Germany: Arrest over the murder of 9-year-old Peggy

One of Germany's most elusive and long-running murder cases came a step closer to a resolution on Tuesday following multiple reports that a man had been arrested over the death of the young girl known publicly in Germany only as Peggy.

Peggy was nine years old when she vanished from her home in Lichtenberg, Bavaria in May 2001. Although she was presumed dead, her body was not found until fifteen years later.

"The 41-year-old Manuel S. will be brought before the magistrate on Tuesday," reported public broadcaster MDR.

Physical evidence links suspect to victim's body

The suspect is believed to be the same 41-year-old who admitted to transporting the girl's body in September. He told the authorities that he had agreed to take the corpse from another man, and admitted to transporting the body to the woods 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) from Lichtenberg where it was eventually found by a man gathering wild mushrooms in 2016.

The case had baffled German authorities for over a decade after the girl disappeared on her way home from school. She was last seen just 50 meters (164 feet) from her parents' house. Until her bones were discovered in the neighboring state of Thuringia, not a trace of the girl could be uncovered by police.

Manuel S. has denied killing the girl, and even told police he tried unsuccessfully to revive her before hiding the body.

At the time of his police interview in September, police said that Manuel S. was considered a "relevant person" in the case, but it appeared they did not yet have sufficient "urgent suspicion" to arrest him.

However, investigators at the time said they had already found traces of the same type of peat found on Peggy's body at the man's home, as well as matching flecks of paint.

Stumbling blocks in the case

Some had considered the matter closed when a mentally disabled man was convicted of her murder in 2004. He had been accused of molesting other children, and confessed to murdering Peggy. The confession was the only evidence tying him to the crime and later his lawyers successfully argued that the confession had been coerced and his verdict was overturned. Peggy's parents had also declared publicly that they believed in the man's innocence.

In 2016 after the body was found, authorities were flabbergasted to find the DNA of Uwe Böhnhardt on the body. Böhnhardt, who died in 2011, had been part of the neo-Nazi terror cell the National Socialist Underground (NSU). However, authorities were later able to ascertain that the DNA match was due to the reuse of equipmentemployed in the NSU case.

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