Trial in Schwerin: man charged with murder – body dismembered
A 38-year-old is accused of killing and dismembering his partner in December 2025 in Hagenow because she refused to lend him money. The trial began at Schwerin regional court without a statement from the defendant.
Murder trial over dismembered body in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern
According to welt.de, the 38-year-old defendant sits with lowered gaze between his lawyers at Schwerin regional court. The trained butcher is said to have killed his partner in Hagenow in December 2025 and then dismembered her. The public prosecutor's office accuses him of murder motivated by greed.
The man allegedly killed the woman because she refused to lend him further money, as the prosecutor explained in the charge sheet. At the time of the alleged crime, the defendant was in a strained financial situation. On the day of death, he is said to have transferred 5,000 euros from her fixed-term deposit account to her current account at 20:08, and withdrawn 500 euros three times on subsequent days.
According to the public prosecutor's office, the man is alleged to have killed the woman at some point between 12:30 and 20:08 on 12 December 2025 with "injuries incompatible with life in an unknown manner". Exactly how the woman died remains unclear to this day. Her torso was never found, which leaves questions about the cause of death.
The defendant is said to have separated the body parts – head, arms, legs and pelvis – from the torso and stuffed them into blue refuse sacks. The tool he used to do this is unclear and was never found. The parts are said to have initially been loaded into his car and brought to his flat. Later, according to the public prosecutor's office, he hid them underneath garden waste at a public green waste disposal site in Goldenbow, immediately next to his parents' house.
These body parts were discovered on 2 February 2026, after police and family had searched for the missing woman for weeks. The victim, Jacqueline K., was 49 years old. According to investigations, the torso was disposed of on 19 December in waste containers at a waste disposal company in Hagenow – possibly because the fatal injuries were visible on it, suspected the co-complainant's lawyer.
On 9 January, the suspect was arrested and has been held in remand custody since. Six co-complainants sit in the courtroom – all siblings of the victim. They hope to finally learn what happened to their sister on that December afternoon. "What the relatives especially wish for is that the defendant would make statements about what happened on that afternoon," said co-complainant's lawyer Ullrich Knye to the German Press Agency.
However, the defendant's lawyer stated that his client would not comment. The first day of trial was subsequently ended after less than a quarter of an hour. The co-complainant's lawyer expressed confidence: "If he makes no statements, I assume the evidence is completely sufficient to convict him."
The court has scheduled 18 trial dates, extending into February. In addition to witness examinations, a psychiatric expert and two forensic medical experts have been summoned. The trial could last months.
Source: Die Zeit Kriminalität