MA MA - Karina Holmer, 20, Boston, 21 June 1996

[dotr]

What’s your thoughts of the killer being a med student?

Welcome to Ws yeshax!
A medical student or a butcher- the person would have to have a tough stomach, imo.

 

[yeshax]

Thank you! Yes, indeed, very tough stomach. The cleaning of the body is another thing. Wipe off the blood, yes, but to clean it, that’s another thing. That’s more methodical. I wonder what was used. Hmmm. But leaving a partial fingerprint, that was sloppy. Hopefully the police will be able to match the print with someone soon.

 

[dotr]

Wondering if Karina's former employers have tried to bring attention to the case, surely it must bother them at some level?

Perhaps one day when the children Karina babysat grow up, they will have questions about their former nanny and her gruesome murder.
imo, speculation.

 

[BornSkeptic]

You and I are in lock-step on all of our thoughts. I think it was a pregnancy that needed to be hidden. The top half was tossed in the dumpster because it was ok that that part was found but the bottom half gone forever??? This murder haunts me to this day...

If you read some of the other info on this case, apparently a pregnancy could be confirmed even with only the torso being present, and there never was any info from official sources reporting a pregnancy. (Of course, they could have withheld that info...) And, maybe the killer didn't realize that the lower half of the body isn't needed to confirm a pregnancy either, so it was a mis-informed attempt at hiding this fact.

 

[BornSkeptic]

I'm very late in adding to this thread, but I've got an interest in this case because the "man with the white dog" lived next door to me -- at least, off and on. So, in the interest of having all the info here in one place, and for the sake of anyone else investigating this, I'll add a few additional bits of info that I know.

Herb Whitten (I knew him as "Will", which is how he introduced himself to me...) was the brother of the woman who owned the home next door to me. I suspect he was homeless, living out of his car, but am not positive of that fact. Anytime his sister was "away" (she would disappear for months -- Will intimated to me that she was hospitalized for some type of mental illness, but I again, I have no evidence of that), he would come and "house sit" until she came back and inevitably called the police to kick him out.

I initially knew Will as a carefree, happy-go-lucky sort. Never seemed to have a job, and he was always doing odd things -- I called him "the hippy next door", as he was often dressed in tie-dye shirts, building shoddy benches or birdbaths or sheds in the backyard. One of the things my wife and I remember was that he'd frequently be digging seemingly random holes -- when I asked him once what he was doing, he claimed he was putting in Koi ponds. He had a big Great Pyrynees dog, and would frequently dress himself and the dog up in matching Superman T-shirts. He told me he liked to dress up the dog and drive into the city at 2am when the bars let out, as it was a gimmick to get woman to stop and talk to him. Everything seemed harmless enough, we just thought he was an eccentric, and he wasn't really there often, maybe two or three months out of a year.

One year he came to stay for the better part of a summer, and the more he was around, the less "eccentric" and more "disturbed" he seemed to us. For one thing, he exhibited definitely bi-polar behaviors. I could be talking to him about something normal, and he'd suddenly switch from happy to agitated for the most innocent of conversations or actions -- something as simple as noticing a dent in his car door and asking him what happened to cause it would throw him into a defensive, aggressive rage. And he often had stories about (and bruises from) getting in fights with random people who were "hassling" him (he was Jewish, and often explained it as anti-semitism.) I was moonlighting at a job in Boston, and would frequently be getting home at 11-12 at night, and several times I'd pull in the driveway to see him standing in his front yard, shirtless, and wearing only shorts (or maybe underwear -- can't be sure) staring up at the sky.

We had three young kids (8-ish to 3-ish), and he would call them over into his yard to see something (like a frog) or to give them small gifts, like a salvaged, repainted, old beat up toy truck, which concerned us. To give the kids a defined line that they were not allowed to cross, we installed a fence, and that set him into a rage -- we didn't talk much in a neighborly way after that, as he was outwardly hostile over it.

