He was considered a great talent in Ukrainian basketball and had fled his homeland to Germany because of the war: Last Saturday, 17-year-old Volodymyr Yermakov was stabbed to death in Oberhausen. Now the police have arrested three more suspects.
The homicide squad executed the arrest warrants this Friday morning, the police and prosecutors said. The suspects are a 14-year-old from Herne and two 14- and 15-year-olds from Gelsenkirchen. All of them are being investigated for, among other things, the joint murder of Yermakov.
The main suspect is still a 15-year-old from Gelsenkirchen who is already in custody. According to the current investigation, he is said to have stabbed the victim and killed her, said a police spokesman. Three other teenagers survived with serious injuries.
The motives for the crime are still under investigation, said the police spokesman. The investigators had previously announced that there was “no concrete evidence of a xenophobic act.”
In addition to solving last Saturday's crime, the homicide squad is also checking whether those arrested could possibly be a candidate for other similar crimes.
According to investigators, there are “a large number of witnesses” to the crime. Video recordings were also secured. According to the murder squad, the young people had already had a verbal altercation on a bus on the way to downtown Oberhausen. When those involved got off the bus at the main train station, the argument escalated.
kha/dpa