exclusive
In the summer of 2022, an undercover agent for the Frankfurt police was murdered in Spain. Now in Turkey, according to research by WDR and NDR a suspect arrested.
For the Spanish police, it was initially not an unusual case: a brutal murder in a drug environment, which actually happens more often on the Costa del Sol. In June 2022, a body was discovered in a holiday resort in Marbella in southern Spain: a man tied to a chair with a plastic wrap wrapped around his head. He was killed with several shots.
The dead man is Aleksandar K., a 34-year-old Serb who last lived in Offenbach, Hesse – and was working as an undercover agent for the Frankfurt criminal police at the time of his murder WDR and NDR had researched last year.
For years, K. had provided the German investigators with information from the drug world: about smuggler networks that are said to have brought cannabis and cocaine from Spain to Germany. While he was spying for the German police, K. himself is said to have organized large-scale drug transports.
Exact circumstances unclear
The police informant is said to have been tortured before his death. Apparently he was murdered because his spying activities were exposed. However, the exact circumstances of the murder have not been clarified to this day. In any case, the suspects, who come from Germany, were able to flee abroad. The Spanish investigators were able to quickly establish their identities using surveillance camera recordings and fingerprints, among other things, and put them on an international wanted list.
According to information from WDR and NDR One of the suspects has now been arrested in Türkiye. It is Tolga S., who is said to be a member of a German branch of the Hells Angels. Aleksandar K. is said to have owed Tolga S. money, presumably from drug deals.
Tolga S. is said to have initially been detained by the Turkish police for another crime, but a check then revealed that the man was wanted by the Spanish judiciary with an international arrest warrant.
Suspected accomplices on the run
A spokesman for the Spanish judicial authorities confirmed an arrest in the case upon request. Learned from circles at the Spanish Policía Nacional NDR and WDRthat Tolga S. was transferred from Turkey to Málaga on April 8th. Tolga S. is now facing charges in Spain for the murder of Aleksandar K. The alleged accomplices are still on the run.
In Germany, the Hanau public prosecutor initially investigated the case. In the meantime, however, the proceedings have been discontinued, as a spokesman for the authority announced, “since all possible investigations in the Federal Republic of Germany have been carried out and therefore there are no further avenues for investigation.” The previous findings on the murder case had been transmitted to the Spanish authorities through legal assistance.
The case of the dead informant is already occupying courts in Hesse, because the information that Aleksandar K. provided to the Frankfurt investigators is said to have been incorporated into several cases against drug networks. Among other things in Giessen Trials are currently underway against several people who are accused of commercial trafficking in drugs. Some of them were former business partners of K. There are indications that the Frankfurt police may have slowed down investigations against the informant, presumably to protect their source.
Stricter rules for informants planned
The federal government would like to regulate the use of informants by the police more strictly. A corresponding draft law, which was developed under the leadership of the FDP-led Federal Ministry of Justice, is now available. The suggestion, for example, to limit the use of undercover agents in time, to approve them in advance through a judicial review and to extensively record the statements of informants, has also met with criticism.
In recent months, police unions in particular have expressed concern that such a law would make the use of human sources almost impossible, as it would hardly be possible to recruit people under these conditions and there would even be a risk that the undercover agents would be exposed. Recruited and paid informants are considered an important investigative tool, particularly in the area of organized crime and state security.
Farewell uncertain
Proponents of a legal regulation, however, argue that the recruitment, management and elimination of sources by the police has not yet been regulated uniformly by law. How such an operation works is essentially based on the service regulations of the state and federal police authorities – in contrast to the sources of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, for example, whose use is clearly regulated by the law.
The current draft law, which was passed in the Traffic Light Coalition cabinet in mid-March, is now to be presented to the Federal Council for discussion at the end of April before it goes to the Bundestag. Lower Saxony has already submitted an application to reject the law completely.