It is usually quiet in the communities around Bramsche (Lower Saxony). The villages are small, everyone knows everyone and neighbors are friends. It’s a security you don’t get in the anonymity of the big city. Two fatal crimes in the past two weeks have hit the residents of the 31,152-strong community all the worse. Trust in the people you think you’ve known for generations has been shaken.
On Saturday, around 150 guests enjoyed themselves at a Schützenhausfete in Bramsche-Pente (Lower Saxony) – a party the likes of which has been seen umpteen times. Even if hardly any of the guests live in Bramsche, but come in carpools from the neighboring towns, everyone knows each other.
The villages are close together. So close that the perpetrator and the victim live only 17.8 kilometers apart. They met at a birthday party in Bramsche-Pente – about 20 kilometers from the victim’s place of residence and only about 8.5 kilometers from the perpetrator’s home.
The dying teenager was found on the soccer field less than 100 meters from the party hut (right).
Photo: Stefano Laura
Joel G. (20) is a boy scout and district league goalkeeper. He was also one of the party guests. He is said to have known the girl from Schwagstorf, about 20 kilometers away. Apparently she trusted him. He took advantage. In the end Melina was dead.
But who is the young man?
A guy somewhere between a buddy and an overbearing chav
prosecutor Dr. Alexander Retemeyer (63) to BILD: “We are still looking for witnesses who can help us to reconstruct the evening.” According to the public prosecutor’s office, the suspect has no criminal record. Former classmates describe the 20-year-old as a young man with two faces: on the one hand a buddy guy who always had a casual joke on his lips, on the other hand an abusive chav.
▶︎ The alleged murderer from Bramsche has also been investigated for stalking in the past. The procedure for re-enactment was discontinued in 2020 after the completion of an educational measure by the public prosecutor, said a spokesman for the Osnabrück public prosecutor’s office. The young woman he is said to have pursued three years ago is not the 19-year-old who was killed
“There have always been a few incidents, I’d say he was grabby. I also spoke to a few of the girls from our class yesterday and they also said we didn’t think much of him because he always pushed around a bit,” quoted “RTL” a former classmate of the alleged perpetrator.
What happened when the others celebrated?
It’s the birthday of two girls. But while her friends are celebrating in the building, something horrible happens to Melina O. (19): on the soccer field not far from the party hall, one of the party guests, district league goalkeeper Joel G. (20), is said to have attacked the young woman. When friends find Melina at around 2.40 a.m., her clothes have been torn off, and any help will come too late for Melina. The young woman is so badly injured that she dies shortly afterwards.
Shortly thereafter, the police arrested a suspect. Retemeyer: “He was arrested in his apartment, wasn’t drunk and is silent. Party guests have given clues about him. He must have obviously been around her a lot.”
BILD at the crime scene in Bramsche Soccer Field of Horror
Suspect is examined
The kicker is currently in custody in the Hamelin youth facility. An expert report should now clarify whether the alleged perpetrator “has a delay in maturity”.
According to prosecutor Alexander Retemeyer, Joel G. remains silent on the allegations. Based on the way the young woman’s body was found, investigators are also assuming a sex crime.
Joel G. is brought to the magistrate in slippers
Photo: Festim Beqiri/TV7News
► What exactly happened on the soccer field next to the party hut is unclear. Only the 20-year-old knows what happened to Melina, why the life of a young trainee was ended so brutally.
Melina and Joel are said to have been guests at the party that took place in this festival hall in Bramsche
Photo: BILD
It is not the first crime in the recent past that has caused an uproar among the residents around Bramsche. Just last week, a neighborhood dispute ended in a bloodbath when Giuseppe Del B. (81) drew his gun and pointed it at his neighbor Sinan F. (16). He shoots the boy, then turns the gun on himself ( BILD reported).
Candles and flowers for the shot youth, Sinan F. (16)
Photo: Sina Schuldt/dpa
after the The 16-year-old was so badly injured after a shot in front of a school in Bramsche that he succumbed to his injuries shortly afterwards. The background to the crime is probably a neighborhood dispute that has been brewing for years between the former restaurant owner and the boy who lived above him with his mother.
In both cases of death, the investigations are in full swing.
