Dagmar Overby
- Category : 1887-births
- Type : MGE
- Profile : 2/4 - Hermit / Opportunist
- Definition : Split - Small (3,38,42)
- Incarnation Cross : RAX Unexpected 1
Biography
Danish serial killer who murdered between 9 and 25 children – of which one was her own – during a seven-year period from 1913 to 1920. On 3 March 1921, she was sentenced to death in one of the most noted trials in Danish history, that changed legislation on childcare. The sentence was later commuted to life in prison.
Overby was working as a professional child caretaker, caring for babies born outside of marriage, murdering her own charges. She strangled them, drowned them or burned them to death in her masonry heater. The corpses were either cremated, buried or hidden in the loft.
Overby was convicted of nine murders, as there was no proof of the others. Her lawyer based the case on Overby being abused herself as a baby, but that did not impress the judge. She became one of three women sentenced to death in Denmark in the 20th century, but she – like the other two – was reprieved.
She died in prison on 6 May 1929, at age 42.