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Agence France-Presse

The man killed in Germany’s crossbow murder-suicide pact is thought to have led a cultish group devoted to medieval folklore and treated the women around him like slaves, witnesses said in media reports Wednesday.
Germany has been baffled by the bizarre case since the man and two women killed with crossbows were found Saturday in a hotel in Passau, followed by Monday’s discovery of two more dead women in the town of Wittingen.
The figure at the core of the group, Torsten W., 53, appeared to have controlled the four women like a harsh sect leader who used physical force and psychological manipulation, Bild daily and RTL television reported.
“Investigators suspect they were all members of a kind of sex circle with a focus on the Middle Ages. Torsten W. may have been the guru of the group,” reported RTL after interviewing several people who knew them.

Bild said W. was apparently “in relationships with several women whom he ruled over like a master”.
W. owned a shop that sold medieval-style weapons and flags, offered sword-fighting classes and featured a bizarre female mannequin wearing suspenders, tied with ropes and chains, and smeared with bloodlike red paint.
RTL spoke with a couple who feared the 19-year-old woman found dead in Wittingen was their daughter Carina U., who they said had fallen under the spell of W. years ago and broken off contact with them.
The once joyful girl had come into contact with him through martial arts classes and quickly become withdrawn and depressive, the parents said, recalling how she had died her hair black and soon moved out.
[He was] in relationships with several women whom he ruled over like a master
Bild
The mother recalled how initially Carina “was raving about Torsten, Torsten, Torsten”, while the father said that “until today I don’t understand how someone manages in four to six weeks to manipulate someone like that”.
Bild daily meanwhile interviewed a former landlord who recalled that W. had harshly shouted commands at the lesbian couple living with him, as the women kept their heads bowed and behaved like slaves.
W. had kept a dog that had previously bitten to death other dogs, said the landlord Alexander Krueger, adding that he had kicked W. out after the man had punched him.
Investigations meanwhile continued at the Passau, Bavaria state crime scene where the prosecutor’s office said the motive was still unclear and a final report was not expected for another two or three weeks.
According to the autopsy, W. and his partner Kerstin E., 33, were found lying in the double bed, hand in hand, with crossbow bolts in their heads and hearts and their last wills nearby.

The other woman, 30-year-old Farina C., lay on the floor, a single crossbow arrow in her neck.
Police were treating the case as a “requested killing and suicide”, suggesting Farina C. first shot the couple and then herself.
On Monday, police searching Farina C.’s flat – some 650km (400 miles) miles away, in Wittingen, Lower Saxony – found two more dead women.
One of them, 35-year-old primary school teacher Gertrud C., was the partner of Farina C., the other was a 19-year-old woman, said police, without naming her.
The cause of death was still unclear, police said, adding that the bodies had been dead for several days, that no crossbows or arrows were found, and there were no signs of a struggle.


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Crime

Man in bizarre German crossbow deaths led a ‘medieval sex cult’ and treated women as ‘slaves’

A mannequin sits on a table photographed through a window of the medieval business of Torsten W. in Hachenburg, Germany. Photo: EPA-EFE

epa07570097 A peek through a window into the medieval business of Torsten W. with armoury in Hachenburg, Germany, 14 Mai 2019. The shopkeeper is one of the victims who died after a shot from a crossbow. German police investigates the deaths of three people shot with crossbow arrows on 12 May. Two more bodies were found on 13 May believed to be connected to the crossbows arrow victims. EPA-EFE/THORSTEN WAGNER

A police officer stands in front of an apartment building where the bodies of two women have been found at an apartment in Wittingen, northern Germany, Monday, May 13, 2019. The women found dead in an apartment of one of three people who found dead on Saturday at a hotel in Passau, several hundred kilometers away in a mysterious case involving crossbows. (Christophe Gateau/dpa via AP)

Three people found dead with crossbow bolts in their bodies in remote German hotel

German special police. Photo: DPA via AP

News

World

Europe

Man and two women were found dead on Saturday with crossbow bolts in their bodies in a hotel in Passau
Two more dead women were then found on Monday


Man and two women were found dead on Saturday with crossbow bolts in their bodies in a hotel in Passau.


Germany

Cults

Sexual harassment and assault

Man in bizarre German crossbow deaths led a ‘medieval sex cult’ and treated women as ‘slaves’

Man and two women were found dead on Saturday with crossbow bolts in their bodies in a hotel in Passau Two more dead women were then found on Monday

Man and two women were found dead on Saturday with crossbow bolts in their bodies in a hotel in Passau

Two more dead women were then found on Monday