When the murder occurred, and news came out that one of the people she was seen talking to last was a man with a big white dog, wearing matching Superman T's, we kind of freaked out -- but the police had apparently already investigated him and I believe he had already moved out again at that point. He came and went a few more times, and he didn't interact at all and was obviously angry.

I remember it as about 6 months later (though I've read other accounts stating it was a year), I came home to find police and medical examiner vehicles in their driveway. A pair of detectives came over to talk to me later that night, and said that he was dead in his bathtub. "Suicide?" I asked. And I distinctly remember the detective's response: "No way, the scene is way too bloody and violent. Somebody did this to him."

But when the news stories came out, there was no mention of homicide, only that he had committed suicide. Weird.

If you listen to the Crime Junkies podcast on this case, they mention that Karina had dated a Boston cop, and that there were rumors of a coverup, and that the Boston police department was somewhat infamous for the levels of corruption during that period. I believe it is definite possibility, given the certainty of the detective that I spoke with that it was a homicide, and then having that theory completely disappear from any news reports.

Personally, I think that he had it in him to murder. Like I wrote above, he was aggressive, angry, and a rather large guy -- probably 6'3" and rather powerfully built. But I don't know that he would have been clever enough to dispose of (and wash!) the body without being found out. Plus he apparently had a speeding ticket that night as an alibi, though Crime Junkies points out that there was nothing to deny that the body might have been already stashed, or even in the trunk of his car at the time.

My wife is convinced that the bottom half of the body is in one of those unfinished "Koi ponds" in the back of their yard, but the house has been sold twice now, and likely any evidence is long gone.

 

[dotr]

I'm very late in adding to this thread, but I've got an interest in this case because the "man with the white dog" lived next door to me -- at least, off and on. So, in the interest of having all the info here in one place, and for the sake of anyone else investigating this, I'll add a few additional bits of info that I know.

Herb Whitten (I knew him as "Will", which is how he introduced himself to me...) was the brother of the woman who owned the home next door to me. I suspect he was homeless, living out of his car, but am not positive of that fact. Anytime his sister was "away" (she would disappear for months -- Will intimated to me that she was hospitalized for some type of mental illness, but I again, I have no evidence of that), he would come and "house sit" until she came back and inevitably called the police to kick him out.

I initially knew Will as a carefree, happy-go-lucky sort. Never seemed to have a job, and he was always doing odd things -- I called him "the hippy next door", as he was often dressed in tie-dye shirts, building shoddy benches or birdbaths or sheds in the backyard. One of the things my wife and I remember was that he'd frequently be digging seemingly random holes -- when I asked him once what he was doing, he claimed he was putting in Koi ponds. He had a big Great Pyrynees dog, and would frequently dress himself and the dog up in matching Superman T-shirts. He told me he liked to dress up the dog and drive into the city at 2am when the bars let out, as it was a gimmick to get woman to stop and talk to him. Everything seemed harmless enough, we just thought he was an eccentric, and he wasn't really there often, maybe two or three months out of a year.

One year he came to stay for the better part of a summer, and the more he was around, the less "eccentric" and more "disturbed" he seemed to us. For one thing, he exhibited definitely bi-polar behaviors. I could be talking to him about something normal, and he'd suddenly switch from happy to agitated for the most innocent of conversations or actions -- something as simple as noticing a dent in his car door and asking him what happened to cause it would throw him into a defensive, aggressive rage. And he often had stories about (and bruises from) getting in fights with random people who were "hassling" him (he was Jewish, and often explained it as anti-semitism.) I was moonlighting at a job in Boston, and would frequently be getting home at 11-12 at night, and several times I'd pull in the driveway to see him standing in his front yard, shirtless, and wearing only shorts (or maybe underwear -- can't be sure) staring up at the sky.

