crime
Dismembered body found – two men in custody
Police officers found a dismembered body in an apartment in a prefabricated housing estate in Greifswald. photo
© Stefan Sauer/dpa
After a gruesome discovery in an apartment in Greifswald, many questions remain unanswered. According to police, a man was killed and dismembered. Two men are in custody. The motive is unclear – as is the identity of the victim.
Blue skies stretch over the prefabricated buildings in the southeast on Monday morning Greifswald. The trees are colored in autumn. There is nothing in the residential area in northeastern Germany to indicate the gruesome discovery that police officers made in one of the apartments at the weekend. On Saturday evening they found a dismembered body.
“What happened was pretty obvious,” said a police spokeswoman on Monday. It was clear from the start that the man, who had not yet been conclusively identified, had been killed in the apartment – “and then the body was dismembered.”
The police know how the man was killed, but cannot say for tactical reasons. An attempt was then made to remove the body with the help of other people.
This made the police aware of the crime. According to earlier reports, two men contacted her who had been asked to help transport someone who had been killed. The body is in an apartment, dismantled into individual parts. There are photos. Officers then drove to the specified apartment.
“There were a lot of individual parts,” a police spokeswoman said at the weekend. A 27-year-old suspect was arrested immediately, the other, a 28-year-old, was able to escape, but reported himself on Sunday and was arrested without resistance in a public parking lot. As a precaution, according to the police, special forces from the State Criminal Police Office were also called in.
Both are now in custody. The motive remains unclear, the police spokeswoman said on Monday. The two Germans are known to the police in many cases, including for assault. It is also assumed that the victim and suspect knew each other. “We don’t yet know to what extent, how closely, or by what means. But at the moment we are not assuming that someone completely stranger was lured into the apartment.” According to the police, the suspects and the men who were contacted about the removal definitely knew each other.
The police assume that the violent act occurred on Friday. To clarify the exact identity of the victim, she relies on forensic medicine, for example by comparing fingerprints. A result can be expected in the coming days, said the police spokeswoman.