About This Episode
The podcast 'Danske Drabssager' dedicates this episode to one of Denmark's most notorious criminal cases from the 1920s. Dagmar Overbye became known as 'the Black Widow' after murdering an unknown number of infants she had taken in for adoption or foster care from desperate, unmarried mothers.
Overbye operated at a time when unmarried mothers were in an extremely vulnerable social position, and she exploited these women's desperate circumstances. She accepted payment to care for the children, but instead of looking after them, she killed them and disposed of the bodies in various ways.
When the case went to trial in 1921, she was convicted of murdering between 9 and 25 children, although the actual number will probably never be known for certain. Dagmar Overbye was sentenced to death, but the sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment.
The episode sheds light not only on the horrific crimes themselves, but also on the social conditions in 1920s Denmark that made such crimes possible. The case of the Black Widow stands as a dark chapter in Danish criminal history, and it also shows how society's attitudes toward unmarried mothers created fertile ground for tragedy.