We had three young kids (8-ish to 3-ish), and he would call them over into his yard to see something (like a frog) or to give them small gifts, like a salvaged, repainted, old beat up toy truck, which concerned us. To give the kids a defined line that they were not allowed to cross, we installed a fence, and that set him into a rage -- we didn't talk much in a neighborly way after that, as he was outwardly hostile over it.

When the murder occurred, and news came out that one of the people she was seen talking to last was a man with a big white dog, wearing matching Superman T's, we kind of freaked out -- but the police had apparently already investigated him and I believe he had already moved out again at that point. He came and went a few more times, and he didn't interact at all and was obviously angry.

I remember it as about 6 months later (though I've read other accounts stating it was a year), I came home to find police and medical examiner vehicles in their driveway. A pair of detectives came over to talk to me later that night, and said that he was dead in his bathtub. "Suicide?" I asked. And I distinctly remember the detective's response: "No way, the scene is way too bloody and violent. Somebody did this to him."

But when the news stories came out, there was no mention of homicide, only that he had committed suicide. Weird.

If you listen to the Crime Junkies podcast on this case, they mention that Karina had dated a Boston cop, and that there were rumors of a coverup, and that the Boston police department was somewhat infamous for the levels of corruption during that period. I believe it is definite possibility, given the certainty of the detective that I spoke with that it was a homicide, and then having that theory completely disappear from any news reports.

Personally, I think that he had it in him to murder. Like I wrote above, he was aggressive, angry, and a rather large guy -- probably 6'3" and rather powerfully built. But I don't know that he would have been clever enough to dispose of (and wash!) the body without being found out. Plus he apparently had a speeding ticket that night as an alibi, though Crime Junkies points out that there was nothing to deny that the body might have been already stashed, or even in the trunk of his car at the time.

My wife is convinced that the bottom half of the body is in one of those unfinished "Koi ponds" in the back of their yard, but the house has been sold twice now, and likely any evidence is long gone.

Welcome to Ws BornSkeptic!
Wow, thanks for that very interesting and informative post!

 

[Fred52]

Thinking about this case today I wondered if anyone had considered a BU med student and someone had. The med school is close by. Would have access to bone saws and equipment to dispose of the blood. She could not have possibly been dismembered in an apartment IMO.

 

[MadisonS]

I remember it as about 6 months later (though I've read other accounts stating it was a year), I came home to find police and medical examiner vehicles in their driveway. A pair of detectives came over to talk to me later that night, and said that he was dead in his bathtub. "Suicide?" I asked. And I distinctly remember the detective's response: "No way, the scene is way too bloody and violent. Somebody did this to him."

But when the news stories came out, there was no mention of homicide, only that he had committed suicide. Weird.

To BornSkeptic --if you are still following this thread...

You are correct about the approx date of Herb Witten's death --he died on January 9, 1997 in Andover according to ancestry.com. Unfortunately, I could not locate an obituary for him. He had a sister named Marianne who lived in Andover; could she have been your neighbor for whom Herb/Will "housesat?" According to property records, she lived on D---i Circle in the 90s. (I deliberately redacted some info for his and your families' privacy).

Personally, I don't think he is Karina's killer. His mental illness appeared to have left him too disorganized to pull this off. Sometimes the mentally ill do kill, but they aren't so good at covering their tracks. This was an incredibly cold murder followed by a thorough (albeit flawed) disposal strategy.

I think this lonely and troubled man was just in the wrong place at the wrong time and couldn't handle the scrutiny that came with it. To make matters much worse, his father died that November - less than 2 months before his 'suicide.'

His high school photo '65 is on the web, but I'm wary of posting a link as I believe in his innocence and don't want to draw undeserved attention to him.
But I am curious if you recognize him as the same man who lived next door. Apparently, he was very involved in sports at Brookline High School.

 

[yeshax]

Thinking about this case today I wondered if anyone had considered a BU med student and someone had. The med school is close by. Would have access to bone saws and equipment to dispose of the blood. She could not have possibly been dismembered in an apartment IMO.

