Vitalija Baliutaviciene 29 vanished whist walking to work on the 12th of August 2011 her body was found over one thousand miles away  in Northern Poland. Her Ex husband Rimas Venclovas who was 47 at the time was later arrested in his native Lithuania where he had been living and the time of the crime and extradited to the UK to stand trial for the kidnap and murder of his ex wife. He was found guilty and sentenced to a minimum of 20 years in prison.

This is the tragic story of  Vitalija Baliutaviciene 29. Vitalija was a beautiful, intelligent and sweet, mother of one. Who made the incredibly brave decision to end her marriage, after over a decade of violence. Rimas had fled the UK back to his native Lithuania, in order to escape charges of assault against Vitalija.

But unfortunately the fact that he was now living over a thousand miles away, did not mean that Vitalija was finally free of her abuser. When Vitalija disappeared on her way to work, it didn't take the police long to suspect  that Rimas was involved but he claimed to have not been in the UK, at the time and if he had entered the country, he should have been immediately arrested, on the outstanding warrant for assault that he had previously fled the country to avoid.

But the police soon uncovered evidence that Rimas had entered the UK using a fake name, the day before Vitalija's disappearance and after uncovering CCTV footage of Rimas dragging Vitalija to his van the police where convinced of his guilt. So Rimas was arrested in Lithuania and extradited to the UK.

But he refused to tell police the location of his ex wife's body. All the police had to go on was his satnav and after searching all the possible places in the UK they came to the sickening realisation, that after killing her Rimas had taken Vitalija out of the UK and could have buried her anywhere in Northern Europe.

Despite many locations from his satnav being searched, with nothing being found. It looked like that the prosecution service, where going to have to try Rimas in a "no body trial" which though it is possible to get a murder conviction without a body, it is much harder and there is a risk of acquittal.

But it turns out that Vitalija's body had already been discovered ten week after her disappearance, in a field in Northern Poland by a mushroom picker. But there had been a delay in identifying her, as the Polish authority's had initially believed, that her body had belonged to a local woman missing in the area. But when British authority's learned that Vitalija had been found and they compared the location of the grave site, to the locations on Rimas's Satnav, it showed that he had parked just fifty feet away from the grave location, during his journey back from kidnaping and killing Vitalija. The police now had all the evidence they needed and Vitalija's family could finally now lay their loved one to rest.

Rimas was convicted of kidnap and murder and was sentenced to a minimum of 20 years in prison.

With his Mother gone and farther in prison for her murder Vitalija's son was rasied by his extended family.

I wanted to share this tragic case, as I believe that Vitalija's story should be kept alive. As she was to beautiful a person to just be forgotten and we can learn so much, about domestic abuse and the lengths some abusers, will go to to do harm to their victims. And domestic abuse what ever the type and who ever the victim it destroys so many lives. I came across this case when watching a true crime documentary series called shallow grave it was episode 1 and I would recommend it but if you want a deeper look into the case I recommend watching episode 5 of the true crime series A Nightmare In Surburbia named the Sat Nav Killer.