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Welcome back to Case of the Sunday Scaries, I'm Elyse, and if you're listening to this, well, you survived Halloween, but today I have a story that will bring it all right back. Because today's case is a tough one. Today's case is about a serial killer you may have never heard of, but I promise you it is certainly a man you are never going to forget.

Elyse: This man brutalized the boys and young men of Hanover, ripping out their throats with his teeth. And no, this isn't a made up, mythological, story from years gone by, uh uh. This is a true story. This man was known as the Butcher of Hanover, but the Vampire of Hanover was much more of a fitting name for him.

Before we dive in, if you're [00:01:00] listening on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts, please go ahead and hit that follow button so you don't miss an episode. And you can help this show grow by leaving a review. All right, let's get into today's case.

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Elyse: Today we're traveling back to the 1920s, just after the end of World War I, to a Germany that was in tatters. World War I had left its mark across all of Europe, and Germany was hit especially hard. Over two million German men had died, leaving countless families shattered, without husbands, and without fathers.

The country was desperately trying to rebuild from the ruins, but for millions, Each day was just a fight to survive.

The city of Hanover had been hit especially hard. This once lively city was now drowning in poverty. Buildings had crumbled from neglect. Streets were swarmed with people just trying to get by. Men who'd returned from the war often came back broken physically and mentally, and many [00:02:00] families were left without a breadwinner.

Young boys, many barely teenagers themselves, were leaving the home, not just because they were seeking out adventure, like teenagers do, but because they really had no other choice. Boys from small surrounding towns left home, traveling into Hanover in search for a way to help their families financially, and to be one less mouth to feed.

These boys drifted into Hanover, they were barely old enough to look after themselves, and of course they knew struggle, and they knew hunger even, but what they didn't know was the same city that held their last shred of hope also meant that these boys were going to be away from the people that loved them, that would look out for them.

Because what these boys didn't know, was this city was the perfect hunting ground for a very specific kind of predator that could prey on their desperation and despair. And one such predator was prowling the streets. And to those who passed him by, honestly, you wouldn't even pay attention to him.

He seemed pretty ordinary, he was average looking, and he seemed pleasant enough, even eager at times, to be helpful to [00:03:00] the people in his community. But behind the friendly smile and a policeman's coat, darkness so destructive it would haunt the city for years to come. As always, Fritz Harman would become the notorious Butcher of Hanover.

So we are going to start the beginning of his life. Fritz was born October 25th in 1879 to Johanna and Ollie Harmon. He had five older siblings, but Fritz was the baby of the family. Same. But from a young age, the odds were really stacked against him. His father had a temper. He had married Fritz's mom because she came from a well off family, and he thought that he could just ride her coattails into a very cushy life olly Harmon was a mostly absent father, but when he was home, he was brutal, and he took that temper out not only on his wife, but his children as well, and he was a bit of a playboy. He had a ton of affairs, one of which even caused him to contract syphilis, [00:04:00] so let's just say he wasn't a super stand up guy.

Because he was just passing that around willy nilly. Fritz's mom, however Well I want to be careful here, because I'm not a parent. And I certainly in these stories know that abuse and all of that would make you a terrible parent. But I have to also describe Fritz's mom as And in this case, it's pretty inappropriate. She had a really inappropriate relationship, in my opinion, with her youngest son, not that it was sexual from our knowledge, but more so she looked at Fritz as if he was a friend, a confidant, more than she did as a mother figure.

She doted on him specifically, and yes, the baby of the family sometimes gets that treatment, but she wanted him to spend a lot of time with her. And I say that this is inappropriate, not because there's anything wrong with A child and a parent being close, that's wonderful. But when a parent is trying to get their attachment needs met through a child, well, that can make for trouble.

Fritz wasn't really interested in most of the things the boys his age [00:05:00] were. He was not wanting to be outside, building forts and roughhousing. He preferred to stay in and dress up in his mom's dresses, play with dolls, and he really enjoyed cooking. And here's the thing, I don't see a problem with that at all. If those are the things that interested him, great. In our day and age, he could have become a fashion designer, a chef, who knows? But, we need to remember the time period we're in. A boy playing with dolls and dressing up in his mother's clothing would have been really looked down upon and made him a social outcast.

I imagine it also made him a very easy target for bullies. And certainly for his father.

In fact, his father thought since his son was not so great at school anyways, he was going to send him off to be toughened up. At the age of just 16, Fritz was taken out of school and sent off to a military academy. And surprisingly, he adapted really well. But after about six months, he started having what they called lapse of consciousness due to anxiety neurosis. Yeah, that's a mouthful [00:06:00] But These days we would just refer to this diagnosis as epilepsy. Due to his illness He left the Academy and returned home and began working in his father's cigar factory But this is where his first known offenses would take place He would lure young boys to isolated spaces and assault them. And while that's awful, he was thankfully caught and arrested in July of 1986.

