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Man arrested for murder 31 years later

A 76-year-old German man suspected of the brutal rape and murder of an 86-year-old woman has been arrested on the basis of DNA evidence re-examined more than 31 years after the crime, police said Friday.

Published: 9 January 2009 17:37 CET

The woman was sexually assaulted and strangled in September 1977 not far from her home in the southern German town of Roth. Despite offering a substantial reward and investigating 2,000 potential suspects, police were unable to solve the grisly crime until the case was reopened in April 2008.

It emerged that the suspect’s DNA – which he had given in connection with another enquiry – matched traces found on the victim’s clothing. The man was taken into police custody on December 29.

“The 76-year-old from Roth is now being held in custody. He has refused to talk about the crime,” police said in a statement.

German police swoop on gang of foreign dating scammers

The Black Axe gang was involved internationally in “multiple areas of criminal activity”, with a focus in Germany on romance scams and money-laundering, Bavarian police said in a statement.

The dating trick was a “modern form of marriage fraud”, police said.

“Using false identities, the fraudsters for example signalled their intention to marry and in the course of further contact repeatedly demand money under various pretexts,” police said.

The money was subsequently transferred to Black Axe in Nigeria “via financial agents”, authorities said.

In the process, the gang used a “commodity-based money laundering” scheme where products, often with a seeming “charitable purpose” were bought and delivered to Nigeria.

Some 450 cases of romance scamming had been reported in the region of Bavaria in 2023 alone, with the damages rising to 5.3 million euros ($5.7 million), police said.

The suspects, who all held Nigerian citizenship and were aged between 29 and 53, were arrested in nationwide raids on Tuesday.

Law enforcement swooped on 19 properties, including both homes and asylum shelters, police said.

The Black Axe gang had “strict hierarchical structures under leadership in Nigeria” operating different territorial units, police said.

The group had a “significant influence” on politics and public administrations, in particular in Nigeria.

Globally, the gang’s main areas of operation were “human-trafficking, fraud, money-laundering, prostitution and drug-trafficking”.

Black Axe operated under the cover of the Neo Black Movement of Africa, an ostensibly charitable organisation used as “camouflage” for the gang’s structures.

The action against Black Axe was the first of its kind in Germany, police said.

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