An Afghan migrant has been arrested for allegedly sexually abusing an 11-year-old girl at knifepoint in a bathroom at a German special needs school.
Samira (not her real name), who attends the Hans Zulliger School in Koblenz, had briefly left her classroom on April 28 to use the bathroom when she was attacked by a man and an accomplice.
Her family's lawyer, Bilal Colak, said: 'The girl told me that one of the two young men pulled down his trousers during the assault. A knife was also involved.'
Samira, terrified by the incident, confided in her sister a few days later about what had happened, and her family quickly filed a police report.
The suspect, the unemployed Nassar S, was arrested and has been in pretrial detention since May 5.
According to BILD, friends of Samira said that they had noticed two significantly older men in the schoolyard the day of the attack.
A classmate said that the victim remained in the bathroom for approximately 20 minutes during the lesson.
The public prosecutor's office in Koblenz confirmed that 'investigations are underway regarding a possible accomplice'.
The suspect, the unemployed Nassar S, was arrested and has been placed in pretrial detention since May 5
Concerned parents in the area said that both men are known in the neighbourhood as 'troublemakers' – and for 'specifically targeting young girls'.
Eveline Dziendziol, the spokeswoman for the Supervisory and Service Directorate (ADD) in Trier which overlooks schools, said: 'The school has established a crisis team.
'In addition to the school principal, this team includes school social workers, counsellors, school inspectors, the school authority, the school psychological service, and police representatives.'
Meanwhile, counselling and support services are available to students.
Since the incident, 'structural modifications' have been made to the entrance of Hans Zulliger School and more adults have been assigned to supervise children during their breaks.
An intercom system with video function is already in place.
A mother, who picks up her daughter from school every day, told Bild with deep concern: 'If our children aren't even safe at school anymore – where are they?'
Nassar S is also accused of abusing a second girl, according to BILD.
'It is true that another criminal complaint has been filed against the accused for an alleged sexual offence,' said Koblenz's senior public prosecutor Kirsten Mietasch.
In April, a 28-year-old Chinese student was found guilty of two counts of attempted murder and seven counts of aggravated rape in Germany.
Zhongyi J was sentenced to 11 years and three months in prison after a Munich judge described his crimes as 'monstrous acts,' adding that 'we have entered uncharted legal territory'.
In a case reminiscent of the decade-long abuse perpetrated by Dominique Pelicot against his wife Gisele in Mazan, France, Zhongyi J was accused of drugging and raping his neighbour at least seven times between February and December 2024.
Prosecutors said the man knowingly administered life-threatening doses of sedatives and anaesthetics.
'I know I did something terrible and that it has had terrible consequences,' he told the court in February.
The trial was part of a broader series of investigations into eight men who were active in a Telegram chat group called the 'German Driving School'.
All but one of the accused are Chinese, and all but one live in Germany. Their victims - those that have been identified - were almost exclusively Chinese women and were the men's romantic partners, colleagues, friends or acquaintances.
Most of the women were unaware of what had happened to them until they were contacted by the police.
In the Telegram group, the men used code words to discuss what medications to use to sedate their victims, dosages, what they did to the women once they were unconscious, and spoke about what tools and objects they used.
They also sent each other photographs and video footage of their crimes.
'Looking for a car' referred to the search for a new victim; 'oil' or 'fuel' meant sedatives; 'luxury car' referred to an attractive woman and sedated victims were referred to as 'dead pigs'.
The ringleader of the group, Dapeng Z from Frankfurt, was the first to be arrested by the police in November 2024 after several of his victims filed charges in the west-central state of Hesse.
'What I think makes this case particularly striking... is simply the dehumanisation that becomes so clear in the way the perpetrators treat the victims: comparing them to cars or even calling them dead pigs,' Charlotte Hirz, a psychologist at LARA, a resource center for victims of sexualized violence in Berlin, told DW.