Dirk Peglow's first experience with the police was a long time ago.

He remembers afternoons he spent as a child in the old police headquarters.

As he walked through the hallways, the stairs, up and down, always back into that one special room.

It was his father's office, a detective.

Although Peglow toyed with the idea of ​​becoming a journalist after graduating from high school and had already started studying politics at Goethe University, the moment came when he realized that these childhood memories had left far more traces than he initially thought.

Catherine Iskandar

Responsible editor for the "Rhein-Main" department of the Sunday newspaper.

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The drive to stand up for the victims of crime and to catch those who committed those crimes was just too strong.

Peglow dropped out of college and applied to join the police force.

He is now married to a policewoman, and his older daughter has also followed suit.

Peglow laughs heartily when asked if the conversations at the dinner table often revolved around the cases they were investigating.

"Yes, of course," he says.

"However, I note with a smile that it is also the case here that parental advice is often only taken into account after intensive discussion."

The other side

Dirk Peglow grew up in Frankfurt, first in Nied, then in Dornbusch, where he attended the Wöhlerschule.

His parental home was middle-class.

The fifty-three-year-old passed on the values ​​that his parents instilled in him to his two daughters.

"Resilience, security, supporting the children where it's needed," that's essential for him, says Peglow.

He himself has seen it often, the "other side".

What happens when people lose their footing and, in the worst case, find themselves in crime.

And he knows the perspective of the victims all too well.

He had experienced "a lot of suffering, misery, grief, but also pure hatred".

On one of his toughest days to date, he was called first thing in the morning to an operation involving a dead infant.

In the afternoon, a fatal train accident occurred in which a mother was hit by a train in front of her children.

In the evening he came home and said to himself: "I don't want to anymore." Another case that he couldn't forget was the murder of Jakob von Metzler.

Peglow's job at the time was to brief the boy's killer, Magnus Gäfgen, after his arrest and to bring him to police headquarters for questioning.

Peglow began his career as a 4th Precinct patrol officer in charge of the station district.

An area in which he urgently wishes that the conditions there would finally improve.

He later switched to the criminal police, and for several years he investigated organized crime.

In 2006 he became first deputy and later acting head of an investigative team that deals with fighting gang crime in Frankfurt.

Around that time, there was also a growing desire to become more involved as a trade unionist.

Peglow is now not only head of the regional group, but also national chairman of the Association of German Criminal Investigators.

It is not uncommon for him to be a guest on talk shows and is also asked about social issues.

The best way to switch off is through sport.

After a long break he is training again and hopes to be able to run the half marathon next year.

When he's not running, Peglow hangs out with friends at the city's markets.

That's what he loves about Frankfurt, he says: "A village with a subway and an airport."