Overview
- More than 100 police, municipal enforcement staff, fire crews and immigration officials inspected roughly 120 flagged units across Duisburg, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Hagen, Krefeld and Velbert as part of a coordinated NRW operation.
- Inspectors found multiple empty apartments that remained officially registered to families who continued to receive child benefits and social payments, including a case where a registered family of six had vacated their claimed unit.
- Fire and building experts declared a Duisburg tenement uninhabitable because of severe fire hazards, vermin and structural decay, and ordered occupants to leave within hours with the city responsible for emergency housing if needed.
- Police stopped a man filming the raids whose car was uninsured and whose driver’s license was invalid, and officers logged his details amid suspicions he may have been acting as an 'Aufpasser' for organised groups.
- NRW politicians welcomed the federal ten‑point action plan and said they will accelerate measures such as easier municipal access to problem properties, stronger landlord obligations and AI‑supported data matching while criminal and administrative investigations continue.