The farmer thrown to the wolves

One of the most bizarre criminal cases was that of farmer Rudolph Rupp, known as Rudi. He was a farmer in Neuberg an der Donau who disappeared without a trace on October 13, 2001, after visiting the BSV Neuberg sports club pub. Like every Friday evening, 52-year-old Rudi Rupp had visited the local sports club’s pub after finishing work in the barn. The portly farmer had taken a seat at the regulars’ table and drunk eight wheat beers before leaving the pub at around 1 a.m., staggering with an estimated blood alcohol level of 2.5, and getting behind the wheel of his Mercedes E 230. While backing out of the parking space, he grazed a flower pot. Then he drove off. After that, all traces of him were lost. The next morning, his 55-year-old wife Hermine paid her husband’s bill and then reported him missing. Rudi Rupp had vanished into thin air, which is why rumors soon began to circulate that the family had gotten rid of the tyrant. Two years after Rudi Rupp’s disappearance, in 2004, the police showed up with a search warrant to investigate the now neglected farm for clues. However, nothing suspicious was discovered. Therefore, the wife, her two daughters, and the fiancé of the older daughter, Manuela, Matthias, were taken to the police station for questioning. There, the four individuals, whose IQs ranged between 50 and 70 and who were therefore considered mentally challenged, made fatal confessions. The average IQ is 100. According to their confessions, which were partly contradictory, the police assumed that the fiancé, Matthias, had ambushed Rudi Rupp in the stairwell after he returned from the pub. When Rudi tried to throw him out of the house, Matthias struck him in the neck with a square piece of wood. Both Rudi’s wife and his two daughters, who had been sexually abused by him for years, encouraged Matthias to continue beating Rudi. When he was lying on the floor, his wife Hermine also beat him with a slat, while his daughters kicked him. They then dragged Rudi, who was still alive, into the basement, where Matthias and his fiancée smashed his skull with a hammer. Afterwards, they went to bed. The next morning, they dismembered the body with a knife, an axe, and a saw. They fed the body parts to the many dogs that lived on the farm. They buried the bones and entrails in the manure heap. Based on these confessions, which all four defendants recanted after the trial began, they were convicted of manslaughter of Rudi Rupp on May 13, 2005, by the jury court at the Ingolstadt Regional Court. Rupp’s wife Hermine and his daughter’s fiancé were sentenced to eight and a half years in prison, while the two daughters received juvenile sentences of two and a half and three and a half years for aiding and abetting by omission. The verdicts were based purely on circumstantial evidence. There was no forensic evidence and Rudi Rupp’s body was missing. But then, on March 10, 2009, Rudi Rupp, who was supposedly fed to the dogs, was found in his Mercedes E 230. The car had been sunk in the Danube above the Bergheim barrage. Rudi Rupp’s body showed no signs of foul play. Despite this sensational discovery, which proved that farmer Rupp had not been fed to the dogs on the farm, a retrial was denied. It was not until March 9, 2010, that the Munich Higher Regional Court approved the defense’s motions for a retrial. These motions proved that the false confessions had been coerced through enormous interrogation pressure and suggestive questioning. Scrap dealer Ludwig H. in particular made serious accusations against the police. He was asked to sign a statement saying that he had secretly scrapped Rudi Rupp’s Mercedes. When he refused, a police officer held his service pistol to his temple and said, “We can do things differently. This is murder, so we can do anything.” Ludwig H. was remanded in custody in 2004 for allegedly making a false statement. On February 25, 2011, the defendants were acquitted by the Landshut Regional Court. By that time, all those convicted had already been released from prison after serving two-thirds of their sentences. However, the court continued to rule out an accident or suicide, as it was not possible to determine who was responsible for Rudi Rupp’s death.