A 41‑year‑old German palliative‑care physician, named only as Johannes M. in keeping with privacy regulations, has been convicted of murdering 15 of his patients between September 2021 and July 2024.
The Berlin court handed down a life sentence and a permanent prohibition from practising medicine, in addition to a mandatory preventive detention period.
Prosecutors warn that these 15 killings could merely be the visible tip of an iceberg, citing investigations into 76 other suspected cases involving the same doctor.
Most of the victims—12 women and 3 men—were severely ill but not in imminent danger of death when the doctor administered lethal drug combinations during house visits, without their consent.
Defendants also alleged that the doctor attempted to set fire to a patient’s home in an effort to hide evidence.
After his arrest, the doctor admitted to killing two patients in a single day in July 2024: a 75‑year‑old Berliner man and a 76‑year‑old woman in a nearby district.
Throughout the trial, the defendant gave little testimony until crying out confession last month, claiming he believed he was sparing suffering. He apologized for the harm caused.
The verdict was met with disbelief from families: a 25‑year‑old woman’s mother cried that her daughter had never expressed a wish to die, while a 72‑year‑old widow’s son recalled his mother’s plans to travel to the Baltic Sea.
With the possibility of further convictions, German media note this could become the country’s largest serial‑murder case in modern history.
The court’s ruling stresses the gravity of the doctor’s offence, reaffirming the necessity for rigorous medical oversight and stricter safeguarding of vulnerable patients in home‑based care settings.
