crime
Murder charges brought in Ayleen case
A candle and a plaque with the name Ayleen lies on the shore of Teufelsee in Wetteraukreis, Hesse, where the 14-year-old’s body was found. photo
© Frank Rumpenhorst/dpa
The case of a 14-year-old killed in a forest has caused horror across the country. Now a suspect has to answer for his actions in court.
In the case of the killed 14-year-old Ayleen, the Gießen public prosecutor has brought charges of murder against a 30-year-old man. The investigators assume that the act was sexually motivated, as the prosecution announced on Thursday.
During interrogation, the suspect confessed to killing the student. According to the investigation, he picked up the schoolgirl from Baden-Württemberg in a car in southern Baden on the afternoon of July 21, 2022 and brought her to a forest area near Langgöns in the Gießen district. There he is said to have killed the girl shortly before midnight on a dirt road.
The investigators accuse the 30-year-old from Waldsolms in central Hesse of murder, including attempted rape resulting in death and confiscation of minors. Ayleen’s body was found at the end of July 2022 in Teufelsee near Echzell in Hesse, where the suspect had led the investigators after his confession.
After chats on social networks
The case had caused great horror. The suspect and the girl knew each other from weeks of chats on social networks and a well-known online game.
The 30-year-old was convicted of a sex offense as a teenager. As a result, he spent ten years in a psychiatric hospital. By early 2022, the man was in a program for recidivist sex offenders. In the spring he is said to have molested a girl again.
The district court in Gießen must now decide whether to admit the charges; a date for the trial has not yet been set. According to the public prosecutor’s office, a conviction is also about a possible preventive detention for the 30-year-old after the prison sentence.