For more than a year, the investigation into the boy found dead in the Danube has been a mystery to the investigators at the Ingolstadt police station. Cooperation with the international criminal police organization Interpol could now bring new investigative successes. The police cooperation of the Free State with Interpol and the 100th anniversary of the organization were now celebrated with a ceremony in the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior. The “Fluvius” case was also a topic at the event.
In May last year, a canoeist discovered a dead boy in the Danube near Großmehring, east of Ingolstadt, Chief Inspector Michael Eiglsperger recalls finding the child. Wrapped in plastic and with a cobblestone on the foot, the child was sunk in the river. The investigators assume a violent crime and have been trying in vain to find out the boy’s identity ever since. It is only known that the body is a boy between five and six years old, who is about 1.10 meters tall and weighs about 15 kilos. Investigators were also able to determine that the boy has type 0 blood. Despite intensive investigations, the boy’s identity remains unclear, reports Eiglsperger.
The “Fluvius investigation group” is now hoping for new insights from the cooperation between the State Criminal Police Office and the intergovernmental organization Interpol, reports the Chief Inspector. With the help of a facial reconstruction of the dead boy, the boy’s identity is now being sought internationally in addition to the national and regional investigations. At the request of the German authorities, an appeal was sent to Interpol member states for information to identify the dead boy.
Joint searches by the Free State and Interpol have often led to success in the past. The Bavarian police benefit from Interpol, for example, through access to the international property search database. It stores 116 million records of lost, stolen or invalidated passports and identification documents that officers can access when searching for missing persons or fugitives. Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann is therefore “firmly determined to further intensify cooperation with Interpol”.
In the “Fluvius” case, too, cooperation with Interpol should bring about a breakthrough in the investigation. Despite a search by the Federal Criminal Police Office with ads on information screens and a contribution to the ZDF television program “Aktenzeichen XY… unsolved”, the investigators were still unable to report a breakthrough more than a year after the body was found. All of the authority’s capacities will be used to identify the boy, said Interpol Secretary General Jürgen Stock. Anyone who believes the boy may have been a family member can have a DNA kinship match done through national police agencies and Interpol.