The background had been a robbery amongst acquaintances, said police spokesperson Robert Scholten when asked by the GA newspaper. Because there had been hints a gun might be in use, a special forces team was brought in too. „We did not find a gun“, said Scholten. Two people were arrested but later released. Because the police call-out remained without a significant result, the case had not been communicated in the usual public police reports.

The two people arrested are supposedly members of a family clan from former Yugoslavia residing in the apartment building in Niederbachem, which keeps the authorities busy for quite some time according to GA information. Police spokesperson Scholten did not comment on the exact identity of the people in question.

Again and again the police have been at the building, in which the family lives. In the past 13 months exactly 38 times - mostly because of disturbances of the peace. The clan was not always the cause for the call-outs, sometimes incidents with other residents were the reason. The problem, according to situation insiders: The ownership situations in the apartment block are extremely diverse, making an improvement of the living situation in the partly visibly run down house difficult.

In 2016, for example, a then 16-year-old Turkish boy lived in the house, who was the leading mind of the so-called Bandana gang, said one investigator. Between June and October 2014, the gang (in various line-ups) robbed young and slightly drunk victims in Bonn and Beuel. The culprits were masked with scarves, or bandanas. The 16-year-old, who has absconded to Turkey in the meantime, appeared to be particularly violent. One proof of this was a fight with a housemate whom he kicked so hard that he fell down the cellar stairs.

Also the family from former Yugoslavia keeps reappearing - like early 2017, when the police succeeded in their investigation against an internationally organised gang of burglars. Seven 20- to 25-year-olds were arrested, also in Niederbachem. They were thought to be responsible for over 70 break-ins and car thefts. They were mostly brothers or cousins, most of them known to the police.

The majority of them were tolerated asylum seekers, who fled their country between 1992 and 1998, said an investigating officer back then. Deportation papers had been issued against some of them previously. Whether they were clan members could not be confirmed, said Scholten, and referred to the data protection act.

The immigration office in Siegburg keeps trying to deport some members of the family clan for quite some time now, which proves difficult because of the unclear origins of some of the persons involved.

It is thought that in total the Niederbachem part of the clan includes the parents as well as four children, two of whom are known to the police because of property offences and causing bodily harm.

Original text: GA Bonn

Translation: Mareike Graepel