However, during this time in Germany, homosexuality itself was a crime and it was also seen as a mental health problem. I certainly agree that to have any sexual attraction to children, there is something deeply, deeply disturbed in your psyche.

But because homosexuality was seen as a mental health disorder at the time, he was evaluated by a psychiatrist and was deemed to be, quote, incurably deranged because he was attracted to the same sex.

And because of this ruling by the psychiatrist, he was unable to stand trial, so instead of prison, they sent him to a mental asylum indefinitely. And that's where this case [00:07:00] ends. He spent the rest of his life locked up for assaulting children. I wish.

Unfortunately, Fritz escaped the asylum, and with Mother Dearest's help, he fled over to Switzerland to stay with extended family. And this is what I mean when I'm talking about his mom. I understand loving your child unconditionally. I understand wanting to be a support system if they are locked up for any reason.

But if he has shown repeatedly to be a threat to innocent children, then when he shows up on your doorstep, the good thing to do as a mother. Is to say, absolutely not. We're going right back to the police. You don't help him cross over into another country so that he can be free to do this to other children.

Fritz is over in Switzerland and he starts dating and even would get engaged to a woman named Erna. I am almost certain she had no idea about his past, but soon after their engagement, he was drafted into the military. And he honestly would say that this was the happiest time of his life. And everyone [00:08:00] above him, his superiors, would describe him as an excellent soldier and a really great marksman.

But his illness got the better of him and he ended up being hospitalized for 4 months before the military would discharge him after just 2 years of service. went back to live with Erna and returned to his work at his father's cigar factory. And him and his dad had some serious legal battles. They weren't just fighting it out in the home anymore. They were fighting out in court because Fritz filed a lawsuit against his dad saying that his illness made it impossible for him to work under his father's factory conditions.

That ended up being dropped, but his dad was pissed like he was putting his whole business in jeopardy and the two got into a really violent altercation and his father tried to get him thrown back into the asylum saying that Fritz had threatened his life. Obviously, there wasn't enough proof to back this up because it was a he said he said situation.

So, again, charges were dropped.

But here's the thing. If Fritz was already sentenced to be in this mental asylum [00:09:00] indefinitely, then shouldn't he have gone back? I'm confused. I don't obviously know what the laws were back then, but if someone escapes prison or escapes a mental hospital where they're supposed to spend a significant amount of time, then Why didn't he have to when he returned to Germany?

The only thing I can think is that maybe while he was only in the military briefly, because he did a good job, maybe it just absolved him of that charge. I don't know. I don't know. I'm very confused about that. However, during all of these legal battles with his dad, he had another psychiatric evaluation, And that psychiatrist found that he was not mentally unstable. So maybe that's what made it possible for Fritz to not have to go back to the institution. But this man had already hurt children repeatedly, so I personally don't give two shits.

If you served your military, good for you. But upon discharge from the military, He should have been sent right back to the institution, and if they found that he was mentally competent now, then send his ass to prison. Like, don't pass go, don't [00:10:00] collect 200, none of that, because we wouldn't be covering this story today, and so many lives would have been spared if they had followed through with anything in this story.

And I'm sure you hear the frustration in my voice, but as we go on, you're going to understand why there is so many times during this case. Thanks for watching! Where it would not have had to continue, for some reason this slithery little creature Kept getting away with it.

The only person in this story that seemed to have any smarts about them was his fiance Edna See unlike the United States who is pretty slow to think women capable of anything But being in the kitchen barefoot and raising children and cleaning You And quite frankly, didn't even let women own businesses without a male relative or husband as a cosigner until 1988.

Germany allowed women to own their business without a man. They were a little bit more progressive at this time. Again, this was before World War II. So when Fritz and Ernest started a fishmongering business, she was smart. She [00:11:00] registered it in her name. After all, she was the one that was working the business because Fritz, at this point, had been classified disabled and got a monthly pension. So when Fritz accused her of an affair which Honestly, doesn't sound super plausible because she was pregnant at the time.

She dumped his ass and ordered him off the premises of the business. And that was that. I honestly don't know if he ever even saw his child. And frankly, I hope not, considering that He was a pedophile

over the next decade. A whole lot is not known about what was going on with Fritz. He seemed to kind of skate by on his pension, but he also got into petty theft and small burglaries. He was in and out of prison for these crimes, but it was not until 1913 that he would receive any sort of prolonged sentence.

After being caught burglarizing a home again, his home was finally searched and they found evidence linking him to other burglaries that had taken place throughout the city. So they sentenced him to just five years in prison when he was released in August [00:12:00] of 1918. World War I was near its end, and in its wake, Hanover was no longer the city that he had known it to be. So, he went back to his life of crime.

