Parents suspected of crimes linked to drownings on Vantaa beach

OFFICERS The Eastern Uusimaa Police Department has opened a preliminary investigation into an incident in which two children were found dead in the water on a beach in Vantaa, southern Finland.

Police said Friday that the eldest child, a seven-year-old boy, died, while his four-year-old sister remains in hospital in critical condition.

Their parents, the statement said, are provisionally suspected of abandonment, negligent homicide and negligent assault and battery. Abandonment is defined in the penal code as rendering a person helpless or leaving them defenseless while one is responsible for them, thereby endangering their life or health.

Neither the lifeguards nor other people on the beach are suspected of any crime.

“The children were at the water’s edge and drowned. We are now investigating how the parents supervised and supervised the children at the beach,” Krista Vallilathe officer in charge of the preliminary investigation at the Eastern Uusimaa Police Department, commented to Helsingin Sanomat on Friday.

The two children were found dead in the water late Friday afternoon, July 26. They received first aid and were taken to hospital.

According to Helsingin Sanomat, earlier reports indicate that the children were in the wading area of ​​the beach with their two-year-old brother and their father. The children left the wading area and jumped off the pier into the deeper part of the water without their father noticing. They were discovered in the deeper part after being underwater for about 20 minutes, it seems.

The mother was also at the beach on the day of the incident.

The incident took place on Kuusijärvi beach, located in the eastern part of the city, next to Sipoonkorpi National Park.

Aleksi Teivainen – HT