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CRIME

Police in Freiburg make 8 arrests over ‘worst child abuse case in state history’

A mother who allegedly sold her young son for sex has been arrested along with six other suspects in a case being described as the most serious child sex abuse investigation in the history of Baden-Württemberg.

Published: 11 January 2018 17:23 CET
Police in Freiburg make 8 arrests over 'worst child abuse case in state history'
Photo: DPA
Investigators in several European countries have arrested eight suspects following the alleged rape of a nine-year-old. The investigation will focus on the 47-year-old mother of the boy and her 37-year-old partner, the public prosecutor's office in Freiburg announced on Thursday. Both lived near Freiburg. They are said to have sexually abused the child together and made him available to other men for rape in exchange for money.
 
The boy has been freed by the authorities and is now in state care.
 
This is the most serious case of sexual abuse of a child ever handled by the State Criminal Police Office of Baden-Württemberg, a spokesman for the authority said. The dimensions of the crime go beyond any case that has previously been investigated in the state, he added.
 
The boy was repeatedly abused and raped by several perpetrators at several crime scenes in and around Freiburg. There are other victims besides the boy. Among them is a girl who had been sexually abused by her own father. He has also been arrested.
 
Police reportedly launched the investigation last September following an anonymous tip-off. Among the suspects is a 49-year-old Bundeswehr soldier, who was arrested in his barracks in the French region of Alsace.
 
The other men in custody were between 32 and 43 years old. According to the investigators, they come from near Freiburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Switzerland and Spain. Some of them have previous convictions for similar offences. According to sources, some of the suspects have cooperated with investigators. The public prosecutor's office has not given any further details.

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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