KYODO NEWS - Aug 2, 2019 - 13:12 | All, Japan

Japan hanged two death-row inmates Friday morning, the Justice Ministry said, in the country's first executions this year.

The two were identified by the ministry as Koichi Shoji, 64, who murdered two women in Kanagawa Prefecture in 2001, and Yasunori Suzuki, 50, who killed three women in Fukuoka Prefecture between 2004 and 2005.

"I ordered the executions based on careful consideration," Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita said at a press conference, noting the two "took away the lives of the victims who had done nothing wrong for very selfish reasons."

The latest hangings brought the number of executions under the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who took office in 2012, to 38.

They follow the executions last December of two men who were involved in the 1988 murder-robbery of the president and an employee of an investment advisory company. Japan also hanged AUM Shinrikyo cult guru Shoko Asahara, 63, and 12 former members of the doomsday cult in July last year.

(Japanese Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita)

Related coverage:

Japan hangs 2 inmates, matching highest-ever year's total of 15

Shoji was convicted of killing and taking money from Hiroko Hayashi, 54, in August 2001, and Fumiko Osawa, 42, in September that year in conspiracy with his girlfriend. His death sentence was finalized after the Supreme Court rejected his appeal in November 2007.

Suzuki was found guilty of strangling to death 18-year-old Nana Kubota in Iizuka and fatally stabbing 62-year-old Toshiko Onaka in Kitakyushu, both in December 2004, as well as stabbing to death 23-year-old Keiko Fukushima and taking her handbag in Fukuoka the following January.

His sentence was finalized after the top court rejected his appeal in March 2011.

Japan's system of capital punishment has drawn international criticism, although some polls suggest the majority of Japanese support it. The Japan Federation of Bar Associations has called for it to be abolished by 2020.

In December, dozens of lawmakers also established a group for discussing the future of Japan's death penalty system, including the potential introduction of lifetime imprisonment without parole. </s> Tokyo, Aug 2 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 2nd Aug, 2019 ) :Japan on Friday hanged two men convicted of murder, the justice ministry said, the first executions this year after 15 death row inmates were executed in 2018.

With more than 100 inmates on death row, Japan is one of the few developed nations to retain the death penalty, and public support for it remains high despite international criticism, including from rights groups.

"I ordered the executions after very careful consideration," Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita told reporters.

The executed were 64-year-old Koichi Shoji and 50-year-old Yasunori Suzuki, a ministry official told AFP.

Shoji was convicted of killing two women and stealing cash in 2001 near Tokyo while Suzuki was convicting of murdering three women on the streets in southern Japan and stealing cash in 2004, according to media reports.

"These are extremely brutal cases in which they claimed lives of victims who had done nothing wrong for their selfish reasons," the minister said. </s> Two men sentenced to death for multiple murders have been executed in Japan -- the first time the death penalty has been used in the country this year.

Koichi Shoji, 64, and Yasunori Suzuki, 50, were executed by hanging on Friday, taking the total number of executions under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government to 38 since he took office in 2012

"These are extremely cruel cases taking the precious lives of the people who have no faults. I have ordered the execution of death penalty after giving doubly prudent consideration," Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita said.

Executions are done in secret in Japan, with no advance warning given to the prisoner, their family or legal representatives, according to Amnesty International.

Prisoners often only learn of their execution a matter of hours before it takes place.

Capital punishment is usually reserved for those who have committed multiple murders. All executions are carried out by hanging. Shoji robbed and killed two housewives in Kanagawa prefecture in 2001 together with his girlfriend. Suzuki was charged with robbing and murdering three women in separate assaults within a one month period in 2004. Japan's Code of Criminal Procedure states the death penalty should be implemented within six months of the sentence being issued, but that is almost never the case. The controversial system made global headlines in July last year when 13 members of the Aum Shinrikyo cult, which carried out the deadly 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway, were executed Japan and the United States are the only two developed democracies to have capital punishment. About 170 states have either abolished or put a stay on executions since the United Nations General Assembly called for a universal moratorium on the death penalty in 2007. Last year, the country's Federation of Bar Associations called for Japan's system of capital punishment to be abolished by 2020. </s> Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita announced the executions of the two men, the first Japan has carried out this year (AFP Photo/JIJI PRESS)

Japan on Friday hanged two men convicted of murder, the justice ministry said, the first executions this year after 15 death row inmates were executed in 2018.

