Iranian woman raped in NRW, police arrest 4 men of Iranian descent

After an Iranian refugee was gang-raped in the city of Iserlohn in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, four suspects, all of Iranian descent, have been arrested and will appear in court today, prosecutors in Hagen said, with authorities claiming the rape was “politically motivated.”

According to police, the four men tied up the 30-year-old woman and “sexually humiliated her” in an old brewery building on Saturday. Witnesses heard screams coming from the building and alerted police around 11:30 p.m., police and the Public Prosecution Service reported.

Officers found the injured woman and took her to the hospital.

The four suspects are men aged 24, 34, 42 and 46. They claim to be Dutch and Danish citizens with Iranian roots, according to the police. The police tracked them down with a helicopter and found them in a forest.

The investigators ruled out a xenophobic motive. The extent to which a possible political background underpinned the crime is still the subject of ongoing investigation. It is also unclear whether the victim and the suspects knew each other, according to the German newspaper Welt.

🇩🇪 Organized foreign criminal gangs cost Germany BILLIONS

🔺A new report from the Federal Police (BKA) shows that damage caused by organised crime cost taxpayers €2.7 billion in 2023. That is more than double the €1.3 billion of the previous year.

🔺It is the highest figure in 10 years.… photo.twitter.com/fWYbwRaUZQ

— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) September 6, 2024

According to the first interrogations, two other suspects could be involved in the crime. The search for these fugitive suspects is still ongoing, as is the analysis of mobile phones seized at the crime scene.

Gang rape and foreigners in North Rhine-Westphalia

The news comes shortly after statistics on gang rapes in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia were first published, with the first names of “German” suspects being given. Of those suspects listed as German, almost half have foreign, mostly Muslim, names.

🇩🇪🚨 Last year, police in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia arrested 155 suspects in connection with 209 cases of gang rape.

In total, 84 suspects were foreigners and 71 were German citizens.

At the request of the state party AfD, the state… photo.twitter.com/Nc3DwTje1o

— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) September 3, 2024

For years, data has shown that half of all gang rapes in the state are committed by foreigners. Now it turns out that another quarter of them are committed by German citizens of foreign descent. This indicates that at least 75 percent of gang rapes are committed by foreigners or Germans of foreign background.

In this state, which is the most densely populated area in Germany, crime has increased sharply in 2023. A disproportionately large share of rapes and assaults are committed by foreigners.