Europe's news in English

COPY LINK

CRIME

Three dead at Berlin tower block

UPDATE: A man fell to his death from the balcony of a Berlin tower block on Monday night after the bodies of his partner and her child were found in his flat. He had reportedly been living with the bodies in the apartment for three days.

Published: 6 May 2014 08:43 CEST

Three dead at Berlin tower block

An officer stands outside the tower block on Monday night. Photo: DPA

The woman’s mother became concerned that she had not heard from her daughter, 41, or grandson, 10, and visited their home in Lichtenberg, eastern Berlin.

But when she arrived at the tower block she found the two bodies and her daughter’s partner. The 46-year-old man then ran to the balcony and fell to his death in front of the grandmother.

Police said it appeared that he had strangled the woman and her son to death.

Officers closed off the area around the apartments and a murder squad is investigating the deaths of the mother and son.

SEE ALSO: Woman decomposed on bathroom floor

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.

Become a Member to leave a comment.

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.

Url copied to clipboard!