missing persons. In February 2018, the case was featured on the television show Aktenzeichen XY... ungelöst, as the investigators suspected that there was a helper, accomplice or a confidant. Investigations The success of the police investigation was due in part to policeman Wolfgang Sielaff, the brother of the murdered Birgit Meier, who began with private research in 2002 and found his sister's body in 2017. In the same year, the police set up a new six-member investigative force which investigated Wichmann's connections with more than 20 other murder victims. Göhrde Murders In December 2017, 28 years after the 1989 murders, the Lower Saxony Police announced that the former cemetery gardener Wichmann was a prime suspect in the Göhrde Murders, and an investigation team was set up. DNA traces from one of the victim's stolen vehicles was linked to Wichmann. The police assumed that there was also an accomplice who may have committed other crimes. The essential clue for a second person involved in the case derives from the fact that Wichmann had driven his own motor vehicle into the Göhrde but had returned with that of the victim. It is unknown if someone brought his car back. According to Sielaff's findings, there were 21 unresolved murder cases in Lüneberg and the surrounding area, which could possibly be assigned to Wichmann. See also List of German serial killers References 1949 births 1989 crimes 1993 deaths 1993 suicides German rapists German serial killers Male serial killers People from Lüneburg (district) Serial killers who committed suicide in prison custody Suicides by hanging in Germany