Berlin police search for missing 13-year-old girl as homicide unit takes over

A girl missing since Tuesday morning

On Tuesday, 3 November 2026, a 13-year-old girl from Marzahn in east Berlin left her home for school and never arrived. Police say she left her building around 7:20 a.m., while one report gives 7:15 a.m. as the departure time. She planned to walk about 700 metres to Barnimplatz and continue by tram for roughly ten minutes to her school. Police published a photo appeal on Tuesday, and a second appeal has since followed.

Investigators do not rule out a crime

Police and prosecutors have not ruled out a crime. Police said it is currently assumed that the girl did not leave her home environment voluntarily. The case was first handled by the missing-persons unit of the Berlin state criminal police office (LKA), which has since handed it to the 5th Homicide Commission of the LKA. A prosecutors' spokesperson confirmed the basis for the probe.

“There is an initial suspicion of a criminal offence.”

The spokesperson declined to give further details. Police have not said which offence they consider possible or what their suspicion rests on. Police treat missing minors as presumed to be at risk to life or limb unless investigations show otherwise.

Search widened on Friday

On Friday, 6 November, police widened the search. In the afternoon a helicopter flew over the prefabricated high-rise estate in east Berlin, sniffer dogs were brought in to pick up her trail, and numerous officers took part. By early evening she had still not been found. Police and prosecutors announced the new stage together, and the homicide unit is now running the investigation.

Missing-person figures and an earlier Berlin case

The Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) recorded about 19,200 missing-person cases involving children up to and including 13 years old in 2025. By the end of that year, 96.1% of those cases had been cleared. Stern links the Marzahn case to the disappearance of a 15-year-old girl from Britz in the Neukölln district in February 2019, a case that has remained unresolved.

What the public is asked to provide

Police describe the girl as about 1.60 to 1.65 metres tall, slim, with long dark hair. When she vanished she wore a black quilted jacket with a hood, flared blue jeans, white-beige DC sneakers and carried a black backpack without a brand logo. Tips can be sent to the LKA missing-persons unit at Keithstraße 30 in Tiergarten. The reports print different phone numbers for that unit, (030) 4664-911555 and (030) 4664-912444, and anyone who sees the girl or a situation needing immediate action should call 110.