With more than 100 inmates on death row, Japan is one of the few developed nations to retain the death penalty, and public support for it remains high despite international criticism, including from rights groups.

"I ordered the executions after very careful consideration," Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita told reporters.

The executed were 64-year-old Koichi Shoji and 50-year-old Yasunori Suzuki, a ministry official told AFP.

Shoji was convicted of killing two women and stealing cash in 2001 near Tokyo while Suzuki was convicting of murdering three women on the streets in southern Japan and stealing cash in 2004, according to media reports.

"These are extremely brutal cases in which they claimed lives of victims who had done nothing wrong for their selfish reasons," the minister said.

Japan hanged 15 inmates in 2018, matching a 2008 record since the nation started publicly announcing executions in 1998.

Among them were a total of 13 people who belonged to the cult that carried out the fatal 1995 sarin attack on the Tokyo subway and other crimes.

The Aum Shinrikyo cult members -- including former guru Shoko Asahara -- were executed in two stages in July 2018, drawing a line under the horrific attack which shocked the world and prompted national soul-searching over the group and its crimes.

The mass executions sparked some criticism from rights groups, including Amnesty International. </s> Already serving a life sentence for two murders, nurse Niels Högel went on trial again on Tuesday on charges that he killed another 100 patients.

When asked by the presiding judge whether the charges against him were accurate, Högel replied: "Yes."

The massive trial opened in the northern German city of Oldenburg with a minute of silence in memory of the victims. Court proceedings had to be held in a nearby festival hall instead of in Oldenburg's regional court to accommodate the 126 plaintiffs in the case and the high level of public interest.

"The plaintiffs want to look the defendant in the eye," lawyer Gaby Lübben said on Tuesday.

Presiding Judge Sebastian Bührmann said that the goal of the trial was to reveal the full scope of the murders that were allowed to go unchecked for years.

"We will do our utmost to learn the truth," he said. "It is like a house with dark rooms — we want to bring light into the darkness."

The 41-year-old nurse is already serving a life sentence after being convicted in 2015 of killing two patients. Investigators later determined that the total number of his victims was likely much higher — making him one of the most prolific serial killers in German postwar history.

Intentionally causing cardiac arrest

According to the indictment, Högel is accused of carrying out the murders between February 2000 and June 2005 in two hospitals in the northern German cities of Oldenburg and Delmenhorst.

The youngest of his victims was 34-years-old and the oldest was 96.

Prosecutors say Högel injected patients in order to demonstrate his medical skills or out of boredom

Prosecutors argue that Högel randomly selected patients and injected them with a cocktail of drugs that caused them to go into cardiac arrest or to suffer other complications so that he could revive them.

"The prosecutor's office assumes that he did this in order to create a life-threatening situation in order to demonstrate his resuscitation skills to colleagues and superiors," the indictment states. Prosecutors have also said he may have done it out of boredom.

He was caught in the act by a nurse in Delmenhorst in the summer of 2005, but it took years for the full extent of the killings to be revealed.

Investigators looked into 200 suspicious cases and have exhumed 130 bodies for tests — including two bodies in Turkey. However, many of the patients who died at the hospitals while Högel was there were cremated and their remains didn't offer any evidence.

German police have said that Högel likely would have been stopped earlier if local health officials hadn't hesitated to inform the authorities. Criminal cases are currently also being pursued against former staff at the two hospitals where Högel worked.

