A whole night and morning, emergency services in Wunstorf near Hanover searched for a missing 14-year-old. On Wednesday afternoon there was sad certainty: officials discovered the body of the young person on a wasteland on the edge of a field in the Blumenau district.
As part of the investigation, a friend of the boy's age told the police that he had killed and hidden him, police and prosecutors said on Wednesday. The boy had not returned home on Tuesday after a date.
The youth suspect was arrested on Wednesday and is being investigated on suspicion of manslaughter. Officials initially had no information about his motive.
There was still hope until the end
The 14-year-old's father reported his son missing around 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday. He had not returned home after meeting a 14-year-old from Wunstorf. According to the police, it is still the subject of the investigation whether the boy had made an appointment with the later perpetrator or with another person of the same age. According to a police spokesman, the officials initially assumed that there was a missing person, then the turn came at night. The testimony of the man who had been arrested meanwhile suggested a homicide. However, in the morning, officials still had hope of finding the missing person alive.
In the search with a large contingent of police immediately after his disappearance, personal tracking dogs and a police helicopter were also used. After the friend said he had killed the 14-year-old, the search was expanded. Firefighters and hundreds of police combed the Lutherforst, a wooded area near Wunstorf. The search continued through the night. The boy's body was eventually found by emergency services about three kilometers from the wooded area.
Because of the police operation, the Hanover railway line in the direction of Minden or Nienburg was temporarily closed in the morning. According to Deutsche Bahn, there were delays and cancellations. Regional trains and all ICE and IC trains on the route between Minden in Westphalia and Bremen and Hanover were affected.
Horror and sadness in the small town
Because it is a very young suspect, his interests worthy of protection must be considered, said a police spokesman. Among other things, he could only be questioned in the presence of his parents. According to criminologists, homicides involving very young suspects are not common. In Braunschweig, however, a 14-year-old has been on trial since the end of December. Together with a classmate who was 13 at the time, he is said to have insidiously murdered a 15-year-old girl from Salzgitter.
In the small town near the Steinhuder Meer, the crime quickly became a topic of conversation. "We read about it on the Internet and last night saw the search helicopter take off," said an elderly woman in front of a supermarket in Wunstorf. "It's quite awful." She has great sympathy for the relatives of the victim and also the alleged perpetrator. "I imagine that's horrible, I get goosebumps right away. I always thought something like that wouldn't happen with us in Wunstorf," said the woman, who didn't want to read her name in the media.
Another woman in front of the supermarket asked herself whether violence among young people had increased. "Of course there are fights, but if people are killed here now, that's a different story," she said. A student on the street was shocked by the news. She said: "We heard it on the news, otherwise we don't know anything about it yet. It feels weird."