He would sell and trade stolen property at the train station. And he flew under the police's radar for most of the time. But he started developing a lot of relationships with other criminals in Germany's underworld, and he used this to his advantage. He became a police informer. Yes, the known criminal and pedophile became pretty tight with the Hanover police.

And he had quite a little ruse going. He would approach one of his criminal contacts, offer to store their stolen property, then he would inform the police and they would raid his house at an agreed upon time and arrest everyone. Including Fritz, because he obviously did not want his criminal buddies to know that he was a rat.

Rats don't end up so well.

So the police would also arrest Fritz, but it was all theater because he would be back on the streets that night setting up his next sting operation. And [00:13:00] Fritz must have thought pretty highly of himself at this point, because he decided to take it upon himself To start making citizen arrests. Keep in mind, he's not a police officer.

He's a police informer, but the man that would become known as the butcher of Hanover was patrolling the train station, making citizen arrests for people that were traveling on forged documents or pickpocketing any sort of thing because he helped the police so much, they developed a really trusting relationship with Fritz.

Which would become more than a little problematic.

See, at some point, although Fritz had assaulted boys since he was a teenager himself, the novelty had worn off for him, and he realized he had other fantasies that he wanted to fulfill. A specific fantasy that would later give him his infamous nickname.

Fritz was not just patrolling the station to make these ridiculous citizen arrests. Absolutely not. Because remember the time period we're discussing here?

The poverty following the war and the loss of so many breadwinners in the home [00:14:00] made it a pretty desperate situation for the young boys who suddenly had to become the men of the house and find a way to provide for their families. The Hanover train station became Fritz's hunting ground.

He would often dress up like a police officer to gain the trust of these young men that he approached. He would offer a meal, a place to stay, or promise that he knew of a job that they could do. In September of 1918, Fritz met a 17 year old boy named Friedl Roth.

Friedl told him that he had run away from home, so Fritz is thinking to himself, Perfect. No one is going to be looking for this boy. So he introduced himself as a police officer and tells Friedel that, Hey, you know what, buddy? I'll look after you. I understand how tough it is. I bet I could even help you get a job.

At this point, Fritz was a thirty eight year old man, and in Friedel's mind, he was a police officer. Someone he was supposed to be able to trust. So when Fritz invited him back to his house, he went along willingly, probably thinking for the first time in a long time he was gonna have a warm, safe [00:15:00] space to lay his head that night.

And as the night went on, Fritz began touching Friedel very inappropriately. But when Friedel tried to push Fritz off of him, Fritz managed to pin him down and began assaulting young Friedel. And this is when his twisted fantasy became more than the dark thoughts of a depraved man.

Fritz had a desire to bite into the flesh of his victims, and for whatever horrific reason, this night he would finally give in to that desire. With Friedel pinned down, Fritz lunged at his neck, biting into his neck through his Adam's apple. I cannot fathom the fear and pain that poor Friedel experienced. Not only had he just been assaulted, but now his neck has been ripped open and he is bleeding out. Because Fritz is a sick, sick sorry excuse for a man, the sight of the blood and I guess the power he had over his victim Fritz actually aroused him, and he kept biting at Friedel's neck, drinking up the blood that poured from [00:16:00] it, until he reached Friedel's windpipe.

Fritz wrapped his teeth around the exposed windpipe and ripped it from Friedel's neck, killing him. A 17 year old boy. Ugh. And I am grabbing at my own neck while I'm talking about this because I'm just incapable of imagining the horror of this boy's last moments on Earth. Fritz had killed his first victim, and he didn't only enjoy it, he was sexually aroused by it. Aroused by the pain and fear that he had brought into Friedl's last moments. But now looking around him, he realized, oh boy, I have to do something with this body.

So he grabbed knives and began to dismember and behead Friedl's remains. He kept the body parts hidden around his house. And over the next few days, he would slowly bring body parts out to be buried. But Fritz didn't account for the fact that people did notice the absence of Friedel. And some of his friends and family members went to the police to report him missing.

They even told the police that [00:17:00] eyewitnesses had seen him hanging around with a man dressed up as a policeman. They described Fitz in almost perfect detail.

And because of the pressure that the family kept putting on the police, begrudgingly, the police showed up at their favorite informant's house and barged in to find Fritz in the middle of assaulting a 13 year old teenage boy. Did the police arrest him and then perform a thorough search of his place, see if they connect him to Friedel's disappearance?

Of course not. But why would they? A young boy had gone missing, supposedly last seen with Fritz, and now they caught him in the act of assaulting a child. But nope, they didn't see a need to search his place. And let me be very clear. Fritz lived in a very small apartment, think like a New York studio. It would not have been a massive undertaking to search this place.

