The Beast of the Black Forest: Heinrich Pommerenke’s Brutal 1959 Murder Spree
In the spring of 1959, a quiet young man triggered by a single movie night unleashed a reign of terror across southwestern Germany. Host Alexander Lawson explores the shocking crimes of Heinrich Pommerenke — the “Beast of the Black Forest” — who raped and murdered four women in just months, committing dozens more assaults while evading capture.
From throat-slashings and train-track horrors to a dramatic arrest over a forgotten bag, this episode unpacks his troubled past, the manhunt that gripped the nation, his record-breaking sentence, and decades behind bars until his death in 2008.
A true…
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