About This Episode
This episode of the Danish true crime podcast Danske Kriminalsager ("Danish Criminal Cases") examines the notorious Spider Case, in which a Danish woman was convicted of poisoning several people in her close circle. It is the first instalment of a two-part series devoted to how the crimes were exposed.
The case shook Denmark when it emerged that the perpetrator had poisoned her victims over a period of years using rat poison and other toxic substances. The nickname attached to the case comes from the calculating way the woman spun her web around those around her before striking.
The episode works systematically through how police and the health service gradually became aware of the suspicious deaths and illnesses. It describes the first suspicions, which arose when doctors began to see a pattern in the symptoms of several patients who all had a connection to the same woman.
Drawing on interviews, archive material and expert assessments, the programme lays out the extensive investigative work that eventually revealed the grim truth. Part one concentrates on those early warning signs and on the inquiry that would turn out to be the beginning of one of the most complicated serial crime cases in Danish criminal history.
