A hologram of a young sex worker haunts Amsterdam’s red light district.
Dressed in faded denim hotpants, a leopard print bra, with a tattoo that goes up her stomach and chest, the 3D computer generated image pops out and appears to be knocking on the window to attract attention.
He leaned forward, breathed into the glass and wrote the word “help”.
The hologram was created to represent Bernadette “Betty” Szabo, a 19-year-old Hungarian woman who was murdered a few months after giving birth in 2009.
His fatal stabbing has puzzled police for 15 years. Dutch detectives are using new technology for the first time in an attempt to solve the case.
A photo of the murdered teenager is framed behind the window, along with hundreds of young women who continue to make a living in this notoriously dangerous industry.
Investigators hope the lifelike hologram will help jog memories and draw attention to unsolved murders.
Until now, Betty’s killer has never been convicted and cold case investigator Anne Dreijer-Heemskerk is determined to change that: “A young woman, only 19 years old, taken from life in such a horrible way.”
Szabo lived a hard life and his story was one of hardship and intensity, according to the detective.
She had moved to Amsterdam when she was 18 and got pregnant soon after. She continued to work during her pregnancy, returning to work shortly after the birth of her son.
It was the morning of 19 February 2009, when two prostitutes went to look for a young mother during a break between customers, because they saw that her usual music was not being played.
When they entered her brothel, a small room with a bed covered in plastic, a vanity table and a sink, they found the body of Shui noMtekhala.
She had been killed three months after giving birth, the victim of a brutal knife attack.
Her child was placed in foster care and never met her mother – a fact that encouraged detectives.
Although the police immediately started a murder investigation, his killer was never found. They are reviewing CCTV footage and questioning potential witnesses.
Most of the people looking at the scantily clad women behind the red neon windows are tourists. The police suspect that the perpetrator was from abroad.
Now they are urging people who might have visited Amsterdam to think back, with a reward of E30,000 to encourage witnesses to come forward.
As Amsterdam faces controversial plans to move its famous brothels to the outskirts of the city’s “erotic zone”, Betty Szabo’s hologram provides a sad reminder of the dangers of traffickers in an area where, despite many security measures, they remain dangerous. .
Prostitutes have expressed concern that removing sex workers from society could put them at greater risk.
The fact that such a violent crime could happen in one of the busiest night spots in the Netherlands without witnesses coming forward continues to baffle investigators.
In the historic red-light district where he once lived and worked, the young prostitute’s digital presence reminds passers-by that his case is yet to be solved.
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