Overview
- Prosecutors now accuse the former patient of murder using a means dangerous to the public after a June 1 blaze at Hamburg’s Marienkrankenhaus killed three geriatric patients.
- According to the indictment, the man allegedly lit his pillow with a lighter in a ground-floor room, causing flames and smoke to spread rapidly across the ward.
- Three patients, aged 84, 85 and 87, died from carbon monoxide poisoning, and 34 people were injured, including staff members who suffered severe inhalation trauma and two reported heart attacks.
- The court has scheduled a Sicherungsverfahren beginning Thursday at the Hamburg criminal court, which may partly be closed to the public and will determine psychiatric confinement rather than a prison term.
- In separate regional updates, investigators confirmed by DNA the identity of a man found after a Hersbruck house fire and an autopsy found smoke-gas intoxication as the cause of death, while a smoke detector in Bönen prompted a timely alert after food burned on a stove and the resident was checked as a precaution.