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CRIME

Naked man sparks police chopper search

Bavarian cops took a naked, half-frozen man into custody on Thursday after several complaints sparked an elaborate hunt involving a police helicopter.

Published: 30 October 2008 15:04 CET
Naked man sparks police chopper search
No glass slippers for this wood sprite. Photo: DPA

Reports that a man in his birthday suit was on the prowl between Rednitzhembach and Büchenbach reached the police early in the morning. They found him with the help of a chopper by 9:30 am, still naked and suffering from exposure on what has been one of Germany’s chilliest nights this autumn.

The 48-year-old man, apparently homeless, had a body temperature of 32 degrees Celsius (89.6 Fahrenheit).

Police said they had already made contact with the man at 2 am the night before, when he’d been caught stealing garden shoes and a pumpkin. The authorities let him go the first time, but unfortunately there were no glass slippers or pumpkin coaches for the man, who was transported to a hospital in Rother instead of the castle ball.

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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