The public prosecutor’s office in Braunschweig, Germany, is investigating a 15-year-old Syrian alleged to have raped a 12-year-old girl.
The reported incident in the city in Lower Saxony took place in a public swimming pool on August 10, but details have only just been released. Local newspaper the Braunschweiger Zeitung has repeated police claims that the delay is due to the age of the alleged victim.
The youth under investigation is said to have first approached the child in the water of the Wasserwelt leisure facility, where he began harassing her. He then followed her into the changing rooms, where the crime is alleged to have taken place.
The public prosecutor now investigating the incident as a rape and trying to piece together more evidence surrounding the events in question.
Since at least 2015, there has been widespread concern about Syrians driving a ‘migrant rape crisis’ in Germany. The following year, the newspaper Bild complained of an unofficial “gag order” being applied to the issue, with angry citizens increasingly labelled as ‘racist’ for criticising police inactivity.