The trial is expected to run until May of next year, with dozens of witnesses expected to testify.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The cannibal of Münsterberg Karle Denke murdered and cannibalized at least 42 people, mostly villagers, between 1903 and 1924 in his Münsterberg apartment in then Prussia (pictured). It is thought that he even sold the flesh of his victims at the Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland) market as pork. A victim was able to escape and later police found cured human flesh in his home. Denke hung himself in his jail cell two days later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The horror of Hanover Fritz Haarmann is thought to have sexually assaulted, murdered, mutilated and dismembered at least 24 boys and young men between 1918 and 1924.The full extent of his crimes were revealed after 500 pieces of human bone, some with knife marks, were found by Hanover residents worried about the disappearance of children in the area. Haarmann, who was once a police informant, was beheaded in 1925.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The butcher of Berlin Karl Grossmann killed his victims and sold their meat on the black market and at his hotdog stand. After neighbors heard screaming, police burst into his home to find a dead young woman on his bed. It is unclear how many lives Grossmann took, but he is suspected of dismembering 23 women found nearby and up to 100 missing cases in Berlin. He hung himself in 1922 before receiving the death penalty.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The terror of Falkenhagen Lake Friedrich Schumann was a locksmith who raped, murdered and stole from 1918 to 1920. After a confrontation with a local forester — whom he shot — Schumann was arrested and charged with the murder of six people and attempted murder of 11 others. He was sentenced to death six times. The night before his execution at aged 28, he admitted to killing 25 people, including his first victim — his cousin.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The S-Bahn murderer Paul Ogorzow was convicted for 31 sexual assaults, the murder of eight women and attempted murder of six others in Nazi-era Berlin between 1940 and 1941. Ogorzow worked for the German commuter rail system and would threaten, stab or bludgeon his rape victims before sometimes throwing them off the moving train. He was sentenced to death and beheaded two days later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The death-maker In 1946 and 1947, Rudolf Pleil worked as a border guard in the Harz Mountains and illegally trafficked mostly women from East to West Germany. For a while, he had two accomplices, who would help trap victims. Rudolf Pleil was convicted of killing a salesman and nine women but he claimed to have killed 25 people. Sentenced to life in prison in 1950, Pleil committed suicide eight years later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The man-eater of Duisburg Joachim Gero Kroll was a serial killer, rapist, child molester and cannibal. Between 1955 and 1976 he murdered up to 14 people, mainly women and young girls. When he was arrested in 1976, human remains were packed in his refrigerator and he was in the process of cooking the arms and hands of a four-year-old girl he had just killed. Imprisoned for life in 1982, Kroll died of a heart attack in 1991.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Smoking out murder Fritz Honka was notorious for killing at least four women between 1970 and 1975. He strangled prostitutes in his apartment and cut up their corpses. Firefighters found hidden body parts in his apartment after a fire broke out while he was gone. Honka was sentenced to 15 years in a psychiatric institution. After his release in 1993, he lived in a retirement home until his death five years later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The St. Pauli killer Werner Pinzner was a for-hire killer for pimps in Hamburg's red light district. He is thought to have killed between seven and 10 people. Pinzner gained nationwide fame in 1986 when he was brought to the Hamburg police department for interrogation with his wife and lawyer. He suddenly pulled out a gun and shot the investigating prosecutor before turning the gun on his wife and himself.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Death by poison A nurse from Cologne, Marianne Nölle killed patients in her care by poisoning them with an antipsychotic drug between 1984 and 1992. Police believe she actually killed 17 people and attempted a further 18 murders, but she was only convicted of killing seven patients. She has never confessed to any of her crimes and since 1993, Nölle has been serving a life sentence.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Killer on the roads Volker Eckert was a German trucker who murdered at least nine women, most of them between 2001 and 2006. According to police, there were probably four others. His first victim was a classmate whom he strangled aged 15. Most of his victims were prostitutes he picked up across Europe and he kept trophies like his victims' hair. Eckert hung himself in his cell during his trial in 2007.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Angel of death Stephan Letter is a former nurse responsible for the death of at least 29 patients by lethal injection at a Bavarian hospital between 2003 and 2004. Arrested for drug theft, Letter confessed to some of the killings, insisting that he was trying to relieve suffering. He is serving a life sentence and until recently, his acts were described as Germany's worst killing spree since World War II.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The killer nurse Keen to impress colleagues with his life-saving skills, Niels Högel would inject patients with cardiovascular medication to induce heart failure or circulatory collapse. He was convicted of killing two people and was jailed for life in 2015. However, after a multi-year probe, investigators now believe the former nurse was responsible for 100 more deaths, making him Germany's most prolific killer.