And had the police done a search? Not even a very thorough search, just open a cupboard or two, had they searched his place, [00:18:00] they would have found everything that they needed to put Fritz Harman away forever. Because in his apartment, tucked away in the oven, under just a few pieces of newspaper, was the decapitated head of Friedel.

His head was in the oven, just a few feet from the bed where they were arresting Fritz. So now again, we have what, the second, third time that this case should have been over and done with. But the police didn't care enough about this young runaway teen to do their damn jobs properly.

They have a pretty extensive criminal record on this guy, not only for theft and burglary, but years of crimes against young men. So here's the opportunity to lock him up and throw away the key. But nope. Listeners, just take a guess for how long he was locked up for them finding him in the middle of assaulting a 13 year old boy.

Nine months. He was sentenced to nine months for the assault and battery of a [00:19:00] minor. What is wrong with these people?

Once Fritz was released, he returned to his old stomping grounds, roaming the train station, and that is where he met 18 year old Hans Granz, which, What a name. Hans was a looker. He had really great hair, I must say. But Hans was a teenager who had run away from home and was working as a sex worker.

He was the one to approach Fritz, trying to solicit his services. And wildly enough, the two seemed to form a pretty turbulent relationship? Friendship? I'm not really sure. But, A relationship of sorts. They were buddies, doing petty thefts and such together, and then somehow they became lovers, and for the next few years it sort of went on like this.

Hans even moved in with Fritz at one point, and I have to wonder why was Hans different? Why was he spared? Because Hans, like I said, he was attractive. He was the perfect victim type for Fritz, who preyed on these young men who were out on their own, [00:20:00] didn't really have anyone to come looking for them. And I think the reason was, is that Fritz recognized something in Hans, something dark.

Because if you've listened to this podcast, you know that these sadistic sickos always seem to find a way to each other. Like most of us are out here struggling to find a romantic partner, but these depraved, disgusting humans, it's like they're magnets for each other. I don't understand how they find each other and not to go on a rant, but almost makes me wonder like how many people must there be with these Twisted moral codes out in the world, if these people are able to find other individuals like them.

Ugh. Okay, well that, that just scared me a little.

Hans would end up going from friend to lover to an accomplice. And one night, Fritz's urges, if you want to call them that, it got the best of him. It seems like he had been in what is known, when we talk about serial killers, as a cooling off [00:21:00] period. Since the first murder, it's believed he had not killed again, and that was in 1918, and now it's 1923.

Maybe his relationship with Hans somehow kept his urges at bay because he had someone always around to feed his sexual desires? I don't know.

But on the night of February 12th, 1923, a 17 year old boy named Fritz Frank, not to be confused with Bad Fritz, had the misfortune of running into Fritz Harman at the police station. Fritz gave the boy the same song and dance, you know, come with me, I'll help you, I'll give you a safe place to stay. So they returned to Fritz's home, and guess what?

Hans and two ladies were there, so they were all having some drinks and banter and all as well. But for whatever reason, Hans and the ladies left the apartment leaving Fritz Frank alone with Fritz. And I don't need or want to go through the details again, but Fritz Frank met the exact same fate as Friedel. He had been assaulted and murdered in the apartment. But This time, [00:22:00] Hans, with the good hair, comes home and walks in and sees the bloody naked body of Fritz Frank laying on the bed.

And instead of turning around and running for his life, he calmly asks Fritz, So, when should I come back again?

At first while researching this story, I'll be honest, this kind of made sense to me. You know, Hans had walked into a grizzly scene, let's just say that, and you don't want this person who's capable of doing this to turn on you. So I get why he was like, Oh, sorry to be a bother. I'm just gonna, turn around.

No problem here. Not going to go tell the police. Everything's fine. Keep doing what you're doing and then run and make his escape. But no, no, no, because Hans truly did not care that this boy had clearly been murdered by his partner. Nope, he just turned around and left, didn't go to the police station, nothing.

He just went out partying. And he returned the next day like nothing had [00:23:00] happened, and a young boy hadn't been brutally murdered in the bed where he would lay his head on that night.

Fritz was not only emboldened by his connection with the police who, oh yeah, are still using him as an informant but now, he's gotten the approval of his partner, or at least Hans didn't seem to really care for what he had witnessed.

So just five weeks later, an emboldened Fritz began a murder spree that would result in the deaths of numerous young men. And we would be here forever if I dove into the details of each of these murders. But I think the victims should be remembered, so I do want to make sure their names are known. And I apologize in advance because I am not German, and I might butcher these pronunciations, but I will do my best.

On March 20th, 17 year old Wilhelm Schultz was murdered. His remains were never recovered, but his clothing was found in the possession of Fritz's landlady. before you get any bad thoughts, we do not have another accomplice in this story. She was not involved in any of this. Fritz would dispose of the [00:24:00] bodies and then keep some personal items of the victims.

