UK Eliza & Henrietta Huszti, sisters both 32, CCTV captures them near a river at 2am, Aberdeen, 7 Jan 2025 #2

[Coach]

Do we know what flat number they lived on Charlotte Street?

 

[UK Girl]

If they turned the water off? What do you mean?

I meant the phone sorry

 

[bringmeacupoft]

New to the case and catching up.

I think the biggest thing I’m struggling to understand is suicide by drowning is so rare & that 2 people settled on that method. Obviously I say this as someone who was not in their situation and therefore no insight into their perhaps desperation.

 

[TMich6811]

If there was no previous communication that they wanted to move out of the flat and as a landlord myself, if I received a message from a tenant at the ungodly hour of just after 2am out of the blue then the first thing I would do is go to the property. In all my years I have never known a tenant to send a message at that time, 2am. We have been renting properties for decades and we are approachable, our tenants can contact us at anytime and we consider them as friends or family, not as tenants. It would have to be something really serious (severe damage during a storm etc) for a tenant to message a landlord/landlady at that time of hour. I do find it odd that they messaged her when they could instead have simply sent a note in the post to her which would have arrived the next day.

We have seen that they did notify prior but reporting of the very minimal info I feel like gets confusing sometimes so I can’t say this positively

 

[davidt]

I think the situation around the tenancy is clearer after the press conference and the information that has emerged in the past few days. Having listened to the police officer again I think is where we are.

"In the days beforehand the sisters had indicated to the landlord they wished to terminate the tenancy" . Police officer when asked if there was a timeline for vacation says no, it was somewhat open ended.

This seems pretty clear at this stage. Sisters had said they were leaving but had not finalised anything. So both parties had an informal arrangement whereby they'd update her when things were finalised. We don't know how much contact there was or how many messages. I expect the landlady was waiting to hear more in due course. Instead she gets a text in the early hours of the morning with words to the effect that "we've gone and won't be coming back". That's more than enough for her to want to go round and find out what's going on. Then when she gets there and finds them gone and their possessions abandoned it's more than enough call the police.

 

[Cherwell]

I think the biggest thing I’m struggling to understand is suicide by drowning is so rare & that 2 people settled on that method. Obviously I say this as someone who was not in their situation and therefore no insight into their perhaps desperation.

In the current night temperatures, you would probably die of the cold before you drowned. A comparatively painless death.

 

[davidt]

Why did they call the landlady and for that purpose (?) took one phone with them, but one phone left at home? The girls could have left a sticky note with 1 sentence "We moved out and won't return to this address, sorry and bye-bye." To call at 2am doesn't make any sense, I think.

According to the police they left phones plural in the flat as well as other "devices". So more than one phone but not specified how many. They may have been old ones they no longer used but we don't know.

 

[CityKid]

I have been pondering this.

Wondering if the landlady could be in their phone as 'home' or something.

But to be honest, the text message is the thing that aroused suspicion. Without it, they might not even have been missed yet. What kind of third party would be motivated to send it and why?

Then again, I can't quite work out why the sisters sent it either. I would be interested to know what the relationship with the landlady was like. I have a feeling it was either rather good, ie they were quite good friends, or acrimonious, ie she was kicking them out. Feels like one or the other for them to think of her in that moment.

Could the landlady have sent it to herself using their phone?

 

[davidt]

This is what I've been thinking. Perhaps one of them was ill.

From what we know they had spent all their lives living together to this point. If accurate they were looking to buy a property together so seems like they intended this arrangement to continue for the foreseeable future. This does suggest they had a very close bond. I won't be surprised if we do ever find out what happened and why, that it's the close bond that will underpin it all. If there was anything, illness, job, relationship or any other issue at all that meant going forward they would no longer be able to live together that from their perspective may be unbearable. It's not uncommon for those in such situations to take drastic action rather than face separation.

 

[TonnnnUK]

I think the situation around the tenancy is clearer after the press conference and the information that has emerged in the past few days. Having listened to the police officer again I think is where we are.

"In the days beforehand the sisters had indicated to the landlord they wished to terminate the tenancy" . Police officer when asked if there was a timeline for vacation says no, it was somewhat open ended.

This seems pretty clear at this stage. Sisters had said they were leaving but had not finalised anything. So both parties had an informal arrangement whereby they'd update her when things were finalised. We don't know how much contact there was or how many messages. I expect the landlady was waiting to hear more in due course. Instead she gets a text in the early hours of the morning with words to the effect that "we've gone and won't be coming back". That's more than enough for her to want to go round and find out what's going on. Then when she gets there and finds them gone and their possessions abandoned it's more than enough call the police.

Think this sums it up perfectly to be honest.

Could the landlady have sent it to herself using their phone?