Victims have been dismembered in bath tubs etc but the cuts have not been very clean, the instruments have not been made for that kind of use in those cases. I can’t recall reading about the details in poor Karina case so imo it is possible that could have happened. But I can’t leave the med student thought, or someone who works in medicine. I often think of Karina and especially when I’m on my way to or in Boston. I never met her but we were nannies in the US at the same time and I feel it could have been me, not her. I am so grateful that you are here with me, remembering her and trying to find out what really happened to her.

 

[dotr]

"Sept 26, 2018
Twenty year old Karina Holmer wanted to see more of the world beyond her Swedish home town. In the Spring of 1996, she decided to go to America, working as an Au Pair for a well to do family in the Boston suburb of Dover. At first, everything was going great, but soon problems began to rear their head. In letters home, the young woman went from positive and excited to negative and eventually, frightened. Karina promised to explain it all when she got home, but unfortunately, she would not return home alive or in one piece. In a case which has become the Boston Black Dahlia case, the young nanny was found murdered in a dumpster not far from the club she was last seen dancing at. Her dismembered remains were discovered by a homeless man, kicking off a massive investigation in which everyone was a suspect. Despite all of the media attention at the time, this terrible incident has been mostly forgotten over time, and Karina herself has become a name most no longer recall."

 

[MadisonS]

Thinking about this case today I wondered if anyone had considered a BU med student and someone had. The med school is close by. Would have access to bone saws and equipment to dispose of the blood. She could not have possibly been dismembered in an apartment IMO.

IMO It is highly unlikely that she was dismembered inside any of the medical schools even by a student with access to the gross anatomy lab. Med schools (especially the labs) are incredibly secure facilities, and it has been that way for a long time. There is no way that someone could carry a body into the building undetected even at 3 am on a weekend.

That being said, it's always possible that someone with a medical background might have cut the body in two. At the very least, her killer was quite comfortable (if not skilled) with using a saw to dismember a body.

I read somewhere that a circular saw blade was found in the dumpster along with her body, but I can no longer locate the source. There are many different varieties of circular blades and depending on how specialized it was, it could reveal a lot about the killer.

 

[MadisonS]

Thanks for posting the Trace Evidence link. I haven't listened to the entire recording yet but the narrator is thoughtful in his analysis.

 

[Crazyjster]

In an apartment right there or somewhere else. the bathtubs in those apartments are high bathtubs some of them are the ones with feet. Those partments are old. I can't remember if there was construction going on and any of them at the time but it's quite possible some of them are vacant and they were tools readily available. As I stated earlier I would smack dab in the middle of Kenmore square as a Grad student BU ( for those of you familiar with Kenmore square I lived behind Bank Boston inithe condos I had a front-row view from my balcony of the Citgo sign and a side view of Fenway). it also put me lesson it also put me about a quarter of a mile (if that,) from where this murder occurred. Every day our comb that passed that say it from my job in Copley and several nights a week I walked home that way from the bars. You talk too many people and if she's friendly like I am you're not rude especially after a few drinks. where's the pizza place like probably a few thousand feet away from my last record where people frequently went and got food on the way home and you know it's near a major intersection but it's secluded it's off to the side. I wasn't cameras there's probably cameras near the major intersection there's probably cameras near the pizza place. there's also a lot of homeless people especially that time of year because it's hot I'm supposed to sleep outside and they're drunk or on drugs. I can see someone coming up an offering a ride homefor asking if she wanted to come back upstairs for a few minutes and have a drink or chill-out have some water you know any scenario could have happened when you were that age don't think you just do your impulsivewe'. Think back at how many stupid situations I put myself in and there was a lot. is it possible there's a pregnancy yes is it possible that someone thought of it if it was in a sexual assault they could get caught so they remove the bottom half of her, yes... Could this have been done to hide pregnancy yeah probably. could this have been done by somebody's son who was involved with BPD or someone's contract law enforcement or politics to make it go away, absolutely. Did it have to be a BU student, no? right there is also 20 other colleges with students all living in that same area. was it the person that I actually was involved in the assault who knows they could have called somebody else in to clean up the mess. I don't think she's buried in someone's backyard I think what was left of her was thrown in the Charles or the Bay. I think there's probably more than one person involved. I think there had to be given the location of where this happened. and possibly even more than one group to pull it off and to keep it unsolved for this long.

