Murder attempt on children
The knife stabber from Duisburg was known as a risky person – a bloody crime could have been prevented
Police officers in Duisburg: Without a communication breakdown, the knife attack on two children would probably not have happened
© DPA
A few weeks after the knife attack on two elementary school children in Duisburg, there are new details. And they don’t reflect well on the police and the judiciary. There was an embarrassing breakdown – with dramatic consequences.
The suspect told a doctor in February 2023 that he had committed an act of violence against his mother, according to the report published on Thursday. He was then included in the Periscope early warning system (people with potential for risk).
Authorities were not informed of murder plans in a timely manner
After reconciling with his mother and then living together without violence, he was deported again in October 2023. In January 2024, two cases of domestic violence against his mother became known. The supervisory authority will examine whether the accused should have been reclassified as a person with potential risk in view of these incidents.
In the same month, on January 8th, the 21-year-old is said to have announced a murder in a chat to a witness in Bavaria that would take place in September 2024. However, the police in Duisburg did not receive this information in time. “According to the current reporting situation, we had no information whatsoever,” said North Rhine-Westphalia Interior Minister Herbert Reul (CDU). Attempts are still being made to determine why an investigating judge who wanted to inform the police could not reach them by telephone.
The Bavarian police identified the suspect as the sender of the chat message and initially passed the investigation files on to the Regensburg public prosecutor’s office. From there the matter was forwarded to the Duisburg public prosecutor’s office. Ultimately, the investigators there obtained a search warrant against the 21-year-old German-Bulgarian, but it was not implemented before the attack at the end of February.
Communication breakdown in the judiciary in North Rhine-Westphalia
According to the report, the supervisory authority is investigating whether there were delays in the judicial authorities in North Rhine-Westphalia due to an incorrectly entered file number, a lack of telephone warning and documents that were not provided.
While the Ministry of Justice in Düsseldorf states that the “cover sheet for sending” from Bavaria did not indicate any particular urgency, the Regensburg public prosecutor’s office emphasized on Thursday that the files on the suspect were forwarded with the note “URGIVE” at the top right of the delivery order .
In addition, the date on which investigation files in the case were sent from the police in Straubing to the Straubing branch of the Regensburg public prosecutor’s office was incorrectly stated in the report, said a spokesman for the investigative authority in Straubing. The report mentioned January 19th, but the police investigation was only completed on January 29th. The files only ended up at the public prosecutor’s office on February 5th.
The NRW Ministry of Justice has now admitted that January 19th was a typographical error. The correct date is January 29th. In the case of an urgent notice, the statement refers to the cover sheet, not to the delivery order.
SPD criticizes state government
“The state government’s report was a complete oath of revelation for both the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Justice,” criticized SPD MP Christina Kampmann. “Nobody wanted to take responsibility for this disaster. Instead, everyone tried to find fault in others. There are still a lot of things that urgently need to be clarified.”
“If there is a concrete indication from a citizen of a threat, then it must not take 51 days for the responsible authorities to take concrete measures,” added SPD MP Sven Wolf. “Especially not when the threat actor is a person known to the police.” The periscope concept is intended to be used to immediately detect ticking time bombs. “Apparently this time bomb sat on desks for more than seven weeks without anyone hearing it tick.”
An arrest warrant had been issued against the alleged attacker for two counts of attempted murder. The Duisburg public prosecutor’s office announced that the arrest warrant had now been converted into a so-called detention order. The suspect has been in a psychiatric hospital since Tuesday. During the course of the investigation, doubts arose about his guilt. The two children whose heads the man stabbed had been able to leave the hospital by now, the report said.