Knife attacks, gang rapes on the rise in Germany

Three women were seriously injured in Nuremberg on Thursday evening by knife wounds. “It can not be ruled out that all three cases could have been the same perpetrator,” the police said on Friday. The Nuremberg Murder Commission took up the investigation and searches for the perpetrator or the perpetrators.

The attacks occurred in the district St Johannis and are spatially close to each other. First, according to police a 56-year-old female pedestrian was attacked shortly before half past eight by a stranger with a knife. The culprit fled while the seriously injured woman had to be operated on.

About three hours later, a man suddenly stabbed a 26-year-old woman on her way home. Shortly thereafter, a stranger attacked a 34-year-old woman. Both victims have suffered life-threatening injuries.

The police searched for the perpetrator or the perpetrators with police dogs and a helicopter. Notably, there were different descriptions of suspects. According to these, the perpetrator was between 25 and 30 years old, between 175 and 180 centimeters tall and strong.

Meanwhile, the Thuringian Minister of the Interior Georg Maier called for knife attacks to be recorded nationwide in the future. This was agreed by the Conference of Interior Ministers at the end of November in Magdeburg. However, the implementation will take some time, because German crime statistics have a uniform structure.

Gang rapes are also on the rise in Germany. In addition to honour killings, state-approved child marriages and polygamy, drug trafficking and the most brutal violent crimes, gang rape or Taharrush has been another “diversity” additions.

On Thursday, the public prosecutor’s office in Augsburg announced that several “young men” raped a 15-year-old student several times – at least one of the acts took place in a “refugee” home in Proviantbach Street. Five Afghans were since taken into in custody.

The 15-year-old girl had in July, according to police, accompanied “two-year-older Afghans” to the asylum centre. They gave the minor “harmless drugs” and raped her.

Hours later, the girl was found helpless and in shock by passers-by on the street in Lechhausen and brought to the children’s hospital. First investigations confirmed the suspicion of a serious rape.

Both first sex offenders, a 17-year-old and a 20-year-old Afghan, were then held in pre-trial detention in the Augsburg prison.

Only three months after the gang rape, did authorities take DNA samples from several residents of the accommodation and another asylum residence in Friedberg near Augsburg. After the DNA screening, another suspicious Afghan was added.

On Wednesday, two other young men from Afghanistan, aged 18 to 20 years, were arrested, but many more suspects may still have been involved.

Investigators so far have given no aditional information, and would only speak of abuse by “more than one inhabitant” of the accommodation.

Last year, the Augsburg police reported 34 cases of rape and sexual assault. In 2016, there were 23 offenses. According to the Augsburger Allgemeine, “experts” however explain the increase in sexual violence in particular as a result of “better laws”.