“Desire to kill”: German doctor who killed 15 patients was sentenced to life in prison, and another 76 people are suspected to have died.
A German palliative care doctor has been sentenced to life in prison for killing 15 patients, and prosecutors are investigating 76 other cases, potentially making it one of the worst serial murders in German history.A Berlin court found the 41-year-old man named Johannes M. guilty of murdering 12 women and three men aged between 25 and 94 between September 2021 and July 2024. Presiding judge Sylvia Busch described him as a “serial killer” at the center of an “unfathomable” and “extraordinary” case.The court ruled that he did not kill out of compassion or a mistaken sense of assisted death, but out of a “power drive over the victim”. Prosecutors said the killer had a “desire to murder” and said the doctor had “no motive for killing these people other than suicide.”The court found that during the home visit, doctors used anesthetics and muscle relaxants that “paralyzed the respiratory muscles, leading to cessation of breathing and death within minutes.” He allegedly set fires on at least five occasions to cover up the killings.In July 2024, shortly before his arrest, he killed two patients in one day – a 75-year-old man in central Berlin and a 76-year-old woman in a neighboring area hours later. Prosecutors said he tried to set fire to the woman’s house but failed.For much of the year-long trial, doctors said nothing. But last month he admitted in court: “Looking at it all, I think it’s the best thing for everybody.” He added: “I despaired of myself.”The youngest victim, a 25-year-old woman, died in 2021, leaving her mother in tears. “She never said she didn’t want to live anymore,” she said.The court sentenced him to a lifetime ban from practicing medicine and ordered preventive detention after serving his sentence. If the other 76 cases are confirmed, it will be one of the worst serial murders in German history.
