How a German computer technician became one of Europe's most infamous murderers
In March 2001, Armin Meiwes, a computer repair technician from Rotenburg, Germany, murdered and cannibalized Bernd Brandes, a 43-year-old man who had voluntarily responded to an internet advertisement. The case exposed a disturbing criminal underworld and challenged German law in unprecedented ways.
Quick Facts
On March 2001, computer repair technician Armin Meiwes committed one of Europe's most grotesque murders in his farmhouse in Rotenburg, Germany. His victim, Bernd Brandes, was a 43-year-old man who had deliberately answered an internet advertisement placed by Meiwes seeking a willing participant in an extreme fantasy.
Brandes arrived at Meiwes' rural home knowing the nature of his fate. What followed was documented in a four-hour videotape that Meiwes recorded himself—a film so disturbing it would become key evidence in one of Germany's most sensational trials. Meiwes stabbed Brandes in the neck and throat, then systematically dismembered his body.
The disposal was methodical. Meiwes stored portions of his victim in a freezer, burying the skull in his garden. Over the next 20 months, he consumed approximately 44 pounds (20 kilograms) of Brandes' flesh. The crimes might have continued indefinitely, but on December 10, 2002—nearly two years after the murder—Meiwes was arrested.
Born on December 1, 1961, Meiwes had worked as a computer technician, maintaining a seemingly ordinary existence that masked an extraordinary darkness. Psychiatric evaluations would later reveal he had been diagnosed with schizoid personality disorder, though he was deemed fit to stand trial.
**THE TRIALS**
The legal proceedings were complex and unprecedented. Meiwes' first trial began in December 2003. On January 30, 2004, he was convicted of manslaughter—a verdict that shocked observers given the premeditation and nature of the crime. He received eight years and six months in prison.
