As of: March 27, 2024, 4:59 a.m
By: Peter Sieben
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Police officer Sabrina Viek has been working in the north of Duisburg for years.
© Peter Sieben
Criminal clans, threats and goats in demolished houses: the work of police officers in hotspot neighborhoods is hard.
A civil servant explains how she copes with it - and why it is still her dream job.
Duisburg – When choosing a seat in the café, Sabrina Viek leaves nothing to chance.
Of course she sits with her back to the wall, facing the door.
As always.
“That’s actually a typical police habit,” she says, taking a sip from the coffee mug.
“I’ll take the seat from which I can see the whole store.”
Some streets in Duisburg-Marxloh are considered hotspots.
Working here is a big challenge for police officers, says police officer Sabrina Viek.
© Peter Sieben
Policewoman in Duisburg-Marxloh: “If we arrest someone now, dozens of people will come very quickly”
Maybe you become particularly vigilant when you work as a police officer in an area like Duisburg-Marxloh.
The district is one of the poorest in all of Germany, the unemployment rate is high and the crime rate is above average.
Some streets are considered hotspot districts.
The 35-year-old police officer has been here for many years, mostly in civilian clothes.
The work is a special challenge, she says.
“There are neighborhoods where I know for sure: If we arrest someone now, dozens of people will come very quickly.” People who then surround the officers in a threatening manner.
That get loud.
Many had knives with them.
The operations often involve drugs, gangs of thieves or criminals from the so-called clan milieu.
“The people who belong to this clientele have the attitude: The state can't do anything to me anyway.
A few years in prison doesn’t impress them,” says Viek.
“It certainly happens that one of the clan people stands in front of the guard and watches over a colleague.
Or greets someone in a seemingly friendly manner on the street and says: I know you, you're a police officer.
That seems threatening.”
Police work in the hotspot district: “When you experience things like this again and again, it changes you”
Is something like this stressful in the long term?
“Yes, when you experience things like that over and over again, it changes you,” she says.
Sometimes you have to see things that you will never forget.
Like this operation: “It started as a normal traffic stop.
Then the driver suddenly accelerated.
During the chase, he crashed into a tree and was seriously injured.” It is important that such experiences are dealt with, as this creates stress.
This doesn't always work because: "The workload for police officers is getting bigger and bigger."
Colorful wedding dresses in the “Brennpunktviertel”: Weseler Straße in Marxloh is a real tourist attraction.
© Peter Sieben
The coffee is empty, we go out into the neighborhood.
On Weseler Straße, which is a phenomenon in the middle of the focal point.
Dozens of bridal shops are lined up between just as many jewelers.
Brightly colored dresses full of rhinestones glitter behind polished shop windows.
There are twice as many wedding shops here as in the whole of Munich, says city marketing.
Turkish immigrants have used a lot of business acumen to turn the once empty houses into a tourist attraction.
Anyone who talks to gold dealers will find out that many customers pay in cash for expensive jewelry.
Is there a money laundering problem?
Sabrina Viek just shrugs her shoulders.
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Away from the flagship street, the picture changes suddenly.
Piles of trash lie in the middle of the sidewalk.
The Wilhelminian style houses were certainly pretty.
Now some windows are boarded up.
It is striking that front doors are often left open - if there is even a door left.
There are usually no names on the doorbell signs - and where there were once doorbell buttons, there are often only cables sticking out of the walls.
“That’s typical for the district.
People just come and go.
Sometimes you don’t know exactly who lives there.”
Garbage is piling up on some streets in Marxloh.
© Peter Sieben
Many come from Romania, often only live in Germany for a few months and then move on through Europe.
Most are victims of gangs who send them to beg or force them to commit fraud.
“One family even had a goat in the apartment.
“Sometimes people also have slaughterhouse waste on their balcony,” says Viek.
Trash piles up in a backyard.
Plaster is crumbling from the facades of the apartment buildings, yellow insulation wool is pouring out of holes the size of football goals.
Sabrina Viek looks around, presses her lips together.
“This is an issue for politicians to ensure that no one has to live in such precarious conditions,” she says.
Theft gangs and clan crime: just under criminal age and already in prison
Many shops are closed and the vacancy rate is high.
© Peter Sieben
There are approaches in local politics.
For example, the “Arrival City” project.
Marxloh is to become a so-called arrival district in which immigrants help each other in supported networks.
That hasn't borne fruit yet.
But the district now has a new problem; theft gangs have been going on raids for months.
The perpetrators are young, often minors.
Someone spray-painted names on a wall: “Free Arubi,” it says, for example – freedom for Arubi.
Sabrina Viek knows some of the names and the people they belong to.
“They just became criminals and are now in prison,” she says.
“Free Arubi”: On the wall are the names of young criminals who are now in prison.
© Peter Sieben
Three young men in thick, dark down jackets stand at the next intersection, their hoods over their heads.
“Typical corner-standers,” says policewoman Viek and slows her pace.
One of them looks around, gives the others a hand signal and hurries into a kiosk opposite.
It's possible that they recognized the policewoman in plain clothes.
“Corner people” are typical for the district, says police officer Viek.
© Peter Sieben
The stress, the danger, the suffering she has to see: has she ever thought about no longer being a police officer?
“Absolutely not, I love this job, which is more diverse than almost any other,” she says, unlocking her car.
She parked it against a wall overlooking the entrance to the parking lot.
As always.
The term clan crime
► When people talk about criminal clans in Germany, they often mean criminal members of large families with Kurdish-Lebanese or Arab roots.
Most people from these families are not criminals.
However, a few subclans have formed groups that commit crimes in the area of organized crime.
► Many belong to the so-called Mhallami, an ethnic group of Arab origin.
Their ancestors were expelled from Turkey after the First World War and then came to Lebanon.
When there was a civil war there (1975 to 1990), many of the families fled to Germany.
► As stateless people, many received tolerated status and were unable to do any regular work.
Asylum seekers and tolerated persons are generally banned from working in Germany.