The police have said that the message they sent to their landlady was sent on or near the bridge, the very one they have the sisters on CCTV walking over and heading onto the dirt path. I would assume they could probably make out the action of one of them using the phone to send the message.

 

[davidt]

In terms of them advising the landlady in advance they were looking to terminate the tenancy I see two scenarios.

Firstly, they did have genuine plans to move on. Perhaps new opportunities to improve their lives. They didn't know the precise details and timescale but wanted to keep the landlady informed. Then perhaps whatever it was all fell through and left them in despair. We don't know what sort of lives they led or what they may have been through in the past.

Second scenario is that they had already reached a firm decision to end their lives but not sorted out exactly when they were going to do it. I think this is much more likely tbh. However if that was the case would you really want to risk giving anything away that might interfere with your plans. I can understand the final text message when it's too late for anyone to do anything but otherwise wouldn't you keep everything to yourself and not risk letting anything slip. Perhaps it was just courtesy but I'd think you'd do nothing at all that might alert anyone.

 

[Shellie85]

MOO but the reason for the sisters being at the bridge earlier that day was for 1 of 2 reasons :
1 - to check CCTV etc to find the best place to go to disappear with no one seeing which way you have went etc and they just wanted to disappear and start a new life .
2- looking at the best places to enter the water, which i sadly believe is the case. I do believe maybe their rucksacks contained items to weigh them down.
I did believe at the start that one accidentally fell into the water and the other went in to help but I just think now this is more planned. MOO

 

[Doric Loon]

In the current night temperatures, you would probably die of the cold before you drowned. A comparatively painless death.

Currently it isn’t as bad, but on that night, with fairly appropriate clothing like they had, it would take up to hours for full blown hyperthermia, to the point you would die, certainly long enough for someone to likely spot them in the morning though, but in the water, you’d be down to mere minutes.

 

[Cherwell]

Currently it isn’t as bad, but on that night, with fairly appropriate clothing like they had, it would take up to hours for full blown hyperthermia, to the point you would die, certainly long enough for someone to likely spot them in the morning though, but in the water, you’d be down to mere minutes.

Yes, I meant in the water! Sorry if that wasn't clear.

 

[CityKid]

Think this sums it up perfectly to be honest.


The police have said that the message they sent to their landlady was sent on or near the bridge, the very one they have the sisters on CCTV walking over and heading onto the dirt path. I would assume they could probably make out the action of one of them using the phone to send the message.

Thanks; I must have missed that they'd pinpointed the place where the message originated.

 

[Rebeka89]

I think with all of the purchasing/banking apps and Apple Pay, etc., that one might possibly have on their phone, locking becomes a necessity. Def the case for me.

I mainly locked it to prevent accidentally pocket-calling people. But yeah, I think most people lock it.

 

[MrsWatson]

All information provided by the police at this point shows the sisters went into the water voluntarily. Nothing has shown there was anyone else in the area at the time. They went into the area, and are never shown coming out. It appears they were in the area previously, perhaps scoping it out. The police have a lot more information about their personal lives than we do.

I think this is a terrible tragedy, but I don't think this is a mystery.

MOO

 

[Grouse]

When Nicola Bulley went in the water she was dead in under a minute from the shock of the coldness of the water. If they went in the water would they even had time to walk in it to try and go undercover in the water somehow.?

If they turned the water off would that stop the police being able to track the body in the water?

Nicola Bulley's case was quite different I think - from the inquest "Prof Tipton said: “In my opinion, given the nature of the likely entry into the water, at speed down a steep slope, gone into the water I think Nikki had a gasp response under the water which initiated the drowning response very quickly.” She would have died in less than 10 seconds."

In this case it appears that they chose a place where the bank is not steep. As to the river depth at that point I'm not sure. The nearest monitoring station I can find is a bit upstream Water level information for Dee (Grampian) at Garthdee and the current level there is under a meter but its states "Normal range 0.619m to 3.552m".

So I think, cold though it will have been, they probably had time to wade into the water.

 

[Grouse]

Since Scotland is no longer in the EU I doubt they are getting free calls.

<snipped for focus>

I don't think free phone calls was ever a benefit of being in the EU.

 

[Grouse]

I guess you could say they were scoping it out in daylight, to see how secluded it was, if there were cameras etc and make sure it was the perfect spot. Doing the deed in daylight hours would mean no privacy, and possible witnesses, who would likely try to intervene. One sister finished work at around 1pm, so I guess the timing is kind of right to be there when they were during daylight hours.

<snipped for focus>

I totally agree, to pick the right spot, with easy access to the water. To then come back when it is quiet, 12 hours later when the tide level would be similar (it does seem to roughly 12 hourly - Aberdeen Tide Times for 7th January 2025 | Tide Times).