 

[MadisonS]

Article from the Boston Globe.

Police officer faced questions in slaying of Swedish nanny

Kahn, Ric . Boston Globe (pre-1997 Fulltext) ; Boston, Mass. [Boston, Mass]07 Nov 1996: B.2.


ABSTRACT (ABSTRACT)

A Boston police officer who dated Swedish nanny Karina Holmer was interviewed by detectives in connection with her killing, according to sources familiar with the investigation.
Holmer, 20, met the officer at Zanzibar, a downtown club where she was seen dancing and drinking in the hours before she disappeared on June 22, the sources said.

A week before Holmer's murder, she and another nanny spent a night in the company of two police officers at one officer's home in West Roxbury, WCVB-TV (Ch. 5) reported last night.

FULL TEXT

A Boston police officer who dated Swedish nanny Karina Holmer was interviewed by detectives in connection with her killing, according to sources familiar with the investigation.
Holmer, 20, met the officer at Zanzibar, a downtown club where she was seen dancing and drinking in the hours before she disappeared on June 22, the sources said.

The officer regularly worked paid details at the club, the sources said. Law enforcement officials have said he is not a suspect.
A week before Holmer's murder, she and another nanny spent a night in the company of two police officers at one officer's home in West Roxbury, WCVB-TV (Ch. 5) reported last night.

The police officer who dated Holmer was one of scores of people interviewed by detectives during more than 1,000 hours of investigative time, according to police and sources.
The sources said the officer was questioned by investigators trying to gather clues about Holmer's personal life. Boston homicide detectives this week said they have new witnesses who have told them that Holmer was seen between 3:30 and 4 on that Saturday morning in front of a Store 24 at Massachusetts Avenue and Haviland Street. Investigators are unsure how she got there or whether she was alone.

Investigators are now focusing on the Fenway, where sources say Holmer may have gone to attend an after-hours party.
Her upper body was found on June 24, a Sunday, in a dumpster one block away from Store 24 by a homeless man rummaging for returnable bottles and cans.

Holmer was strangled and her body was severed with what investigators believe was a saw. Investigators have not found the rest of her body or identified a crime scene.

 

[MadisonS]

Suspect in kidnap of woman free on bail

Ric Kahn and John Ellement, Globe Staff . Boston Globe ; 11 Dec 1996: B.5.


A Brookline man accused of kidnapping and trying to rape a woman he met last weekend at the downtown nightclub Zanzibar was released last night on $5,000 bail.

The man, Gregory Hummel, 34, is a real estate broker with a history of drunken driving and allegations of violence against women, records show.

At a hearing in Boston Municipal Court yesterday, Assistant Suffolk District Attorney Jennifer Rowe argued that Hummel should be held without bail until trial because he was a danger to "young women." Judge Charles Johnson instead set bail at $5,000.

Although the case was not mentioned in court, police authorities said they would like to talk to Hummel in connection with this summer's slaying of Swedish nanny Karina Holmer, whose severed body was discovered after a night out at the same club.

"We're certainly not identifying him as a suspect, but he is someone we are interested in talking to," said Lt. Detective Paul Farrahar, chief of the Boston police homicide unit.

Hummel's lawyer said yesterday that he was never approached by police about the Holmer case during the two hours he spent at the South End police station Sunday after Hummel's arrest.

"The suggestion that they want to speak to him in and of itself is preposterous," said the lawyer, George Hassett. "There has been absolutely no indication whatsoever that he has any ties to that incident. There is no connection whatsoever."

