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CRIME

Ex axes door and stabs two

A stalker in the German town of Dinklage broke down his ex-girlfriend's balcony door with an axe before stabbing her to death on Tuesday. He then wounded his own sister and fled.

Published: 12 March 2008 15:07 CET

After using an axe to break down the door, the man stabbed both his 27-year-old ex-girlfriend and his sister, who happened to be visiting at the time, police said on Wednesday.

The suspect is father to two children who were also in the apartment along with a male visitor. He threatened to kill everyone in the apartment because he wasn’t allowed to see the children. When the male visitor brought the children to safety, the suspect stabbed the two women.

The 37-year-old man’s ex-girlfriend died shortly thereafter in the hospital. According to police, his sister’s wounds are not life threatening, though she remains hospitalized.

The fleeing suspect resisted arrest and was subdued with a bite from a police dog, officials said. He has refused to discuss the incident with police in the German state of Lower Saxony.

The man’s violent behavior had already aroused concern in February, and he was under a police restraining order not to go near the woman’s apartment. Family members are receiving psychological care, police said.

CRIME

Teenager turns self in after attack on German politician

A 17-year-old has turned himself in to police in Germany after an attack on a lawmaker that the country's leaders decried as a threat to democracy.

Published: 5 May 2024 12:52 CEST
Teenager turns self in after attack on German politician

The teenager reported to police in the eastern city of Dresden early Sunday morning and said he was “the perpetrator who had knocked down the SPD politician”, police said in a statement.

Matthias Ecke, 41, European parliament lawmaker for Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD), was set upon by four attackers as he put up EU election posters in Dresden on Friday night, according to police.

Ecke was “seriously injured” and required an operation after the attack, his party said.

Scholz on Saturday condemned the attack as a threat to democracy.

“We must never accept such acts of violence,” he said.

Ecke, who is head of the SPD’s European election list in the Saxony region, was just the latest political target to be attacked in Germany.

Police said a 28-year-old man putting up posters for the Greens had been “punched” and “kicked” earlier in the evening on the same Dresden street.

Last week two Greens deputies were abused while campaigning in Essen in western Germany and another was surrounded by dozens of demonstrators in her car in the east of the country.

According to provisional police figures, 2,790 crimes were committed against politicians in Germany in 2023, up from 1,806 the previous year, but less than the 2,840 recorded in 2021, when legislative elections took place.

A group of activists against the far right has called for demonstrations against the attack on Ecke in Dresden and Berlin on Sunday, Der Spiegel magazine said.

According to the Tagesspiegel newspaper, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser is planning to call a special conference with Germany’s regional interior ministers next week to address violence against politicians.

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