Like most serial killers do, these were his trophies. he would also sell and trade their personal possessions, like clothing, for money. And sometimes he would give their possessions as gifts to his friends, neighbors, and even acquaintances.

And if you already thought his crimes were bad, and his choice of how to carry out that crime was terrible, well, There's more. I can't dive into this too much because the thought of it is going to make me lose my lunch. this has never been explicitly proven because it couldn't really be tested, but at this time meat was so hard to come by.

And I, I think you know where I'm gonna go with this. Fritz was known around Hanover to be an active trader in contraband meat. Fritz's meat was boneless, diced, and often sold as ground meat, like the ground burger we had purchased in the grocery stores now. Anytime Fritz was asked where he got the meat from, he would give different stories, which led many to believe that the flesh [00:25:00] of his victims was actually being sold the unknowing citizens of Hanover.

There is truly no moral compass in Fritz whatsoever, because not only are you assaulting and murdering these boys in the most and painful way, but then you're I can't even say it. It makes me just have, I have goosebumps. Because he's potentially giving their bodies to other families to bring home and eat. Ugh.

Besides Friedel, Fritz's first murder, he never again would bury a body. Once Fritz killed someone, he would dismember their body in his home, and he had a pretty methodical way that he did this. First, he poured himself a big ol cup of coffee. Then he would place the body on the floor, and because he is a coward that can't face what he did to these boys, he would cover their face with some sort of cloth.

He would then remove the organs of the stomach cavity, in an attempt to soak up the blood, he would fill the cavity with towels. Then [00:26:00] he would push down so hard on the ribs that the bones would snap. And then he could remove the organs of the chest. All of the organs were diced up and placed in a bucket.

Then he would remove their arms and legs. And then he would basically fillet the victim like you would a fish and remove all flesh that he could from the bone.

Lastly, he would strip the flesh from the dismembered head and wrap the skull in rags. And then he would hit it with an axe until he could access the brain. Then he would discard all of the organs and body parts in a nearby river.

And Fritz said that he hated doing this, oh poor Fritz, it made him so sick.

But that, and I quote, his passion was so much stronger than the hour of cutting and chopping. Sick, sick, sick. But I want to get back to the victims, because unlike Fritz, who treated them as something disposable for his sick pleasure, these boys lives mattered. They were sons, brothers, and friends who had [00:27:00] value, and their lives were cut tragically short for trusting this sick freak.

Elyse: Sixteen year old Roland Huck disappeared on May 23rd after telling friends he was going to leave home and join the military. Nineteen year old Hans Sonnenfeld disappeared on May 31st. He was wearing a distinctive yellow jacket that Fritz was seen wearing after he disappeared.

In June of 1923, Fritz moved into an attic apartment, and just two weeks later, Ernst Ehrenberg, a 13 year old son of his neighbor, went missing. His braces would later be found in the apartment. Just think about that for a second.

How much time would it take to remove braces from someone's teeth to keep them as a trophy? Shortly after, 18 year old Heinrich Strube went missing. His belongings would be found in Fritz's apartment. 17 year old Paul Broniszewski disappeared September 24th, returning from a summer [00:28:00] working for his uncle. His jacket, backpack, trousers, and a towel would be found in Fritz's apartment.

Seventeen year old Richard Groff, who had told his parents on the 30th of September that he had met a really nice man at the train station who knew of a good job for him, would never be seen again. 16-year-old Wilhelm Ner went missing on October 12th. His parents said that he had mentioned meeting a detective named Fritz Hanner Brock, an alias that Fritz Harmon often used.

Fritz and his now conspirator. Hans sold the boys bicycle. About a week later, 15-year-old Herman Wolf disappeared from the Hanover station on October 12th.

Thirteen year old Hines Brinkman was last seen October 27th standing at the train station after missing the last train back home. He was escorted by a police officer.

Seventeen year old Adolf Hannepel disappeared from Hanover Station on November 10th. Several eyewitnesses say that he was sitting on a trunk in the waiting area, just waiting for his train, and those same witnesses [00:29:00] identified Hans pointing toward the boy, and then Hans and Fritz were spotted walking with Adolf towards a cafe.

Nineteen year old Adolf Hennis disappeared on December 19th. Now this one is a little odd because Fritz admitted to dismembering him. But not to killing him. He said that he had returned to his apartment and found Hans with another criminal buddy of theirs named Hugo standing over the body of Adolf and that Hans said, This is one of yours. But the boy did not have Fritz's signature wound to the neck, which Fritz actually referred to as his love bite. His love bite. You know, I've gotten, Dad, stop listening. I have gotten a little love bite in my time, sir. You end up with a little bruise, and you wear a turtleneck in the middle of summer.

