Killer hatched kidnap plot to impress rich girlfriend

A law student kidnapped and murdered the 11-year-old son of a prominent banker because he wanted to join a "jet set" of wealthy teenagers whose lifestyle was beyond his financial means, a court in Frankfurt will be told today.

Magnus Gaefgen, 27, is charged with abducting and killing Jakob von Metzler, an heir to Germany's oldest private banking concern, last September. The proceedings have provoked legal controversy because police admitted threatening to torture Gaefgen to extract information on the whereabouts of his victim.

Police were unable initially to establish a motive for the crime but evidence to be presented in court indicates that Gaefgen, who has confessed to the murder, was motivated by a desire to be accepted by the group of wealthy teenagers.

Gaefgen's lawyers say their client, a successful law student from a modest background, was besotted by a 16-year-old schoolgirl named Katha who loved Mercedes cars and designer clothes. "She belonged to a generation that defines itself in terms of whether one has enough money to buy a Gucci handbag," Hans Ulrich Endres, Gaefgen's lawyer, told Der Spiegel magazine last week.

Gaefgen lived in the Frankfurt suburb of Sachsenhausen, where the group of teenagers and the von Metzlers also had their homes. His lawyers say he was fascinated by their Mediterranean holiday homes, Porsches and parties.

Gaefgen tried to compete by pretending that he worked for a top Frankfurt law firm, when in reality he earned pocket money jobbing at trade fairs. He took Katha on a four-week holiday to Florida paid for out of his savings. Katha spent the holiday shopping. To finance other shopping sprees Gaefgen sold the remaining shares he owned and plundered a pension fund his father had set up for him. With a bank overdraft in excess of €4,000 (£2,750) Gaefgen decided to raise money through a kidnap ransom.

Jakob von Metzler, whose sister went to school with Katha and who was the son of Friedrich von Metzler, the chairman of the 300-year-old Metzler private bank, became his target. Gaefgen had intended to kidnap the boy, collect the ransom and then set him free on a deserted railway station, but his plan went wrong almost immediately. The boy started to scream and struggle as Gaefgen gagged him with adhesive tape, provoking Gaefgen to tape over his nostrils and throttle him. He then dumped the dead boy in a lake.

Gaefgen collected €1m in ransom money from the von Metzler family two days later, but police witnessed the hand-over. The next day Gaefgen ordered a C-class limousine from Mercedes to please his girlfriend and booked them flights to the Canaries. He was arrested on his way to the airport and his victim was discovered hours later.