A 49-year-old man with a migration background has been arrested after allegedly beating his 38-year-old partner to death with a hammer and seriously injuring their 13-year-old daughter in the early hours of Monday morning in Barsinghausen, a town of around 34,000 residents in the Hanover region of Lower Saxony.
Police received an emergency call at 2:10 a.m. Officers rushed to the scene, a single-family home on Rehbrinkstrasse where the family of seven was living.
“A 15-year-old boy said his father attacked his 38-year-old mother,” said police spokesman Michael Bertram.
The suspect was standing at the door when officers arrived. According to Welt, the 15-year-old son had managed to persuade his father to leave the house before calling police.
Bertram confirmed: “The 49-year-old allowed himself to be arrested without resistance.”
Inside, officers found the mother lifeless on the floor. Emergency responders attempted resuscitation but were unable to save her. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
“The suspect’s critically injured daughter was also discovered in the house. She, too, was apparently attacked by her father,” Bertram said. Investigators learned the weapon used was a hammer.
The daughter was rushed to the hospital in a critical condition. The couple’s son and three other children, including two infants, were taken to safety. Investigators are now working to establish the full circumstances surrounding the killing.
The family only moved into the house around a year ago and had been well received in the neighborhood. An 88-year-old local resident said: “I saw the children swinging outside yesterday while the father was working in the garden. Everything seemed harmonious.”
According to a neighbor, Dieter Becker, “It’s hard to understand, because for me it was a family that didn’t stand out either. His wife was hanging out the washing a few days ago. The man tidied up the garden and actually kept it tidy.”
Another local construction worker, Alexej Nigodenko, said: “I’ve been here on the building site since last August and have seen the police inside the house four or five times. I don’t know what’s going on, of course, because I saw the man himself, talked to him and everything. Actually, he was always nice, but you never really know with anybody.”
The couple’s other children were unharmed; two of them are still toddlers. They are now being looked after by the youth welfare office. The police are looking for clues and, above all, the motive for this crime.
The murder comes after a long spate of “honor killings” and revenge killings involving mostly Middle Eastern men and their wives in Germany. Many of the attacks have also occurred in the presence of children, often in large families.
