The three murdered women

It was 1896 when the station commander of the 6th Munich Gendarmerie Brigade found three dead women’s bodies at Karlstraße 33 in Munich. They were the ministerial widow Caroline von Roos, her daughter Julie, and their cook Maria Gradl. Since a bottle of arsenic was found on their kitchen table and there were no signs of violence at first glance, the police initially assumed that the three women had committed suicide or died in a tragic accident. But the autopsy revealed a very different truth. The three women had all been strangled. The motive was quickly found, as 800 marks and a large number of mortgage bonds from the Bayerische Hypotheken- und Wechselbank were missing. It was a robbery-murder. But who was the perpetrator? The women had lived very secluded lives, and since the cook had opened the door to the perpetrator, the police assumed that she knew the murderer. The police therefore concentrated on the relatives and acquaintances of the murdered women. But when this failed to yield any results, the police turned to the public. Tips from the public actually produced a hot lead. This led to Johann Berchtold, a bricklayer born in Munich in 1862, who lived lavishly in the posh Schwabing district. According to witness statements, he had been in Karlstraße on the day of the murder and at the time of the crime. He also knew the apartment of the murdered women, as he had already carried out masonry work there in August for the installation company Holzmann & Co. Johann Berchtold was therefore familiar with the local area. In addition, rumors circulated that he had also committed the robberies and murders of a woman named Ernetskofer on Quellenstraße and a man named Johann Schneider on Paulanerplatz. It was suspicious that Johann Berchtold suddenly had a lot of money at his disposal. An anonymous letter received by the police station reinforced the suspicion against him. Johann Berchtold was finally arrested on February 21, 1896. On October 1, 1896, the first trial against Johann Berchtold began before the jury court at the Munich Regional Court, based solely on dubious witness statements and circumstantial evidence. Johann Berchtold always maintained his innocence. However, after 14 days, on October 14, 1896, he was sentenced to death on the basis of witness testimony and the fact that he suddenly had considerable financial resources at his disposal. This sentence was commuted to life imprisonment on March 28, 1897. Even after his conviction, he continued to maintain his innocence. After the verdict, a witness came forward who testified that she had seen Berchtold in Schwabing at the time of the crime. For this reason, Berchtold’s lawyer, Dr. von Pannwitz, sought a retrial. However, the request was denied. Despite considerable doubts about his guilt, Johann Berchtold had to serve his sentence in prison, where he died on August 18, 1925, at the age of 65. Whether he was actually innocent is a question that ultimately could not be answered.