Multiple sets of Kosonen’s fingerprints were found in the wreckage of the burnt-out car used in the crime. Fingerprints also proved Kaarina had been held hostage in the basement of his home, which he had soundproofed.
Investigation into Jussi Kosonen raised many questions but answered none. He had been a forty-four-year-old corporate lawyer employed by the University of Turku. Kosonen had studied in Turku and Stockholm and spoke several languages fluently. His profile bore no resemblance to that of a high-stakes kidnapper, and according to his employer, he didn’t have money difficulties.
The Turku branch of the Social Democratic Party was flabbergasted by the revelation. Kosonen had stood as a Social Democratic candidate in the municipal elections in the autumn of the previous year. He lost the election. Kosonen was the father of three and in the process of getting a divorce. He was supposedly tending to the children while his wife was on a two-week vacation in Tenerife. The children hadn’t attended school during that time. Kosonen had informed the school that he had decided to take the children and join his wife on holiday, in an apparent attempt at reconciliation.
Antti Saukko wasn’t returned to his family and remains missing, raising the question of whether he took part in the crime or was murdered by his kidnappers. Kaarina Saukko was assassinated with a high-powered rifle while strolling outside the family villa three days after her release. The bullet entered one temple, passed through her head, and exited out the other side. The bullet was never recovered. However, the wound channel suggested the bullet had been fired from a.308 caliber rifle with a full metal jacket. A simulation of the sniping, guesswork at best, and a calculation of trajectory based on it indicated that the shot had been fired from about seven hundred fifty meters.
If the killer were proficient enough, he could have fired a sniper rifle with the intent of passing the round through her head without hitting hard bone, and he would know what lay beyond her, and could have intended to ensure that the bullet came to rest in a place from which it would be impossible to locate and recover. For instance, in a patch of grassy lawn, where the bullet would bury itself and be impossible to find, or into the sea. Such an assassination would require a marksman of significant prowess.