A love bite is not getting your windpiped, Ripped from your throat with someone else's teeth. Oh, Fritz is so sick. Anyway. Apparently Fritz and his little lover boy Hans took Christmas off that year from brutally murdering and assaulting young boys [00:30:00] because the next murder would not take place until the 5th of January 1924. 17 year old Ernst Spiker disappeared.

Fritz would later say that, Well, I guess he could be one of my victims when they found all of Ernst's possessions in his apartment. This boy, this 17 year old boy was so unimportant to Fritz that he couldn't even remember if he ripped his windpipe from his throat and dismembered him.

You come on. Absolutely not. Ernst was a human. A boy with so much more life to live. You wacko. And the least you can do, the very least you can do, is give his family some sort of peace. Not peace, that's the wrong word, but closure. And saying, yes, I was the one that attacked him. That's why you haven't seen your son in however many years.

Oh, he's just so sick. 20 year old Heinrich Koch disappeared on January 15th. 19 year old Willie Singer disappeared on February 2nd after telling his sister he was going to go travel with a [00:31:00] friend. disappeared on February 8th. The oldest of Fritz's known victims was 22 year old Hermann Bock.

Hermann's clothing was in the apartment and Fritz gave his suitcase. To his landlady. This man and Fritz were known to be acquaintances, so I wonder what happened here. Because this is a little bit out of his victim profile. Maybe this guy Herman found out what was going on. And, of course, we're never gonna know.

But Fritz was sure to tell their mutual acquaintances not to go to the police to report him missing. And if someone told me not to go to the police and report something, buddy, my suspicions would be on you. Immediately.

16 year old Alfred Hogriff disappeared from Hanover Station April 6th after he had run away from home. Another 16 year old boy named Wilhelm met Fritz during one of his fraudulent patrols of Hanover train station. He was never seen after April 17th. [00:32:00] 18 year old Robert Witzel disappeared after borrowing money from his mother to go see the circus.

Eyewitnesses reported that they saw Robert being escorted from the train station to the circus by a police officer. Fritz later admitted that he killed Robert that same evening. 14 year old Heinz Martin was abducted from Hanover station on May 9th. His clothing was found in Fritz's apartment.

17 year old Fritz Wittig, who is a traveling salesman, was murdered on May 26th. And why? Fritz said it was because Hans insisted that he kill him because he liked the suit the boy was wearing. And please, go get so effed. Brutalizing and murdering a boy for their suit? And of course, Hans was seen wearing that suit just days later.

But that same day, Fritz killed his youngest known victim. A ten year old boy named Friedrich Ebeling was doing what so many young kids do. He had skipped class, and unfortunately, instead of returning home and getting a little slap on the wrist [00:33:00] from his parents, Friedrich was never seen again.

Sixteen year old Friedrich coach. and I've got to say, we have a lot of the same names here, so I apologize if it's confusing. Apparently, people were not very creative with their names back then. But Friedrich Koch was approached by Fritz on June 5th while he walked to class. Two eyewitnesses say that they saw Fritz approach him And then tap Friedrich's boot with his walking stick and say, Well, boy, don't you recognize me? He stopped to talk to Fritz and then was never seen again. And even after I've read off all of those names. There's even more, quite a bit more, that police suspected that he murdered as they fit his victim profile. There was just not enough evidence for conviction. On June 14th, 1924, Fritz would murder his last victim,

Seventeen year old Eric DeVries. His dismembered body washed ashore on a lake. Fritz would later confess that he had made four trips to the water to bring the boy's remains there. He carried them in a leather bag that [00:34:00] belonged to another one of his victims. And if you weren't counting, we're at 27 boys and young men murdered at the hands of this monster.

27 that we know of.

And you would think, 27 boys, plus a few more, have gone missing during a relatively short time period. Were the police thinking these must be connected? No, because this is the police force that had already failed the public so badly by not locking up Fritz the first time, the second time, the third time they had caught him attacking boys.

Rumors were going around that many of these victims were all seen talking to a policeman before their deaths. Some people even named Fritz by name. And again, they completely dismissed him as a possible suspect, even though he had a track record of attacking boys of this age. And their good old buddy Fritzy, their top informant, could not possibly be the one behind these [00:35:00] disappearances.

These boys had probably just run away. Or so they thought,

because even when a couple of children on May 17th of 1924 found a human skull believed to be a male between 18 and 20 years old with knife marks on it on the bank of the Lean River, Nah, nah. That was even dismissed as something that was probably discarded by grave robbers, most likely. Couldn't it be a murderer?

By June, four more skulls would be found. Oh, and wouldn't you know it? They all had similar knife marks on them. One had even appeared to have been scalped.

