Arrest - After nine months: Fugitive killer from Bruchsal caught
Nine months after his escape from the Justice Facility Bruchsal in Karlsruhe, a convicted murderer was arrested at a guarded exit. The man had eluded authorities in the southeastern European republic of Moldavia, confirmed the Baden-Württemberg Justice Ministry. A coordinated operation in the morning in the capital Chisinau was successful.
Previously, the "Stuttgarter Nachrichten" and "Stuttgarter Zeitung" had reported. Baden-Württemberg Justice Minister Marion Gentges (CDU) spoke after the arrest about an "excellent international network".
The 44-year-old had escaped from a JVA-employee supervised exit at a quarry lake in Germersheim, Rhineland-Palatinate, in late October of the previous year. His electronic ankle monitor was found shortly thereafter in the city of Germersheim.
The man was serving life imprisonment in Bruchsal prison, and the severity of his crime had been determined at the trial in 2012 by the Landgericht Karlsruhe. He had murdered a 44-year-old man.
At the quarry lake, he had met with his wife and children. It was the eighth time the German-Kazakh had been accompanied. The agreed-upon plan after a family meeting and a shared breakfast at a Fast-Food restaurant in Germersheim near the French border continued to a supermarket and a DIY store. After that, the small group went to the Naherholungsgebiet Sollachsee. The man managed to escape at the playground there.
Pannas at the exit had made the man's escape possible despite the oversight by two employees of the Justice Facility Bruchsal, admitted the Justice Ministry after the incident. Penalties had recently been imposed on the two Bruchsal prison guards. They are still in service at the Bruchsal prison according to the Ministry.
Only a few weeks after the escape in Germersheim, a prisoner from the JVA Mannheim used a doctor's visit in Ludwigshafen to escape. He was apprehended near Heidelberg a few weeks later. A JVA employee had also admitted to having started a romantic relationship with the prisoner and had smuggled him a mobile phone in prison.
In the previous year, according to the Justice Ministry, there were approximately 20,000 so-called "outings" and "escorts", including doctor and court appointments, as well as - in significantly smaller numbers - legally required "escorts" for the preservation of life-sustaining measures.
- The arrested murderer spent his imprisonment in Bruchsal, a city located in the Rhineland-Palatinate state, specifically in Bruchsal prison.
- Following the news of the arrest, Stuttgarter Nachrichten, a Stuttgart newspaper based in Baden-Württemberg, reported on the event.
- The 44-year-old convicted murderer, who is of German-Kazakh origin, had evaded authorities in Chisinau, the capital of Moldavia.
- The Ministry of Justice in Rhineland-Palatinate confirmed the arrest, acknowledging the role of the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Justice in the coordinated operation.
- After his escape, the fugitive had meetings with his family at the Naherholungsgebiet Sollachsee near Germersheim, which is situated on the Danube.
- Ms. Marion Gentges, the Justice Minister of Baden-Württemberg and a member of the CDU party, commended the "excellent international network" that led to the arrest.
- The convicted murderer had initially escaped from a guarded exit in Germersheim, which was overseen by personnel from the Justice Facility Bruchsal in Karlsruhe.