rs/jm (AP, AFP, dpa)

Each evening at 1830 UTC, DW's editors send out a selection of the day's hard news and quality feature journalism. You can sign up to receive it directly here. </s> At least seven people are dead and dozen are missing, and at least 1,000 people have been evacuated from their homes following “once in a lifetime” torrential rains in Japan since July 4 in the wake of Tropical Storm Nanmadol and a seasonal rain front that continues to hang over the western Japanese island of Kyushu. With dozens still missing and rains forecasted to continue into the weekend, the death toll will likely rise.

Downpours of at least 55 centimeters have been recorded in Asakura City, Fukuoka Prefecture, since Wednesday, July 5—about 50 percent more than usual for the month of July. So far the hardest-hit communities have been Asakura in Fukuoka Prefecture, where at six are dead following landslides, and Hita, in neighboring Oita Prefecture, where flooding has swept away roads and railway lines and left hundreds stranded.

Localities in northern Kyushu are all receiving record amounts of precipitation. A special weather warning from Japan's national meteorological service has been issued for 16 communities in Fukuoka and 15 in Oita. This is the first time a special weather warning has ever been issued for Kyushu since the warning was put into effect in 2013.

As torrential, record-breaking rains continued throughout the week, the military was mobilized in order to evacuate thousands, and search for survivors.

A challenge in the initial days was that the chaos of widespread flooding made rescuing survivors difficult.

Daily life has been disrupted in Yamada, in Asakura City in Fukuoka Prefecture. Houses in my neighborhood have mostly been swept away. Seven people who have taken refuge on the second story of a factory here have been unable to be evacuated and have been left behind. If the local firefighters can't get in… I just hope someone can help us.

Some of the most striking images of the disaster came from Yamada, in the city of Asakura, in Fukuoka Prefecture. Raging rivers swept piles of debris into the center of the community, blocking roads and hampering rescue operations.

In Oita Prefecture, a rail line and bridges were washed away, and thousands of residents were left stranded.

The rains affected northern Kyushu the most, where some areas in Fukuoka and Oita Prefectures (shaded in purple in the map in the tweet below) received over 50 centimeters of precipitation.

The weather pattern was extremely unusual for Japan, combining the effects of the seasonal rain front and the remnants of a large tropical storm to drop torrents of rain on Kyushu.

By Friday, July 7, as the rains continued, so did rescue operations in a desperate struggle to find survivors of mud slides and flooding.

As of Friday, July 7, rain was still forecast for Kyushu and western Japan. </s> Beijing : A serial killer dubbed China´s "Jack the Ripper" for the way he mutilated several of his 11 female victims was executed Thursday morning, three decades after the first murder, the court which sentenced him said.



The court in the northwest city of Baiyin, Gansu province, which handed him the death sentence in March last year announced on the Twitter-like Weibo that it had been carried out.

China´s supreme court had approved the execution, it said.

Gao Chengyong, 54, robbed, raped and murdered 11 women and girls between 1988 and 2002 in Gansu and the neighbouring Inner Mongolia region.

In March 2018 he was found guilty by the Baiyin City Intermediate People´s Court and handed death sentences for both robbery and intentional homicide, and lesser sentences for rape and dishonouring corpses.

Gao targeted young women wearing red and followed them home, often cutting their throats and mutilating their bodies, according to state media reports. The youngest victim was eight years old.

Some victims had their reproductive organs removed, the Beijing Youth Daily said when Gao was arrested in 2016.

"To satisfy his perverted desire to dishonour and sully corpses, many of his female victims´ corpses were damaged and violated," the court said on Weibo when he was convicted.

"The motives of the defendant´s crimes were despicable, his methods extremely cruel, the nature of the acts vile and the details of the crimes serious."

Police had been hunting Gao for years.

"The suspect has a sexual perversion and hates women," police said in 2004 when they linked the crimes for the first time and offered a reward of 200,000 yuan ($30,000) for information leading to an arrest.

