Brigit Meier, 41, a mother and talented photographer, mysteriously disappeared from her home in Lüneburg, Germany. Initially, investigators speculated that she may have run away or taken her own life, citing the stress of her impending divorce. However, her family believed that she would never be able to leave her daughter Yasmine and suspected from the beginning that there was an affair.
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The sudden disappearance of 41-year-old Birgit Meier. The police suspected an escape or suicide
Birgit Meier was married to a successful entrepreneur named Harald, but things didn’t work out between them and they were in the middle of a divorce. The woman took the end of the marriage hard. However, their separation seemed to proceed without any excesses or arguments. Birgit and Harald met at around 6 p.m. on the night of her disappearance to discuss the terms of their separation and to confirm the amount of DM 500,000 that the couple had agreed as a settlement offer to be paid to the woman. However, the meeting did not take place in the most pleasant atmosphere and after 20 minutes it ended in a sharp exchange of views. According to Harald Meier’s testimony to the police, the man has not seen his wife since then. At 10 p.m. Meier was still talking about the meeting with her daughter Yasmine. However, when the next day, concerned about the lack of contact from her mother, she visited her home, she did not find her there. Birgit was nowhere to be found, nor was the purse she usually carried with her. Yasmine panicked and called her father and uncle, who in turn contacted the police.
After the investigation into Birgit Meier’s disappearance began, her home was searched, revealing evidence such as an open patio door, a shoe print in the flowerbed outside, two wine glasses on the table, and cigarette butts of two different brands in an ashtray. There was also a handkerchief under her bed, but it was never found or sent for testing. Undoubtedly, Birgit had a visitor the day before, after her ex-husband’s visit and the telephone conversation she had with her daughter. Despite this, some officials still believed that she may have escaped of her own free will or harmed herself for the reasons she found herself in. When the first possibility was eliminated, the criminal aspect came to the fore.
Harald Meier was the number one suspect from the beginning. A new lead was suggested by a friend from work
Harald Meier was quickly identified as the suspect, as he could have lost hundreds of thousands of Reichsmarks if Birgit survived and brought about the divorce he had started. Moreover, it was also significant that she had previously claimed to have documents that could put him, a successful entrepreneur, in prison. The detectives interrogated Harald for hours, but his story, in which he maintained that his wife was never a burden to him and that he had no influence on her disappearance, never changed. That’s when one of Birgit’s friends came forward and revealed that on the day she disappeared, the 41-year-old mentioned a man, whom she allegedly became close after meeting him at a neighbor’s birthday party a few weeks earlier. He turned out to be a local gardener and married, so she asked for discretion. When the police began questioning the man, he denied any close connection with Birgit, but his behavior suggested that he was hiding something. Kurt-Werner Wichmann not only he had no solid alibi, but he also refused to take off his gloves, claiming he had a fungal skin reaction which was never confirmed. His criminal record didn’t help either. He spent several years in prison for rape and was also suspected of trying to strangle a neighbor.
For many years, there was no breakthrough in the investigation. Searching the house of Kurt-Werner Wichmann
It took almost four years for authorities to obtain a warrant to search Kurt’s home. The breakthrough came with the appointment of a new prosecutor in Lüneberg, who decided to continue the investigation. On February 24, 1993, police officers knocked on Wichmann’s door and then called him at work, finding only his wife. However, instead of coming home as requested, he decided to run away. The subsequent exploration of his home provided serious evidence from one of the rooms only he had access to. This included a shooting vest, a small caliber rifle, countless other weapons, bondage equipment, anesthetic injections, a secret compartment leading down to the basement with a rope, and bloody handcuffs. At this point, Kurt had six cars registered in his name, and one of them was found buried on his property surrounded by a rock garden. What was most shocking, however, was that there were blood stains on the back seat of the vehicle, and that the corpse-sniffing dogs found that there was a body in the trunk at one point. Items in another of his cars also showed that he often traveled long distances and slept in the car. At the time, Wichmann was still wanted by the police after he fled. After almost two months, to be exact On April 15, 1993, he was tracked downbut only because it caused a traffic collision. Machine gun parts, ammunition and lots of cash were found in his car during the arrest. However, the man did not live to see the trial because ten days later he committed suicide in his cell, leaving no answer. So the case stalled and was closed.
Birgit Meier’s brother Wolfgang Sielaff took matters into his own hands. He brought the case to the end
Birgit’s brother’s determination to find the answer finally brought the matter to an end. As he was a valued former police officer in the industry, he decided to gather all specialists (psychologists, lawyers, criminal investigators) and create a team with them. They undertook another search of Wichmann’s room, which remained intact after his death. They then came across tapes previously unsecured by the police, containing excerpts from television news coverage of Birgit’s disappearance, as well as four other murders that also occurred in 1989. Interestingly, as in the case of Birgit, the police failed to determine who was behind them. Nearly thirty years later, DNA evidence confirmed that the blood on Kurt’s handcuffs was Birgit’s. What’s more, in September 2017, the remains of her skeleton were discovered from under the concrete floor of Kurt’s then-garage. When her husband arrived at the place, he had no doubt that they belonged to her. As he quotes in the documentary “The Disappearance of Birgit Meier”, he said:
I saw earrings among the bones. I remember them very well because they were a gift from me. I knew it was her. It was completely clear to me.
After a thorough search of Wichmann’s property, approximately 400 personal items were found that may have belonged to the victims. To this day, it is unknown whether Kurt killed Birgit immediately or tortured her for days or weeks after her disappearance and possible kidnapping. In 2021, Netflix released a documentary on the “Missing Birgit Meier” case, which also explained that officials believe he had an accomplice, but that person has not yet been formally identified.
Source: Gazeta
Bruce is a talented author and journalist with a passion for entertainment . He currently works as a writer at the 247 News Agency, where he has established himself as a respected voice in the industry.
