# Calgary Woman Found Dead In NE Home Killed Her Own Infants: Police



## Archived_Member16 (Apr 30, 2010)

source: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Calgary+woman+found+dead+home+killed+infants+police/2965725/story.html

*Calgary woman found dead in NE*
*home killed her own infants: police*

By Sherri Zickefoose, Calgary Herald - April 29, 2010

CALGARY - A woman who murdered and concealed the rotting bodies of her three dead babies died after complications of a secret home delivery, police say.

Harsimrat "Simmi" Kahlon, 27, committed infanticide on her own, killing her own babies and concealing their decomposing bodies in bags and containers after three separate births since 2005, police are revealing today as they wrap up their investigation.

Every indication is that Kahlon's common-law husband, co-workers and family were unaware of her pregnancies, as she went to great lengths to conceal them, police say.

Investigators holding a press conference Thursday morning to release new information.

Kahlon's body was discovered by her boyfriend in their northeast basement suite on Taracove Estates Drive N.E. last October.

The badly decomposed bodies of her three secret babies were discovered afterwards.

Kahlon died from complications within weeks of giving birth, investigators say.

Police say no other person was involved, and no charges will be laid.

Months before Kahlon was found dead in her basement suite with the hidden bodies of three newborn babies, she told her live-in boyfriend she'd had an abortion.

However, police believe, based on search warrants obtained by the Herald, two of the babies were actually delivered at home by the woman.

The search warrant reveals that Kahlon's live-in boyfriend told investigators he knew she was pregnant last spring, but believed she had had an abortion.
But Kahlon had been pregnant before. In 2005, the woman gave birth to a healthy daughter she named Reet at Peter Lougheed Centre.

In the summer of 2009, two more babies were born inside Kahlon's northeast Calgary basement suite. She never named those children. Police Insp. Guy Slater told a press conference today the father of the first baby born in hospital may not know about that pregnancy,

Two to three months before the 27-year-old woman was found dead, Kahlon frequently sprayed air freshener to mask the putrid smell of the tiny decomposing bodies and bloodied towels wrapped in layers of garbage bags, according to the warrants.

Reet's body was hidden inside a suitcase.

The other two shared a box.

Kahlon, called Simmi by friends, visited a doctor last April and inquired about an abortion, the document says. She missed her appointment, but told her boyfriend she was no longer pregnant, he told detectives.

Instead, investigators believed Kahlon concealed her pregnancy and the home birth of her children.

The grisly evidence unfolded when Kahlon was discovered dead at home by her boyfriend. Harnet Mahal. Oct. 4, 2009, in their shared rented basement suite.
The couple lived in separate bedrooms, the warrant says. While sorting through Kahlon's belongings the next day, Mahal opened a suitcase that contained a decaying baby girl. It was Reet, still wearing a hospital ID bracelet. The name of the baby's father, a different boyfriend from Mahal, doesn't appear on hospital papers.

A few hours later, another unthinkable discovery was made. Mahal's sister found another dead baby boy in a box.

When the medical examiner opened that bag, there were actually two dead infants and one placenta found inside.

There are few answers about Kahlon's life leading up to the deaths, and whether she was an unwilling mother of unwanted babies.

Police now say, after studying the dead woman's diary, that she suffered from depression and borderline personality disorder. "We will never have all the answers," said Insp.Slater.

Family, friends and co-workers say they were shocked to learn Kahlon had been pregnant and given birth.

Kahlon grew up in Chandigarh, India, and came to Calgary to live with relatives in 1999.

Kahlon left her aunt and uncle's Martindale home before she gave birth to Reet.

Relatives said they knew nothing of a pregnancy, and "had no contact with her," despite living in a nearby neighbourhood.

Kahlon first lived in a Falconridge basement suite before moving to Taradale with her boyfriend in 2006.

Neighbours along the family-lined street say the couple kept to themselves and they saw no evidence of children at the residence.

Kahlon, who worked as a receptionist for a law office, was described as a hard worker who seemed happy.

szickefoose@theherald.canwest.com

© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald


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## Mai Harinder Kaur (Apr 30, 2010)

This is a horror story that could have been written by Edgar Allen Poe or Stephan King.  Is it really true?

The first question that came to my mind is how could she possibly have hidden her pregnancies?  Maybe from her co-workers and friends, but surely not from her boyfriend.  Without getting explicit, he had to have seen the changes in her body.  Something is really fishy here.

Another question that is unanswered is:  Did no one have any curiosity about what happened to Reet?  People knew that this baby existed and then she disappeared.  Babies do not simply disappear.

These two questions seem to point to some involvement by the boyfriend.

This young woman was obviously deeply disturbed.  I cannot help but wonder, if she had received understanding and treatment from her family, could this whole tragedy have been avoided?  I'm sorry, I just can't go on.


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## Archived_Member16 (Apr 30, 2010)

Mai Harinder Kaur said:


> This young woman was obviously deeply disturbed. I cannot help but wonder, if she had received understanding and treatment from her family, could this whole tragedy have been avoided? QUOTE]
> 
> Truly sad & horror news. It would appear that most people, relatives or friends no longer "CARE" in this era of Kaljug about a fellow human being. The poor soul suffered alone in silence!
> 
> May Waheguru Ji Bless all the departed souls!


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## Tejwant Singh (Apr 30, 2010)

Soul_Jyot ji,

Guru Fateh.

What happened to this woman is tragic and sad.