So, um, No, I don't think, police officers, that this is just a coincidence, or some grave robber is willy nilly. Did the police pay attention yet? We now have five skulls found. No! Because why would we expect anything different at this point? However, the people of Hanover had had enough.

They realized, since the police [00:36:00] couldn't, hey, all of these skulls are being found by the river, so if the police aren't going to do anything, let's go search the river ourselves. On June 8th, hundreds of residents got together to search the banks of the river and they found a lot of human bones, which they collected and brought to the police.

And it was at this point, finally, the police thought, Hmm, you know, perhaps we were a little off here and finally decided to drag the section of the river that ran through the city. They found more than 500 human bones and sections of bodies, most having knife marks on them. 500 human bones.

While the term serial killer wouldn't come around for quite a few years, they knew someone or someones was out there murdering people. Finally, they thought, hey, we might actually have to look into our good buddy Fritz because people are pointing him out specifically. And he at this point has 15 prior [00:37:00] convictions, including assault and battery of minor boys.

And in the only instance of police being smart in this case, since the officers in Hanover were so buddy buddy with their informant, they were deemed unfit to carry on an investigation, and they brought in the big guns. They brought in two undercover officers from Berlin to trail Fritz. On June 22nd, just a week after the murder of his last victim, the undercover officers found Fritz arguing with a 15 year old boy named Karl Fromm.

The police stepped in and found out that the young boy had spent several nights at Fritz's home. I don't know how he was still alive, but this kid was just down on his luck and he needed a place to stay, but he had been repeatedly assaulted by Fritz. They arrested Fritz and with that testimony, were able to finally get a warrant to search Fritz's home.

Finally. And his home was nightmare fuel. The walls, the bed, the floors were all extensively bloodstained.

Oh, but Fritz had an explanation. He told the [00:38:00] police that this was because of his underground meat business that he ran out of his apartment. Which brings us right back to that awful suspicion of what he had done with the flesh of these boys remains.

After they had searched his home, the police hung up all the clothing and personal possessions that they had confiscated from Fritz's house. And one by one, parents, friends, siblings would go through and start to identify possessions from the missing boys.

they said that they had seen him with an alarming amount of young men, but really didn't want to question it. They didn't want to be involved. But I think perhaps they had to have questioned more than they let on, because two neighbors confessed to even following Fritz one night and seeing him dump a heavy sack into the river.

But I guess they didn't choose to say anything. The evidence continued to mount up against him, and finally, with his sister urging him on, Fritz Harman confessed to the assault, killing, and dismemberment of many young men. Fritz would tell police officers, quote, I never [00:39:00] intended to hurt those youngsters, but I knew that if I got going, something would happen. And that made me cry. I would throw myself on top of those boys and bite through the Adam's apple, throttling them at the same time, end quote.

And there are so many parts of this statement that First of all, these were not consenting sexual partners. These were children, teenagers. They weren't even of age, most of them, to consent, even if they were attracted to men. So miss me with all of this nonsense of passion and all that. No, you're a sick, sick man. And even if you did not know. base level anatomy that, hey, humans, you know, kind of need air to survive. The first time that you bit into a throat and caused the death of someone, I think that would give you a pretty darn good idea that it's going to happen again, if you do that same thing again.

And it's so disgusting that he would use the word [00:40:00] collapsing because the reason I think he used that word. It was because he was so sexually aroused by the pain and power he was holding over these people as he ripped into their necks that his collapse was from sexual climax. He would collapse on their lifeless bodies after he ripped their tracheas out with his teeth.

So, I'm sorry, there is no part of me that feels like, oh, poor Fritz, you had some sort of mental defect and you just couldn't stop these urges. only semi microscopic possible redeeming thing Fritz ever did in his pathetic, pathetic life was he confessed and then assisted the police in recovering additional body parts. However, he also played coy. He would only confess to the murders where there was evidence against him, 27 in total, the ones that we talked about.

But he would tell police, there's more that you don't know about. Fritz guessed it was between 50 and 70 [00:41:00] victims. But he would never give their names.

Hans was also arrested for being an accessory to murder. Fritz's trial began in December of 1924 and much like another overly confident killer that we have covered on this channel, Ted Bundy, Fritz decided to represent himself. This case also became a media sensation of the time with so many victims.

Obviously, how could it not have been? People flocked to the courthouse, but by just day three, the judge closed the courtroom to the public because he thought the discussion of the victims demises was so gruesome, it was unbearable.

It was unfit for the public to hear. Newspapers internationally picked up on this story, which is where he got the nicknames the Butcher of Hanover, the Vampire of Hanover, and a couple others. Some even referred to Fritz as the Wolfman. And I can tell you after researching this case, I have a couple choice nicknames for Fritz myself.

