Remembering Our Dead

Hande Ö

Hande was an asylum seeker from Turkey. Her body was found after police broke down the door to her apartment in Haymerlegasse 22 in Vienna's Ottakring district.

The naked and bound body of a Turkish citizen found on Sunday afternoon after police broke down the door to her apartment has been reported as being a 35-year-old transsexual asylum seeker. According to a press release from the asylum rights organization Asylum in Need, the transgender woman was not allowed to work, and therefore had turned in desperation to prostitution to support herself.

The organization criticized the current asylum system, saying that through a "lack of alternatives she was forced to look into the sex trade".

They further called for basic social support for asylum seekers, "from which one can live and is not forced into the underground economy or sex work".

According to an autopsy report from Monday, the victim was most likely strangled. Her hands had been tied behind her back, and she was found naked with a cloth ligature around her neck.

A month later a 32-year-old Serbian was arrested in connection with her murder after DNA analysis matched his profile.

He had recently robbed a sex worker at a Thai massage studio in Ottakring, and a day later he robbed an alternative healer in Vienna. The latter was able to give an accurate description of the suspect, allowing police to make a quick arrest. The suspect was already in custody for the armed robbery of the 54-year-old healer, when Hande's body was found.

After being presented with the DNA evidence, the suspect made a full confession. He claimed to be short of money and had murdered Hande during a robbery.

TvT project: Pink News 13.02.2015

https://www.thelocal.at/20150213/trans-prostitute-murder-suspect-arrested

https://www.thelocal.at/20150127/turkish-deceased-was-transsexual-asylum-seeker

https://www.thelocal.at/20150125/body-discovery-triggers-murder-investigation

Report added: 31 Oct 2018. Last updated: 13 Jan 2021

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