Mystery Teen Dead In Forest With Pearl Necklace Revealed

Story By: Koen Berghuis, Sub Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Central European News

Cops have shared this composite photo of a boy whose decomposing naked body was found with a pearl necklace next to it in a forest in the hope of solving his mysterious death.

Picture Credits: CEN

The unidentified boy’s body was found in October last year by a couple who took their dog out for a walk in a forest near Dippoldiswalde, a town located in the Eastern German state of Saxony.

According to police chief Frank Haschke, the dog suddenly ran away from the couple off the forest path into the treeline.

Haschke said: “When the couple followed their four-legged friend into the thicket, they saw the skeletal remains of a human under a fir branch.”

Forensic investigators have since determined that the dead person must be a boy between 12 and 17 years old. 

However, they did not manage to trace the identity of the boy with also nobody in the country reported their child missing.

Haschke said: “We did not find a missing person in pan-European search systems of investigative authorities which matched the age, DNA or teeth.”

A new theory of the investigators is that the boy might have been trafficked across the nearby border with the Czech Republic into Germany.

Haschke said: “The dead person could be an unaccompanied underage asylum seeker.”

He said that human traffickers in the area are known to drop off migrants in an area close to the place where the body was found, where they are left on their own.

There are more mysteries surrounding the body as the boy most likely did not have any clothes on when he was found.

Haschke said: “Garments always have metal parts that do not decompose. But we found no evidence of clothing.”

A mysterious necklace with four pearls was found next to the boy’s body and is the only other lead found in the forest which investigators have to go by.

No signs of violence were found on the skeleton, which makes it impossible so far to determine whether the boy died from natural causes, had an accident, or was murdered.

They know that the boy must have entered the forest between the 1st of July and October 2018 as a day before the forest floor was meticulously searched.

Haschke said: “This is proven by records of a private ordnance disposal service, which searched the place on 30th June for ammunition remains.”

Even though the skeletal remains of the boy were badly decomposed – most likely due to the summer heat in the area – investigators managed to make a composite drawing of the boy which they hope might lead to new tips.

Investigations are ongoing.