Agency Report
More than 400 suspected paedophiles have been identified in Germany as part of a probe into a huge child pornography network linked to the city of Bergisch Gladbach, investigators said on Wednesday.
A total of 439 suspects have been identified and 65 children have been freed from the clutches of paedophiles since the network was uncovered in October 2019, the Berg special investigation group said.
“We have suspects from all walks of life” including “high earners and highly educated people” as well as “ordinary people”, said investigation group leader Michael Esser.
“They went about their work quite normally and there were no indications in the working environment that such acts had been committed,” Esser said.
Most of the children were abused by a member of their own family, the investigators said.
The victims were aged between under a year old and 17, with the youngest rape victim just three months old at the time of the crime.
The Bergisch Gladbach case was opened in 2019 with the arrest of a suspect known as Joerg L.
