An analysis of the cases of the past ten years shows that in the East of Germany three to four children are killed by their parents as often as in the West.

In the east of Germany, according to the criminologist Christian Pfeiffer, three to four children are killed by their parents more often than in the west. Probably one reason is that there are more young mothers in the East who grow up in social isolation and poverty and are overwhelmed with their motherhood,"said the director of the Lower Saxony Criminological Research Institute on Sunday.

The reasons for the more frequent killings in the East are still unclear.

"We are not yet ready to settle these East-West differences." Three dead babies were found in Brandenburg within a few days. According to Pfeiffer, a study is currently being carried out at his institute on all cases of parental deaths in Germany over the past ten years that have been brought to justice in approximately 900 to 1000.

Different motives

The evaluation of approximately 150 cases so far shows that there are three categories of mothers who kill their children, but the categories also flow into each other." A quarter to a third of the cases are women who conceal the pregnancy, deliver the child without help and then kill it or leave it to themselves."These are"very isolated women who do not want or can't accept their mother role." Among them are young students,"Pfeiffer stressed.

In fifty to sixty percent of the cases, catastrophic living conditions played an essential role." Often the young parents try to raise their child first, but then they are completely overwhelmed and at some point it happens that the father or mother shakes the child to death or no longer provides for it."Thus, a few days ago, the six-month-old Florian in Frankfurt (Oder) starved. The parents are under suspicion of murder. As a third category, Pfeiffer called mentally ill women (15 to 20 percent of all cases).