"He´s reclusive and unsociable, but patient," according to the police profiling at the time.

A lead in the case came when police collected and tested the DNA of one of Gao´s relatives over a separate minor crime, the China Daily had reported.

Police concluded the killer they had been hunting for 28 years was a relation, and Gao´s DNA matched the murderer´s.

The original Jack the Ripper was a serial killer active in east London in the late Victorian era, who is widely believed to have murdered five women, mutilating several of them. Those killings have never been solved. </s> MOSCOW: A former police officer jailed for murdering 22 women received a second life sentence on Monday for the murder of 56 more people, making him one of modern Russia's deadliest serial killers.

Dubbed the "maniac of Angarsk" after his home city in Siberia, 54-year-old Mikhail Popkov drove victims to secluded spots where he killed them with axes, knives or screwdrivers. Some were also raped.

He was detained in the Russian Far East in 2012 two decades after he began his killing spree and was sentenced to life imprisonment in January 2015 for 22 murders and 2 attempted murders.

He confessed to 60 more crimes, including 59 murders, after he was convicted.

Investigators said on Monday that Popkov had provided evidence allowing officers to exhume the remains of victims killed 15-20 years ago, along with their personal effects and the weapons he had used to kill them.

Investigators said Popkov's victims were women aged from 16 to 40. He also killed one man, a fellow police officer.

A state prosecutor told the court that Popkov had a phenomenal ability to recall minute details of his crimes, including the clothes, tattoos, and jewellery worn by his victims, RIA news agency reported.

Andrei Chikatilo, known as the Rostov Ripper, was convicted in 1992 of killing over 50 people. He was executed.

In 2007, supermarket worker Alexander Pichushkin was convicted of killing 48 people. He became widely known as the chessboard killer as he had hoped to put a coin on every square of a 64-square chessboard for each of his victims. </s> Serial killer and former nurse Niels Högel was sentenced Thursday to life in prison for the murder of 85 patients.

"Your guilt is unimaginable," Judge Sebastian Bührmann told the convicted man. "The human mind struggles to take in the sheer scale of these crimes."

"I feel like an accountant of death," the judge remarked. "Sometimes the worst fantasy is not enough to describe the truth."

Högel was originally accused of having murdered 100 patients while on duty as a nurse from June 1999 until 2005. The victims, people of all ages and backgrounds, some in bad health and others on the mend, had trusted the medical centers in Lower Saxony where Högel worked with their lives.

The court in Oldenburg handed down Germany's most severe form of a life sentence which precludes the chance of an early release after serving 15 years. A prisoner sentenced to life imprisonment can usually apply for parole after 15 years, but if the court judges there is a "severe gravity of guilt," as it did in Högel's case, parole can be delayed for a non-specified period beyond that time.

Apology to victims

During closing arguments at the district court in Oldenburg on Wednesday, Högel addressed friends and relatives of his victims.

"I would like to sincerely apologize to every single individual for all that I have subjected them to over the years," the 42-year-old Högel told the court.

While working at a clinic in Oldenburg and a hospital in Delmenhorst, Högel deliberately induced cardiac arrest in patients by injecting them with certain drugs. He then resuscitated them to win everyone's admiration. But many of Högel's stunts went awry, and patients died.

A former colleague told the mass-circulation German newspaper Bild that Högel "always pushed everyone else aside" when resuscitating patients. The man, also a former nurse, said less-experienced doctors even expressed their appreciation that Högel was around. The killer's unsuspecting colleagues nicknamed him "resuscitation Rambo."

Read more: Parents accused of stabbing children, torching foreclosed home

The prosecution sought a murder conviction on 97 counts against Högel, having conceded they lacked the requisite evidence in three cases. Högel's defense team closed its arguments by calling for 55 murder convictions and 14 attempted murder convictions. They said 31 cases should be thrown out.



Dubbed "resuscitation Rambo" by colleagues, Högel did not revive everyone he drugged

Trial after trial

Högel's killing spree came to light in June 2005, when fellow nurses at the Delmenhorst hospital caught him manipulating a patient's syringe driver.

