A 40-year-old palliative care physician in Berlin is in custody, suspected of at least eight murders on elderly patients.
Now the pieces of the puzzle about the serial murders are starting to fall into place.
According to the authorities, the man’s motive is likely to have been homicidal – to kill for no other reason than to satisfy a need to take life, reports Tagesschau.
A 40-year-old doctor in Berlin is in custody, suspected of at least eight murders of patients between 2022 and 2024, something TV4 Nyheterna previously reported on. According to the investigators, the doctor, who worked in palliative care and treated terminally ill patients, must have administered lethal mixtures of drugs without a medical basis.
The eight victims include both elderly women and men, but there are suspicions that more deaths may be linked to the doctor. Two bodies have already been exhumed from the graves as part of the investigation, and investigators are now combing through patient records in search of more potential cases.
The authorities announced on Thursday that the man’s motive was likely to have been homicidal – to kill for no other reason than to satisfy a need to take life, writes Tagesschau.
Wrote doctoral thesis on murder of the elderly
The suspected doctor has previously researched murders and unnoticed deaths. His doctoral thesis at the Goethe University in Frankfurt dealt with violent deaths in the city between 1945 and 2008.
In the thesis, he concluded that murders of the elderly in need of care were not easy to prove and that perpetrators of elderly victims met with less resistance. Even external influences are often overlooked there during post-mortem examinations due to inadequate legal regulations.
In the thesis, he also included statistical investigations and conclusions about violent deaths with a focus on, among other things, elderly victims and the high number of dark figures in terms of solving the crimes. Despite this, spokespersons at the university believe that the thesis did not raise any suspicions, as it was mainly a statistical study.
Employers in shock
The suspected doctor has previously worked in several states in Germany, including hospitals in North Rhine-Westphalia, Hesse and Berlin. The current employer, a healthcare company in Berlin, has expressed shock at the allegations and is cooperating with authorities, the paper reports.
Despite the serious allegations, the doctor has so far not commented on any of the criminal suspicions. He is in custody in Berlin awaiting trial. The investigation continues, and it is now estimated that more cases may be added.