Further allegations have come to light in the case of the alleged rape of a 16-year-old girl at a youth centre in Berlin. A youth welfare office employee is said to have refused to allow a policewoman to intervene because she was too “harsh” towards Muslims.
The investigation into the allegation of a cover-up of an alleged rape at a youth centre in the Berlin district of Neukölln is becoming increasingly convoluted. A staff member at the Neukölln Youth Welfare Office is alleged to have refused the assistance of a police officer from the prevention team of the relevant police precinct.
Sevil Yildirim, the coordinator of a neighbouring girls’ centre which was also attended by the victim, is said to have wanted to call in two policewomen to investigate the rape. “She found one of the officers I suggested too harsh,” Yildirim told a team of investigators from the newspaper Tagesspiegel and the ZDF television programme Frontal about the employee. According to the coordinator, the Youth Welfare Office apparently had a problem with the fact that this officer took a “very hard stance” against Muslim youths.
The 16-year-old victim is alleged to have been raped by a 17-year-old in November 2025 in the garden of the youth centre on Wutzkyallee, which the facility shares with the girls’ centre “RosaMinta”.
The suspect is said to be a regular visitor to the youth centre and, in mid-January, to have been involved, along with other young people, in further sexual assaults on the 16-year-old.
News of the rape had become known internally when, a few days after the assaults in January, the victim confided in social workers at the neighbouring girls’ centre about the latest incident.
What followed was a series of discussions between staff from “RosaMinta” and the youth centre where the incident took place. The case came to public attention when the newspaper Bild first reported on it on March 11.
There was widespread horror, partly because accusations were immediately levelled at staff at the Neukölln Youth Welfare Office for failing to take action against the alleged perpetrators. It was reportedly claimed that this was done to avoid stigmatising Muslim youths. The 17-year-old alleged to have committed the rape is also said to be a Muslim.
The State Criminal Police Office and the Berlin Public Prosecutor’s Office are now investigating the case. A commission of independent experts, which was set up in mid-April, is due to present an initial interim report on the events in May.
Yet the accounts of the social and youth workers involved, as well as those of the Neukölln Youth Welfare Office, regarding the scandalous events could scarcely be more contradictory. This applies above all to the allegation against the youth centre and the Youth Welfare Office that they deliberately refrained from filing a criminal complaint against the alleged rapist.
Furthermore, the Youth Welfare Office is said to have failed to initiate a ‘child protection report’, as is mandatory in the case of such serious allegations as rape. Youth Affairs Councillor Sarah Nagel (The左派) was forced to admit this failure on March 21 in response to a question from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) during a meeting of the Youth Welfare Committee.
Several criminal complaints have been filed with the public prosecutor’s office against Nagel, the councillor responsible for the youth welfare office. Even with the support of the AfD, the CDU parliamentary group lacks the necessary majority in the Neukölln District Assembly to secure Nagel’s dismissal, which the group is seeking to push through. The Left Party, the Greens and the SPD have expressed their “disapproval” of Nagel’s role in the youth centre affair, but wish to leave it at that.
Nevertheless, the public prosecutor’s office is continuing to investigate whether the initial suspicion against Councillor Nagel is well-founded, the authority told FOCUS online on Thursday in response to an enquiry. Should this be the case, an official criminal investigation will be launched against her.
Those involved are completely at odds over why neither the youth centre nor the youth welfare office filed a criminal complaint regarding the rape.
There is disagreement over what happened following the incident. According to Sevil Yildirim from the neighbouring girls’ centre, it was the 16-year-old victim’s “express wish” that the youth centre on Wutzkyallee should contact the police and file a report. However, this wish was repeatedly disregarded by the staff at the youth centre.
According to research by the ‘Tagesspiegel’, staff at the youth centre are said to have repeatedly claimed in various internal memos regarding the investigation of the events that they did not know the names of either the victim or the suspect. The staff cite precisely this to justify why they did not comply with the girls’ centre’s insistence on filing a criminal complaint.
However, Yilderim from the neighbouring girls’ centre vehemently contradicts the youth centre’s account. “The girl’s name was known.” The same applies to the name of the alleged perpetrator. The staff at the youth centre “knew immediately which boy was involved”. It had been discussed among them that the group behind the sexual assaults in mid-January was also believed to have been involved, at least indirectly, in the alleged rape in November.
In an email, which is one of hundreds of conversation transcripts, a youth centre staff member writes to the head of the girls’ centre, however, that he can “clearly” remember the girl – including the “unpleasant situation in the chill-out room”, where further sexual assaults had taken place. “I don’t want to name names, but I think you know what I’m talking about.”