Initially, Högel was accused of manslaughter. Then, in a subsequent trial, he was accused of three murders. And, as evidence began piling up, it became clear that Högel was most likely involved in numerous deaths.

Read more: Wife confesses to husband's unsolved 2008 murder

In court, Högel admitted to the crimes for which there was sufficient evidence to convict and cultivated his image as a cooperative defendant. In 2015, he was sentenced to life in prison.

Subsequent investigations and postmortem examinations found that Högel might not have been telling the truth. The corpses of many other possible victims could not be forensically analyzed as they had already been cremated.

Högel said he did not recall what happened to those patients. "I do not remember, but I cannot rule anything out," Högel said when asked about the various people he has been accused of murdering, according to the German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung.

Read more: Parents accused of stabbing children, torching foreclosed home

The defendant spoke as if he were commenting on something altogether banal. Högel showed neither "sympathy nor remorse," the newspaper reported.

He denied involvement in the deaths of five people.

Watch video 01:02 Share Puzzling crossbow killings Send Facebook google+ Whatsapp Tumblr linkedin stumble Digg reddit Newsvine Permalink https://p.dw.com/p/3IRJA Crossbow killings: Two more bodies found

'Extremely narcissistic person'

Högel is reported to have had a happy childhood and to have later led a structured life, offering no clues as to why he committed dozens of murders.

Read more: German nurse killed patients 'out of boredom'

It's possible that "he could no longer bear seeing gravely ill or dying patients and then took matters into his own hands," Karl Beine, head physician at St. Marien-Hospital Hamm and professor of psychiatry at Witten/Herdecke University, told DW. For 25 years, Beine has been researching the phenomenon of medical staff who murder patients.

Högel likely knowingly instigated medical emergencies so that he could then "shine by successfully resuscitating" the patients, Beine said. This, he added, would indicate that Högel "is an extremely narcissistic person who depended on external recognition to boost his weak ego."

The court heard an emotive account of patients' lives — and Högel's role in ending them

Desensitized to death

Beine described Högel as someone who had become desensitized and no longer had empathy. He said Högel "to this day has not fully understood the incredible pain he caused the victims' families." The doctor added: "One will never learn his exact motives."

Högel's murder spree means that other hospital workers will also have to go to court. Investigators will need to determine how it was possible that Högel could kill so many patients and why there were no security measures in place to prevent this from happening.

The nurse had been moved out of the intensive care unit after initial suspicions arose, but he was nevertheless handed a certificate testifying to his excellent work, which he then used to find employment at a different hospital. There, he might have murdered 60 more patients.

"Early warning signs and evidence that something was up were not registered," Beine said, or they were "ignored or even hushed up." That, he added, points to much more than just a failure or lack of hospital security measures. Instead, he said, "hospitals prioritized their own interests over the interests of their patients."

Gaby Lübben is one of several lawyers representing the victims' families. In May, she showed the courtroom pictures of the murdered patients and spoke about their lives. Then, she addressed the defendant. "I hope that you, Mr. Högel, will never forget these images," she said, adding that a just verdict would see him "grow old behind a locked door, tormented by the spirits of the deceased."