Holmer's upper body was found on June 24 in a dumpster one block away from the Store 24 on Mass. Ave. in the Fenway. She had been strangled, her body severed with what investigators believe was a saw. She had disappeared two days earlier after an evening at Zanzibar.

Authorities say that on Sunday Hummel offered a 24-year-old Newton woman a ride home from Zanzibar, stopped at an apartment he keeps on Harrison Avenue in Roxbury, and dragged her up to his fourth-floor flat, where he tried to rip off her clothes and force her to have sex.

 

[Fred52]

IMO It is highly unlikely that she was dismembered inside any of the medical schools even by a student with access to the gross anatomy lab. Med schools (especially the labs) are incredibly secure facilities, and it has been that way for a long time. There is no way that someone could carry a body into the building undetected even at 3 am on a weekend.

That being said, it's always possible that someone with a medical background might have cut the body in two. At the very least, her killer was quite comfortable (if not skilled) with using a saw to dismember a body.

I read somewhere that a circular saw blade was found in the dumpster along with her body, but I can no longer locate the source. There are many different varieties of circular blades and depending on how specialized it was, it could reveal a lot about the killer.

True but why would he have to carry the body in? He would only have to carry her out after he murdered her inside. But I understand what you mean. I know it's possible she could have been dismembered in an apartment bathtub but the blood and noise would seem almost impossible to disguise. I don't believe a circular saw was ever found with the body because that would have been traced to it's store of origin in all likely hood and eventually to the killer. Also if the killer dismembered her because she would have been easier to remove from the murder scene why dump her in different locations?

 

[MadisonS]

True but why would he have to carry the body in? He would only have to carry her out after he murdered her inside. But I understand what you mean. I know it's possible she could have been dismembered in an apartment bathtub but the blood and noise would seem almost impossible to disguise. I don't believe a circular saw was ever found with the body because that would have been traced to it's store of origin in all likely hood and eventually to the killer. Also if the killer dismembered her because she would have been easier to remove from the murder scene why dump her in different locations?

Med schools are policed by security guards especially after hours. Even if you are are authorized to be there, the guards will check up on you. For that matter, the med schools likely had a lot video surveillance back in the 90s, too. Researchers were often targeted by animal activists and the need for security was pretty high.

Just a blade (not the entire saw) was found in the dumpster and the police never said whether it was connected to the murder. Its presence in the trash might have been purely coincidental. I've located that article and will post the contents later tonight.

I suspect that the killer was disrupted while putting the body in the dumpster behind 1091 Boylston and had to finish disposing of evidence elsewhere. There are a lot of apartment windows that overlook the dumpsters, plus vehicle and pedestrian traffic. There are many things that could have spooked him. I've never understood why the killer dumped her torso right there. He had been so cautious up until that point.

 

[dotr]

Wondering if they ever brought cadaver dogs into the club, would there be a place that such a murder could occur given how loud a club can be?
total speculation, imo.

 

[Fred52]

Med schools are policed by security guards especially after hours. Even if you are are authorized to be there, the guards will check up on you. For that matter, the med schools likely had a lot video surveillance back in the 90s, too. Researchers were often targeted by animal activists and the need for security was pretty high.

Just a blade (not the entire saw) was found in the dumpster and the police never said whether it was connected to the murder. Its presence in the trash might have been purely coincidental. I've located that article and will post the contents later tonight.

I suspect that the killer was disrupted while putting the body in the dumpster behind 1091 Boylston and had to finish disposing of evidence elsewhere. There are a lot of apartment windows that overlook the dumpsters, plus vehicle and pedestrian traffic. There are many things that could have spooked him. I've never understood why the killer dumped her torso right there. He had been so cautious up until that point.

Great info..Thanks! I've always assumed he carried the remains to the dumpster because the murder and dismembering happened locally. If he was driving why would he stop at such a public place? Also a car stopped at that location would be more obvious then someone dropping something off into a dumpster. I suspect the murderer carried one half of the body from the murder scene, dropped it off in this dumpster, returned to get the other half and drop it off in another dumpster.

