In a move that shocked Germany and the world in mid-2018, the media revealed the unbelievably evil details of a couple (a mother and her partner who had taken the role of her children’s stepdad) repeatedly prostituted the woman’s infant son over two years, between 2015 and September of 2017, by contacting interested criminals through the dark-web.
Presented to the court in the south-western city of Freiburg, the couple, identified only as Berrin T. (of forty-eight years old) and Christian L. (her boyfriend, of thirty-nine), plead guilty and received twelve years each in prison.
The woman’s partner received further legal measures that will, in turn, keep him in jail for life.
But before the moment of justice arrived, the extent and complexity of the abuse was something unheard of for the German public, which, intertwined with the German social services’ failures that enabled it, made the case reach all the major headlines of the country.
Keep reading as we discover ten terrible details about this case of parents turned criminals.
10 /10 The Beginnings
Berrin, the boy’s mother, raised him on her own until she met Christian, a younger man who agreed to become her partner.
However, at some indeterminate point in time, Christian (a previously convicted pedophile, no less) started threatening her with leaving unless she allowed him to abuse her son.
The boy was seven years old at the time. Berrin, concerned overall with her safety and having her boyfriend around (in a move reminiscent of Mary Lee Johnston, Precious’ mother in the homonymous film), allowed him to abuse her child.
9 /10 Brutal Days
During this time, both the mother and her partner were the boy’s abusers. Beginning with verbal abuse and humiliation, the situation quickly escalated into repeated rape and beatings, of which the mother was the first enabler and later participant.
The couple would also abuse the daughter of one of Berrin’s friends, a three-year-old girl that she sometimes left under her care.
It is possible that both the boy and the girl were under circumstances of previous (if lesser) abuse, which made them more tolerating to these horrifying circumstances.