With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The cannibal of Münsterberg Karle Denke murdered and cannibalized at least 42 people, mostly villagers, between 1903 and 1924 in his Münsterberg apartment in then Prussia (pictured). It is thought that he even sold the flesh of his victims at the Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland) market as pork. A victim was able to escape and later police found cured human flesh in his home. Denke hung himself in his jail cell two days later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The horror of Hanover Fritz Haarmann is thought to have sexually assaulted, murdered, mutilated and dismembered at least 24 boys and young men between 1918 and 1924.The full extent of his crimes were revealed after 500 pieces of human bone, some with knife marks, were found by Hanover residents worried about the disappearance of children in the area. Haarmann, who was once a police informant, was beheaded in 1925.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The butcher of Berlin Karl Grossmann killed his victims and sold their meat on the black market and at his hotdog stand. After neighbors heard screaming, police burst into his home to find a dead young woman on his bed. It is unclear how many lives Grossmann took, but he is suspected of dismembering 23 women found nearby and up to 100 missing cases in Berlin. He hung himself in 1922 before receiving the death penalty.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The terror of Falkenhagen Lake Friedrich Schumann was a locksmith who raped, murdered and stole from 1918 to 1920. After a confrontation with a local forester — whom he shot — Schumann was arrested and charged with the murder of six people and attempted murder of 11 others. He was sentenced to death six times. The night before his execution at aged 28, he admitted to killing 25 people, including his first victim — his cousin.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The S-Bahn murderer Paul Ogorzow was convicted for 31 sexual assaults, the murder of eight women and attempted murder of six others in Nazi-era Berlin between 1940 and 1941. Ogorzow worked for the German commuter rail system and would threaten, stab or bludgeon his rape victims before sometimes throwing them off the moving train. He was sentenced to death and beheaded two days later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The death-maker In 1946 and 1947, Rudolf Pleil worked as a border guard in the Harz Mountains and illegally trafficked mostly women from East to West Germany. For a while, he had two accomplices, who would help trap victims. Rudolf Pleil was convicted of killing a salesman and nine women but he claimed to have killed 25 people. Sentenced to life in prison in 1950, Pleil committed suicide eight years later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The man-eater of Duisburg Joachim Gero Kroll was a serial killer, rapist, child molester and cannibal. Between 1955 and 1976 he murdered up to 14 people, mainly women and young girls. When he was arrested in 1976, human remains were packed in his refrigerator and he was in the process of cooking the arms and hands of a four-year-old girl he had just killed. Imprisoned for life in 1982, Kroll died of a heart attack in 1991.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Smoking out murder Fritz Honka was notorious for killing at least four women between 1970 and 1975. He strangled prostitutes in his apartment and cut up their corpses. Firefighters found hidden body parts in his apartment after a fire broke out while he was gone. Honka was sentenced to 15 years in a psychiatric institution. After his release in 1993, he lived in a retirement home until his death five years later.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The St. Pauli killer Werner Pinzner was a for-hire killer for pimps in Hamburg's red light district. He is thought to have killed between seven and 10 people. Pinzner gained nationwide fame in 1986 when he was brought to the Hamburg police department for interrogation with his wife and lawyer. He suddenly pulled out a gun and shot the investigating prosecutor before turning the gun on his wife and himself.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Death by poison A nurse from Cologne, Marianne Nölle killed patients in her care by poisoning them with an antipsychotic drug between 1984 and 1992. Police believe she actually killed 17 people and attempted a further 18 murders, but she was only convicted of killing seven patients. She has never confessed to any of her crimes and since 1993, Nölle has been serving a life sentence.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Killer on the roads Volker Eckert was a German trucker who murdered at least nine women, most of them between 2001 and 2006. According to police, there were probably four others. His first victim was a classmate whom he strangled aged 15. Most of his victims were prostitutes he picked up across Europe and he kept trophies like his victims' hair. Eckert hung himself in his cell during his trial in 2007.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers Angel of death Stephan Letter is a former nurse responsible for the death of at least 29 patients by lethal injection at a Bavarian hospital between 2003 and 2004. Arrested for drug theft, Letter confessed to some of the killings, insisting that he was trying to relieve suffering. He is serving a life sentence and until recently, his acts were described as Germany's worst killing spree since World War II.

With a view to kill: Germany's worst serial killers The killer nurse Keen to impress colleagues with his life-saving skills, Niels Högel would inject patients with cardiovascular medication to induce heart failure or circulatory collapse. He was convicted of killing two people and was jailed for life in 2015. However, after a multi-year probe, investigators now believe the former nurse was responsible for 100 more deaths, making him Germany's most prolific killer.



At 1830 UTC, DW's editors send out a selection of news and features. You can sign up to receive it here.
Japan carries out the first executions this year, hanging Koichi Shoji, 64, who killed two women in 2001, and serial killer Yasunori Suzuki, 50, who killed three women between 2004 and 2005 in Fukuoka Prefecture.