 

[MadisonS]

Below is the article that mentions the circular saw blade found in the dumpster. If you scroll down, I've highlighted the relevant text in bold print.

A BOSTON AU PAIR'S GRISLY SLAYING STIRS FEARS IN THE NANNY NETWORK

Matza, Michael . Philadelphia Inquirer ; 27 June 1996: A.2.


The murder and mutilation of a Swedish au pair is sending shock waves through the international nanny network. Karina Holmer, 20, who had worked since March in a Boston suburb, was savagely slain and dumped in the city over the weekend in a trauma affecting parents, nannies and the agencies that place them.
``There's no doubt that we'll see a redoubling of efforts to train nannies'' about personal security, said Betsy Weaver, publisher of Parents' Paper, a Boston-based monthly newspaper that carries a nanny and au pair guide. ``It may be that we'll see fewer girls from Sweden in the next few weeks,'' said Bill Gertz, a spokesman for Au Pair in America, a placement agency that promotes itself as ``child care with a cultural flair.''

News of the killing played on the front pages of the Swedish tabloids Expressen and Aftonbladet yesterday, and a spokesman for the Swedish Consulate in Boston said parents there were concerned.
Richard Eisenberg, an attorney whose firm specializes in health insurance for the International Nanny Association, predicted more nannies would begin carrying battery-powered, personal-protection sirens and other security devices.

The killing - so gruesome that even veteran homicide detectives were revulsed - took place after Holmer left Zanzibar, a ritzy downtown nightclub that caters to an international crowd. Among the patrons are many European au pairs, who often arrive after midnight and linger until last call at 2 a.m.
Flashing an apparently fake driver's license, the athletically built Holmer, whose blond, shoulder-length hair was styled in a bun, passed for 21. She entered the Back Bay club on Friday evening. She was last seen early Saturday morning, laughing with friends outside the club around closing time.
Another Swedish au pair who was there has told authorities that she saw Holmer leave with ``an older man'' to go to an ``after-hours party.''
Her torso, stuffed into a black plastic trash bag, was found Sunday afternoon in a Dumpster behind a Boston apartment building. Her legs and pelvis have not been found.
Citing preliminary autopsy results, police believe she was strangled, then cut in half at the waist. Among the evidence retrieved from the Dumpster by detectives wearing plastic gloves and face masks was a metal disk that appeared to be from a circular saw.
Police are reviewing surveillance videotapes of patrons entering and leaving the club. They have twice interviewed Frank Rapp, 43, Holmer's employer.
Rapp, a commercial photographer, his wife, Susan Nichter, and their two children live in a quiet, neatly landscaped townhouse in Dover, a tony suburb west of Boston. He rents a studio workspace in an artist's loft near Fort Point Channel in South Boston. He told police he let Holmer stay there occasionally on weekend nights.
Holmer came to the United States via an illegal nanny broker in Stockholm who apparently did not arrange for her to get a work visa.
``Technically, [she] was an illegal immigrant,'' the broker, Tage Sundin, 46, told Expressen. According to the newspaper, Sundin has twice been convicted and fined by Swedish authorities for operating an employment agency without a permit.

After graduating from high school in the small town of Alaryd in 1994, Holmer went to school to learn the restaurant business. She worked as a waitress and a chef. After winning $1,500 in the Swedish state lottery, she flew off to Boston in March.
Police are reportedly investigating two theories about why the body was severed.
One theory has it that Holmer was forced to have sex with someone who panicked and strangled her when she threatened to report him. By disposing of the lower half of her body, the killer wanted to hide traces of semen, which could link him to the crime through DNA matching.
The other theory is that the body was simply lopped in two for easier transport and disposal.
Credit: By Michael Matza, INQUIRER STAFF WRITER
Illustration
PHOTO (1)
1. Karina Holmer, 20, of Sweden, arrived in the U.S. via an illegal nanny broker.