Status: 26/09/2023, 13:44 p.m.
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Policemen are standing in the village. After the violent death of a six-year-old boy in the southeast of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the police have arrested a 14-year-old suspect. © Stefan Sauer/dpa
There are new findings on the death of a six-year-old in a small village near Neubrandenburg. A 14-year-old from the village is in custody on "urgent suspicion". He has been silent so far.
Pragsdorf - After the killing of a six-year-old boy from Pragsdorf near Neubrandenburg, a suspect has been identified. The 14-year-old was arrested on Tuesday and was remanded in custody on suspicion of manslaughter. During the presentation to the magistrate, the young person did not provide any information on the advice of his lawyer, said a spokeswoman for the Neubrandenburg district court of the German Press Agency. However, there was "an urgent suspicion" that the arrested man stabbed the child. The motive of the German was still unclear, it was said by the police.
The six-year-old victim had gone to play at a football field in Pragsdorf on September 14, but did not come home at the agreed time. The parents reported the boy missing after a short search in vain. In the evening, he was found by firefighters with severe stab wounds in a hedge at the football field. He lay unconscious in a hiding place that the children had built there. Attempts to revive the boy were unsuccessful.
The police immediately searched for the murder weapon, a knife, with a large contingent. Even then, the suspect had caught the eye of the investigators. However, a search of the family's apartment because of the murder weapon had not yet substantiated the suspicion at the time. The knife was later found in a scrub.
Now, forensic investigations by the State Criminal Police Office MV led to the suspect, a police spokeswoman said. According to police, the 14-year-old was also the last person who had seen the victim alive at the football field. During interrogations, he had then become entangled in contradictions after several days, it was said. In addition, DNA traces were found on the clothing of the deceased and on the knife, which can now be assigned "with a very high degree of probability to the 14-year-old".
That was enough for the district court: At noon, it issued a pre-trial detention order against the 14-year-old, who had been arrested in the morning in the family's apartment. He had apparently stopped going to school.
After the arrest of the teenager, Pragsdorf's mayor Ralf Opitz was relieved. "This is a relief for all residents, but questions remain," Opitz said on Tuesday in Pragsdorf. What is going on in a person to kill a six-year-old?, the mayor asked. In two places in the village, mourning candles and stuffed animals commemorate the killed. Dpa