Police capture suspect who may have sent Natálka’s family death threats
Today’s edition of the daily Právo reports the North Moravian Police have captured a man they believe sent threats to the family of little Natálka, the Romani girl who suffered serious burns in an arson attack on her home in Vítkov. At the start of this year, Anna Siváková, Natálka’s mother, found this message in her mailbox: “To the gas chambers with everyone – first Anna Siváková, then Natálka, and then her father and the other three children!”
Soňa Štětínská, spokesperson for the Moravian-Silesian Police, told the paper police had tracked down the probable author of the letter. “Detectives collaborated with their colleagues from the Police Presidium and requested several expert evaluations. Thanks to this intensive work, the last piece of the puzzle fell into place at the end of March and the detectives are now able to say they know the identity of the suspect,” she said.
Štětínská says the possible author has not yet been charged. However, that is likely to happen in the next few days. Police are investigating the case as one of suspicion of supporting and promoting a movement to suppress human rights and freedoms.
“I still get goose bumps whenever I think of it. Photos of our entire family, cut from the newspapers, were also in the envelope. It was written in ballpoint pen that we would be going to the gas chambers, and they wrote numbers on the photographs to indicate the order. I was number 1, Natálka number 2,” Právo quotes Anna Siváková as saying.
Arsonists attacked the single-family home in April 2009. The investigation revealed that three Molotov cocktails were thrown into the building. Three people were injured during the subsequent blaze. Natálka, who was not yet two years old, was the most severely injured, with extensive second and third-degree burns over 80 % of her body. David Vaculík, Jaromír Lukeš, Ivo Müller and Václav Cojocaru are charged with the crime. All four are members of the extreme right wing. The trial starts 11 May.