But I would never be able to put out another episode if I said them out loud.

There was hundreds [00:42:00] of pieces of evidence against Fritz. Bones, eyewitness statements, personal property of the victims, and testimony from his neighbors and landlady. Many testified that they had purchased minced meat from Fritz, and said he regularly left with packages of meat, but they never saw him go in.

With any packages of meat to his apartment his landlady even Testified that he was often regularly straining meat that he claimed was pork She also testified that her family got very very sick after eating sausages bought from Fritz Who claimed that they were sheep intestines? Can you imagine these people were in poverty? They were willing to buy inexpensive meat from him.

Maybe they thought it had expired or something, but they needed to feed their families. But to even have to consider the possibility of what that meat might have really been? That would have been one way to turn me into a vegan overnight. Fritz was a despicable human. But the way he described the murders in [00:43:00] court was without a shred of remorse.

He acted like it was no big deal. One victim's mom actually fainted in court when she heard Fritz describe her son's death. He caused so much physical pain to these boys and emotional pain to all of the victim's families. But the only thing he seemed to regret was having to dismember them. He never expressed regret for ending their lives or assaulting them.

Two weeks and over a hundred witness testimonies later, Fritz Harman was convicted of 24 murders and sentenced to death by guillotine.

In the courtroom during his sentencing, he addressed the court saying this, Condemn me to death. I ask only for justice. I am not mad. Make it short and make it soon. Deliver me from this life, which was a torment. I will not petition for mercy, nor will I appeal. I want to pass just one more merry night in my cell with coffee, cheese, and cigars, after which I will curse my father and go to my [00:44:00] execution as if it were a wedding. What a poet.

Hans was also originally sentenced to death for his involvement in the crimes, but later his sentence was turned over and he would only spend 12 years in prison. In Germany at the time, they would not let you know of the date of your execution until the evening prior.

Fritz met with a pastor for prayer Before receiving his final wishes of an expensive cigar to smoke and a hot cup of Brazilian coffee to drink. On April 15th, 1925, Hans was escorted to the guillotine at Hanover Prison. Unlike many executions in the past, Only a few were allowed to bear witness to his execution. He apparently walked in with bravado like the pompous ass he was and said to those there, I am guilty, gentlemen, but, hard though it may be, I want to die as a man.

As his head was placed for his execution, his final words were, I repent, but I do not fear death. After his execution, Fritz's decapitated head was put in formaldehyde [00:45:00] and given to a medical school. You can actually find pictures of this online, and it's pretty disturbing, but there is some poetic justice in it.

You see, Fritz Harman had done the unthinkable to so many young lives. He dismembered their bodies, tossing away their remains as if they were nothing more than garbage. This was a man who stripped away their humanity. Treating these boys like objects that he could dispose of at his will. And so it's only fitting that his own execution was so gruesome, and then his head was preserved for years as an oddity to be gawked at by medical students.

And for decades, his head sat there, sealed away in a jar. No one mourned, no one remembered him. It was as if his humanity, or whatever shred of it might have ever existed, had been stripped away just like he did to his victims. The medical school eventually grew tired of storing it, and in 2014 they finally had it cremated.

The remains of his known victims were buried together in a communal grave with the names and [00:46:00] ages of his victims carved into a large granite memorial.

Before we close out today, I want to point out another horrific legacy that Fritz Harman left behind. Earlier, we touched on how homosexuality was criminalized at the time in Germany, and honestly, many in society kind of tolerated or quietly ignored it. But Fritz's actions cast a really dark shadow throughout Germany.

As Morgan Dunn wrote for AllThat'sInteresting. com, With the lurid stories of Harman's sexual violence and Gronz's sickening cruelty, a wave of homophobia swept through Germany. As the hearts of most Germans hardened toward the plight of gay men, the path was cleared for the later campaign of murder against homosexuals that would be carried out by the Nazis.

And it's a chilling reminder that the impact of these violent acts doesn't end when the criminal is gone or locked away. Harmon's crimes left scars not only on his victims and their family, but an entire community, and in some ways, an entire country.

Today we're left to remember the victims, [00:47:00] not only those young men that were killed at his hands, but the thousands who came after punished in the name of hatred and fear that he helped instill.

It's easy when we discuss crimes that happened long ago to kind of disassociate from them, to not see the humanity in them, to see them as singular, gruesome moments in history. But these stories continue to serve as cautionary tales, even now. They remind us that hatred is a powerful weapon in the hands of wrong people, and that the real horror isn't just in the monstrous acts of one person, but in the ripple effects those acts can have on society for years and generations to come.

Thank you for joining me on a case of the Sunday scaries. If you want more episodes like this, please make sure to subscribe, follow, and please leave a review. It really helps us grow. I'll be back with an all new episode, but as always, until then.