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The Documentary Podcast

The three babies mystery

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.32.6K Ratings

🗓️ 1 June 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On a cold night in January 2024 a dog walker finds a baby in a bag in east London, UK - a foundling. She is named Elsa, after the Frozen character. Reporter Sanchia Berg begins to follow the case, gaining rare access to the Family Court and to the police investigation. DNA tests reveal Elsa is the sibling of two other babies found abandoned in the same area over recent years. What has happened to the mother?

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

You're listening to the documentary from the BBC World Service.

0:04.7

I'm Sancho Berg and this is the Three Babies Mystery.

0:09.4

Honestly, it's very hard to describe.

0:11.4

Initially, when I got the call from my mom,

0:14.0

I immediately felt that something was off because she's right outside.

0:18.6

And as soon as she picked up, she said,

0:20.0

like, I need you guys to come down here right away.

0:21.9

And she said, I think I found a baby.

0:27.7

My name is Akvilias Valao's wife.

0:35.6

Akvila's mother, Rima, is speaking to us on the phone in Lithuanian.

0:41.6

Together they remember a freezing cold night in January 2019 in East London.

0:50.0

She said there was not like not a soul around.

0:54.0

It wasn't like pouring down, but it was like a drizzle that just kind of gets you to the bone.

1:00.5

So we lived on a short road.

1:02.8

We lived in the very first house and just a 30 second walk outside our front door was this little playground park where we would take our little

1:13.4

dog out for walks, usually in the evenings.

1:17.3

When they were trying to leave and my mom kept calling my dog over and he usually listens very

1:24.9

well.

1:25.3

But this one instance, he would not listen.

1:27.0

He kept circling the bag, a bag for life, Sainsbury's bag.

1:31.7

Yeah, I remember very well it was a Sainsbury's bag.

1:34.3

So she called, she kept calling him over, and she went up to him to try to put the leash on him,

...

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