'Nazi bride' to speak about 'Germany's Maddie McCann' after murderous lover's DNA found at girl's gravesite
Germany's "Nazi bride" has told judges she wants to testify in the disappearance of a nine-year-old girl who is thought to have been murdered by one of her dead former lovers.
Beate Zschäpe looks set to provide crucial evidence in two of Germany's greatest crime dramas that recently converged when DNA of mass-murderer and neo-Nazi Uwe Bönhardt was found on the corpse of the nation's most famous missing girl.
Genetic material found at the gravesite of missing Peggy Knobloch has been confirmed as Bönhardt's, a fascist gangster who committed suicide along with his sidekick Uwe Mundlos in 2011 during a botched bank robbery.
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The shock of the young girl's disappearance drew allusions to missing British girl Madeleine McCann, The Sun reports.
Bönhardt and Mundlos were attempting to steal funds for their Nationalist Socialist Underground, a terror network focused on driving immigrants from Germany.
Zschäpe, the surviving member of the gang, is on trial for the murders of ten immigrant businessmen and a policewoman, crimes that occurred over a decade.
It's alleged Zschäpe, Bönhardt and Mundlos had killed the migrants with the intention of striking terror into other foreigners, driving them from the country.
She played lover to both men and earned her "Nazi bride" moniker in the German press, further encouraged by the Nazi propaganda and pornography found on the group's seized computers.
When her cohorts killed themselves, Zschäpe torched their caravan hideout.
Several children's toys, including a teddy bear, were found among the charred wreckage.
Peggy went missing in 2001 in Bavaria, her remains being found in July this year about 150 kilometres from the city of Eisenach where Bönhardt and Mundlos killed themselves in 2011.
A small fragment of genetic material was uncovered from the site, police saying it was linked to Bönhardt.
Peggy's disappearance shocked the German nation and sparked a massive police operation that lasted weeks.
In 2004 a man named Ulvi Kulac was found guilty of her murder and sentenced to life in prison, only to be released in 2014 after it was found he was of unsound mind.
It was only when a mushroom picker stumbled upon the grave in a forest that new leads into Peggy's disappearance were opened.
Bönhardt was known to be an associate of child molesters, including Tino Bandt who was sentenced to more than five years in prison for sex crimes involving children.
With her trial dragging on since 2013, Zschäpe has now said through her lawyer she wants to answer questions about Peggy.
That part of her trial is set to begin on December 5, but what new truths may emerge about the Peggy Knobloch's connection to the dead Nazi murderer remain unclear.
Top news stories - November 30