I respect your Sikhi quest and your devotion and dedication but let's not mislead people by twisting Gurbani and start playing Ik Ong Kaar by interpreting this beautiful Gurbani in our own ways to justify this tragedy which has nothing to do with Sikhi no matter how much we try and concoct our own views while claiming it to be our Gurus'. It is insulting to our Gurus' vision and also to Gurbani.

you write:



> Truly sad & horror news. It would appear that most people, relatives or friends no longer "CARE" in this era of *Kaljug* about a fellow human being. The poor soul suffered alone in silence!


All these yugs  in Gurbani are used as metaphors by our Gurus.There is nothing real about them. For you to use _*Kalyug *_as part of Sikhi is not only incorrect but also misleading.These yugs belong to the Hindutva and are imaginary eras. There is nothing real about them.Thus,they have nothing to do with Sikhi. There is an essay written about them and is posted on this forum. Gyani ji has also mentioned about them as being imaginary in many of his posts as well. Please check them.

Our Gurus were visionaries and too intelligent to believe in this kind of nonsense.

Our Gurus gave us the tools to get rid of these superstitions and let's take the best out of them.

Regards

Tejwant Singh


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## Mai Harinder Kaur (May 1, 2010)

*A few more details - and a picture.
*



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 					 <!-- legoctl: ctl01 --><!-- CACHE MISS: story0 -->  *Diary details Calgary mom's  torment before she killed her babies*




By Valerie Fortney, Calgary HeraldApril 30, 2010




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*27-year-old  Harsimrat Kahlon, known to friends and family as Simmi, was found dead  in her northeast basement suite in October of 2009, the victim of  post-birth complications.*

*Photograph by: Archive,  Calgary Herald*




She wrote of feeling worthless,  of her steadily deteriorating emotional state and lack of hope.
Yet  she never devoted an ounce of ink to her babies, three innocent little  souls who, by all accounts, departed this earth not long after letting  out their first cries.
In a case no less upsetting and confounding  today than when it first came to light -- that, in the end, receives  closure, thanks to highly educated guesses but no absolute certainty --  it was Harsimrat Kahlon's diary that gave the best clues to what was in,  and what was conspicuously absent from, her heart.
The  27-year-old woman, known to friends and family as Simmi, was found dead  in her northeast basement suite in October of 2009, the victim of  post-birth complications.
Over the next few days, unlucky family  members, and police officers, stumbled onto an even greater tragedy: the  decomposing bodies of three babies, concealed in airtight containers  hidden in suitcases.
The horrifying discovery shocked an entire  city.
How could her friends, her co-workers, even her trucker  boyfriend, not have known she was pregnant on any of these occasions,  let alone even suspect a tragedy of such unimaginable proportions was  unfolding over the last few years?
As I wait with a group of  fellow media in a conference room at the Calgary Police Service's  downtown headquarters, my mind is filled with these and other questions.
Insp.  Guy Slater of the CPS speaks first, explaining that some of the  mysteries have now been solved: DNA proves all the babies, a boy and two  girls, were Simmi's; that one of those babies, a girl named Reet, was a  confirmed live birth at a local hospital in 2005; and that after  extensive questioning, all are satisfied that the troubled woman had no  accomplices in what is being labelled a case of infanticide.
But  it was Simmi herself, her personal torment scrawled into a diary, that  provided the biggest piece of the puzzle.
The native of  Chandigarh, a pretty town in India's Punjabi state, was not a victim of  her culture and religion, acting out extreme beliefs — which are  explicitly forbidden by the Sikh faith — that female children are a  burden because of the prohibitive cost of dowries, or that pregnant,  single women are a shame on society
Indeed, her actions horrified  our city's fervently family-oriented Indo-Canadian community even more.
Many  of them knew that this horrifying incident would cast a pall on an  immigrant population often described as one of Canada's most successful,  as people searched for answers to how a young woman could kill her own.
No,  it was a mental disorder, says an expert in such matters, that most  likely led to the years of deception and death that Simmi has left as  her legacy.
According to University of Calgary adjunct professor  Thomas Dalby, Simmi was a clear case of borderline personality disorder,  which is found in about four per cent of the population and can vary  from experiencing unstable relationships and emotions to psychotic  breaks that can unleash the most unthinkable and inexplicable criminal  behaviour.
In a rare case made even more rare by the death of the  mother, Dalby explains the unique challenges of what he calls "a  psychological autopsy," gaining insight into a deceased individual's  mental state by interviewing those who knew her best.
At best, he  reminds us, we can only have "a strong hypothesis" and no scientific  certainty that she was suffering from borderline personality disorder.
Even  though he's had numerous experiences dealing with infanticide, it's  clear Dalby is still affected by such incidents, as he visibly winces  when describing why Simmi kept the dead babies near her: "a terror of  being abandoned . . . she had a theoretical attachment to them."
In  life, the administrative assistant who worked in a law office  apparently chose to suffer in silence, and managed to fool everyone: her  friends and relatives saw her as "very happy;" her co-workers described  her as "friendly;" and her landlord, whose comment last fall that he  "never heard babies crying," was perhaps the most disturbing of all.
But  in death, her written words gave her away, and offered a team of  hard-working police officers and psychologists at least a strong  hypothesis as to how, and why, such an unimaginable thing could happen.  That's as certain as it's ever going to get.
vfortney@theherald.  canwest.com
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald_


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